I have been missing Daryl and Beth from this particular world - especially from the time when they were just starting out.
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She has grown up, watching musicals where the heroine bursts into song and dance when they're in love and they want the entire world to know about it.
But Beth knows her life isn't a musical – no matter how sometimes she wishes so badly that it was – and even though she's in love, she can't sing about it no matter how badly she wants to. She's in love with Daryl Dixon - and she can't let a single person know about it.
It bothers her but she knows there's not much she can do about it because no matter how much of a lie it all is, the town has one opinion of Daryl Dixon and one opinion only. His last name is Dixon and therefore, he is lower than mud on the road. They don't know him but they feel they don't have to know him. Why should they? He's a Dixon and all of the Dixons are alike and the world would be a better place if they were all just thrown into cages with the keys tossed away.
So, she knows she can't burst into song. She can't even hum because if she's humming, her parents will ask why she's so happy and she hates the thought of lying to her parents. She's not necessarily lying to them now – she's just withholding the truth. For some reason, neither her mom or daddy have even thought of asking Beth if she has a man in her life because if they had asked her, Beth would have had no choice but to tell them about her and Daryl and the past few weeks. She knows they won't approve. She knows they will be angry and make demands of her to end it and for the first time, Beth will have to disobey her parents because she knows she won't be able to do that.
For the first time in her twenty-two years, Beth finds herself to be truly happy and she finds herself to be in love and she can't just walk away from that. From him.
And it's scary because she has absolutely no idea how Daryl feels about her. She knows he doesn't love her but she actually doesn't even know if she makes him happy. She sometimes will find herself wondering if she's jumping into this without thinking things through. She may be young but she's never been the one to at reckless. That's always been Maggie. Beth likes to be cautious; to take her time and really look before acting.
It's so strange for her to be acting like this – to be practically throwing herself at a man, to be keeping a secret from her parents, to be keeping a secret from everyone – and yet, she can't imagine having things different for her in any other way.
From the second she got a flat tire on the way back to her family's farm and Daryl Dixon stepped from the woods in the middle of his hunting, she looked at him and within a second, she knew that this man was going to change her whole life.
She wonders what he thought the first time he saw her. She would ask but she knows that there are certain questions Daryl won't answer them and that will be one of them.
Being with Daryl is sometimes like being blind. She just has no idea what she's doing or what he's doing or what to expect. She doesn't even know if he wants her around but he hasn't told her to get out and Daryl is the kind of person who would tell her that if that's what he really wanted but he doesn't say anything so she keeps coming up to his house whenever she can.
It's hard. There are only so many excuses she can use; so many times she can say she's visiting Sasha in Savannah. But her parents trust her – and she tries not to dwell on what will happen once they find out what she's really been doing with her time and who she's been spending that time with – and she's twenty-two and she's an adult who can spend her time as she wishes without needing a chaperone or to ask for permission.
She tries to be as honest with them as much as she can without actually telling them that she's going up into the woods to spend every spare moment she has with Daryl Dixon. She knows they'll know soon enough. She doesn't intend on keeping this a secret from everyone forever. She's only gone along with it because she knows that Daryl is a private person and hasn't wanted anyone to know so she's giving him time to get used to it but she hopes that he knows she's not going to keep it a secret forever. It's been a few weeks but Beth doesn't want the secret to go one much longer than that.
Some nights, she'll get up to the house after work before he does and she'll wait on the front steps, looking up at the sky as it grows darker with night. And it's so quiet up here – just the cabin and the woods and nothing else around for miles. She has always thought the farm had been quiet but there had been crickets and cicadas and the animals in the barn and the faint hum of cars on the highway. But up here, there's absolutely nothing except the wind through the leaves and the occasional rustle of an animal making movement that she can't see and she can understand why he would choose to live up here, away from everyone and everything.
She hears the rumble of his motorcycle and sees the single headlight cutting through the trees and she smiles and stands up as he stops his motorcycle in front of the cabin. And Daryl always gets off and looks at her as she stands on the front steps always the same; as if he can't quite believe that she's there and he has no idea what she's doing there.
"Are you hungry?" She asks. "I've brought some groceries with me tonight."
He shakes his head. He always shakes his head when she tells him that. "You don't gotta be cookin' for me, Beth," he says and he always says that, too.
He seems to never like her doing anything for him.
He walks past her up the steps onto the porch, stopping at the front door, fiddling with the keys on his ring to try and get the one for his house.
"I want to," she tells him as she stands behind him, holding the brown paper bag in her arms. "I'm not going to be able to spend the night so I thought we could have a meal and a nice evening together before I have to leave again."
"Mmmm," Daryl says and nothing else.
He gets the door open and goes into the house, flipping on the lamp next to the door but Beth finds herself staying outside. She always allows herself to be stung when he says something like that no matter how many times she tells herself that it's just Daryl being Daryl. He doesn't have much experience with people and he certainly isn't the sort of person to actually talk. They're nothing alike in both of those aspects.
And she reminds herself of this but anytime Daryl says something like that – and he says things like that often – she feels a sting of pain in the center of her chest and she can't help but be hurt. Anytime he does this – act like he couldn't care one way or another if she's there or not – it makes her just want to leave altogether and not come back again. But being in love apparently makes a person glutton for punishment because he'll say something like that and she'll be hurt but she'll come back the next night and he doesn't even know that he had done anything to hurt her in the first place.
And that's the problem, isn't it? If she doesn't tell him, he'll just keep on doing that. Or maybe he does know and he's trying to hurt her as a way to get her away from him.
He's gone into the bedroom to drop off his wallet and keys and when he steps back in the living room, he sees that she's still standing on the front porch, holding the grocery bag. His brow furrows a little and he frowns as he looks at her.
"You comin' in?" He asks.
She almost does. She almost shakes her head and brushes the sting off and goes into his little kitchen where she'll make them both dinner and they'll then sit at the table together where they'll eat and she'll talk the entire time because he won't say a word.
She looks at him and she so badly wants to be able to do that. But tonight, maybe he'll help her or tonight, maybe he'll actually talk as they eat and they can have a conversation. Maybe tonight, he'll give her a little sign that he likes her being up here or even to what his feelings for her are.
Because in moments like this, she feels like nothing more than some annoying gnat that's constantly flying around his ears.
"No," Beth hears herself say and she feels herself shaking her head before she even really realizes it and Daryl looks genuinely surprised for a moment before his ever-present mask falls over his face and he doesn't show her anything anymore. She steps forward and gently passes the grocery bag from her arms into his. "There's chicken in there so be sure you get that in the refrigerator," she tells him and then quickly turns away before she gives in and goes inside. She can already feel her weak resolve begin to crumble as she leaves the front porch and heads back to her car.
Daryl doesn't say anything and he certainly does nothing to stop her. If she is holding her breath for him to do either of those things, she will definitely pass out.
She doesn't look in her rearview mirror as she drives away, carefully heading down the winding one-lane path back towards the main road. Either he's back inside the house with the door shut and she'll be hurt that he doesn't care at all that she's not staying or he's still standing there with the grocery bag and watching her drive off and she will be tempted to turn around and go back to him and she won't be able to stop herself.
"Hi, doodle-bug," her daddy smiles at her when she gets back home, sitting in the living room, reading that day's newspaper. "I thought you had plans tonight with friends."
Beth does her best to smile. "I did, but I'm a lot more tired tonight than I thought. I just kept thinking how much I wanted to come home and go to bed."
Hershel chuckles at that. "Youth," he then teases and Beth feels herself giving her daddy a genuine small smile.
She's the only one who lives at home anymore. Shawn has moved to Atlanta after college and Maggie is living with a boyfriend – much to Hershel's disapproval – but Beth knows that she'll be moving back in eventually. Maggie is always living with boyfriends and then breaking up and moving back home and Beth doesn't expect her sister's relationship with this latest boyfriend, Randall, to be any different.
"Hi, sweetie," Annette greets her as she comes into the kitchen. "Wasn't expecting you home for a little bit."
"I was just telling daddy that I'm just so tired, I wanted to come home," Beth says. "Do you need any help?" She then asks, seeing her mom in the midst of rolling out dough.
Annette sighs. "I would say yes, but I don't want to drag you into this."
Beth smiles a little. "Garden Club?" She guesses.
"That Janet Moss would fall over if she had to do something other than pose next to her roses and smile," Annette frowns as she rubs more flour on her rolling pin and Beth purses her lips together to keep herself from laughing.
She wishes Garden Club drama was the most conflict she had in her life.
"Are you hungry?" Annette switches topics.
"Not really," Beth answers truthfully with a shake of her head. She's left her appetite back up in the woods on Daryl's front porch. "I'm just going to make some hot chocolate and then go up to my room."
"Alright, sweetie," Annette smiles at her and goes back to rolling and in that moment, Beth is so tempted to tell her everything.
She hates keeping things from her mom and daddy. She's always been so close with both of them and she's never kept secrets from them – at least none that involve her. There are things with Maggie and Shawn that she's kept close to her heart and have never revealed because they are siblings and there are some things that are meant to be kept between just the three of them. But when it comes to her, Beth has always been so open and she's always been able to talk with her parents about pretty much everything.
She's not ashamed of Daryl or the time she has spent with him or falling in love with him. She knows she'll never be ashamed of any of that because she's not like the others in this town. She has gotten to know him over the past few weeks – or rather, she's gotten to know him as much as he was willing to let her – and he's nothing like what people say. But she can't help but think that her parents will hear Dixon and that will be all they need to hear but they hit the roof.
Beth has no one to talk to about this except for Sasha but Sasha has always been like Maggie – strong and independent and will probably tell Beth to just forget about him - and she wishes she could just talk with her mom right now about a breaking heart but that will lead to way too many questions and there's no way Beth will be able keep the secret from her then.
With a steaming mug of hot chocolate in her hands, she leans in and kisses Annette on the cheek. "Good night, mom," she gives her a small smile.
"Good night, sweetie," Annette smiles at her. "Are you sure you're alright?" She then asks, looking over her face closely.
"Of course I am," Beth answers and she hopes her mom can't see anything to the contrary on her face. She's not as good as being expressionless like Daryl.
"Alright," Annette says after a moment, almost reluctantly as if she doesn't quite believe her but she has no proof as to why she shouldn't. "Get some rest."
Beth nods and turns, heading up the back stairs, grateful that she'll be able to go into her room for the rest of the night and not be bothered or be expected to come out again until the next morning.
In her room, Beth closes and locks the door behind her and turns on the small lamp on the nightstand beside her bed. She then goes to her desk and turns on the lamp there as well, giving her room a warm glow to it. She turns on her stereo, making sure the music isn't too loud so it would annoy her parents, and there's a Sam Amidon CD that she had been playing this morning as she got ready for work and she keeps it playing now.
Taking a sip of hot chocolate, she pulls her journal out that she writes in every night before going to bed, recounting the events of that particular day. She knows what tonight's entry will be about. She has no one to talk to about Daryl but she has her journal and she can pour everything into it without fear of being judged or yelled at or punished for even uttering the name Dixon let alone being actually in love with one.
She almost lets out a scream when she hears someone tapping on her window and she gives such a jump, she splashes a few drops of hot chocolate onto the pages of her journal. She spins in her chair to look at what would be tapping on her second-floor window and it takes her brain almost a full minute before it realizes that what she is seeing is actually a who. And it's Daryl.
Beth hurries out of her chair and rushes across the room, unlatching the window and pushing it open. She sticks her head out past him to look down and he's poised there, holding onto the rose trellis that grows on the side of their house, right beneath her window. She then pulls her head back and looks at him with wide eyes.
"Are you insane?" She hisses. "My parents are home and are right downstairs!"
"You mind lettin' me in?" He grunts as he holds onto the windowsill. "I think it'll be more obvious to your parents if I fall down two stories."
Beth quickly takes a step back and then grabbing his hand, she helps him crawl through her bedroom window. She quickly turns the volume of the stereo up just a little bit more – still not too loud but just a little bit louder to mask Daryl Dixon now in her bedroom.
"What are you doing here?" She asks as she moves past him to close the window once again and keep the chill of the autumn night outside where it belongs. Her heart is beating rapidly as she looks at him and she wonders if she has actually fallen asleep and is now dreaming because she can't believe that Daryl is actually here in her bedroom.
Daryl's taking a moment to look around her bedroom and Beth feels the back of her neck flush. She wishes she knew what he was thinking. She has dance ribbons horse riding trophies from competitions and she has a stuffed bear on her bed and books fill the small bookcase – most of them hardback editions of her favorite children's books because she doesn't care how old she is. Anne of Green Gables and other books like that will always be her favorite. She knows she's younger than him but suddenly, she feels so much younger and she's almost sorry that he's in her room now.
Daryl then looks back at her. "I didn' like the way you left earlier," he admits – almost in a mumble as if he's embarrassed to be saying such a thing to her. "And I didn' know how else to talk to you and let you know that."
Beth stares up at him for a moment. "So, you snuck over to my house and crawled through my window?" She asks and the little breaks from earlier, she can feel them all filling in once more and her heart is close to bursting.
Just when she's trying to tell herself that things would be so much better If she didn't love Daryl Dixon, something happens that reminds her that it wouldn't be better at all. Being in love with Daryl Dixon is the best thing of all.
And he likes her. For the first time since this began, Beth knows that he really likes her. If he didn't, he wouldn't have cared how she left and he wouldn't have worried about how he would have been able to talk to her again and he certainly wouldn't have bothered coming here and climbing up the rose trellis through her window. But he's done all of those things and she can't wonder about his feelings for her anymore.
He shrugs then – as if this is all not such a big deal but he's not fooling anyone, especially her, and they both know it.
She smiles faintly up at him and she finally feels as she always feels anytime she's with him. She feels warm and light and like she can do anything in this world because this man is standing next to her. That's how she knows she loves him.
Beth stands on her toes and slips her arms around his broad shoulders and she kisses him softly, brushing her lips across his – once, twice and on the third time, Daryl's arms clasp around her, holding her to him tightly and he kisses her back, adding more pressure from his lips to hers that makes her moan softly.
She's grateful for the music still playing and that she thought to lock the door because now that Daryl's here, she can't imagine letting him leave this bedroom – and her – anytime soon.
She can't help but begin to hum softly against his lips and she feels his twitch as he gives a little smile.
…
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