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Inside the common room of the prison cell block, I placed myself in the corner as far away from the Dixon brothers as possible. Merle had been placed on the other side of the locked metal gate separating the dining area, but it didn't make me feel anymore safer. He'd be lucky if I didn't murder him in his sleep... I'd tuned out most of what the group was debating about, something on wanting to actually leave the prison and take our chances back out on the roads. I was to busy watching the two rednecks from afar.

"We made it through winter on the road, we can do it again," Hershel said.

"Ya, that was before you had one leg and we had a baby that cried for walkers every four hours," Glenn reminded him.

"We should have slipped out last night..." Carol joined in.

"I'm sure he's got scouts on every road of this place by now," Merle spoke from behind the locked gate, leaning lazily against it.

"We're not afraid of that prick," Daryl grumbled, arms crossed over his chest.

"Y'all should be, hell he could starve us out if he wanted to," Merle answered, sounding like he had no concern in the world.

"Lets put him in the other cell block," I spoke up, squinting my eyes towards him.

"No, he's got a point," Daryl defended him, giving me a look back. There was a moment of silence, before we all looked to Rick. After all, he was the one in charge. Then, we watched as he ran a hand over his face and turned to leave the room. So when Hershel yelled at him to get back here, it made me jump a little.

"You're slipping Rick, we've all seen it, and we understand why. But now is not the time to be running off. You once said this wasn't a democracy, it's time to own up to that," Hershel reminded him.

We all stood around shocked to see Hershel get so angry, he was always so calm and collected I wasn't sure there was a mean bone in his body. Rick nodded, and proceeded to step outside anyways. We were beyond screwed... I made my leave and headed back inside my watch tower. The sun was already starting to set as I sat outside and started gutting the animals I hunted earlier, throwing the guts down at the hungry walkers in the yard, watching them scramble for it.

"You tryna get yourself killed? There could be snipers out here," A deep voice grumbled behind me. Daryl was bound to come around sooner or later, I guess it was sooner.

"So be it," I whispered under my breath. I wasn't sure if he'd heard me or not, but he came and took a seat besides me. legs hanging over the edge, arms leaning on top of the railing. I guess he didn't care either.

We sat in silence for a while with nothing but the sounds of me tearing the skin from a rabbit and the walkers growling below us begging for it. Daryl deeply sighed next to me before turning to make eye contact, but he stopped and started to study my face. I could feel his eyes glance over ever cut and bruise. I bit the inside of my lip as I set the skinned rabbit down and turned to face him.

"I'm sorry this happened to you... It should've been me out there," he shook his head, blaming himself. I don't know why, but this set me off.

"You're right, then maybe Glenn and I wouldn't of been tortured, I wouldn't of had to fight off a walker that your brother let loose on me while I was tied to chair, and just maybe the governor wouldn't know where the prison is!" I yelled at him, tears threatening my eyes.

"Wouldn't you do anything to have your family back? Merle's all I've got left," he asked me calmly, a hint of sadness in his eyes.

"No, I wouldn't actually, not all of us had the luxury of having a family you cared for," I told him, tears finally falling as I stood up and walked inside the tower. Surprisingly, he got up and followed me.

"Merle was the only family I had!" his voice raised slightly as he got frustrated. I whipped around to face him again, inches apart.

"At least you had that! You know what I had? A drunk an abusive father, a mother who didn't want me and left before I could even tell her just how much I hated her for leaving me with him. Becoming homeless and always on the run, sleeping in the rain, goings days without food, having to steal, wondering what the hell I did to deserve it all..." my voice died at the end.

This was first time I'd ever admitted what happened in my childhood, not even Quinton ever asked about it. I just kept it all bottled up inside and Daryl shook it up just enough to make that bottle explode and shatter, leaving me feeling empty. I wasn't even looking at him anymore, my eyes were glued to the floor, afraid to look up.

"I didn't know... I'm sorry," he quietly spoke after a while. I shrugged my shoulders at him, still looking down.

"Don't be," I whispered, leaning against the wall. Daryl slowly came over and leaned against it beside me.

"So the marks on your arms, did he do that?" he asked carefully. My head looked up at him, how did he know? I always felt so careful to keep my flannel on even when the whether was boiling.

"Most of them..." I muttered, thinking of all the burnt marks from the ends of lit cigarettes I'd gathered over the years. It was part of the reason I had to quit smoking all that time ago.

"It's okay, I have them to," he admitted. I looked back down at the floor and shook my head slowly.

"What happened to the rest of your family?" I asked him. He hesitated so long I thought he wasn't going to answer, but soon enough he cleared his throat and parted his lips.

"Mom died when I was young, Dad was a drunk asshole, not much else to say," he shrugged. I knew there was far more to it, but I wasn't going to force it out of him, I could tell it was hard just to get that little bit out.

"I'm sorry," I told him. He nodded his head slowly at me as his eyes met back with mine.

"Merle's done a lot of terrible things in his life, and i'm not asking for you to forgive him cause frankly I don't think I can even do that, I'm just asking that you try a little," he said. My heart sank as Daryl looked at me with sad ocean eyes.

How was I supposed to tell him that the reason I can never agree with living under the same roof as Merle is because he helped hold me down while him and his buddies had their fun with me? How do I tell him that every time I look at his brother, I want to claw his eyes out? That his voice haunts me at night, I wake up screaming and thinking that biter is locked inside the room with me again, that I'm tied to a chair being tortured...

I must've waited to long to respond, cause when I finally parted my lips to say something, Daryl was gone. I was alone in the room feeling emotionally drained and fishing for another smoke to place between my lips.

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