I am all alone, or so I felt. The world has gone to the dead and I am the lone survivor of my family. Both my parents are dead and my siblings are gone, too. I moved south to Georgia and found myself running with a group of survivors, and I fell in love with a certain crossbowman...

The breeze from the graveyard keeps murmuring death

Too much time harbors thoughts in heads

Now I'm compelled to care

About a future that's going nowhere

The world has gone to the dead. Zombies. Flesh-eaters. Geeks. Walkers. The dead come to life - they reanimate - and they kill people. Is this God's plan for us all? I know the Bible says the dead will come back to us, but is this what He means? This is Hell for us all. And how can we survive? The humans race in its entirety, I mean. We now live the shells of lives that once were, things we once had. How can we start again with this Hell on Earth? This Hell that keeps trying to kill us off one by one...

I tucked my long bangs behind my ear and out of my face, then looking into the scope of my 22-caliber gun. I could see a walker twenty yards away moving towards me. I cracked my neck from side to side and looked into the scope again, placing my finger against the trigger and pulling. The bullet sped out of the nozzle and I smiled to myself as the walker went down, blood spattering from the back of its open head wound.

"Nice shot." I jolted up and whirled around, seeing none other than Daryl Dixon standing behind me with his crossbow over his shoulder and a smirk on his face. Red came to my cheeks and I blushed from the crossbowman's compliment.

"Thanks." I said quietly, letting out a small smile. "We all know I've had lots of practice with this thing..." I looked to my gun and cracked my knuckles in my free hand as I rested the gun on my shoulder. I seemed to have a habit of cracking my knuckles when I was nervous. Before my mom died, she would have told me not to do that because it would eventually lead to arthritis in my hands; but that wasn't true. It was an old wives' tale, whatever that means...

"C'mon. Let's get back to Rick and the others before dark." Daryl looked to the sky above the trees and saw clouds of plum purple and sherbet against the sunset. I nodded once, and Daryl and I took off towards our base camp again.

We took out two more walkers as we hurried back to camp. I was about to shoot the first one but Daryl held me back, saying that Rick told him the walkers were more feral at night. I narrowed my gaze and hit the zombie point blank range with the barrel of my gun - without firing it. Daryl said I looked badass when I killed the walkers. I blushed again at his compliment and then Daryl took out the second walker with an arrow, making sure to retrieve it after the walker went down and motionless.

I found Daryl quite the attractive specimen. Before the world as we knew it ended, I was in college and on my way to becoming a scientist. In high school, I was smart and socially awkward and would never have seen myself friends with a rugged-looking southerner like Daryl but the world has changed so much in these short months. The genius fell in love with the hard-shelled jock, of sorts, myself being the girl with the genius IQ.

Our fast-paced walk back to the farmhouse was silent and swift, and made me think about how I've been falling for Daryl for a while now. I love him but I feel I have no chance with him. He's out there being his incredible self and I'm here in the background trying to survive in this hellish underworld.

As I stand here all alone in the cold wondering where I'm going today

Then a snowflake fell and it felt like a kiss

Now I'm okay

I looked to the ground which was almost pitch-black and chewed on my lower lip, trying to send a subliminal message to Daryl, urging him to speak to me to end the odd silence; but he said nothing. I was wondering what to say to him to stop the deafening silence between us but nothing I could think of sounded good enough to say.

We hadn't heard a thing until a snap was heard behind us. Daryl and I whirled around and I couldn't help but scream as a walker jumped upon me and tried to bite my flesh. Daryl jumped and pulled the walker off of me, which was now trying to attack him. The crossbowman felt the ground for his crossbow but it was nowhere. In this darkness, it was almost invisible. I felt my heart race and tears threatened to sting my eyes. Who knows how many more of them are out there? And we're still a ways away from the Greene farmhouse. I grabbed my 22 from the ground and rammed it into the back of the walker's skull and it fell limp onto Daryl. He wretched as it smelled awful, just as a rotting corpse should smell like, and he got up and looked me over, taking my arms in his hands and tearing my shirtsleeves to look for bite marks.

"Daryl, what the Hell are you doing?" It wasn't natural for me to partake in cursing but this was as good a time as any. It was cold without the long sleeves of my shirt and I'd already felt the warmth fade within me. Before I knew it, Daryl took me into his arms and held me tight.

"I was scared I'd lost you..." Daryl said to me.

My eyes widened. "What?"

Daryl pulled away from me, still holding my hands in his own, and looked into my eyes. "Don't you see? I love you. I can't lose you. Ever." Daryl cupped my face in his hands and he kissed me long and firmly on the lips, my eyes closing and the world fading around us. Really, for the first time in my life, I felt... whole.

The ringing from the bells keeps screaming out love

As snow fell from the Heavens above

Directionless no more

Emptiness no more

Our kiss deepened and I let my gun drop to the ground at my feet. My bare arms in tattered garb snaked around Daryl's back, and his arms encircled me protectively. When the kiss broke, Daryl let out a smile. "The wolf fell for the she-wolf in sheep's clothing." I let out a smile as he looked into my eyes and kissed me again, even longer this time, and I smiled through the kiss. Despite losing everyone I cared about in my old life - my parents, my siblings - I still had Daryl. Daryl was the only one I cared about more than a friend, and I absolutely refused to lose him. After all, he was all I had left to live for.

Now I don't feel so all alone in the cold wondering where I'm going today

For a snowflake fell and it felt like a kiss

Now I'm okay