The plan was made. The trap was set. Carol had the knife Daryl had given her - a beautiful blade, silver and black with perfectly sized knuckle grips - tucked safely within the folds of her clothing, simultaneously hidden from sight and within easy reach, and she knew how to use it. She had tarps ready and waiting in the back of Daryl's truck, parked out amongst the trees behind her house where, she knew, Ed wouldn't see it until it was too late.

They had staked out the house. They had seen Ed ambling around the house, stumbling from his drinking the night before as he climbed into his truck and drove off. She had known where he was likely going - his favorite bar, not too far away and eager to sell him his vice - and it had made her shudder instinctively, the memory of alcohol-filled breath in her face and booze-fueled fists pummeling her too close for comfort.

She brushed the memory aside, burying it under the cool, calculated side of her that was focused on what they had to do. They went in, both moving quickly and quietly as they pulled the rug out from under the dining room table and replaced it with a tarpaulin. She considered trying to spare the rug, but eventually decided against it; it was an old, soiled, nasty thing, already stained with blood from days long past. No one would think twice about her getting rid of it, or about the bloodstains caked thick. In the end, they just laid it back on top.

Then, it was simply a matter of replacing the table, of arranging the chairs just so - like he'd ever notice - until it was as if nothing had ever changed. They had stood there for a few minutes, looking at the tableaux they'd staged, both caught in their own thoughts. Carol wasn't sure what Daryl was thinking, but all she could think was a single mantra, "Ed has to die" on repeat in her head.

It was a car that ended up jolting them back from their minds, sending them scurrying about. It wasn't Ed's - that was far too loud, far too menacing to sneak up on them that way - but it could have been and they still had work to do.

Daryl had gone out the back, bringing in Sophia from where she had been sitting and playing with her doll. Carol almost couldn't bring herself to say goodbye without crying, had to force herself to twine her fingers in the girl's hair and pull her in for a kiss with a straight face before sending her off to run upstairs. Sophia knew how to act - they had told her to be quiet, to stay in her room - and it hurt something in Carol to see just how well she listened; the girl hadn't made a sound since she'd stepped on the property.

Daryl followed just after her, bidding Carol goodbye and good luck with a fortifying nod before melting into the shadows of the house. She knew roughly where he was going, knew that he was going to station himself somewhere in the house to watch in case anything went wrong, but they'd mutually agreed not to discuss the location; things had to be as normal, as genuine, as possible.

Carol, meanwhile, left for the kitchen to cook. That, at least, was familiar, and she told herself - reminded herself, more like, because, for once, it was actually true, not a lie told to cope - that it was the last time she was going to cook for him. Slowly, she stirred the pots in front of her, dished out the food, placed it on nice white plates and set them out on the table.

She had just finished setting down the final plate - a nicely arranged platter of black eyed peas on a bed of rice and lettuce - when the door opened, slamming against the wall with enough force to make the windows rattle. He was standing in the doorway, slumped against it like it was the only thing holding him up. For all she knew, it was.

He didn't say anything. That was, perhaps, the most unnerving part. For all the time she had known the man, his go-to weapons were fists and a raised voice, not silence. He was so erratic on a daily basis that seeing him this controlled was near-paralyzing. She half-wondered if she'd made up her own plan, if the reason she didn't know where in the house Daryl was hiding was because he wasn't really there, whether her mission was bound to fail.

Except then the tarpaulin crinkled ever-so-quietly beneath Ed's foot - too quiet for him to notice, not knowing what was there, but loud to her - and she was suddenly grounded, reassured that she hadn't simply made it up. Sure, he was acting odd. Sure, that might interfere with the plan. But Daryl was somewhere in the house, she had come up with a plan, and she was going to kill Ed.

It was easy - disturbingly easy - to fall back into her role of subservience, to pull out his chair and play the doting wife as she dipped out the beans. He collapsed into the seat, eyeing her with a vicious gleam in his eye as he took in her quivering voice (faked) and shaking hands (real).

She moved to sit down, and that was when he finally spoke, his hand closing around her wrist in a bruising grip. Her other hand jerked slightly - he eyed it like he thought it was a flinch, but he was wrong - as she contemplated reaching for her knife before deciding against it. "Where d'ya do ya think yer goin', woman?"

The words came easily. "Please, Ed, I- I was j-just going to sit down." She almost winced at the act, wondering if she had overdone it, but he seemed mollified enough that the grip slackened slightly.

He didn't completely let her go, though, peering down at his beans instead. She hadn't taken her usual care in serving them - perhaps that was a mistake, because he was looking at them like something was wrong with them - and they were sloppily laid out in a way she never would have done mere weeks earlier. He picked up his spoon, which wobbled in his drunkenly convulsive grip, and started poking at it, swirling it around his plate.

"Tha hell you think this is, bitch? Sure ain't dinner." He twisted the spoon, splattering some of the beans onto the one remaining clean section of the dish. "This don't look edible, and I'm damn near certain I said I wanted dinner."

"It's black eyed peas, Ed." Shit. She wasn't stuttering enough and he'd noticed, beady eyes focusing on her again. She played it up further to compensate, aided by the re-tightening of his hand on her wrist, her breath occasionally cutting off at the sharp push of pain as it constricted further. "I t-th-thought you'd w-want something s-special."

He frowned at her, glaring between her and the beans before he nodded once. She had just enough time to consider the fact that this is not normal before he yanked her arm, pulling her forward until she was bent half-over the table. "'F I wanted somethin' special, 't wouldn't be this slop, now would it? Hell, I ain't even sure this is food. Ya tryin' ta poison me with this shit?" Her heartbeat picked up at that, but she bit it down, focusing on trying to shift just enough to ease the pressure on her arm. It didn't work, but it kept her mind busy. "I's thinking you need to prove to me that this mass of shit is actually food." He paused again, the room falling silent before he added, "Take a bite." For a second, the words didn't register, and her split-second hesitation was enough for him to pull her down further, her shoulder twinging against the wood. "I said, take a bite."

Hastily, she nodded, letting her mind clear slightly, ignoring the pain and her meek side that once more threatened to take control. With her other hand, she reached for a utensil, unable to stop the hiss of pain as the movement tugged at her broken ribs. Slowly, her fingers clasped the metal of a fork and she took up some of the beans, bringing them to her mouth and chewing them. She swallowed - they didn't go down easily simply because her entire stomach was in knots, ready to hurl itself out at any moment, but they went down - and was rewarded with her arm being released.

Ed didn't speak again, simply nodding with a glare as he returned his attention to the dish. Absent-mindedly, she couldn't help smiling a little; she had considered merely poisoning the beans, having it over and done with quickly… but, thankfully, she had decided against it, had decided that too much could go wrong, had realized that she needed to do it herself.

That - that need to do it herself, to see him dead and, whatever the consequences, feel the squelch of a knife moving through brain matter - was what drove her forward. That was what brought the blade into her hand, threading her fingers through the cold grips. That was what led to her smiling "in fear" and heading off to the kitchen, fake brightness in her "I'll get the next dish, Ed."

That was what led to her standing behind him, contemplating for the final time if she was really about to do it. His head was right there, an easy target. She'd seen it frequently, so very frequently, when she was too terrified of doing the wrong thing, of saying the wrong thing. She'd had the opportunity to do it any number of times, to plunge a kitchen knife or something into him and be done with him forever.

She'd actually considered it from time to time, had thought of doing it whenever she saw Sophia looking even mildly uncomfortable near him. She'd considered it all - poisoning, bludgeoning, stabbing - and each time she'd dismissed it. There was too much that could go wrong, too much chance of him surviving, too much possibility that he'd take it out on her or on Sophia.

Now, though… Now, there was too much that wouldn't go wrong. It was no longer a question of if she could do it - she could - or if the knife would break - it wouldn't; she had gotten it from Daryl, and she knew it was strong - or if she could handle something going wrong - she could, and, even if she couldn't, Daryl, lurking in the shadows, could. No, now there was no reason for her not to stab him, to bring the blade down so hard that blood would flow across the tarp she'd put there.

And so she did.

She brought down that silver-and-black knife and slammed it through bone. She felt the bone give beneath her touch, force from years of anger fueling her swing until it was hilt-deep in his head and that very head lay amidst the mangled and boody remains of a nice dish of black-eyed peas.

The thick, tangy smell of iron immediately filled the room but, for the first time that day, her stomach actually settled. She took a step back and let her hand drop from the knife, partially numb. The absolute fury that had driven her over the last few days faded away and was replaced by emptiness. Instead, the cool, calculating side of her - the side that had governed her even despite her emotions over the last hours - was finally given full reign.

A few seconds passed before she eventually got control of herself enough to speak. "Daryl!"

She needn't have shouted; he materialized from the same door he'd used to leave in mere seconds, appearing suddenly and casting his eyes over Ed's corpse. He nodded, looking over at her, meeting her eyes as though reading into her soul. "Ya okay?"

She nodded once, meeting his gaze head-on. Then, she smiled and tilted her head towards the corpse. "Let's get to work."