Just want to say, that I have edited ALL all of my pieces to the best of my abilities, cross-referencing between Fanfiction and AO3, re-reading several times and using Grammarly too, but there's this weird glitch that keeps happening where some paragraphs will repeat themselves and I can't find the root of the problem. I think it's the transfer between the two websites and I've tried to fix it but sometimes it takes a while for me to recognise it because I have to find the time to edit. Besides that, enjoy!
They eat in perfect silence.
Daryl's actual freaked out a little because Beth's got the most serious, most disgusted scowl he's ever saw on her face and it's making his balls kind of shrivel up into his stomach. She won't speak to him and he hasn't said a word to her, so there's nothing but the click of their knives and forks against their plates.
After that, she takes a long shower and emerges looking like the devil incarnate. He's really starting to think that she does this just to piss him the fuck off because she waltzes out in another weird ass white top with crisscross strings over the tits and a tiny ass denim skirt, frayed along the edges.
The thing that destroys his vital damn organs though, is the thigh high boots she's wearing, that are tight on her golden skin, revealing a patch of flesh between the very short edge of her skirt and the tops of her boots. Daryl clears his throat and keeps scrolling through his phone like he's actually fucking paying attention to it, rather than her.
Out of the corner of his eye, she's in the mirror, gripping her hair and wrapping it into a bun that pulls at her forehead and widens her eyes, leaving but a few baby haired curls to frame her forehead and neck. He swallows tight and coughs again, discreetly pulling one of the throw pillows over his lap to hide his hardening dick.
Beth glances over at him with a squint to her eye. "What?"
"Hmm?" He asks, still looking at his phone with his heart thumping a little irregularly.
"You got summin' to say?" She asks, turning to face him with her hands planted on her hips.
Daryl looks up absentmindedly, trying like hell to act cool. "Huh? Nah, nothin'. You goin' to see an' 'old friend' right?"
Her finger whips out and her eyes narrow even further. "What was that?"
"What was what?"
"The quotation marks you practically damn used when you said, old friend. Spit it out, Daryl. Whatever's on your mind."
He glances up again and actually tries to look into her eyes, but he's pretty sure his own stray down to her top. "Must be a good friend."
Beth scowls and once again he sees that flush break across her face, that beautiful second of haziness in her eye that says she's completely out of her depth, losing her control. "He's a real good friend, actually."
"Oh, I bet he is Greene. I bet he is."
She opens her mouth and then scowls again, snatching her clutch off of the table she put it down on to glance at herself in the mirror. "Don't wait up."
"Have fun!" He hollers.
Daryl grins when she slams the door. "Jerk!"
When he hears her feet stamp off, he clicks his phone off and smiles out of the window at the New York landscape. "Two can play at that game, Greene."
Daryl Dixon has a lot of respect for women. He was raised practically by his ma, with no help from his shitty father, so all his impressionable life he watched his ma do whatever she could do to get by, to make sure they were fed, clothed, well looked after. Money was tight but she still made sure he and Merle got a magazine and a sweet after school.
From there, he's done nothing but met more amazing women. His school teachers, who were patient with him and helped him learn to read, his high school headmaster, who would force him to do his homework whenever he was sent out of class, just so Daryl could keep a grip on his failing grades.
He's worked construction at four am with women who didn't sleep the night before but still got up, fed their kids and hauled ass to work to keep feeding them. So yeah, he loves women. He's not a player, he doesn't sleep around, frankly, he doesn't find much attraction for a woman, just appreciation, which has always made him a push over in relationships.
Beth's different.
She's sassy and bratty and she brings out things in him he never knew he wanted or particularly craved. She turns him on and makes him hunger for new desires, for ropes and spanking and blindfolds, just to show her who should be in charge. Not to demean her, never for that, but to knock her down a peg or two, watch that perfectness get fucked up.
So, he's never rude to women or about them, but when he glances over at the sleeping brunette beside him, his stomach rolls just a little. He expected blonde hair, he wanted blonde hair, tanned thighs and a juicy ass. The girl next to him has a nice ass too, honestly, there isn't anything wrong with her, just him.
Because her bare legs and slim back makes him roll away from the sunlight with a groan and sit on the edge of the bed. His head kills and he grips it tight, shoving to his feet to go and hunt for something to clear the decaying taste of alcohol from his mouth. Through the door he goes, quiet as he can and then he follows the hall to the kitchen.
It's still and silent, nothing moved and he knows immediately Beth isn't home. The sun's a bright gold, like a shiny penny so it has to be sometime in the early hours, way before nine anyway, which is the time that Beth has her meeting. Which means she stayed out all night. He scoffs to himself and opens the fridge.
As the door opens there's a creak behind him, so he glances over his shoulder with a cartoon of orange juice in hand. "Hey."
The girl he brought home from the bar last night smiles a little shyly and he didn't really remember her face but she's quite cute. Freckles and long lashes, big green eyes and bare lips. She's not wearing makeup, not even remnants of it, so she must not have been last night neither, which is probably why he was attracted to her. Daryl's always preferred a bare face and he's wasted many hours trying to picture Beth's.
He dips his chin at the girl. "S'early. Why you up?"
"Didn't know if you wanted me to stay," she whispers.
Her voice is soft and clear, as clear and open as her skin. She looks young but also she looks innocent, pure in a way that he never sees Beth, in her tight skirts and high heels, puckered mouth and sharp brows. For just a moment, Daryl wonders why he can't find this kind of girl interesting and why instead, he's comparing her to his boss.
Speak of the devil.
The minute his mouth opens, the front door card reader beeps and Beth saunters in, still in yesterday's clothes but walking like it doesn't faze her and Daryl's brow raises as she glances down first at the lacy bra littering the floor and then her eyes climb up, to him and the girl from the bar in the kitchen.
Wearing nothing but his shirt.
"Walk of shame, huh?"
She ignores him, turning piercing, alert business eyes on his date from last night. "Why are you here with my boyfriend?"
"What?" The word is a ringing echo because both Daryl and the girl say it at the same time.
"Beth, the fuck?" He turns to his boss to tell her to pack it the hell in but finds her crying.
Actually crying real fucking tears as she turns to him and says, "Daryl, I can't believe you would do this again. How many times do I have to forgive you!?"
"Greene!"
He turns to the girl and his face meets her palm, a ringing slap on his cheek that turns his head to the side. As Daryl lifts his face and looks at Beth, she smirks at him and then her chin wobbles when she turns back to the other women. "I'm so sorry he's done this to you too!"
"No, I'm sorry!" The girl hollers back, rushing around the room collecting her clothes. "Sorry I ever went home with such a pig!"
All of the sudden the commotions gone, sucking out the sound as the woman leaves, slamming the hotel door behind her. Daryl turns to Beth with his hand still pressed to his face. "The hell!?"
She shrugs, wiping at her cheeks. "You brought a girl back to my suite. Don't forget this is business, Daryl. This is work. You're lucky I didn't fire you."
"You stayed out all night shaggin' some 'old friend'!"
Beth was walking away but now she whips back to face him. "Don't talk 'bout my personal affairs when it's none of your damn business!"
"Don't come an' mess with mine!" Daryl shouts back.
"You're a damn child!"
"An' you're a spoilt brat, princess, but you don't see me flippin' my shit!"
"Ugh! You're infuriatin'! Go home!"
Daryl snorts. "You need me, Greene. Go to work."
Beth flounders before she huffs and stomps away.
So, guys, I'm going AWOL. Kinda. I will upload tiwdfy on Friday and the prompts on Sunday, but after that, I'm taking a break. It's really challenging working every day, making sure the ASE chapter is ready for Wednesday, getting the tiwdfy chapter written in two days and making sure it's ready for Friday, to then have to make sure the prompts are written and again, uploaded in two days. It's got to the point where I'm stressing over my writing like 'gotta write that' and 'gotta upload this' and I don't want to feel like that. Writing is fun and something I enjoy on the side, but I need the time in between work to see my partner and family, whereas I'm coming home and sitting straight on another computer after all day at work, for hours at a time. So yeah, sorry for the life story, but I hope you guys understand and I promise I won't be gone long. Thank you as always, you guys are the best 3