…
Two.
Like most people of a certain age, Beth Greene had had dreams of becoming famous. It seemed like everyone was becoming famous just from posting something on YouTube or TikTok and going viral. It looked so easy and surely Beth could do it, too. She actually had talent and writing her own songs and playing them on either the guitar or the piano. Just about every day, Beth uploaded something new to her various accounts. She became obsessed with views and comments and how many people were liking what she felt brave enough to put out there. She couldn't seem to concentrate on anything else. If she went a couple days without updating something new, she began to panic. Everyone would forget about her if she wasn't constantly creating. She couldn't figure out why fame wasn't happening to her. She had some attention but not nearly enough. She had a good number of followers but not nearly enough. Nothing was enough. She had more talent than the idiots on social media platforms with millions upon millions of followers so why wasn't she able to crack into the same world?
Something terrible then began to happen. For the first time since she was a little girl and had discovered how much she loved music, Beth began to look at practicing and playing as a chore. Something she had to do. It wasn't supposed to be like that. She was supposed to love music because she did. She had always loved playing the guitar and the piano, either playing songs in existence or writing and performing her own. In a race of her own making to be famous and gain as many followers as possible and make money, she had forgotten how much she loved it.
Her parents had been worried about her but hadn't known what to do. The whole world of social media was still confusing to Hershel Greene. He didn't know why he was supposed to care what someone ate for breakfast. It was confusing to Annette Greene but it had been far more concerning. Kids were actually filming their mental breakdowns because it was the "in" thing to do. There were actual pro-eating disorder and self-harm accounts. Where were the parents of all of these kids? Hershel and Annette knew that their youngest was just posting her music onto her accounts but even that seemed to be a cause for concern because if she wasn't writing or playing, Beth's phone was practically glued to her hand, making sure she had the attention of complete strangers and that they liked her. Their daughter was consumed and they didn't know how to break her out of it. Luckily, Beth broke free herself. She deleted every single social media account she had and she did it quickly so she didn't allow herself to have any second guesses as to what she was doing. She then handed over her phone and laptop to her parents – just for a bit – so she could get over the hump of her addiction without signing back up for anything.
"It's hard to have hobbies nowadays," Hershel commented one evening over dinner. He and Annette had both noticed that it had been almost two weeks since Beth had picked up her guitar or sat at the piano, which worried them, but they both knew she needed a mental break until she was ready again to pursue either, or both, again.
Beth had been chewing and she waited to swallow. "What do you mean?" She asked.
"It seems like if you love to do something, most people think you have to try and make money from it. I love to make my birdhouses but I don't try to sell them."
"Could you imagine if you tried?" Annette couldn't help but laugh at her husband for that.
Hershel looked at her from across the table and he was doing his best to not smile. "They're not that bad."
To keep from laughing or even smiling as Annette continued teasing Hershel, Beth resumed eating and she thought about her dad's words. He was right. She had loved music and because of invisible pressures she put on herself and convinced herself it was something she had to do because it seemed like everyone else she saw was doing the same thing, she tried to force herself to make it into something she thought she had to. And now, she was exhausted and she didn't even know if she loved music anymore.
…
When she went to college the next year, Beth still didn't have a social media presence and she had only just started playing piano and guitar again. It was slow going. She was still working on getting her love back. She majored in library sciences because, as silly as it sounded, the idea of being a librarian made her smile. Finding a job as a librarian was not easy though, as Beth discovered upon graduating. Books were dying and most preferred to stare at a screen to read than hold an actual psychical book. Many towns were closing their libraries altogether due to funding and the ones that still existed weren't looking to hire a new librarian. Still, Beth set out an application to just about every library within the state of Georgia that she possibly could.
And only one got back to her.
Maxwell was a small town near the border of Tennessee. It was on the poorer side of things but it was filled with good, kind people who welcomed the new librarian with open arms. In fitting with the size of the town, the library was small as well. Beth was the only librarian with a handful of volunteers who mostly helped with shelving the returned books or reading to the children who came for story time. And three years later, the library had truly become her own. She rented a small house, got herself two dogs – a black Labrador Retriever named Sadie and a Golden Retriever named Bonnie – and she had bought an old piano from the Goodwill store in town. All of this time later, she still didn't have social media.
…
Okay. The man was being slightly odd but Beth just rolled with it. She had the two children fill out the forms and she entered all of the information into the system. Molly and Benji Dixon. Within five minutes, they had new Maxwell Public Library cards and she gave them each a pen so they could sign the back of them. Beth wondered if this man they were with – Daryl Dixon per the utility bill – was their father. They didn't look much like him at all except… if he wasn't their father, there had to be some sort of relation. He was tall and lean yet fit (not overly so but obvious). His hair was dark with some greyish hair sprouting on his chin and more longish and his eyes were some weird mixture of blue and grey. She had never seen eyes quite like it before. The children, on the other hand, had strawberry blonde hair with a wave to it, pale skin, freckles and those same eyes. Those eyes let her know that there was definitely some shared blood between them all.
"Alright," Beth smiled at the two kids. "You are allowed to check out ten books at a time and you can keep them up to two weeks. New books, you can check out five but you only get them for one week. And any type of media, you can check out three for one week. Got it?" Both nodded and she kept smiling. She slid two pamphlets across the desk for them. "And these have all of that information so you don't have to remember every single thing I just said. It also has the answers to questions you might have but you can ask me anything. Children and young adult is that way-" she pointed to the left. "Adult fiction, nonfiction and reference are that way." She pointed to the right.
Both kids thanked her, taking the pamphlets and holding their cards. At the same time, they turned and looked up to the man, waiting for him.
"Alrigh', le's get you some books," he said and both kids instantly smiled. His voice had that lazy drawl to it and it was a slightly rough voice as if he didn't use it as much as other people used theirs. It was rough but it wasn't mean in tone, Beth noted. He looked back to Beth. "Thank you," he said and she smiled and nodded.
Both kids went ahead and Daryl followed after him. It took her another moment to place him. Daryl Dixon had actually moved to Maxwell around the same time she had and he owned an auto shop. Dixon's Auto Garage if she was remembering correctly. She had never needed to take her car there so she had never met the man before now. The dealership where she bought her car wasn't too far away and she always took it there when it needed to be serviced. But Maxwell was nothing if not small and she had heard nothing but compliments about Dixon's Auto Garage. If he wasn't a good mechanic, the people of this small town would have shut him down by now.
Beth's eyes scanned over everyone else in the library that morning to see if they were all good. Mr. Beech was, once again, looking at the LL Bean website on one of the library's computers. There was a down parka the man had been studying every day for the past week but he hadn't pulled the trigger on purchasing it yet. It was three-hundred dollars and that was a good amount of money for anyone in these parts. Beth wondered what his final decision would be. A teenage girl was on another computer and she seemed to be on some kind of Wiccan website. Usually, the library had strict security blockers of what websites could be accessed but Wicca would be considered "religious" and those kinds of websites were open for viewing. Mrs. Farcy was studying the paperback romance books. All and all, a typical morning at Maxwell Public Library.
She finished scanning the returned books and movies back into the system and loading them onto the cart and she smiled when she saw Molly and Benji Dixon returning to the front desk with books in their arms and Daryl Dixon following behind with a DVD case in his hand. The two kids raced to the desk to see who would be first and Benji won by a hair. He grinned at his sister and set his books down along with his new library card. Beth smiled as she pulled the books closer to her so she could begin scanning the barcodes.
"I'm so happy we have things you want to read," she said as she scanned. The boy had gotten ten books and they were all fantasy or mystery.
Benji nodded. "You've got a lot of good stuff," he confirmed and Beth's smile widened.
Next was Molly, who was checking out only three books but they were on the thicker side of things. Beth smiled at her as she scanned them. "This one is my absolute favorite," she said in regards to Little Women.
Molly smiled and nodded. She seemed, perhaps, a little quieter than her brother though Beth could be completely wrong, she knew. After all, they were in a library and they should all be quiet. "This will be my third time reading it," she replied.
"Well, that is a book you should definitely own then," Beth said. She finished scanning the books and her card and slid them back to her.
"Our dad and mom didn't believe in owning books," Benji spoke up. "They thought that if you read a book once, you wouldn't need to read it again."
That was far from the first time Beth had heard that particular opinion from people. It was the wrong opinion but she kept that to herself. Everyone was allowed to think what they wanted but when it came to that point of view, Beth truly didn't understand. Yes, she was a librarian and it helped to read a book (for free) to see if it was a book that the person loved and wanted to have on their own shelf at home but, as a librarian, Beth had plenty of books at home that she owned and which she read over and over again. When it came to owning books and those books not being trash, Little Women would be a safe bet. There were too many books out there that were, unfortunately, just not good so the library did help.
"Benji!" Molly hissed at her brother and then quickly glanced at Beth as if worried that he had just insulted her by saying that as if it was universal law to not say an opinion about books when around a librarian.
"What?" Benji looked genuinely confused and Beth just smiled.
It was Daryl's turn now and Molly slid her library card back towards Beth as he set the DVD down. "Would you like your own library card?" Beth asked as she popped open the case to make certain that the correct DVD was inside. It was a John Wayne western that she had never seen. Not that she thought she would have seen it. Westerns had never been her particular favorite movie genre.
"That's okay. I'll just keep usin' one of them if I need somethin'," Daryl answered. He seemed to be able to speak to her now. Whatever had been going on when they first came into the library must have passed.
There was something about his voice. For whatever reason, Beth liked it. It was comforting in some way and not just because it was the kind of accent she had heard for her entire life. There was something else and she couldn't even begin to explain it. She heard it and for whatever reason, she wanted to hear more.
Beth smiled at them all as she slid the DVD and library card back towards them. "Thank you for coming into the library today. And again, welcome to Maxwell."
…
The library closed at seven and Beth made sure everything was locked up good and tight with the security system set as she left. Her car was the only one in the parking lot and her heels echoed in the night air as she walked. She didn't feel unsafe. It was dark outside of the yellow circles coming from the parking lot lights and she was the only one out here but still, she did not feel unsafe. She knew that anything could happen anywhere – even in a small town like Maxwell – but since moving here, she had never thought twice about walking out of the library at night by herself.
She lived closed enough where she didn't necessarily have to drive but the weatherman had said there had been a slight chance of a summer thunderstorm that afternoon and for some reason, she had believed him so she had driven to be safe. She should have known. She had yet to find a weatherperson who right every single day. No rain had come today and she felt slightly guilty for wasting gas for going less than a mile to her house. It was a cute little brick house with one bedroom and one bathroom and being a librarian in a small town was far from a lucrative job. The rent was just right and the landlord, Miranda Morales, was wonderful who was always there if Beth needed her for anything. Miranda had two children, Eliza and Louis, and Beth wondered if they were the same ages of Molly and Benji Dixon. Miranda's husband had recently passed away and they had owned several properties together. Miranda was now in charge of them all.
As always, as soon as she opened the front door, Sadie and Bonnie were right there, their tails wagging so enthusiastically, their entire bodies rocked back and forth. And as always, Beth felt so happy and she smiled as soon as she saw them. No matter what kind of day she was having – good or bad – her two dogs were always so happy to see her. They loved her no matter what and Beth knew they missed her when she was gone. All of those feelings were mutual. When Beth moved to Maxwell and rented this house and got settled in her new job at the library, she decided it was time for a dog. Her dad being a vet on their farm, Beth grew up around all sorts of animals. Her house definitely felt a little empty without at least one. She checked with Miranda that it would be alright and then Beth headed down to the dog shelter. Sadie was ten and Bonnie was eight. Senior dogs and no one wanted senior dogs. They all wanted adorable puppies. Well, Beth saw these two dogs and thought they were pretty darn adorable at any age. She promptly adopted them and the three immediately comfortably settled into their life together.
Beth had a next door neighbor, a retired older man, Mr. Rawlings, who was nice enough to come over and let the dogs out midday for her while she was working and now that she was home, she went through the same routine as she did every other night. She went into her bedroom, changed from her heels and into comfortable sneakers, and then went back to the front door where she hooked leashes onto both dogs, who were still so excited she was home and moving too much, making her job a little more difficult to do. She laughed and finally got them each hooked and Bonnie and Sadie proceeded to drag her from the house.
The neighborhood was quiet. She passed the houses, seeing lights and glows of televisions coming from inside. A boy was in his driveway, dribbling a basketball and shooting it towards the hoop over the garage. In another driveway, someone had all four doors of their car open and was vacuuming the carpets as Bruce Springsteen blared too loudly from the speakers. Bonnie and Sadie sniffed at everything and marked often and Beth made sure their walk was nice and long. They turned a corner and immediately saw the red and blue lights of the police car ahead, silently spinning. There was an ambulance, too, parked in a house's driveway and Beth gently pulled on the leashes so both dogs stopped walking ahead. It was too quiet for a police car and ambulance and in fact, the entire street seemed absolutely silent. Beth swallowed, feeling nervous all of a sudden for some reason. And then, the front door of the house opened and the gurney came out, being pushed by two paramedics. There was a man and he wasn't moving and the paramedics seemed to be in no hurry – as if they knew that there was no need to be in any kind of hurry. Beth obviously had no idea what had happened and it could have been anything but she had a feeling as to what had happened.
Overdose. So many overdoses – even in a small town like Maxwell. It was always so sad to her that even in a town like Maxwell, where it so often seemed like the outside world didn't even exist, drugs still were here and people were still dying from them.
She guided Bonnie and Sadie back home after that. She needed a distraction. She needed to do something happy. She needed something that would completely take her mind off of everything. She didn't even look to her piano. Instead, she changed into her pajamas before going into the kitchen. She made sure both dogs had plenty of kibble and fresh water and Beth had a bowl of Frosted Flakes for dinner. She didn't feel too much like cooking tonight. After the kitchen was cleaned up again, Beth turned off lights and made sure the front door was locked securely. Going to her bookcase, she plucked Little Women. It had been a while since she had read it and Molly Dixon had put her in a mood for it. Daryl Dixon was some kind of relation. The way Benji had talked - Our dad and mom didn't believe in owning books – in the past tense, Beth had to assume that for whatever reason, dad and mom weren't around anymore. She thought she had heard Benji say 'Uncle Daryl' but it had been done so softly, Beth didn't know if she had heard correctly. Well, no matter who Daryl was to those two, he was obviously family and Beth wondered how he felt about owning books.
…
I can't say thank you enough to those who read and commented on the first chapter. It means the world to me. It really does. What happened to Beth in this chapter is what I have been going through. I put so much pressure on myself because I thought I had to publish my work. I had received some messages that basically said I was a loser for still writing fan fiction. I have been trying to remind myself that I LOVE to write and I should do it for myself. Who cares if I'm never published? Why can't I just have a hobby I love doing in my free time?
*deep breath* Anyway, THANK YOU again for everything!
Also - I write Jon/Sansa for Game of Thrones but I post those stories on my AO3 account and I have always posted my Daryl/Beth stories on this account so, for the time being, I'm going to keep the two separated like that.
