Whatever Happened To Normal?

Chapter 14:

It took him a while to investigate everything, but after another month or searching, he finally cracked it. It seemz that Rick did complete his task that weekend at the Police Expo, because after heavy digging and searching, Daryl not only found out the details, but found the woman Rick had slept with and got pregnant. Now, she too is three months pregnant, but with Rick's child and her name is Michone Mitchell.

Tracking her down wasn't hard, but getting her to trust and fall in love with Daryl was like trying to light a flame in a rain storm. She evaded him, until the sex cravings hit and the loneliness. The token woman was in need of someone to comfort her since all her family lived in Mississippi.

So after a few weeks of wooing said woman, Daryl finally invites Rick over for a dinner- expecting everything to go according to plan.

"Daryl, does this dress make me look fat?"

"Of course not, Chone. You look beautiful and the baby is glowing today." He is at his nicest setting he can be, but ya know, pretending to love someone often leads to just that. He has been doeting on her every chance he can and has evem gone the extra mile of allowing her to move in. He does have feelings for her, maybe even more than he had for Beth.

"Oooo, they're here. I can't wait to meet your best friend!" She excitedly says. And that's another thing- she doesn't know she's meeting Rick. Going to the door, she and Daryl open it up and two of three of the four people are shocked. "Rick?

"Michone?"

"Rick?" Beth shyly asks.

"Daryl?" All of them ask in unison and Daryl pretends he doesn't understand the confusion.

"Michone, you look..." His eyes fill with panic as he notices her baby bump, which is slightly bigger than Beth's. "Good."

"How do you two know each other?"

"Umm..." Michone looks away.

"Well..." Rick doesn't want to answer.

"We met at a policeman's expo." Michone says honestly.

"Actually it was at the Police Station on 3rd and Asbury." Rick reaccounts. It doesn't take long for Beth to figure out what has happened between them- it's written all over their faces. Daryl fights like hell to hide his amusement.

"Oh...I didn't know you two were already aquainted. Well shall we eat dinner and share a few stories?"  Daryl politely says and they all awkwardly move to the table. As they start to eat, Daryl tells them about him and Michone, protraying love and care to her- causing Beth and Rick to simmer with jealousy. "Aww it's been a wonderful month."

"It has...Beth, Daryl tells me you're expecting?"

"Yeah...three months along." If she thought about it, the months wouldn't have added up to when she had xover up sex with Rick. Uh oh.

"Me too!!" Michone says and Daryl inwardly smiles. The bait already hooked the fish.

"I'm going to get some more coffee, would anyone like anything while I'm up?" Daryl says kindly and kisses the top of Michone's head before getting ready to leave.

"Let me help you with that." Rick says and stands up. Beth expects him to kiss her like Daryl had Michone, but he completely ignores her, which makes the situation worse. Once in the kitchen, Rick is right by Daryl's side. "Hey, so um...I think I should tell you something..."

"Tell me what?" He acts as if he doesn't know and watches Rick becomes almost static like.

"Umm...well...Michone's baby- it isn't yours."

"I know." He says without an amount of shock. Rick pulls back a bit.

"Well, I figured you knew..."

"Then why bring it up?"

"Because the baby's mine. Daryl, Michone and I had a thing three months ago... I didn't know I got her pregnant." He seems remorseful and Daryl becomes slightly agitated. But he already knew this so he lets it slide off his back. "Aren't you gonna say anuthing?"

"Yeah....that baby in Beth is mine. Oh and congrats." Daryl says kind of stiffly and walks back out with the coffee. Rick leans against the counter, bewildered by what Daryl said. Doing the math in his head, it finally processes and makes sense. Going back out, he finds Daryl sitting at the table and Michone conversing with Beth, who seems slightly annoyed as it is. He nods his head slowly to himself and feeks like a complete jackass.

"And that's why I took the job as the secretary instead of officer..." He can barely hear Michone and Beth talking through the static noise in his head. How could he have been played like that? Worse, how could he, a cop, not see what was going on?

Daryl just stands by the open balconey door and watches his friend unfold. His friend was the first to be unfaithful, the pain would never equal out for both of them.

"Rick, are you alright?" Beth asks and Rick can barely look in her direction.

"Yeah, yer a little pale there buddy boy. Maybe you wanna go lay down, or get some fresh air on the balconey?" Daryl says with almost a smug smile on his face. He's tired of being shit on, so now, now he has uncaged the beast within him. Rick contonues to nod his head and walks a lil closer toward Daryl, and soon his anger takes the better of him and he charges Daryl and starts wailing on him. Daryl hits back because finally, he's done with this shit. The women stand up and are yelling at the men to stop it, but it's too late, by the time, Daryl falls over the balconey into an open dumpster, causing the lid to fall down with the impact. Looking over the balconey, all of them are shocked and Rick finally comes back to his senses.

"Oh my god. Daryl!" He calls and starts going down the fire escape as the women go to the elevator. Getting down there, Rick opens the lid and finds Daryl laying amongst the trash staring up at the night sky. When Beth makes it through the door, she races over and begins to cry and shake. Michone too is worried for the man.

"Guess we always knew I was a piece of trash." Daryl says half angry and half trying to be amusing. Rick tries to help him out and Daryl brushes him off anf hops out of the dumpster and starts painfully walking down the alley.

"Daryl, I'm so sorry." Rick calls and Daryl just keeos walking, his sillohuette just raise his hand up and flips them off before disappearing from their sight.