Naomi

Daryl up and left without saying goodbye or telling me that he was going. Carol had seen him on the way in to visit me, but when Aaron came home, and I'd casually mentioned Daryl was fixing up his bike, he'd looked at me like I was crazy. The garage was empty. I thought Daryl had only gone out for a moment, but as night drew in, it became clear he wasn't coming back. I worried something had happened to him, and got close to raising the alarm, but Eric mentioned in passing that he'd seen him at Deanna's. So, I guess the mystery was half-solved.

I tried not to read too much into it, but I worried I'd freaked him out. I shouldn't have said that thing about not trying to talk myself out of whatever was going on between us. It had been too much. What if he'd been thinking about backing out and then I'd gone and opened my big mouth? Why did I always have to overthink everything? Why couldn't I have just let it be… whatever it was?

Aaron and Eric gave me the same concerned looks that they'd given me after Daryl and I had first kissed. At least I had a concussion to blame it on this time. Although my head felt fine now and I hadn't felt dizzy in over twenty-four hours. It was just the cut on my scalp that was giving me a bit of trouble, easily itchy and irritated by my damn hair.

I was feeling a little queasy, and I couldn't eat much. I tried not to think about why Daryl had run off without saying goodbye or why he hadn't come back. Instead, I channeled my nervous energy into finding something productive to do. Having spent most of the day before doing not much of anything, I was keen to do something useful.

I stood up to clear the plates a little too fast and got a head rush. I waited a few seconds for it to pass while Eric, who had barely finished eating, feigned shock that I was so keen to do some housework. Usually, I had to be heavily persuaded into keeping up with his levels of cleanliness. I hoped scrubbing breakfast dishes would be enough of a distraction to stop my stomach churning and my mind from turning over the same questions over and over. But it just gave my hands something to do while my brain stressed out.

Why didn't he tell me he was leaving?

Why didn't he come back?

I'd never been someone who got caught up on this kind of shit. Never been the kind of person who obsessively checked my phone for texts from someone I'd been dating. Nobody I'd ever dated had made me feel like this. Pathetic and a little desperate. But, I guess I'd never tried dating Daryl before. If that was even what was going on.

Fuck. This.

I hated this obsessive and needy side of myself. I didn't recognize it. If I was going to nip it in the bud, I needed something to distract my mind. I marched back out of the kitchen and opened one of the cupboards around the dining table.

"Now what's she doing?" Eric asked.

"She's got a name," I said to him. "And she is getting her maps out."

"Why?" Aaron asked, with a mild amount of suspicion. Arms full of maps, I turned around to look at him.

"Denise said we're running low on meds," I said, spreading them out across the table. "I thought I'd have a look around for places that might be good to check out."

Aaron narrowed his eyes at me. "Do you really think it's the best idea for you to-"

"I'm not saying I'll go out scavenging today," I said. "If I find a place that looks good, I'll take them to Glenn, he can plan from there."

Aaron relaxed, "Need some help?"

"Yeah," I said, pushing one of the maps towards him. "Pull up a chair."

We started with the obvious; a nearby hospital and a few medical centers. Although it was unlikely they'd have anything that wouldn't have already been scavenged, we wanted to be thorough. Malls and big shopping centers offered other possibilities of finding a drug store but were as unlikely to be untouched. The rest was more laborious, finding clusters of shops that could include a pharmacy. Last-ditch efforts would have to involve combing through local houses and seeing what, if anything, people had left behind.

This task proved to be a much better distraction. The only problem was how hot it was in here. It made it hard to concentrate. I was boiling. A bead of sweat irritated my forehead.

"Hot today, huh?" I said, wiping it away.

"Eh, I guess," Aaron said. Then he paused what he was doing and studied my face. "You okay? You're very pale."

"Yeah, I'm fine," I said, as breezily as possible, but the queasy feeling in my stomach was just growing. Was it the thought of going over to talk to Glenn about this and running into Daryl after he'd flaked out on me? Was I really such a mess that the thought of one potentially uncomfortable conversation made me feel like I was on the verge of throwing up?

No. Not the verge.

I was going to throw up.

I stood up so fast it made my head spin. Dark shadows closed around the outer edges of my vision, and I felt like I was falling. I stumbled toward the bathroom as fast as I could, the sting of bile in my throat.

I flung the door open. My knees hit the tile. I barely had time to grab my hair away from my face before my body lurched forward, and the contents of my stomach hit the toilet bowl. I sank down onto the bathroom tile. They were surprisingly and refreshingly cool against my skin. The room felt like it was spinning, I closed my eyes to stop it. My stomach churned. The back of my throat burned. An involuntary shiver ran up my spine and through my limbs. Was it cold in here? Or was I too warm? My hands shook, and I could feel goosebumps breaking out across my arms. When I rubbed my hands across my face, I found a cold sweat there.

"Naomi?" I heard Aaron but still couldn't open my eyes.

"I don't feel so…" I started to say.

"Eric," Aaron yelled to him. "Run and get Denise."

I took a few deep breaths and waited until the spin of the room slowed enough to ease how queasy I was feeling. I opened my eyes. Aaron had crouched down to look at me.

"You okay?" he asked. I nodded. He pressed his hand to my face. "You're burning up. You think you can stand?"

"I think so," I said. My legs felt weak and shook when I tried to move. Aaron helped me up and to the couch. I wanted to tell him that I was fine, but even I knew I wasn't. Eric rushed in with Denise. They both looked sweaty and stressed.

"Eric says you might have a temperature?" Denise smiled in a way that I think was meant to be reassuring, but the look in her eyes was wide and panicked. "How are you feeling?"

"Er… not great," I admitted. Denise reached into a bag she'd brought with her and pulled something out. "A bit queasy."

"Alright, let's just take your temperature," she said, extending a thermometer toward me. I took it from her and held it under my tongue. When Denise told me to, I took it out and handed it back to her. She took a look at it and winced, "Yeah, that's far too high. Do you still feel sick?"

"A little," I admitted. Eric quietly pulled the mop bucket out of the cleaning cupboard and slid it toward me, clearly worried I'd throw up all over his carpets.

"I'm going to take a look at the wound on your head," Denise said in that calm and soothing way doctors do when they're about to put you in some amount of pain, and are trying to keep you calm. "I think you might have an infection."

I nodded and propped myself up while she peeled back the bandage on my forehead. I felt her fingers on my scalp. It hurt like hell. Eric winced and looked away while she cleaned out the wound again. We were all too distracted to hear the front door open.

"Naomi," Daryl's voice called for me in the hallway. "We gotta talk."

"Shit," I jerked my head away from Denise, knowing what kind of spiral this would send him into if he saw it. I looked at Aaron, "Don't let him in here, just -"

Too late. He'd heard my voice and knew where I was. The door opened.

"... I know you won't want to, but…" he stopped and looked around at everyone. His eyes fell on Denise. "What's going on?"

"It's nothing," I said, but it was one of the most obvious lies I'd ever told him. He'd probably have known even if I wasn't lying on the couch with Eric and Aaron hovering nervously around me. But the presence of Alexandria's only medical professional was the real tipping point. So I tried to explain, as calmly as possible, "It's just a little infection."

"Infection," he repeated.

"A little one," I assured him, but he held up a hand.

"Nah, I ain't listening to you," he said, looking back at Denise. "How bad is it?"

"She'll need antibiotics," Denise said.

"We got them?" he asked.

"We have one course of antibiotics left," Denise said. "They should last her a few days. I hope that'll do it."

No. I closed my eyes. Hope. I knew that word wouldn't be good enough for Daryl. He'd never really been one for sitting around and relying on something as flimsy as hope to get shit done.

"But, it might not?" Daryl said. I opened my eyes again, caught the way his eyes were boring into Denise. Like he was searching for a lie she wasn't telling, a reason to suspect this would be worse than she thought. "She might need more?"

"Maybe," Denise admitted. "It's impossible to know at this point."

Daryl gave a small nod that I don't think he's aware he does; it's only when he's made some kind of decision, agrees to something with himself.

"Alright," he said, then he turned on his heels and started to walk out of the room. "I'll go get some."

"Wait!" I called. He rounded on me, ready for some kind of fight. I knew he expected me to try and stop him from going out there.

"Naomi, I ain't-"

"We've got maps," I said before he could yell at me for trying to stop him from going. "Aaron and I marked up potential pharmacies earlier."

"I'll get you them," Aaron said, leading him out of the room. "You want anyone to come with you?"

"Nah," I heard Daryl say. "I got this."

I knew I couldn't stop him from going, but I wished he'd take someone with him. Doing something productive might make him feel better, but doing it alone was riskier than it had to be. The door slammed harder than Daryl probably meant it to, and Aaron came back into the room, giving me a look that showed he was as worried as I was.

"Alright," Denise said brightly as if nothing had happened. "Mind if I just…"

She got back to cleaning my infected wound with something that burned the rest of my scalp around it. When Eric looked like he was the one who was about to throw up, I nudged the empty mop bucket back toward him with my toe. Denise bandaged me up again and handed over the antibiotics. I felt immensely guilty already. They sat heavy in my hand. Alexandria's last.

"Take these three times a day until you've taken them all," Denise said. "And keep taking them even when you start to feel better. Hopefully, we've caught it before it becomes anything more serious."

We hadn't. I got worse real fast after that. I'd been considering holding back on taking the medication and waiting to see if I got better on my own. But there reached a point when even I realized I couldn't wait this out. Every muscle in my body was tired and sore. I could not stop shaking and sweating. Anything I tried to eat came right back up again.

I slept a lot but never felt rested. The light was different every time I opened my eyes, although it felt like I had only closed them for a few seconds. Sometimes I wore up alone. Other times, I was aware that Eric or Aaron was there with pills and a glass of water. All of it felt hazy and disjointed. Dreams seeped from my sleep to the room around me. My body ached and shivered so much it didn't feel like mine anymore.

I woke up alone, and it was dark. My throat was dry. My muscles hurt. I turned for my glass of water and found it empty.

Fuck.

I listened, in case there was someone still awake in the house, but everything was silent. The kind of dark and quiet that feels as if you're the only one in the world who's awake. I was too cold and too hot, all at once. I wrapped my comforter around my shoulders and stood up.

The ground was unsteady for a moment, and I took a lot of deep breaths. The house felt like it was sinking underneath me. My legs shook, my hands shook. A thin layer of sweat glistened permanently on my forehead. I didn't know if it was because I was still shivering or if it was just because I was so damn weak. I couldn't remember the last time I'd eaten anything that I'd actually managed to keep down.

I can do this.

I got to the door and managed to get it open. I reached for the railings around the stairs and held onto them tightly with one hand, my empty glass in the other. My palms were sweaty and slid along the wood of the banister. I took each step slowly, visions of myself tumbling down and landing in a broken, comforter-clad heap at the bottom for Eric and Aaron to wake up and find played over in my head. I reached the bottom and made my way to the kitchen.

A snore from the couch as I passed by the living room made me stop in my tracks. Eric? Aaron? Had they had a fight I'd managed to sleep through?

I shuffled into the room. There, sprawled on the couch, was Daryl.

This had to be a dream, right?

There was a big bowl of something beside him. Looked like berries, but they hadn't been touched. Real Daryl would never have left food uneaten, so this had to be a dream, right? A hallucination? But the snoring was so real…

I picked up a cushion from the other couch and threw it at him. He jolted awake and looked around at me, all tired and bleary-eyed. "Naomi?"

"Are you a dream?" I asked him suspiciously.

"No," he sat up, rubbing his eyes and looking a little cross. "What you doing up? You okay?"

"Needed some water," I said, holding up my empty glass. "Are you sure I'm not hallucinating?"

"Has it been that bad?" he asked. His tired eyes got all scared and crestfallen. "You been hallucinating?"

I had, occasionally, when vivid dreams had seeped into the time I'd been awake.

"I don't know," I said. "Are you really sleeping on my couch?"

"Yeah," he stood up. "You need some water? Sit down, I'll get you it."

"It's okay, I can-"

"Naomi!" he snapped. "Sit."

"I ain't a dog," I muttered. Daryl took the empty glass from my hand, but I didn't move. I was so exhausted that staying still felt like it took up less energy than moving to sit down. He fixed me with a stern glare, and I forced myself to sink, comforter and all, down onto the couch he'd been sleeping on. He gave me a little grunt of approval, and then he was gone. The brief sound of running water and his returning footsteps were the only things left to convince me this wasn't a dream. He held out a full glass of water to me.

"Didn't mean to yell," he said quietly as I took it from him. "But you gotta stop telling me you're fine when you ain't."

"I just don't want you worrying," I said.

"Yeah, I know why you do it," he said, slouching down into the seat beside me. "But, you gotta stop."

"Sorry," I said. "In my defense, I didn't think it was going to be this bad."

He hardly heard me, didn't react to what I'd said. This had clearly been running through his head for a while. He wouldn't stop until I got his point.

"Something happens to you, I wanna know about it," he said. "No matter how bad you think it is. No matter how much you think I won't wanna hear it. You can't just deal with shit by yourself all the time, it ain't fair."

"Daryl, I hear you," I said. "But I really thought I was gonna be fine. It was just a cut… until it wasn't. Fever came on so fast."

"I ain't just talking about now," he said. "I don't just mean when you get sick."

"Then what do you mean?"

He shifted uncomfortably in the seat next to me, his hand rubbed the back of his neck as he looked at his feet. I wondered if it was cricked from having slept on this damn couch.

"No matter what it is," he said again. "If something happens, I want to know."

I tried to sit up straighter, but it made my head spin. "Daryl, where's this coming from?"

He sighed. Loud and frustrated.

"It ain't fair on you to keep shit to yourself," he said. "Always helping everyone with their shit and not dealing with your own. But it ain't fair on me, neither. I want to be there for you. I never want you to feel like you ain't got nowhere to go… or… I just think you need to…especially if we're gonna-"

He stopped. Mid-rant.

"Gonna, what?" I prompted.

"Don't matter," he said.

But I'd got it.

Going to be together.

It hung in the air between us, unspoken. Heavy. I almost addressed it, but thinking about it gave me a headache even when I wasn't fighting off an infection, and he knew it, that's why he'd stopped. There was also still a small chance that all of this was a fever dream, so any conversation would be pointless.

"So… what are you doing sleeping here?" I asked.

"Nice to see you too," he grumbled.

I studied his face. I didn't realize it at first, but I was looking for signs of a fight. He had a habit of getting a little reckless when he felt scared and out of control, which was precisely how he'd looked last time I'd seen him. "Rick kick you out?"

"No, idiot," he said. I narrowed my eyes at him, and he finally realized I wasn't letting up. "I'm here for you. I brought you these."

He handed me the weird bowl of berries I'd noticed earlier. I looked down at them, expecting to find some kind of meaning in there and didn't.

"Thanks, Daryl, but I'm not hungry," I said. "Don't wanna gross you out, but I can barely keep anything down."

"No, dummy, they're for your fever," he said like that should've been obvious.

"What?"

"Elderberries," he said like that explained a damn thing.

"What?"

"Yeah, they help to…" he looked a little less sure of himself, "bring fevers down and shit."

"Really?" I said. I popped a few in my mouth, sharp and bitter. "How do you know that?"

"Back at the prison, a whole bunch of people got sick. We didn't have any medicine, but there was a doctor there that said elderberries were good for this kinda shit."

"Oh," I said. "Did it work?"

"Worked until we got enough antibiotics to treat them," he said. I nodded, ate a couple more.

"Who was the doctor?" I asked, realizing there wasn't anyone in their group now who fit that description. He looked away because he didn't want me to see that he was still sad about it, but I knew he would be. Daryl was the kind of person to carry that shit with him for life.

"Hershel," he said.

"Hershel," I repeated. "Unusual name."

He sat in silence for a moment. I could tell he wanted to say something else, so I waited.

"He was Maggie's dad," he said. Then he cleared his throat. "And, actually, he was a vet. We were staying on his farm before that. There were horses there. You'd have liked it."

"A farm's a pretty good place to be stuck in all this," I said. "What happened to it?"

"Overrun with Walkers," he said.

"Sorry, man, that's shit," I said. I closed my eyes, exhausted despite having done nothing for however long I'd been lying in bed. I'd reached the point of being ill where it's hard to remember what it ever felt like to be well. This was the first time in a while that I'd started to feel like my old self. However much of a struggle I'd found it to get out of bed and down the stairs, I was damn glad I had. "I missed you."

I didn't really mean to say it out loud, but I was weak, and my usual defenses were down. My exhausted body kept trying to pull me back to sleep while my mind fought to keep me awake, keep me with Daryl.

"You been asleep for two days," he said. "Ain't been awake long enough to miss me."

I smiled because, underneath all of that grump, I knew he was happy I'd said it, and that made me feel like less of an idiot.

"You can just say you missed me too, dumbass."

"I missed you too, dumbass," he said. I hadn't expected him to. I assumed he'd just tell me to shut up or call me a nerd or something. But his voice was all gruff. Maybe he was more worried about me than I'd realized. "Now, eat up."

"I'm eating as fast as I can," I said. "But there's a lot here. You leave any berries for anyone else?"

"There'll be more out there if you need 'em," he said. The way he said it was more of a threat than an offer. I kept quiet and swallowed down as many as I could. After going a while without eating, my stomach didn't really know how to react to food hitting it. I heard it rumble in a way that sounded more like a groan. Daryl pressed the back of his hand to my forehead, surprisingly cool. "Shit, Naomi, you're really hot."

"Keep it in your pants, mister," I gave him a weak smile. "I'm sick, doncha know?"

His face went a little red. "Not sick enough to stop telling crappy jokes."

I threw a berry at him, but he saw it coming and caught it in his mouth. He winced when he bit into it. "Shit, them things are sour."

"I kinda like sour," I said. Berries might do fuck all to help my fever, but they were clearly helping Daryl to feel better about it all. So I ate until I couldn't anymore. I set the bowl down again.

"Naomi…" Daryl said, a warning note in his voice.

"Please, I can't eat any more of those," I said. "You should just be happy they ain't come up again yet."

"Fine," he said. "But, you're eating the rest tomorrow."

"Deal," I said, and leaned into him. He put an arm around my shoulders. I stifled a yawn. "Can't believe you slept here."

"Didn't wanna leave," he said. "Didn't want to wake you up, neither. I went to almost all of them places on your map and couldn't find shit. Everywhere's been picked clean."

"Sorry."

"Ain't your fault."

"Sorry you wasted your time, then," I said. He was quiet for a while. I closed my eyes and, although I knew he was clearly thinking about something, I let the comfort of that silence wash over me.

"Sorry I weren't here for you," he said. "When you got sick."

"Don't matter," I said. I could feel myself drifting off. Being close to Daryl was just enough comfort for me to relax into the fatigue that seemed permanently embedded into my muscles. "You're here now."

I closed my eyes for what felt like a second and then something jolted me awake again. The ceiling was moving above me, and I could hear footsteps, but I knew I wasn't walking. Daryl had picked me up. I tried to raise my head to look around more. "What are you doing?"

"Getting you to bed," he said. I wanted to fight him on it and tell him I could walk up there for myself. But I knew that wasn't true. And he'd just asked me not to keep things from him anymore.

"Where did you go?" I asked.

"I went to look for meds," he said, sounding worried that I'd forgotten so fast.

That wasn't what I'd meant. I wanted to know where he'd been before all of that. Before he knew I was sick. Where he'd gone when he'd left the garage. Why he'd stayed away for almost a full day. But then I felt myself sink back down into the pillows on my bed. I looked for Daryl, and he was gone again like he'd melted into the dark. I thought it might be a sign that I'd dreamt him up after all, but then he was back, pressing a cold damp cloth to my forehead. I felt the bed dip as he sat down beside me. Sleep had come to claim me again, already weighing down my limbs and making my eyelids heavy. I felt him lie down beside me in the dark, and his hand took mine before I lost my grip on consciousness.

Daryl

I'd never seen someone shiver so damn much. All while heat radiated out of her like she was some kind of furnace. Her fever was too high for me to get close, I knew her body temperature needed to be lowered, and I didn't think adding my body heat to the mix would help. But all I wanted to do was hold her. Her sweaty hand had been limp in mine since she'd fallen asleep. Hair stuck to her paler-than-usual forehead. I pushed it back so I could turn over the damp cloth I'd put there to cool her down. The side that had been against her skin was worryingly warm already.

"Daryl?" Aaron's quiet voice from the doorway made me jump. I glanced at Naomi, saw she hadn't stirred, and moved as carefully as I could out of bed, so I didn't wake her.

"Hey, man," I said. "She got up for some water, I…"

"I just came to check on her," Aaron said, clearly not looking for an explanation as to why I was in here with her. "If you need a break, I can…"

"Nah," I said. "I got this. Go back to bed."

"I'll come and check on you both in the morning."

I nodded, and he started to turn away.

"Hey," I called quietly at his retreating back. He turned back. "Thanks for… taking care of her. While I was…"

I'd spent two days out of Alexandria looking for meds, not knowing that she'd been getting dramatically worse. It was clear Aaron and Eric had been taking care of her, making sure she took her antibiotics and trying to get her to eat when she was lucid enough to try.

"Happy to do it," he said, with a shrug like it was nothing. It wasn't. There was a small smile on his face like I was a weirdo for thanking him. As if it was normal for folks to take care of each other like this. But it wasn't, not for Naomi and me anyway, if she'd gotten this sick as a kid... Overwhelmed by how grateful I was to him and Eric, I gave Aaron a hug he wasn't expecting.

I had no idea she would get this sick.

"Hey, it's okay," he said. Surprised, he hugged me back. "We love her, too, man."

I didn't know what to say, I just patted him on the back and let go, turning away because I was feeling too much and knew it would be written all over my face.

Stepping back into her room, I tiptoed across the floor and opened all of the windows to let in the cold night air. Then I settled back down next to her, as close as I dared get without touching her.

"Fight, Naomi," I whispered to her. "Please, you gotta fight."

She was fast asleep, but they say sometimes you can take things in subconsciously, right? The amount her body was shaking and how warm she was, it was almost a blessing that she wasn't awake to suffer. I just wanted her to know, even subconsciously, that I was rooting for her while she fought it off. Thought that knowing someone was waiting for her on the other side might give her a bit of extra strength. And she was so strong already. So much stronger than even I had known.

It was hard to think about.

Those assholes putting their hands on her like that.

Taking Mia from her.

Weeks of pain shut up in a damn box living in fear that one wrong move would kill someone she loved.

The fight to break free.

Dead kids chained up and left undead to torment them.

The boy they'd made her kill.

And she was still standing, after all of that. Not sure I would've been. Corny to say it, but she was my goddamn hero.

I knew deep down, no matter how strong-willed she was, an infection could still snuff her out. The same strength that had helped her through that hell… None of that meant shit when it came to fighting an illness. Her body could still give out on her. That was the fear that kept me awake. Like if I wasn't there to listen to the sound of her breathing, she might just… stop.

I stayed awake to watch the room lighten around us. Heard the sounds of Alexandria waking up and listened for Aaron coming back. I gave her hand an absentminded squeeze, and she rolled over, opened her eyes. Gave me a weak smile.

"You're here?" she said. Her voice was so quiet. Her eyes were sleepy and didn't have their usual spark in them. I hated seeing them so dull. If I could've swapped places with her, I'd have done it in a heartbeat.

"'Course I am," I said. "Where else am I gonna be?"

She was quiet for a moment, and I thought she was about to drift off again, but then she tried to pull herself up into a sitting position. Her limbs were still weak. Naomi looked at me, studied my face, and mumbled, "Weird."

My heart started racing. Had I overstepped some kinda boundary by being in her room? She hadn't technically invited me, so maybe this wasn't okay. I should've thought about it, how she might feel waking up to someone in her room, rather than just doing what made me feel better. "Weird?"

"Yeah, I think you were in my dream," she said through a yawn. "You were making me eat all these berries…"

She pulled a face like she could still remember how sour they were. I relaxed. "No, that was real."

"Huh," she looked mildly surprised but didn't say anything else. Didn't ask me to leave or question why I was here.

"How are you feeling?"

"Better," she paused to think about it for a moment. "Hungry?"

She didn't sound so sure about that last one, but I took it as a good sign. From what Eric and Aaron had told me, she hadn't much felt like eating until now. I pressed the back of my hand to her forehead again. Warm. But not in a way that sent cold panic through me anymore. "Hey… I think your temperature is coming down."

It felt too good to be true, or even to say out loud.

"For real?" she said, opening her eyes a lot wider. She looked down at her own arms and legs like they were someone else's. "Hey, I think I've stopped shivering."

She had. My heart lifted. "Think you could eat?"

"More berries?" she asked, looking a little glum.

"You did promise you'd finish the ones downstairs," I reminded her, "but you can have something else if you think you ain't gonna spew it up again."

At this point, I'd have got her anything she asked for if it meant she was gonna eat.

"I'll do my best," she said, and then started to climb out of bed.

"Hey, where are you rushing off to?" I asked her.

"Food," she said.

"Nah, stay here," I told her. "I'll get you it."

I waited for her to push back and convince me that she was well enough to get up and about on her own. I saw her thinking about it. Maybe it was the look on my face, or perhaps even she realized that three days of fever had left her body too weak. Whatever it was, something changed her mind. Reluctantly, she pulled herself back to where she'd been sitting before. She locked eyes with me, and a moment of acceptance passed between us. I knew it must be killing her to give in like this, but it helped me breathe a little easier.

I made my way quietly to the kitchen downstairs. I popped some bread into the toaster and rummaged around for other quick and easy food. I didn't want to be away from her for too long. When I'd said I wanted to make her breakfast again, this hadn't been what I'd had in mind. I'd pictured her happier. Healthier.

I loaded up a plate for us to share, buttered the toast when it was done, and grabbed the leftover berries before heading back up. She was sitting exactly where I'd left her, waiting.

"That is way too much food for one person," she said, scrutinizing the plate in my hands.

"Ain't all for you, greedy guts," I said, picking up a piece of toast and biting into it. I passed over the plate and then settled down next to her.

"You're staying?" she asked, and there was this look on her face like she expected me to run off now she was awake.

"Yeah," I said, and then because I couldn't quite figure out the way she was looking at me, I said, "If you want me to?"

"Yeah," she said. "'Course I do."

We ate together in a comfortably familiar silence. She couldn't manage as much as me, or as much as I'd seen Naomi put away before, but that didn't matter. I was just happy to see her eating again.

It marked the start of a slow recovery. She still needed a lot of sleep. The fever had really weakened her. It came and went over the next few days, but never as high as it had been. Each day she got a little stronger, and the color returned to her face. Each day she could eat a little bit more, and her eyes got a little brighter.

I stopped staying over. Without the urgency of Naomi being a death's door, it felt like crossing a line. She never said so, but it would've been weird to keep living on her couch when she wasn't in danger of dying overnight. Eric and Aaron let me stop by whenever I wanted. Sick of answering the door to me all the time, they told me to just let myself in and didn't bat an eye when they'd come home and find me hanging out there.

I took the maps I'd been using to try and find medicines over to Denise. I knocked and peered through the glass door, noticing too late that Lucas was in there with her. I still didn't like him, but it was harder to truly despise him now that I knew what they'd been through. So I guess his damn tactic of showing me that Terminus tape had worked, in its own way. He hadn't let Naomi put down those dead kids' Walkers on her own. So I got it now, why she defended him so much, you don't go through something like that with someone without it bonding you.

I had a split second to decide whether to just turn around and come back later or go in before they spotted me through the window. Denise motioned for me to open the door.

"Hey," I said. It had been almost a week since Lucas and I had seen each other. Neither of us was happy about coming face to face again now. He used to look nervous when he saw me like he could see all the thoughts I had about punching him. Maybe he could, I wasn't too good at hiding that kind of shit. But he didn't look nervous anymore. Watching that damn tape had tied us together in shame, and he resented me for it. I deliberately avoided looking at him.

"Hey, Daryl," Denise said. "Everything alright?"

"Brought you these," I said, holding up the maps. "I've checked all the places that are marked up, but I thought you might spot something we missed."

"Thanks," Denise said. "Leave them on the table by the door, and I'll take a look."

I nodded and put them down, feeling a small glimmer of hope that I'd now be able to get out of here without saying a word to Lucas. But he decided to stick his nose into the conversation and asked, "Are we in need of more meds?"

"We're low on a few things," Denise said.

"Has anyone scheduled a run for some?" he asked. I wanted to through something at his dumb head. He was the kind of guy who'd spend so long scheduling and planning that everything would stand still for a week instead of just getting out there and getting shit done.

"Nowhere to take a run to," I told him. "I've been out there looking, and there ain't nowhere nearby that hasn't been picked apart by other scavengers."

"You've looked?" he asked. "On your own?"

"Didn't wanna just sit on my ass," I said. "Not when Naomi was so ill."

"Okay," Denise said over the top of me, trying to diffuse the situation. "I'll have a look at the maps and see if there's anything that jumps out, thanks for bringing them by."

"No problem," I said, my hand already on the doorknob. I was almost free.

"Hey, when you find one," Lucas said, I stopped the door half-open. "Let me know."

He was talking to Denise, but it felt aimed at me. I looked back at him.

"You want to come?"

"Yeah," he narrowed his eyes at me. "It's about time I stopped sitting out this kind of thing, don't you think?"

"Do what you want, man," I said, trying to act like I didn't care. I got out of the door and felt a brief sense of relief. I did think it was time he pulled his weight more, risked more. But I didn't want him coming on this damn run. Or any that I was on, I just wanted him to stay as far away from me as humanly possible. Just looking at his dumb face reminded me of all the shit I had to feel guilty about.

Sadly, he had the opposite idea. I heard Denise's door open, and then Lucas tried to call me back. I turned back around but didn't say anything. Lucas took a few more steps toward me and lowered his voice, "How's she doing?"

He didn't have to tell me who he was asking about.

"Better," I said.

"Did you tell her…" he asked. "What we did?"

Guilt, sharp and ugly, cut me up inside. It drove me to walk closer to him. If we were going to have this shit out, I didn't want anyone else overhearing.

"No," I said, thinking he'd be relieved about keeping my trap shut, but he looked at me like I was dirt. "Didn't wanna bring it up when she's tryna recover, y'know?"

"Sure," he said like he didn't really believe that was the only reason. Like he could smell how lame my excuse was. "But she's better now?"

"Yeah. Kind of."

"So, we should tell her."

"We?" I said. "Ain't no 'we'."

"We both watched it," he said. "We're both to -"

"Nah," I snapped. "If either of us tells her, it should be me. I'm the one who made you keep playing it. I'm the one who didn't know… any of that shit."

I'm the one who knows her best, I wanted to add but didn't.

"But-"

"No," I said, more firmly than before. "Trust me. She doesn't want to talk about this, and if we make her, she ain't gonna want an audience."

"Two people is hardly an audience," Lucas rolled his eyes.

"It will be to her," I said. She'd kept it private for a reason. Lucas had been there, yes, but he'd already known what they went through at Terminus. I was the one she'd kept it from. This was between her and me.

"Fine," he said eventually. "But if you don't do it soon, I will."

"That a threat?"

"No. She deserves to know what we saw."

"Think I don't know that?" I said.

"Just reminding you," he said.

"Don't need reminding," I snapped. "I tell her."

I turned away and walked away from him before that dumb look on his face could make me feel worse. I'd been meaning to tell Naomi about the tape, I really had, but the longer it went on, the easier it was to keep it a secret. It was easy to justify it to myself, too. I didn't want to bring it up when she was sick and put her under more stress. I wanted all of her energy focussed on getting better, not spent up dealing with past trauma. But even I had to admit that she was pretty much back to normal now.

I stood in front of her house for ages. Kept willing myself to walk up to the door and open it, but my feet were glued to the street outside. The place seemed taller than usual. Darker and not so welcoming. I couldn't open that door without a plan. I remembered bursting through it after a sleepless night of that damn tape playing over and over in my head. I'd been ready to talk about it then, it had felt so damn urgent and necessary. But all of that went out the window when I'd seen her lying there; pale and sick.

Now, it had been almost a week. The urgency was gone, but the need was still there, mixed in with the guilt of keeping it a secret. The shame of going behind her back. I couldn't just casually throw it into a conversation. Naomi was so sensitive to the slightest mention of Terminus, and I was damn sure she was going to be the one to bring it up. Not after she'd kept it from me for so long. How do you tell someone this kind of thing? When you've done something that you know is going to make them mad?

"Daryl?" her voice came from somewhere above me. I looked up, saw her leaning dangerously far out of one of the upstairs windows, an amused little smile on her face.

"Hey…" I called back up to her but didn't move any closed to the door.

"Is the door broken?" she asked. "You need me to let down my hair?"

"Nah," I said. "You can keep your hair to yourself, Repunzel."

"Alright," her smile widened. "Well, either come in or quit lurking outside like you're casing the joint."

She shut the window again. This was it.

I walked in her front door. She was coming down the stairs to meet me. She had this big, warm smile on her face that usually would've sent my heart racing, but today, it made it sink. I was sure I was about to give her news that would wipe it right off of there. She was in a good mood. Full of much more energy than I'd seen from her in a while. No more excuses, I had to tell her. But I didn't want to ruin this. She smiled at me, "You alright?"

"Yeah," I said, but I didn't feel alright. I felt sick. "You?"

"I'm good," she said. She looked it. "You're later than usual."

I knew she was teasing me for the extreme amount of time I'd been spending at hers lately, usually arriving shortly after the sun rose and leaving after it set.

"I was, uh, talking to Denise," I said, trying to find a natural way into the conversation I knew we needed to have. "Gave her your maps."

"What? Why?"

"Thought she might know about places the rest of us didn't," I said. "What with her being a medical professional and all. Also, it meant that looking for places didn't stop just because you're resting. Although I feel like I've searched everywhere, I'd be surprised if she can find anything."

Naom thought for a moment, "Maybe we could ask the Hilltop… or the Kingdom if they have any-"

"You think they'd give up their meds?" I asked.

"I'm not saying we'd get them for nothing," she said. "We'd have to come up with some other deal, but-"

"Nah. I'm done making deals," I said. The last one had almost cost me everything.

"But," she said louder than before, annoyed that I kept interrupting her, "It's worth it if we get some more antibiotics for this place. More painkillers too. Who knows how soon we'll need them again?"

I saw how serious she was about it, and then I got why. She'd needed the last of it, and she was the kind of person who'd feel guilty about it forever if the time came that someone else was in need, and we couldn't help them.

"We'll find some," I assured her. "Or… someone will. Think I might leave it to Glenn to go."

"Really?" she said. "Why?"

"Dunno," I shrugged. I didn't know how to describe it to her. How ill she'd been when I got back, how pale and shaky. I'd left when she had a mild infection, and when I'd come back, she'd been too sick to wake up. I was kind of done leaving when things could change so fast.

"We could go together?" she suggested, and there was a spark of hope in her eyes. "If Denise finds anything."

"Maybe," I shrugged. I didn't want to say no outright when I knew she was holding herself back from going out for my sake. If it was up to her, she'd have been back out there already. But she'd stayed home an extra few days for my piece of mind. And I appreciated that. If I was honest, the thought of being there when she went back out for the first time brought me some comfort. "You sure you're up for that?"

"I'm fine now," she said. "I feel miles better. Been feeling like myself since yesterday, and I'm almost done with these damn pills."

She took the nearly empty box out of her pocket and shook it at me.

"Uh-huh." It didn't make me feel a whole lot better. She'd looked me in the eye and told me she was gonna be fine before, and we'd both believed it.

"You ain't gotta worry anymore," she assured me. Her eyes got real serious. "I don't like seeing you worry."

"Can't help it," I said.

"I know."

It was especially hard now that I knew just how much she could keep hidden. A silence settled between us. There was a lot I wanted to say. A lot I'd put off saying. Every time I glanced at her, it looked like she was mulling something over. Was my guilt obvious from my face? Was she slowly piecing together that something other than her sickness had been behind my little outburst? Or, was she going to tell me about Terminus herself? Should I tell her I already knew? Act surprised? I tried not to freak out.

"Hey, Daryl?" she said eventually.

"Yeah?"

"I'm sorry." I waited for her to follow up with something that would clarify what she meant, but she didn't. She just fixed me with a gaze that were still lost in thought.

"... what for?"

"I've been thinking a lot about what you said…" she took a deep breath, and I wished she wouldn't. I'd said a lot of shit, I didn't want to react until I knew what specifically she was talking about. "About telling you that I'm fine when I ain't."

"Oh," I tried to hide that I was surprised. I wasn't sure she'd remember me saying that, she'd been so feverish at the time. "Yeah?"

"Yeah, and you're right. It ain't fair," she said. "I'd hate it if you did that to me."

She'd given this a lot more thought than I thought she would. Maybe I'd been more frantic at the time that I'd realized. I nodded. "It's okay. I get it."

She relaxed a little and sat down on the couch, but there was still something plaguing her. I sat down next to her, and she looked at me.

"Where'd you go?" she asked quietly. I wondered if she was back on the maps, back to thinking about all the places she might be able to replenish the med supply.

"All of them places you and Aaron marked up. I tried-"

"No, not then," she shook her head. "Before that. You were fixing up your bike, and then you were just…"

She trailed off and shrugged. Now was the time to come clean. She'd handed me the perfect opportunity. Almost a week to think of the perfect thing to say, and I still had squat.

"I'm sorry," I said, not sure how to continue, but an apology felt like the right kind of start. "I-"

"Was it me?" she blurted out.

"You?"

"Was it because I… did I say something, or…?"

"No," I said. "No. What the hell would you have said?"

"Dunno," she said, but the way she kind of shrank away from me made it clear she'd had something in mind.

"Tell me."

"Nah, it's fine."

"Naomi…"

"I thought when I said I… wasn't trying to talk myself out of… anything happening between us," she looked away from me. I saw her cheeks start to go red. "I thought maybe that… freaked you out, and that's why you took off."

"No," I said, too shocked to hide it. "God, no."

"Really?" she said. "Because I knew you didn't wanna talk about things, and then I brought it up…"

"It's okay," I told her, feeling like she was building to an apology she had no business making. She was so far off base with all this.

"Really?"

"Yeah," I said, she didn't look like she believed me. "As long as you meant it when you said it."

"Yeah," she said. "Of course, I did."

"Then, it's fine."

"But, I also meant it when I said I don't want things to get messed up," she said.

"Yeah," I said. "I know."

I didn't want that either. Seeing Naomi so ill and seeing that tape of everything she'd been through, had been a wake-up call. There were much worse things than not being with her. As long as she was alive and well, I had nothing to complain about.

"I'm not good at this kind of thing," she admitted. "It's just..."

"Relationships are hard for you," I finished for her.

"Yeah," she admitted, looking ashamed when she didn't need to.

"That's okay," I said.

"I'm not good at long term shit."

"Nothing wrong with not wanting anything long term," I told her. "You ain't gotta feel bad about that, if it ain't who you are."

"But it's who you are," she said. "Ain't it? Unless you got some kinda wild past that you ain't told me about."

"I don't." I waited to see if she'd make fun of me for being a prude like Merle used to when he'd been picking up chicks, but she didn't.

"It's not that I don't... want anything more serious," she said. "I mean, hypothetically, but it just never felt… right with anyone. Anytime they got too close, it's like a part of me just..."

"Bolts?"

"Yeah," she said. Her eyes were impossibly sad. "But this is you. You're already so close."

"I know," I said quietly because I did. It would have been easier to have fallen in love with someone else. Someone who hadn't already meant the world to me. But it hadn't felt like I had any kind of choice in it. Naomi could do the short-term casual thing, so maybe she was different from me. Maybe she'd have a choice. If she was able to opt-out, I couldn't blame her for not wanting to risk everything.

"I don't wanna fuck us up," she whispered. "I don't wanna reach that point with you. I don't…"

"I know," I said again. "You don't wanna hurt me."

It was hell, watching her torment herself like this. For someone who'd said she didn't want to talk herself out of anything, she was doing a damn good job of doing so. I just wished she'd do it quicker, so it might hurt less. If she didn't want to be with me, that was fine, as long as she stuck around. As long as she was still in my life.

"Look, it's okay," I told her. "If you don't wanna be with me, if you don't want to risk it, I get it."

It was a big gamble for her, and I knew I sure as hell wasn't worth it.

"Really?" she said. I tried to work out if she was relieved, but it was getting harder to look at her. Something in me was starting to break.

"We can call it a day if you want," I said. "Pretend none of it happened. No hard feelings."

She looked at me then, her eyes searching my face for something. I fought the urge to look away from her. I was so used to averting my gaze and hiding how I felt, but if this was the end of it, there was no point in dodging it anymore.

"Thing is," she said. "I don't think that is what I want."

"No?" My heart sped up. I kept thinking I must've heard her wrong.

"No," she said. When I didn't say anything, she faltered a little. "But, if you want to call it a day now, that's fine. Like you said, no hard feelings."

There was a moment of silence where we just looked at each other. Two heartbeats for me to make a decision, to get up the courage to tell her, "That's not what I want."

Another heartbeat of silence. It was crazy to me that she hadn't known that. I thought she'd had some understanding of my feelings about all this. She was usually so good at identifying them. But I guess she was too busy trying to define her own. I watched the realization of what we'd just agreed to hit her. I wondered if it would be too much already. Enough to make her bolt after all. There was a glimmer of disbelief in her eyes like she expected this to fall apart at any moment.

"We doing this?" she asked. "We starting something?"

I was glad she asked because I couldn't get my head around it either. I'd been so busy preparing myself for the exact opposite of this that it didn't feel real.

"Yeah," I said. "I think we are."

"Okay," she said. I could see the beginnings of a freakout threatening to rise up behind her eyes. "But we find it ain't working, we stop immediately. We don't let it get in the way of what we already got."

"Agreed," I said.

"And if you decide you don't feel anything for me," she said. "Or if your feelings change, you gotta tell me. None of your shutting down bullshit because you don't want to have a difficult conversation."

"Fine," I said, knowing they wouldn't. "But, you gotta do the same."

"Deal."

I couldn't look away from her. I felt like the second I did, she'd change her mind. Or I'd wake up.

"So, we take things slow?" I said.

She nodded. "We take it slow."

Neither of us said anything else. We sat in the unbroken silence of the decision we'd just made and let it wash over both of us. I realized I was smiling when she did too. It spread across her face with a warmth that reached her eyes. I couldn't stop.

"So…" she said. "What now? Do we... shake on it?"

"This ain't a business meeting," I laughed. She was really freaking out. But at the same time, I hadn't seen her look this happy in a long time.

"Right," she nodded. "So...?"

"I think we can probably just kiss like normal people would," I said. "I mean... if you want to."

Now that I knew everything she'd been through, rushing her into anything physical was the last thing I wanted to do. I'd waited a long time for this; I could wait longer.

"Yes," she said. I reached out for her and cupped her face in one of my hands, drinking in her smile. Those eyes. The way she whispered, "God, yes."

"Yeah?" I tilted her face up toward mine as she moved closer. I saw her nod and close her eyes before I kissed her. Again. Finally. That sweet, fiery taste I hadn't been able to shake. I'd longed for it. Dreamt about it. But that all had all been nothing compared to the real thing. I savored it. A slow and gentle kiss while I wrapped my arms around her body, finally able to hold her like I'd wanted to for so long. Her arms linked around my neck, pulled herself closer to me.

I tried to keep it gentle, wanted to stop it from getting too intense too fast, but she kissed me harder, and it was impossible to resist. The soft warmth of her body against mine, the feel of her wrapped up so completely in my arms, the taste of her. It all ignited that feeling in me. That burning, all-consuming need to let her know that she was mine.

Forcing myself to pull back, I looked at her. Her eyes fluttered open again, she fixed me with that big, beautiful smile and it took everything in me not to tell her I loved her right there and then. But this had been a big step. For both of us. And I wasn't about to undo it by coming on too strong too fast.