A/N: This was originally designed as an interactive chapter. Follow instructions below for best Bethyl feels. If I did it right, and you follow the steps, you should feel like you are within the chapter itself.
Step 1. Leave here and visit youtube to listen to Chantal Kreviazuk's version of Randy Newman's song Feels Like Home. I choose this song specifically, not only for the lyrics, but the melody as well. It really adds something.
Step 2. Yay, you're back. You should already be excited. Now find a quiet comfortable place where you won't feel self conscious for what I am about to ask.
Step 3. When Beth begins to sing I want you to sing along with her, then drop out of the song to read my written words. You do not have to be good for this to work. Simply repeat the process all the way to the end.
Enjoy!
"I wouldn't pay a nickel, to have it paved in gold.
Everything I love, is at the end of a dirt road."
-Author unknown
"You should have seen her out there Glen. She was amazing. I cannot believe the difference in her."
"Did the two of you have a chance to talk."
"We did, and you were right. I don't need to know everything that is going on in her life. I really just need to be a part of it."
"Does that mean I can finally stop playing twenty-questions with Daryl, cause I think it's starting to effect how the two of us work together."
Maggie lets out a laugh. "I'm sorry. Was it terribly awkward?"
"You have no idea," Glen chuckles.
"Well you'll be happy to know that it does. It definitely does... But I swear if he hurts her in any way, shape or form, he'll have me to answer to."
Glen laughs out loud and nods his head in support. Truth be told Glen never really considered the idea of Beth and Daryl a reality until a few days ago, but Glen knows his wife well and so can honestly say that if he were Daryl, he would tread lightly.
Maggie smiles up at her husband, nudging his shoulder. "Speak of the devil."
Glen looks up to see the hunter round the corner of the wall and walk toward the campfire. As Daryl draws closer, Glen looks back over to his wife and can see a mischievious glint dancing in her eyes. He wonders to himself exactly what Beth has told her. It must have been more than what he got out of Daryl.
Maggie gives the hunter a nod, and without saying a word Daryl promptly changes course and props himself against the outer wall, maintaining a certain distance from the rest of the group. Amusement plays on Maggie's lips, even as she extends the olive branch. "Daryl, I'm really glad you're back." He merely grunts his reply, but refuses to meet her gaze.
Moments later Beth emerges with Tara around the same section of the building. On her hip, displayed for all to see is a black leather sheath with a very familiar Gerber locking knife sitting inside it (minus the blood of course). Glen turns his gaze to the hunter. Sending him a raised brow and an encouraging smile, as Beth settles in beside Maggie on the log.
As Tara passes around the water, the rest of the group begins to relay the days events for the late arrivals. Michonne stands up in front of the fire and acts out a play-by-play, while Carl sits by her side smiling as chews away on a Big Cat bar. Rick finds a spot next to Daryl and leans back against the wall, listening to the conversations swirl around him with a quiet resolve. Glen can't help but notice the sad look in his eyes. He has aged well beyond his thirty-seven years in the last six months and it doesn't take a genius to guess the cause.
Glen pushes the thought from his mind. This is suppose to be a happy time. He knows tomorrow he and Daryl will have the unpleasent task of speaking with Rick and Abraham about Noah and the run, but for tonight he will simply enjoy being home.
Carl's voice pulls Glen from his thoughts. "Beth, will you sing us a song? A happy one."
All eyes turn to the tiny blonde and Beth smiles back sweetly. "Any requests?"
Abraham interrupts, "Darlin', if you can bring music to my ears than I will listen to whatever you want to sing." Rosita curls up close to him on the opposite side of the campfire and eagerly waits for Beth to start. Music is all but a thing of the past now, and its a rare treat if you can get the opportunity to hear it."
Beth clears her throat, tucks a strand of yellow hair behind her ear and begins to sing.
"There's something in your eyes, makes me want to lose myself,
makes me want to lose myself, in your arms."
The melodic sound of Beth's voice causes a silence to fall on the group. Her only musical accompaniment is the crackling fire, and the cicadas that are playing backup in the field outside the wall.
"There's something in your voice, makes my heart beat fast,
hope this feeling lasts, the rest of my life."
Maggie nestles in close to Glen's side, and he can feel the heat that radiates off of her body as she leans her head against his. Sasha and Bob sit canoodling on the log beside them, and Rick stands up to make his way over to Carl. He pats his son's shoulder, then takes a seat at his side, and Michonne smiles up at them like they are the two most important people in her world.
"If you knew how lonely, my life has been,
and how long I've been, so alone."
Behind the crackling flame Daryl shift's the position of his body against the wall, sitting a little taller as he wills his eyes to look up.
"And if you knew how I wanted someone to come along,
and change my life the way you've done."
Beth cannot help the flush in her cheeks, and doesn't attempt to conceal the look of yearning she sends out to him now, wanting, almost daring a response.
"It feels like home to me,
it feels like home to me,
it feels like I'm all the way back, where I come from."
Maggie releases Glen from their embrace and slides her arm around Beth, the sisters swaying to the music, as she joins the song. Her harmony mixes with Beth's willowy voice and creates magic. Glen escapes into another world, a better world, and glancing around him, he doesn't think he is alone in his thoughts.
"It feels like home to me,"
His wife's voice adds confidence to the song,
"it feels like home to me,"
and the music gains strength.
"it feels like I'm all the way back, where I belong."
It has power.
"A window breaks, down a long dark street,
and a siren wails, in the night."
Maggie's voice suddenly drops off, but she holds Beth up by simply holding her hand. Judging by the expressive look in Beth's eyes it is clear to the group she is nervous, but why? Beth never gets nervous about singing.
"But I'm alright, cause I have you here with me,
and I can almost see, through the dark there is light."
Electricity crackles through the air as the fire flies light up the night. Glen takes note of the smile that forms on Beth's face. It's no longer that of a teenage girl... Not anymore. Just like her sister's, Beth's smile is brilliant, and is focused entirely on Daryl Dixon.
"If you knew how much this moment means to me,"
His steel-blue eyes meet her sky-blue orbs.
"and how long, I've waited for your touch."
The hunter's intense gaze focusing on the tiny blonde as if in doing so he can see every particle of her being.
"And if you knew how happy you are making me,"
Silence fills the air, but for the crackling fire, and Beth's eyes that are glistening in the moonlight.
"I never thought..."
They flutter shut, only to open once more. Her whole body shaking along with her voice, and it causes her chest to rise and fall several times as she breathes. Daryl's eyes are dark, and they never leave her. Not for a moment. Not even for a second. He pushes the constant vale of dark hair away from his face, only to have it fall back once more. The dim light of the fire flickers on, casting just enough illumination over the shadowed nook for all who are there to fully grasp the intensity of the hunter's stare. Daryl's gaze burrows into Beth's blue depths, seeking... almost pleading. As if within her eyes lies the secret to saving his soul.
"...I could love anyone so much."
Not even the cicadas are singing now.
"It feels like home to me,
it feels like home to me,
it feels like I'm all the way back, where I come from."
Beth stands up from her spot on the log, and walks passed the group and around the fire, making her way to the shadowed nook that Daryl has claimed as his own.
"It feels like home to me,"
She lowers her body to the ground so that her back leans up against his angel winged vest.
"it feels like home to me,"
He doesn't hesitate to wrap his arms around hers.
"it feels like I'm all the way back, where I belong."
Daryl slowly tilts his head forward and brings his mouth to Beth's ear. His whispered words causing a single tear to roll down one of her flushed cheeks, yet judging by the blinding light that resides in her eyes and the smile that plays on her lips, it is clear to anyone who knows her, that she is anything but sad.