Chapter Two
He was aggravated, plain and simple. Not that he wasn't generally aggravated - he was. He was just more-so today. He wasn't talking to anybody, he barely gave anybody acknowledgment that they even existed other than Lil Ass-kicker and that was only because she was repeatedly calling his name. "Darl, Darl" was kind of hard to ignore, even for him.
He paced back and forth against the walls like a caged animal, one hand held his cross-bow as the other clutched a smoke in between his hand. The agitation he felt today was unusual and he couldn't exactly figure out why. Sure, he hadn't been out of the walls in a few days but that wasn't anything major. He'd been stuck inside for weeks during the winter time and he had barely batted an eyelash. What was so different about today?
"Daryl?" His thoughts were interrupted as he looked up to see Maggie walking towards him cautiously. She flashed him a small smile. He ignored it though as he eyes fell down to trace the contours of her now-large belly. He figured she was about ready to pop any day now.
"What d' ya' want?" He asked gruffly as he pulled the cigarette to his mouth and took a large drag. His eyes were squinted at her. He very rarely spoke to the brunette and only when it was necessary. She'd never out right came and searched for him, and she'd picked today of all days to do it. The day when something was bugging him and he couldn't figure it out.
"Heard ya' were over here, thought you might like to talk." She said, one hand shielding her eyes from the sun and the other resting on top of her baby belly.
"What'd make ya' think that?"
"No reason. I just heard that you 'bout bit off Ricks head this mornin' when he asked you to do patrols and you've been pacin' out here all afternoon. Sounded like ya' needed to talk."
"Don't need ta' talk, Maggie. I ain't no girl." He glared at her. She was infuriating, always had been and it'd just gotten worse with her getting pregnant. He didn't need to talk, what he needed to do was get the hell out of the walls and get far away from here. Maybe he'd throw together a run. Yeah, maybe he'd do that, he decided.
"I didn't say you were a girl, Daryl. Even men need to talk to somebody. Somethin's wrong."
He looked back up at her and just looked at her for a few minutes, his cigarette forgotten about for the moment as he held it in front of his face. She knew something, he decided. Her body stature was stiff, as if she was trying very hard to hold herself together, her eyes were rimmed red as if she'd been crying (not that she hadn't been doing a lot of that lately – damn pregnant women), and she was clutching something in her hand. It looked like a bracelet or necklace of some sort, he couldn't tell exactly.
"Spit it out, girl." He grunted.
"What do you mean?" She asked, her eyes wide.
"I can tell that ya' wanta tell me somethin'. Spit it out. I ain't got all day." In truth, he did have all day but he didn't need the darn women knowing that. Then she'd want to sit around all day and talk about things like feelings and babies and he just wasn't gonna have any of that.
"W-well, I know what's botherin' you and it's botherin' me too, so I thought we could talk about it … together. Ya' know?" The last part of the sentence was quiet. Almost so quiet that he wasn't sure he heard her right. She knew what was bothering him? How can that be when he didn't even know what in the hell was wrong with him. This woman was out of her goddamn mind.
"What in the hell are you talkin' about, woman? Ain't nuthin' wrong with me."
"You're lying, Daryl Dixon." She replied, calmly, "I know that if this day is going to bother anybody as much, or if not more, than me – its you."
He squinted his eyes carefully at her, remembered about his cigarette, took another long drag, blew out the smoke and proceeded to stare at her. She'd lost her mind, he'd decided. Absolutely fucking lost it. Now he was gonna have to go find that husband of hers and inform him that his wife was bat shit crazy. He sighed. This was not how he wanted to spend his day. "What in the fuck are you talking about?" He finally asked.
"Daryl... you really don't know? I was just assumin' that from the way that you were acting that you ..." She got quiet and he watched as her eyes fells to her what was clutched in her hand. She began running the small item through her fingers and that when he realized that he recognized it. It was one of Beths' bracelets. That's when reality hit him in the gut.
"It's not -" he mumbled, throwing the cigarette over the wall. "It's fuckin' not-" His voice grew steadily louder. It couldn't be. He wouldn't accept it. That wasn't what was wrong with him and he knew it. Fuck her. She was wrong.
"It is, Daryl. I've been countin' the days – today's the day."
He began to pace again, his hand gripping his bow tighter than he should have been. No, she was wrong. She had to be. It hadn't been that long, there was no way. It happened last Summer... Fuck.
"It's not today, Maggie. Ya prolly fucking miscounted – go back and check again. Hell, why were ya even fuckin' counting anyways? It's not like ya fucking cared about her!" He growled angrily. He watched as her face transformed from one of certainty to sadness and then to anger. Pregnant women, he thought even more angrily. Couldn't keep their emotions in check.
"Don't talk to me like that! I know what day it is! It's been a year – it's been a year since Beth died and I know it. And don't you fucking dare tell me that I didn't care about her – SHE WAS MY SISTER!" She screamed.
Daryl took a step back and watched as the tears formed in the brunette's eyes. He knew he should feel badly for her. Hell, he knew he shouldn't have said what he said. Still didn't make it any less true, at least, in his mind. "She may have been your sister, Maggie. But where tha fuck were you when the prison fell, huh?" He took a step forward and flung his arm in the air. "Where were ya when we were alone? Where were you when those goddamn bastards took her," He edged even closer to her so that he was mere inches from her face. "What did you do when I told you that your sister was still alive, huh? Ya' high-tailed it off to Washington D.C, that's what ya' did. You weren't there when we found her. You showed the fuck up after that bitch had done killed her. No, Maggie, I don't think you gave one damn shit about your sister."
She slapped him. She slapped him hard.
He stumbled backwards, his mind barely registering what had happened. He saw red. God, he wanted to punch something, punch her, but he wouldn't do it. He'd never lay a hand on her, no matter how bad he wanted to.
Beth would kick your ass...
He shoved the thought away as he turned away from her. "Don't you fucking tell me that I don't care about my sister, Daryl Dixon. I thought she was dead. Hell, for all I knew, you both were. I loved her!"
He turned, suddenly. "AND YA THINK I DIDN'T?" He paused as he realized what he'd just said- what he'd just admitted... out loud... to Maggie fucking Greene … Rhee... Whatever the fuck her name was.
Her mouth fell open as big, swollen tears ran down both of her cheeks. Damn-it, he thought angrily. Why'd you do a stupid thing like that, Dixon?
"I k-know that you l-loved her, Daryl. And I know that you're in pain... but so are all of the rest of us. We're all in pain every day that she isn't with us. We all loved her."
"But not all of you thought she was strong. Not all of you believed in her like she should have been believed in. You all just shoved her in the back corner and let her play baby sitter because you all thought she was weak – she wasn't."
There was a long silence.
"She was my baby sister... I was just trying to protect her."
Daryl thought back suddenly to one of the last days that he'd had with the blonde girl that he cared so much for. Something that she'd said to him that had stayed with him.
"She could take care of herself." He mumbled before he turned around and hauled ass towards the front gates. He was tired of dealing with her shit. He needed to be alone.
What felt like days later, but he knew it was only a few hours, Daryl slowly began to work his way back towards the Alexandria Safe Zone. He knew that running off like he'd done was foolish but he hadn't been able to deal with that conversation any more than he'd already had.
He couldn't believe it. He refused to believe it.
A year?
It felt it had been just a few months since he'd last seen her, smiling at him from across the kitchen table, that "Oh" falling so delicately from her pretty, pink mouth.
It felt as if it had been just a few weeks since he'd picked her up and carried her body from that too-clean hospital.
It felt as if it'd only been just a few weeks since he'd dumped her body, regretfully, into that stupid fucking car because of that stupid fucking herd...
He sighed and stopped to lean up against the nearest tree. Why? He wondered as he'd done so many times before. Why had shit gotten so fucked up? Why had Beth... He shook his head. He'd never know the answers to those questions, as bad as it hurt. It had just happened and it had fucking sucked. It still fucking sucked.
A part of him felt guilty that Maggie, of all people, had remembered what today was and he hadn't. He was the one who'd helped her, damn it. He was the one who'd chased that fucking car until he thought he was gonna die. He was the one who'd tracked her down and found in that fucking hospital. He should have been the one to remember what day it was. Maggie had no right.
And yet, she did.
He sunk to the ground, his mind and body filled with defeat. He sat his crossbow beside him, reached into his pocket and pulled out his pack of cigarettes. He usually rationed them – one, maybe two a day if he felt like a needed it – but today, he'd smoked nearly half a pack and he had a feeling that he was gonna finish the damn thing off before it was all said and done. He put one between his lips, letting it dangle there as set the pack beside him and searched his pockets for the matches. Finding them quickly, he lit the end and took a deep, long drag and exhaled the smoke with a sigh of relief. It didn't totally calm his nerves – nothing truly ever did – but, it helped and that was all that mattered.
He pulled the cigarette from between his lips and began to twirl it between two fingers, watching the way the cherry ate at the tobacco. He wondered if that was what was happening to him. He wondered if the guilt of losing Beth fucking Greene was eating away at him until, soon, there'd be nothing left of him but a butt. He chuckled at himself. He was already an ass, he didn't need to be any more of one.
He took another drag and let his eyes scan his surroundings. He was deep, he knew, in the middle of the woods. Far enough away that he could probably yell for days and nobody would hear him. Why he'd let him get so far away, he didn't know. It was only going to make it harder for him to get back to Alexandria and nightfall was coming.
He shrugged. He's spent the night in the woods plenty of times. He might as well make the best of it. He'd just camp out overnight and rise up early enough to look for a deer or somethin' to bring back to camp. No sense in coming back empty-handed, especially when he knew he was going to get looks from people after making little-miss-perfect-Maggie-Greene-Rhee cry.
He sat in silence for a few minutes and watched as the sun slowly fell beyond the horizon, basking the woods in an eery but calming glow before he stood and began to prepare himself for camping out where he was.
He gathered the small branches and twigs around him, enough for a small fire, and threw them haphazardly into the middle of his make-shift campsite. Her reached around his waist and untied the rope that he always had on him, just in case, and was just beginning to tie it around the first tree when he heard it.
When he heard the most horrifying, blood-curdling scream he'd ever heard in his life.
He took off running. He didn't even hesitate.
Several very long, very tiring minutes later, he came up on the commotion. It was just beyond the trees he was standing behind but he wasn't fixing to rush out there without knowing what was going on. Ever so quietly, he peeked out from behind the massive Oak he was leaning against and began squinted his eyes to see what was going on. It was getting quite dark now and it was hard to tell.
He heard the tell-tale moans and grunts of Walkers but he couldn't see who'd screamed – unless they were already dead and he'd been too late. He took a closer step forward, trying to hear how many people, living or dead, were in the clearing.
Three. No, four. Three dead. He could tell by the sound of their clumsy shuffling. One alive. Far too quick to be a Walker and too light on their feet to be a male. So one female battling three, starving roamers. Great.
Finally, he stepped out of the woods, shooting one arrow off into the closest Walkers head, sending it straight to the ground before running up and stabbing the next. It hadn't even noticed him. He briefly noticed that there was already another dead walker on the ground not far from where he was standing.
He stopped, listening for the third and final one when he spotted it on the ground, presumably on top of the girl he was trying to save. Taking a few quick steps forward, he reached down, grabbed the thing by the back of its shirt, ripped it off of her and stabbed it quickly in the brain before dropping it. He deftly bent to wipe the blade of his knife off with the permanently dead creatures shirt. His clothes were nasty enough without adding to it.
He heard movement, groaning to be specific behind him, and he jumped, thinking another one had roamed into the area but he sighed with relief when he realized that it was just the form on the ground moving. "Ya' bit?" He barked out, his voice rougher than he meant it to be. He didn't want to scare the girl.
"No-" came the curt response.
He paused. What in the fuck, he thought. Was his mind playing cruel pranks on him? He could have swore he heard-
"I'm okay."
-her voice.
He stumbled forward, his eyes widened and his body shaking as he tried to get a closer look at the person who was just now starting to stand up. She was turned away from him, preoccupied with brushing the dirt and leaves from her body, but he cringed when he saw it. Blonde. Her fucking hair was blonde. Fucking long blonde hair in a fucking pony tail.
He let out a curse as his right hand came up, his nail bed going in between his lips as he began to promptly freak the fuck out. The world was playing a very cruel and very unnecessary prank on him. It ain't her, he told himself. Beth's dead. Shot in the head. This is some other girl – somebody who just looks and sounds like her...
"Thank you -" She suddenly turned to face him and he swore the world turned on its fucking axis.
"Beth?!"
Staring right back at him, alive as could be, was none other than Beth fucking Greene. Bullet wound and all.
He promptly bent over and threw up.
No fucking way.