Here's another one-shot! If you've come over from Defying Gravity, then you'll know almost right away that this is a Daryl/April one-shot because you got to see so little of April in Defying Gravity. I hope you like it, it was a little awkward to write but I hope I did alright.

If you haven't read Defying Gravity and just happened to find this story, this chapter will make sense but you really should read DG so you understand why I even wrote this.

Thank you to everyone who read and to those who followed and especially to my reviewers! If there's a certain one-shot you'd like to see (that follows the plot of Defying Gravity) don't hesitate to ask, I'll try to accommodate.

I forgot the disclaimer on the first chapter, so I'll post it here but I won't post it again, since the fact that I don't own the Walking Dead will not change.

Disclaimer: I do not now, nor will I ever, own The Walking Dead comic or TV show and do not make any profit from this story. This is purely for entertainment purposes, no copy-right infringement intended.

BLAME IT ON THE ALCOHOL

Daryl pushed open the door and moved out of the way so that the blonde behind him could get inside. Rain hadn't been in the forecast but everyone knew weathermen were wrong more often than they were right so he wasn't at all surprised by the downpour that had started on the ride over. Once he'd pushed the door shut behind them both he shook his head like a dog and smirked when the blonde squealed and tried to shield herself from the water flying around.

"Daryl! You ass!" she said with a laugh, wiping her face and pulling off her sodden jacket, hanging it on a peg to dry before following Daryl further into the room. Noise attacked them from all sides, loud rock music blared from a jukebox in the corner, the bartender and doorman were in an argument with a patron near the bar, and a table at the other end of the bar was full of college-age girls squealing about something that was, without a doubt, stupid and irrelevant to all human life.

He'd expected the bar to be busier than it was, considering it was a Saturday night, but he was grateful for the lack of activity because they were able to get two stools right at the bar. The tender, Josh, finally finished his argument with the drunk man and was more than happy to grab drinks for his two regulars.

"You know how it goes," Daryl said, pulling the shot glasses closer to them. "Gotta do as many shots as your age. You've graduated to twenty-four, happy birthday small fry!" He tipped his head a little as they raised their glasses in toast to her birthday before downing the shots quickly.

"Josh!" April yelled, "got a pen or something?" The harried bartender look around quickly before tossing a spare pen onto the bar in front of her. "It might be twenty-four for me now, but I've always been able to hold my liquor, and I bet I can drink you under the table!" As she spoke she make a straight line perpendicularly across her wrist. It was the first of many shot tallies for the night if she had anything to say about it, and then copied the line on Daryl's wrist.

"No way you can outdrink me," he replied dismissively, waving his finger to get Josh's attention and more drinks.

An hour later, Daryl had accumulated fifteen tally lines on his arm compared to April's twelve. He could tell the alcohol was already taking its toll on her but he could also tell that she was trying valiantly to catch up to him.

"Remember when my parents took that trip to New Orleans and you and I drank all the alcohol in the house?" April reminisced, giggling. "Remember how sick we got?"

Daryl threw back another shot and laughed, "we were fourteen, had never drunk so much in our lives. If I remember right, you'd only ever had two beers before that night."

The night in question had been one of their worst ideas ever. They'd been watching one of the old soaps, about the only station April's TV could get in, and Daryl had gotten bored almost right away. It hadn't taken him long to come up with the bright idea that it would be much more fun to drink all the alcohol April's parents had in the house. He'd underestimated how much liquor two drunks could have accumulated in one place though and by the time they'd gotten to the last bottle of Jack Daniels, April had been throwing up and was almost comatose on the kitchen floor and Daryl was weaving back and forth, trying desperately to keep the alcohol from spewing from his mouth all over the sofa in the living room.

April smiled at the memory of their first drunk experience and leaned her head against Daryl for a minute. She'd just accidently closed her eyes when Daryl grabbed her shoulder and shook her hard.

"Hey now, none of that! You still got ten shots to do!" he admonished, helping the process along by pushing her shot glass into her hand.

"Hey little brother, what gives? You told me you didn't wanna go to the bar tonight," came a gruff heavily accented voice from behind Daryl. The hunter couldn't help the flight flinch that swept through him when he realized that Merle had come out tonight too.

"No, I said I didn't wanna go to the bar with you," Daryl growled back. "I had plans already."

Merle walked around to April's unoccupied side and dragged his gaze over the both of them before sneering back, "clearly."

"It's April's birthday dumbass," Daryl replied with a glare. "I don't gotta spend my whole life with your smelly ass. Besides, weren't you meetin up with Roger and Dude? Go fuck off with them and leave us alone."

A scratchy laugh escaped Merle's lips, "you always get like this when this little bitch is around. Gotta act all big like you got some balls so she don't realize you're a piece of shit that's not worth her time. Give up little brother, she's gonna realize it soon enough, without any help from me." The older, larger man extended his hand and pushed over April's full shot glass with his finger.

The strong smelling liquor splashed off the bar and onto April's top. It hadn't been a lot, just a shot's worth of liquid but it was enough to make her gasp loudly and try frantically to wipe it off. Daryl didn't know shit about girls clothes but from the way she was rambling to herself he was getting the impression that she was worried it might not come out of the fabric. He heaved a sigh, downed the last shot in front of him and got to his feet.

"Come on April, let's get you home so you can wash that shirt. Don't want it ruined do ya?" he said, pulling her to her feet by her elbow.

"But we're not done celebrating!" she exclaimed unhappily. "I still have nine shots to drink! It's tradition!"

Daryl sighed again, threw his head back and silently prayed for someone to give him patience. "Fine, but you're gonna have to slam 'em, you been drinkin too slow and those stains will set in if you don't hurry your ass up."

April gestured to Josh and ordered the nine shots she still needed to do and had him bring the five that Daryl needed as well. He'd already finished those five by the time April was down to her last three and she was definitely struggling now. When she finally drank down the last one, he took her shoulders and walked her toward the door. He'd pushed her out the door before remembering she'd left her jacket inside so he ran back in to get it. When he came out she was slumped over the back of his truck and he cringed at the thought that she might have thrown up back there.

"Come on Ape, let's get you home so you can wash that shirt," he said, helping her around to the passenger side and boosting her up into the seat. She almost fell and smashed her head against the open door twice, the continuing rain mixed with her inebriated state was not a good combination in the least.

"Daryl," she said when they were halfway back to her trailer. "Why's Merle such an asshole? Why doesn't he like me?"

The redneck wasn't sure how to answer the clearly hammered girl, his thoughts kept jumbling together and he was having a hard time making sense of them. Clearly he was more intoxicated than he'd thought. Finally he spoke, "always been that way. Takes after Pop I think, he was a right asshole too, didn't care bout nothing but himself. Treated women like shit. Don't know why he doesn't like you personally, never cares when I bring a girl home for the night. Might be he knows you matter to me, my best friend and all. He's the only one that ever had a part in my life after Ma died, could be jealous that you get my attention too."

When the blonde beside him didn't reply he assumed she'd passed out from the alcohol, so he jumped when she spoke suddenly, "he's stupid, and mean, and I don't like him. But he's your brother, and you're my best friend, I guess we should start trying to get along."

If there was one thing Daryl knew, it was that Merle Dixon did not placate anyone except himself. If he didn't want to get along with April he never would, even if doing so would make Daryl's life easier. There were very few people that Merle got along with, even fewer that he actually liked, and Daryl wasn't delusional enough to believe that April would ever be one of those people. He was still thinking about this when they pulled up to her trailer.

She was already out and to her door by the time Daryl made it around the truck to help her. It had begun to pour and water dripped into Daryl's face as he waited for April to get the front door open. Clearly unlocking a door was a difficult task for a drunk girl because it took at least five minutes and they were both soaked when she pushed the door inward.

Daryl stumbled over the threshold and turned to close the door behind him. He heard a squelching sound behind him and twisted back around to see April's shirt on the floor and her in the process of undoing her pants.

"Whatchu doin?" he asked blankly, unable to comprehend that he shouldn't be watching her.

"My clothes are all wet Daryl," she said decisively. "I hate wet clothes. Really, you should take off your clothes too, I bet you're cold and your jeans will start to chaff that wonderful behind of yours," she teased as she bent down to pull her socks off with her pooled up jeans.

Daryl was still standing in place, his eyes never leaving April but his mind whirling, too many thoughts spinning around for him to make any sense of what he should do. His blonde best friend took the decision from him though. With practiced hands and a smile on her face she pulled his sleeveless button-up over his head to join her shirt and pants on the floor. Her hands travelled down to his belt and jeans button while her eyes focused on his. He could see tiny rain droplets that had stuck to her eyelashes and he found them oddly mesmerizing as she continued to strip him of his pants.

She was about to take a step back from his almost naked body when his arm shot out and circled around her bare waist. Before either of them could really comprehend what was happening Daryl's lips were on hers and she was wrapping her arms tightly around his neck and letting her fingers pull tightly on his hair. Within seconds he'd lifted her up without taking his lips from her mouth or neck or wherever they were finding skin to kiss and he was carrying her to her bedroom.

The Next Morning:

Sunlight pierced through Daryl's closed eyelids and he frowned, shifting his head in vain to escape the blinding light that even now was hurting his head. Finally giving up on getting anymore sleep, he opened his eyes slowly and groaned when the room tilted. He slowly turned onto his back and felt something warm against his hand.

"Ugh, where the fuck am I?" he moaned, staring up at the ceiling that wasn't his own. His stomach was queasy, his hangover fierce, and he didn't want to move even his eyes to see if there were any clues as to where he could be. The warm something shifted against his hand and it took a second for him to realize that it was another person, he must have picked someone up last night after he and April partied.

Whoever it was let out a whimper, he assumed she was just as hung over as he was and had just realized her unfortunate state. He realized that he'd been touching her wrist when her arm moved and her fingers brushed over his own, up his arm and came to rest where his shoulder met his neck. After a few minutes he decided that he might be able to look around a little without getting sick, so he turned his head to the right and saw a typical girl's room, although there was something unexplainably familiar about this room in particular. He assumed he'd been with this girl before and that was why he recognized it, but when he heard the girl gasp and turned to look into the face of his horrified best friend he realized his assumption could not have been further from the truth.

"Daryl!" April whispered, gathering the bed sheet around her chest and sitting up, her long blond hair rolling over her shoulders and into her face in a messy wave. "What are you doing here?"

I didn't want to go into a big thing with them arguing or freaking out about sleeping together, and I thought that'd be a fun place to leave this chapter. If it wasn't clear, this is THE moment when Keegan is conceived. I struggled finding a good way to get them into such a situation and I'm still not sure if I did it the way I wanted to, but it's out there now and hopefully it will be fine. The next one-shot will not continue this chapter, most likely it will not even be about Daryl and April.

As I said above, if you have a one-shot you'd like to see (i.e. Shane and Lori? Molly and Aaron? Molly and Finn or her parents? More Daryl and April? Anything else?) just let me know and I'll try to get it done. It has to follow the Defying Gravity story though. I'm not going to write something that contradicts my ongoing story. For example, I won't write a chapter that pairs Molly and Rick when it's clear from DG that Molly and Daryl are involved. I also won't write a chapter in which characters do something in a place they aren't present. SPOILER- There can't be a chapter with Lori and/or Shane at the farm because in DG neither of them are at the farm…stuff like that.

Alright, I'm done rambling, sorry! Please review, I've come to find that one-shots are not my forte so I'd appreciate knowing if you thought I was doing a good job with them!