AN: Here we are, another chapter here.

I hope you enjoy! Let me know what you think!

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"I bet you that Clyde's going right back over to Agnes's house," Carol said with a giggle as soon as she buckled her seatbelt.

They'd just dropped the old man off at his truck. They'd eaten and, honestly, taken their time doing a few things. They wanted to allow Agnes and Clyde to have as much time as they might like together. But, when it started getting late, Daryl figured they ought to take Clyde to get his truck. He didn't know how late people of that age liked to stay up, but he figured it had to be getting somewhere close to bedtime.

"Why you say that?"

"That goodbye wasn't a sincere goodbye," Carol said, laughing quietly.

"What'cha mean? They said bye. Hugged each other."

"But that wasn't a sincere goodbye," Carol insisted. "That was like a—I'll be right back goodbye. Like it was for our benefit. I don't know how to explain it was just—you could see there was something else there. He's headed right back over there the minute he leaves the tree lot."

Daryl shook his head.

"They ain't said nothin' about that," he said.

"And? Daryl—did you tell them that we're probably going to fuck when we get home?"

Daryl immediately smiled. He liked the idea of fucking Carol, and that certainly brought a smile to his face, but he also liked when she said certain things. It never failed to amuse him when she said "fuck" except, of course, when it aroused him. Sometimes, honestly, it did both at the same time, and he didn't mind that, either.

"We are?" Daryl asked, glancing at her enough to raise his eyebrows in her direction. She gave him a bored and slightly irritated expression, but he could tell it wasn't sincere.

"We might not be now," Carol responded.

"Don't be that way," Daryl said with a laugh. He reached his free hand over and rested it on her leg. She didn't protest, so he rubbed her thigh with his fingers, enjoying nothing more than the connection of touching her.

"That wasn't my point, Daryl," Carol said. "My point was that they may have plans that they don't want to announce to everyone. We don't have any right to know what they planned."

"What the hell would he go back over there for? It's late."

"They look like they really hit it off, Daryl," Carol said. "Maybe they're going to…you know…sleep together."

Daryl wrinkled his nose.

"You mean like—sex?" Daryl asked. "Old as they are?"

"Is it that ridiculous?"

"I hate to be the bearer of bad damn news, but…I don't know if that shit works anymore. I mean—age an' all?"

Carol hummed.

"I mean—maybe. Maybe not…everything. Not all the time, I guess? But—there are lots of things that you can do. Don't you think?"

Daryl's face contorted a bit more.

"If it's all the same to you, I don't wanna think about it one damn bit."

Carol laughed.

"Are you saying there's an expiration date to intimacy, Daryl? Like—should I start storing this up like a camel or something because the day's going to come when you're just like…nope, we're too old? That's just done? No more sex or…even intimacy for us?"

"OK—but me an' you are different," Daryl said.

"No," Carol said. "We're not. And there are plenty of—of twenty-year-olds that, when they can tell I'm pregnant? They're going to be like…oh my God, how did that even happen—old as she is? You know she's not having sex at her age…ancient old woman like that."

Daryl snorted—not because he agreed with the sentiment, but because Carol's rendition made it quite possible to picture some college students meeting for coffee in the café and discussing the unfathomable sex life of the mysteriously pregnant woman who works there.

"Fine," Daryl said. "Fine—I'll give you the point. Maybe he's headed over there right now. Maybe they gonna do whatever the hell it is that they want to do. But the fact remains that I still don't wanna think about it. Because thinkin' about it just seems to make it a hell of a lot less likely that lil' damn you-know-who is comin' out to play tonight. In fact, I'd rather if he just didn't hear a damn thing about none of this."

Carol leaned into Daryl and looped her arm through his.

"Fine," she said. "We won't talk about it. I'm sorry, Pookie." She reached over and petted his crotch delicately. "Do you—think he'll recover from this traumatic experience?"

She smirked at him and cocked her eyebrow.

"Really?" He asked. She laughed in response.

"I'll stop," she said. "I'm sure—they're just…sleeping together. Just sleeping." She quickly added the last part when Daryl gave her his best warning look.

"Maybe that's not that bad," Daryl said with a laugh. "It is nice not to have to sleep alone."

Carol's only response was to squeeze his arm a little and nuzzle her face against it like a cat.

It was nice, really, to have someone else to be there. And if someone else could have that—and especially if Daryl didn't have to think to hard about any of the details? He was happy for them, too.

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"So—there ain't nothin' wrong?" Daryl asked.

"Plenty fuckin' wrong that oughta never been fuckin' wrong," Merle gruffed. Daryl watched as his brother peeled apart his cheeseburger and went about doctoring it up with the condiment packets he'd hoarded from the burger joint. "Just it's all in Andrea's head."

"But she went to the doctor," Daryl said. He'd asked Merle what was going on the day before, but Merle had declined, entirely, to speak on the issue until after Andrea's appointment. Daryl was irritated by his brother's silence on the subject, but he understood that Merle had something of an irrational fear of jinxing some things if he talked about them too much.

"Went to the doctor," Merle confirmed, nodding his head.

"They called her, Merle. That's what Carol said. And they don't do that shit for an extra appointment unless there's like somethin' goin' on. That's what Carol said."

Merle laughed to himself.

"Carol'll be done talked to her by now," Merle mused. "Listen—they called her, but it's because I called the doctor myself. I had to. Told her what that nurse said."

"But she already knew about it," Daryl said. "Because you called her before. She fired that nurse. That's what Carol said."

"She did fire the damn nurse, but just like a bullet leavin' a damn gun, there weren't no drawin' them words back up once they'd got loose an' done their damage. What she said had done struck Andrea. It done its damage. She'd say she was fine, but the next damn thing I knowed, she'd just be hidin' out in the bathroom or somethin', bawlin' her eyes out at the damn drop of a hat. I was tryin' to make her like—you know—like happy. With like talkin' about it and all. But every time I brought it up, she was distracted. Sayin' things like it prob'ly didn't matter no way, an' there weren't no need to get attached…so I called the doctor."

"And told her Andrea was actin' like that?"

"Told her we had to have a damn do-over or some shit," Merle said. He crammed a handful of fries into his mouth all at once and chewed.

"You can't do a do-over, Merle," Daryl said.

"Well, I told her she better motherfuckin' try," Merle said. "I told her I didn't care if insurance didn't cover it or…whatever. Bill me direct. I don't give a shit. What the fuck I been savin' money up for since my ass went sober if it weren't do some shit to make my wife feel better and…and save my fuckin' kid?" Daryl frowned at his brother, mostly because Merle's expression made his stomach ache a little. "I read about that stuff. Looked it up on the internet, Daryl. They say it on every page I read. Depression can kill people. And if it could kill someone as big as Andrea? A little damn Peanut don't stand a damn chance against it." He shook his head. "I don't like it. So, I called her."

"And she give Andrea an appointment?"

"Somehow got insurance to cover it," Merle said. "Said it was necessary. And—I don't think she lied. I think that shit was as necessary as any damn appointment we gonna go to until the kid gets born. She done the whole thing. Checked her from asshole to appetite. Got us a fresh picture to put on the fridge and all."

"And you think that changed anything?" Daryl asked.

Merle somewhat smiled to himself as he considered it.

"Changed a whole fuckin' lot. On second look? Our kid weren't even quite as big as we thought it was. Said the tech musta read it wrong the first time or somethin'. Knocked off a couple weeks. Give the doc like a perfect damn excuse to have us in there. Soon as she saw it she was like—didn't miss a damn beat—she was like this was what I was thinkin'…turns out that the baby weren't quite as big as we thought. And the doctor told Andrea, you know, that there's like mamas out there that don't even know as soon as she did, and the baby looks good. She told her it all looks good. Like her blood and everything looks like it's supposed to look. Said it's a good lookin' kid. Got all its parts and—seems to be right content. And I told her how upset Andrea's been and she told her flat out that she oughta just relax. Prescribed her relaxin'."

"You a damn lie," Daryl said, laughing to himself.

"Swear it," Merle said. "Wrote it out on a little pad an' everything for Andrea to put on the fridge right next to them alien ass lookin' pictures."

"Did it work?" Daryl asked.

Merle half-heartedly shrugged his shoulders while he chewed through a large bite of his dripping burger. He hummed an answer as a place-holder so that Daryl would know that he intended to answer him as soon as his mouth was empty enough to allow for such a luxury.

"Too soon to be sure, I reckon. Still, she ain't cried last night," Merle said. "And I caught her this mornin' lookin' at them alien pictures on the fridge all doe-eyed and shit."

"You oughta put 'em in a frame for her," Daryl offered.

"Ain't a bad idea," Merle said.

"They got a bunch of different ones at the dollar store," Daryl said.

Merle hummed and raised his eyebrows like Daryl's words had made him think of something else. The gesture he made, his mouth full again, suggested that he had thought of something, but once again, Daryl was going to have to be patient to hear about it.

Daryl put his attention, at least temporarily, into squeezing the contents out of a half a dozen ketchup packets so that he could dip his fries the way he wanted to dip them.

"I don't give a fuck what people say," Daryl said. "It'd be about a thousand times better for the fuckin' planet if they was just to give you a lil' ass bottle of ketchup to go with your fries instead of all these dinky ass packets."

"We oughta save time," Merle said. "Buy us a bottle of ketchup an' put it in my truck or yours."

"Put it in the fridge at work," Daryl said.

"Wouldn't do us no damn good out here if it was there."

They were on the tailgate of Daryl's truck, and they were parked outside the house where Merle was working for the day. They could have gone back to the office to eat at the picnic table, but Axel would've wanted to listen to their conversation. Tyreese might have been there, too, and then they would have had to be careful talking about things, just in case the negativity that his wife had sprinkled around happened to come up as a topic of conversation.

"Would go rancid in the truck, Merle. Especially in the summertime when it's hot. Right now, it's the same as bein' in the fridge out here," Daryl said, laughing. It was cold, but it wasn't unbearable, and they were accustomed to eating lunch outside in pretty much all weather except for rain.

"I'ma start carryin' a cooler," Merle said. "Better any damn way. Ain't gotta stop at the gas station and buy drinks. Bring 'em from home. Cheaper that way."

"The hell you come up with earlier?" Daryl asked. "It weren't about no ketchup. It was somethin' you was gonna say about Andrea."

"Oh—I was gonna say it might be another like sign that things took better that, this mornin'? She was talkin' about turnin' your old room into a nursery. Puttin' her house on the market and all that. Serious, like. And this was the first time that she ain't looked sad about the whole nursery thing, you know?" Daryl nodded his understanding.

"That's good, though. What'd you say to her?"

"Jumped on that shit," Merle said. "Told her—you know—that she ought to start lookin'. Thinkin' about what she might like an' all. She don't gotta buy it right now if she ain't ready, but…wouldn't hurt to have some ideas. Hell, I don't think it would hurt to have her some little things to look at—much as she likes lookin' at them alien pictures."

Daryl laughed to himself.

"Maybe you start by…not callin' the kid an alien?"

"Maybe," Merle said with a laugh. "Checked on them classes. At the Y? Signed me an' you both up for that Daddy's Do It…or whatever the fuck the stupid-ass name of that Daddy class was. You still gonna do that shit?"

"I'ma do it," Daryl confirmed. "Didn't you say they was two?"

"Other one's like—couples. Like Carol and Andrea's the stars of the show in that one. I asked about it, but they don't let you in the class 'til she's in the third trimester, they said. The Daddy class is like a longer program you can do whenever. Said you can do it more'n once if you want."

"You figure we're gonna fail it or somethin'?" Daryl asked. He laughed. "Need to repeat that shit? Daddy Sumer School?"

"I was just sayin'," Merle said. "You don't gotta be an asshole about it. You don't even gotta take the damn class if you got it that under control."

Daryl swallowed back his amusement. He could immediately tell that this was very serious to his brother, and that he was a little sensitive about it. Daryl didn't want to say or do anything that might discourage Merle from continuing with this strong interest he'd found in the well-being of his new family.

"I'ma take the class," Daryl said. "I'm just givin' you shit. Wanted to ask you, too, about—helpin' me with a buildin' project."

"Buildin' what?"

"Workshop," Daryl said. "Carol said she don't care if I put one in the backyard and…I like gettin' out there to work on stuff. Besides—got some shit I'd like to work on."

Merle shrugged, dragged his last remaining fries around the paper wrapper that was holding his collection of ketchup, and spoke around them.

"Whenever you wanna start," he said.

"Go with me after work to start buyin' up the shit?"

"Suits me," Merle said.

"I'll text Carol. Tell her—do somethin' babyish and fun with Andrea." Merle smiled, clearly pleased with the suggestion.

"Don't'cha forget about our classes, though," Merle said. "Like I said, I done signed us up."

"When they start?"

"Wednesday."

"I'll be there with jingle bells on, Merle. Don't you worry your ass about that."