Closed Starter for @pythzn
It was the third day of him not feeling well. Daryl wasn’t the type to complain but Rick had noticed and all but demanded he get checked out by Siddiq. In Daryl’s mind, if he was conscious and not bit then he was fine but Rick had disagreed, so to keep the peace, he went. It only took Siddiq about three minutes to realize Daryl was running a low fever, which hadn’t phased Daryl much. But after a thorough examination with Siddiq poking and prodding him all over, the diagnosis came down and Daryl had to pick his jaw up off the ground.
It’d been years since his last one, before the world ended and not a single one since. Living rough on the road, barely enough food to survive, the stress, the exhaustion, it didn’t surprise him they stopped. It certainly wasn’t the right time to try and reproduce. Then at the prison, despite the better food and conditions, he hadn’t gone into heat then either. At that point he figured maybe they’d stopped naturally, even though he’d been a bit young for that, or that maybe the rough living had done permanent damage to his body, rendered him infertile. Either way, he didn’t expect to get another one ever again.
It had become so foreign to him that he hadn’t even recognized the early signs of it. Siddiq said he had about two days before he’d need to ride it out, take it easy for four or five days until it passed. He was not looking forward to that, or to tell Rick, he felt embarrassed for being so stupid about it. Still, he made his way back to their home, head hanging a little low even as he walked in the front door. He saw Rick in the kitchen and no kids in sight so it felt like a good time to broach the subject.
“Well, I ain’t sick but um, y’know how I told I didn’t get heats anymore? Surprise sounds like it should be here in a day or two.” he grimaced. Why was this so embarrassing?