Chapter Six – Spankie's
She pushed the coffee table out from in front of the door jam, and let it slowly creek open. Crossbow raised, they both emerged into the early morning sun light.
The walked in silence, following the gravel pathway that lead to the center of town. "I had a brother." Daryl broke the silence. "His name was Merle. Our dad, he uh, well he was hard on Merle and Merle always did his best to protect me… But, drugs and alcohol, and the law took him… I was six maybe seven when he went to jail the first time… That's when, when dad started in on me… Merle went to jail three times then, the judge said military or prison. Merle picked military. He was gone then, for a long time. Mom died while he was gone. Our house burned down…" He was silent once more.
"You were talking to Merle in your sleep, kind of seemed like he was giving you some sort of twisted pep talk about something." Riley kept pace with Daryl.
"He was, tellin me to stop being a pussy." Daryl grew silent again.
"Where are we walking to?" Riley looked around, they had been lucky so far – no walkers.
"I worked for this old asshole, friend of dear old dads, he had a machine shop." Daryl pointed up ahead, to a sign that read "Spankies".
"So a car?" Riley surveyed the lot.
"Not quite, motorcycle is my style. That ok with you?" Daryl paused, there were five walkers mulling around the lot, they had not noticed them yet, but would soon.
"Fine by me." She whispered under her breath. They were older Walkers and slow. "They will be a while." She mumbled.
"Knife." Daryl instructed her. She thought about rolling her eyes, but he liked to be in charge and she wanted to live. He watched her out of the corner of his eyes, a flicker of anger had crossed her face. She had two long knives, one in each hand. He was surprised, she ran, full speed, and sort of hopped into the air, striking two walkers at once in the head, the force of her hit dropped them, and she was quick, dispersing two more. The fifth walker was sort of lurking around towards Daryl, he watched Riley, and she cocked her head to the side, then dove at the walker, impaling it in the back of the head. He stared at her. "We kill together, k. We will create a way to survive. Together. We will find our families. Together." Daryl nodded at her.
She flashed him a smile. It was different from Carol's, different from his dear Beth's. It was the smile of hope, trust. He approached the front door. He rapped on the glass, as she moved closer to him. They both jumped as older looking Walker slammed into the glass panel. "Spankie" Riley whispered, reading his name tag.
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