This is really a very small ficlet, but since its the first thing I've written in like 6 months, I wanted to post it here and not just on tumblr. Warning in advance, this is a "Daryl mourning Beth" ficlet. It's probably not very happy for most people.


Title: He Remembers

Word Count: 551
Universe: Canon (S5B/S6, it doesn't matter)
Rating: General
Brief Summary: Daryl remembers Beth, not as she was the day she died, but as she will always shine, bright in his mind, full of hope.
Notes: This is about mourning, I guess. I mean, within the story, but also for me in writing it.


He thought that the day he lost her would be forever seared into his mind. That when he thought of her, those would be the only images he recalled, the only ones that clung to his mind like prickly briers, impossible to discharge, a constant loop of a ringing gun shot and a blur of blonde hair and blood and the slow fall of her body to the ground.

And yet.

And yet.

And yet, when he remembers her, it is never like that. Perhaps some part of his mind rejects those images even now, as he rejected it then: Can't be happening, can't be real, not her, not after all this, not Beth. It wouldn't surprise him. He's always been good at pushing down the dark and painful memories that have built up to create much of his life.

Or perhaps, somehow, it is because of her. Perhaps she was so good, so pure, so damn fucking sweet and shining bright, that it's impossible for his memories of her to be anything other than good.

(Perhaps somehow, it is literally her, holding back the memories the same way she did when she was alive, clinging like some kind of damn tiny limpet to his back as if she could hug him tight enough to chase the darkness away.)

When Daryl remembers Beth, he remembers her glowing, lit by firelight that makes her blonde hair shimmer gold and her big blue eyes seem even warmer. He sees her eyes bright with tears, voice trembling as she speaks her doubts- I wish I could change- having no idea that to him, her ability to feel and hope and long for things, makes her the bravest person he has ever known.

He remembers her tremulous smile, her little soft, bell-like laugh and the way it resonated through him and continues to do so even now, every time he allows himself to sink into that memory.

He remembers her silly, drunken, daring words: We should burn it down.

He remembers the blaze of fire, the heat that didn't just radiate from the house they'd destroyed but built low within him to warm him to his core in a way nothing ever had before, let alone since.

He remembers the way she looked later, lit by a softer flame, lips parted in surprise and big eyes wide as she breathed out a single word both intrinsically simple and impossibly complex all at once:

Oh.

He remembers, he remembers, he remembers.

He thinks it will kill him, the remembering. Thinks it will break him to remember her, to remember what was lost not only by him, but by the whole world, when she was torn from it.

But it doesn't kill him, somehow. Instead, against what feels like all odds, it sustains him. Like a tiny flicker of warmth inside of him, urging him on, reminding him to keep on living, to keep on trying, to keep on believing.

He figures different people have different names for that feeling. Hope, belief, faith. He ain't sure he believes in any of those things. But he believes in her.

So it probably isn't surprising, that when he thinks of that feeling, he names it simply Beth.

And he continues not only to remember, but to live. For her.


(If it makes it better, you can technically imagine she's still alive and he finds her/she finds him later, after this.)