It makes him frantic.

Might seem melodramatic. It's not. It's really fucking not. There were times after - two big ones that he can think of, and look at how the second one turned out - where she really did do that to him. Made him like that. Freaked him out that way. Messed him up.

Running was fine - not fine, really, but it was a known quantity. He knows how to run. She does too. Sooner or later they always do. Fighting - sure. Sucks, terrifying sometimes, but whatever; you do it or you die, it's a pretty binary situation, and there's always been something comforting about that. The end of the world has a way of stripping things down, simplifying many of them.

Massively complicating others.

She fucks him up. He knows she doesn't know how much. She might suspect, now, but if money meant anything at all anymore he would lay all of it down on the bet that she doesn't know, because there are still some things he can hide. She's been so strong since they started running, it's awed him, and he hasn't said anything because every time he tries to work up the language, the language utterly fails him. There aren't words for her, for what she does. He's been weak as a newborn kitten since this whole fiasco began - maybe even before, maybe it's just that now he's realizing how true that was and is - but she's held it together with a stubborn determination he can scarcely comprehend. She's kept moving, kept him moving, and the wonder of it all, wonder of wonders, is that he would also bet all that money that he doesn't need to tell her that he's grateful in order for her to know it.

But she fucks him up, when she falters. When she cries. Because he stands there like a fucking idiot and he gawks at her with his clumsy stupid body and his clumsy stupid hands and his clumsy stupid brain running in wild circles, and he should be able to do something and he never can.

He wants to fix it and he never knows how.

When they found the bodies and she just stared at them and he watched her fall apart right in front of him. He bit his lips so hard they bled but it's not like that helped her at all. Like he would suffer if it would make things better, because suffering is something he knows he can do very well, but that's not what she needs.

He was leaving her alone in it and he hated it. Wanted to reach her. Show her. It wasn't that he didn't give a shit. Wasn't that he looked at her and he didn't feel anything.

God, you can feel so much that it paralyzes you. You really can.

So there was that. There were other times. Then, finally, there was the schnapps, and that - looking back on it - was when everything broke open, shattered like that bottle, because it was ridiculous and it felt useless but he did something and she stopped crying.

And then later she smiled a little. He made her smile. Until he fucked it all up again, because that's what he does.

But that was the thing. What she did. To him. For him. She didn't leave him alone in it. She wouldn't let him be alone. She broke in. Broke and entered and she didn't leave.

That was three days ago.

He doesn't know what he expected. He doesn't know what he thought would happen. That everything would be different, maybe. Or maybe everything would slip back into the exact same routine, the fire and the moonshine being only temporary madness - wonderful madness, but madness like that never lasts. It burns away to nothing under the force of its own intensity.

Instead the truth is somewhere in between. It's been the same: they make camp, they eat, they drink whatever water they've been able to find, they sleep in shifts, they pack up and run again. It's as mind-numbing as it always was. He can feel that dull shell starting to reassert itself, slide over him. Enclose him in gray nothing.

But then he looks at her and all that goes away, and he feels like maybe he can do things again. Like he's not clumsy and stupid, and he doesn't have to be useless.

And she's smiling more. She's smiling at him.

He has no idea what to do with any of that.

Except some things really don't change. And here they are, night three Post-Moonshine, and it's his shift and it's a gross night, thick and muggy, one of those nights where the air itself feels like sweat, and the trees around them are full of all kinds of sounds that would be safe and familiar if they weren't all mingling and coalescing somehow into something very disquieting, and Beth is curled by the dying fire and crying in her sleep.

And he's just sitting here, turning his knife over and over in his hands. Clumsy and stupid.

It's been going on for about ten minutes now, off and on. Soft; she never groans or screams no matter how bad her nightmares seem to be. She never thrashes around. She curls up, makes herself small like she's trying to protect herself from something, and he knows what that looks like, feels like, to try to save yourself that way, and it's like a punch in the heart. She whimpers, sighs, lets out quiet little sobs. She sounds so young and so weak, and she sounds alone, and he knows she's strong, that she's one of the strongest people he's ever known, tough enough to chew nails… But she can be weak too. Of course she can.

And fuck, he should do something.

There are no bottles of peach schnapps here to hurl to the ground.

Frantic, everything tightening up. She won't attract any attention; it's not about that. She's not anywhere near loud enough. It's just about how he hates it, it's the worst, and he watches her trembling form in the last of the firelight and he wants to scream. He wants to hit everything in the world but her, tear it apart around her - maybe, in the process, destroy whatever is tormenting her in her sleep.

Probably not, though.

He looks down at the knife, at its faint gleam. Up at a moon haloed in moisture-haze. At the whispering trees.

It's all such bullshit and he's the worst of all of it.

And without meaning to, without realizing it, he's looking at her again and he's thinking what's the worst that could happen?

He has no idea what that's about until he remembers, and he doesn't know how he could have forgotten. Except he didn't forget. There were just connections he never drew, because he's him and she's her and of course those connections wouldn't exist. Of course he couldn't… He's not like her. He's nothing like her. He could never be anything like how and what she is.

But he's gazing at her now - the faint ruddy sheen of her hair, the outlined slope of her shoulder and side and her knees drawn up to her chest, her arms tucked in close to her body - and he can't stop thinking about it now that he's begun.

There are things she would say. Or perhaps not her at all.

C'mon, you fuckin' pussy. What's the worst that could happen?

Is that really a question that should get asked at the moment?

You wanna be clumsy and stupid, follow your fuckin' bliss.

No. No, he doesn't. Christ, he doesn't, it's wrenching him inside, tying him into knots, watching her shiver and moan so low, the glistening tracks of her tears clearly visible on her cheek and nose. He doesn't want to be clumsy and stupid. He wants to do something. Like she did for him.

She showed him something.

So before he can talk himself out of it, he moves.

Slow. Easing toward her, almost like he's creeping up on her - does it have to be like that, does his brain have to draw that kind of connection, oh my God - but it's not like he would wake her anyway. Not like this. Sometimes he grits his teeth and waits for her to wake up on her own, sometimes he prods her - gingerly - until she does, but either way, she never comes out of these things easily.

She always comes out of them exhausted. Like she's been fighting her way up from something very dark and very deep. Something that doesn't want to let her go.

So she won't wake up when he lowers himself down to sit behind her, facing the fire. She won't wake up when he lays a very, very tentative hand on her upper arm. When he squeezes her, shakes her a little. She stirs, whimpers again and mutters something that might be a word, but otherwise she's gone.

Far away.

So - oh Christ, he can do this, he really can, he has no excuse for not doing it, what's the fucking worst that could fucking happen, is she going to set him on fire or something, is she going to do something to his organs that causes him to explode - she won't wake up when he reaches for her with both hands, takes her shoulders, and, as gently as he can, gentle like she's made of blown glass and could shatter, tugs her into his arms.

It's very awkward. When she held him before he wasn't facing her. She had her arms around his waist and her head between and just below his shoulderblades, and it felt so close, agonizingly so, but there was also distance. He still had a bit of protection. Now there's none, now he's pulling her against his chest, and it's so fucking weird, and he's so fucking bad at it, he sucks at this just like he knew he would, he's clumsy and stupid even when he tries to do something. He took her to the shack and the moonshine last time he tried, and he just ended up hurting her worse in the end.

But he doesn't let go. He holds on. And she's still shivering, letting out soft, breathy sounds, but just as he's certain he's doing nothing to help and he should let her go-

She burrows into him.

It's not slight. It's not a sleep-slowed movement, barely there. She angles her body and presses against him, seeking him, her face buried in his shirt and her breath and tears hot against his skin - and all of her is hot, burning, and it's not residual heat from the fire; it's her.

She's burning in his arms like a little fever. And he has no idea what the fuck to do.

So he just holds her tighter. And when she whimpers again, levers herself more fully into his lap, he doesn't try to stop her.

This is very confusing.

But maybe he is helping. Maybe he's doing that. Maybe if he curls her against him and moves his hands slowly over her back, strokes her - maybe that might be good. Might not bring her out of whatever she's lost in, but it might reach her somehow. Might make it a little better.

Probably stupid, but it might.

She's still trembling but she's also settling, at least a bit, her arms still tucked in close and her legs still drawn up but the muscles of her shoulders and back loosening the smallest amount. She sniffles, pulls in a shuddering breath, and when he obeys yet another bizarre and possibly ill-advised impulse and cups the back of her head, fingers moving aimlessly against her tangled hair, she whispers something against the base of his throat.

He can't hear. Is willing to abandon it to the category of general sleep-talk. But then she says it again, some voice behind it, and he freezes.

"Daddy."

Of course. Of course it would be this. She hasn't ever made it this blatant before, but very likely it's this far more often than it's not. Possibly the most horrible thing that's ever happened to her. More than enough fuel for a lifetime of nightmares.

And suddenly just holding her isn't enough; he gives in, doesn't overthink it, strokes her hair again and presses his lips to her hairline and murmurs the only thing he can think of, even if it's a fucking lie.

"It's alright." Speaking against her skin, into her hair. "It's okay, Beth."

Even though it's not.

But she's loosening still more, and as she does she seems to be crying more freely, shaking but not with the kinds of tremors he identifies with fear. She's soaking his shirt, every breath shaky and tear-clogged, and he fucking hates it when she cries but maybe this is good. Maybe it's actually good for her to do this.

In the end, when it was all over and he was limp in the circle of her arms, it was good. It was still awful, but it was like poison had been drained out of him, and he didn't feel alone.

"Daryl," she breathes thickly, and for a fraction of a second panic grips him. She's awake. Shit shit shit she's awake and she knows and she's going to pull away, be very not okay with this, he's stepped across some kind of line, he's fucked up somehow, again, but then she twists in a way no conscious person would and his stomach plunges straight into the ground.

Because it's like he already knows what's coming.

"Help him," she chokes. "I- God- help him, Daryl, help Daddy, please."

This isn't fair. It's not her fault, Christ no, but it's not fair, because he's trying to help, and he… He can't.

Not that way.

Maybe I coulda done somethin'.

Maybe.

He has no idea what to say, and she almost certainly can't hear him anyway. And maybe he could have done something but that was then and now there's fuck-all he can do.

So he just holds her tighter. And after a while she quiets, begins to go still, and he knows that whatever it was she was lost in, she got out.

She made it.

I'm sorry, he thinks. He won't say it, can't, can't bear to and he knows that even if he has the words in his head, once they hit his tongue they'll disintegrate into a jumble of random syllables, utterly devoid of meaning, and he'll be left with nothing, clumsy and stupid. But right now he does have them in here, and he thinks them because it's better than nothing. I'm so sorry, I'm sorry I fucked up, I'm sorry I didn't do anything, I'm sorry that maybe I really couldn't have done anything because I should have been able to, I'm sorry I'm so bad at this, I'm sorry you're in there alone and I can't reach you and I can't get you out, I'm sorry, I should be better, you deserve better, you deserve so much better than this.

Than me.

She might not agree. It doesn't matter. She's very sweet and she's very kind but it's still true, and it's even truer because of those things.

But now she's quiet, lying against him, and he probably doesn't have to do this anymore, he can probably lay her back down by the fire and leave her alone… but he doesn't want to. It hits him, disturbing: He doesn't want to let go of her.

She feels good like this.

He gapes at it. Because it feels so wrong, given what just happened. This is not supposed to feel good. He's not supposed to want her here. Not with what got her here. Is he allowed that? Is he allowed to want this? Just how fucked up is he, really?

But it feels good. She's warm and she's soft, and she's small but there's such a solidity to her, a kind of power that has nothing to do with size. He can feel that too, and that's part of it. That's part of why.

He felt it when she had him. When she held on. He surrendered to it, because he was so tired and because he finally knew he could, and she would take care of him.

So maybe this is okay.

"'s alright,' he whispers, lips moving so close to her brow as his hands drift over her back, her hair. The outlines of her bones, her tight musculature, how well it seems to fit here. How this doesn't even feel difficult anymore. It just feels right. "I gotcha. I gotcha, Beth."

She shivers. But it feels like nothing more than an aftershock of terror. And after a second or two, she nods.

And she's probably not awake. But she might be.

That thought isn't as frightening as it was.

So he doesn't let go, not until he's too tired to stay awake anymore and it's her turn, and then he lays her carefully down, smooths her out, her clothes and her hair, leaves her for a few moments and comes back to wake her like he always does.

She never says anything about it, so he has no idea if she knows. The next day is business as usual - that same strange combination of everything-the-same and everything-different - but it all feels a little more different than before. And it could just be him. It could be. But he kind of wants it to not be.

Whatever that was…

He's not sure he wants to be alone in it.