Chapter 53

Before he'd finally fallen asleep, he'd spent far too long watching Carol.

She'd drifted off, right after he'd rolled his body off hers. She'd hummed slightly and sighed to herself before curling into his side. It felt like only seconds had passed before she was lightly snoring.

But he couldn't sleep no matter how hard he'd tried.

Instead, he laid there staring at her. He realised he had spent almost every second since he had met Carol, missing her. When he was at the Quarry, he missed her, because she hadn't been his and the moments with her were fleeting.

At the campsite, he had missed her too. In those times when he had pulled away from her or, just the simple fact that they were both busy. They were together, but they were still apart.

And then he found himself lost, so separated from her that there were no stolen moments that he managed to capture. He didn't her to crawl into bed with her at night or sneak off with her for a quiet moment alone.

He'd had nothing.

Then there was this.

Something so unexpected, something he never knew existed. It was missing someone while you're wrapped up with them. He could be inside her, have her bundled up in his arms, with their bare skin pressing against hers. He could have his mouth open on her neck and still he felt like he missed her. He couldn't reach her passed the wall he had built.

He had fallen asleep missing her, even though she was right there.

That was until Sophia came into their room. She said she was scared, that she didn't feel right.

He didn't offer to take her back to her room like he usually did and stay with her until she settled. It was clear that she had no intention of going back into her cell. He knew that because she had brought her brother along with her.

She didn't wait for an offer, she simply passed him the baby and crawled over him. Carol had woken up, but only long enough to wrap her arms around Sophia and watch him briefly, as he placed the baby between them.

Hours had passed since then, and he knew it was just going to be one of those nights that he didn't sleep.

As time passed the three of them had moved to get more comfortable, while he had remained still in his same position. Carol was still hanging on to Sophia, but now the girl was laying diagonally across the bed. With her legs over him. Hayes slept like a starfish, stretched out over everyone without a single thought to personal space or boundaries.

How the four of them managed to fit into a double bed at all he wasn't too sure. He knew he could feel ankles and elbow pressing into him. Yet he had no intention of leaving the bed. It never even occurred to him.

As he looked at the four of them intertwined, he remembered being in the tent alone at the quarry. Sure, that he was destined to be alone forever. But here he was. He had a family that he wanted to be with, people he loved more than anything on earth, more then he'd ever loved anything before.

So why couldn't settle into it.

Why was it so hard to just let all of it go and just move the fuck on.

"Can you say momma?" Sophia cooed at the baby, who was growing like a weed before his eyes.

Carol had told them, though she wasn't all too sure, that the baby was around 8 months old and that there was a possibility that his first words could come in the next few months. For Sophia, it had been the most exciting thing she had ever heard, at least it was the most exciting thing she had heard since she was told they could start feeding the boy mushed carrots or that he could sit up by himself.

So now they sat on a laid-out blanket on the grass, just outside of the cellblock encouraging the boy to crawl more, sit up unassisted more and hopefully start talking.

Daryl laid on his side, propped up on his elbows, watching Sophia play with Hayes while they waited on Carol to return from a council meeting.

"You think he's gonna do it soon?" Sophia asked as she plucked the baby up and held him against her chest, smiling as the boy blew spit bubbles at her.

"I do." He told her, even though he didn't have much more to go on other than what Carol had told him.

"He don't stop babbling nonsense. I think he's just gotta work it out."

Sophia smiled and nodded. "Plus he's smart. I think he's really smart. So, he'll probably figure it out soon."

Sophia praised Hayes any time she spoke of him. She didn't even seem to know she did it. She just thought so highly of her baby brother that often sounded like she had been hired to be the boy's personal cheerleader.

"You take him in the afternoons now?" Sophia questioned as she settled Hayes back on the ground in front of her.

He nodded.

It hadn't been something he had planned; over time it had just happened. His jobs here, varied. He hunted, did repairs, worked the fences or kept watch in the tower. But no matter what he did he was usually done by the afternoon. It just didn't make sense for Hayes to be with Beth if he wasn't busy.

The first time he had gone to see Hayes at the makeshift day-care, he had been uncomfortable. He wasn't sure if he was messing up some schedule or plans that Beth had, by wanting to take the boy. But Beth had just laughed and handed Hayes over. She told him that he didn't have to ask permission to take his son, that he was welcome to do so any time he pleased.

"I start early, I finish early. Just makes sense that I get him" he told her with a simple shrug.

Sophia nodded again.

"Beth usually takes him right after Breakfast." Sophia said, suddenly looking oddly nervous.

"That's when ya Ma starts work" he pointed out, even though he knew Sophia knew this.

"I know. It's just that. I don't usually start working with Herschel until later on. Sometimes I have like 2 hours to spare."

"Good then." He told her squinting when the sun hit his eyes.

"Good?" She asked , raising her brow.

"You should take him in the mornin." He told her. "I ain't got no problem him being with Beth. She's good with him. But she's also busy and..."

"He should be with us when he can be." Sophia said, finishing his sentence for him.

They sat in silence for a few minutes, but Daryl knew from the expression on Sophia's face, that it wouldn't last much longer. He could practically see her mind ticking over.

"Whenever Ma talks about you to Hayes, she calls you Dad."

Daryl nodded. He knew this and he knew Sophia knew that he knew. So, he decided to stay silent to see where she was going with this.

"And when-...And she calls you Dad in front of him." Sophia added. But again Daryl didn't really understand why she was relaying information to him that she knew he was well aware of.

"That's so he knows who I am. So, when he starts talkin he knows what to call me."

"Yeah, I get that."

"it's just that...what if it confuses him. When I call you Daryl."

Daryl froze in place. The feeling that suddenly entered his chest wasn't exactly unpleasant, but it did have his heart feeling like it must explode inside of him.

He wasn't a genius, no one could ever accuse him of being one. But he also wasn't completely stupid.

There were lots of people who called him Daryl in front of the baby. He was sure that Sophia had grown up with a lot of people calling her mother Carol, but she had never gotten so confused she didn't know what to call her mother and he doubted that Hayes would either.

This had nothing to do with Hayes.

Nothing at all.

Sophia did her best to act as though she wasn't invested in the conversation at all. She didn't want him to know she was testing the waters. She kept her sights on Hayes and shook the rattle lightly to get his attention.

Daryl knew there were different ways to go about this.

For it to be easy? He could just go along with her and tell her that it was in Hayes best interest. But he didn't want her thinking that was why he'd agreed to it.

He smiled at her and though her eyes weren't on him at the time, she must have felt it in some way or another.

She glanced up at him with her mouth agape, red cheeks and wide eyes.

"You can call me whatever want Sophia. It's what I am, so you might as well"

"You wouldn't care?" She questioned.

"Oh I'd care". Daryl assured her. Wanting to make sure she knew this wasn't something he was taking lightly. "But it won't bother me none, if that's what you mean."

She looked hard into eyes for a moment. He knew it would take a long time for her to trust him completely. He knew she most likely thought she did trust him completely. But there was something lingering in Sophia. Something that Ed had been far to careless with. Like he'd broken a piece of her, something, he knew, would take years to heal. But Daryl had time, and he didn't get offended when she watched him like that, waiting to see a glimpse of something untrustworthy.

"Ed said to Maggie-"

"I know what that asshole said." He told her, keeping his tone flat.

Sophia's brows creased.

"You do?"

"Of course, I do. I went looking for Maggie after that council meeting to find out what crawled up under your skin"

"I don't believe what he said" Sophia said confidently, surprising him, when he was already with a speech to prove the prick wrong.

She shrugged.

"Maybe it upset me at first. But the more I thought about it-" She shook her head and pulled Hayes back on to her lap where he snuggled into Sophia and started pulling at her shirt.

"I don't feel like I'm his daughter..." she whispered, shaking her head.

"Me, either" Daryl agreed.

He worked the fence. Just as he always did when he wasn't needed anywhere else. Carol was with Hayes and Sophia was Carl, helping Rick. They were all busy and he found himself wanting to burn off some energy before night hit.

The train of thoughts that popped into his head were simple to begin with. First, he thought that he was tired and then he remembered the overly occupied bed he'd slept in the night before.

Something about it had been bothering him and it hadn't Hayes sharp little fingernails scratching at his neck or Sophia foot digging into his rib.

It was the fact that they had been in his room at all.

She was scared but she couldn't really tell him why, she had just told him that she woke up and felt like something was wrong. It was wrong enough that she had taken her baby brother from his bed in the middle of the night and come to crawl into bed with him and Carol. It just wasn't like her. Most people wouldn't have thought twice about a kid being scared of the dark, but he trusted her intuition. If she said something didn't feel right, he knew it was because something was wrong.

The memories of hearing someone in the hall at night, hearing the cat hissing from his cell, of waking up himself because something simply felt off…all flooded into his head at once, just as he rammed the crowbar into another walker's skull. When he thought about it, over the past few weeks, maybe more, there had been something wrong.

"That Fucker" he snapped throwing his crowbar to the ground and storming off towards the cellblocks.