For an age, she does not move. Undone, Beth stands completely still as the water cascades down on her, penetrating the cold and the dirt, and deeper. Drumming the incessant pattering of the relief of rainfall back into her ears, the water runs too hot. Though not scalding, it's undoubtedly marking her scalp and back a bright crimson from the impact, but so novel is this sensation of absolute warmth she delays any move to adjust the temperature. Instead, she bends herself gingerly away from it as needed rather than squander this rarity. The heat, the fragrant air, the feeling of finally getting clean, it all could rival heaven. Infinitely superior to rag baths from boiled scouted water, Beth allows herself slowly to melt into the steady stream of comfort and old-world normalcy. A hot shower — to be enveloped in steam and an endless cascade of free running water, to smell of soap and herbs, to feel truly clean, and to be warmed to the core — it's something akin to a dream, a fantasy to play with when such things as daydreaming can be indulged. How many times since her last hot shower, long past forgotten for being little more than unremarkable at the time, has she dreamt this simple dream?

Even in the midst of it it seems too good to be truly real, yet too visceral to be a vision. Her mind washes blank, willingly giving way to only what is tactile. Beth lathers and shampoos. Her scalp tingles with the sensation of renewed activation and is eased by the lovely tension of the torrent of water weighing down her hair, slicking it back as it pulls to her neck. Closing her eyes to the spray, she feels herself both invigorated and soothed. What amount of will power had spurred Daryl from this haven? Driven by the steady evenness of the freshet, Beth vacillates from side to side, setting a meditative rhythm from shoulders to hips as she soaks it in. Arching her back, she allows the water to encompass her and to find what path on her it will. This is not a sponge bath, not a dunking of her head in a pot of heated water nor a pour-over with a single pan pulled from a flame. It is not a cold-water river rinse. The shower she rejoices in now is as good as any from the time before. Better than, for now she knows its true worth. For however grim their circumstances, it is restorative. More than frivolous, this simple unassuming thing signifies so much of what they struggle for. Setting aside the level of safety requisite to prioritize such a thing as bathing, clean water alone is a necessity not a trifle. And to have more beyond what's needed for drinking and cooking is a boon, and reason enough to celebrate. What's more, heated water is far from a petty pleasure. The product of concerted effort, behind it there is industry and mechanics: the chopping and hauling of wood, the setting of fires, the employment of both ingenuity and forethought. Rarity and comfort alone are not all that gives this value; the hard-learned labor behind it now renders every bath and shower before and after impossible to take for granted. Though in essence it amounts to not much more than soap and water, still it is a revelation. For a body no longer striving to live no longer cares about being clean. There is a sort of hope in it, a resistance against surrender.

Beth succumbs to the pleasure of being wholly warm, wholly clean, and wholly without a timeframe. Everything beyond the circle of the shower curtain is for the moment staved off and beyond her concern. She breathes in, rousing her pleasure senses. Peppermint, rosemary, honey, and pinewood. Absorbing every relentless falling droplet, a welcome deluge floods her skin, her ears, her nerves with happy stimulation. Naught can be heard but the downpour of water and the occasional crack or pop of the fire. Her lips open and trails of water fill her mouth, tasting of minerals and earth.

The longer she remains the more restored she feels but so too the colder the outside world becomes. The thought of leaving this sanctuary looms ever more unthinkable, but finally, after bracing for it more than once, she does. The knobs turn stiffly to the right until they will budge no further beneath her grip. Using both hands Beth wrings and tousles the water from her hair. From behind the plain canvas curtain Beth reaches for the damp towel and uses it to dry herself. Her hands rest then on her abdomen. Her belly's grown since last she had the opportunity to study it: Her toes are no longer just there to be seen. Somehow in a week's time, without her noticing, the shape of her has changed.

A single knuckle knocks lightly on the bathroom door. Beth lifts her eyes away from her child. "Com' in."

Soggy-haired but clean and otherwise dry, Daryl pushes open the door. Having managed bandaging himself as best he was able, Daryl's traded the tattered mess of his clothes for the thermal long johns uncovered in a storage box from the closet. Dressed thus, unplagued by the gore of their past disasters, no longer covered by the visible reminders of his injuries and all they'd nearly lost, he appears comfortable, but unlike himself.

Daryl brings her pack to her. Most every item of clothing and bedding they carry had been sullied in the efforts to stop his bleeding, but he speculates Beth may still have some undergarments she can use. "Got your pack," he offers. "N' this." He extends to her a long-sleeved flannel button-down, sourced also from the box in the closet.

Wrapped in her damp towel, her hair still dripping, Beth swipes open the shower curtain. "Thank you."

Seeing her move to step out from the clawfoot tub, Daryl drops the bag and is quick to reach for Beth before she takes the extended step over the rim. "Here. Be careful."

Beth accepts the assist and climbs out of the tub with steadied balance. "Thank you." Lingering there, she holds his attention just long enough for Daryl to take her meaning to be more than this small offer of support.

Daryl shakes his head mutely. "You got us here." He means this, but Beth's not looking for credit.

Still dripping, she nods in the direction of her bag, "Could you? Ziplock in th' front bottom pocket..." With a nod, Daryl limps some to the bag. Lifting it to the counter, he unzips and digs through until he uncovers what she needs. Pulling open the plastic press-lock seal, Daryl removes one pair of cotton underwear and offers them over. "Th'nks." Holding her towel bunched closed behind her, Beth bends to tug them on. It's a tricky task with one hand, complicated further by the dampness of her skin. Once she's managed it well enough, Daryl passes her the shirt. Beth pulls one sleeve on before releasing the towel to slip on the other. The doing so momentarily exposes her breasts and leaves bare her pregnancy.

Daryl can't help himself but look. His gaze takes on a sort of removed intentness as he takes in the sight of her. If he's gone some time without having seen his own body fully unclothed, it's been just as long if not longer since he's seen Beth's. The body revealed to him now is entirely new and not her own. Full and round, her belly takes the shape of a flattened melon, not as protruding as it will grow to be in her final weeks, but already well defined and prominent. Whereas once she might have passed as merely thick waisted, no longer. Without the detractors of winter clothes and heavy belts and holsters, her condition, still carried high and compact, is unmistakable. If one were to conjure the notion of a belly in gestation, hers might be the very dimensions one might picture. He'd held his hand to her just this afternoon but ... "Look'a you..." he marvels.

Two blue eyes flit to him then follow his gaze back to herself. Beth's hand moves mindfully to her middle where she unknowingly cradles the child within her. She looks to him then. "... I thought you were going to die." She hasn't bothered to button the shirt, she's not conscious it's open. It's he who is her focus, not her state of undress or her dripping hair. "Up on that ridge, watchin' it all happen. And afterwards in the car. I knew you could be dying."

"—Beth."

Her countenance is solemn. Now that she's able to talk of it, she will not be dissuaded. "I sent you down there." Finally, she tugs the flannel closed at her breastbone. "It was my insisting that sent you both down there."

"It was th' right thing."

Beth exhales, tired of this day, weary of this truth. "I'h know it."

The fire cracks and sizzles. Between them so much goes unspoken. Daryl shakes his head, breaking them from this rumination. "It's over. We let it go." Beth nods. It's the way they live. The only way to survive. By this point she's ready, welcomes it even. "C'mon," he nudges. "Bed."

Beth agrees. It's time. She turns and leaves her discarded clothes on the bathroom's tiled floor beside his own. Pausing at her pack, Beth stops to dig through it. Producing from it another gallon-sized ziplock, Beth pulls out the toiletries she has packed. She rolls on the liquid lavender-scented aluminum-free deodorant she'd been happy to have sourced, then squeezes a chalky length of mint toothpaste across the bristles of her yellow toothbrush. Beth wets it under the sink and proceeds to brush. Daryl would have gone straight to bed, but he'd stopped when she had and in another beat he retraces his steps to pull out his own brush and allow her to squeeze out a dab of paste for him. Beth spits and continues brushing. It feels good to do this. Normal. Still brushing, Daryl crosses to the fireplace and chucks in another two quartered logs. Beth spits again and rinses her mouth and brush as Daryl leans in behind her to spit over her shoulder. Through, Daryl drops his brush onto the counter, wipes his mouth with the back of his hand, then pulls Beth's hair together in a one-handed bouncing tug at the nape of her neck. Taking the cue, Beth brings the candle with her and follows him back into the bedroom. The room is considerably colder after the bathroom but the heat and light of the fire do reach it some and in the low glow of this light, at the end of this trying day, it'd be tough to envision any bed more inviting.

Beth crawls in, Daryl beside her. The baby had been kicking and shifting in the shower, but now it sleeps, and Beth settles in to rest and be similarly still. She pulls the pillow beneath her in nearer, and watches as the shadows of the candlelight flicker. "... I disappeared." Her self-impeachment comes hushed through the quiet of the night. Not looking for absolvement, Beth is compelled to hold herself accountable to him and this life they've been living.

"You didn't. You were exactly where you needed t' be ev'ry time you was needed."

Beth's heard him, but her view of it is her own. "... Didn't think that was me anymore."

"Wasn't th' same." Beside her, Daryl is warm and as solid in his conviction as he is in frame.

In the dancing blaze of the candle, Beth's eyes find his. She is earnest when she asks him, "What do you see when you look at me?"

"You. Greene." Daryl's answer comes low and firm, grounded in earth and time. "All there is t' see."

Still holding his gaze, Beth studies his rugged face, meaning to discern his full truth. But he's already spoken it. Her searching will yield nothing more. If ever Daryl had viewed her as lesser — a weaker link in their group of survivors, a dependent only to be protected, and with little beyond the domestic to contribute — that rendering of her has long past been purged. That old framework hasn't been his reality in all this time they've traveled together. If she's vulnerable so is he. If she needs protecting so does he. Beth as much as Simon had saved his life. More so. It was she who'd kept a clear enough mind to navigate the road that night, who'd found them cover and treated and dressed his wounds. She'd gone numb only when it was safe to do so, and even then she'd never froze. Daryl simply does not see weakness when he looks at her. Not even in the periphery. If ever she indeed had to, Beth Greene no longer has to prove herself to him. Going cold is a protective measure, as called for in its turn as keeping a watch or setting a perimeter line. He's employed it nearly his entire life. If innate defense mechanisms look any different on him than they do on her, so be it. She's his partner, not his ward. And though he'd been gutted when he'd lost his brother, Beth had endured worse, losing better people than Merle. She'd had more to lose from the old life than he and faces different risks than his in this new one, but she bears it and persists, often with a smile. He neither desires nor needs more from her than this.

Daryl's thumb passes over the furrow in her intent brow, smoothing it away. Her eyelids flutter slowly under his steady touch. Everything is quiet. Side by side in bed, Beth's hand finds his. For the first time in what feels longer than it's been, neither of them is asleep, neither is keeping watch, no one is actively in pain. This space between the sheets is theirs, occupied by only them. They are alone, the world is still, and all urgencies and troubles are for the moment held at bay. Though it does little to shield them from the chill their wet hair exposes them to, the bed is warm and protects the heat their two bodies radiate. They lie there wordless, but not absent connection. The other's face — one bearded and steadfast, the other cherubic and unreserved — is all that holds the other's interest.

Cozy beneath the covers, Beth brings his hand to her, trailing it to her bare leg and between her thighs, guiding him to touch her there. Equal to her silent solicitation, Daryl caresses her, lightly running his hand up and down over the thin layer of cotton she wears. Not longer than a week before he'd been holding her in his arms, exchanging kisses with her in the night, feeling her body enwrapped in his as he stood his back against the cold and the wind. How easy it'd been then, just to kiss her as he wanted, to hold her face between his hands and rub his ungloved thumbs against her windswept cheeks. It was simpler that night; they had music and conversation and not so many demons. He remembers how Beth had held him, gripping his leather cut to her as she bestowed upon him one kiss after another. Unbothered by the chill, she'd been unwilling to let their stolen moment fade. The open sky had been theirs that night, and the love between them simple. Beth, centered only on the here and now of this present moment, curls into her man, nuzzling her head against his shoulder, planting kisses of soft encouragement and enticement where she may.

Trailing over hems and fabric, testing the boundaries of leg and waistband elastic, Daryl ventures nearer, in time pulling down what is in his way and teasing out from her gentle indiscernible responses. For the past two days it'd felt like all he wanted was any sort of response from her, some indication of vitality of self. He hadn't thought so soon to be eliciting unworded whispers from her earthly knowing. Lying beside her, Daryl traces and presses little awakenings, bending his hand to the curves and vaults of her secrecy. His hand is cold but this hearth is warm. In no hurry, he feels her, relearning the valleys and hollows of a body he's come in time to know so well. The effect of the rhythm he keeps progresses from pleasant to pleasing and Beth welcomes this honeyed sense of well-being, opening herself to his invited touch as the yearning but not yet the pace begins to build.

Satisfied to be alive, satisfied to see her whole, Daryl commits to making her feel only good. Beth inhales deeply and Daryl admires her, finding her both the same as and changed from the dauntless beauty who one blazing day bravely stood her ground by a riverbank and asked him to love her. Not taunting but coaxing, Daryl's cool touch draws slow, lengthy, intentional tracks. Configuring first strokes and then calculated circles and deviations, Daryl's sole objective is to beguile from her more and more in her faint responses. Blood storms awakened and alive within them both, swelling and waging a dull but mounting yearning. Wanting him, wanting more of what he's giving, wanting to please and soothe and rile and exhaust him, Beth opens her legs to him, lifting herself to meet his touch, wanting and seeking that gentle quiet pressure, his mesmerizing spiraling of artful design. Feeding off her unvoiced encouragement, Daryl's timing quickens threefold by his measure with a steady soft pressure, up and down, circled around. Beth's hips do not rise to the tempo of his workings but instead ride the underlying intensity of the course of his purpose. Unable to be still, her slim limb wraps over him and tucks under his leg as she gives herself to this.

Joying in this though she does, the discomfort of lying on her back for this long begins to take its toll. To better support the weight, Beth turns onto her side. She keeps his hand to her as she pulls him along onto his good hip behind her. At once agitated and well-tended, Beth bends herself to him. Feeling his hips square against hers she grips his arm where it crosses her below her waist, as if all depends on his remaining just there. It's a turn on for him to see the effect he has on her, and Daryl braces her small frame ever tighter, laying claim to her as she'd bid and as it thrills him to do. Her eyelids grow heavy with appetite and Beth nestles her head back against his, relishing the scratch of his beard against her skin and the warmth of his breath hot against her flesh. With little else to do, she clutches his forearm tighter. With his free hand Daryl brushes aside her hair, holding her forehead as Beth arches back to meet him. He kisses her then, using all his mouth to kiss her jaw, her ear, her neck. When he can't get close enough he grazes her with his teeth. There is no getting his fill of Beth. Always there is an undercurrent of wanting, but Daryl is content in this hazy moment of stirring and willingly sets aside his own arousal.

Curbing the drive within him to assume his place within her arms and between her legs, Daryl sees this through. Without rushing, he sinks into the mystery of her body, wet as her mouth would be if only he could reach it. He draws from her slow concentrated breaths, not yet gasping, not yet breathless, not yet held in intense anticipation of climax. Eliciting the small undulating response under his touch, Daryl means for her enjoyment to be unhurried as he hastens and traverses, delivering her her furtive pleasure.

There in that spot where now he eases with less resistance, this sustained touch is no longer enough. Beth's eyes roll shut, her jaw juts and tightens in unspoken exhortations, Yes— More— Within his care Beth nears imminent frenzy, yearning for a satisfaction more commanding than a relentless tease or ministering. This must— It must continue— Close to maddened, Beth plies her body, entreating both for release and prolongation. It has to continue— This cannot stop— Released from all concerns but this, their parallel desires surge. Far from inert, Beth feels wild in her captive transfixed state, More— Please— The urgency is growing. Anxiously her body hunts for his. A swelling ache guides her searching hips around and around waiting for him, determined this impending absolution should be shared with Daryl not only derived from him. Daryl wants her, but he's tempted to maintain and let this be her own delight.

"Daryl—" she breathes to him. "No more…"

He'd never intended to make her plead. The pretty sound of it electrifies. Daryl withdraws from her then, prolonging her desire to appease a little of his own. No longer able to tolerate not feeling the smoothness of her skin or the heat of her body against his, Daryl yanks off his long-sleeved thermal and pulls back her flannel as she unbuttons and struggles to free her arm. Creamy in her less exposed regions and suntanned in others, her skin — where it is not marred by wound or accident — is soft and dreamy, something to lose oneself in. Beth's impatience multiplies as she intrinsically presses back into him and then all tolerance for denial and deferment burns away and he's raging, pulling at his own waistband, giving clearance to his pathway back to her as Beth kicks and employs her flexing toes to pull at his thermals until they can be shoved away and forgotten beneath the covers.

Ignited, Daryl takes hold of her hip, gripping her into position. Beth reaches back for him, taking him firm in hand as he lustily pursues her, past her palm and any aperture but her. "Love—" He utters throatily.

The initial relief they find in each other is consuming but short-lived. An aching wanting rises, a tide that will swell to overcome them in time. Ceaseless and as one, on their sides they ride this current together. Daryl's hand slips to her breasts but too tender and sore she guides his hand further down, below her navel and lower. Her free leg bends backward atop his, crooking her foot beneath his calf, urging him ever nearer, both echoing and setting their pace. Daryl swipes her hair free from her face and kisses her jaw, her neck; he suckles at her earlobe, all poor stand-ins for her mouth which he cannot truly get at. No longer alone in this, Beth reaches back behind her head. She grasps at his wild hair, clutching it so that he might know how much she needs him. Daryl buries his face in her. She smells of peppermint and passion. If some paces off the fire he'd built still burns there's no means of knowing, they're blinded by each other, and too ardent to feel any heat but theirs. Pulses quicken and thrum within their chests and ears, drumming out an urgent call for love and sex and diversion. Their breathing becomes labored, their partnered efforts punctuated by staccato pants and huffs. Time and again Daryl presses up against her, bouncing off the trim plumpness of her ass. With every thrust he pushes them ever nearer to release and confounding gratification. Playfulness is not foreign to their bed, nor laughter, nor agility, but all these they leave for another day. Here there is reunion, comfort, and cherishing. After exhaustion, despondency, and isolation, an exigency not to be diverted binds them wholly in this. Flesh grasps and grips to flesh, sweat beads and pools, limbs tangle, teeth graze, hearts race. Bodies cramp and tire but still bend and drive, twisting and yielding and giving and taking in whichever manor will see them to the feverish reckoning they two will wreak upon each other.

There— There— So close to the verge, as though pulled by a current to a fall's boundless edge, the molten delirium intensifies, burgeoning in a great proliferation. Feeling herself unmoored, Beth digs her fingers in as Daryl's one hand provokes her further and his other clasps her face. Her visage contorted with presumption, Beth's teeth and tongue and lips hunger for headway. She gasps loudly, then holds that breath— Holds her body, completely frozen in this singular moment before the storm of passion overtakes her and she gives way to the clenching shuddering waves— Daryl braces similarly, holding himself rooted to his woman, letting her throes be his until this moment of stillness before his own precipice gives way— and finally all their wanting and desires come licentiously undone.

Beth exhales and folds forward onto her pillow, her eyes closed shut to everything beyond her own body. Depleted, Daryl too falls back, his chest rising and falling. Beside him, Beth has gone slack, overwhelmed by the vividness and magnitude of which her changing body now is capable. "Hmph," she half laughs into her pillow, a quick jolt in her still recovering body.

"Tell me." Face down beneath the mess of her mussed hair, Beth shakes her head, unable to muster the words necessary to answer. With eyes still shut, Daryl reaches for her, searching for her hand. Finding no success, he settles for resting his palm on the full curve of her hip. Her skin had been aflame not too long ago, now it cools incrementally. "You're good?"

"'Good'?" Beth echoes with another sort-of laugh. She wiggles her toes until her foot finds his. Tucking in, bending hers in compliment, Beth fills the arch and shape of his with hers.

Daryl pats her bare ass. As the impossible weightlessness recedes from their bodies, Daryl begins to feel the ache in his left hip from relying on it too long, and Beth the pangs in her right leg's highermost joints from flexing herself as open to him as she could. Mild physical discomforts are not all that surface in the wake of their lovemaking: a quiet tumbling's awakened inside her. A lightning flickering and zapping. It's painless and private and very much there. Cocooned in bliss and happy comfort Beth enjoys the flurry of flutterings as her own, but in time she reaches to shift Daryl's hand from her hip to where the baby kicks and bounces. "All good."

Daryl spreads his open palm wide, stretching his fingers broad to encompass as much of this as possible. It's different from the hiccups; he couldn't say how, but it is, and it's a wonder to him to already have learned enough of his unborn child to know such distinctions. Daryl pulls her over, turning her and their child toward him. Beth's smile shines bright as she turns. She wraps her legs in his and snuggles closer to him, admiring the shadows and ridges of his well-loved face. They're at ease, and everything between them is all right. Beth sweeps aside his hair. She kisses him, and caresses his bearded face. Gently her thumb pulls down on his lower lip, exposing the deeper shade of his readied mouth. Daryl bypasses her trailing fingers and kisses her, more soundly than she had done. His lips plant firmly on hers until he coaxes them open, softly baiting her for more. Their bodies still warm, recovering, and blissful, Daryl once again lays his hand on the swell in her stomach, waiting for the flashes of flurries and underwater surges. As they come, Daryl, unable not to, bends himself to press his lips to the spot the baby kicks. His beard scratches and tickles her but she does not mind. Beth runs her fingers through his unruly hair, pulling fondly on the ends, happy to keep him there. "Hey, you," he murmurs to the baby, his gaze soft and attentive as he does. "What kind 'f trouble you gettin' up to?"

"No trouble," Beth smiles distantly, entwining her hand in his. He's still sweating but under his touch Beth's skin grows cold. Daryl kisses her above her navel and restores himself beside her. With a decided tug he pulls the blankets up with him and jointly they resituate and settle in as Daryl tucks the bedding in around them. Beth rests her head against his. Daryl exhales. Beth picks at the corner binding of the wool blanket. "... Long way from this mornin'..."

Daryl nods, trailing his index finger through the scruff of his beard. "Haven't been in great shape, 've we." More so than is his practice, his mind retraces through their courses, and Daryl runs his calloused fingers over the lengths of hers, those hands he'd once watched so prettily play piano, a balm to his soul when he'd needed it.

She kisses his shoulder, and once more apologizes, "I'hm sorry."

"Enough," he soothes. "It's over." Daryl rubs at the shoddy bandaging at his shoulder. "... Y'know… it weren't th' same. B'tween what this was an' back then." Comparing the last several days to Beth at age seventeen, carving her wrist after the change in the world at last shattered what she'd still held onto from life before— "Wasn't th' same at all," he rumbles. Beth doesn't speak. Gently, Daryl takes her wrist in his grip. "Y'didn't quit, Beth. Y'went quiet, but y'never stopped fighting. That ain't you." He holds her gaze until he's assured she's well and truly listening. "You're ev'ry bit as tough as you ever thought y'rself. Tougher."

Tears creep into the corners of her eyes from nowhere as she just as quickly rolls them away and smiles them into a swallowed almost-cry. "I want this baby," she affirms with heart and a near laugh to hide the darkness. Daryl listens. Intent and patient, he studies her emotive face. "I want you."

"Tha's j'st what you've got."

Wetting his face some from her forgotten tears as she holds her face to his, Beth kisses him. Daryl kisses her in return. He pushes back her hair, clearing her brow and caressing her as his lips continue to engage hers. What had been meant to be a kiss of confirmation, solid but finite, deepens and softens as Beth clings to him, unafraid to love, unashamed to tear. Once again their lips, their tongues, their wills give in to one another. Her heart open and raw, Beth extends to Daryl an open invitation to know her, and to be made whole by her, as he has mirrored her wholeness to her.

Daryl's hands roam freely from her face to her self, taking hold of her in all the soft bends and curves he'd just possessed her. This new arousal is potent and stirring. Mixed up in one another as they still are, despite or because of the heaviness of their talk and the weight of what they daily carry, they lose themselves in the shape of the other and push back again against the waiting world. They will seize this time together while they may and luxuriate in the occasion.

Awake despite the weariness of their bodies and the growing drowsiness of their critical minds, they splendor in this sheltered intimacy. The lateness of the hour and the events of the day leave them near mindless aside from quiet desire, and senseless aside from savored sensation. Choice no longer steers them. The warm familiarity of the other and the nearness they still have to their last moments of pleasure take hold. The suspended promise of further ecstasy and release ushers them by instinct toward reunion. Their bodies move slow and rhythmic, building a sort of incantation between the two of them, a worldly magnetism that is as divine as it is inevitable. As they touch and explore and love, there is potent muscle memory at play. So clear are the remembrances of what they can be to each other, of how they can make the other feel and what they can be made to feel, the memories meld and overlap with present moments. The embers of their shared bed yet undoused, they want more. Though covetous to feel it all again they exert patience. Appetites wetted but unhurried, they play drowsily; like honey, they move slow. They have time.

Still riding their last high, they drift, they tease, they anticipate, re-stoking a craving that had only just been quenched. No longer freshly showered, their bodies are alive with heat and sweat, desire and sex. Beth wants him. For her own part, she wants voraciously to take him in, to with him penetrate that aching emptiness made in the shape of him. More so she wants to love him. Beth means to consume and enwrap him, to tenderly and ravenously swathe him in both cherishing and debauchery. Her absence of guile or reserve bolsters and dizzies Daryl, knocking him out every time she comes for him. To the benefit of her other senses, Beth's eyes fall shut, and blind by sight only, she runs her fingers, her lips, her face across his chest, his face, his neck, his limbs. Wrapping her leg across his, Beth brings his hands to her hips where in turn Daryl firmly grips her as she positions herself atop him. Her hands traverse him then, running through his traces of hair, trailing the contours of his muscled frame. Beth takes him in her hand. She'd use her mouth if it were easier to maneuver, but she's tired and less nimble these days, and Daryl's long inhalation relays to her his satisfaction.

Beth is flushed and alive, full of touch and taste, ardor and heart. The dreamy visage of her fills Daryl's eyes. Her face is ruddy and her damp hair a mess. The swell of her middle makes more pronounced the slightness of her breasts but still their impertinence arouses him, and he would take hold their brazen beauty in either mouth or hands if either she could tolerate. Instead, his seasoned hands hold fast at her hips as she runs hers along him, astute and well-practiced. At her leisure, Beth takes hold of his good shoulder. It is already foregone, this coming together. With no interest in austerity or abnegation, there is a rapacious hunger between them. They two lust once more for communion.

With eyes still held shut, Beth lowers herself onto this man she'd feared she'd lost, this person she loves the most, this friend who will not let her falter. He is handsome, he is strong, he is resilient, he is hers. Above all, he is truly decent. He is a man of morals; a person who earns the trust others invest in him. He has earned her trust and her love, and Beth bestows it all to him now. She breathes in. There…

Her eyes open. Brightly they find and fix on him. Slowly she rocks, shifting her weight from her hips, forward and back, easing her love onto him, cradling him beneath her and between her knees, persuading low sighs and shadowy rippled contortions from her lover. Beth takes her time. Slowly. Indulgently. In this moment — this self-created space — there is no wanting, no longing, no lacking anything. In this bed there is only excess. Satiation. Repletion. If the world outside them is aflame their own fire will burn more brightly.

In answer Daryl strokes and grips her thighs, her ass, her hips, any part of her he can. Her tousled beauty rivets him and he compiles with and reciprocates every wanton shift and thrust her body makes. Slowly, deliberately, unfalteringly, continuously, sumptuously, they take and give liberally of themselves. If their labors yield nothing more than this lolling reprise it would be enough. But though Beth's pleasure came slowly at first — a luxury of excess she waded through and helmed at her will and Daryl's vellication — now the urgency builds, and what had been a secondary lark shifts to a critical mass. No longer subdued or languorous, their sustained enterprise has newly incited vigorous fervency. Daryl props himself up and, positioned so, kisses and engages her. "Daryl," she gasps heartily. "Oh, God— Fuuuck—"

Daryl's senses brim with the zealous conviction of her expletive. Though she's done it so deliciously, there's nothing plaintive in this outcry, and the excitement of it galvanizes his efforts. "Be—eth—" The libidinous undercurrent in the near-growled guttural utterance of her name is all the verbal answer he gives her. Always more than the sum of his words, the speaking of her name, at once reverent and lewd, surpasses anything else he could muster, filthy or otherwise.

Unrestrained, together they grant themselves the freedom to love and be loved, to give in and give over, to sieve from this life the succor of joy and companionship, licentiousness and ecstasy. As one, they root their humanity in something other than fear. They give to their bodies something more than pain and labor and drudgery, giving their souls something more solid than hope. Within this boundless moment they exist this way. Solid within each other's grasps. The architects of one another's bliss.

Out of breath and close to spent, they seize for gratification, for an electrifying human glimpse of death and life in one inscrutable instance of union. Beth quivers. She fixes on Daryl and freezes. Arresting this final moment, Beth draws from it every visceral sensation she can stand. She stops. The world stops. Everything stops in the heady haze of rapture brewing. In this impossible stillness at the brink of giving way, it feels that the release may never reach her— And then it comes, and there's a contracting and a great surrender, firing untold tremors from her womb to her extremities— Beth breathes, and her rigid body goes limp, and her toes, where they were curled beneath him, straighten, and she yields herself lovingly to Daryl who receives her pleasure as welcome as his own.

Spurred by the gorgeous pyrexia of her undoing and an eager vassal to Beth's continued exertions, Daryl unleashes his own violent devastation. Clutching Beth closer, feeling her hips open impossibly wider to him, he loses himself to her and within her until the fever overwhelms him too and he is blissfully ruined and laid waste to.

Beth melts into place beside him as if there were little left of her but liquid. Their partnered bodies radiate the reverberations of heat and arousal. Numbed now from tensed use they decline into the netherworld beyond theirs, one that is not quite their own nor the outside world's. Slowly the sensations beyond their own creating creep in, a misplaced pillow, a bunched and scratching blanket, the scent from the fire, the chill of the open air. Gradually they sink back into their bodies as they daily inhabit them. Weight and shape and sight return. Everything is less hazy, less alight, but the warmth lingers and will not dissipate wholly until forced.

Beth tugs at the covers, Daryl snuggles her close. Fingers entwine, feet and legs as well. They are woven into each other utterly, still feeling the under beat of their love. His head rests near hers, and their hushed voices mix together as one.

"Daryl," she kisses into him.

"...Beth," he breathes huskily.

No further words are spoken. None are needed. To speak the other's name aloud, to know that it is heard and felt, to know truly the other is unfailingly there, it is more than enough.

It is everything.

Boy, this was a tough one to finish. I thought this was going to be ready to post more than a week ago but this chapter was tricky to write somehow and harder even to revise. Did it work out in the end? I'm not sure if this exactly qualifies as smut or not but it was tough to craft this time and I can't tell if the chapter works or if it's kind of cringey, or overly flowery/pretentious, or a combination.

I also want to apologize if these chapters feel like they're repeating content touched on in my "recent" previous chapters. (I'm not certain they do, but I sometimes get the feeling I'm writing myself into a redundancy). One of the drawbacks of working on this story so sporadically with such long time gaps in between is that I sometimes lose track of the specific nuances. That said, you're all being forced to read it spaced out like this, so perhaps you don't notice?

Anyways, thank you so much for being here, you all are the best for even indulging this truly slow story. If you have the heart to do it, I'd love to hear from you, what's working, what's not, what the story's got you thinking, or even that you're still here.

Thank you!