Thanks for all the reviews, follows, and favorites! I always love to read feedback comments so please remember to review - let me know how I'm doing. (This chapter is a little long but it's purpose is to let you know more about Grace).
Chapter Seven: The Days Before
Hunker down they did. They decided to leave the single light bulb on; both agreeing that the dim light wouldn't keep them awake. Grace laid on her side on the cot, under the single dusty flat sheet, and rested her head on what had to be the stiffest pillow in the world. She had offered the cot to Daryl, trying to get him to take it, but he had refused repeatedly almost to the point that they nearly had another argument. It ultimately ended with him insisting that he was perfectly fine on the floor. Daryl laid his head on his backpack and stretched out his body on his vest to give him some comfort from the hard, cold floor.
Grace figured she might as well try and get some rest and she shut her eyes and opened them again, time after time, as if she was trying to force them to stay closed. Just when she was about to drift off, Daryl's soft drawl made her open her eyes again.
"Where did ya learn to throw them knifes like you do?" Daryl casually asked out of the blue from the floor.
"Oh, from my daddy and my brother." Grace answered. She smiled to herself, the memories coming back to her.
"It's all started out just for fun, you know?" She continued. "One summer, when I was about nine or ten, I was kind of going through this little…this little tomboy phase, if you will."
Grace chuckled at the thought of her back then - how short she had cut her hair and went for three days without washing it and also how she refused to wear anything but blue jeans and Johnny's old baggy T-shirts.
"You, a tomboy?" Daryl snickered. "Git outta here!"
Grace laughed. "Yeah, I know. I think it only lasted like a couple of weeks. But anyway, yeah, one day Daddy and Johnny were outside and Daddy was teaching him how to throw the knifes in this log. I came out there, hands on my hips, and said: 'Well, I can do that!' Like it was the easiest thing in the world. But of course I had no idea what I was doing - I was chucking them knifes everywhere and I don't think I hit the log once. Daddy and Johnny sure got a kick of it. Made a fool outta myself, for sure."
Although she couldn't see him, Grace knew Daryl was grinning at her story, trying not to laugh.
"So then what happened?" Daryl asked.
"Oh, I finally got a grip and stopped trying to show off and they just taught me how to do it. It took a few years to get it just right but it kind of became like a hobby for me, you know, like right up there with cooking and baking and cheerleading - knife throwing."
Daryl did laugh at this. "Ha, ha, ha! A knife wielding Barbie doll!"
Grace giggled. "Yeah, that was me." She paused as a somber thought came to mind. "Didn't think I'd ever really have to use that skill, though." She added quietly. "But Daddy thought it was important for me to learn."
"Sounds like he was a daddy that cared."
Daryl replied in such a clipped voice that Grace actually raised her head up from the cot to look at him. She had heard through the grapevine from the others that Daryl didn't have the best childhood growing up.
Daryl cleared his throat and they were both silent for a few minutes.
"So…you were a cheerleader?" Daryl began again, trying to change the subject.
"Yeah," Grace said. "Three years, junior varsity."
"How old are ya, again?" Daryl asked.
"Nineteen," She replied. "And you?" She had made some guesses in her mind about his age but was never really quite sure.
"Old enough."
Grace scoffed playfully. "Oh come on, I told. So can you."
Daryl chuckled. "Well, let's put it this way, honey…I'm old enuff to remember Reaganomics and when MTV played music."
Grace giggled. So he had to be somewhere around his late thirties or early forties. That wasn't that old, she concluded.
"So, tell me about you?" Grace asked.
Daryl grunted. "Not much to tell."
"Oh, come on." Grace pressed.
"Well, I had drunk daddy and mama. They weren't 'round much. Didn't really keep tabs on me…Old man liked to take his anger out on me…One night Mama was so drunk she fell asleep with some lit cigarettes. Burned the house down. Merle was in and out of JV lock-up so many times I lost count. I pretty much fended for myself." *
"I'm sorry," Grace whispered, wishing she hadn't had made him talk about it.
"Yeah, so I am." Daryl replied bitterly.
"So, is it true about all that stuff everyone says about Merle?" Grace asked, implying to Daryl that she had heard the others mention Daryl's older brother - about what a character he was and she had a feeling their description of him probably didn't even scratch the surface.
"Yeah," said Daryl. "Whatever they told you is probably true and then some. But he's my brother, ya know? Nuthin's ever gonna change that."
They lay in silence again, letting Daryl's story hang in the air, until they both felt comfortable enough to talk again.
"So, how did ya know there'd be a shelter here?" Daryl asked.
"What?" Grace replied, confused. She was still thinking about Daryl's sad childhood.
"Ya said when we were out there that ya knew there was a shelter by the church." Daryl reminded her.
"Oh, yeah." Grace said. "Well, the church outside looked so much like my old one back home. We had a storm cellar like this too, although it was much smaller."
"You'd go to church much?" Daryl asked.
"Yeah, I did." Grace said, remembering those Sunday mornings with Daddy and Johnny. "We'd all go." She continued picturing herself in her Sunday best, the sweet little girly frocks she wore.
"You still believe?" Daryl asked in a tone that sounded like he'd be surprised if she said yes.
"Well," Grace began. "I don't know…honestly? I think I still believe. I know that sounds ridiculous given that the world has gone to hell in a hand basket but deep down I still believe in God."
"Huh." Daryl grunted. Grace waited to see if was going to say any more but when he didn't she went on.
"I mean, I wasn't a perfect Christian. No, not by far. Even before all this happened I started having doubts."
"Doubts about what?"
"Oh, just the usual doubts, you know." Grace hemmed hawed. "I think everybody goes through it. At some point or another you gotta decide what you believe. I mean, I loved God and Jesus, you know. But I knew I did stuff that…I wasn't supposed to do and I felt like I was this big disappointment to God or at least that's how some of the church folks made me feel."
"Welcome to the Bible belt," Daryl laughed. "So… the things ya used to do? What were they?" He sounded amused, albeit, intrigued like he was having a hard time imagining her being a bad girl.
Grace chuckled. "Oh…I would skip school sometimes. I'd hang out with this group of girls. They were kind of…oh, I don't know what you'd call it…I guess "art freaks" would be the label. They were into indie music, smoking weed, and skateboarder dudes. And I would just do what they did. Tagged along. Missed so much of my junior year that my Daddy actually got a phone call from the school saying if I missed anymore days I'd be forced to repeat the eleventh grade."
"What ever happened to yer daddy, Grace?" Daryl suddenly blurted out. "And what about your mama? Ya never talk about her."
Grace was rendered speechless for a second. She took a deep breath.
"Daddy was an alcoholic." She began slowly. "But he wasn't a drunk, you know what I mean?" And then she wanted to slap herself - of course he knew the difference.
"But anyway, yeah, he'd been drinking since he was like fifteen or sixteen years old. And basically it just caught up with him. Liver poisoning. He was fifty-two. It happened about a year before the outbreak started."
Grace paused and gave Daryl a chance to speak, if he wanted.
"And your mama?" He asked.
"She left Daddy when I was four. They got divorced and I never really saw much of her again. Last I heard she moved to Tennessee and got remarried, but I don't really know. All I really knew was Daddy and Johnny and that's was good enough for me."
She knew she was lying about that last bit but Grace really didn't want to get into it. It actually drove her crazy for years. How does a woman just up and leave her own kids like that? Johnny would explain to Grace as she grew up that their father and mother had a shotgun wedding, Mama already five and half weeks pregnant with Johnny when they were hitched. She had been only eighteen at the time. Then less than a year later, Grace came along. So their mother had been this nineteen year old bride with two very young babies in tow and married to a man she barely knew. Daddy had once told Grace that it had been too much for her mother; that she had blamed him that she had to grow up too fast and didn't have a chance to sow any wild oats. Well too bad, so sad…Grace often thought of that. Sometimes Grace wondered if that was where she got her lack of strength from, from her mother.
"I'm sorry, Gracie Lou." Daryl was saying to Grace now. "Gracie Lou". He was the only one that called her that and she didn't know why he did it but she liked it. It was like his pet name for her and it made her feel so special.
"So…were you into the skateboarder dudes?" Daryl asked, obviously trying to keep the conversation light.
Grace giggled at the memory of her high school friends swooning over those greasy-haired, hacky-sack playing, pants-dragging-the-ground, Vans wearing goof-offs.
"No," She answered. "I guess they weren't my type."
"You ever have a boyfriend?" He drawled curiously.
"Yeah, sort of. His name was Charlie." Grace closed her eyes and pictured the curly red-headed freckled faced boy. They had met through a friend of a friend and after weeks of going round and round ("Does he like me?" "Girl, he totally likes you!" "Why don't he ever talk to me?" "Give it some time, he's just shy…" "OK, Grace, I told him to meet us here after school…" "Oh my god, I'm so nervous, does my hair look OK?") they finally made it official at the school sponsored country-line dance.
"We'd go out dancing, bowling, hang out at the Pizza Hut in town." Grace told Daryl. "You know, the typical high school stuff. Charlie had a four wheeler and he'd take me riding on that sometimes. He was a fun guy."
"Just a fun guy?" Daryl questioned. "It wasn't true love?"
Grace laughed. "Oh, no. We weren't that serious. At least I wasn't. I know he wanted to get serious but…no. I just didn't feel that strongly about him."
There was a brief pause in the air.
"Did y'all git a little handsy?" Daryl blurted out, snickering.
"Daryl!" Grace exclaimed but she was laughing as well.
"I'm sorry, I'm sorry!" Daryl was cracking up. "I couldn't help it! So…did ya?"
Grace let out an exaggerated sigh, pretending to be offended by the question but she really wasn't. It was just so funny the way he asked it.
"Well, that depends on your definition of "handsy", mister." Grace said. "We'd make-out. There were a couple of times he'd try to feel me up but I'd always squirm away." She paused and considered something for a moment.
"I guess I really should of done it while I had the chance, huh? Never thought the end of world would come if I didn't lose my V-card right away. I always thought that was something everybody just said; now I know that they really meant it!" She joked.
Daryl was laughing heartily.
"Oh my god, girl." He was saying. "Yer too silly! But hey, you know what? It's OK."
"What's OK?" Grace asked.
"Oh, ya know." Daryl spoke softly now. "About what ya said. It's OK. There's nuthin' to be 'shamed of."
There were those butterflies in her stomach again. Grace pulled herself into the fetal position on the cot wondering if maybe she said too much and if he thought she was a prude. But the way he had said she shouldn't feel ashamed; she felt like he really meant it.
"So…what about you?" Grace asked Daryl, dying to know about his love life.
"What about me, honey?"
Grace scoffed. "Oh, no, no, no!" She was laughing but she wasn't going to let him off the hook. "You ain't gonna play that game, mister." She told him. "If I can share; so can you!"
Daryl laughed. "OK, whatcha wanna know?"
"Did you ever have a girlfriend?" Grace thought it was stupid to ask, the man was very attractive and old enough to have had more than few girlfriends in his lifetime. But she had a hard time picturing him with anybody because of his loner personality.
"Well," Daryl began. "There was this girl in high school. Bridgette. She was cute as a button."
"Did y'all get a little handsy?" Grace drawled, giggling.
"Sure we did!" Daryl answered her without missing a beat. She knew that he knew she was mocking him but he didn't care. Grace couldn't stop giggling at the silliness the conversation had taken a turn for.
"I am just yer average red-blooded 'merican male, ya know?" He continued. "Sure. We got a little handsy and then some."
For some reason this made Grace shifted a little nervously in the cot. She figured he wasn't a virgin but still had a hard time picturing him making love to anybody. She wondered what he'd be like in bed: slow?, fast?, soft?, hard? The only thing she could come up with was when it came down to it he probably knew what he was doing - and the thought of that thrilled and terrified her at the same time.
"To be honest wit you, Grace," Daryl was saying now. "I never was that serious wit any girl. I mean, I like women and all. But I never really had a shinin' example from a man on how to treat a lady, ya know?" He paused and then added quietly, "I guess ya could call me gun-shy."
Grace rolled over to look down at Daryl on the floor. He was still stretched out, laying on as much of his vest as he could, head on his backpack, eyes closed. A few whispers of his shaggy brown hair were out of place. Before she could stop herself, Grace reached over and push those strands back to where they belong. Daryl's blue eyes snapped open and looked at her curiously.
"I think you know how to treat a lady," Grace whispered to him. She was going to say more but thought maybe she had said enough for the night. To her surprise, he took her hand, that was dangling from the cot, brought it up to his lips and planted a kiss on her knuckles. Grace felt a jolt of electricity running through her, through every nerve in her body, as if she had been standing outside with a lightening rod.
"Yer a sweet girl, Gracie Lou." Daryl told her as he let go of her hand but still held her gaze. "Don't ever change."
And with that he rolled over, indicating that their late night talk was over and he wanted to get some sleep. Grace rolled over on the cot and faced the concrete wall. She was still thinking about his lips on her hand, how he told her she was sweet…she knew she was acting like a thirteen year old girl but didn't care. It made her feel the happiest she had ever felt in a long time.
Absentmindedly she began humming a tune, softly to herself. Soon she found herself quietly singing:
"Georgia, Georgia, the whole day through/Just a sweet old song keeps Georgia on my mind/Georgia, Georgia, a song of you/Comes as sweet and clear as moonlight through the pines…"
Grace had no idea why the state song popped into her mind. Maybe because she always liked that song or because she was just so giddy at moment she couldn't help it.
"Grace?" Daryl mumbled.
"Yeah?" She replied.
"What didcha do before all this happened?"
"Oh, I was working full time at this ice cream shoppe in town. I had just started taking some online college classes. To get my general ed stuff outta of the way."
Daryl grunted. "That's nice." He murmured. "So I guess if the world ever gits back to normal I won't have to worry about ya being a singer for a livin', huh?" He chuckled.
Grace laughed. "Oh, shut up, Dixon!"
"Night-night, honey." He drawled, amused.
*(I'm new to the show so let me me know if Daryl's backstory is correct or not)
