midnight in the garden of eden - carl grimes

VI

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vi.

take care
"tell me, does it feel?
it's not good unless it's real"

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When I find Daryl, the dining pavilion is deserted, the remains of the lunchtime crowd long gone. He's perched on one of the picnic tables, methodically cleaning his arrows with a rag that's seen better days. The air smells faintly of woodsmoke and sun-warmed earth, and the sound of birdsong fills the quiet spaces between us.

"Tara said you were looking for me."

Daryl doesn't look up. Doesn't even acknowledge me at first, just keeps his eyes on the arrow in his hands. He spits on the rag, rubbing at a dark stain, the kind that only comes from too much blood baked into the metal. Finally, he glances up, his gaze landing on my uncovered face. The patch is stuffed in my back pocket, and for a moment, I wonder if he'll say anything. But Daryl, being Daryl, just grunts, his eyes flickering back to the arrow.

"Say how old she was?"

"Said she was ten when all this started. Makes her about nineteen now." I answer, crossing my arms over my chest.

He doesn't react right away, just keeps working that rag over the arrow's shaft. "Not much younger than you. Still just a kid." He pauses, his eyes slipping back to me for a moment before returning to his work. "She don't wanna go back out there? Not with them?"

"I don't think so." With a heavy sigh, I slump onto the table top next to him. "She said... That she was safer in that cell than she was with them."

Daryl's hands pause, just for a second. "I saw her arms. Bruises like that... they ain't accidents. And they ain't all happen at once."

"No." I agree. "They don't."

"That mom of hers." He begins. "...Beats her?"

I set my elbows on my knees. "That. And worse. Probably." The words come out from me with curtness that belies how much my insides twist at the thought. "Are they talking about sending her back out there?"

Daryl gives almost an imperceptible nod of his head, greasy bangs falling into his eyes. "Tara's against it. Girl's got that going for her, at least. But people are talking. Saying if it wasn't her fault what happened to Jesus, maybe we ought to go after her people. Find out who is."

"And do what?" I scoff. "Kill them all?"

He shrugs. "Ain't saying I agree with it. But I get it. Someone's gotta pay for what happened to Jesus. That's how things work around here."

"I don't think those people are worth finding." I look how along the building around us, this community. "I always thought an eye for an eye was wrong." Then I turn my face to him, bearing my horrific wound. Know that although the person who gave it to me is long gone, I never wished him to be dead.

Daryl doesn't push it. The afternoon sun is starting to dip into the tree-line, evidence of the days growing shorter as the season of autumn persists and for a moment we just sit there in silence.

He pulls out another arrow from the quiver beside him, inspects it with the same grim focus. I can hear the faint scrape of metal as he rubs at another dried bloodstain, but my thoughts are elsewhere, caught up in the mess of it all. Lydia, her mom, her people, the whispers that hang around us both heard and unheard. The memory of her bruises, her words, clings to me.

"She's strong," Daryl finally says, breaking the silence. "She'll be fine. Whatever happens."

"Yeah." I murmur, nodding slowly. "But she can't go back."