Another drabble as part of the whole birthday thing, and also my first attempt at writing Daryl. YIKES! You can park this on the timeline around late 5b, soon after the group gets to Alexandria. I hope you like it...
Nobody questioned him when he headed through the gate and into the woods, not that anyone ever had. Hell, Daryl still wasn't used to the idea of anyone showing any kind of interest in his comings and goings, much less concern for his safety. Not that anyone ever needed to. Everyone, himself included, was too used to him looking after himself.
Abraham was posted as sentry and acknowledged his passing with a nod, but otherwise Daryl went unnoticed from the community. Alexandria seemed too good to be true, too much like a world long passed away, but there was no questioning how much the group needed a place like it. Shelter, stability, everything that always seemed to slip from their grasp when they weren't paying attention. For it to appear in the wilderness as it had made them all suspicious, but Daryl wouldn't have been easy anyway. Never had been among places like this, cookie cutter houses and manicured lawns, community barbecues and homeowners associations. No way in hell he and any of that shit ever mixed, much less mixed well. Yeah, they needed a place like Alexandria, but Daryl couldn't shake the feeling that the walls were closing in, finally driving him out.
There were a few walkers shuffling along outside the wall. Not enough to be a threat on their own, but enough that their noise could draw more. He shot the first two, bludgeoned a third with his crossbow, then sank his knife into the fourth one's skull. It was almost too easy by now, and things had a way of going to shit right when they looked smoothest. Wouldn't surprise him if it happened again before long.
Some of the weight seemed to roll off his shoulders as soon as he stepped under the shadow of the trees, the close press of the branches and trunks nowhere near as stifling as the walls he'd escaped from. Alexandria was like nothing he was used to, but it was different out here. No matter how dangerous it really was, the woods for him always meant safety, a hiding place. Out here, he was master of his own destiny.
His footsteps through the undergrowth were almost silent over the rustling of the leaves. The only voices were a few birds calling to each other in the distance. There weren't even any walkers around.
There was no telling how long he had been walking before he came to a clearing, the light painted green and silver through the canopy above and a rough deer trail leaving the ground bare and uneven. The stillness here was a tangible thing, the whisper of the wind and the shelter of the trees themselves offering peace as long as he wanted to stand still and lose himself within it. For him, that was a safe haven equal to anything Alexandria had to offer.
He leaned against the nearest tree for a moment before sitting among the roots. Setting his crossbow where he could easily reach it if needed, he propped his forearms on his knees and picked absently at his fingernails, leaning his head back against the tree and closing his eyes. He tried not to think for a moment, not about anything. Not the new community, not the road to Virginia, not losing Ty...
Not Atlanta...
For a moment the shock paralyzed him, the memory as raw and brutal as if he was standing in that hospital corridor hearing that gunshot, watching her fall, the grief hiding behind rage and both of them together covering the pain. He had wrestled with it in the weeks since, alternately pushing it away and letting it move through him, but right now he didn't want any of that. He cast his mind back to candlelight and music, to seeing her hands move across the keys of an old piano as she sang some song he'd never heard before and would never hear again in any voice but hers.
Among the others, the memory was ethereal and distant, always just out of reach. Out here it was closer, a moment of peace and quiet when the world shrank down to the two of them and she was everything that was good and right. As long as he could find his way to the woods, he could find her at that piano again. And whatever else happened, he thought he might be all right, as long as she kept singing.
How did I do? Leave a comment as a birthday gift!