Chapter Forty Eight
Cincinnati

The days came by. Then the weeks. Daryl didn't wash. He didn't change. He was in-and-dated with visitors from refugee centers in the towns about job fairs. It was happening too quickly. Everything was orchestrated too finely. Everything seemed planned. When Daryl would look out of his lounge window, he wouldn't believe that only some weeks previous, the yard was full of walkers waiting for their next meal. It was too perfect. He was offered jobs all over the town. He turned down every one of them. He told them he wasn't staying. Daryl was offered counselling and medication. Nothing was accepted. They told him it would be hard to adjust. Daryl was used to having no help in his life. He wished he could have that back again. Maybe he was ungrateful. It kept him awake at night. He couldn't sleep. Bed at midnight. Awake at 2am.

Back in Georgia, when Beth had left the farm that day, she headed for the shack again. Daryl clothes were thrown into a bag beside hers. Family photos were shoved into the bags and his crossbow was across her back. Beth barricaded the front door and tried her best to cover up the dirt track leading to the house so that it would remain untouched. Then she headed for the nearest refugee centre. She bypassed piles of decaying bodies on the bike, following the signs to the centre. When Beth, arrived, she begged for them to tell her where Daryl and Carol and Eugene were. But nothing. Their bus to Ohio had departed already. They took her name and offered her a place on the next bus going to New Jersey and Washington. But Beth didn't accept. That wasn't where she wanted.
"What's the next bus outta here? Indiana or something?" Beth asked one of the guards after her failed attempt of finding Daryl. His eyes searched the clipboard,
"Washington's been cleared and Delaware."

Beth about-turned and went back outside with the bags on her back. Delaware was close enough to New York.

And so she went.


In Cincinnati, Daryl was struggling. There was no hope. There was nothing for him. Carol wrote. He never responded. There was nothing to say. He filled his days with rough sketches in forced, heavy ink from one of the few pens he found. They were nothing special. If he wasn't drawing or busying his hands, he was drinking whatever he could find. All the work he had progressed through during the end of the world was being washed away with each mouthful. Daryl was going back to his old ways when he and Merle would have reckless nights in a dive bar and kick up fights. There was an incident on his back porch when he was having a cigarette and his neighbour waved over the tall fence to him. The cigarette was thrown onto the grass and Daryl yelled for a come-on. He was laced on vodka and creme de menthe he found in the back of a cupboard behind some stale loaves. It wasn't exactly the jackpot but it was enough. The neighbour never looked in his direction again.

Daryl had outbursts in the house, arguing with people who weren't there and being generally anxious. He called in his binge-induced sleep about the walkers. How they were coming back and he could reach anything. How it was the end for him. He didn't dream of people or things outside of the apocalypse. It was hell he dreamt. Reliving every minute, every second and waking in a cold sweat and ready to grab his bow. It was never there when he woke up. One morning, when the Kahlua was empty, Daryl fled Cincinnati. At dawn one morning, he woke and walked. He never grabbed anything. There was nothing in that house belonging to him except the cigarettes he claimed when he seen them in the utility cupboard beside bleach and laundry detergent. Neighbours seen him leave. The front door was wide open and rattled off of the hallway wall. He had nothing.

AN/ Sorry this is such a terribly short chapter. I just have too many ideas for future chapters and I felt this ran dry really quickly. Thank you for all your reviews and views. It means so much to me! x