It was half a day before they came on something that looked like it could be suitable shelter. Daryl had let his instincts guide them as he always did, trusting them to keep both him and Beth (most importantly Beth) safe. He hadn't said much all morning but that was never a problem for Beth. She filled the silence when she felt the need to, telling him little stories or letting her thoughts ramble, while other times she was just contentedly quiet next to him.
He didn't prefer either over the other really, although there were times when he wanted her to talk, because in silence he could hear her hitching breath as she swallowed what he was sure were pained sounds caused by her ankle or her wrist or the bruises over her body. Each little cut-off breath was just a reminder of the ways he'd failed by letting her get hurt this badly. Even knowing she didn't blame him didn't help at all; she was crazy about things like that, after all, crazy (in his mind anyway) for almost never blaming people for the trouble they caused.
Daryl's gut had led them to a small cabin in the woods. From the outside he could tell it was probably abandoned; there was a hole in the roof where part of it had sagged in from a fallen tree, and one of the windows was smashed. Then again, it looked like most places did these days, so there was no telling whether it was safe or not and Daryl wasn't taking any chances with Beth beside him. He'd spent the last year and a half trying to keep people safe, but none of that came close to how determined he was to keep Beth safe. He'd almost lost her once. He wasn't gonna risk her again.
"You stay behind me," he grunted as they approached the run-down cabin with his crossbow loaded and in his hands.
"I'm not helpless, you know." Beth narrowed her eyes as she looked at him, clutching her knife in her uninjured hand. There was such a contrast in her, in that moment. The sight of her injuries and the scar across her face made guilt and worry swirl in the pit of his stomach and yet there was a light in her eyes, a fierceness that made him believe she could do anything she set her mind to, including this.
It was that fierceness that had him saying, "I know. I need you to have my back, okay Beth?" He hesitated a moment, and then added in a low voice, "I ain't askin' you to stay behind, am I?" He wasn't. He'd considered it, but he couldn't do that to her, not again. It was telling her to run off without him that had almost made him lose her in the first place.
Besides, Daryl wasn't lying. He did need her to have his back, and he trusted her to have it, too, even injured as she was. She'd come a long way from the person she'd been on the farm, though Daryl had no doubt she had been strong in her own way even then. Now she had new ways to use that strength, skills that he'd taught her, or Rick had, or ones she'd picked up herself. Beth must have heard that honesty in his voice because after a moment she relaxed and though that fierceness was still there in her eyes he saw a hint of pride and pleasure at his trust, too. It was almost distracting, or it would have been if he hadn't been so focused on making sure she was safe.
Being cautious, they circled the entire cabin first, checking for signs of people or walkers or anything else. His gaze scanned the ground for signs of footprints, or skimmed the windows and back porch for empty cans or the marks of fortification. Only when he made sure there were no signs on the outside that this place was occupied did Daryl make his way slowly up the stairs with Beth right behind him. It was a constant inner struggle between wanting to keep Beth safe behind him, and trusting her the way she needed (and deserved) to be trusted. He hesitated a moment as he reached the porch of the small cabin, and then nodded his bow towards the left (unbroken) window.
He didn't have to say a word. The two of them had been a team for over a month now and they knew how to read each other's signs. Holding her knife at the ready, Beth made her way slowly but surely towards the window to try and peer inside. He watched her for a moment, gaze lingering on her slight limp and the way she kept her injured wrist tucked against her stomach, before he pushed aside that worry and guilt and made his way to the broken window to the right of the door.
It was dark inside; or dim, anyway, thanks to the sunlight filtering in from outside. He could see the faint shapes of furniture; a sagging couch and a broken end-table. The only movement he could see inside was the shifting of dust-motes in the sunlight that filtered through the cracked glass. And then he stepped closer, and the floorboard beneath his foot creaked and suddenly, the window wasn't so empty anymore.
A walker lurched through the shattered glass, and he had just a moment to think that he was glad he hadn't sent Beth to this window before the walker was reaching through and gripping his shirt in it's rotted hands. It was a man, or it had been once. Now it was a monster, snapping at him with a mouth of half-broken, half-missing teeth, a clotted bloody hole through it's cheek that Daryl instantly recognized as a bullet hole.
Idiot tried to end his life and missed. The thought fired through his mind in half a second as he struggled to prevent that same idiot from taking hislife, too. His crossbow got in the way, tangled up between them and making it impossible to shoot. He used it roughly to try and shove the asshole back, shifting to slam the bow up and under it's neck, using the leverage to shove it back towards the window.
Suddenly there was a flash of movement at his side. He hadn't even heard Beth come up beside him, but then again, he'd been a bit distracted, and now there she was. They moved in unison, anticipating and understanding each other without even realizing it. He used his bow to pin the walk back, twisting his arms to press it's head against the window frame. No sooner had he pinned it then Beth was right there, lifting her knife and slamming the blade right into it's head.
As soon as she pulled it free, the walker slumped to the ground and Beth turned to look at him. Something flashed between them, he felt it in that moment. Adrenaline and relief, yeah, but something else too, something he couldn't quite name but something he'd been feeling now, day after day when he looked at her.
"See?" She wiped the knife clean, and gave him a faint smile. "I've got your back."
Ain't never doubted it, he replied in his mind as he looked her over. Out loud of course he only gave a nod, a low 'mm' of response, but he knew she saw it. He knew she understood, because he could see it in her eyes too, right before he turned his attention back to the cabin.
His feeling that the walker they'd just killed was the only resident only intensified, once they got the front door open and made their way slowly inside. The cabin was small, and so the room they entered into seemed to be the main one. There was a couch and an armchair to the right by a fireplace, and in the corner he could see what looked to be the kitchen; if a single counter and an old fridge and an iron stove counted as a kitchen, anyway. It was a one-person sort of home; with just one other door leading to what he guessed was the bedroom; probably not in very good shape considering that the sagging hole in the roof had been right above it.
Everything Daryl saw got pieced together in his mind to form a theory, a story about this place and the walker they'd put down, but he didn't speak them out loud. Not yet. Instead he looked at Beth and asked, "What d'you think?"
He had seen her eyes flicking around, taking in things the same way he had, and he was curious to know what she'd pieced together. "Small place," she remarked as her gaze scanned over the small and dusty furniture, "Probably only enough for one person. Maybe two, but it doesn't look like two people lived here."
When her gaze shifted to the dead walker hanging out the window, he prompted her carefully, "What about him?"
Beth nodded immediately. "He was shot, right? Through the face?"
"Good eye." Daryl's expression showed just a hint of pride, but even a hint was a lot coming from him. "Looks like he shot himself but missed. Must've turned and been here all this time. Prob'ly his place."
"It's not bad, though." Beth turned in a slow circle, scanning the dilapidated little room. "Almost homey."
He snorted and raised his eyebrow at that, and Beth turned to him with a flicker of a grin. "What, it is! We close that bedroom door to keep out the draft from the roof, maybe light a fire in the fireplace… it won't be so bad at all."
"Always seein' the good, ain't you?" He said it roughly, but there was just a tiny hint of a smile lurking at the corners of his lips as he took a few steps further into the cabin. But she was right, it wasn't so bad. There was a roof overhead that was mostly intact, furniture that wasn't broken, a fireplace they could use to keep warm and cook… it was better than being out in the woods sleeping against a tree. Better for her, anyway, and that was what was important.
"You should sit," he remarked, gesturing to the couch. "Rest your ankle and that wrist." But she was shaking her head even before he was done, and of course Daryl should have known she'd protest. She didn't like being useless, she was like him in that way. Right now she was giving him a look that would have been at home on his own face, really. A lift of an eyebrow, a challenge in her eyes as if she were daring him to make her sit down.
Resigned, but with a hint of amusement in his eyes, Daryl went on instead, "Alright. You get that bedroom door closed, an' I'm gonna pull this walker out an' get some wood from outside. Saw a pile, against the side when we were walkin' around."
Beth nodded, picking up the train of his thoughts. "Okay, then I'll get a fire going while you secure the place."
It was habitual with them, almost ritual. They moved like a team in unison as if they'd done this a hundred times before; and maybe they had. He'd lost count of the camps he'd set up with Beth now, sometimes inside and sometimes outside. He'd secure the camp or hunt for food, she'd start up the fire, sometimes help him string up the cans and string or rummage for food tucked away in cabinet if they were inside.
Nothing changed today, although Beth might have taken a little longer to get her part done with the way she was limping back and forth across the room. That twinge of guilt returned when he watched her reach for a piece of wood with her bad hand and then wince before switching to the other. There was nothing he could do for that now except push past it, find a way to help her heal, find a way to make it up to her for the fact that he'd failed her.
Eventually they had the little cabin as secure as they could make it; the bedroom blocked off, a small fire going, cans strung up in front of both entrances and what little canned food they'd found in the cabinet set up on the table.
"Not a… what was it you called it? A red-neck feast?" Beth smiled. "But it's not bad."
She was sitting at the rickety kitchen table in the single chair, while Daryl leaned back against the counter a few feet away. From here the fire cast a dim yellow orange glow across her features, almost making it seem as if she glowed, but her words brought him back to a time when the light had been flickering instead. It seemed so long ago and yet it was only a couple days when they'd been sitting at that table in the funeral home, eating peanut butter and pigs feet while Beth scribbled out a note to the owners, neither of them knowing what was about to happen. What had beenaverted, if barely, he reminded himself as he stood there watching her, raising a spoonful of beans to his mouth before he gave a hum of agreement.
Dinner passed quietly like that, both of them not saying a word as they ate and chewed and swallowed, and eventually they ended up in front of the fire. The quiet lingered, but in the end Daryl was the one who closed the distance between them. Beth was curled up on the floor (the sofa had sagged so much when she'd tried to sit on it that she'd decided the floor was better), wrapped up in a blanket with her leg stretched out in front of her and her injured wrist in her lap.
"Here," he said roughly, crouching down in front of her and dropping some supplies he'd scavenged by his feet. "Got a sheet we can tear into strips. Can use it to bind your wrist up." He pulled the sheet closer and grabbed his knife from it's sheath. With Beth watching him, he dug the tip of the blade into the fabric and dragged it up, tearing a line through the fabric to help rip it into strips. Once he had a collection of them, he knelt right against Beth's side and gently moved her wrist into his lap so he could begin to undo the makeshift brace he'd created yesterday.
"How do you know how to do things like this?" Beth asked curiously as she watched him undo the strips of shirt fabric and gently expose her injured wrist. "I didn't know you knew how, you always let my Daddy-" Her voice hitched for just a moment, the way it always did when she mentioned her family, before she continued, "-care for stuff like that."
It took him a long moment to answer, as he mentally stumbled over the right things to say. With anyone else he never would have even bothered. It wasn't anyone's business, nothing about him was. But with Beth, it had always been different. There was something about her and her sweet silence that made it easier to talk, easier to tell her things without fear of judgement or pity. Which was what had him eventually licking his dry lips and roughly responding, "Lot's of practice. Had a couple breaks, when I was a kid. No insurance, and my Pa… didn't like doctors."
That was an understatement, or at the least something rather vague. Plenty of people hated doctors, he reckoned, for their own reasons. His father's hadn't been good ones; he'd hated doctors because they would instantly know the reasons for his injuries, and report him to child services again. Doctors, hospitals, nurses, they were all forbidden in the Dixon household, and so Daryl had learned from a young age to take care of himself physically the way he did in everything else, too. He'd learned how to treat cigarette burns and lashes, how to set twisted or sprained or broken bones… on both himself and, sometimes, his mother.
After a moment, he cleared his throat and went on, "Then later, got a lot of practice with Merle. He was always gettin' drunk or high an' causing some stupid fight for no reason other'n he wanted to. Can't count how many times he ended up with somethin' sprained or broken."
Beside him, Beth was silent, though he could feel the weight of her eyes on him. She didn't say a word, though, and he was grateful for that. He hadn't expected she would, not really. Beth always seemed to know when to push and when to stay quiet. Removing the stick he had been using as a brace for her wrist revealed the red marks it had left behind on her soft skin from where the bark had irritated it. Without thinking he rubbed his thumb over the marks, letting the rough pad of it trace across her smooth skin.
The brush of his thumb over the underside of her wrist had Beth breathing in sharply, and Daryl instantly looked up at her. "You okay? That hurt?"
"No. No, it doesn't hurt." But she didn't say anything else, she just sat there looking at him with those big, wide eyes as she nibbled on her lower lip, making him wonder… if it hadn't hurt, why had she breathed in like that? He didn't dare wonder if it had something else to do with his touch, after all, despite the fact that the look in her eyes right now was somehow similar to that night a few days ago and the flickering candlelight, and the dawning realization of her 'oh'.
Suddenly, looking into her eyes was almost too much for him and he had to break the gaze and look down, fixing his sight on her wrist as he gingerly moved it to to see how bad the sprain was. Even now he was gentle, stopping the moment she winced or her breath hitched. The last thing he wanted to do was hurt her.
"I-" She started and stopped, swallowing thickly before going on more firmly, "I've broken a bone before. My arm."
"Really?" Daryl couldn't deny he was surprised. Then again, the things he associated broken bones with were never the things he associated with Beth. After a moment he reached over for one of the strips of sheet fabric, and began to wind it tightly around her wrist.
"Yeah, my arm. Not this one, the other one." She paused, but just until he tipped his head up just enough to catch her gaze. It was his way of asking her to go on, and she must have gotten it, because after a second Beth's voice shifted into that softer, slightly dreamier tone she got sometimes when she was remembering something from her past.
"I was up in the loft of the barn, with my brother Shawn. Daddy was in town visiting someone's sick dog, and Mama was a couple miles away at our neighbor's house, so Maggie was in charge of watching us. We were supposed to be doing chores, but Shawn and I had slipped away into the barn to play and Shawn was in one of his daredevil moods. He was always daring me to do something, you know? Daddy used to swear half the trouble I got into was because of Shawn, but then again he didn't know that I was just as bad sometimes." She giggled. "I mean, there was this one time- No, I'm just gonna go off on a tangent. Just believe me when I say that half the trouble Shawn got into was because of me, too."
For a moment he saw the sadness and pain of loss flickering across Beth's face, and though she managed to chase it away, he instinctively shifted his hands to stroke his thumb gently over her wrist. This time he could see the shift in her at the contact, the way she breathed out and the tension eased from the lines of her body as she went on, "Anyway, that day he was daring me to jump down into a pile of hay. Kept calling me a chicken, which wasn't working, and then he said I couldn't do it because I was just a silly, weak girl. He didn't mean it, really. At least, I don't think he did. He just knew that was always a good way to rile me up."
Daryl stayed sitting there silently beside her, continuing the slow and rhythm process of tightly wrapping her wrist as she spoke. He wanted to keep the fabric tight enough to give her support, but not enough to cut off circulation and it required just the right amount of focus. There was just something about listening to her that allowed him to find the concentration he needed, like her voice relaxed him, put him in the sort of state where everything seemed natural and easy.
Beth's head tipped back against the arm of the sofa and from the corner of his eye he saw her turn her head a little to watch him as she continued, "Anyway, I did it. I jumped. And like an idiot, I missed the haystack slightly and landed right on my arm. I just remember this crack and this wave of pain, and all I wanted to do was cry but I kept hearing Shawn's words ringing in my head, about how I was just a silly weak girl, and I didn't want him to be right, you know? I didn't want him to think I was weak." She shook her head. "Anyway, Shawn was terrified. He went off and got Maggie, and oh when she came in and found me she was so mad at him. Told him to go fetch Daddy right away and then she knelt next to me on the floor. She never left me, you know. It took Shawn almost 45 mins to get into town and back with Daddy, but Maggie stayed by me the whole time, never left my side. She let me rest my head in her lap and she ran her fingers through my hair and told me all kinds of stories to distract me. About times she'd gotten hurt, or times her friends had. And at one point…"
Beth broke off for a moment with a soft laugh, right as he slowed in his movements and finished off another strip of fabric. "It hurt so bad I was dizzy with it and all I wanted to do was cry, but I couldn't let myself. Maggie must've seen me trembling, biting my lip, trying so damn hard to keep from letting it out. She finally asked me, you know, why I wasn't just letting it out. She was so furious when I told her that Shawn had called me a silly girl, and I didn't want to prove him right. I can't remember what I said, something like how crying makes you weak and then I'd just be a weak, whiny girl, I dunno. But I remember Maggie and how she got so huffy. I remember her holding me carefully and looking down at me and telling me that everyone cried. That it wasn't just girls, and it wasn't a sign of weakness. She said… being able to cry when you needed to, just meant that you were strong enough to admit you were upset, or something like that, I dunno."
He could see it in his mind as he spoke; a little version of Beth, in pain but so damn brave, and her big sister looking over her the way he'd seen Maggie do so many times before. In some part of his mind, her words conjured up another image. The two of them standing in front of that shack, screaming heatedly at each other.
I ain't afraid of nothing!
I remember. When that little girl came out of the barn after my mom. You were like me. And now God forbid you ever let anybody get too close.
His fingers stilled on the strip of fabric for a moment as his mind filled with the memory of him, body shuddering with tears as her arms wrapped around him from behind and she pressed her small face against his back and just let him cry.
Being able to cry just means you're strong enough to admit you're upset.
As he twined the last strip of fabric around her hand and wrist and tightly tied it off, he looked up to see a grin curving up her lips as she chuckled again and finished, "Anywya, then Maggie told me some story about Shawn crying over stubbing his toe or something, and said the next time he teased me about being a girl or being weak or chicken, to remind him of that."
"Did you?" He spoke without thinking, so caught up in the story that it seemed easy to ask her more about it.
"Didn't need to. I never found out what she said exactly, but I guess Maggie cornered him somewhere and went off on him. Otis told me. He never teased me about being a girl again." For one moment the memory had her radiant with amusement but as he watched, the smile on her lips slowly faded and she breathed out in a near-whisper, "I miss her. I miss all of them you know? Shawn, and Mama, and Daddy. But I miss Maggie most right now… I think because I keep thinking she could be so close and I've got no way of knowing, you know?" She hesitated just a moment, and then asked him, "Do you think she misses me, too?"
"Course she does." Daryl didn't even hesitate. "You're her sister. Two of you, your whole family really… closer than most families I ever knew. Bet she's lookin' for you, too." There had been a time when he never would have answered that question, and he figured Beth knew it. He figured she easily remembered all those times he'd brushed it off, tried to act like there was no chance their family was out there, looking for them, surviving still. She was the one who helped him believe that it was possible they could be out there somewhere alive. She was the one who had made it possible for him to give her that reassurance, when just a couple weeks ago he hadn't believed it himself.
It was worth it to see the soft smile on Beth's lips before she reached down to run her fingers over the makeshift cast he'd created for her. "You did a really good job, Daryl."
"Ain't nothin'," he said gruffly, though he felt the slightest hint of pride at her words. It was hard to feel proud of his skills in stuff like this, considering how and why he'd earned them. He couldn't help remembering all the times he'd bound his own wounds, or his mother's, or later taken care of Merle after the asshole had gotten himself into another drunken brawl. The memories were all mixed up in his mind now with her soft words, and he found himself saying without thinking, "Don't have no good memories like you do, 'bought things like that." He shifted to sit back and drew up his knees, keeping his gaze on the fire as his arms dangled between his legs. "Ain't got no fond memories at all, from before this. Not really." Nothin' tied up in his past was good. Even the stuff with him and Merle, none of it was really pleasant. Life before this had just been… existing. Drifting. Doing whatever Merle wanted.
Beth's gaze was a curious weight on him again, thoughtful and considering. He could see her studying him from the corner of his eyes, and it was a few moments before she replied, "But you've got memories from after, you know? Stories to tell. And you can still make new ones." When his only reply was a faint grunt, Beth went on, "You do. Like, remember that time I got caught in a bear trap like an idiot, and twisted my ankle?"
He grunted again, but looked over at her. "That ain't so funny…"
"It is a little bit, now. I mean, a world full of walking dead and I almost get brought down by a rusty old bear trap?" She gave him a hesitant little smile, but when he just shrugged at her she went on instead, "Okay. How about that time we found a nice little cabin in the woods… a bit rundown, but not so bad. And we lit a fire and sat down in front of it with a nice warm blanket and just sort of talked for a bit and shared stories. That was nice."
"Ain't really a story if it's still happenin', is it?"
"Of course it is." The ease in her voice pulled his eyes back to her and now he was the one studying her. Sometimes she was so damn hopeful he thought he could see it on her. Like she had some kinda damn glow or something. Like those angels on the stained glass windows in a church. He'd never been in one, but he'd seen 'em from the outside, with the light around their heads. Sometimes when she was so hopeful and good like this, it made him think about those angels, glowing and radiant.
Except with her, it was all on the inside, and she made it sound so simple and obvious, like she did right now as she went on, "Besides… this is one of the nicest nights I've had in a bit. It'll make a good memory some day, don't you think?"
'Course I do. His mental response was almost immediate. This was a good night, but every night he'd spent with her since the prison- or almost every night- had been good. But he couldn't tell her that. He couldn't tell her that every day he spent to her felt seared into his mind as some of the best days and nights he'd experienced in his long, rough life. He couldn't tell her that she was so many of his good memories now, or that he felt they he kept all of them in this special little place in his mind, one that glowed with warmth, one he didn't feel worthy of venturing into but could never seem to be able to resist.
He couldn't say any of that, so he just nodded and grunted, but after a few moments he added simply, "It ain't bad."
It was the most he could say, but judging by the smile on her lips, it was possible she knew just what he really meant.
**A/N: Sorry for the delay in updating this! I will try to update a little more frequently after this. I think the part about Maggie was the hardest to write, because Beth just loves her sister so much and hasn't realized at this point the disservice that was done to their relationship by the writers. SIGH.