YEARNING - Daryl Dixon

FOURTY THREE.

BONNIE stood away from the group and washed the walker blood from her skin and clothes as best she could.

"I shouldn't be wasting this." Bonnie muttered as Daryl held the bottle up for her and she wiped her skin harshly, "I don't think it'll look good if we came to this community with you covered in walker blood like that." Noah smiled up at Bonnie and she laughed.

Frankie sat with Judith and Carl a little away from her.

Bonnie's eyes softened at the sight of her niece.

She was the proudest Aunt in the world, to a strong young girl who was so brave to live in a world like this.

Once Bonnie got as much of the blood off as she could, Aaron walked over "Hey Bonnie, sorry to interrupt." Daryl glared at the man and Bonnie sent him a kind smile.

"Are you able to take a look at Eric's ankle?" She nodded "Yeah of course." Aaron nodded as Bonnie began to follow him over to a room.

The pair walked in and Bonnie seen a man with his ankle elevated.

"Hi Eric, I'm Bonnie."

Bonnie reached out her hand and shook Eric's gently as she kneeled down beside him "What happened here?" She reached out and gently looked over his extremely swollen ankle.

"The others said it was broken." He told her with a wince of pain and she nodded, moving so she was kneeling in front of his ankle.

"I have to check it, do you mind if I take this off?" She asked, ensuring she sent him a reassuring smile to comfort him, and he shook his head.

She gently untied the makeshift wrapping and placed it on the ground.

Daryl stood in the doorway and watched her work.

He was mesmerised at the shift in her behaviour, how she could be so ruthless one minute, to being so gentle and caring the next.

"Let me know if the pain gets too much, okay? I'm just going to have a feel around."

Eric nodded and Aaron watched on anxiously, biting his thumbnail.

Bonnie delicately rested her cool fingers on Eric's ankle, he flinched at the contact. The blonde slowly felt around, feeling extreme tenderness.

"Alright, it's pretty tender, so you have some muscle damage, but only a little bit in your soleus." Daryl watched as she pointed to the source of the tenderness.

"Have you got any loss of feeling?" Eric shook his head no and sat up slightly, Bonnie rested her hands either side of his ankle, "Okay well the good news is, that it's not broken, just fractured."

"But the bad news, you will have to be out of your little adventures with Aaron for roughly six to eight weeks." She sent him a small frown "But I will make sure you are on your feet in no time!"

Daryl moved into the room, closer to Bonnie. She heard his footsteps and turned to look at the dark haired man, sending him a small smile.

"This community, your camp, does it have icepacks?" Bonnie looked over at Aaron as she began to re-strap his ankle.

"It has an x-ray machine, freezer, hot water."