Chapter 4 Frustration

That night, Daryl tried to sleep. He tossed and turned on his pallet, unable to think about anything but Michonne. He thought about her in the bubble bath as he had the first night, and now he thought about her drenched in sweat as she had been during the run. Who was she? A lawyer? A hell of a lot that told him! From what he had known of lawyers in his life they'd always been greasy scumbags with no good merits. He couldn't believe that of the woman, and yes he realized now if he hadn't before that she was a woman, who had backed him up in quite a few sticky situations.

He didn't know what to do with himself, and he didn't know what to do with Michonne. He could finally admit that he was attracted to her, but what? Was he supposed to just bring that up to her? Maybe mention it over coffee? He hadn't had that kind of practice with women. Michonne was different than any other woman that he'd ever approached. Most of the women of his life before all this happened had been women who had more or less asked him to have sex with them. They dressed in ways, acted in ways, and insinuated in ways that they were interested. That wasn't Michonne. She hadn't shown that she was interested in much more than killing Walkers, except for the brief vulnerable moment when he'd seen her crying over Andrea.

He'd seen her crying over Andrea. The loss of someone she had come to love so deeply. He didn't feel too much for the loss of the annoying blonde, but it had broken his heart for a moment to see what Michonne was going through, and wondering what they had been through together...out there...alone.

Maybe that was it. Maybe he was totally wrong in thinking of Michonne as any kind of possibility in his life. Maybe it had been Andrea all along that she had been in love with. No wonder she'd been mourning the loss so greatly. He'd probably be wasting his time if he tried anything.

Michonne tossed and turned, more than a little angry at her imagination, but there was nothing that she could do about it. It had been a long time since she'd been with a man. She hated that she secretly craved it so much, but she was dying to feel someone inside her...just to have a moment of release.

When she was with Andrea, there had been a few encounters. Beautiful and delicious though they had been, she had bid farewell to her friend, long before her death. Andrea had chosen the Governor over her quickly. She, not sure to do with such a loss, had tried to continue on and convince herself she'd be fine alone. She would have been, if it hadn't been for the Governor's henchmen wounding her alongside her desire to save her treacherous friend.

Now here she was. Andrea was gone. The life she knew before all of this was gone. Her whole past was erased. Nothing remained. Yet she felt a sweet spot. She wondered what Daryl was like. She wondered what it would be like to feel his muscular arms around her. She wondered what it would be like to feel him inside her. It had been so long since she'd felt a man inside her. Michonne turned over again, flipping her pillow on top of her head as if that would block out her thoughts. She didn't want to think about things that couldn't and weren't going to happen.

Daryl couldn't get her out of his mind. He wondered what she'd do if he just approached her and came out with the truth. He'd been thinking about her. Time, these days, was limited. He just wanted to be with her once, to feel her under him...to have her let him know that he still existed and he was still a man. But how could he approach her with that?

Michonne wasn't that kind of woman...he was sure of it. She's sever him in half if he tried to make any kind of move on her that was uninvited, and she wasn't known for her inviting nature.

Still, he thought he might go insane if he wasn't able to figure out a way to approach the unapproachable. He could almost taste her sweet skin, and the images that haunted him threatened his sanity. Michonne struggled through the night, unable to really sleep. She was haunted by images of everything Daryl could be and should be in an alternate universe.

"In one where my skin doesn't disgust him." She growled to herself as she got out of bed and dressed herself in the darkness of her cell. "Forget it, and forget him." She said. "I don't need him."

Regardless of his sleepless night, Daryl and Rick were up early in the morning mending patches in the fence with the wire they had brought back the day before, reinforcing the strength against determined Walkers, who given enough numbers, could plow down almost anything.

"I think it's gonna hold pretty good." Rick said. Daryl didn't respond. "Daryl, I said I think it's gonna hold pretty good." He repeated. Daryl was staring off at a distance at Michonne who was rambling through the courtyard and toward the gates.

"Oh, yeah, yeah." Daryl said. "That should do it." He barely glanced at the fence before his vision went back to Michonne who was now opening the gate. She stepped out and slaughtered a few Walkers with her katana. "What's the crazy bitch doing?" Daryl asked.

"Practice?" Rick offered.

"Maybe so, but she shouldn't go out there. Before she knows it more may be on her than she can handle." Without much more warning, Daryl left Rick finishing up the patch job and walked toward the part of the fence where Michonne stood ready with her katana for any approaching Walker. "Hey, what are you doing?"

"Just keeping sharp." She replied, trying to ignore the fact that Daryl was behind her, and safely behind the chain link fence.

"Don't ya know you can get killed like that? It especially ain't safe since we don't know when the Governor and his bad guys'll show up." Daryl said.

"I guess I was alright on my own before I found this group, it isn't like this is my first batch of Walkers." Michonne said, lopping the head off of another.

Daryl was frustrated, but realized he had no way of winning. "Suit yourself." He said. He didn't know why, but he desperately wanted her safely inside the gate. At the same time, however, he realized this was a woman that no one would ever cage.