When I heard my sister's voice, I assumed she was talking to me.
"Can I speak with you?", She asked not me, but Daryl beside me. My heart pounded, wondering if somehow people knew about me and Daryl, or if they had, what they'd think. Daryl didn't answer her directly, only stood. Maggie began to walk off, and he shot a glance of comfort in my direction. My eyes followed them until they were out of earshot. It was still morning, and we still had a lot of moving to do. I looked in the direction of my sister and Daryl, she was serious for a while, but now smiling. It had only been a few minutes but it felt longer to me. She wasn't wearing a bra, as always. Most of the men in our group stared at her, I always wished I could pull attention like she could in the simple ways. She was strong and sexy and more of a leader than I'd ever be, so I don't know what Daryl saw in me.
Sasha hands me a piece of bloodied meat, instructing me to take it over to our small fire where Rick and Tyreese were cooking the other bits slowly but surely. We'd cook it all before moving, each person would have their own portions to last them a while. I handed the meat off to them, then wiped my hands in the grass to wash them somewhat on the morning dew. I looked over to where Daryl and Maggie were talking earlier to see Maggie back with Glenn and Daryl sitting on a stump, making extra arrows out of branches. Random conversation topics and laughs filled my ears from the others as I awkwardly walked around them back to Daryl, pretending I had an important question about tracking. He was quiet when I sat down in front of him.
"So, how do you make those?", I asked. He grabbed my knife from my side and handed it to me handle out. I took it from him along with a stick. He moved to the ground beside me to show how thick to make the arrow, and how to make the sharp tip. Eventually he was fed up watching me do what I thought was right, and took both of my hands in his, moving mine to shave the correct amount of wood down. Once I had that, we made plenty of bolts in no time. He put a few in the holder underneath the crossbow, and the rest went in his plastic trashbag. He needed a backpack, so I made a mental note to find him one soon. About noon is when we got all the meat cooked and evenly distributed across everyone. Rick informed the group we were helping the new people get to Washington, because one knew what started the outbreak. Daryl looked reluctant to go along, but I didn't want to leave my sister and I don't think he'd leave without me. Rick handed Judith off to me and began going over the map with Glenn, figuring which route would be best. They also mentioned getting a car or two to fit all of us, so we'd spend a few days finding them. Once we had a quiet moment together again, I looked to Daryl.
"What did Maggie want?", I asked him, Judith's head rested on my shoulder. She was fussy today and didn't want to ride in the stroller. Some of the group split apart to find cars, while the rest of us stayed at our new camp hours away from the old one. It was by a small stream, clean water and a chance to wash clothes. I set Judith down and undressed her, leaving her in her cloth diaper while I washed her clothes. She picked up a long stemmed flower, shaking it around and smiling.
"Nothin' important.", He replied, awkwardly watching me lay out the clean-ish clothes to dry. I took off his vest and handed it to him so I could take my overshirt off to wash it. Even though I had a tank top underneath I still felt a light blush on my cheeks as I did so. I knew he was looking at me by his silence. We were practically alone over here except for Judith who was preventing anything from happening or not happening. I glanced up, my eyes meeting Daryl's for a minute. He cracked a smile, sort of.
"You look like a damn strawberry.", he muttered.
"Damn!", I heard from a smaller voice. My eyes widened and I smacked Daryl on the shoulder. "Look what you taught her!", I complained. I'd hear something from Rick about this if she kept saying it.
"You're no better teachin' her to hit!", Daryl shot back. He was smirking now.
"Damn!", Judith repeated. I groaned and laid out my over shirt in the sun by Judith's clothes to dry. It was hot out today, so the sun should dry them quickly. He glanced between Judith and I.
"Say somethin' else like.. Beth.", he suggested instead. Now he was the one turning a lighter pink. I looked at him and he shrugged. "Gotta learn our names sometime.", He laid back in the grass. Judith simply repeated damn again, and crawled over to where Daryl laid. She climbed on his stomach and bounced, making him grunt in pain. I shook my head, a smile playing at my lips while I took my pants off to wash those too. I nervously glanced to where Daryl was, but he was too distracted by Judith to notice my lack of clothing. The stream was too small to bathe in or else I would've considered just jumping in, but it felt nice on my feet while I busied myself. Judith's laughter filled my ears, I assumed Daryl was tickling her. Judith's clothes were mostly dry now but I didn't dare interrupt them. My overshirt was dry too, so I slipped that on leaving it unbuttoned. They were quieting down, I noticed Daryl staring at me and grabbed Judith to put her dried clothes on. When I was done I kissed her head.
"Need anything washed?", I asked him, glancing shyly to him. He shook his head. It took forever for my pants to dry, leaving an awkward situation until they were, but Judith kept things light until I put them on. They were still a little damp but I didn't mind.
Beside me Daryl lit up a cigarette. I wrinkled my nose at it, and he offered it to me. I hesitated for a moment, but I was always curious to see why everyone smoked them before the whole walker issue. I took it from him and breathed in once it touched my lips. I coughed a lot after that, handing it back to him and shaking my head.
"That.. is.", I shook my head. He smirked.
"Acquired taste I guess.", he said. "Wasn't very good my first time either.", I wondered if he was just talking about the cigarette. The question was burned into my mind now, had he slept with anyone before? I pulled Judith into my lap while I thought.
"I'm startin' to miss that moonshine.", I admitted sheepishly. At first, it wasn't supposed to be something I said out loud and I was embarrassed. Daryl laughed quietly.
"Yeah. Said some pretty bad things that night.", His eyes went lower onto me, and I knew he was looking at the scars on my wrist. Of course I remembered what he said but I hadn't given them much thought. Thinking about them now kind of hurt a little bit. I never cut myself for attention! I stared at the blades of grass moving in the wind. His hand was on my cheek, his fingertips brushed my face and tickled it. It was like a silent apology, and I knew that's all I'd ever get out of that night. One of my hands came up to touch his. I turned my head, kissing the palm of his hand and smiling at him.
It was dark that night. Most of the group was back and making plans. Tomorrow Daryl and I would go with the group to help look for car parts. They were teaching me things more often now that the group split up happened. Carl would be coming with us too, so he'd know how to get a car in emergency. I sat near the small fire in the ground we had. When that burned out minutes later I was left in the dark. My eyes adjusted slightly, enough for me to crawl around and know where people laid. I felt a hand on my wrist, knowing it was Daryl, and laid down next to him. He put his arms around me. It was surprisingly cold tonight, despite the heat of this morning. I felt him move around a bit, then he draped something cloth over me. It felt like a blanket. I must've been shivering. I didn't want him to be cold, so I spread it halfway on him and halfway on myself. Even though we hadn't done much today, I was out in seconds.
I was woken up by Daryl getting up just before the sun rose. It was dark, and no one else was awake as far as I could see. I stopped him, pulling him back down to me which with slight resistance, he dipped down and kissed me. His lips fit mine, gently moving with them despite how aggressive he normally was. Maybe it was something about getting a good night's sleep that made him sweeter. His hand went under my first shirt and rested on my side, my arms hooked around his neck in response. The kiss between us deepened, he was hovering over me now and the weight of him made it harder to breathe. Normally a guy would prop himself up as to not crush me, but he hadn't been with too many women as far as I could tell. He grunted when my leg went around his waist, that seemed to wake him up out of the trance we were in. His hand left my breast, where it had some point moved away from my side, and he rolled off of me panting. I was out of breath and my lips felt heavier, when I sat up I noticed someone awake- Carl. He silently stared at me, and my face heated up until I couldn't look at him anymore. He didn't say anything to me or Daryl, and I'm sure Daryl didn't even notice he was awake. I was the one to wake up everyone going with us today- Rick, Michonne, Carl, and Bob. One of the people from the other group came with- the woman named Rosita. The group split. Bob and Rosta went into one house, Daryl and I walked with Michonne to one down the block, leaving Rick and Carl alone.
Michonne was quiet as usual. I liked her despite barely knowing her. She was pretty badass, anyone in the group had to admit that, even Daryl. Michonne checked the upstairs of the house we walked into, while me and Daryl checked the kitchen. I bent over to check a cabinet and felt something brush against my backside, making me stand up straight and turn around. All I saw was Daryl across the room, going through cabinets with his crossbow slung over his back. I frowned, doubting it could be him by the distance between us. I kicked the door to the cabinet shut and climbed on the counter to reach the cabinet above the fridge. Daryl's hands were on me in a second, steadying me so I didn't fall. One hand was on my back, and one was on my hip. I felt safer as I searched the cabinet, finding some instant oatmeal and a few jars of peanut butter.
"Not bad.", Daryl said, picking me up and gently dropping me onto the ground. I smiled at him, and was about to kiss him, but Michonne walked into the room.
"Found one of Carl's comics.", she told us, holding it up. "And sleeping bags.", she tossed us each one to carry. Michonne never carried things when she went out on a run with people. We checked the garage last, where I found a backpack and shoved the peanut butter and oatmeal, then gave it to Daryl.
"Here, thought you could put your stuff in it.", I told him, going over to the beat up looking car and popping the hood for Michonne. Daryl gave me the backpack. "You wear it.", he said. "I've got the bow, no room for one right now.", he had a point. Plus his things were back at camp. I put the extra sleeping bags into the backpack, leaving barely any room. We found a battery that was seemingly okay, and stuck it in there too. There wasn't any gas in the car, not that we could've used it anyway. A couple more houses, and a pack of beef jerky later, we met back up with the others and walked back to camp together. They had luck, finding enough gas to last us a few days, but now we just needed a vehicle, like a bus. We would move camp again, walking a few days, and then look for a bus to save time and get further away from Terminus. When we got to the camp, everyone froze. Daryl pulled me behind a tree surrounded in a few bushes.
"Shit.", he said. Carl was beside us, Rick and Michonne had been discovered along with Bob. In our camp was Gareth and others, guns loaded. Some were missing. Rosita sneaked around the sides, trying to get to the two guys she was with. Glenn was trying to reason with them in between taking punches, but lost it when someone touched Maggie. I wanted to help, but Daryl held me back.
"We should run.", he whispered in my ear. It wouldn't be much help if we were caught. I heard a gunshot, and Maggie's scream, and ran.
[A/N: Sorry for the late upload x_x I've been out of the house so much this weekend which is weird and by the time I got home I was tired as hell leaving me no energy to write. Hope you enjoyed the chapter, I'm way too sleepy to go over it and revise it further. Thanks for reading as always :) Make sure and review, I love reading you guys' thoughts. -Sam]