Chapter 7

so here i am trying to figure myself out. how do i feel jeez this sucks I don't know

She rolled her eyes and flopped back on the mattress. She hated confronting her feelings. It was easier to just push it all down, pretend it wasn't there. She wished Daryl was there, he had been her calm, her island amidst a raging sea. Now he was the reason for all her turmoil. She let out a groan, then rolled over and pulled out the little glass bowl from her bag. She sat looking at it, twirling it in her fingers as she debated whether she really wanted it or not. No, she decided, it wasn't a crutch. She packed it away again and went back to her notebook.

try this again. i shouldve gone back why was i such a coward he woulda forgiven me then. now i dont know its been too long. morgan says he loves me but i cant think that if he does now and changes his mind when he hears the truth i couldnt bear it. better to think that hes just willing to hear me out. i just want my best friend back why does it have to be so hard? Fuck! this is all marks fault god i could kill him again for doing this to me. shoulda done it that night. why couldn't that bastard just leave me alone i hate him for what he did i lost daryl because of him the only true friend i ever had

She broke down then, tears rolling down her cheeks, her body wracked by sobs. She was finally starting to grieve. For Daryl, for her mother, the life she should've had, the life she did have. Seeing Daryl had cracked the wall she had built to contain her grief, and writing out her misery made it tumble down, and it came pouring out of her in torrents. For almost an hour she cried, laying on the bed hugging her knees. When her sobs finally eased, her breath no longer hitching, she realized she felt different. Not quite whole, she had only know that feeling with Daryl, but close, as if she had gained back a part of herself that had been lost all those years ago.

She wiped her eyes, got up and went into the bathroom. She turned on the faucet, still stunned that anything came out, and splashed cold water on her face. She took a couple deep breaths, trying to puzzle out what she had been missing. She let out a laugh as it came to her: her strength. That piece of her that let her stand up to injustice, to refuse to let anyone sway her from what she knew was right. She had shut down that first night, her mind refusing to comprehend what was happening, and it had been smothered, buried under the weight of her grief and guilt. It hadn't left her completely, there had been just enough left smoldering to keep her alive through the years. Now that she had shed her long held tears, it came roaring to life like gasoline on a fire. She shut off the water and was about to head down the stairs when she heard a motorcycle pulling up.


As soon as he went out the door, Daryl had jumped on his bike and took off outside the walls. He was itching for a fight, and he soon got it when he came across a small herd of walkers. They came towards him, teeth gnashing, arms reaching for him, growling and snarling at the promise of food. He got off the bike and let them come, waiting until they were almost on top of him, his body a bundle of nerves steeled for battle. With a primal scream he attacked, becoming a whirling dervish as he took down one walker after another. They dropped like flies before him, until he was standing in a ring of fallen walkers, breath rasping in his throat.

He looked around as the fog of rage lifted, and dropped to his knees, sobbing. His heart ached when he thought of those scars. He understood that what she had gone through to get them could not have been good. She didn't deserve that. He should've protected her, been there for her, but she had left him. In that moment he hated her for leaving, but in the next he was relieved that she was back in his life. He wanted to grab her, shake her, hug her, never let her go.

He shook his head to clear his thoughts, pushing all the unwanted emotions back down, trying to bury them. He closed his eyes and another image came to him unbidden, her body in the shower, water streaming down her fair skin. He groaned with desire as he imagined running his hands over her, feeling the muscles that lay beneath her soft yeilding flesh. His cock responded, twitching against the cotton of his boxer-briefs as it grew hard. He wanted to take a pink nipple in his mouth and suckle it until it was a hard little pebble, making her moan. He thought of her sex, covered in fine red hair, slipping a finger in her slit to find her wet with desire. Desperate for relief, he unzipped his pants and pulled out his raging hard-on, stroking it as the images came faster. Her panting and squirming as he flicked her clit, his fingers inside her. Pinching her nipples until she screamed. His hand moved faster, his tip leaking precum, making his hand glide over his stiff rod. He saw himself slamming his dick in her, feeling her moist heat wrap around him, squeezing him as he made her cum. His grip tightened, on the verge of release, pumping his hand furiously. He saw her face, her lips full and pink, eyes the blue of a glacier, the freckles across her cheeks and nose. He came hard, his seed spilling onto the pavement as he let out a moan.

When he opened his eyes, he remembered where he was and quickly tucked his softening member back in his pants and stood up. His head wasn't any clearer about what to do, but he was calmer. He climbed on his bike and headed back, wondering how he was gonna explain his sudden disappearance.

As he pulled up in front of the house, he saw her standing on the porch across the street. She was leaning against the post, waiting for him. He climbed off the bike and made his way over, stopping on the step below her. His eyes were downcast, unable to look at her.

"Hi Dixie," she said quietly. There was something different in her voice. She sounded more like the girl he used to know. He looked up at her, and she was smiling.

"Hi Kitten." He couldn't help but smile back. There was definitely a change. Just the way she carried herself, like an anchor that had dragged at her was gone.

"C'mon, let's go in," she said with a jerk of her head. He climbed the last step to follow, but before she moved, she flung her arms around his neck. He stood there in shock for a second, unsure of what to do. She held him, uncaring whether or not he hugged her back. Suddenly she felt him relax, his arms coming around her waist. He was filthy, covered in dirt and sweat and gore, and she didn't care. She had needed to feel him, hold him in her arms at least one more time. Slowly she broke away, taking his hand and leading him inside.

The only furniture was the kitchen table, so they went in and sat down, hands still intertwined. It was as if once the connection had been made neither one wanted to let go. She spotted a note on the table from Morgan, saying he was out with Rick. She realized that they were truly alone, and she passed the note to Daryl so he would know as well.

"So I guess you've seen them," she blurted out, breaking the silence.

He turned red in the face. "Yeah. It was an accident. Wasn't spyin or nothin," he mumbled. He shook his head as the anger started to well up again. "How?"

"Mark, my...father," she grated out. She hated calling him that. "You need to hear, all of it. It's gonna hurt."

He took a breath. He had always assumed that their last night together had been planned, she had known she was leaving and couldn't tell him. He had hated her for a long time for that. Now he wasn't so sure. "Ok. Let's hear it."

"I never wanted to leave you. If I had known what was gonna happen, I would've never left you that night. I know you hate me for it, and if you still do after I'll understand." She took another breath and dived in. "When I got home, I found him and my mom in the kitchen..."


She walked in the front door, knowing she would catch hell and not caring. But what she saw stopped her in her tracks. Her mom was lying on the kitchen floor, a pool of blood spreading out from beneath her, staining her simple floral dress. Her father was towering over her, a bloody knife in his hand and a look of pure rage on his face. The sound of the screen door closing made him snap his head around. When he saw her, he stomped over to her before she could move and grabbed the back of her neck in a vicelike grip.

"You see what you've done?! Lookit what you've made me do, you and your whore mother!" He was shouting, and the alcohol on his breath hit her like a wall.

"Mama!" she wailed, tears streaming down her face, and she tore herself away and ran to her, cradling her lifeless head in her lap. He snatched her up by the arm and spun her around to face him.

"You are gonna clean this up, then you're gonna pack up your stuff. We're leavin." He swung his hand out, backhanding her across the cheek. Her lip split open, dripping fresh blood on her dress. "Get movin! There better not be a drop left when you're done!"

She moved robotically, her brain shut down, as she got a bucket of water and a rag to start cleaning. Her father left to the bathroom and returned with the shower curtain. He laid it on the cheap linoleum and rolled her mother onto it. He scooped the body up and stumbled out the front door. She could hear him open the trunk and dump her in unceremoniously. She started crying even harder, and when he came back in and saw her, he grabbed her by the hair.

"If you don't stop cryin and get this cleaned up I'ma call the cops an tell em what you done," he sneered. "They'll lock you up with all the other murderers where they'll rape you for killin your Mama."

After hearing him belittle them both all her life, watching as he beat her, telling her it was her fault, she believed him. She wanted to run, to find Daryl, he would know what to do, but she just cowered in front of her father. She had seen too many times what would happen when her mother had tried to escape. He slapped her again and threw her head towards the floor. "Get to cleanin."

He moved to the bedrooms, and as she mopped up her mother's blood, she could hear him tearing open drawers, stuffing clothes into whatever bags he could find. At one point she heard him laugh drunkenly, muttering "Stupid little bitch, thought you could hide money from me."

He passed by her three times, carrying the bags he had packed to the car. As she dumped the bucket of red water down the sink, he came back carrying the jar of money her Mama had been saving, her run away stash.

"Let's go, in the car." He shoved her through the door and slammed it behind them. She climbed in the backseat and put her seatbelt on. This wasn't her first trip with him drunk behind the wheel, and she knew it would be another white knuckle ride this night.

They drove for hours, she would doze off only to be woken when he would jerk the wheel back into his lane. She prayed for a cop to pull him over, but her prayers went unanswered, and she eventually succumbed to sleep just before dawn. When she woke it was 11am and they were pulling into a rest stop. She sretched her cramped muscles and as soon as the engine cut off she reached for the door handle, but before she could open the door he grabbed her wrist, making her bones grind together.

"Remember, you say one word and you'll be in jail faster than you can blink," he snarled. She nodded her head and he let her go. While she was in the bathroom relieving herself, she wondered if she could just stay in there and he would leave her behind, or trying to get to a pay phone while he was distracted. But she had no one she could call since Daryl didn't have a phone. She hung her head, tears threatening to spill, but she blinked them away and steeled herself. She washed her hands and went back to the car. He tossed her a water and a half eaten pack of donuts as she climbed back in.

"Here, eat something."

The rest of the day was a blur of driving and the occasional rest stop. She slept alot, trying to forget it all, but she couldn't forget one stop. Just after midnight they were driving down a backroad through rural Pennsylvania when he suddenly pulled over and climbed out. She was still half asleep when she heard him open the trunk. Her eyes shot open and turned around in her seat to see him pulling her mother's body from the trunk, carry it behind the car about 10 yards, then dump it over the side of a bridge.

"We finally stopped in Parrish New York, a tiny little hole-in-the-wall town upstate. When I turned 18 I left and never looked back."

As she told her story, Daryl had grown angrier, pacing the kitchen as she talked. Angry that she'd had to go through that, that her father had done it, most of all that he hadn't been able to protect her. One question burned through all of it.

"Why didn't you come back once you left?" he yelled, unable to stop himself.

"I was scared. I thought you must have hated me for leaving, and if you didn't you would have."

"What do you mean?"

She took another breath, biting her bottom lip. This was the part she dreaded telling him. "Once we got there, he beat on me almost daily. I had become his replacement for Mama. My stomach was his favorite place to hit me, cause it was easier to hide the bruises. We'd been there about two months when I woke one morning with really bad pains in my belly. When I went to the bathroom there was blood, lots of it. I screamed, not knowing what was going on, and he came stumbling in half drunk demanding to know what was wrong. When I finally told him he got a creepy grin on his face and told me that I was a woman now. He told me that when I stopped bleeding he'd show me what that meant."

Daryl seethed at that, not wanting to understand. He closed his eyes and whispered through gritted teeth, "Are you tellin me he raped you?" Daryl stood stock still, his hands balled into fists, the cords of his neck standing out as she replied.

"Yes. For four years he used me. That's how I got the scars. He would always take me from behind, and he would put his cigarette out on my back when he came. Every spot was like a notch on his belt." Cat stopped and looked at Daryl. He was bent over the sink, his knuckles white as they gripped the edge. He didn't want her to see the tears that slipped from his eyes. Her words were shaky as they crossed her trembling lips. "That's not the what kept me away though. When I first started bleeding, the pain was terrible, wouldn't let up, so he let me go to the clinic to get checked out. Turns out it wasn't my period, I was," she paused, almost too scared to say it. Tears sprang to her eyes as she whispered, "It was a miscarriage." She buried her face in her hands, afraid of what his reaction would be.

He whirled around, not quite comprehending, then it dawned on him, and it hit him like a freight train. "You were pregnant? It was mine?" he whispered, his voice catching in his throat. She nodded, a sob escaping her. She had never told anyone that part. He moved in front of her and knelt down. He pulled her hands down and turned her face to look at him.

"Oh, Kitten," he whispered, "did you think I would blame you?"

She nodded. "For a long time I did. I was messed up. Took me six years to realize it wasn't my fault. By then, I don't know, I figured you had moved on. Didn't want to open up old wounds. I was stupid." She shrugged her shoulders, acting as if it was no big deal, but a tear still slipped down her cheek.

He pulled her out of the chair and into his arms, cradling her as she cried, finally grieving the loss. Tears seeped from his eyes as he understood everything that loss meant. He would've been a father, could've had the chance to be better than his dad, to provide better for her, show her how much she was worth, watch her be a mother to his kid. All of that had been snatched away from them both.

"There's one more thing I have to tell you. Over those four years he never played it safe. I went back to that and other clinics every couple months or so. 12 abortions in all. It messed up my insides. Once I was free, I went to a doctor cause I'd never bleed, and they said I'll never have kids, that all the scar tissue in there would make it impossible." She paused a moment as something dawned on her, making her laugh sadly. "Guess that's a good thing nowadays."

"No, it's never a good thing that someone hurt you," he told her, shaking his head emphatically. He cupped her face, bringing her face to his. "I'll never hurt you." He leaned forward and kissed her gently, his lips barely brushing against hers. A shock ran through her and she kissed him back, her hand going to the back of his neck, pulling him closer. The kiss deepened, mouths and tongues slowly exploring. He traced a line down her back with his hand and wrapped it around her waist, pressing her into him as they knelt on the floor.

Just then the front door opened and Morgan and Rick walked in to see them kneeling on the floor locked in each other's arms. Daryl turned his head away, turning almost purple at being caught making out. Cat smiled softly at them, wiping the traces of tears from her face. Morgan smiled back and gave her an approving nod. Rick's face was grim, however, and she could tell they came bearing bad news.

"What is it?" The worry in her voice made Daryl snap his head around. He stood up, tugging her up from the floor. Her hand was trembling in his, and he squeezed it tightly, letting her know that he wasn't going anywhere.