A/N: I'm back!
I super, super, super apologize for the time it took to update. WOW. I was going to update that weekend I had posted the Author's Note, but believe it or not, the universe was being funny and I got into a moderately serious car accident. Some girl had her turn lane light go yellow and decided she just couldn't bother to sit through another light and turned right in front of my sister's car. Luckily, no one was seriously injured, but a quick trip to the ER confirmed that my tailbone is screwed up and my sternum [the vertical bone in the center that attaches your rib cage] was cracked. So, to be blunt, sitting and typing is not an easy activity anymore. Sitting and writing on a pad of paper or, my livelihood- drawing, just hasn't been happening. Sooo.. that's fun. People have told me it takes months for a tailbone to heal, so fingers crossed! Anyway, this was written and typed out in bits and pieces over the course of the last few weeks. I wanted to update my Author's Note for you guys, but a few people had reprimanded me in reviews because technically, ANs as chapters is not allowed on this site. So I didn't want to push my luck and get the story deleted altogether.
It's not going to be a mind-blowing chapter, mostly because I'm out of my groove, but I hope it's good enough to get us back on the right track with the story so I can keep going!
I will put this warning in there, though: I had a few reviews that were a little de-motivating previously; complaints about how the story had lost touch with itself and there was too much action stuff. I started second-guessing my plotlines and kind of lost motivation. I'm NOT saying constructive criticism isn't welcome. It's just my first posted story ever, and I was surprised at how much a couple of negative words from strangers made me second-guess myself. Without being able to write, I did do a lot of pondering and I decided that I'm just going to write what I want to write and if I enjoy it, I hope others will, too. Everyone may not, and that's okay, too.
So without further ado… Chapter 23. Enjoy. And again…. I'm sorry about the delay!
Chapter 23
He was running through the woods, slipping on mud, slapping branches out of his way. It was hot and sticky, but he barely paused to wipe away the sheen of sweat coating his skin. "Sophia!" he shouted again, turning in circles, straining his ears for the screams of a little girl. If they didn't get to her soon, before dark, then the others would surely find her… If the others found her first, she would be lost to them. He ran until the earth shuddered and cracked beneath his feet.
He fell through the fissure and into a stream full of bodies. One of his own arrows was sticking out of his side and there were hundreds of discombobulated ears ebbing in the gentle flow of the river. An old, worn barn along the bank burst open suddenly, and out poured bodies of people Daryl knew were dead. His da was among them, reaching out for him, his face frozen in a permanent scream of agony. Daryl's mother was there, too, a charred body that he only recognized by her necklace. He knocked his arrows and shot at the walking bastards; one by one, they went down as his arrows pierced them and they crumbled where they stood, like bloody sandcastles in the wind. Little Sophia came out of the barn next, staggering on two broken legs, blood seeping out of her face. He'd failed her. He'd fucking lost her and she'd met her end. He shot her down as she got close to him, snarling and reaching for him where he sat among the floating ears, paralyzed and unable to flee from the horde. He could only fight on, as he always had. Surviving.
Last out of the barn came a long-legged woman.
Beth. His Beth, with blood vessels and brains spiraling out of her skull, twisted among her blonde, ringlet curls. She was wearing a pink sundress stained in brown, and below the hem, her knees were bloodied where she'd fallen. Then Beth smiled at him in a way that broke his heart, and even as he knocked his arrow back and took aim, he knew he couldn't release it into her as he did the others. Closer and closer she came, smiling her sad, beautiful smile.
"You're gonna miss me so bad when I'm gone, Daryl Dixon," she told him softly. As she knelt down and sank her teeth into him, he wasn't surprised that she'd be the one to devour him.
Daryl sprang up in bed so violently that the pillow he'd been using was flung to the floor. He wiped sweat away from his brow, wincing at the movement. His body felt as though he'd aged a hundred years while he'd been unconscious; every muscle was stiff and sore, and he felt as heavy as if he'd been filled with lead while he slept. Or like he'd truly been dead.
The nightmare began to recede as he spotted the body lying next to him; whole and unmarred. Looking around, he confirmed that he was still in Beth's bedroom. The night before, they'd been in the woods, searching for Sophia. And they'd found her, even. Alive. They were all alive.
He turned his attention back to Beth as he let his muscles relax and his breathing began to slow. Her light colored hair was mostly tangled in a heap above her head, and she was lying on her stomach with one arm tucked under her. Even Daryl's upheaval hadn't disturbed Beth in the slightest, for she slumbered on in a deep sleep. Careful not to wake her, Daryl leaned down, pressing his pounding forehead against her shoulder and ran his nose lightly across her skin, inhaling the scent of coconut and fresh rain; compliments of their debacle from what he could assume was only hours ago. He laid his palm softly against her temple, letting her slow heartbeat calm him even further.
He knew it was probably a little creepy for him to be touching her and taking comfort in her while she was unconscious; after all, it wasn't like she would ever be his to covet in such a way. But he couldn't help admiring the way her skin glowed, the way she smelled amazing pressed up against his nose, and the way her soft skin felt under his rough fingertips. Every time he let himself get too close, though, he felt a warning zip through his body, like being electrocuted by lightening, that caused him to back off.
He was absolutely wrong for her. Daryl knew beyond a doubt that Beth deserved better than one of the Dixon brood. He had to keep his distance.
As he sat up, slowly this time, gritting at the pain in his arm, he took stock of her room. He noted the strange shade of green light coming from the cracks in her drawn curtains and was curious. Untangling himself from her warm blankets and comforting presence, Daryl softly walked over to peek through the blinds. Outside, the air was clear of falling weather particles, but the sky had taken on the sickly green tinge that it sometimes did after a particularly bad storm. The clouds were crowded in close proximity, so the sun was nowhere to be seen; the entire day seemed to just be backlit in the strange green hue.
Unfortunately, it looked well into the middle of the afternoon, and that'd make the second time in the same week that Daryl had not bothered to show up on time or call into work. Back in the old days when he and Merle just hung out and travelled around, skipping work wouldn't have fazed him; getting reprimanded or fired sure wouldn't have bothered him, either. Now, though, things were just different. Somewhere in the span of time, Daryl had begun to give a shit about his life, and the people in it, and he was definitely troubled by the fact that he was being unreliable at the shop.
Briefly, Daryl glanced over at Beth's still sleeping form, smirking when he realized how disheveled she looked. She hadn't been joking that time that she told him she hated sleeping in clothing because she strangled herself in it; the shirt she had on looked like it was twisted around her body 3 or 4 times. Her pants were likewise skewed, and Daryl quickly turned away as he realized that the lace band of her blue panties was peeking over the hem of her ill-fitting pajama pants. His adjusted gaze snagged on a russet red color, and he saw that the grumpy dog stuffed animal he'd given her during her hospital stay was perched on her nightstand like a guard dog, ready to ward off shifty looking dust bunnies.
Quietly, so as not to wake the sleeping maniac, Daryl gathered his still-damp pants off of the floor and padded into her bathroom, shutting the door behind him silently. He slipped his phone out of his soggy pocket and was disgruntled to find that his battery had effectively died on him. All he could do now was head to work and hope he could salvage his job in person.
The week had already inched into first place as one of the longest weeks of his life. He only hoped that it wasn't his last one in the area. Ron hiring Daryl was somewhat of a fluke, after all. He had met Daryl outside of business hours to have the interview, so no one ever got the chance to pull Ron aside and tell him about the Dixons. No one in this town or the next was bound to make that mistake again; especially if he pissed Ron off enough to fire him after just a few months. It had been the longest Daryl had ever worked at one place, but for most people, working nearly six months for the same employer wasn't a long time, and he knew that.
After relieving his strained bladder, Daryl quietly made his way back through Beth's bedroom. He smirked as he passed by her bed; she'd already rolled over into a new crazy position that left her diagonal on the bed with one arm thrown over her own face. The girl was a fucking lunatic.
Daryl slipped his damp jeans back on, cringing at their chilly temperature against his skin, and gathered his socks and boots. As he made his way past her kitchen, he caught sight of a pad of paper and pen she kept on the fridge to write her grocery lists.
He snatched up the pen and poised it over the empty page, but hesitated, unsure of what to do. He wasn't her boyfriend, so it wasn't like he was obligated to leave her a damn note telling her where he was at or anything. He'd done far more with women than just pass out in their beds, and still had no problem walking out the next morning without so much as a word spoken. Not for the first time, Daryl wondered how Beth had become so much different to him than other women.
In the end, with his thoughts twisted up in knots, Daryl scribbled a quick, and practically illegible, Thanks again. –D.
After the seemingly long drive back to his apartment, Daryl plugged his phone into an outlet, hopped into a steaming hot shower, and finally let himself relax a bit. He was a little stressed at having to face Ron soon and possibly lose his job, but if there was one thing in the world a Dixon could do well, it would be taking shit as it came. He would survive the day, just like he had survived much worse in days past.
Tipping his face up to the scalding water, Daryl closed his eyes and let the stream burn his slate clean. Letting his mind wander only produced snapshots of Beth, but in the solitude of the shower, he figured he had enough amnesty from the harshness of reality to he let his thoughts roam free. He reflected back to the night before, which seemed like eons ago, to the memory of Beth's pale, frozen face. Even cold and miserable, she was damn beautiful. Her bright blue eyes had practically emanated their own light as they'd borne into his, her eyebrows pulled down stubbornly, with her bright pink lips set in a determined scowl. She'd been trembling with the cold, her feet soaked from stumbling her crazy ass into a puddle or two.
"You need t' get your ass inside an' get dried off. You won' be doin' that little girl no favors by losin' a few toes to fuckin' frostbite," he'd told her.
She'd shaken her pretty little head, then, turning that stubborn ass look onto him. "I can't stop now. Sophia will lose more than a few toes if we don't find her, and soon."
For someone so small and so soft, Beth was one of the toughest people Daryl had ever met. Daryl had known drug dealers and back ally brawlers, gamblers and thieves, gangsters, racists, and even a murder or two. He'd known assholes who could put a cigarette out on their own arm without a shift in their expressions. He'd seen his own brother take a bullet to the shoulder and just keep going. Shit, Daryl had known plenty of pain in his own life, too; he'd gone through plenty of bloody tribulations and all seven circles of hell growing up under Lonnie Dixon's roof.
But there was some kind of inner strength that little Beth Greene possessed that put all of these hard criminals to shame; it was a strength that made Daryl Dixon feel misplaced and unsure of himself. Beth had the type of self-conviction and confidence that made tough men like Daryl lose their sense of the world. Every time she smiled at him, it was like she knew something about the way of the universe that would always remain a mystery to him. She had a face that would launch a thousand ships; the kind of voice that made men weak in the heart. Before, Daryl had never understood men going to war over their women. He understood it now, though. Beth was the kind of woman men should die for. As much as he told himself to keep his distance, to stay out of her path, and to keep a clear mind, Daryl knew one thing above all others: He would protect that woman from anything. From everything; even if it tore him apart.
This new epiphany fucking terrified him.
After his freaky nightmare, shaking himself up in the shower regarding the power Beth seems to have over him, and the general state of his health lately, Daryl was starting to feel like he couldn't catch a fucking break.
The stitches in his forearm throbbed as he used new gauze to re-wrap the bite he received from the demon dog. He popped a couple of Ibuprofen before throwing on his work uniform and heading over to the shop. He ignored the trepidation and tried distracting himself with the radio. None of the stations were playing anything decent, so he kept pushing his presets and flipping through everything. He landed on one station with a woman's voice blaring through the speakers…
And I dug my key into the side of his pretty little supped-up, four-wheel drive…!
Daryl punched the power button on his radio as images of Beth in a skin-tight black outfit and cat ears flashed through his mind.
At this rate, he was going to have a fucking breakdown before the day was even over. He needed to go out on a hunt, badly. Clear his head. Tackle his fucking sanity and wrestle it into compliance.
He pulled into the shop's parking lot as Ron was coincidentally slamming the gate of his own truck. Daryl parked next to him and climbed out. He felt anxious, but stuffed the feeling way down. Dixon's ain't afraid o' nothin' an' no one! His brother, Merle's, voice randomly wafted through his head.
He was definitely fucking losing his shit.
"Daryl," Ron said, looking shocked as Daryl nodded at him and walked around the back of the truck. "I'm surprised to see you here."
Of course he's surprised t' see you, Daryl thought to himself. Any intelligent asshole would've known not t' bother coming back in t' work at this point.
Daryl felt like an idiot, but he stood his ground regardless, anticipating the killing blow.
"I'm sorry 'bout not callin' in," Daryl said shortly. He couldn't remember the last time he'd apologized for anything in his life, except for Beth. But then again, except for Beth, he couldn't really remember anything else this important to him, either.
"Well hell, boy, I'm not worried about that," Ron said. "After what you did for that little girl in the woods last night, I'd have reckoned you'd be asleep for the next three damn days!"
Daryl wouldn't have been more shocked if Ron had whipped out a pair of boobs.
Ron's lips twitched in what could be considered a smile as he took in Daryl's expression. "News travels fast 'round these parts. I reckon you'd know that, seeing as how you grew up around here and all. I've heard twelve different versions of the story already today, and in every one of them, you're a damn hero. I have two little girls of my own, and if either one of them had gotten lost in the woods like that…" Ron's lips went tight and his jaw clamped shut as though speaking of them that way was beyond his capabilities. Finally, he said, "Well… anyway, what you did for that little girl and her family is something to be damn proud of, son. We're all proud of you, too. The shop is fully staffed and we haven't been overly busy. Take a few days off if you need to. Get that arm working again."
Daryl, never a man with many words to begin with, stood there in silence, unsure of what to say or do. He didn't consider himself a hero to begin with, mostly because anything good he's done recently has been because of Beth. He also had never had someone tell him he'd made them proud, except for Merle. But then, Merle was proud of all the wrong stuff.
"See you in a couple of days," Ron said, clapping Daryl on the shoulder briefly before grabbing his tool box off of the ground and walking back toward the shop.
Daryl watched him go, still stunned into silence. Beyond Ron, Oscar caught his attention from the open garage and gave him a loud, piercing whistle and a thumbs-up.
Suddenly feeling like he'd been drenched in a weird alternate dimension, Daryl climbed back into his truck and left the parking lot of his miraculously current employer.
What the fuck…?