Chapter Text
Daryl trembled nervously. He was down his third smoke, and he was still panicked. He stared at Rick wide eyed, like a deer in the headlights.
He leaned against the tailgate of the beat up truck of his with a cigarette hanging from his lips, legs crossed from the ankles and nervously fiddling with the dirty red rag between his fingers. He was on a break and Rick had chosen this time to drop the fucking bomb on him. The damn 'K' Bomb!
“Ya ain’t fucking serious!” he growled at the uniformed man in front of him.
“I though that was what you wanted,” Rick replied nonchalantly, kicking some pebbles on the ground.
“Jesus,” Daryl breathed, puffing the cigarette with ardor.
“You knew this is what comes with me, if we - - you know - -,” Rick sighed, and shrugged his shoulders, “Got together.”
Daryl glared at him, trying very hard to digest the news he’d just received. Of course he’d known. But that didn’t make him any fucking less scared shitless. He couldn’t remember if he had ever thought about it. If he had he was sure that his answer probably was ‘no way in Hell’.
“Or don’t you want to?” Rick asked, tilted his head, and frowned a little. Daryl saw him pouting, and scoffed as a reply.
“I wanna! Of course I wanna, Rick,” Daryl sighed, and trying to make amends, he added, “But I don’t wanna end up screwing things up. Jesus, what if I lose ‘em?”
“Lose?”
“Yeah, they haven’t exactly lived in the woods like I did, what if they get lost, your backyard is huge, man,” Daryl said, chewing aggressively his bottom lip, and looked up to meet Rick’s rather puzzled gaze.
“Hold on, let me get this straight,” Rick said, took a nervous step, and pointed his index finger at Daryl casually, “You don’t want to move in with me, because you’re afraid the kids will get lost in the backyard. The fenced backyard!”
“I’mma lose ‘em for sure, and you’ll hate me for it,” Daryl growled.
Rick stared at Daryl, blinking his eyes furiously few times, contemplating if he was going to make things worse if he'd burst into laughter. Two seconds later he didn’t care about that anymore, since he was actually howling with laughter, while Daryl glared at him.
“’m gonna go back to work,” he growled at Rick who wiped his eyes.
“No, no, c’mon, man,” Rick said quickly grabbing Daryl by his wrist, stopped him from running back inside the garage.
He glared at Rick, but stopped. Against all the instincts he had, he stood there, waiting for Rick to talk him into it. Because he was almost certain that it would happen. Despite that, he kept glaring at Rick, who rubbed the bridge of his nose, and tried to gather his thoughts.
“Daryl,” Rick said, reaching over, placing his palms on Daryl’s shoulders, and looked intently at his silly Hunter, “Daryl, I’m sure you’re going to do just fine with the kids. The backyard ain’t that big, and if I have confidence in your tracking skills if they happen to ‘disappear’ into the backyard,” he said gently but determined.
“How about if we give it a go this weekend?” Rick asked, smirking, “Take ‘em camping, cook food over the open fire, roast marshmallows, make s’mores, and you can teach them track and maybe even shoot with that crossbow of yours. You like the woods, right? We can sleep in the same sleeping bag…” he said, and winked.
Daryl’s shoulders slumped, and he sighed, and still pouting, he nodded, “Fine.”