I'm terrible at updating, I am so sorry this has taken ages. BUT I love this story and it will be finished, if not for other people then at least myself! Thank you for the reviews, I love reading them. A little note about this chapter - I'm from England and I'm not always 100% on how things like school etc go in America, I do a lot of research and can only hope to get things as accurate as possible, so I apologise for any discrepancies.
I hope you enjoy this chapter, it's a little different, but we will be back to the present day in chapter five! Thank you for reading!
Six Years Ago
"No! Tara, no, we can't, my daddy will catch us!" Beth pleaded with her best friend, who was hastily pulling off her pyjamas and tugging on her jeans.
"Beth, it will be fine! You've just turned eighteen! You're supposed to be sneaking out! And besides, Maggie got away with it... More often than not... Anyway, everyone is expecting us. Jimmy is throwing you a birthday party!" The pretty brunette's dark eyes flashed as she gave Beth a mischievous smile.
"You know full well Jimmy is throwing that party for Jimmy; it just happens to be my birthday. And what do you suppose this evening was?! I've already had a party. Which everybody attended!" Beth stood in her night dress with her hands on her hips. "Tara, this is a bad idea."
"Seriously, Beth, live a little! You'll be going off to Chamberlain soon! Studying to be a nurse, and you won't have time to be irresponsible and FUN because you'll be busy saving lives." Tara adopted an expression of mock wistfulness, staring into the air, "And I, I will be the greatest police cadet the academy has ever seen. We NEED to live it up while we still can, Bethy." She turned her eyes back to Beth and gave her signature puppy dog expression. Beth rolled her eyes, and pulled her night dress over her head.
"Fine! But I'm not drinking. What am I going to wear? Oh my goodness, I cannot believe you are making me go along with this!" Beth started rummaging through her wardrobe, looking for something suitable to sneak around farmland in the middle of the night in.
"You could wear a nice dress... Tonight could be the night you and Jimmy, you know, finally get it together!" Tara wiggled her eyebrows, and then yelped as a Chuck Taylor sneaker narrowly missed her head. "Hey! What was that for?!" She giggled and sat down on Beth's bed, waiting for her to get ready.
Beth emerged from the small walk-in wardrobe with a white crochet vest on over an old, cut off band tee, buckling up a distressed pair of jeans with a brown belt. "One, when have I ever worn a dress outside of church? And two, you know I do not feel that way about Jimmy. Two dates to the diner and one school dance does not a relationship make!" She grabbed her cowboy boots, deciding it best to carry them until they got outside.
"Okay, okay, fine. I noticed you making googly eyes at someone else all evening, anyway." Tara gave her a knowing grin, and Beth felt her cheeks getting hot.
"I don't know what you mean, Tara, you must be imagining things." Beth turned away and started looking for her bag.
"Oh, I think you do. We have known each other our whole lives, Beth Greene, and I know when you have a crush on someone. You couldn't take your eyes off that biker guy! Sheriff Grimes' friend. What was his name...? David? Derek?" Tara jokingly pondered with her finger on her chin.
"Daryl. And I don't have a crush on him. I just... I was surprised he came, is all. He knows my dad, he hunts on our land. I don't know what he does the rest of the time. He seems very antisocial." Beth hoped this would be enough. It wasn't.
"Sure! That's all! Wouldn't have anything to do with his bulging biceps and bad boy attitude, would it?" Tara wiggled her eyebrows at Beth again, grinning as she tied up her dark hair.
"Since when do you notice bulging biceps? Hey, shouldn't we get going soon? All the beer will be gone by the time we get there. Is Sam going to be there?" Beth knew Tara would be distracted by talk of her on again, off again girlfriend.
"Ugh, yes. And she will be there with Brandon, of course. How did I manage to get stuck in a love triangle with the head cheerleader and the quarterback of the football team?" Tara lamented as she got up from Beth's bed, and slung her bag across her body.
"It's not really a triangle if one side doesn't know about it, Tara..." Her voice became more hushed as she approached her bedroom door. "Are you good to go?" Beth turned back to her best friend.
"As I'll ever be!" Tara whispered back. Beth eased the door open, and both girls snuck out, shutting the door silently behind them. They tiptoed down the stairs and out of the front door, sprinted across the east field, only giggling once they had climbed the first fence.
"Only two more fences and we're on Jimmy's family's farm!" Beth laughed, slightly out of breath from the quick sprint. "The things l let you talk me into!"
...
Three hours, four beers, and two shots later, Beth was regretting going to this party. The entire senior class was there, trucks parked up under an old barn with no walls on Jimmy's farm. Someone was blasting music from a sound system, random hip hop music that wasn't to her taste.
Beth had made it clear to Jimmy that night that she only saw him as a friend, and after a fairly long talk, he had made his peace with it. It was a load off her mind, in all honesty, as she didn't want to lead the guy on. She noticed he got over her pretty quickly though, as only an hour later Beth spotted him making out with Haley, a pretty girl she knew from her History class. Beth knew she had made the right call when she didn't feel a sting of jealousy over it. She spent the rest of the night milling around, going through the motions of laughing and chatting with the other seniors, when really she'd rather be back at home, just hanging out with her best friend.
Tara and Sam had ended things, as she wasn't going to split up with Brandon. Fortunately, he was none the wiser to the motives behind the argument, which meant the final two weeks of school would be relatively drama free for both of them now.
Beth and Tara were sat on the edge of someone's truck bed, both their final beers of the night.
"Pretty sure you said you weren't going to drink." Tara smirked.
"Yeah, well, here I am." Beth sighed. "Shall we go? I'm really not in the mood for this any more."
"Ha, you are such a depressing drunk!" Tara wrapped her arm around Beth's shoulders. "Come on, birthday girl, let's get you home."
...
Beth didn't remember much of her walk home with Tara, right up until the point she twisted her left ankle and fell flat on her face. She rolled over on to her back, shrieking with laughter as Tara tried to help her up, only to have her equally drunk friend stumble and fall next to her.
"I've really hurt my ankle!" Beth choked out between laughing. "I don't think I can go on!" Their giggling abruptly stopped when they heard a male voice yelling at them.
"HEY! Who the fuck's there?!" The two girls turned to stare at each other.
"That's not Brandon is it?" Tara whispered, looking vaguely annoyed.
"No, it's not whiny enough!" Beth snickered. "I can't believe Sam is staying with him!"
Tara rolled over onto her side with an incredulous look on her face, "I know, right?! What is she..." She was cut off by the appearance of a tall dark shape towering above them.
"The fuck are you two doing laying in my field at three o'clock in the morning?" The dark shape crossed his arms and waited.
"What? Your field? No, this is MY farm!" Beth sat up and pointed to the ground next to her. She tried to stand up but her ankle wouldn't let her, and the figure in front of her caught her before she could fall. "Wait. Daryl?" She squinted at the man holding her up, and felt her face burn up in embarrassment. Oh no, no, no, not him, anyone but him...
"No, this is my land. And you two are drunk. Home's that way." He pointed in the opposite direction of the way they had been walking. "Go on, go." He let go of Beth, who promptly sat back down in the grass, and started walking away.
"Hey, Da.. Darren? Daryl! She can't walk! You couldn't give us a ride could you?!" Tara shouted after him as she got up, and quickly gave Beth a look.
"No, Tara! Shhhh!" Beth couldn't believe what her best friend was doing. Tara wiggled her eyebrows at Beth once again. Daryl stopped and turned back towards them. He let out an exasperated sigh, and headed back towards them.
"Fine. C'mere." He leant down and grabbed Beth by the hand, and pulled her up. "Can you walk at all?" Beth tried to take a step but stumbled, and was once again caught by Daryl, who gave another sigh. Before she knew it, she was swept up in his arms, bridal style, and he was carrying her towards a small farmhouse that she hadn't noticed between the dark and her drunken haze. It was tiny, with a low pitched roof and a small porch out in front. Instead of going inside, he marched towards the dark grey truck parked alongside the house, and helped her in the passenger seat. It all happened so fast, she almost didn't have time to appreciate the warm skin sticking to hers, the strong, solid arms gripping her body or the dark hair tickling her forearm where it was wrapped around his neck. Almost.
...
"Hey, so I know it's basically your front yard but what were you doing out too?" Tara asked Daryl as he pulled out onto the main road, leaning forward between the two front seats.
"Could hear the music from your party. Kept me awake. And then I heard y'all shrieking." He shrugged, keeping his eyes on the road.
"Cool, cool." Tara cleared her throat. "So, um, are you going to tell our parents? Our dad's would kill us."
"Not my business. Both eighteen. Do what you want, 'cept not on my land." He still sounded annoyed, and still wouldn't look at either of them.
"You know the legal drinking age is twenty-one, right?" Tara questioned.
"Don' care." Daryl grumbled again.
Relief washed over Beth, and knew his response had satisfied Tara because she sat back in her seat, and kept quiet the rest of the short journey.
Beth was in the front of the cab next to Daryl, and couldn't help but keep glancing at him. His dark hair hung over his eyes, and Beth's fingers itched to push it back so she could see his eyes. She didn't know what colour they were, having never been brave enough to make eye contact the few times she'd met him. Beth only ever got a look at him from a distance when she saw him in town, or if he stopped by to see her dad. As Daryl hunted in the woods on the Greene farm regularly, he always offered Hershel some of his best kills.
They pulled onto her driveway, a long track that cut through a small section of woodland, before emerging into wide open farmland. She could see her house up ahead. The porch lights were on, but nothing else was. They were off the hook.
Daryl slowed to a stop before he reached the house. "You think you can get her in okay?" He looked in the rear view mirror at Tara.
"Sure thing. Thanks for the ride!" She fumbled with her seat belt before getting out of the car.
In a split second, Beth realised she didn't want to get out. She had had a crush on this man for months, and had never even spoke to him directly before. Beth knew about him though, about his brother, and about his past. Most people did. Daryl had been somewhat of an outcast before his unlikely friendship with the sheriff, and the fact that Hershel Greene was on good terms with him too cemented his place in the community. Some people still considered him trailer trash, though.
None of that bothered Beth. She didn't care what people thought of him, she just felt like he was a good person. And, she had to admit to herself, it didn't hurt that he was so good looking.
"You're really nice!" Beth blurted it out, and although she meant it as a way of thanks, she couldn't help feeling that she had given herself away. But, Daryl simply frowned at her with a look of confusion. Blue eyes... At least he doesn't look annoyed, she thought. His eyes flickered towards her house, and following his gaze, she saw her father standing on the front porch, in his dressing gown, and with his arms crossed. Shit, she thought as her heart sank.
Daryl jumped out just as Tara opened Beth's door. "Busted!" she said in a sing-song voice, as she helped Beth out of the truck.
"I wondered what took you.." Beth grimaced as she eased herself out of the cab, leaning on her friend for support, and shutting the door behind her.
"Just saying hi to your old man!" Tara didn't seem phased by the situation at all.
Daryl walked over to Hershel and had a brief conversation. He nodded his head at the older man, and walked back to the truck, got in and promptly drove off.
Five minutes later both girls were sat at the kitchen table, opposite Hershel. "You know I'm going to have to call your father about this, don't you, Tara?" He spoke calmly, with an expression so neutral he could have been talking about the weather. She nodded, a self deprecating smile on her face, and Hershel continued. "You go on upstairs, Beth will be up in just a moment."
Tara got up and darted out of the room quickly, leaving Beth sitting looking sheepish in front of her father. He sighed, and said "At least you waited until you were eighteen to start sneaking out of the house, unlike your sister. I am disappointed in you, though, Bethy. More than disappointed - you know how I feel about alcohol."
"I'm sorry, daddy. I am." It was all she could say; the guilt of knowing it wasn't the first time she had been drunk clawed at her. She had always been a daddy's girl, and she hated letting him down.
"I know you are. And, although it's your birthday, there are going to be repercussions." He raised his eyebrows at her.
"I understand, daddy." Beth replied, wondering how long she was going to be grounded for.
"Tomorrow, you are going to go round to Mr Dixon's house and apologise to him. And, you're grounded for the week." Hershel looked at her until she nodded. "Now, let me look at your ankle before you go to bed."
Beth gave him an abashed smile, and let her father bandage up her sore ankle. It was already feeling better, so maybe she hadn't hurt it too badly.
As she hobbled up to bed, Beth was surprised to find that she was excited, despite being grounded. Tomorrow, she would get to see Daryl again. She limped into her bedroom, where Tara was already laying on the bed in her pyjamas. Seeing the smile on Beth's face, she grinned back, and simply said, "I knew you liked him."