A/N: Hi! Yes, I know there might a person or two out there waiting for a prevaricate or hands clean update, and I swear I'll never give up, Jack, but my mind gets distracted and then things like this happen. Totally experimental here, but I basically have the entire story done, just needs editing. Reviews are welcome, as always. I do not own nor am I affiliated with TWD, AMC, any of the recognizable characters, any parts of song lyrics/songs used for chapters/titles, etc.

chapter 1: all my tears have been used up

"There a reason you're here?"

She sucks in a harsh – but, thankfully, quiet – breath as his words fill and stretch the vacant air between them.

She's surprised that he's acknowledging her presence. Surprised that he knows she's there, because she's standing several feet behind him and he's got his back turned to her and she knows she's being and has been quiet. Invisible, almost.

She doesn't answer. Maybe she can't. Maybe she doesn't know what to say. Maybe she's pretending that she's not actually there.

She shouldn't be.

He's patient, to an extent. She knows this. He's the same as he's always been. The same as he's been since she first met him. Since she first loved him.

The air is thick here. It's a muggy day. Early summer. There's a light breeze, but it's not the kind that cools or refreshes. It only seems to make the air thicker and more difficult to inhale. Maybe all it's doing is pushing the thickness around in invisible waves.

She looks down at the hem of her sundress and picks at it a little with her lightly-trembling fingers, because it's sticking in random places to the sweaty skin of her thighs. It's nothing too over-the-top, her dress. Nothing too happy.

He sighs audibly and she watches with wide eyes as he stands from where he's been squatting for the better part of the last hour. She sees the shadows cast by the trees that surround the grounds here begin to shift as he half-turns his body toward hers.

Her first instinct – and it's strong and heavy and almost chokes her with its weight – is to take a drop-step backward and then make a run for her car. Assuming she can find it. Assuming she can remember where she parked it earlier that morning.

But she swallows it down, that instinct, and it slides down her esophagus on top of the saliva that's built up in the back of her throat.

The ground is fresh where he's now standing. He keeps his eyes narrowed and directed towards her as he takes a few steps backwards and then a bit to the side so he can perch his ass on the side ledge of a headstone.

It doesn't belong to anyone in his family. Not hers, either.

She's not entirely sure what she's thinking, if she's thinking at all. Her eyes slide upward from his boots to his mildly dirty, dark blue jeans and half-tucked-in blue shirt, which is underlying the same denim vest that he always wears and has always worn, and then stop abruptly when they reach his face.

He's lit up a smoke, and she can just barely catch the scent of it as the feeble breeze carries it away from the space he occupies and into hers.

"Havin' food and shit at Rick's. Ain't nothin' else goin' on here. 'S a damn graveyard, Beth."

His voice is low and his face is angled slightly downward toward the ground, but she catches each word individually as he speaks them.

She finds her voice eventually, as she begins taking small, shuffling steps across the neatly-manicured lawn. Not exactly towards him. But sort of.

"I know. Just didn't get the chance to talk to ya much at the – at his services. Haven't really – ain't seen ya in a while, Daryl."

She's a few feet – but, still, an entire world – away from him when he lifts his head. He jerks it backward, just slightly, to maneuver the dark, shaggy hair out of his eyes. And then he looks at her again.

And there's something there in his eyes that she can't identify.

"Talk?" He snorts and takes a rough drag from his cigarette. "The fuck y'wanna talk 'bout? Weather? News?"

"I just –" she starts, and it sounds semi-confident, but she doesn't know how to finish. And that's nothing new for her – not when it comes to him and them and here and now and then.

"Just wanted to tell ya I'm sorry, I guess." She looks down. "'Bout Merle. Know how much he meant to ya."

He shakes his head at her before sliding his own eyes to the ground, kicking it a little with the toe of one boot.

"Nothin' everyone in this town ain't been expectin' for years. Hell, he's my damn brother and I don't even know how he made it long as he did, way he acted. Yain't gotta pretend you're sorry."

"I'm not." Her response is almost immediate. And it's true. And she wants him to know that for some reason.

"Not pretendin', that is," she clarifies quietly.

"Where's Annie?" He's stepping closer to her now. "Maggie got her? Didn't see Jim by your side at the funeral home."

She's surprised – again – for a moment. That he'd even notice something like that. Something like the absence of her boyfriend.

Recently turned ex-boyfriend. But he doesn't know that. It's a new development. One that she hasn't even shared with her and Daryl's daughter. Because the death of her uncle was much more important. No need for piling more stress on top of the five year-old girl's shoulders.

She clears her throat. He's just a few inches away from her now, blowing smoke out the side of his mouth.

"Oh, um – yeah. Maggie's got her. I'm sure they're at Rick and Lori's."

He furrows his eyebrows and his blue eyes are dancing between hers for a few silent moments. And then he nods.

"Thanks for bringin' her. Know it ain't no picnic, that two-hour drive. 'Specially with a kid."

She shrugs and smiles a little. Squints into the sun and tilts her head upward so that she can look at him.

"'S okay. I was already plannin' to be bringin' her up next weekend for ya'll's campin' trip anyhow. And – look, Daryl. Don't feel like ya gotta keep her for the week after all of this. We can reschedule. It's only June. Plenty of summer left."

Without being aware of it, they'd begun walking toward the western edge of the cemetery, towards the street.

He's biting on his thumbnail, maintaining a couple of feet of space between them without any effort that she notices.

"Ain't gonna have no more vacation days after this. Not 'til after October, at least. And then she'll be in school. Shit."

He sighs.

She's silent for a moment as they continue to walk.

"We ain't in any rush to leave town." She keeps her head and her eyes forward, halfheartedly squinting at the road in front of them to see if she can spot her car.

"School out for the summer already?"

She nods.

"Did Jim quit his job or somethin'?"

She keeps her mouth shut for a few minutes and notices that their pace has slowed.

She can feel his eyes on the side of her face, and it burns her skin a little. She hasn't spent more than ten or so minutes with him – alone, at least – in the last three years. Not that she can remember, anyway. Always just brief hand-offs of the child they share. Or text messages, now that he's better at it and it no longer takes him three hours to compose the same number of sentences.

His stare doesn't waver, so she shakes her head and sucks her bottom lip into her mouth before popping it out and turning slightly towards him.

"We ain't together anymore." Her voice is soft and she wonders if the words she's spoken will get lost in the expanse of air that stretches between them.

And as if on cue, her sandaled feet contact the pavement of the sidewalk and she catches a glimpse of her silver Chevy Cobalt a few yards up the road.

"Thank God," she sighs. "Was beginnin' to wonder if I actually drove here or not."

They've stopped walking, but he's still looking at her. She awkwardly taps a foot on the pavement.

"Left my bike at the funeral home," he mumbles, shifting his gaze towards his own feet. "Rode over here with Rick and Lori. Wasn't thinkin' 'bout after."

"Come on," she says, turning in the direction of her car.

"'S okay, I can walk."

"Don't be stupid, Daryl," she blurts. And she slaps a hand over her mouth. Because she instantly regrets it. Because it reminds her of a long time ago. When they were them.

She feels her throat growing red and, after seeing the half-smirk that's formed on his scruffy face, her face heating up.

"Sorry," she says, squeezing her eyes shut for a moment with the hopes of regaining some composure. "I mean, if ya wanna walk to think and be alone and stuff, then I get it. But otherwise, please let me give ya a ride. Your daughter wants to see you."

His smirk and face fall a little as she speaks, but he lifts his eyes to her and they're the glowing blue base of a flame.

"God, I wanna see her," he says on an exhale. "Fuckin' love her, Beth. Best thing I ever done with my life. Merle loved her, too. He's been talkin' 'bout our campin' trip for weeks 'til – well, 'til this."

Beth feels an acute twinge of pain in her chest. And it's been there since last week, when she got the call from Daryl that Merle had passed away, but it'd changed and dulled a little as the shock had worn off.

But now it's splintering and breaking apart like little chips of wood, filling and emptying her all at once. And a lump forms gradually but fiercely in the base of her throat when she hears Daryl, the man she first loved and still loves and always will because he's the father of her child, choking on his own shallowly-inhaled breaths in an effort to avoid spilling a tear over his brother.

She stops walking abruptly and, in one motion, turns around to face him and presses her body into his and tightly wraps her bare, slender arms around his tensed shoulders.

And he exhales so deeply that it sounds a little like relief.

And if he could hear her over his own struggle to normalize his breathing, he'd know that the breath she exhaled against his chest sounded just the same.

His arms are tight around her waist and his head is dipped low into the skin that spreads smoothly from her neck to her shoulder. She feels him shudder and breathe and sob quietly. And she whispers her condolences, reminds him – though he's well aware – that she loves Merle, that Annie loves Merle, and that he has his memories and no, it'll never be the same but it'll get better, I promise you, Daryl.

And eventually they pull themselves together and apart and awkwardly wipe their eyes and noses while staring at the ground between them.

Wordlessly, they get into her car. Wordlessly, she drives the few short miles to Rick and Lori's house.

And when they walk inside the house and she watches as Daryl and Annie embrace – and she hasn't seen their interaction, not in this way, in a very, very long time – she feels another lump form in her throat. And it's different. Harder. Denser.

For just a moment, the spaces between her eyes and her mind are saturated – assaulted – with an abridged version of their past.

She's crying. Annie's in her car seat, asleep. He paces, and a look of something somewhere in between disgust and disappointment is plastered across his face.

"I'm sorry, Daryl," she whispers. "I wish there was another way."

He looks at her, and all she can see is fear. Anger. Sorrow. Desperation, like the kind she feels.

"I love you, Beth. Love you both. Can't get my shit together. Not with ya'll here. Ain't fair to you. Ain't fair to her. Shit's been so bad."

She's forgiven him – or she's trying. She's trying to forgive herself. And she's leaving. She has to, for the sake of her heart and his and for the sake of their daughter's. Before it's too late. Before the resentment turns into something like hate. Something worse, like indifference. Maybe it's already too late, here and now – she doesn't know. They're so fucked up – she is and he is and yet they created this perfect human, this beautiful little girl – this accident – with the bluest eyes and the sandiest version of fine, light-colored hair. None of it's fair.

"Y'alright?"

The present snaps back into focus, and he's here – still here – and he's standing in front of her with Annie squirming in his arms.

"Oh," she whispers, and she notices the subtle concern in his eyes. "Yeah, sorry, I – I'm just a little tired."

"Daddy says we gonna stay for a while!" Annie's voice is enthusiastic.

Daryl holds a finger up to his lips. "Told ya, li'l one. We're gonna talk 'bout it later with your momma."

Beth sighs, because she's still hoping to mention something to Maggie before Annie does.

"I'm gonna get some food and say hi to everyone," she says, patting Annie on the head.

"Can we talk after ya eat?" Daryl asks quietly, distracting Annie with Uncle Merle's dog tags.

Beth nods and curls her lips into a small smile. "Just holler at me if she gets wild, okay? Couple hours past N-A-P time."

She makes her way toward the kitchen, sparing Daryl and Annie one more glance as she rounds the corner at the entryway.

And runs headfirst into her sister's chest.

"Jesus, Maggie. Sorry," she breathes, clutching her chest.

Maggie narrows her eyes.

"What's your problem?" Beth moves to walk past her older sister only for Maggie to block her trajectory, again, with her body.

"I don't think you stayin' here's a good idea, Beth. We should talk."