AN: This chapter is a major chapter and it took a lot getting this out. TRIGGER WARNING for next 3 chapters: There will be descriptions of trauma, rape and past abuse. This is meant to be a healing chapter for Beth. And maybe a little for Daryl too. This will probably continue to a lesser extent for the next couple chapters. Hopefully you will like where I am going with this. Many of Daryl's intimacy issues and what Beth went through at the hospital will be talked about in this chapter. Bear with me, I promise you will love where I am going with this story.

Chapter 10

He never thought he could have done what he and Beth did; that he could give himself over in that way. It had surprised him that he had been able to in the moment, that he could splay himself open and let her see. He figured she saw it all anyway, but still he had never felt more raw, more vulnerable than he had in that moment.

They had not done much more than kiss for the past couple of days. She hadn't said anything, but she knew. Just like she always did. She knew he needed time to adjust to this new phase of their relationship. Baby steps; they had promised each other.

He had been bent out of shape about the whole thing an hour after she had gone to sleep. Then his mind relaxed against the idea, her sweet scent beside him spurning powerful images in his mind. Of skin and fingers, parted lips and parted thighs.

It grew over the next two days and he had moments of utter clarity and others where all his desires became muddled with his past and his present and wondering how the universe (or God or whatever being deigned itself responsible for this world gone to shit) had ever thought to put sweet, prettier than daylight Beth Greene with the likes of him.

"I was nobody, nothin'."

They'd nearly finished the book she'd been reading to him each night and he loved every minute of it, though he wouldn't tell her that. He knew she saw it in the way he watched her face as she read. The way her eyes would slide over the pages and how she'd look up at him occasionally to catch his reaction. It was one of his favorite parts of the day, Beth reading to him about a princess and her prince and how they had been apart for such a long time and against all odds, he had saved her. Then in the end, she ended up saving him too since he was only "mostly dead". Daryl felt that thick feeling in his throat that threatened to overtake him and he just knew he'd be lost in a swirl of emotions. He swallowed past it but the feeling was brought on by the realization that he himself was mostly dead before Beth showed up in Alexandria. He had been literally like Rick had once said. "We are the walking dead."

He was a dead man walking. He had been no better than the ones that roamed outside the walls, seeking to feast upon the flesh of the living. The only difference was he was devoured every bit of anger he harbored in his heart for a god who would let someone as pure and good as Beth to die.

He wasn't sure what tomorrow held and his past was still a mystery as to how he had survived it but he was absolutely certain of one thing. He had gone and fallen head over heels in love with Beth Greene and he'd never be the same again. He couldn't help the spread of the smile across his face at the thought that he knew with the same certainty that she loved him too.

Beth stared down at the pale yellow journal that Daryl had gotten her. It was blank, every single page an empty canvas for her thoughts. He'd given it her the day before and she had fallen in love with him all over again that he had remembered how much she loved writing in her journal. Then she didn't know why she hadn't guessed he'd do something like that. It was really just like him. That was the thing most people didn't know about Daryl. His thoughtfulness that came from a place deep inside him. A place that sought out the love that he never got as a little boy. It had made him a reticent romantic. He had the forethought for romantic gestures and planned them out. He just lacked a certain finesse in receiving a compliment about how well the gesture was executed. It was as if he felt he was atoning for something and he couldn't accept the fact that people loved him just for him. She loved him like that and for the million reasons she thought of every day.

She was waiting on Daryl to get home now. He had gone to a planning meeting with Rick and Abraham for expanding the west wall of the zone. The journal stared back at her and she tentatively reached for it, the hue of home churned butter blending with the soft bound leather of the book and it appealed to the Beth she used to know. The "before" Beth. The one who didn't mind being around a lot of people, who could "sing out in crowds like it was fun".

One of the things she missed most about her old journal was reading through the old entries. It held some of her most precious secret memories. Now those secrets were out there for anyone to read them though she didn't know who would. The world was a different place now. She would have liked now to go back and read the entries about Daryl, especially the ones after their fight when she had noticed such a change in him. How he'd seemed less hardened somehow. And how sometimes she'd see him, just watching her, his eyes burning into her like he could light a fire. She smiled remembering how he probably had. When they burned down that shine shack. It was a good memory that she wrote about in her diary. She had been full of hope after they'd left that shack, whispers of their fight a dim memory and in its place images of burning copper flames rising in the sky, their pasts a Phoenix rising up and in the middle, her and Daryl with their middle fingers thrust upwards at a world that had tried to screw them in every way since the turn. A gigantic fuck you. She wondered what her Daddy would think about her thinking such a word. Let alone her saying it.

She worried her lip between her teeth. Sometimes she worried she didn't know that girl anymore. Hershel Greene's daughter. Maggie's little sister. Even Judith's babysitter. She wasn't the girl that wrote on those long ago pages. Maybe somehow if she wrote in this diary, she could somehow connect with that girl she used to be. She put her pen to the paper and began, hoping it came out like she wanted.

Hi, you don't know me yet. But that's okay, I don't know you either. In fact, I'm not even sure I know myself anymore. We've all lost a lot. I've lost a lot. And I'll tell you all about it, eventually. With all that I've lost, it's really only fair to say I found something too. Something good. Or someone rather. Daryl is the best good there is though I have to remind him sometimes. That's our little private joke. We have a lot of those.

Daryl once told me that the good people don't survive. Leave it to Daryl to never see himself as good. He's always been the protector of our group. Like a guardian angel. I feel like the luckiest girl in the world because I am with him now. He's my guardian angel too. Sometimes I don't even think he knows how much he saved me. And he just keeps on saving me. Maybe somehow, I saved him too.

Daryl let himself in their small house and closed the door behind him, listening for cues as to Beth's whereabouts. She had been quiet as a mouse before moving through the echoed corridors of the prison but here in this house, she was like a ghost. He bristled at the thought like he could call it back into the recesses of his mind. He knew it had come from a place where he had thought she was gone forever.

The meeting with Rick had gone well. There were new residents moving into the safe zone every day. It had just been a little trickle last week, one straggling survivor here and there. But yesterday, a group of 20 had arrived and though they were happy to accommodate if the trend continued, they would be having to double up housing. No one would mind considering the alternative of what was outside their walls but at the same time after not having to live in each other's pockets so much it would be hard to go back to that. Plus it seemed a shame to waste all the perfectly good houses that sat just on the other side waiting to be occupied. The plan was to move the wall in increments. If they stuck to it and everyone worked together, they could have the wall moved in less than a month and gain enough housing for another 150 residents. That was a generous estimate but they had decided to err on the side of optimism.

He walked back to the staircase, seeing not hide or hair of Beth. He called up the steps as he went. "I'm home."

After scaring the living daylights out of her the day before, he'd figured maybe it was wise to announce his presence. She had been shaking when it had happened and he'd only seen that particular look on her face one other time. The night she had told him a bit about that hospital. He didn't know all of it. He knew what she was willing to share and that was enough for him. Even if she never told him what had happened there, he could be okay with being here to help her put the pieces back together and count himself lucky that she wanted him there.

Sometimes it broke his heart how much innocence and openness she exuded before she was taken. He stood in the doorway to their bedroom and he couldn't stop the smile that crept onto his face at the picture she made, hair cascading down her shoulders, pen behind her ear as she looked at something in the journal he'd given her. He felt a swell of pride that he might have done something good. She looked up at him, a wide smile stretching across her face. The way she was smiling at him, he kind of believed he did do something good and it felt really nice. He caught the spark in her eyes and he couldn't seem to wipe the tiny grin off his face.

She launched herself from the bed, the journal and pen forgotten behind her. She was in front of him before he could blink. His hands went to her waist, his fingers just barely skimming under her t-shirt, coming into contact with her warmth just as her hands slid up around his neck.

"I missed you today." She murmured looking up at him.

"You say that every day Greene." She narrowed her eyes at him and he chuckled low.

Beth couldn't help the tiny laugh. "I can't help it. This is where you're supposed to say you missed me too." She chided gently.

She was teasing and he knew it and the glint in her eyes was downright mischievous. "Course I missed ya Beth." His voice was gruff at the end of his statement and she held his gaze all the way until his lips met hers. Hers closed and his did too and he got lost in his girl for a bit. His girl.

He got lost in the sensation of her warm lips and sweet taste and the little flicks of her tongue in his mouth were enough to bring him to his knees. She groaned into his mouth and it set a fire that coursed its way to his gut and kept on going until it threatened to consume him. He fisted his hand lightly into her hair, molding her to fit his lips. Kissing Beth like this always made him feel like his soul was on fire. Finally out of need for oxygen, they broke the kiss, but they still made no move to disentangle themselves in one another.

Beth looked up at him finally. "How was your day?"

He glanced at the bed, knowing she caught his meaning. He didn't want to pry but he was giving her the go ahead to talk about things if she wanted to. Her eyes said she wasn't ready to talk about it yet and that was fine with him. He'd be here when she was.

"Billy came down with some kind of flu bug. Jenny had to walk him home." Jenny was her assistant. She was 16 and deemed to be done with their form of schooling since she was so darn smart. Sometimes Beth wondered if she ought to be teaching the class instead of Beth.

Jenny was sweet and she reminded Beth a lot of herself when she was her age. That had only been three years ago but it seemed like something out of another life, another time, which was strange considering that had been after the turn. She didn't know a lot about the girl yet but she seemed to gravitate towards Beth. It was strange too that it seemed like Jenny was the only person in the safe zone that didn't make her nervous in the least. Besides Daryl of course. She smiled at the subject of her thoughts, her hands sliding from his shoulders, her palms coming to rest on his chest. She loved all the ways he was so hard, so masculine, so different from her.

"Mmm. That's not good. The last thing this place needs is some flu to sweep through. It was bad when all that went down at the prison. We barely survived that." Of course right in the middle of that, the Governor and his men had shown up and flushed the out of their home. It had happened every time.

Sometimes at night when his thoughts started to race, he began to worry that it was only a matter of time before someone flushed the out of this place too.

"Hopefully it won't last long. Maybe you shouldn't kiss me after all. I could be contagious." She grinned up at him.

"Too late now." He dipped his head to hers and claimed her lips again. It was a really long time before they came up for air.

Beth sat down to write in her journal again. She had kept it up steady for the past week and a half and she was getting antsy for some reason. She didn't know what it was and she couldn't put her finger on it but she felt like she was on the verge of something. She had a feeling she might not like all of it but she also knew that she would be better for it, whatever it was. As she began to write, it occurred to her that it might take more than one book to get it all out.

It's me again. I can't seem to get past this feeling of not knowing myself and I think I figured it out. When I woke up today, it felt different. I felt different. Like maybe this day was set aside for something. The start of something maybe. A journey that began a long time ago even though the telling of it starts on day one from where I am now. Speaking out of time doesn't make a lot of sense unless you consider that I never left the place where the bad had moved in my mind. I've been suspended in a cobweb of lies ever since. Lies I told myself. "You gotta put it away" and "I don't cry anymore." Lies they told me. "You're not strong." "…Just somebody's burden." Those were the lies that resonated within me.

I know I put on a big front like it's all okay and what happened there at that hospital doesn't bother me but the truth is it does matter. What they did to me does matter. What Gorman did to me does matter. And I remember. I remember a lot of things I didn't know before. At first I thought they were just nightmares but that's another lie. I was living in the nightmare at Grady and right now it's like I never left. I can still smell the antiseptic. I can still hear Joan's screams as we took her arm. I can still taste the green apple lollipop and I want to throw up. I thought I left it all behind but it just followed me here. I thought I could put it away, but that was just a lie too.

She read back over one sentence in particular. "I don't cry anymore." Beth thought that might be the biggest lie of all as tears fell from her eyes to land on the pages in front of her. She cried for the girl she had been and the girl she lost and she cried for who she didn't really know she had become.

Daryl found her this way, sitting with the diary opened to the entry she had just written, that startling revelation. What a hypocrite she had been. She looked up at him then and he came to kneel beside her where she sat at the table, his face a mask of concern.

"Beth." She had only heard this voice one other time, raw, broken, the sadness leeching from his bones and pouring out onto the warped planks of that shack. There he'd spilled all his secrets to her and here she was harboring her own. She dropped her head as the tears started again.

She felt rather than saw Daryl pull her into his arms as they sank to the floor of their kitchen, whispering to her assurances as her breathing came in ragged short gasps. "Shhh, it's okay. I'm here Beth. Y'ain't there anymore baby girl."

God it hurt seeing her like this, hearing her like this as the sobs wracked her body and the tears fell rapidly onto his shirt. He couldn't make sense of anything she was saying right now but he caught that she had been writing in her journal, the one he had picked up for her. He questioned his wisdom of doing that for a moment and then he remembered that book he had found at that shelter. The one about survivors of child abuse. It had talked about getting things out, writing in a journal and that it would be hard and painful but that it would help getting it all out of your head. Daryl understood that. He did. But he felt weird writing out what he was thinking. Even weirder thinking about someone finding and reading it.

Until he held her in his arms sitting on the hard linoleum, he thought he didn't know how bad it could hurt seeing another person's pain. And he thought of one thing. The one thing he might be able to do besides whisper these assurances that it would be okay. He didn't know that with a certainty but the one thing he did know. Yes, he could do that. "I love you." He whispered against her hair, pressing his lips to her head and tightened his arms around her. He repeated it as he brought one hand up to the back of her head, holding her to his chest where she had crumpled against him. "I love you." He said it again, a little louder than a whisper.

Beth heard him whispering that he loved her and it was the only thing that could reach her in that moment. In the dark place where all the bad thoughts were. His voice. His arms. His touch. His love. She pulled back just enough to look up at him. "I know Daryl and I love you too. I'm sorry."

"Girl you ain't got nothin' to be sorry for." He ran his hand over her hair and leaned in to press a kiss to her forehead. His heart was thrumming something awful at her pained expression, the one that showed she wore all her pain inside her. Just like him. Just like him and it broke his heart into a million pieces that she could go through anything like that. Sweet, pure, Beth Greene suffering at the hands of some pricks. Like Joe's guys or maybe even worse. "I wish I could take it away."

Beth shook her head and sniffed. She smiled at him sadly. "That's just it, Daryl. I'm the one who has to put it away. I said I was sorry because I was holding you to a standard I couldn't begin to meet. Not yet anyway. I can't put it away until I go through it. I gotta face it with my eyes open. I think I've been hiding. And I've been hiding what happened to me there. But I can't do that anymore."

Daryl eyed her for a long minute, wondering where in the hell she got to be so wise in her 19 years.

She glanced at the journal. "It's helping. Thank you. I think if maybe you want." Her voice trailed off then steeled her resolve to what she had decided in the instant she wrote the last sentence of her journal entry.

"I want to tell you. I want to tell you all of what happened to me there at Grady. I think it's the only way I can get through this and move forward. Ya know? To talk about it. Give it a voice so it's not all up here. Then I can put it away." She looked at him questioningly hoping he got what she was talking about. Some part of her knew that she was being philosophical but she'd heard stories of Daryl and speaking of being Zen. She knew he'd understand her.

Daryl couldn't keep the surprise from his voice when he asked. "Me? Why me?"

She smiled at him. "Because you know me better than anybody Daryl, better than Maggie does even. And I know you won't judge me. I just don't want you to look at me differently."

Daryl shook his head and moved his hands up to her face, his palms resting on her cheeks. "Beth, I could never think any differently of you. I told ya, I'm yours." He emphasized the last word. He had not forgotten their first words exchanged of what they were to each other. Defining the love that was blooming between them.

She smiled at him. "People think you don't talk much, but you got them fooled. You always know what to say Daryl Dixon."

He sighed in relief. Score another point for the Dixons. They needed all the help they could get. "Maybe ya inspire me."

She raised her eyebrow at him and he actually grinned at her. He looked so impossibly handsome that rare grin stretched across his face and maybe it was that she'd just bared her soul to him and he'd just seen her at her worst. Again. She didn't know what to chalk it up to. But she knew she wanted to lose herself in him. She wanted to feel something more than the bone-crushing numb that she had been locked into for what seemed an eternity. She and Daryl had not had many intimate moments lately. But she was hoping he was ready for it.

"I'm feeling inspired right now." She smiled at him demurely, testing the waters, and she knew he caught her meaning when she saw that flash of desire in his eyes. She always knew when he wanted her. She could see it reflected in his gaze. Their bright blue hue darkened considerably when he wanted her in that way.

"Yeah?" His breathing hitched in his chest. It felt like ages since he'd gotten this feeling and he realized how much he missed the feeling of the loss of breath being this close to her knowing that one day they'd be together in every way. He knew it'd be someday. Not today but it was certain eventually. Because he loved her and she loved him and that was what people did. They just went about it a different way.

Sometimes he thought he and Beth were supposed to be born of a different time. A time when things mattered, like getting to know the person you were with. Soul searching with that person and digging deep until you find the roots that will connect you, bind you for life. He knew that's what he and Beth were doing and maybe he was waxing poetic a bit but that was okay but this was Beth.

He eased her from his lap and got to his feet, helping her up in the process.

"What are we doing?" Beth sniffed back the remnants of her tears as her cheeks flushed. She hadn't wanted to push him but she'd missed this part of their relationship. The physical part. Being close to him with lips and tongues and hands and fiery skin and warm breath.

"We're going to go inspire one another." He gave a wolfish grin and led her up the stairs to their bedroom.

As they reached the side of their bed, he turned towards her and just looked at her looking up at him all implicit trust and barely concealed passion. He saw it flash behind the blue orbs that stared back at him. He watched silently, barely breathing as Beth brought her hands up to her shirt and pulled it over her head, a little smile playing across her face, then it was gone, replaced by raw need. She never took her eyes off of him as she moved her fingers to her jeans and worked the button loose and slid the zipper open and eased them from her hips and down over her legs, kicking the aside. She was clad now in nothing but that damn pink bra and panties set. He really should fucking burn the damn garments or else they were bound to be the death of him.

He groaned at how perfect she was. She closed the small distance between them and moved her fingers to his buttons. He was about to interrupt her when her voice broke his thoughts. "I shouldn't want this Daryl. To be like this with you." She blushed as she looked at him. "I mean I know we ain't gonna do everything just yet, but just being with you like this, giving each other what we can, it should scare me. It should be a trigger." She whispered that last part, the raw showing in her eyes and in her voice.

Daryl stilled her fingers as she moved to push his pants from his hips. "We don't have to do nothin', Beth." The last thing he wanted to do was cause her to have some kind of panic attack like he'd seen downstairs. He'd just as soon rip his own heart from his chest than cause her that kind of pain.

She shook her head at him and smiled. "That's just it Daryl, this seems to be what I need. What I crave. I shouldn't want this. This should be the last thing I want but because it's you, it's what I want. What I think about all the time. I guess this is my apocalypse therapy." She couldn't help the giggle that burst forth from her lips.

"Sex therapy." He felt his ears turning red as he implied something they hadn't even done yet but she was still laughing and he laughed through his flustered state as she finished working the rest of his clothes from his body, save for his boxers.

Nothing else between them, the climbed up into the bed towards the pillows and Daryl made sure he got a nice view of her ass before she turned to sit down. There was a moment of hesitation on Daryl's part, but then Beth ran one of her hands low on her belly, swooping up to tweak one of her nipples. She was watching him, her eyes taking in his expression and he knew he gave it all away in one growl.

Beth loved watching Daryl get turned on. It was something no one else got to see. In a way it was a shame because it was a sight to behold his eyes going all dark, his pupils bleeding out into pitch black and all the raw desire pulling you under his stare. She felt herself getting wet just looking at him watching her. Then his lips were on hers and his hand was splayed lightly across her ribs and she arched her back, sliding her ribs more firmly against his hand and he got the hint and he moved his hand up and down her torso, coming to rest under her bra. She slid one hand around his torso, her fingers caressing his back the puckered flesh apparent but it was oddly the areas of his skin she loved the most. The areas that marked him that needed claiming for a better memory. A better tomorrow. He didn't tense and actually leaned into her touch, like he craved it and Beth hoped somehow he could heal her scars, not the ones on her face. The ones she hid deep inside where no one could see how they cut and made her bleed.

Daryl continued his assault on her lips before breaking away to breathe and wasted no time in moving his lips down the smooth pale column of her neck, marveling at how soft she was. So soft where he was not and her skin so pale against his ruddy complexion. He wondered that she let him touch her like this and the soft sounds she was making as he ran his lips and hands over her neck and arms, that she liked it. She liked it very much.

What happened next set the chain of events that they almost couldn't recover from. Daryl was moving his lips lower and lower down her neck and it was that moment that Beth chose to arch her back up off the bed, as his head slipped down and he ended up with his lips over her breast. The material of her bra was thin, too thin to be called a bra really especially when he considered that he was scant inches from her nipple. He looked up at Beth, all parted lips and a breathy sigh and she nodded her head at his unspoken request. He barely breathed as he closed his lips over that pert little bud poking up through the thin material and Beth Greene moaned his name as he sucked at her breast through her bra, wishing like hell he'd had the forethought to move the damned material out of his way so he could taste her skin. He flit his tongue out and as if Beth heard his thoughts she reached down into her bra and thrust the material aside, freeing one breast leaving his eyes to feast upon the sight of Beth Greene's tit right in his face. One hand splayed against her hip and as he fastened his lips over her bare nipple and sucked it into his mouth, Beth bit back a cry and his pants had gotten so tight he was craving release from all the pressure. Daryl turned them and Beth moved her legs apart a bit and Daryl slid one leg between them and Beth ground into him causing them both to moan at the almost contact. His breathing hitched in his chest as she reached behind her and removed her bra and he was left to stare at her, cheeks flushed, lips swollen from his kisses, bare-chested, her rosebud nipples just begging to be kissed. He reached out and ran his fingers over her shoulder and traced an imaginary line watching her eyes follow his fingers and then she looked at him as he continued on his path to her other nipple, the one he hadn't gotten to taste yet. He dipped his head quite suddenly taking it into his mouth, only watching her, lost in Beth. She moved her hips again, wiggling against his leg wedged between hers and it wasn't long before she had settled into a rhythm that mimicked the very thing their bodies were straining so hard to not do. Or maybe it was that they were straining to do it and they were holding themselves back. She was writhing against him now and he removed his lips from her breast and moved quickly up over her as he claimed her lips again with his and her mouth willingly accepted his tongue, hers flitting against his and she moved her hips again and his hands slid of their own accord much as they had the time before, except this time they slid down to Beth's thigh and she whispered against his lips. "Please touch me Daryl."

God he was helpless. He had to. He reckoned he'd do anything she asked of him and hell as he slid his hand slowly, achingly slow down her thigh and back up and finally at the juncture, he tentatively took one finger and traced an imaginary line and he was surprised to feel wetness through the fabric. He looked up at her and met her gaze. Her eyes seemed to challenge him. She wanted him; this is what she wanted him to know.

"More." She whispered.

Daryl pressed his fingers in and Beth moaned and bucked her hips against his hand, craving contact. She was about to lose her mind and wanted his fingers on her, his mouth on her. She wanted every single part of him fused with hers and it didn't make sense and it brought her clarity all at the same time. He pressed his fingers in harder and he'd been watching her move her fingers against herself because he was working her in all the right ways. She moaned loudly as he pressed in harder where her clit was and she wished more than anything that she was naked right now. She saw stars as he pressed harder and she heard bells. Bells didn't seem right.

Daryl bit back a curse as he realized there was someone at the door. Beth's eyes flew to his. "I don't want to see anyone." Her eyes were panicked.

"You don't have to. We can pretend we're asleep." Daryl murmured quietly, rubbing her arms reassuringly.

"It's not even dark." Beth smirked at him. Not even Carol went to bed this early.

"Well they can assume we're doing somethin' else then." She swore he wiggled his eyebrows at her suggestively.

"Did you just?" Beth laughed. They wouldn't really be doing that. They wouldn't have sex. Neither could deny that the mood had been lost but they had moved very fast. She was lying there bared from the waist up and she was overtaken by a sudden desire to cover herself. She reached for the blanket.

"Cold?" Daryl whispered, lest their surprise unwanted guest heard him.

She flushed and shook her head at him, pulling the blanket up. "I' 'unno." He looked at her sharply and realized she was trying to cover up. He moved his hand to her wrist, grasping it gently.

"You ain't gotta hide. Not from me. Besides I like it." Daryl flushed at his own admission. It was true though. Looking at Beth now, she looked like some damn goddess staring back up at him. "And you're beautiful."

She smiled at him. Always knowing what to say. Always. He thought she was beautiful. And he was hers. She smiled to herself and tucked her body against him, stretching as she did so.

"Maybe we can claim we're asleep after all." She yawned.

Daryl pulled her close and reached for the blanket. "Go to sleep baby girl. I'll be here when ya wake up." Whatever she'd gone through down in the kitchen had probably been enough to exhaust her. She needed the sleep.

She nodded in agreement and tucked her head into his chest her hands coming up to splay across his abdomen. "Daryl?"

"Mmm?" He whispered as he ran his hand over the back of her head.

"I love you." Her words would have been enough but the weight of her voice, the change in timbre as they slipped past her lips was like a bolt to his heart, penetrating all the walls he'd built. He was helplessly, hopelessly in love with her and he couldn't help but be happy about it.

"Love you too." He pressed his lips against her hair, breathing her in, vanilla and sunshine. He had never known loving someone could splay you open like this. Make you feel all the things you never even knew you had it in you to feel. There was not another person in the world he could ever imagining doing all this with. No one except her. Beth.

Well there is the first installment. This was kind of a buildup to the next chapter where she gets to bury her past too just like Daryl. Hope you like where I went with this. Let me know.

As an aside, I took a big step myself this week. I got a tattoo that reads "Let go, move forward" with an arrow tipped in green between the script. It turned out lovely and I realized something vital. It's not a commemoration as much as it is a promise. That things will get better. I have moved forward but I haven't let it go because I have not put it away either. I have to face it. Some of this will leech into this fic and I think it will become what it was supposed to all along. Let me know your thoughts. Until next time, xoxoxo