…
His eyes fluttered open and for a moment, he laid there, wondering what had woken him. His brain felt groggy and he laid there in the bedroom, noting that it was still pitch black both inside and out so he could only guess that it was the middle of the night. It took another passing minute but he then realized that he was laying in their bed alone. That realization was what made him finally lift his head from the pillow. He looked around the dark bedroom as if he was expecting to see her somewhere else in there but the room was empty of her presence.
He then heard the faint tinkling of piano keys and he knew exactly what had woken him up. It wasn't the soft music filtering in from the living room. It was because she had left their bed. A year ago, he wanted nothing more than to always be left alone and now, he couldn't sleep without her.
He sat up, yawning, his brain still tired, and he pulled himself from the bed. His eyes caught the clock on the nightstand and saw that it was a little past one. He wondered how long she had been awake and he wondered how in the hell he hadn't heard her or sensed it the second she got up from bed.
He padded from their bedroom into the living room. The lamp on top of the piano was on, creating a soft glow around her against the darkness of the rest of the room and she sat in one of his flannel shirts, her fingers light and soft on the piano keys.
He stood there for a moment, listening to her play; watching her play. They had been married for a week and everyone in town knew about it by now; the whispers and the stares already getting on his nerves. He wondered how she was handling it. She, after all, had taken a greater risk in marrying him and becoming a Dixon. He could just imagine the shit being said to her about him on a daily basis but she never came home and told him about any of it. Never complained or cried or showed her anger. Everything just seemed to roll off her shoulders in regards to them and this marriage and he didn't understand how she did it but a part of him wasn't really that surprised. That was just who Beth Greene – now Beth Dixon – was.
He shuffled to her and to the piano he had gotten at an estate sale – an upright Kimball that had needed the wood treated and a badly needed tune but when he had gotten it home and showed it to Beth, she had wrapped her arms around him in the tightest hug and had begun to cry, telling him it was the most perfect wedding present. She had moved up here in the middle of the woods to live with him and he wanted her to be happy.
She turned her head and smiled at him when he sat down beside her on the bench, her fingers never stopping their soft tinkling.
"I didn't mean to wake you," she said.
He shook his head. "You didn'," he said. "Guess I can't sleep without you anymore."
She laughed softly at that but didn't say anything and he watched as her fingers flew across the keys, never losing their place in whatever song she was playing. She then began to sing, her words just as soft.
"I remember too/A distant bell/And stars that fell/Like rain/Out of the blue/When my life is through/and the angels ask me to recall/the thrill of them all/then I shall tell them/I remember you."
He watched her as she sang and a small smiling was pulling at the corners of her mouth as she felt his eyes on her. Her words faded off then as her fingers played the last few lingering notes and then her fingers slid from the keys, the last faint echo of the last note hanging in the air. Because he couldn't help himself, he leaned down then and pressed his lips softly to the spot where her shoulder and neck met. Beth closed her eyes and smiled, leaning into him a bit.
"Wanna tell me why you're up?" He asked.
"Just couldn't sleep," she shook her head slightly and she looked at him for a moment before looking down to her hands. "We need to get some groceries," she then said almost in a whisper, as if she was afraid of telling him that. He didn't say anything and Beth looked at him. "It's no problem, Daryl," she then quickly said. "I can go by myself…"
She trailed off and looked back down to her hands. Daryl stared at her and still didn't say anything. They hadn't been in town together yet – not since they had gotten married and everyone found out about them. He hadn't wanted to go where people could see them together and make all of their whispers and judgments right in front of them. He hadn't wanted Beth to have to go through that.
He knew she loved him. The girl had made that fact known to him countless times over the past year since they began. And he didn't doubt that she loved him and that she was happy being married to him. He thought she might be crazy for it but he never doubted it.
But he didn't want everyone to see sweet and young Beth with the dirty redneck who was her husband standing next to her and have everyone staring openly at her and studying her for bruises like the ones his mom used to walk around town sporting. They all thought that because he was a Dixon – son of Will and brother of Merle – he must be doing everything they had done and that included slapping and pushing a woman around.
No one knew that he would cut his hand off before he ever laid it on Beth. Merle had sometimes told him that he had always been the different one. There was something good inside of him that hadn't been in their old man or in Merle, either. It was something that maybe might have been in their mom long before Will Dixon beat it out of her. He was the sweet one, as Merle had said on more than one occasion.
But no one else knew that and he didn't want put Beth through the gossip only a small southern town could provide if she was seen with him. He knew she was already getting enough of that without being seen with him and he knew being married to him wasn't easy on her and he didn't want this life to be hard on her. Being poor and having to count every single penny and go without certain things was hard enough for her – and she had only been doing it a week. She no longer lived in comfort on the farm with her parents taking care of her. She had married a poor man which in turn had made her a poor woman and it wasn't an easy life. She didn't need anything added to it.
But she looked so damn disappointed, as if going grocery shopping with him was all she wanted to do and Daryl found himself always unable to deny her anything. He couldn't give her much and ff he was able to give something to her, he did.
"Okay," he then answered gruffly.
Beth looked at him and a slow, hesitant smile began to form across her lips. "Yeah?"
He nodded once, his eyes never leaving hers. "Yeah."
Beth hugged him then, her arms tight around his neck, and Daryl turned his head and buried his face in her hair.
Aldi opened at seven and at one minute after, Daryl was pushing a cart down the aisle with Beth walking beside him, only the one cashier and the stock boy working that morning in the store with them. Beth had set money aside for their grocery budget that month and she had made a list of everything they needed, studying it closely and grabbing each item as they passed it.
Occasionally, Beth would look at him and give him a small but bright smile and Daryl found himself wanting to give her a small smile in return.
She slid her hand over his on the handlebar of the cart and rubbed her thumb across his skin. He looked down at the simple gold band on her third finger and he told himself – reminded himself – that if she could do something as brave as marry him, he could be brave enough to handle going grocery shopping with her.
…