Had a bit of writer's block with this one :/ Sorry about the wait. Some heads up, this is the retelling of the last chapter, seen through Daryl's eyes :) Hope you like it and remember to review! :D
Disclaimers: I don't own nuthin :(
Warnings: Language
Chapter 14: Serrated Eyes and Loaded Tongues
The house was relatively small. It was a tiny white number, all faded, chipped paint and warped siding. The door was a dented and worn down dark green. The screen stretched across it was riddled with so many holes that it let in more bugs than it kept out and, in the summer, all the AC, when it was actually working, whistled straight through it, leaving the house stuffy and sticky. The roof was a patched up mess, bald spots laid bare to the open air, entire sections sagging just a little inward, like the whole house was getting so fed up and goddamn tired, it was just caving on in, defeated. It was a piece of shit; had always been a piece of shit. Daryl had always wanted to escape it but never could. His 'home.' His house of horrors. He'd hated every second he spent in the goddamn shit hole.
So why was he here?
He hadn't been here before right? He was somewhere else…somewhere…different. Not here. He'd left here. Why…why he couldn't remember. It was something important though. Something…something very important. But he couldn't remember. It burned on the tip of his tongue, in the back of his mind, lingering on the fringes of his mind but whenever he reached for it, the idea slipped through his fingers like smoke, a cascade of random images that made no sense.
A field, a town, on fire; the flames licking to the sky.
A glance of blue water; ripples fanning for miles.
A glimpse of cars and tents; a shantytown.
A glimmer of green eyes, sharp and bright, like gems.
Daryl turned his head from side to side, tearing his gaze away from the crappy four walls he had spent all his life caged within, trying to figure out why he was standing in front of his house. To the left, a dead and dried up field lay, just dirt and dilapidated grain, barren and deserted, bleached gray like the color had been sucked out of it. A rusted out tractor lay tipped over on its side, just as colorless, like a dead animal. The tractor was familiar, had been laid to rest there for years but…it looked different. Aside from the missing color, pieces were absent too, a tire, an axle, and that's when Daryl noticed the vultures that pecked viciously at the tractor's innards, beaks grating on the metal. The sound was screechy and unholy and Daryl winced, slapping his hands over his ears to ward off the noise. The birds glanced up at his movement, an innumerable number of black beady eyes trained in on him, and bile abruptly roiled in Daryl's gut as he noticed the vulture's beaks had been torn away, shredded by their violent pecking and feasting. All that was left was a bloody mess, black and red gaping holes, stark in the washed out landscape, and suddenly, as one, the birds let out a horrible screech, the sound resembling a collective human scream. Daryl turned away quickly and stumbled to the right, away from the racket, towards the small shed that was situated halfway around the house, just as rundown and shitty as the rest of the land. He kept the keys to Merle's bike there; maybe he could drive away from here. The thought of his brother's name stirred something in his mind. Merle. Where was Merle? Hadn't…hadn't he been with him? With him…someplace else? Daryl tried to remember but, as he lifted his head, a sight drew him up short, like walking into a brick wall, and the noise of the vultures grew louder at his back, the sharp sounds of metal on metal ripping to pieces intermixed with the calls of the black, hulking birds.
A white truck lay between Daryl and the shed, a 1974 Chevy pickup, the rear window long since busted out, the sides dented and dinged, the front bumper hanging at an angle. It wasn't that he didn't know the truck; that wasn't why he had stopped. The fact was…it was familiar, too familiar, and there was no way in hell it could be here, parked in Daryl's driveway, because it had flipped over in a ditch almost ten years ago, taking its fucking driver with it.
A sudden creak split the air, loud like a gunshot, making Daryl realize the birds behind him had fallen silent, not a vestige or an echo lingering of their ghoulish screams. It was a complete silence, a dead silence, and, unbidden, he found himself turning towards the house; his whole body spun around like he was a goddamn puppet and some marionette was yanking on his strings. The door gaped open, the screen hanging from its hinges. A cold fear seized Daryl as he stared into the yawning black hole, unnamable and instinctual. He tried to take a step back, tried to turn away, but his whole body was frozen in place, facing his house. He struggled and thrashed, writhing in place, dying to escape but not knowing exactly why. He didn't need to know why though; something in him just said that he needed to get away, that he shouldn't, couldn't, go into that house.
But then he blinked and the choice was made for him: he was standing in a claustrophobic hallway with cold floorboards beneath his feet, the first sense of feeling he'd had, framed in a warped doorway, and suddenly, Daryl was six years old, four feet off the floor and small.
Two figures struggled in the room before him. Back and forth, push and pull, a violent tide. It was dark, the space illuminated only by a lone lamp situated on a night table, shoved into the corner of the room. The dim light cast shadows of the fighting duo, twisting and writhing shapes thrown against the opposite wall, leaping and dancing in chaotic patterns. A sharp cry rang out, echoing, and one of the figures fell heavily to the floor, an arch of golden hair flashing in the weak light. Daryl whimpered, a high-pitched almost soundless noise, and took a step forward, bare feet tripping over the threshold.
"Mama?"
The silhouette that was still standing jerked its head up at Daryl's exclamation and the young boy flinched as he recognized his father, the owner of the truck outside, a bear of a man with dark hair, an even darker expression, and stormy blue eyes that bore testament to the darkness behind them.
"Ya got something ya wanna say boy?" George Dixon growled, his voice distorted and low, a demonic voice.
Daryl whimpered again and looked down at his feet, his mother prone on the floor. As he watched, her head shifted, the long gold hair glinting.
"Sweetheart? Are you there? Help me. Daryl, please help me," she begged. A shaking arm snaked out across the floor, reaching for him. The little boy bent down to help his mother, extending his own arm, but then she lifted her head and he screamed, stumbling back, colliding harshly with a now closed door.
She had no face. It was rotten off, completely unrecognizable. Her lips were gone, ripped off; broken, serrated teeth bared in a skeleton's grin. Her cheeks were in ribbons, flesh hanging in tatters, white bone shinning underneath. One of her eyes was hanging out of its socket, dangling and swinging back and forth, brushing the corner of her mouth with each movement. But she still called out to him, fingers still grasping for him, her voice eerily normal, the same warm drawl that sang him to sleep coming out of the mouth of a walker.
"Daryl? Sweetie, help me. Daryl?"
A metallic taste burned on Daryl's tongue but he couldn't bring himself to move towards the thing that resembled his mother. Not even when his father stepped forward and began to kick her, over and over again, the sound of breaking bones and flesh resounding in the room even as Daryl's mother continued to say his name, the syllables starting to blend into indiscernible gurgles and moans.
"Aren't you going to help her?"
The question was sudden and loud, right next to Daryl, incongruent with the setting he found himself in. He whipped his head to the right and Audrey was right there, standing beside him and that's when Daryl noticed that he wasn't six any longer, that he was normal height, normal aged, and still glued to his spot by fear.
Audrey cocked an eyebrow at him and her expression was hateful, green eyes, like lanterns in the darkness, flashing with the shadowed reflection of his father, still beating his mother into the ground behind him. "Well?" she asked, the words sharp as glass, tone more spiteful than he had ever heard it, even when she had cursed him and Merle out. "Aren't you?"
Daryl opened his mouth, tried to say something, anything, he didn't know what, couldn't even begin to think, but the kid just sneered at him, eyes dragging contemptuously up and down his frame before she spat in his face, saliva like acid as it ate at his skin. "Knew you were nothing but useless trash Dixon," she snarled and Daryl flinched at her tone, her words. "Worthless inbred."
And then she was slipping away from him, past him, through the bedroom door that was now open and into the dark hall, walking farther and farther away until she was swallowed up by shadows and all that was left behind were her words. He wanted to follow, tried to, for what he didn't know, but shackles dragged him back, tight, digging into the skin of his wrist and ankle, rending flesh from bone. He cried out, sharp and loud, and spun around to free himself only to find his father latched unto his wrist, grinning at him from behind a rotten face, as his mother clawed at his ankle, moaning and gurgling what used to be his name, asking him why over and over again as her teeth descended towards his skin...
Daryl wakes up with a jerk, chest heaving as he blindly gazes up at the blue-grey ceiling of his tent. Sweat beads at his temple, slipping into his hair and the bedding around him is damp with a cold sweat. His heart pounds a stuttered stucco pattern beneath his ribs and his breaths comes short and ragged.
What the fuck was that?
He clenches his eyes shut and opens them again, making sure he is awake. When the ceiling of his tent doesn't move, doesn't shift or change, Daryl slowly sits up on the rickety cot that is his bed and runs a trembling hand through his tangled hair. Merle is snoring on his side of their tent, chocking and snorting noises that are the result of a life time of smoking god only knows what. Birds shift in the trees outside and the weak predawn light begins to illuminate the tent but Daryl pays none of these things any mind. His heart is still hammering in his chest, pushing somethin akin to fear through his veins, and the echo of his name continues to whisper in his ears, ghostly and faint, the mere memory of a dream.
That dream…Daryl's never had that dream before. Hell, Daryl hardly dreams anymore period and when he does they're usually chaotic and nonsensical, just flares of colors or images, the flash of teeth or a pair of rheumy, bloodshot eyes. They're never as vivid as this, never as lucid, and Daryl feels sick as he recalls it. Recalls the sight of his house, the rundown shit hole he had spent his whole life in; the wreckage that he and Merle left behind two months ago, when the world finally went tits up and burned to the ground. Recalls his Pa's Chevy that Daryl had sold to a scrap yard two weeks after the bastard died, using the money for a down payment on his own shitty truck. His Pa himself, the son of a bitch that had been gone ten years, long before the dead started comin back to life, long before the walkers.
Walkers…Daryl sucks in a breath at the image of his mother as a walker, rotten and festering, calling out for him as her husband beat her, as she reached for his flesh. It was fuckin stupid, crazy. Lilah Dixon had been dead for decades, stiff and six feet under since he was eight. She didn't live long enough to see this shit, to be bitten and turned. Cancer's what took her; wasted her away until nothin was left but skin and bones. She had never been a walker, neither had his Pa. His head was messin with him. It was stupid. Stupid, stupid, stupid. Just a goddamn nightmare. Nothin more.
And yet, as Daryl scrubs at his face and swings his legs down off the cot, he can't stop himself from rubbing his ankle, checking for bite marks as he rubs at his ears, trying to chase away the lingering cries of his Ma, the desperate pleas of his name.
"Fuck," he thinks as he starts to get dressed and ready to face yet another shitty day. "Ima tell Merle to smoke his shit outside the tent from now on. I ain't gonna get high off his second hand smoke if this is the shit that happens."
Curling his lip in disgust, Daryl kicks his brother's stash bag under the older man's bed, listenin with a dull satisfaction as something made of glass shattered into a million pieces. Serves the fucker right. Speakin of Merle, Daryl glances at the snorin lump that is his brother and kicks the edge of his cot roughly. Merle grunts and mutters incoherently under his breath before flipping over onto his other side, giving Daryl his back. Daryl rolls his eyes and shakes his head. Whatever. He'll wake Merle up later.
Outside, day is barely breaking. The tops of the trees are tinted a pale orange, pink, red, birds darting across the lightning sky. Already, it is warm; borderin on hot and the sun isn't even all the way up. Daryl looks out across camp, blue eyes scannin unconsciously for anythin that could pose a threat. Nothin stands out. Most people aren't even up yet. As of now, all he can see is Walsh sittin on top of the RV, the old man tinkerin with the fire a few yards away and some woman walkin over to him, pots and pans in hand. The scene is normal and flat; the same sight that Daryl had woken up to for the last few weeks. Soon enough, the idiots will have breakfast goin and everyone will come stumblin out of their tents, like roaches out of the woodwork. Daryl scowls and moves over to the rock he had rolled into their small campsite, sitting down with a groan. Might as well get some shit done before Merle gets up and starts talkin shit or, worse, before Walsh comes over and demand he go hunt or some other crap. The former cop was really startin to grate on Daryl. It was only a matter of time before Daryl stabbed him, he was fuckin sure.
Unsheathin the knife at his hip, Daryl reaches down beside him and picks up Merle's own blade that the older man had left outside last night, too out of his mind to think clearly enough to bring the weapon inside just in case. Anger wells within the hunter as he starts to sharpen the two blades against each other, steel on steel. His brother was bein stupid, gonna get himself killed bein too methed up. He had to say somethin to Merle, say somethin before it was too late. Merle might be an asshole and a drug addict but he was the only kin Daryl had left. He'd be damned if he lost him too. Resolved, the young man set down to the task at hand, dragging his and his brother's blades together until the sun was well into the sky and the smell of cooking meat signaled that breakfast was ready.
"Fuckin tired of this squirrel and beans routine," Merle growls, stabbing at the brown mess on his plate. "Ima growin boy goddamn it. Need me some greens, some venison, wild boar. What're doin in those woods all day, boy? Chasin fuckin faires?"
Daryl ignores him and continues to eat his own meal, shoveling the bland tasting food down his gullet before be can taste the charred and burned flavor, the stickiness of the coolin beans. Merle's been up for less than ten minutes and, already, he's on Daryl's last nerve. Bitchin 'bout this or that, the ache in his back from sleepin on the cot, the headache poundin behind his eyes and, now, the food. Daryl was rethinkin the savin Merle bit. Be lot less trouble without him around.
"Hey! Ya listenin to me Darlina?"
Sighin, Daryl swallows and chases the food down with a gulp of water. "Yeah I hear ya Merle. Not my fault the huntin's shit round here. The city's too close. Most the game's moved on. Ya'd know that if ya came out with me once in a goddamn while."
Merle glares at him from across the ash pit of what used to be their fire. His eyes are hazy and bloodshot, the rims a burning red. The skin on his face is clammy, a sweat beading on his brow that has nothin to do with the heat of the morning. Daryl knows from experience, years of it, that his brother's comin down now instead of goin up and that's always worse to deal with. Merle lifts a hand and jabs a dirtied fork at Daryl, the hand shakin ever so slightly.
"Now don' ya go and start givin me lip boy. Just cuz the world went and ended don' mean I won' kick yer ass six ways to Sunday," he threatens but Daryl doesn't take him seriously. He can take care of Merle, hasn't been truly afraid of him in years. Shaking his head, the hunter just mutters something unintelligible and turns back to his meal. But Merle doesn't want to let it go, maybe can't with all the shit in his system, and he leans forward, knocking Daryl's plate right out of his hand, the last slivers of meat and beans scatterin into the dirt, the plastic pingin off the metal of Daryl's crossbow that rests at his feet.
"Hey!" Daryl cries out, snappin his head up to glare of his brother. "The fuck Merle? I wasn't fuckin done!"
The older Dixon smirks at Daryl's affronted tone, the corner of his eyes crackin into a web of crows feet, makin him look decades older than his 40 years. "Looks like ya are now, don' it?" he laughs, loungin back in his ratty campin chair. The thing is really a piece of shit and it groans in protest of Merle's weight but, by some miracle, it holds true.
Daryl scowls and feels irritation burn through his veins but it's too goddamn early for this and, really, it ain't even worth the trouble to argue. So, instead of gettin in Merle's face, he settles for throwin a few curses his way as he bends down to retrieve his, now, empty plate. "Screw you Merle," Daryl growls out. The man just laughs at him and continues to eat, more cheerful now that he's caused his mornin destruction.
"Aww don' ya cry over spilled milk Darlina," Merle coos. He reaches down and snags his canteen off the ground, throwin back his head in such away that Daryl automatically knows he ain't drinkin just water. Merle smacks his lips as he swallows. "Ahh. Now. Since ya ain't doin nothin, why don' ya go out and find some real food, not this measly squirrel crap. Hmm?"
Lips pursed, Daryl clenches his fists, glarin at the cocky, sprawled out figure of his brother. Merle was always givin him shit, always fuckin bustin his balls. Ever since Daryl was little, Merle had been 'toughin' him up; 'makin' him a 'man.' It is goddamn old and Daryl is fed up. He isn't a kid anymore. He is a grown man and he isn't gonna take Merle's shit like a lil bitch anymore. Without even thinkin, Daryl steps forward and grabs the alcohol filled canteen right out of Merle's slack grip, also yankin the not quite finished plate of food from his grasp while he's still gapin.
"Hey! Hey! The fuck ya think ya doin!" Jerkin upright, Merle makes to grab Daryl but the younger man steps out of his reach, tuckin the canteen into the back pocket of his jeans. Merle glowers and gashes his teeth but doesn't get up, knowin how unsteady he'll be on his feet. "Goddamn it. Give it back Darlina." It's not a request.
But Daryl shakes his head in response, a smirk of his own dancin on his lips. "Give what back? Far as I can see, yer plate's clean." Locking his eyes with Merle's, Daryl brings the plate to his mouth and tips his head back, lettin the food slide into his mouth and down his throat. He isn't even that hungry and the food is far from appetizin but it's worth it to see the shocked and pissed expression settle on Merle's features.
"And ya can fuck off Merle cuz I just went huntin two days ago. If ya don't like it, ya can fuckin go out yerself," he drawls back at him. For a minute, Merle just glares at him, pissed off and bristled like a drenched alley cat, but then he just screws up his mouth and spits at Daryl's feet, throwin himself back in his chair as he fishes into the pocket of his filthy jeans. After a moment of searchin, he pulls out a crumpled pack of cigarettes, extractin the last butt from the pack before he balls it up and throws it to the ground.
"Screw you," he mumbles around the smoke, takin an angry drag once he's lit up.
Daryl scoffs. "Whatever. Look Im'a go dump these plates in the bin. After, yer gonna get off yer white ass and go help me check the traps alright?"
Merle just gives him a one-fingered salute in reply. Rollin his eyes, Daryl turns on heel and starts walkin over towards the main part of camp, where the rest of the assholes congregate for meals and where the goddamn RV is parked. Daryl makes it a point to avoid that part of camp as much as possible. He and Merle just stayed here for the numbers, the bodies that they could put in between them and the walkers, if and when they showed up. The Dixons ain't part of whatever fuckin thing the rest of them had goin on here; they ain't part of this group. Daryl gives Walsh the game he's cleaned and then collects his and Merle's share of the meals. That's it, the end of his interaction with the rest of the dumb fucks. He gave them food and they gave him whatever other meager supplies they had. They didn't talk anywhere outside of that.
Well…until recently anyway. Daryl casts a glance at the group that's huddled around the campfire, eatin their breakfast and shootin the shit. He sees the old man who's always givin him shit, that stupid hat perched on his head like he's straight out of "On Golden Pond." He's been worse as of late, always findin a spare moment to call Daryl out on somethin. Bastard. Daryl's eyes stray to the side and see Walsh's fuckin bitch, the loud mouthed cooze who screamed at him 'bout a week ago. All cuz of the kid. Know wat? Thisshit was all her fault. Before she came along, Daryl said no more than two words to the rest of camp in a week's time. Now everyone is steppin up to him, sayin shit, jumpin down his throat. Hell, the kid herself never shuts up. Always babblin 'bout some shit or another. Daryl can't get a second's silence. Granted, she isn't as bad as the rest of them, doesn't really bitch or nag, but she is bad enough with her incessant talkin, that journal of hers and her stubborn fuckin ways. Yeah, she's bad enough…just not as bad as the rest of 'em.
Speakin of the kid, Daryl finds himself unconsciously lookin for her in the circle of faces but he doesn't see her. He shoves down the immediate question that pops up in his head, askin why that is and where she is. He doesn't give a shit after all. She's only his partner for huntin and seein as Merle's goin with him when he returns, he doesn't need her. So he doesn't care where she is or whom she's with. Doesn't care one goddamn bit.
But then he lifts his head as he arrives at the RV, ready to just dump his plates and get back to Merle before the bastard could get strung out on him, and there she is, not five feet in front of him. The sight of her draws him up short, surprise filterin through his muscles.
He hasn't talked to her, not really, in two days. The last time had been in the clearin where she read Dr. Seuss to him like she thought that shit was funny. Despite all her fuckin around, they had pulled in enough that day to give Daryl some respite, some time to fix and clean his crossbow and knives thoroughly. But she looks…different today; Daryl can't put a finger on why. Unbidden, he finds himself scrutinizing her, the thought tuggin at his mind. He takes in the shitty shoes she has strapped to her feet, ratty things that look about to fall to pieces. But they're the same shoes she always wears, the only pair he thinks she owns. The shorts she has on her legs ain't any different either; nondescript cut offs that have raggedy threads trailing down her thighs. She's bent over, which he tries not to notice, which he doesn't notice, so he can't see her shirt but then she's snapping up straight and whirlin around, sudden and instantaneous, and he notices she's wearin a tank top and that's what is different. He can see her shoulders. Ignoring how pale they look, how thin and pointed, Daryl instead zeros in on her face, schoolin his own as blank as he can.
"Jesus H Christ!" she gasps out, her features equal parts startled and annoyed. "Could you like breathe or something? I fucking hate it when you do that." Her face is flushed and there is sweat pooling in the hollow of her collarbone but it's her eyes, always her fuckin eyes, which draw immediately Daryl's attention, like goddamn magnets. They're bright as ever and from this distance Daryl can see the flecks of hazel and brown in them, see how the one on the right looks slightly rounder than the left one and suddenly, without preamble, his dream comes back to him full force smacking into him with all the weight of a freight train.
"Knew you were nothing but useless trash."
"Worthless inbred."
The surprised irritation she sports bleeds into abject hatred as Daryl watches, like a filter clicking over her eyes, and when she opens her mouth he is half expecting her to spit at him, acid and brimstone, but all she does is say, "What?" And, like a flash of lightning, it's all gone, the hatred, the disdainful slash of her mouth and the kid's gazin at him with a tilt to her head, innocent confusion in her green eyes as she stands with her arms crossed over her chest. Daryl blinks at the rapid changes, thrown for a loop himself, his dream suddenly pounding behind his eyes, but he manages to recover some of his composure and grunts somethin bout her bein in his way as he jerks his chin at her. The kid quickly steps out of his way and Daryl immediately just dumps his plates in the bin, on autopilot, because now all he can hear is his mother's voice at his ear and there are flashes of gold hair and rotten flesh skitterin before his eyes.
But then the kid is speakin again, talkin, drownin out the voices in Daryl's head and he finds himself lookin at her, takin in her frown as she scolds him for mistreatin the plastic he's just released. Daryl feels so out of sorts that he just automatically sneers at her, falls back on habits long since ingrained in him.
"Ain't my dishes," he drawls out, callous and barbed. If it were anyone else, Daryl is sure they would have backed away at the sharp edges of his words, backed up with hands in the air and eyes wide, frightened. He's spent years perfectin that response, made sure it was one of the only ones people could come up with around him cuz he doesn't like people and the farther they stayed away from him, the better. But the kid isn't just anyone. She's this stubborn, hardheaded, ballsy scrap of a thing and all she does is roll her gem green eyes, unimpressed with him.
"Yeah but you still eat off them don't you?" she asks and Daryl narrows his eyes at her admonishin tone. She had a mouth on her, the brat. She ain't his Ma and yet here she is, lecturin him like he's a goddamn kid himself. "Show some fucking respect," she continues. "What if I just started throwing your crossbow around huh?"
Daryl has to fight back a smirk at the sudden image of her tryin to heft his crossbow, let alone throw it anywhere. Without thinkin, he glances at the bare skin of her arms, the pale, freckled, expanse that hides taunt strings of muscle underneath. The kid has some power in her, Daryl hasn't forgotten how she kicked Walsh's ass or how she ran like a goddamn deer the first day they met, but she's still slight, made even more so by the lack of substantial food they've been havin, and he doubts she can handle the heft of his crossbow. It's probably more than she even weighs at this point.
He doesn't even bother respondin to her. It's too early in the damn mornin to be arguin with her and Merle is still waitin for him. The fucker's probably snortin more of that crap or smokin his brain away the longer Daryl dicks around here so he's gotta go. He'd talk to the kid later. Maybe. If he needed her help.
But, as he turns to leave, already thinkin of five different ways to curse Merle out, Daryl bumps straight into somethin, a small and thin object that rebounds off his hip and makes this tiny, breathless, squeakin noise. He blinks and it's the lil girl, the blond, quiet one, just suddenly right fuckin there. Their collision has thrown her off balance and she's stumblin back, a cascade of different colored plastic plates tumblin to the ground, clatterin and rattlin somethin awful. When the noise has died down, the girl doesn't move, rigid in her place, like a dog on point 'xcept her eyes are glued on the ground and there's a tremor runnin across her thin shoulders.
Daryl feels like he should be irritated, annoyed on some level, cuz God knows Merle would be damn livid, but he's surprised more than anythin. He hadn't even heard the girl walk up. He tries not to think why that is but Daryl knows, at the back of his mind, the kid behind him is completely at fault. Again.
All of the sudden, Daryl realizes the girl still hasn't moved, is still frozen and starin at her feet, so he shifts forward to pick up the plates. The rest of the assholes 'round here might be annoyin as hell but this girl is still just a kid, no fuckin older than twelve he guesses, and he isn't just 'bout to shove her down and walk off. He ain't Merle and he knows it was just an accident. However, as he goes to help her, the girl starts into action, jerky and fumblin. Still, Daryl tries to help but he hasn't moved two inches when the girl flinches so violently, ya think Daryl had punched her.
The reaction makes Daryl stop dead; his hand freezing in mid air and the air in his lungs drying up in an instant. He knew that movement, that instinctual recoil that was blatant as any fuckin bruise. The girl thought he was goin to hit her, lay his hands on her, and Daryl suddenly feels sick to his stomach because the girl is just blonde enough to stir up his dream again and his Ma is starin up at him from the floor, bruised and beaten, rottin, beggin for Daryl to help save her.
Out of nowhere, a memory crops up to the forefront of Daryl's mind, a real one this time, from years long since passed. It is the memory of his grandmother, a tiny old woman dressed in black as they laid her daughter, Daryl's mother, to rest in the ground. She had grabbed his chin as the mourners walked away from the grave, sharp nails cuttin into his skin as she glared down hatefully at him, her grief drivin her mad.
"Yer a Dixon boy," she had snarled and Daryl remembers shakin under the intensity of her wrath. "Got the same poison in ya. Should be ya and yer goddamn worthless brother and father in the ground instead of my Lilah. Demons, the lot of ya. The only comfort I have is that yer never gonna see my daughter again. They don't let yer kind in the presence of the Lord. Garbage ain't allowed in heaven. Ya know that, don' ya boy?"
The words, even two decades later, make Daryl's chest grown tight, constrictin so he can't breathe properly. It hadn't been the first time someone called him worthless or trash or anythin of that ilk and it certainly hadn't been the last. And, to some degree, Daryl did deserve it, all those names and shit. But he had never hit a child, never entertained the idea, couldn't, not with the scars that he himself bore, the burns and lash marks, and to see this girl cower before him, thinkin he would…
Daryl suddenly needs to get away from here; away from his Ma and this lil goddam girl and those fuckin green eyes that he can just feel burnin a hole through the back of his neck. The urge electrifies his nerves and, before he knows it, he's already five paces away, just about marchin his way back to Merle. He doesn't look back, doesn't even try, but he can feel those eyes on him and his stomach clenches tight as he remembers how hate looks sharp as any blade when it's shinnin from those god forsaken emerald depths.
Merle is right where Daryl left him, though he looks considerably more doped up than when he left him. There's an easy, shit eatin grin spread across his face and a haze to his opaque blue eyes, their Pa's eyes Daryl realizes but shoves away, and the hunter thinks he can see the remnants of Merle's last hit dustin the skin around his nose but he ignores it. He just stomps right past Merle and ducks straight into their tent, eyes castin about for a glance of his crossbow.
Outside the tent, Merle laughs, a half-crazed sound. "Where's the fire lil brother?" he asks. He snorts suddenly and Daryl wonders how much coke he's taken already and how out of his mind he really is.
"Shaddup," Daryl grunts back, irritable and pissed. He finds his bow tucked under his bed, the length of rope he uses to string the game curled beside it. He drags both out roughly and swings them onto his back. As he walks back out, he considers the dryin rack that's leanin against the foot of his cot but descides against it, instead grabbin his brother's rifle that's propped up against the tent's opening. Merle, the lazy ass, is fuckin helpin him today. They'll skin the catch together, outside their tent, when they return. Whether the bastard liked it or not.
Daryl emerges out of the tent and drops the rifle in Merle's lap. The older Dixon looks up at him in annoyed confusion, eyes skitterin around before they blearily focus on Daryl. "The fuck is this," he growls. Unamused, Daryl kicks his brother's chair and moves to sit on the rock across for him.
"It's a gun Merle. Ya shoot things with it," he drawls out. Merle snarls and wrestles the gun into his grasp, cockin in menacingly and Daryl goes the slightest bit tense, even if he doesn't look up.
"What did I say 'bout that mouth Darlina? Ya best shut it if ya wanna keep those pretty lil teeth of yers in yer skull."
Snorting, Daryl swings his leg up and struggles with the laces of his worn out boots, making sure their knotted and double knotted. "Cut the crap Merle," he grits out, not in the mood for his brother's usually shit. "Ya said ya wanted more food so we're gonna go check the traps." Merle opened his mouth to no doubt argue but Daryl cut him off with an impatient wave of his hand. "Naw, don't say shit. Yer comin with me and that's fuckin it." Standin up, Daryl jerks his head at the knife he had sharpened this morning, havin left it next to Merle's chair. "Take yer knife too. I sharpened it this mornin so don't be bitchin that it's dull or some other shit."
Merle narrows his eyes up at Daryl and there's a certain edge to his gaze, a certain shape to his mouth, a specific line to his jaw that makes the hunter believe he's gonna argue, and vehemently at that. But, as quickly as the violent look solidifies, it melts away, quicksilver and mercurial. In the blink of an eye, Merle's all grins again and when he stands, which makes Daryl tense again, he just claps his brother on the back good naturedly.
"Well look who's finally grown a pair huh Darlina," he laughed, rufflin Daryl's hair and pullin him into a half-hearted headlock. The amusement in Merle's voice lets Daryl relax slightly and his muscles unclench from their alert and wired positions. Even when the younger Dixon struggles against his brother's hold, it's in an unconcerned matter, more for show than anythin else.
"Shut the hell up Merle," Daryl growls back but the threat lacks true heat. After a few moments of pointless scuffle, the hunter extracts himself and settles a partial glower on his brother, unable to fully cover the smirk pullin at his lips. "Come on ya old sumbitch," he taunts, knowin just how to rile his brother up. "Let's check the traps before ya get any older."
"Old? Who the fuck ya callin old? I ain't fuckin old!"
Snickerin under his breath at the affronted and pissed expression of Merle's, Daryl adjusts the strap of his crossbow and makes sure his rope is secured across his shoulders. "Nah? Then prove me wrong," he goads and as Merle begins to curse, he spins on heel and strides into the woods, smirkin when he hears the other man barrel after him not five seconds later.
Needless to say, the traps are all empty. Daryl isn't really surprised. The game's been gettin scarcer round here. He thinks it's a combination of the camp's proximity to the city and how often he hunts, which is nearly every day. It ain't his fault though. There's a lot of goddamn mouths to feed and it ain't like they can drive to a McDonald's for a Big Mac anymore. But Daryl is gonna have to think of somethin else to solve their food problem.
Or…maybe he won't. Survival of the fittest, right? Less people means less work and more food. It sounds like a logical plan and Daryl entertains the idea for about half a second. But then the image of the damn kid crops up in his thoughts, the hollowed, starvin look that she had worn the first day they met, the sharp, grotesque protrusions of bones beneath frail skin, and he abandons the notion entirely. Stupid brat would never let him just stop huntin anyway. And if she did, she'd probably just try to go out herself and end up gettin killed. That particular thought bothers him; makes him feel like there are ants crawlin beneath his skin. He tells himself it's cuz he'd be out of a partner if she kicked the bucket, left to deal with the rest of the dumb fucks and Merle by himself, not to mention he'd have to go back to the skinnin alone again. That would be a bitch and a half. He ignores all other answers that flit across his mind, images of green eyes and white smiles and the sound of clear, smooth, laughter. The kid was just a business partner. Barely that even. Hell, she probably wouldn't survive till the winter, too soft for this new fucked up world.
The ants start shiftin under his skin again but, like he does more and more frequently these days, Daryl ignores the feelin.
When the last snare turns up empty as the rest, Daryl snarls under his breath and kicks at the ground, frustrated. Damn it. This means he'll have to actually go out and hunt. He's due for another trip but…he shoots Merle a glance and, unfortunately not for the first time, he wishes he had brought the kid instead of his brother. The fact that he wants someone other than his own kin around him makes him slightly ashamed and guilty.
But Merle's too fucked up to be of any real help on a real huntin trip. Hell, even if the traps had been filled, he wouldn't have been much help. For one, he can't shut the hell up. Been talkin nonstop since they left camp, loud and full of bullshit, true Merle Dixon fashion. He just likes to hear himself talk, especially when he's high or drunk and he's a bit of both at the moment, havin stolen his canteen back from Daryl half an hour into their trip. Which brings Daryl to the second reason he wished Audrey were here instead of Merle. His brother can hold his fuckin liquor, ain't no doubt 'bout that, but he's a few sheets into the wind already and stumblin every so often, the pathways from brain to feet muddled and fried. His talkin and stumblin combined, any animal in a mile radius would hear them and, besides that, Daryl wouldn't be able to hear if somethin other than an animal was sneakin up on them.
He could leave Merle here, tell him he's gonna go ahead alone and for the other man to return to camp but he has a feelin that Merle wouldn't go without him or, worse, he would and either pass out somewhere in the woods or make it back to camp and start some shit with Walsh again. Both options are screwed up.
Daryl doesn't know when he became his brother's keeper but it irritates him all the same.
Sighin, Daryl swings his crossbow onto his back. "Let's head back," he grumbles.
Merle looks up from where he's, fuckin Christ, peein on a tree, and grins that stupid, insipid, grin again, doped up and methed out. "Well what's the hurry?" he drawls, shakin himself before he tucks it away. "Ya got a hot date I don' know 'bout little bro?
Daryl scowls. "Don't be stupid. There's nothin out here to find Merle and I just don't wanna fuck round. I ain't bout to get bit just cuz ya wanna take a Sunday stroll."
Merle rolls his eyes walks up to his brother, slingin an arm round his neck and pullin him close enough that the hunter can smell the booze and drugs literally oozin from his pores. "Come on now Darlina. Yer too tense. Ain't nothin up here but us and the fuckin trees." As he talks, he steers himself and Daryl towards a fallen log that looks stable enough to hold their combined weight. The younger Dixon tries to slip out of Merle's grasp but it's too tight and he's shoved down before he can protest, forced to sit beside his brother as Merle drops down to the log beside him.
"Kick yer feet up, baby brother," Merle laughs as he pulls his half empty canteen from around his waist. He takes a healthy swig and extends it towards Daryl, jostlin it when all the hunter does is stare and glower. "Don' worry. I'll make sure some dumb dead bastard don' take a bite out of that lily white ass of yers."
Eyes narrowed, Daryl opens his mouth to argue, to decline and just tell Merle to quit the shit and return to camp with him, but at the last second, he decides against it, curlin his fingers around the lukewarm container instead. He knows it's stupid, last thing he needs to do is get fucked up and get them both killed, but today's been pretty fucked up already and he needs somethin to take the edge off. Shovin away the protests and warnings of his conscience, Daryl brings the canteen to his lips and knocks back a swallow, shudderin as the alcohol burns a path down his esophagus and settles into a pool of lava in his stomach.
Merle's grin grows at the sight. "Atta boy."
Ten minutes later and Daryl's feelin considerably better. The world's just a tad bit fuzzier but he isn't irritable any more and Merle's babblin doesn't rub him the wrong away. He doesn't talk as much as his brother but he nods and grunts occasionally. Mostly he just accepts the canteen when it's passed to him and takes another swig.
Merle isn't feelin any pain either by this point. He's calm and docile, still loud but almost lethargic as he lounges back on the log, retainin a surprisin amount of balance for someone who is as drunk as he is. Merle got two kinds of drunk: pissed and ready to right or this, lazy and ready to talk some bullshit. Daryl likes Merle this kind of drunk a lot better. He doesn't have to worry bout breakin up no stupid fights or savin some dumb ass before Merle killed him. When Merle's this kind of drunk, all he has to do is nod and listen, mutterin some kind of affirmative every few minutes to keep the peace. It can be rather boring and can become very irritating very quickly but Daryl's got some liquid patience in him now, so it makes it a lot easier.
"Now ain't this nice?" Merle suddenly drawls, elongatin every word so it's like one big slur.
As is his duty, Daryl responds with a noncommittal grunt, blindly reachin out for his turn at the canteen. Pacified, Merle continues. "Shit, we should do this more often. Fuck the rest of 'em. Just the two of us. Dixons. Gettin drunk and havin fun. Like old times."
Daryl almost says ain't that all ya do Merle but instead chases the retort back down with a gulp of whatever Merle seems to have hidden this long somewhere in their tent. His taste buds feel kind of seared off but he ignores it and hands the now almost empty container back to his brother. Merle fumbles for it, squintin likes it's movin on him. Hell, it probably is.
"Ya know what baby bro?" he abruptly asks, finally able to close his fingers around the canteen. Daryl doesn't respond but doesn't have to cuz the question had been rhetorical and Merle is already answerin his own question. "Ya need to relax more often; take the stick that's stuffed up yer ass out once in a while."
Snortin, Daryl shoves his brother, rough enough that the canteen jiggles on the way to Merle's lips and spills down his chin, splashin on the ugly ass vest he always wore and the bare skin of his chest.
"Screw you," Daryl bites out, but even he is slurrin slightly by now and there's no true heat in the words. "'M fuckin relaxed enough. Just cuz I ain't drunk or high all the damn time don't mean I ain't relaxed."
The second the words tumble off his tongue, Daryl half wishes, in the back of his mind, that he could take them back. It's not like they ain't true; they are. But Merle doesn't take criticism very well and, unfortunately, he's very quick to change from the docile drunk to the angry one and Daryl doesn't want to fight with his brother right now, doesn't have the energy nor the balance.
However, Merle surprisingly doesn't get angry; he just finishes his turn and hands the canteen back to Daryl with a grin.
"No need to get yer panties in a bunch. Just fuckin with ya."
Daryl scowls but accepts the drink nonetheless.
There's a few seconds of silence before Merle continues. "So…does a certain jailbait with a tight ass and perky tits have anythin to do with ya bein relaxed baby brother?"
The alcohol abruptly goes down the wrong tube as Daryl inhales sharply in shock and suddenly, the swill is burnin a hole through his lungs as the hunter chockes and coughs and sputters. The chocking fit goes on for a few minutes but when Daryl has enough oxygen in him, he lifts his head, squintin through one watery eye at his brother.
"The fuck?" he gasps, voice rough and scratchy. "What the hell ya talkin bout?"
Somethin akin to fear begins to twist in Daryl's gut, threadin through the haze in his brain. He knows Merle doesn't like Audrey; in fact he nearly hates her. S'kinda why the Daryl and her had kept their…partnership a secret. Daryl needed the help with the catches and she was offerin but Merle would certainly be pissed beyond reason if he knew his little brother was acceptin help from the 'loud mouthed city cooze' as he called her. But, as of late, he hadn't really mentioned her. Maybe it's cuz the kid's been steerin clear of Merle, and Daryl for that matter, unless they were hidden by trees and distance. Daryl doesn't know. All he knows is that his brother hasn't mentioned Audrey in days and now he's bringin her up and Daryl is on edge cuz he doesn't know why.
Merle's expression is curiously flat as he stares at Daryl, placid but for a small undercurrent of amusement. "Whatcha mean what? Don' tell me ya ain't noticed. The cooze is a cunt but I bet she'd be all sweet in bed," he leers, lickin his lips in such an obscene way that Daryl simultaneously feels enraged and disgusted.
"Hell nah I ain't thinkin bout the stupid kid like that," Daryl snarls and, even to his own ears, his tone sounds defensive. He scowls and spits to the side, tryin to look apathetic and indifferent even when a whirlwind of irate emotions is wellin inside of him. "Ya said it yerself, she's a loud ass…cunt." He stutters on the last words cuz, unbidden, Audrey's face flashes in his mind, smilin and…not pretty. She isn't pretty. She's a cooze, a cunt. Daryl tries to repeat this in his head cuz if he can't convince himself, he can't convince Merle. "She's like the rest of 'em. Bunch of assholes I can't goddamn stand."
Merle narrows his eyes but he's smilin again, or smirkin; it's really hard to tell with him. "Aww come on now. Ya sayin ya wouldn't bump some uglies with her? Ya wouldn't even have to listen to her if ya tie her up, gag that flappin jaw of hers." His tone is joking enough but there is somethin beneath it, a certain keenness to the suggestion, that makes Daryl think Merle ain't all that jestin after all.
The mere thought of what Merle has said makes Daryl feel sick, nauseous and like he wants to vomit. To mollify his brother, to make him drop the subject and move unto somethin else, Daryl knows he should agree, should laugh and make some kind of degradin comment. But he can't, he just can't; not when the image of those green eyes burn into him even through a memory and not with the memory of what they looked like full of hate, full of disgust and disdain. The kid's only a business partner but…she's useful enough and she's…she hasn't done anythin for Daryl to hate her, not like the rest of them. The hunter might not like people, has tried to steer clear of them his entire lifetime, but he ain't his Pa and he ain't Merle and the kid's done nothin wrong. It's cuz of that, cuz Daryl still retains some memories of his Mama and the manners she taught him, of returnin favors and bein kind when shown kindness, that he can't force himself to side with his brother in this, not even in theory. He tells himself it's just boils down to the fact that he doesn't want to be like his Pa, an all around abusive bastard, but, at the back of his mind, Daryl begins to think it's cuz of somethin else too, though he can't name what.
Still, he shakes his head harshly at Merle. "Naw. Don't want nothin to do with her. Don't need the trouble." Really needing it now, he takes another guzzle of the alcohol still in his hand and then shoves it roughly at the other man. "Ya want the rest of this or ya wanna keep takin crap?" he grunts.
He lifts his head and looks the older Dixon in the eye and starts as he sees somethin but by the time he blinks, it's gone and Merle is grinnin from ear to ear as he takes the canteen and goes to finish it off. "Knew I taught ya to be smart baby bro," he chuckles cryptically. He tilts the glass at Daryl, as if in a toast, and downs the rest of their drink.
Daryl mutters somethin in reply, what he doesn't remember, cuz all he can think about as he sits across from his brother is the look Merle had in his eyes mere seconds ago, a cold, way too lucid, calculatin gaze that no man as drunk as Merle could accomplish. It must have been a trick of the light or the booze in Daryl's own veins. He'd imagined it.
He had to have imagined it.
After the two Dixon brothers finish their midday drinkin, they recheck the traps, albeit slower than before, one last time just in case Fate were to smile on them. But Fate is a cold-hearted whore and they found nothing more than they had hours previous: whole lot of fuckin nothin.
By the time they make their way back to camp, it's already mid-afternoon and hot as hell. Daryl doesn't feel nearly as drunk as he did an hour ago and he thinks he's probably sweated out all the booze before they even hit the camp's perimeter. It's right when the two of them run into the road that leads down to the quarry that Merle suddenly veers off. Daryl stops in his tracks and calls out to his brother but Merle just waves him off, walkin backwards, pretty straight for the amount of alcohol he drank, and tells him he's gonna go take a dip in the lake. The hunter considers goin with him but Merle must have realized his plan cuz he told Daryl to fuck off and that he didn't need his baby bro pervin over him when he 'chocked the chicken.'
Flushin red, Daryl had flipped him off and told him not to drown cuz he wasn't goin to come down to the quarry and resuscitate him if he had his pants 'round his ankles. Merle had only laughed and turned on heel, struttin down the road and sayin he'd be back in an hour or so. Daryl would be lyin if he didn't say he was slightly worried for his inebriated brother but Merle was a big fuckin boy and could take care of himself. Or so Daryl hoped.
When Daryl arrives back at camp, he makes a beeline for his tent and fishes out his own canteen, half full of water this time, and chugs it down. His mouth still feels cottony and his head is still a bit fuzzy but it ain't that bad. For now at least. Daryl really hopes he doesn't wake up with a hangover tomorrow mornin.
Since he hadn't brought any game back, Daryl feels kind of listless. He putters around their campsite for a while, pickin things up and catalogin how many clean clothes he and Merle had left so he could figure out when it was time to do the laundry again. The rest of camp did their laundry together, a communal thing, but Daryl would be damned if he let some strangers wash his clothes like he's some invalid of goddamn child. He's a grown man. He'd do his own clothes.
After he's finished with that, he pulls his crossbow into his lap and checks the string and the fletching on each of his arrows. He's been pretty good on maintainin the thing so there's not much that needs to be done. Within a handful of minutes he's finished and randomly decides to fish out his spare knife from beside the dryin rack in his tent. He doesn't use this one as often, it's small and not as useful, but it could use for some sharpenin so he sets down to hone the blade on a spare piece of steel he had found God only knows where.
For a few minutes, it's blissfully quiet and blissfully calm. There's the hiss and grate of metal, the hum of the ever present cicadas, and the wind in the trees; Daryl can barely even hear the rest of the camp, a dull undercurrent, a quiet murmur, like the sounds of waves lappin against the shore. But then, as the hunter flips the knife in his hands, inspectin the edge, the white hot glint, a sudden realization comes to him, the thought that this is the blade that he lends to Audrey when they go out on their 'hunts' and his movements falter, fumble and stutter because holy crap, the kid just hasn't left him alone today, or at least the thought of her hasn't. Since that stupid ass dream this mornin, she's been constantly at the back of his mind, in one way or a-goddamn-nother. Daryl can't say why and it pisses him off. His movements grow more forceful, the blade scrapin harshly against the metal piece but the hunter isn't payin much attention. He's too busyin tryin to figure out why the kid is circlin round his head, like a broken damn record, too busy tryin to find another station, another tune to fuckin sing to.
But he can't cuz she sticks out like a sore thumb in all his thoughts. It's irritatin. He remembers random things about her at odd times and he doesn't want to. Yet they are there all the same, memories of spare phrases and the way her voice drawls them out. The way her face looks when she reads, chewin her lips and that crease between her eyes as she concentrates. It isn't like Daryl stares at her all the time; it's just…she's confusin and Daryl has a good memory with a hunter's attention to detail.
Perhaps, more than anythin, it's the fact that she's been here almost a month now and Daryl still can't get her number. He just can't seem to understand her. She just pops out of the woods one day and by the next, she's perfectly assimilated into this shitty little group they've got goin here. Without even tryin, she has everyone wrapped around her deft, calloused fingers: Walsh, the women, the kids, the chink…everyone. They all love her; Saint fuckin Audrey. She reads to the little brats round camp and pulls her own weight: takes watch, does her share of chores and then some when someone is slackin or protestin about how hot it is or how they are too tired, all without complaint. Even if she didn't do all that, she's all kind and bright smiles and Daryl's sure the idiots would love her anyway, just for her personality.
Which is why the hunter still can't fathom why the hell she bothers comin round him. She's said on multiple occasions that she just wants to help…but no one is that fuckin nice. Daryl's been with the rest of these assholes for nearly two months and, after they found out that he could do more with that crossbow than just look intimidatin, they didn't say shit bout it, just assumed he'd do it for fuckin free, not even botherin to offer any help. And Daryl's done it; mostly to make up for the shit Merle pulls every few days but also cuz, like he's rationalized to himself before, there's security in numbers. But the kid hadn't been in camp three days before she was jumpin to be of some use. Daryl had turned her down, flat, with a kick to the teeth to further emphasize his point and yet she still came back. Granted, after she verbally beat his ass and called him out for bein a dick but it wasn't his goddamn fault ok? He wasn't used to this…interactin with people that didn't include fightin and he certainly wasn't used to acceptin no help.
Still…she tried again, when no else would even bother to try the first time, and, what's more, she was helpful. She ain't no tracker, too uncoordinated and awkward, the mark of a city kid, but she did her best and took Daryl's advice when he barked it at her. No arguin, no sneerin at him like she thought she was better. Nothin. Whenever she didn't know how to do somethin, she asked, deferred to Daryl as the expert and didn't try and pretend to know shit when she didn't. She was…different than every other bastard in that aspect. And, cuz of it, the traps got cleared a lot faster, the skinnin done in half the time, even if she wasn't a fast as Daryl at cuttin the meat. It was…nice. Daryl squirmed mentally at the word, he wasn't no sissy or pansy, but it was fuckin nice to have some help, even if he would never say it out loud.
Now, if that were all the kid did…Daryl thinks that maybe he would understand her. He could understand doin what one had to in order to eat, shovin away differences and dislikes to survive. If all the kid did was follow him along, skin and cut, and then leave, without sayin one word in between, he'd know that she was only doin it to stay alive. And that would be fine with him. Every man and woman for himself or herself right?
But that isn't all she did.
Daryl recalls the first time they went out together, the day where he was literally this close to punchin Walsh in the mouth and laughin when he spat out his teeth. He had thought the kid had followed him to just echo Walsh's lil fuck buddy, demand some more shit or just be overall irritatin. But she proved him wrong, turnin out to be decent enough to provide some help. However, that wasn't what confused him, what haunted him now. He already said he could understand the helpin bit. It was the part that came after the helpin that threw him for a loop: the part where she stayed despite bein attacked by a weasel; the part where she actually cracked some jokes and laughed and offered him a goddamn lollipop for Christ's sake; the part where she didn't blame him for gettin hurt, at least not enough to resent him, and didn't…didn't curse at him, mutter insults under her breath like the other assholes thought he couldn't fuckin hear. She just…sat beside him, didn't even seem bothered by it like…like she actually kind of was ok with spendin time with him, even if at the time it had been strictly business, at least for Daryl.
And that wasn't even the worst of the confusion that the kid brought on. Even after she was sliced to ribbons, worked good and hard until she was sweatin and pretty worn out from trekkin through the woods, she still had enough energy to not only come back to finish the job of cleanin the game…but also to defend him to the rest of the assholes, even if none of her injuries were really his fault in the first place. That bit struck Daryl dumb and perhaps made him respect the kid a bit more. Blamin him would have been the easy way out, just one point of the finger and she wouldn't have to say one word more, everyone rallied against the hunter that hurt their golden child. But she took the more difficult path, defendin him, lyin for the both of them so she could keep goin out on hunts with him. Daryl thinks that it's cuz she did that…that he had gone to her a few days later, when Merle had dug under his skin and he was so irritable he was ready to shoot somethin. Now, he hadn't gone lookin for her, nothin like that. But, when he found her, he didn't just slip away like he would have done with anyone else, unnoticed, just the way he liked it. No, instead he spoke up, makin her notice him and then he had actually chosen to sit beside her, be near another living bein when at any other time, he wouldn't have even considered the idea. At the time he had told himself it was cuz he wasn't bout to return to camp and deal with all that shit that was there and, also, the quarry was the most open space in the immediate area, ideal for makin sure nothin snuck up on him.
But, in all honestly, which he would never voice anywhere outside his own thoughts, the kid was all right to be around. The mutterin had annoyed him at first but after hearin her explaination, modest and truthful and so goddamn innocent…Daryl let it go. Even felt a bit guilty for snappin at her, and Daryl never felt guilty about anything; wasn't in the Dixon blood to feel sorry and he was a Dixon, through and fucking through.
And yet, that day, and every day after, he had done somethin un-Dixon like, somethin Merle would probably beat him for if he knew: he actually asked her bout that book of hers, that journal. He didn't know what possessed him that day but the question had tripped off his lips before he could stop it and he couldn't take it back so he went with it. And the kid had answered.
Now, contrary to belief, Daryl isn't a redneck idiot. He had gone to school; graduated high school and all that shit. He had even taken some courses at the community college in town, after Merle had gone to prison for a five-year stint that was. He hadn't been the cream of the crop but he wasn't the bottom of the barrel neither. He got decent grades, could read and write and fuckin add. But he had never been particularly partial to any one subject and to hear how…enthralled the kid was with some fuckin words…Daryl wanted to say he didn't care but the way her eyes had lit up, the way she had bit her lip and looked at him, waitin for his response, his judgment…he couldn't lie. It had interested him, a first in nearly a decade. He didn't understand why she liked those…poems so much…but somethin in him, somethin he had never really paid attention to, not since he was offered the job at the mechanic shop, not since Merle got out of the joint, not since the world went and ended, wanted to find out, wanted to learn.
That's why he had accepted her bet. If she won…then he would understand; and if she lost…well… then he had somethin over the kid. He doesn't know what he'd ask for if he won…hell, at this point, he doesn't even know if he wants to win. The look in her green eyes when she read those liltin words…Daryl doesn't recall a time he ever looked that happy. It confuses him and makes him want somethin he can't even name or recognize but he's gone to her anyways, sat beside her as she read poem after poem, listenin to her voice and feelin more calm than he has any memory of. He still snaps at her, growls and grunts, but it's mostly for his own benefit cuz she's still just a partner, a business partner, nothin more cuz she can't be more, cuz he doesn't want more.
The memory of her standin in the dyin light of the sun, blood on her wrists, his dryin rack under her arm and forgiveness on her tongue comes back to Daryl now and he pushes away the thought that he doesn't have to want more cuz he already has more, no matter if he insists on callin it any less or by some other name.
Without preamble, a snatch of somethin the kid had read to him flits across his mind. "A rose by any other name would smell as sweet." (1)
And shit. Now Daryl's spoutin flowery crap. Fuckin great. Merle is gonna kick his teeth in.
The thought of Merle makes Daryl flinch in remembrance and there is a flare of pain as his knife slips and a nick blooms across his finger. "Hell," he curses under his breath, stickin the bleedin appendage in his mouth, suckin away the crimson liquid. He pulls out his finger and inspects the injury but it isn't that bad. It's barely a paper cut, even though it bleeds a bit more cuz of the alcohol in his system, and he soon picks up the knife again. The steel is plenty sharp already, glintin almost white in the afternoon sun, stained with drops of scarlet now, but Daryl needs somethin to keep his hands busy as anxiety twitches under his skin.
What Merle said early today, the half serious comment about tyin Audrey up...it still makes his gut roll. Even if Daryl hated Audrey…he would never do somethin like that; would never…force himself on a woman. Just like he would never hurt a child. His Pa had been the bastard to do that shit and Daryl had vowed at the age of five, when he found his Ma cryin in the bathroom, a fresh shiner on her eye, that he would never be anythin like George Dixon.
Merle is a different story though but he's kin and, for better or worse, Daryl is gonna stick by his side. His brother is all…well…the most important thing he has left anyway. He ain't bout to fight with him, especially over a business partner.
"Can we talk?"
The sudden words, and the voice that Daryl can now tell anywhere, make him start because holy shit, this is the second mother fuckin time someone has snuck up on him. The hell is wrong with him today?
He keeps sharpenin, an automatic, mechanical motion now, to hide his abrupt surprise, his guilt, and his worry. The surprise is self-exclamatory, the guilt is for his thoughts, not even his thoughts really, his brother's but he felt ashamed nonetheless, and the worry is for his brother himself. If today is any indication, Merle really does not care for the kid and if he sees her here, talkin to Daryl, he'll be livid.
Where the hell is Merle anyway? How long has Daryl been sittin here, lost in his head? The hunter doesn't know, can't guess as to when his brother will return, so when he looks up he makes sure to inject a coldness to his gaze, a harshness to the set of his jaw.
Audrey stands a few feet in front of him, jitterin in place and she looks nervous, on edge, glancin over his shoulder and Daryl thinks he knows why.
"Merle ain't here," he says and keeps the but I don't know where he is and why the hell are you here to himself.
The kid frowns and tilts her head in confusion, her short hair splayin across the line of her jaw, dark strands on pale skin. "What?" she asks and Daryl repeats himself, puttin the knife away before he cut himself again, distracted by the kid herself now instead of just the thought of her. He's surprised when she says she wasn't lookin out for Merle cuz, before now, she'd been real careful to only talk to Daryl when they were sure Merle couldn't see or hear them. He's confused as to why she's riskin Merle happenin upon them now and, with all the shit that circlin in his head, he can't help the sharpness of his next words.
"So what do ya want?" He feels exposed and vulnerable. He wants the kid gone. Not for good or anything. Just from here, for now. He'd find her later or somethin but he feels like Merle's bout to pop out of the treeline and it makes him feel anxious.
Audrey seems to ignore the edge to his words, or just doesn't notice it, and only fidgets for a moment, wrappin her arms around herself, drawin Daryl's gaze for a split second to the exposed skin of her shoulders and bare arms, before she cuts right to the chase and blurts out, "We need to go hunt again."
Daryl is surprised at her admission and more than a little annoyed cuz it's like she knows how he failed today and she's shovin it in his face and he knows it's illogical to think that but it's what he feels all the same and he growls insults at her, more caustic to her than he had been in days. The kid scowls at him then, sparked by his anger, and Daryl is sure she's gonna snap back at him or argue or just storm off, that's what everyone else does when he is in a bad mood, but she's not everyone else and she never ceases to stun him.
In the blink of an eye, Audrey goes from irritated…to somethin else. Somethin small and fragile cuz she takes a step forward and drops to the ground, curlin in on herself like she is tryin to ward off somethin bad and harmful. She looks young with her knees up to her chin and Daryl narrows her eyes cuz…in that moment she reminds him of the little girl he bumped into today. It's a look she has in her eyes, the look that seems very similar to fear. He wants to ask her what's wrong, the desire is sudden and burnin through his veins, but the kid answers his unasked question before he can open his mouth.
"We're running out of food Daryl."
He barely catches the whisper, has to nearly lean out of his seat to do so, but when his head registers what she has just said, he's irritated again. "Out of…we just brought a haul back two days ago," he reminds her cuz he doesn't need to be reminded. He knows full well they'll have to go out probably today or tomorrow but they have enough food to tide them over until their next trip. Even if the meat is low, the others have supplies the chink has scavenged from the city. He doesn't know why this warrants him needin to know.
But the acidic aggravation fades away the second the kid's next sentence hits the air.
"I know," she says and her voice is hoarse and desperate and Daryl can't stay mad when he hears the near plea in her voice, beggin for him to listen. "I was there remember? But I was talking to Glenn this morning…it's almost all gone. And it's not just the meat. Like…everything almost gone. Glenn says we have about three days before it's all used up. After that…"
She trails off, apparently unable to continue. But the hunter doesn't need to hear her final words to understand what she's gettin at. They're about to starve, all of them, and it's partially Daryl's fault.
Fuck. He'd noticed the game was gettin thinner but he just assumed the other idiots would have enough canned goods and shit to supplement the lack of kill Daryl and Audrey were haulin in. Stupid. What the hell was he thinkin, trustin the dumb asses, assumin they'd have any foresight to not let the supplies dwindle done to nothin before they realized, oh hey, maybe we should fuckin restock. Daryl wants to kick himself. He knew not to assume, to assume only made and ass outta you and me, as his Ma had thought him from an early age. But he's been distracted recently and, although he should blame the kid for that, he doesn't, puttin all the blame on himself instead cuz he knew better and he can't believe…
Daryl stops that particular line of thought in its tracks. What's done is done. He fucked up. He can't change it. All he can do is try and fix it before they all die of, ain't that a bitch, starvation in a goddamn apocalypse where dead people were shamblin round eatin people.
His mind immediately starts to turn, hits the ground runnin, cogs and wheels and gears grindin in this head. First things first, he'll need to go out and really hunt, not just mess round camp like he had been doin recently, stickin to the traps, makin it easier for Audrey to follow. He needs to leave the city behind, get farther out into the woods, like he had been the day he first ran into the kid. A trip like that will take a few days, at the least, if Daryl hopes to find anythin big enough to bring them back from the brink. Shit, he's gonna have to pack a few supplies and aw hell, what about Merle?
...Fuck it. Merle will just have to stay; can't be trusted to be lucid enough to do anythin but hinder Daryl and Daryl needs help not hinder. Speakin of help…what about Audrey? She'll want to come, like always, but the more he thinks about it, the more Daryl realizes he's gonna leave her behind too. She's eager and a quick learn but she doesn't have Daryl's years of stealth practice and, while trackin, she's bout as graceful as a bull in a china shop. She'll just scare shit off before the hunter can catch sight of it. Ok so no Merle and no kid. Daryl's gonna go out alone. He's just about to start considerin which direction he'll head, which locations he's had luck with in the past, when there's a sudden touch to his wrist and he becomes aware of a stingin pain in his fingertips.
Daryl jerks his head up and, suddenly, the kid is right there, inches from him, her green eyes shinnin up at him and her slim, calloused fingers wrapped around his wrist, tugging his arm towards her. "You're bleeding," she whispers at him and Daryl's gaze is drawn to the pink of her lips and how they form the words, the shapes they mold to and…
He wrenches his arm away from her and wipes his fingers on his jeans, realizin now that he can taste the copper on his tongue that he had torn the skin of cuticles again. It was a bad habit of his, one of many that he can't seem to break.
The kid clears her throat abruptly and asks the question Daryl knew had been only a matter of time before it was asked. Shakin his head to gather his wits, and shake away the feel of her skin on his, Daryl stands and grabs his crossbow. Not lookin at the kid, he tells her his plan, how he's goin out alone but she doesn't take it well, vaultin off the ground and plastered almost chest-to-chest with him before he can blink.
"What do you mean you're going hunting? I'm coming with you," she says forcefully, a familiar stubborn set to her jaw that Daryl knows will just make this all the more difficult.
He tries to show her he ain't dickin around, conjurin up his fiercest glare to make her back down. "No, you ain't," he growls out but she's so fuckin hardheaded and demands to know a reason. He intends to be diplomatic about it, as diplomatic as a Dixon can, but the kid just pushes his buttons and he nearly spits his response, all the shit he had tumblin in his head, in her face.
"Cuz goddamn it. I ain't about to fuckin starve and there ain't anything bigger than squirrel left round here. If ya don't want to die, I have to go farther out, away from the city. Spend a good day or two trackin a buck or doe. And I can't do that if yer tramplin along after me, scarin everythin off!"
Audrey gapes at him when he's finished, mouth flappin open, green eyes wide and gem bright and Daryl is suddenly so frustrated, with her, with the situation, with himself, that he just thinks fuck it as he tries to stalk off, supplies and plans be damned. He's made it a few days without food before; he doesn't need anythin. Just his crossbow and knife and the skills he's had ingrained in him from a young age, really the only good thing Merle has done for him in his whole life.
But the kid won't let him go. She chases him, from his tent all the way to the edge of camp, a distance Daryl has no recollection of crossin, and grabs his arm before he can slip under the shitty string of cans the idiots have strung up for "security." He's thrown off balance by her whirlin him around and he's cussin up a storm before her words cut him off.
"Let me come with you," she pants and Christ. This kid is as stubborn as a dog with a goddamn bone.
He glares down at her, realizin randomly how short she is compared to him, half a head smaller, as she gazes right back at him, unrepentant. "Did ya not just fuckin hear-" he tries again but she won't let him get a word in edgewise.
"I heard," she interrupts. "And I still think I should go with you. "Look. I know I'm not exactly light on my feet, at least not in the woods. But I'll do my best to stay quiet. I'll step where you step; breathe when you breathe. I won't say a fucking word. Just…please. Please let me go with you."
She's desperate by the end of it, down right beggin. Her eyes are as wide as the fuckin moon and she's so close, Daryl can see every detail of her face. He can see that the pink bow of her lips is chapped and dry, split skin, and how the bottom lip is just slightly plumper than the top. He can see that her nose is twisted to the left, just a bit, crooked startin halfway down the bridge. He hasn't noticed it before but she has freckles scattered across her face, everywhere, small and unnoticed on her forehead but growin more prominent over her nose and cheeks, like an unmapped galaxy. And, of course, her eyes. Framed by a forest of thick, dark lashes, they're greener than anythin he's ever seen, a thin ring of hazel around the pupil and a darker, forest green long the edges of the iris, an emerald sea trapped between the two rings. Those eyes never fail to befuddle him, whittle down the walls and spikes he tries to throw up in defense with their goddamn open, window like quality and he already feels himself weakenin, surrenderin, but he still asks her why, one last time, to keep up appearances of his adamant resolve.
Audrey shudders in a breath, lips parted and Daryl can't help but oscillate between her mouth and eyes as she responds. "Because how else are you going to drag back some big ass deer all by yourself?" she asks and Daryl realizes he never really thought of how hard that would be, how he's always had his truck or, on the very rare occasion, Merle, to help him haul an animal that big in. But she's still talking and, unsurprisingly, she makes more than more valid point. "Not to mention watch your back so a walker doesn't come up and bite you in the ass? You can't, not alone." He doesn't think she realizes it but, as she finishes her reply, Audrey takes half a step forward and speaks the words into Daryl's very goddamn lungs.
"I just want to help Daryl," she says earnestly. "Just like I said before. Just help you…and help everyone else here, make sure they don't go hungry."
The moniker that Daryl had given her earlier comes back to him again. Saint fuckin Audrey. He would say she was full of shit if she didn't know her, didn't know how damn, honest to God, truthful, she was bein. And then, like in a cliché cartoon lightbulb, a realization comes to him in that instant.
She had come to him. Not Walsh, the self-proclaimed king boss of their little spinnin glass ball world. Not the chink, who, he's pretty sure, is in love with her by the way he follows her round, wide-eyed and trippin over his dick. Not that he'd noticed or anythin. But back to his point. The kid…Audrey, had come to him when she was concerned, when she was, is, scared. Daryl thinks about what that must mean. All he can come up with is that…she trusts him, enough to confide in him. God only knows why but she does. And Daryl isn't sure, has never experienced this himself, but he thought trust was somethin ya only gave to friends and he realizes, right then, that no matter how he views her, what he labels or defines her has, she considers him her friend and, honestly, he has no idea what to do with that fuckin piece of knowledge.
For a moment, he contemplates refusing her out right, bein as big of a dick as possible so as to shove her away, take away the risk before it became dangerous. He had told her before, he doesn't need a goddamn friend, has never wanted one. But he puts the idea to rest just as soon as he thinks it cuz…he still needs a partner and, no matter what she saw him as, he would never consider her anythin more. Daryl Dixon knew what he wanted and what he didn't. He could keep the lines dividin the two clear as damn day.
And to prove that, he agrees to take her, tellin her to keep the fuck up cuz he ain't stoppin for nothin.
Audrey breaks out into a smile, all teeth and laugh lines. "Since when have you ever?" she retorts and Daryl rolls her eyes and tells her to just shut up and follow him before they loose the light. She starts to move towards him but they she stops suddenly and her brow furrows and Daryl can't suppress the groan of, "The fuck's wrong now?"
She stares past him, obviously thinkin, and points out that they'll need supplies, the very things Daryl had decided to forgo a few minutes ago. He'd still be willin to go without them but the kid's already movin away, sayin how it'll only take a minute or some shit.
He's watchin her turn her shoulder when a sudden impulse seizes him and he's already grabbin for her arm before he can stop himself. Her skin is warm and smooth beneath his palm and she casts a curious look over her shoulder and Daryl flounders for a moment cuz he doesn't know why he grabbed her, but he blurts out the first thing that comes to mind.
"Then we're leavin alright? No more fuckin around." Even to his own ears, the words don't sound as firm and authoritative as he meant them to. The kid notices too and smirks, placin two fingers to her brow in a mock salute, sayin, "Yes sir," in a deep, and obviously tauntin voice.
Daryl has half a moment to want to say somethin in retort but the kid is suddenly goin rigid in his grasp and the hunter is equally confused and concerned by the shaky exhale that she chokes out. He thinks she must see something and the word walker flares across his thoughts, bright as a neon Vegas sign, and he snaps his head up to find the source of her shock.
It's the lil white boy, the cooze's son, the one Walsh was always dotin on. He's standin a handful of yards away and Daryl opens his mouth to tell him to fuckin beat it and go back to his mother and goddamn, it's only the goddamn apocalypse, why was no one watching the damn child? And what is with Daryl not hearin jack shit today?
But the boy is stutterin somethin, eyes bulgin and face pale and Daryl hears Audrey try to respond, her own words fallin ass over tits on themselves and the boy starts shakin his head, whipin it back and forth as he stumbles away and suddenly, he's goddamn screamin.
"Mom! Shane!"
He's gone is a flash of a red shirt and blue jeans and Daryl blinks after him. Somethin about the boy's voice, a certain tremble to his words, makes the hunter's lips purse and eyes narrow. The boy had been upset, that much was clear and ya'd have to be blind, deaf, and dumb not to realize it. It was understandable; the little brat idolized Audrey and hearin that she was leavin, so abruptly, for a reason he doesn't know, fucked up the boy's little perfect world. But, if Daryl didn't know better…he'd say the brat had sounded…almost…frightened. Why would he be scared though? Audrey was fine and…oh fuck wait. The boy had called Walsh's name didn't he? Shit. If that son of a bitch came down here now, Daryl and Audrey would never leave. Fuck. Fuck, fuck. They needed to leave like five minutes ago and…
Suddenly, the kid is whirlin around, expression wild and eyes on fire but before she can say a word, her name is screamed out behind her and Walsh comes barrelin through the tree line like a chargin bull, a whole line of idiots behind him. Daryl goes rigid as he catches sight of all the people, he is never in the same vicinity as this many of 'em and everyone is wearin similar expressions of fear and anger and what are they all lookin at him like that for?
He swings his gaze to glare at Shane, about to ask what his goddamn problem is, but the former cop's own expression stops him short. The other man's mouth is a thin line, his nostrils are flared, and his eyes are full of hate, locked on to a point near Daryl's waist, between him and the kid and…
It hits him like a ton of bricks and he drops the kid's wrist like it was burnin him but Walsh just looks even more livid and Daryl begins to think he knows why they are all lookin at him like that.
"Dixon," Walsh snarls and Daryl can hear all the hate the former cop has for him in the way he spits his name out like it tastes like shit. "What's goin on here?"
Daryl opens his mouth to tell him it's none of his goddamn business, cuz it really fuckin wasn't; what Audrey and him did was between the two of them and it kept the rest of them fed so they had no right to say shit.
But the kid beats him to it, stutterin out some stupid soundin reply that only makes Walsh curl his lip and narrow his eyes at Daryl like he's thinkin of shootin him here and now. The hunter meets his glower head on and snarls silently in defiance. He ain't scared of no fuckin cop who thinks he's the shit just cuz he wore a badge in another life time. Shit like that don't count for nothin any more. All that matters is brute strength and who can think fastest on his feet. Survival of the fittest, like Daryl had said.
Walsh bares his teeth slightly in enraged revulsion and grinds out his next words so harshly Daryl's surprised pieces of his teeth don't come with them. "Carl said Dixon grabbed you," he starts, directin his words at Audrey, but Daryl doesn't even hear the endin of his sentence, the first five words resoundin in his skull.
"Carl said Dixon grabbed you…"
"Carl said Dixon grabbed you…"
"Dixon grabbed you…"
And all of the sudden, Daryl feels sick again and he can taste bile in the back of his throat, acidic and overly sweet. That's why he had sounded frightened. The boy…that fuckin lil boy had ran back to camp and told the rest of these fuckers that Daryl had grabbed Audrey, like he was doin somethin she didn't want, she he was hurtin her. It's just like that little blonde girl, the girl that Daryl can see peekin out from behind her Mama's legs, wide-eyed and scared. His eyes flickered over to the brat that had started all this and that same frightened look is in his eyes and it's in everyone else's eyes, the whole audience Daryl and Audrey had drawn, and it makes him so pissed he's physically sick.
The whole lot of them are lookin at him like he's some kind of monster, somethin to be reviled and hated and Daryl's never hit a woman, never laid a hand on a child, has only come to physical blows with Walsh once and yet they are all gazin at him like he should be locked up or, better yet, put down. He's kept them fed for two months, only takin a few supplies for Merle and himself, and they treat him like a rabid, feral, dangerous beast.
He's aware that the kid is talking, sayin shit that Walsh is respondin to and that the rest of the group is pitchin their two cents into, but he can't hear them, not over the roar of blood in his ears and definitely not over the words that are screamin in his head.
"Sweetheart? Are you there? Help me. Daryl, please help me."
"Aren't you going to help her? Well? Aren't you?"
"Knew you were nothing but useless trash Dixon."
"Worthless inbred."
"Demons, the lot of ya."
"Garbage ain't allowed in heaven. Ya know that, don' ya boy?"
Daryl suddenly tastes copper on his tongue and realizes he's bitten through his cheek, scarlet metal coatin the inside of his mouth. It jerks him away form his thoughts and he's about to wrench away from this cluster fuck of a mess when the kid's voice pierces through the haze in his mind, bright and clear and sharp.
"You don't have to worry," she's saying and the hunter doesn't know whom she's takin to but his next words make him balk. "Daryl and I have actually gone hunting together in the past."
And there it was, out in the open, exposed to the air, their "dirty little secret."
She…admitted it, easy as hell, and there's somethin akin to pride in her voice and Daryl can only see the back of her head but he can tell it's held high and can almost imagine the stubborn tilt to her jaw. He doesn't understand what's goin on but when Walsh grunts sometin caustic, glarin at Daryl over Audrey's shoulder, he gestures to her face and Daryl knows everyone is lookin at the scar his bolt had left on her face, small and cauterized but there nonetheless.
"Accidents," Audrey smoothly replies and the harshness to her tone makes Daryl shift his gaze from Walsh to her, wonderin as to why the hell she sounds pissed now. She's the 'victim' in all this. Daryl's the one that should be angry, is angry, but the kid keeps goin and her words get sharper and sharper until the last one is hurtled out like a razor fine dagger. "Honest to god accidents and nothing more. Hunting is a dangerous job Shane. Not that any of you would know."
Walsh gapes at her and Daryl sees the rest of em wear similar expressions but Audrey doesn't spare them any mercy or apology and instead just bluntly states that she's goin huntin with Daryl and that they'll be back in a few days, thank you fuckin kindly. Daryl is completely lost by this point cuz she isn't supposed to be doin this. She's supposed to just say sorry and walk away from Daryl and not look back and agree with all the shit the rest of them say about the bastards that bear the name Dixon. But she doesn't. And when Walsh refuses to let her go, like he honestly has a goddamn say, insultin Daryl along the way, Daryl sees an Audrey that he's only seen glimpses of, in the sneer she wore when she told off Merle, in the scowl she wore when she argued with Daryl, in the snarl she grinned when she beat Shane at their spar, wild and unrefined and unrepentant.
"Shane," she growls out and Daryl has never heard so much venom in her voice and all he can do is stare at her back in shock as she pushes herself into Walsh's face. "My last name is not fucking Walsh. I am not your daughter. You are not my father. So do not presume to tell me what to do like you know fucking better. I understand that you've somehow become the leader of our ragtag group and are trying to make some executive decisions but I am an adult and I can make my own decisions. And, right now, I've decided to go out and hunt with Daryl so no one starves. Understand?"
Not knowin the kid in front of him, used to docile Saint fuckin Audrey, Walsh pulls the first thing he can think of out of his ass. "You're only seventeen; in the state of Georgia ya gotta be eighteen to be considered an adult," he recites. "You don't have a say and, seeing as I'm a public official, I say that you aren't going. End of discussion."
Ironically, out of everythin that's been said, it's those words that smack Daryl in the face, make the breath rush out of him, cuz it makes him realize somethin.
The kid is really…just a fuckin kid. She ain't even an adult yet; goddamn jailbait like Merle had said not that Daryl had been thinkin of her like that. It's not like he didn't know her age, he did; she had told him herself days ago, just in passin conversation. But it still cold cocks him cuz she's only seventeen for Christ sakes and Daryl seems to always think of her as an adult, despite the fact that he refers to her as kid, cuz, out of every other dickhead in camp, she's the only one that can actually, on some practical level, take care of herself.
Audrey obviously thinks along the same lines cuz she's laughin in Walsh's face. "If you haven't noticed, the world has freaking ended. Sorry to burst your bubble but you aren't a "public official" because there is no public anymore. It's just us: less than two-dozen people surviving day to day here. You can't threaten to write me a ticket and, unless you're going to handcuff me to the RV of shoot me in the leg, you can't keep me here."
Walsh seems to take her words at face value cuz he grabs for her when she tries to move away and the sudden, violent urge that Daryl has to punch him in the face, get him to let Audrey go, surprises him. The two of them begin to argue but Daryl isn't listenin. He's thinkin bout the fact that…the kid is almost defendin him, fightin to go out with him, like it means so much to her that she's willin to piss a few people off. It makes no sense why she would do that, unless she's tryin to prove a point but what point can that be? It can't just be some stupid teenage shit of you aren't the boss of me. It's somethin more, somethin deeper and Daryl suddenly recalls how Walsh called him a 'backwater hillbilly' and how that is when Audrey got in his face, started to fight, like that had upset her, like…she cared about what the rest of them said about Daryl.
But then…that would mean…her point would be…that would mean by goin huntin with Daryl she would be tryin to prove, tryin to show the rest of them that the hunter was a good person, a trustworthy person, a person she considered…a friend.
The thought jars him cuz that's…that's not what he wants. He ain't her friend. He's just a fuckin business partner and...fuck it. He did this alone before and he can do it alone again. This shit…this fuckin stupid kid was too much-
"I'm not a kid," he hears her snarl. "And that's bullshit. You just don't want me to go cuz-"
And Daryl can't take it anymore, her voice, her defense of him, and he suddenly explodes.
"Jesus Fucking Christ!"
Everyone falls silent at his outburst but he doesn't give a shit how they are lookin at him or how they think of him, or what they think of him, and he shoves past Walsh, sneerin his defiance in his face. He's made it five feet before the kid's callin out to him, beggin and pleadin again, and he tries to ignore her but she just won't be ignored and he knows she'll just follow him if he says nothin so he makes damn sure she won't want to follow him.
Grittin his teeth, Daryl casts the coldest look he can muster over his shoulder, puttin in it all the hate he had for these motherfuckers, all his anger and spiteful feelings. He looks right in those god-awful puke green eyes of hers and severs their partnership as easily as he can cuz hell he doesn't need this. "Ya ain't worth the goddamn trouble," he snarls and he says the words like they disgust him, like she disgusts him and he turns away, ignorin the shattered look in her eyes as she hears him.
She doesn't call out to him again and he doesn't look back as he stalks away. He doesn't have a specific destination, just fuckin away from there, but he finds himself in front of his tent before long and, lucky him, Merle is suddenly there.
His older brother doesn't look drunk or high any more and his eyes are crystal clear, his teeth gleamin razor sharp as he smiles at Daryl. "Well now," he drawls and there's such glee in his voice that Daryl automatically tenses and feels like shit is about to hit the fan cuz Merle only ever sounds this happy right before he starts a fight. "Sounds like we got us a little powwow down there. What? Did ya not tie the gag tight enough round the cooze's mouth?" He laughs, a mean and ugly noise, and Daryl feels rage spiral through him, his fingers curlin into shakin fists at his side.
"Shut the fuck up Merle," he grinds out but the older man doesn't seem phased by the anger in his brother's voice. In fact, it seems to amuse him cuz his smile only widens, holdin his hands up in a placating gesture.
"Aw don' be like that baby brother. I told ya the bitch was no good."
Daryl's chest is startin to heave and Merle takes in the shakin shoulders and flutterin muscles in his brother's jaw and his grin bleeds into a slow, shit eatin smirk. "Or maybe ya were the one who was no good," he taunts and red starts to filter into Daryl's vision. "Did she turn ya down lil bro cuz yer a good for nothin piece of…"
Merle never gets to finish his sentence.
"FUCK YOU!" Daryl screams and he's lashin out without thinking, his fist suddenly flyin through the air and into his brother's cheek with a jarrin force, the crack that follows signifyin that somethin had been broken upon impact. Daryl doesn't know if it's Merle's cheek or his own hand but he doesn't care as he spits on his brother's prone body, only seein red red red as he stands there. Merle looks shocked, even behind the blood, and Daryl feels so much hate in him at that moment he only has one thought and that was leave.
But when he whirls to go, she's fuckin there again, standin yards away, skin flushed pink and thin frame gaspin as her mouth forms a perfect 'o' of surprise. Daryl meets green eyes for just a fraction of a second but he can't take any more than that, the hurt in their emerald depths pokin holes through his fury and he doesn't want that. He wants the rage, the anger, the wrath; wants to ride the tidal wave of those feelins all the way out of camp and to the ends of the world.
So he pretends like he doesn't see her and he pretends like he doesn't know her, lettin his gaze slide away like water and flowin right into the trees behind him. He doesn't know where he's goin, doesn't have the slightest clue, but as long as it is away from here, it's fine with him.
As long as it is away from Walsh and the judgment in his eyes and those brats and the fear in each freckle on their faces; as long as it is away from Merle and his goddamn disgustin thoughts; as long as it is far away from that stupid kid and her hideous green eyes and thin shoulders and her words that make no sense to Daryl but that he does not want to make sense of…he doesn't care if he ends up in the middle of the ocean, lost and fuckin drownin.
It isn't until much later, almost two days later, until he's worn out all his anger, until he's bone tired of runnin to nowhere, until the moon is the only witness in the world, that Daryl allows himself to admit that… he doesn't know what a friend is, doesn't know what the fuck it entails exactly, but that he feels the kid…feels that Audrey had come the closest anyone ever had before he fucked it up.
But maybe it was for the best. Cuz she's Saint fuckin Audrey and garbage like him ain't allowed in heaven.
(1) Quote by Shakespeare.
Allllll right. Well there ya go :/ For some reason it is REALLY hard for me to get in Daryl's head so I hope this is satisfactory . I was iffy on the last bit but...meh :P We'll see how you guys like it.
PLEASE remember to review! :) You don't know how happy they make me and to ALL my faithful reviewers, THANK YOU from the bottom of my heart :) I love you guys and it's your comments that keep this story alive ^^
Next chap we are back to Audrey's POV and the trip into Atlanta that brings Officer Rick Grimes into the picture ;) Whoot!
PS: These next two weeks are gonna be veritable HELL for me T.T I have AP Exams and graduation so if it takes me a bit longer to update I apologize x( Please bear with me and don't give up on Audrey's and Daryl's story yet! :D
Thanks again for reading!
~Shadows