Asleep.

You don't feel pain or hunger, or loneliness, or bitterness. In sleep you can drown in false euphoria, and when you awaken, you just don't care about anything.

I wish that could have happened to me. I wish I could have awoken without one single care, but all I felt was anger at my stupidity. The pain in my side jerked me from slumber, ripped me from peace. My eyes felt groggy and heavy on my face and it was hard to get them open. Light was passing through the crevices of my lids cursing my pupils to hide from such a sight. After a few minutes of squeezing my eyes shut, opening them, and shutting them again I finally adjusted to my surroundings. Grayness surrounded me. Grey walls, grey sheets, grey everything, except the color red was seeping into my vision like a leaking drain seeping into my eyes shattering the monotone grey. There was no red except in my memories. I heard breathing and tried my best to move my head or body but he reached out and stopped me from movement. He sat by the side of my bed looking down up my face with remorse. "Are mom and dad here too?" I asked him my voice cracked and quivered.

He shook his head. "No," a hard surface was pressed into my palm. I curled my fingers around it discovering it was his hand. "You are not dead Rose." I knew he was not dead, but why was he here? The only way he could be here is if he came back and he would never have done that...If he came back to me why did he leave me in the first place?

"Get out."

"What?" he was taken aback by the power behind my voice. Surprised I was even capable of mustering that much hate in a sentence after just awakening. "I-I just came back…I saw-I ran here…"

I turned my face away from him. "I said get out Keegan." He did not speak as he stood up. I knew he must be upset with me for his eyes were already puffy from previous crying. Keegan always was a crier. "Tell Daryl to come here." He must have nodded or something for his presence left the atmosphere. I am surprised Rick allowed him to stay in the prison with us seeing as we kicked out plenty of people to create a town. Perhaps Daryl convinced him to let Keegan remain here until I have my say about him.

"Rose…"

"Daryl I am so sorry." I began as he rushed towards me. "I should have stayed put. I just got so worried after you said all that stuff and I could not fine you and I thought everything was okay. I was so dumb Daryl."

He gave me a tired smile dropping down to his knees to be eyes level with my horizontal body. "It was my fault sweetheart. I should have stayed put too." His hand sneaked its way into mine. "We both got worked up and things happened. Not everything had a cause. I am just happy you are alive and awake. I love you." He leaned forward a bit to peck my lips.

His mouth felt feeble, his body seemed weak. He had been crying, but he would never admit to it. "How long was I asleep?"

"About a week and few days…" The bags under his eyes were obvious and his body language was droopy. He did not dare sleep while I was. "Rose," he sighed sadly. "I wanted to be the one to tell you this, but…" he gulped looking downward figuring the best way to speak his words. His mouth hung loosely open before he shut up then opened it again. I knew what he had to say was not going to be pleasant judging by his incomprehensible word formation of the subject. Why would he tell me such news after waking up? Isn't there a rule about breaking news to someone after a certain amount of time has passed? "When you got shot…the bullet it-it penetrated you side. Luckily it did not hit any organs, but Hershel… He-He thinks that since there was such a harsh entry of the weapon that the trauma caused you to miscarry. There was so much blood on you we could not tell." I stared at him. A blank, emotionless stare. Miscarriage. I had a miscarriage. Our baby-my baby-was gone forever. Who could kill a baby? "Rose." His voice was extremely sad. I wondered if he felt the same pain I did. "Are you okay?" I wonder if he knew what it felt like to have something die inside you. "Say something." I wonder if he thought it was my fault. "Say something Rose, please."

I shifted trying to turn on my good side so I may curl up into a ball, but pain coursed through my body like wildfire lighting every nerve with agony. I could feel myself shaking from this pain. Was it external or mental? Was it the wound that hurt or my heart? I could not trigger point my place of oncoming distraught all I knew it was causing me to cry. Like a dam bursting the tears flooded from my eyes. I tried to keep a composer, tried to remain content with neutral emotions, but I was never good at it, never as good as Daryl. I always cried just like my brother. My face was drenched in my own body fulled sadness as he just watched me break down until I felt like nothing more could come out of my eyes. They still came, even when the last drop was thought to be spent more came diving out of my tear ducts making my nose run, my throat dry, and my body ache with despair. His fingers toyed with the skin of my neck and hands doing what he thought best to calm me. I think it worked or at least I hoped it was. My heart beats felt slower inside my cracking chest, my breathing was dragged out, and my feet had stopped curling and uncurling with protest to move despite my leg refusal to want to move. "I don't know what to say." I brought my sleeve up wiping away my tears. "What could I say? I could never raise a child in this anyways? No, because I could have and I should have! I deserved that child for all the shit this world and the world before has done to me! I deserved that sliver of hope, that gleaming ray of happiness, the pure sensation of something loving you unconditionally." I shook my head sniffing in the process. "No one deserves to lose their their baby. No one..."

"I do not blame you Rose for it." he blinked looking at the ground. "Maybe it just was not the right time for us to settle down. We have the whole future ahead of us to get over this."

I gritted my teeth. "You don't understand. It was not living inside you."

"Don't you dare tell me I don't understand." he glared and for the first time I felt his anger towards me, something that was rare. "I just lost my brother and now my own. That was my child too, not just yours. You of all people should know how shitty my life was before this apocalypse. You know how much abandonment and abusive plagued my childhood. This miscarriage just reminded me that people never do truly stay with you even when you think they're safe." he huffed out air away from me then turned back to my face. My eyes quivered looking at his tired eyes, how much pain was it to hold back those tears? "I was so excited to have this baby for the first time something would be mine forever and could never leave me because it would always feel loved and cherished and never neglected. I would give this childhood the best damn childhood it ever had so it would never have to be sad. You don't think I am truly devastated by it's untimely death? You don't know how hard it is to keep a composer knowing it was planned to take this child away from me-away from us. Because you and I...we made that baby. We don't deserve this loss. We don't deserve this at all." he leaned forward kissing my cheek slowly, hesitantly. "I love you. I loved that baby, but this is not going to bring it back. You told me when Merle passed away to be strong, and I was because of you. This next week, month, year, I know it will be hard for you-hard for us but we have more things to worry about. We all got things to worry about." he tried to smile. "You are so brave sweetheart, I know you will be okay. I know we'll both be okay. We'll need to lean on each other a lot though."

"I love you too..." I reached out grabbing a tuff full of his hair in a hug I was not sure how to get through to him with. "And for the sake of our survival I'll need to be selfish and not wallow of this bump." I sighed. "I was just looking forward to it. I am just sad."

"We can have more kids Rose!" he exclaimed. "We'll buy a big house with loads of bedrooms and have little babies to fit in every one of those bedrooms. They'll each have their own bikes and we'll get a dog and have a garden in the back where we can grow some cucumbers because I know how much you love those." His voice cracked."We'll wait until we have all the kids we want until we get married so each one of them can be in it." I blinked his words burrowing into my brain. For memory reasons.

I furrowed my eyebrows. "Why did you tell me all this now? Why not wait?"

"Hershel said to wait until you were on your feet again..." his hand fiddled with mine. "I wanted to now so you know sooner and can grieve quicker while you are disabled for the moment. When Merle died we went right into war, but now you're on bed rest until you are healed. I think it will help you get over the loss."

"And you?"

He shrugged. "I think I feel sad, but I was never good with my emotions. You know that...Being concerned about you really helps get my mind off of everything." My mind trailed off hearing him ramble on about the new residents. Keegan was all I could think about. Why had he came back? After all his time waiting out there he was so close to me. Was he in Woodbury while I was? Was he even in Woodbury? Too much was being thrown at me. Everything was flying at me at back breaking speed it was hard to comprehend it all. My emotions refused to set in. Was I happy? Sad? Hurt? Angry? It was all spinning around in my mind each accusation more irrational than the last one.

"Are you alright?" he slid his thumb around my thumb hooking and unhooking our phalanges in a rhyme. I just nodded closing my eyes. What was even possible to say in this point of time? My responses seemed forced and almost unconditional so why bother hurting myself to try and talk. The minute my diaphragm began to work so did the pain in my side. All I wanted to do was sleep; sleep and never wake up until I forget all the bad stuff that has circled around me. Not even minutes after learning of my dead child I had to deal with the endless amount of internal questions I had concerning my assumed lost brother. How was I expected to react? Daryl must have understood my expression though. He crawled onto the bed curling his weary body, the best he could, around me not dare to touch anywhere near my wounds. This would be the first time he slept since I was asleep, this would be the first time I would not sleep since I was asleep.