A/N: I finally finished something! I have a million half-done AUs for this series sitting in my folders and today I sat down and finished one. This is going to be a two parter. Leave me reviews and I'll post part 2 soon (yes, that's blackmail).
Georgia, 1867
"Should I set a place for Mr. Dixon?"
Beth looked up from her plate of food towards Patricia, then turned her gaze towards the grandfather clock in the corner of the room. She'd been waiting for him for nearly an hour and as if to emphasize that point; her stomach gave a rumble.
"I reckon Mr. Dixon won't be showing up in time for dinner." She said with a sigh as she watched Patricia usher the kitchen maid to move some of the plates on the table closer to Beth. She looked around at the large dining table pathetically and completely unsurprised that she was sharing her dinner with no one but 7 empty chairs. She could count the number of times she had had dinner with her husband on one hand, and one of those times had been her wedding day.
Still, her loneliness didn't make her heartless and as Patricia exited after the maid, she called out, "Patricia."
The housekeeper took a few steps back into the room and Beth glanced towards the main door of the dining room again, a silly part of her hoping he'd make an entrance any minute. "Make sure you leave something aside ready to heat up for when he comes back. In case he's hungry."
Patricia stopped for a beat as if to say something; but after a few second's consideration she only nodded. "Of course Miss Greene," and left the room. She was sure the kitchen maids probably laughed at how pathetic she was; going through this ritual of waiting for him every night only to wind up alone until the wee hours of the morning when he would stomp into the house. Even then, it was never to her. He usually took residence inside what had been her daddy's office if he wanted to sleep, but mainly he'd head back by the barn, skinning an animal if he'd been out hunting or cleaning his bow or a gun. On one occasion she hadn't seen him all day and in a fit of silent panic, she'd decided to take a horse out to look for him, only to find him sleeping on some hay stacks in the barn.
She tried to push down the humiliation she felt to think that her husband would rather sleep in the barn than in the same house as her; finding comfort in that at least it had been her the one to find him and not any of the workers who would no doubt spread the news of how much Mr. Dixon wanted nothing to do with his wife.
Patricia was the only one to seem to give her kindness. Of course, she'd also raised her. But she never questioned when Beth ordered that every meal be enough for both her and her husband (even if he was never home), and in private, like she'd done just moments before, she'd take to calling her "Miss Greene". Never "Mrs. Dixon" if she could help it; even with others present, Patricia would favor simply calling her "M'am" before ever uttering Beth's new name. "M'am" she could be. She could be the lady of the Greene's house and farm like her daddy had wanted her to be. Daryl Dixon's wife, was another matter entirely and something that nearly 8 months after taking his name, she still didn't feel like. Being "Miss Greene", even if only to Patricia, gave her a sense that she hadn't completely lost control of her life.
A part of her thought Patricia felt partially responsible for Beth's situation. It had been Otis who'd pushed for the marriage, after all, once her daddy had died. Beth didn't blame any of them though. She was set to marry Daryl years before Otis had insisted upon it. She'd just turned 18 when her daddy had taken her hand and suggested (without leaving much room for discussion) how much it would benefit the family to have the neighboring lands the Dixons owned at their disposal. How now that Maggie had married and gone off north, she was their only hope to save the farm, and how in retrospect, it had been far better that Merle Dixon had suggested a wife for his brother and not himself.
She was lucky; all things considered. Daryl wasn't a stranger. She'd known him for years (as long as she could remember, in fact), and even if he was a man of few words Beth knew him enough to assume that life with him might not be unbearable.
So when the war got worse, Daryl Dixon had placed a hesitant kiss on her newly ringed hand and he boarded a train headed for Virginia, a photograph of her tucked into the pocket of his uniform.
It was so much more the idea of marrying because she'd been ordered to that she was opposed to, rather than who was to become her husband. She had meant it when she'd write to him; telling him to take care of himself and that she prayed every day that he came back to her safe and sound. His replies were always short and far less sentimental. A mere sign that he was alive, with polite well wishes for her and her family; but with the eagerness Beth awaited every single letter anyone would have guessed she was madly in love with the man.
She blamed the months after the war. When she was at her most vulnerable after being inside her house with nothing but her own grief for company.
The war had, unsurprisingly, brought death with it; Merle Dixon died at the front and Beth didn't know the particulars but she assumed it wasn't quietly. He'd been the first to enlist and had happily gone off to spill and draw blood in the name of the south. Back home, Hershel Greene passed in the middle of a gray and still winter night. Both of his daughters by his bedside. Maggie had clutched to Beth in her grief but as the days and weeks dragged on, life seemed to go back to normal and Maggie had a baby on the way and a husband in the north that needed her attention. Beth was left to sit idly by; alone in her big empty farm with nothing to do but feel pity for herself.
When Daryl Dixon was dragged through her front door, as news of the war being over soon floated around the town, Beth had focused all of her energies on him. On tending to his wounds, nursing him back to health and ever so slowly becoming more and more content with the idea that he'd be the man she'd spend her life with, as her daddy had ordered it.
He was kind to her then, loving even, as she read to him every night and she sat beside him while he was still bedridden, recovering from a bullet wound in his side. She'd started out in a chair by his bedside while she read, but one day he'd silently held his hand out and pulled her forward gently, until she was sitting on the edge of his bed. She'd blushed and he'd looked at her through squinted, curious eyes.
"It isn't proper, is it? Being here..."
He shrugged his shoulders and took her hand in his, "Ain't no one here to say nothing. It's just me, Beth."
She'd had a fleeting thought about how no one else had ever seemed to say her name quite like he did and she really should have pinpointed that moment as the moment she was done for. They continued on like that from that night forward; and she'd even braved a kiss to his cheek as a 'goodnight', the night before he proposed they marry.
There'd been a war raging through; but after the dust had settled, the soldiers buried and the widows did their grieving, their attentions turned back to the petty gossip spilled over sweet tea on hot Sundays after church. If only to divert from the feeling of losing the war. Beth hardly ever noticed, she didn't leave her farm if she could help it under normal circumstances and with Daryl in her care, she found even less reason to leave his side. He'd been recovering quickly, far more so than the doctor had predicted and as Beth finished changing his bandages the day after she'd kissed him goodnight, he'd grabbed a hold of her wrist before she could move too far away from him.
"Otis's been saying," he began. "We oughta get married soon. People are startin' to talk."
Her eyes had gone wide as she reconsidered the idea of marriage. She wasn't nearly as opposed to it as she had been when it was first proposed, but after the months she'd spent by him she'd hoped that he'd simply forget about the marriage; with both her father and his brother gone.
"What they been saying?" she asked, genuinely confused.
He shrugged sheepishly, "you know."
"What?"
He sighed and looked away from her, embarrassed to have to explain, "People are talkin' bout us. 'Bout you. Living with me without bein' married."
"We ain't living together!" she protested because she wasn't with him in that way. He only raised an eyebrow at her and she suddenly understood that it didn't matter what the truth was. Only what everyone else thought.
"Oh," she said. And one week later, while he leaned his bad side on a wooden crutch, the pastor had given his blessing and she'd walked out of the small church a married woman.
Now, so many months later, she felt silly thinking back at the naive hopes she'd entertained for herself. She'd admired Daryl for years. He was strong and handsome; someone easy for Beth to let her imagination run with. She imagined herself being able to ease her way through his tough and silent exterior with her kindness and patience. She even imagined him falling in love with her one day and now she nearly laughed at the thought. Whatever friendship they'd formed in the time after the war, whatever hope she had built during the months before they married, were abruptly shot down almost the minute she became his wife. He became cold and distant and while before she could recognize his lack of conversation for shyness, in marriage it was simply that he didn't wish to be near her. Of course, by then Beth had already, stupidly, handed him her heart.
The next morning Beth walked into her father's office to find Daryl pacing the length of the room, biting the nail of his thumb.
"Patricia said you were looking for me," he only grunted in response and she stepped into the room and closed the door behind her. "I was upstairs. You could have just come up."
He simply stared at her as if she'd grown another head and Beth sighed but said nothing. She wasn't quite in the mood to think about how much Daryl avoided even going near their bedroom. And she only said their bedroom because that's what it had been appointed. She couldn't bare the embarrassment of telling anyone (even Patricia) that she and Daryl weren't even properly husband and wife. He'd never touched her; never so much as kissed her on the lips.
She was sure that just being in his presence in her nightgown was scandalizing him but she'd lost her desire to walk on eggshells for him a long time ago. Sometime between the not-talking and the not-touching of their relationship. Sometime in the months where the surprise of what she'd hoped and what she'd gotten out of her marriage felt like it had taken a little bit of the life and light out of her. She'd lost hope for them a long time ago and now she walked around with a bit of an ache in her chest; wondering what she was missing every time she received a letter from Maggie who was so completely happy with her life. If she hadn't naively set her hopes on Daryl, if she'd yelled and cried enough until she was free to marry someone else, maybe she wouldn't feel so empty all the time. Even as the thought passed her mind, she knew she would have never done it. Not when her family's farm was at stake and not after she'd started to care about Daryl. She felt stupid for still caring about him but while she had come to terms with the fact that she would probably never stop, she'd stopped looking up at him with hope that things would ever get better.
"I'm going out for a few days. T' hunt," he said as he regarded her carefully. Beth nodded slowly, wondering if she was missing something. This wasn't the first time he disappeared for days at a time, but it was certainly the first he was telling her about it.
"Do you need me to tell the maids to get something ready for you?"
She was at a loss as to what he could possibly want and he only shook his head, a hint of frustration in his eyes.
"Nah. Just lettin' you know is all."
They stared at each other for a few long moments before Beth simply shrugged.
"Alright. Have a good hunt." She gave him a half-hearted smile, intent on making her way back up to her room. With a furrowed brow and a look of concentration on his face though, Daryl crossed the distance between them and took hold of her arms before pulling her forward (making her stumble with the force of it) and pressing a brusque and clumsy kiss to her forehead.
Eight months ago she would have melted under his touch, flushed all the way up to her ears, but today she just stared at him curiously, ready to ask him if he was feeling alright.
He nodded once, seemingly satisfied with his goodbye and grumbled out, "I'll see ya soon." Stalking off towards the door and leaving her standing there alone.
"A what?" Beth asked with a shaky voice. She was trying to process the words Patricia had just uttered. Not being able to make the connection between Daryl, her husband, and what her housekeeper and friend had suggested.
"It ain't that surprising Miss Greene. Men like that have affairs all the time. Why, Mr. Walsh down at the Harris farm has been going around with some woman from out of town. Even Mrs. Walsh, Andrea, knows about it. I reckon she don't care much as long as he keeps it quiet."
Beth tried to control her breathing as a million scenarios played out in her mind. Each one making more sense than the next.
"Why would he tell me he was leaving then? Shouldn't he be tryin' to hide it?"
Patricia waved her off, "Probably just tryin' to not seem suspicious. It's a lot more suspicious that he actually told you, if you ask me. He's been comin' and goin' as he damn well pleases this whole time and only now he finds the decency to tell you? Reckon he's feelin' guilty about something. Probably knocked her up."
At those words, Beth suddenly felt light headed and nauseous all at once. The thought that she didn't have Daryl's affections was one thing, but someone else having them. Someone else having a family with him. Patricia came up behind her to lace up her corset but she batted her hands away.
"I think I'd rather wait a little bit before I get dressed, Patricia." She felt as though just the smallest tug on the strings of the corset would make her chest explode. "You can go now, I'll call you back up after lunch." Or supper. Or the end of the new year, she thought. Patricia tutted and gently patted her shoulder.
"Don't fret over what I told you, Miss Greene. You should consider yourself lucky that he found something to amuse himself with somewhere else. Not all young ladies in your situation are quite that fortunate." She knew what Patricia meant; and she had no way of knowing that when she'd married Daryl, it had been far less at the urging of Otis or her deceased father. Even in her ignorance, Patricia took one look at her through the mirror and her face softened into one of concern. "Or maybe you oughta ask him yourself. He gets back tonight; talk to him. I could be wrong, Miss Greene."
Beth doubted it. Suddenly everything she'd been bewildered by made sense and though she had a hard time connecting Daryl to secret mistresses, Beth had very little to tell her otherwise.
She could have been standing in front of her mirror in her unfastened corset for hours or minutes. She couldn't be sure. She vaguely recalled the click of her door closing as Patricia made her leave. She wanted to find it in her to be angry at someone. At Daryl. At Patricia for putting the idea into her mind when she'd been content in ignorance. In the end, she could only find regret for doing whatever it is she had done to let this happen and an unshakeable desire to simply, run.
She called a kitchen maid up to her room, not being able to trust that Patricia wouldn't talk her down from her decision and she found herself strangely numb as she waited for her suitcase to be brought up, letting her mind wander off and considering how long a trip to the north would take.