AN: Here you go, another little chapter!
I hope you enjoy! Let me know what you think!
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"You gonna sit over there an' act like you don't know me now?" Daryl asked when, apparently, he was tired of the silence in the cab of the truck.
They'd stopped along the road and found a house that they'd cleaned out to hold up in for the night. Some of the group was choosing to lock themselves in the RV, feeling the space was safest. Others, though, had chosen to trade the comfort that the house offered over the chance that they might be safer locked into one of the vehicles.
Choosing a compromise between the truck and the house, going for safety and comfort, Carol had requested that they make room for Sophia in the RV. She felt like it was the safest place that they had to offer and it was certainly more comfortable for the girl to be able to actually lie down than it was for her to sleep sitting up in the truck.
But Carol hadn't expected that they'd tell her that the space was at full capacity and that anyone else in would mean that someone who had called "dibs" on the space first would have to trade out. Carol didn't feel comfortable asking anyone in there to give up their spot for her, so she'd simply asked Lori to keep a watchful eye on Sophia while she slept and not to let the girl leave the space for anything.
And she'd been planning on sleeping in the house with those that were gathering there…until Daryl had asked her to stay with him.
She still wasn't entirely sure why she said, yes, but she had. And now she was in the cab of the truck, supposedly trying to sleep after all the insanity of the day and their fleeing from the CDC, but she wasn't feeling very much like sleeping.
"I know you," Carol said. "I wasn't pretending I don't…but…I have to admit, I don't know what we do from here."
Daryl hummed and leaned his head against the glass of the truck window.
"You mean? What you mean? On the road where we goin' or…?" Daryl asked.
Carol heard when his voice trailed off leaving his unfinished statement floating out there in the air surrounding them in the truck.
He didn't know how to ask what she meant and she wasn't even sure how to say what she meant. Together they were doing phenomenal on all counts.
"We could've died today," Carol said. "All of us…"
Carol knew it and yet she still had a hard time believing it. They could have all died right there in the explosion. It was so close that if death had been something tangible, she could have reached out and touched it. She and Sophia both could have simply ceased to exist…and the same was true for everyone else.
The thought was almost too much to take in and with the passing of the overload of adrenaline out of her system, Carol was finding that it almost seemed like this morning was one of her most distant memories, or even as though it hadn't happened at all. It was almost like some kind of strange nightmare that she'd had.
It felt odd, too, to imagine what kind of conversation could even be deemed appropriate after something like what had happened to them. She'd spent most of her ride reminding Sophia how much she loved her, holding her close and kissing her, snuggling into her…thankful that she was safe and in her arms.
Now it was simply hard to imagine what conversation might be appropriate. Everything seemed like it would simply be out of place. Nothing would really fit…or maybe anything would, really.
"We could die any day," Daryl said. "Hell…it was always true. Just more true now, I reckon."
It was true, they could die any day before all of this, but it was much more in front of their faces now than it once had been.
Carol didn't respond. She didn't know how to respond to that. Luckily enough, she didn't have to because Daryl started speaking again.
"I didn't wanna die today," he said. "Didn't want you ta die neither, or ya lil' girl."
Carol chuckled to herself. It was a nice thought, even if it might have been worded differently.
"You didn't want me to die?" Carol asked with some amusement at his failure to word things probably like he meant them. "I appreciate that."
Daryl laughed too.
"Didn't come out like I meant it to," he said. "But, no, I didn't want you ta die. That lil' girl don't deserve nothin' like that neither. And…I don't know…hell, like havin' you around."
Carol hadn't ever really thought that a declaration that simple might be that flattering, but at the moment it was remarkably flattering. The simple sincerity behind the words, perhaps, was what made it all the more meaningful. There wasn't anything being put on there. It was a simple declaration. Daryl liked having her, and Sophia too obviously, around.
"Is that why you asked me to stay with you in the truck tonight?" Carol asked. "Because you like having me around?"
Daryl hummed at her.
"You said you weren't sorry about what happened at that place," Daryl said. "About what happened with me. You still ain't sorry about it? Now that we out here again?"
"I'm not sorry about it," Carol said, shaking her head. "I enjoyed it."
She laughed to herself.
"I guess I might say I'm not the kind of person who does that sort of thing," Carol said after a moment, "but I guess maybe I am."
Daryl opened the truck door and got out. Carol watched him in the darkness. She saw his lighter flare up and knew that he was smoking and then she heard him digging around what little supplies they had…what little supplies they'd brought from inside the house after they'd cleared it and gone quickly through every closet space the place had to offer.
He was getting a blanket. He threw it into the truck, almost on top of Carol, and then he got in and locked the door again, cranking the window so that he could smoke out of the crack of it.
"So you weren't the kind that done that sorta thing," Daryl said after he was settled again. Carol halfway folded and halfway balled the blanket up and put it between them. She wasn't ready to go to sleep yet and it didn't look like he was either. It looked like he had simply gotten the blanket while he was thinking about it.
He finished his cigarette in silence and Carol guarded her own silence. When he flicked the butt out of the crack of the window, he rolled it up and chewed at his thumb.
"I weren't the kind that done that sorta thing neither," Daryl said. "Least…I don't think so. Guess that shit changes too, don't it?"
Carol laughed at him and glanced at him. He cracked a small smile, the corner of his lip curling up at her.
"Is that why you asked me to sleep in the truck?" Carol asked.
"That's the second time you asked me that," Daryl said. "You was the kinda person asked everything twice?"
"Were you the kind of person that never answered a question that you were asked?" Carol shot back.
She got a repeat of the half smile. Daryl nipped at his fingernail again, now resting his elbow on the steering wheel.
"What you want me ta say?" He asked. "I asked ya ta stay in the truck 'cause I wanted you ta stay with me in the truck. Ain't had no damn master plan."
Carol laughed.
"Did you think we were going to…" Carol squirmed a little in her spot, there was something exciting about the exchange, "sleep together, Daryl?"
Daryl hissed out in a laugh.
"Yeah," he hummed. "I did…what the hell was you gonna do all night? Stay awake?"
Carol gave him a look that she knew that he could see only as clearly as she could see his expressions in the dim light, and that wasn't too well.
"I wasn't talking about sleeping," Carol said. "You know that."
He hummed.
"You ain't that kinda woman," he said.
And suddenly, somehow, without her even knowing how he'd done it, Daryl Dixon had turned it around on her. Now, if they were going to do anything besides actually sleep, she was going to have to be the one to ask. And the worst part of it was that even though he was biting back the smile, Carol could tell that it amused him.
"Fine," she said. "I guess that means that we'll go to sleep."
He chuckled quietly and covered it by clearing his throat.
"Almost died today," Daryl said. "Lotsa shit's bound ta happen wouldn't normally happen…wouldn't have a damn thing ta do with the kinda person someone is…would have ta do with the fact that we almost fuckin' died."
Carol thought about it for a moment. Her heart was pounding in her chest over the possibility. She almost felt like he might be able to hear it in the small cab of the truck. She swallowed and checked her nerves as best she could, ashamed that she was a grown woman and something like this…whatever it was…had the ability to make her feel like this.
"What would everyone say?" Carol asked.
"Everyone who?" Daryl asked.
"Everyone," Carol said with a shrug.
"Merle's in the damn car behind us…your old car ain't it? Fuckin' the hell outta that blonde wanted ta die today," Daryl said. "Don't sound ta me like she's thinkin' 'bout dyin' right now."
Carol turned around in her seat and looked out the back window. She couldn't see enough of the car parked behind them to know what was going on, though.
"They're in the house," Carol said.
"Musta ducked out ta…take a piss," Daryl said. "Crack ya damn window an' listen…you might catch the grand finale ya care that damn much."
"I don't care," Carol admitted.
"An' that's what the hell they'd say," Daryl said, biting his thumb again. "Don't care…but I ain't tryin' ta sell you nothin'. You wanna sleep? Let's sleep. I'm dog ass tired anyway."
As if he was declaring that all there was to it, Daryl wiggled around and put his legs up in the seat in what was clearly an uncomfortable position, his back against the driver's side window. He hissed out a breath after he was in the odd position.
"Be a hell of a lot more comfortable if you could be the kinda woman willin' ta crawl on up here an' sleep with me," Daryl said. "Hell…slept in this truck with Alice an' Merle a good long time…ain't shit happened then."
Carol sucked in a breath and nodded. She moved her body and found her way toward him, stopping when she realized there wasn't anywhere to put her hands to keep moving. And there wasn't anywhere to put her body, either.
"How do we do this?" She asked.
Daryl stretched his legs out where he wanted them and grabbed her under the arms, heaving her up toward him and onto his body with the same kind of motion she might have used to move Sophia when she was very small and still light enough to pull around with ease.
Carol tensed, his body warm under hers, and worried that he was going to be uncomfortable with her here, using him essentially like a mattress.
"I weigh too much for this," Carol declared.
Daryl wrestled the blanket he'd kicked in the foot on top of them.
"Spread this out an' lay down," he said. "You don't weigh too much…too damn skinny an' ya bones poke me when you worry."
Carol stayed still for a moment and then she chuckled to herself and did what he asked, fixing the blanket over them both. It smelled like moth balls…a strange contrast to the smell of the air around them and the smell of the man that she settled down on top of.
"Are you comfortable?" Carol asked after a minute.
He hummed.
She put her head down on his shoulder, just near his neck.
"I guess we're sleeping together?" Carol said with a chuckle.
Daryl hummed again.
"Goodnight, Daryl," Carol offered.
He hummed at her again and Carol took that as her goodnight from the man who was still very much a mystery to her...but a mystery that she hoped one day to solve.