Author's note: I am the worst when it comes to updating I know. I'm so sorry this story is taking 800 years for me to write it. On the bright side the last chapter is written and just needs to be edited before posting. Hopefully that won't take more than a day or two. The epilogue is also mostly written but that might not be up for another week. Again sorry for the delays and I hope you enjoy the chapter!

Chapter Twenty-One

They'd been on the road for nearly two weeks and they had yet to see a single sign of anyone living.

They had passed the place where Aaron and Eric had last searched for survivors a few days ago and the cars had since been reduced to a snail's crawl as they carefully mapped out each new area they passed. Street signs were written down and landmarks were made note of as their pair of cars crept steadily along. Daryl drove most of it while Beth carefully drew out the map of the area so that if they ever needed to return to this place in future trips they would know which streets to avoid and where fellow survivors were most likely to congregate. In between lengthy lulls of silence Daryl would ask her questions in the attempt to shake some of her memories lose but they stayed stubbornly locked in place like they had for the past few weeks.

Eventually even his questions drew to a halt as he tuned in to the shortness of her replies. Beth had tried to keep her irritation with herself out of her tone but it had begun to bleed into every aspect of her being, and her life. Like so many of their days had become this one too passed in silence broken only by directions or the noting of a landmark

By the time Eric's now familiar voice came over the walkie Beth had stuck in the cup-holder and told them they were going to stop for the night a thin air of frustration hung in the car although Beth was not sure who it was directed at. She knew that she was annoyed with herself because the progress she had steadily been making had been halted by some unseeable force but she was not sure if Daryl's annoyance stemmed from how short she had been with him lately or because he was angry with her for not trying harder to recover her past. She felt like she had been dredging through the broken mess of her mind with a fine toothed comb lately in the attempts to pull something worthwhile out of it but all she had gotten in return were fragmented scraps and a never ceasing pounding in her temples.

After driving down a few more deserted streets Aaron chose a small house at the end of a cul de sac for them to attempt camping in. It's backyard led straight into the woods providing them with cover to get away if things took a turn for the worse. They parked one of the cars at the end of the street and drove the other back a few blocks to confuse any living people that might stumble upon them and turn out to be the not so friendly sort. Once their cars were parked they cautiously made their way back to the blue two story. Daryl rapped his knuckles on the door three times before they waited with bated breath, weapons held up at the ready. When several minutes had passed in silence Daryl eased the door open, stepping inside of it quickly with his bow raised high.

Clearing the house did not take very long and after a quick meal of canned food, Aaron turning up his nose as Eric ate applesauce beside him, Beth and Daryl retreated upstairs to sleep while the others took the first watch. Once inside the small unfamiliar bedroom Beth felt some of the strain of the day leave her shoulders as she debated whether or not it would be worth the risk to sleep with her boots off. In the end she decided against it and crawled into the bed with her shoes still on, exhaustion taking her over mere seconds after her head hit the pillow.

XxX

He lay beside Beth in silence, her back to him as she slept fitfully. His fingers tapped against his chest as he tried to talk his mind into calming down enough to sleep, an exercise he already knew would be futile.

It seemed that this was the way things were going to be with them on the road, only one of them ever seemed to be able to sleep at a time. It had not passed Daryl's notice that the few times he did manage to get any sleep Beth always had dark circles under her eyes and an edge of perpetual annoyance that nothing seemed to shake off. When Daryl had tried to comment on her lack of sleep she had just brushed him off before slipping back into silence and he knew that her sleep patterns had just entered their 'do not discuss' zone, along with the progress of her memories.

Daryl wasn't sure when it had happened, this sense of unease between the two of them, but that wasn't surprising since he also wasn't one hundred percent sure of the cause. The first few days after they had left the walls had been surprisingly pleasant, even more so now in hindsight. Beth and him had talked about so many things that there was rarely a silent moment in their car and those that they had were always companionable and comforting. But somewhere along the way a switch had fallen and they now spent most of their days in silence, a wedge driven through them that had not been there since the early days after the prison fell.

He wasn't sure where the tension between them was coming from but he knew that his heart broke with the pain that was apparent on Beth's face whenever she thought that no one was looking. Daryl knew that it likely all stemmed from her attempts to pry out her memories and watching the toll the lack of progress was taking on her he was suddenly remorse that they were even trying. He didn't want to put Beth through any form of pain, ever, but every time that he tried to broach the subject with her Beth just shut down and he was at a loss for what to do. Daryl had seen Beth a lot of ways; broken down, angry, and hurt but never before had he seen her look so empty.

He kept trying to find a way to tell her that he didn't care anymore. It no longer mattered to him if her memories ever came back as long as she could be happy again now.

After a few hours of laying in the darkness Daryl suddenly tuned in to the minuscule shift in Beth's breathing and although she had not moved at all he knew that she was awake. He waited for her to fall back asleep but minutes passed and still her breathing stayed the same. He was overcome with the urge to reach over and touch her but the thought of her pulling away from his hands filled him with dread. Finally just the idea of her pulling away became too much for him and Daryl had to know if that's what she would do. If that was what their relationship had come down to.

Trying not to move too much he cautiously stretched his hand across the empty space between them, his fingers just brushing her arm. He waited in a stiff silence for Beth to bat his hand off or to roll away but instead he felt a thrill of relief course through him as she reached her hand up to twine her fingers through his.

XxX

Her head resting against the window of the truck Beth couldn't help but stare at her own face reflected back at her in the glass. She kept glaring at the offending scar on her forehead, the one that was the root of all of her problems.

The words Maggie had whispered to her before they left kept running through her mind as well, 'Don't push yourself too hard.' As if Beth could do anything but push at this point. Not that it was doing her any good, whatever cracks that had been in the wall blocking her memory seemed to have closed up. Nothing would come to her anymore.

Maggie was right, she'd pushed herself too hard and now she had broken everything.

"Do you wanna drive?" Daryl's voice suddenly broke through the darkness of her thoughts and Beth turned away from her reflection to look at him in surprise. This was the first time he had offered such a thing to her and she got the feeling that he greatly preferred to be behind the driver's wheel himself, that trusting himself to another's control of a vehicle was not his favorite thing to do.

She felt a rush of warmth towards him for offering her such a thing because she knew it was an intense sign of trust. She could see how much her own personal pain was affecting him so Beth tried to shake it off and put on a brave facade for him.

"I would but I probably shouldn't." Beth admitted with a sigh, looking at the wheel with longing. She missed driving, missed the feel of doing something productive even if it was from something as simple as eating up the miles underneath the wheels. But her distorted vision held her back, the memory of how she had almost run over Morgan at their first meeting was all too real in her mind.

"Why not?" Daryl grunted, his brows knitting together in confusion.

"Because of my eye." Beth said in surprise, perplexed that he had her clarify. When his look of confusion didn't dissipate she continued on haltingly, realizing with a surge of guilt that she had never in fact told him about the other side effects of her head wound. "Because of the black spots." she whispered, waving her hand in front of her left eye as if she could brush the blackness away from her sight with the motion.

For a long moment neither of them said anything but Beth noticed the whiteness of Daryl's knuckles as he clutched the wheel. She had just opened her mouth, whether to apologize for not telling him or something else she wasn't sure, but in the end it didn't matter because Daryl spoke before her.

"What else?" he muttered, his voice as tight as his grip on the wheel as Beth's shook her head at him in bewilderment. "What else did the bullet do?"

"Just my hand." Beth whispered, holding up the offending limb as she waggled her fingers guilty. "I can't really feel very much with it but at least I can move it now."

She had offered up the last part as a sign of hope, as a sign that she had at least made progress in something, that some part of her had improved since her initial wound but Beth saw instantly that her words had the opposite of her intended effect.

The tension seemed to leave Daryl at her words and he slumped against the seat like a puppet whose strings had been cut. It looked as though he was fighting off the urge to fold in on himself as he whispered. "You couldn't move your hand?"

Beth knew from the hopelessness of his voice that he did not really intend his words as a question.

XxX

A thrum of guilt kept coursing through him, pounding harder with every beat of his heart and dimly Daryl wondered if this was his heart breaking for Beth. He could not believe that in the months since her return he had never even toyed with the possibility that her memory loss was not the only negative effect her head wound had given her. He could not shake the guilt that he had never even bothered to ask Beth if there had been any other effects, he'd known that she had gone to see Denise a few times since her arrival of course but he had always thought that those were just routine inspections, that the doctor had wanted to make sure her wound was healing properly not so that they could test how much feeling had returned to Beth's hand.

He knew that he was not the only one who had not known about these things but that knowledge did not make the guilt ease up any less. In fact it made it worse somehow, that no one in their group had bothered to ask Beth what else the bullet had done to her. They had all been so consumed with the loss of her memories that it had never even crossed their minds that the bullet could have presented Beth with other troubles.

Beneath all of his guilt however was a darker thought, one he kept trying to shake off but that stayed stubbornly in place.

Even if he hadn't asked, why hadn't Beth bothered to tell him?

XxX

After a few hours of driving in silence they pulled up in front of a small pharmacy, none of them actually hoping that they would find anything of use left inside but all of them feeling obligated to at least try.

"We'll go around back." Eric said, indicating himself and Aaron who followed him like they were parts of the same machine.

Beth followed after Daryl silently, their feet crunching on the broken glass of the door as they passed the threshold.

"I'm sorry." the words suddenly bubbled up past her lips of their own accord, as if she was no longer capable of holding them inside.

She saw Daryl stiffen but he made no move to turn to face her so Beth continued on in a rush. "I should have told you, about the other side effects." she swallowed roughly at the words, knowing they were true. "They just didn't seem important you know?" she was going to continue on, telling him about how even to herself comparing her hand and eye to her memory loss had just seemed so insignificant but the words died in her throat when Daryl whirled to face her.

"Not important?" he whispered, the anger in his voice laced with enough guilt that she knew it was not directed at her. "Beth, anything that has to do with you is important to me."

The words stirred something inside of her, shaking lose a name for the feelings she had for Daryl. Her mouth was open and she was gaping for words, for what words would be an appropriate response for something like that? The words might not have felt like much coming from some one else but Beth knew that coming from Daryl that was ridiculously close to the three words she found were sitting dangerously on her tongue.

Before she could say anything in response though a low growling filled her ears and her hand flew to her knife just as she saw Daryl raise his bow up as they both turned to scan the dilapidated pharmacy. Silently Beth cursed herself for letting her emotions get the better of her before they checked to make sure the area they were in was safe. She tried to make her breath as shallow as possible as her and Daryl turned to scan the shelves surrounding them. Beth picked her way carefully through the debris that scattered the floor, her ears tuned in to the growling enough to tell that there was only one walker nearby. She turned in time to catch Daryl's eye and she mouthed the word 'one' to him which he nodded to sharply. Beth wasn't surprised that he had already worked that out on his own.

The pharmacy wasn't that big and they were nearing the end of the aisles when Beth's foot suddenly got caught in the trash that cluttered the floor. She tried to yank her foot free but the motion only caused the object around her ankle, a chain of Christmas lights she noticed dimly, to rattle against the edge of the aisle. From the corner of her eye she saw Daryl turn towards her but before she could wave him off to say she was fine, just tangled, a pair of hands were suddenly gripping her upper arms.

Fear coursed through her but Beth clamped down on it immediately, shoving it to the back of her mind as she fought to pull herself free from the grip of the walker. She heard Daryl call out her name and she tried to pull herself far enough from the walker so that she could turn and make contact with her knife. Before she could manage such a maneuver the walker was suddenly pulled off of her and she watched with surprise as Daryl tackled it to the floor. He looked over his shoulder at her and caught her eye and she nodded at once, her hand tightening the grip on her knife before she really even understood why. All at once though Daryl rolled over, the walker's shoulders caught between his arms as he locked the walker's head in place. Trying not to look too closely at the torn skin that was left on it's face Beth rushed forward, placing her hand on it's torn shirt for balance as she thrusted her knife into it's skull.

Daryl pushed the body off of him with a nod of gratitude at her, and Beth reached down to help pull him to his feet. Just as she did so something clicked in her brain and she knew with a certainty that they had taken down a walker like this before. A wave of relief washed over her so strong that for a moment Beth found it hard to stand. She wasn't sure if the relief was because they were both okay or because she had remembered something after so long of silence but when Daryl asked her softly if she was okay Beth didn't bother with words and instead fell straight into his chest and wrapped her arms tight around him.

XxX

Daryl rose his arms to wrap around Beth without a second thought, surprised once again by how easily she fit against him. He was slightly confused as to why she was holding him so tightly, they had been in far more dangerous situations than this before, but he was not about to comment on it and ruin the moment. He let his chin rest on the top of her head before the sound of the back door opening drew him back to the present and he pulled away as the sound of Aaron and Eric entering reached them.

"You have any trouble in here?" Aaron asked as he slowly sheathed his knife as he saw that there seemed to be no immediate danger around them.

"Just this one." Beth said, nodding towards the walker at their feet. "How bad was it outside?" she asked as she bent to untangle her foot from the cords it was still wrapped in. Instinctively Daryl knelt to help her too, soaking in the appreciative smile Beth gave him at the help.

"Nothing we couldn't handle." Aaron reassured them as he grabbed a shopping basket from where it lay discarded on the floor. "Well it's all clear. Let's go shopping."

XxX

The atmosphere in the car had shifted drastically. Whereas before they had both been locked inside their own frantic minds now a sense of calmness seemed to have settled over them. Beth leaned her head back against the seat and studied Daryl from the corner or her eye, smiling at him shyly when he caught her staring. She opened her mouth to apologize for the bad mood she had been in for the past few days, to explain that he had not been the cause but her own frustrations at herself but before she could say anything Eric's voice came over the walkie, telling them they had found a good place to stay for the night.

Beth went through what had become their usual routine of parking the cars and doubling back to their potential nightly home, checking to make sure it was clear without a second thought. They had only been scoping places out for a few weeks and already her body moved through the motions on autopilot. She tried to stay more focused than usual on the task at hand, the close call at the pharmacy still fresh in her mind.

Eric and Aaron took the first watch as they always did and Beth followed Daryl upstairs to the bedroom they had spied earlier. Beth was still thinking over her apology to Daryl for the past few days when he spoke from behind her

"I'm sorry." Daryl mumbled just as Beth had decided to keep her shoes on again and had begun to climb into the bed fully dressed. She stopped and knelt on the bed as she looked over her shoulder at him as he clarified. "I'm not trying to push you into remembering things. I was just trying to help."

Beth smiled sadly as she patted the bed beside her, trying to let him know that she was not cross with him. "I know that Daryl and I'm not mad at you. I'm mad at me." he sat beside her on the bed and slowly Beth slipped her hand into his. "I'm sorry I'm not remembering more."

She leaned her head against Daryl's shoulder in time to feel him shake his head.

"Ain't your fault." there was a long pause and for a moment Beth wondered if Daryl had fallen asleep sitting up when he whispered. "Somethings still blocking you is all. Once we get past it your memories will come back."

Beth craned her neck to look up at him and Daryl looked down at her wordlessly in the gray light of twilight seeping through the open windows.

"You really think so?" she whispered softly, her voice catching on the last word.

Daryl nodded slowly before leaning down to press a soft kiss against her forehead. "I have faith." he whispered into her hair, causing Beth to smile as she closed her eyes and pressed her face closer to his chest.

XxX

They sat huddled together for a long moment before Beth spoke slowly, her words muffled by the leather of his vest.

"I did remember something today." she whispered, her voice hesitant as if she was unsure whether or not she should be sharing this with him.

A thrill of hope ran through Daryl at the words and he tried to squash it down forcefully. There was no point getting his hopes up when it came to her memories, their return was far too erratic for that.

"What was it?" he grunted, trying to focus on the fact that she was telling him about this at all even though her voice showed the hesitant she was feeling.

"The way we killed the walker today." she muttered, pulling back to eye him quizzically. "We've done that before haven't we?"

Daryl nodded shortly as he remembered how the move had become their signature, the easiest way to get walkers off each others backs without causing a mess. The weird thing was that he had never felt nervous about it, even the first time they tried the move without ever having discussed it first Daryl had known that Beth would know what to do. That she would have his back.

He was just happy that no matter what else had happened between them that fact hadn't changed.

XxX

Daryl's breath had long since grown easy with sleep and yet Beth still lay awake, her eyes watching the moonlight play across the ceiling as if the answers to all of her worries could be deciphered from it's shadows. Minutes ticked by into hours and finally she could stand the stillness no longer. It took her the space of several breaths to slide out from underneath Daryl's arm and out of the bed without waking him but she managed. Her feet moved nearly soundlessly across the carpeted floor and Beth marveled silently at the ease with which she treated a stranger's home like her own.

The hallway was dark around her and she kept one hand on the wall as she slowly made her way downstairs. She could see Aaron walking past the front windows on the porch outside and for a brief moment she considered going outside and joining him and Eric on watch but she dismissed the idea quickly. Beth wasn't entirely sure what she was seeking in this house but company was not it.

She made her way through the main floor of the house slowly, eyeing the faces in the pictures frames with curiosity. She couldn't help but wonder if all of these nameless faces were still alive out there somewhere, or if all of those people had since perished.

Beth ran her fingers lightly through the dust on a long table in the hallway, picking up a book with curiosity as she entered the back room of the house. The book's title did not hold her interest so she let it fall from her fingers onto the couch as she came further inside the room. Something stirred inside of her chest as she caught sight of a large black shape nestled in the corner of the room.

Drawn to it like a moth to a flame Beth approached it slowly, her fingers brushing lightly over the ivory keys so softyl that they produced no sound. She was still marveling at it's beauty when a voice spoke quietly from behind her.

"Probably shouldn't play that."

Beth turned at the familiar sound of Daryl's voice, relieved that the tension that had been tugging at them for days seemed to have passed.

"I wasn't." she whispered in return, bending her knees to sit at the piano's bench. She heard Daryl's footsteps approaching her but she could not seem to tear her eyes away from the piano. "It's just so beautiful." she whispered, running her fingers over the cold keys again and wishing she could press them and hear their sounds. Beth had no idea if her hands would be able to produce anything resembling actual music from the piano but her skin was suddenly itching with the desire to try. But Beth knew that the sound of the keys would only bring the dead to them so with a surge of disappointment she pulled her hands off the keys, going so far as to place them underneath her thighs in the hopes to squelch the urge building inside of her. She felt something flicker in the back of her mind and she was just reaching out inside of her to grab it when Daryl spoke again from where he had settled on the couch.

"Maybe you could sing something?"

His voice was hesitant, halted, as if he was unsure of whether or not he could ask that of her. Beth cast him a grateful smile over her shoulder as she wondered how it was that he always seemed to know exactly what it was that she needed.

"Okay." she whispered before turning back to the piano, she knew that she could not play it but the sight of it's ivory keys gleaming in the moonlight filled her with a strange sense of calm. Beth searched inside her for the song she wanted to sing and she had grown so used to songs coming to her from the recesses of her mind that she was not even surprised when the words that spilled out of her lips were ones she could not remember having sung before.

"It's unclear now what we intend we're alone in our own world." Beth heard Daryl draw a sharp intake of breath from behind her but the sound only registered in the back of her mind as a strange pulsing began in her temple. She shook it off even as a shudder ran through her, the words stopping as she glared at the piano and tried to place where the unsettled feeling was coming from.

There was the briefest bit of silence until Daryl whispered from behind her, "Keep singin'."

Beth's spine straightened on instinct, her hands shifting out from beneath her thighs to grip the bench beneath her as her whole body went rigid.

disclaimer: The song Beth sings is 'Be Good' by Waxahatchee.