Top 10 Carol and Daryl moments on The Walking Dead

3. We Ain’t Ashes

From season 5 episode 6: “Consumed”

This was probably the deepest conversation that these two characters ever had. Carol is still in a dark place emotionally and she’s physically banged up too. They are stuck in the office building without any weapons because Noah took their weapons. They are still surveilling Grady Memorial trying to figure out how to get Beth out.

They start talking about everything that has happened and how it changed them. Daryl asks Carol about something she had said about him, that he wasn’t like he used to be. He asked her what she meant. She tells him that before, back in the quarry camp, he had been like a boy but now he’s a man. And he asks her how she’s changed. She tells him:

"Me and Sophia stayed at that shelter for a day and a half before I went running back to Ed. I went home, I got beat up, life went on, and I just kept praying for something. But I didn’t do anything. Not a damn thing. Who I was with him… she got burned away. And I was happy about that. I mean, not happy, but… and at the prison, I got to be who I always thought I should be, thought I should’ve been. And then she got burned away. Everything now just… consumes you."

Daryl looks her in the eye and tells her, “Hey, we ain’t ashes”.

It’s a beautiful moment where he again gives her that subtle, quiet support that she needs. He doesn’t try to ignore or minimize her pain or what she’s going through. He just loves her. And lets her go through what she needs to go through. She does the same for her. The relationship that these two have is a great example of unconditional love. Neither tries to change the other person. They understand each other and accept each other unconditionally.