[fic] Holding On [2/5]
Title: Holding On [2/5]
Author: badboy_fangirl
Fandom: The Walking Dead
Characters/Pairings: Beth POV; Daryl/Beth (past Beth/Zach); with appearances by everyone else.
Word Count: ~7200
Rating/Warnings: NC-17 / Spoilers through all of season four. MENTIONS OF RAPE, POSSIBLE TRIGGERS.
Summary:
Author's notes: This is a companion/continuation fic to Empty Handed. You may read it without having read the first fic, but it won't make as much sense, IMHO. Also, many thanks to Cricket for the beta.
Previous Chapters: [1]
You're not alone
Together we stand
I'll be by your side
You know I'll take your hand
If she thought the memory of his eyes was provoking, it's only because she hadn't been as aware of his gaze before when it had been on her.
Now, wherever she goes, whatever she's doing, she can feel him watching her because he really is. In her office, he's mostly talking to Carol, but his eyes keep straying to her, drifting over her like familiar fingertips. And then all the way to the Housing Department, she can feel it again.
That night at the big dinner the Sanchez's throw for them, she's seated straight across from him purely by accident, and every time she looks at him he's already looking at her. Even when she glances at him in horror as Rick talks about the people who held them hostage in Terminus, who made them listen to others being tortured in an effort to keep them in line, and who eventually forced them to kill or be killed, his eyes are steady and full of something disconcerting in a completely different way.
She knows he wants her, even though he'll never say it. In fact, she thinks Daryl might never have a real secret from her ever again, because when he's staring right at her, there's just no room for speculation. She can feel different parts of her warming up at the thought. At the blatant appraisal, the obvious appreciation, the pure adoration.
She is 18 years old, she knows that romantic notions are supposed to be part of her every day thought processes. She is unprepared for just how romantic Daryl is in the flesh, because he'd been pretty damn romantic in her imagination. She'd been rescued again and again by the thought of him, but it pales in comparison just being in a crowded room with him.
She feels badly that Maggie wants her attention, wants her to come and curl up under a blanket and talk all night with her like they did when they were kids, when their biggest worry was lying to their daddy about what they were fighting about. All she wants to do is be with Daryl, but she knows she can't do that, not tonight. She manages to hug him goodnight, sliding up under his arm, causing him to jump like a Walker got him, but then when he realizes it's her, his arm tightens painfully, crushing her against his chest.
She whispers, "Goodnight, Daryl Dixon," and watches him swallow. He nods his head at her, his mouth in a hard grimace, but he might as well have shouted something devastatingly private because the emotion in his eyes makes her whole body feel hot.
She's not sure how she manages to let Maggie take her away. Carol leads them all back to the house, and Maggie talks non-stop. She talks about getting out with Sasha and Bob, searching high and low for Glenn, for the miraculous way they were reunited, and Beth understands that all her praying hadn't been in vain. She listens because at this point she doesn't have much to say anyway, and it's taking all her self-control to stay still. As much as she wants to hear what Maggie's saying, and be with her sister again, Daryl is this pressing issue, this thing that's hanging unresolved.
She knows she'll see him tomorrow, but that feels like a lifetime away. After nearly six months of dreams and fantasies, the real thing is so close, but so far at the same time.
About an hour later, Glenn intervenes, and for the first time in her life Beth thinks she could kiss her sister's husband.
"Maggie?" he says, wedging himself between the two sisters. "I hate to do this, interrupt all this and everything, but I'm exhausted. I need to sleep, and I need to tell Beth something, so you're gonna have to stop talking, okay?"
Maggie flushes, embarrassed in that way that doesn't really bother a person when they're with their family. She nods, clapping a hand over her own mouth to silence herself. Her eyes shine brightly, her joy at being there so loud Beth can still hear it even when her voice has stopped.
She feels the same way, she truly does. She just has a lot of it to go around at this point.
"I just wanna say," Glenn begins. The earnestness that endeared him to their entire family right from the start encases each word. "That it would be real nice if you could talk to Daryl and make sure he knows you don't blame him for anything bad that happened out there. He has beat himself up this entire time, ever since you got separated. And, seriously, Beth, I saw him smile, twice, tonight, and it was a freaking miracle, because he hasn't smiled since we found him again. He's barely opened his mouth to talk unless we forced him, too, and most of that was sad or mad or both. I just...it's really important that--"
Beth throws her arms around her brother-in-law so hard it knocks the wind out of him. "Thank you, Glenn. Thank you." She jumps to her feet. "I'm sorry, Maggie. But I gotta go. Okay? I'll talk to you tomorrow, I swear. And the day after that, and the day after that. We'll talk all the time. But right now, I gotta go."
Maggie's still got her hand clamped over her mouth as she nods her head in agreement. Beth should have realized if anyone would understand, it was her sister. She stopped at nothing to find Glenn.
It isn't that Beth cares more for Daryl than the rest of them; her joy at being reunited with everyone was immeasurable, even Bob and Sasha, whom she hadn't known very well. She's been happier thinking about how excited Tyreese would be to see his sister than anything else.
It's just different with Daryl. And the urgency coursing through her body to be with him, just in his presence, is unlike any other experience she's ever had.
She runs out to the garage to find the bike she bought a few weeks earlier. She peddles hard, all the way to the dorms.
She leaves her bike just inside the door, not caring to lock it up. She knows this building well, it's where she lived herself when they first arrived in D.C. And if someone wants to steal her bike she's fine with that; it's just another reason to stay longer with Daryl.
Because the one thing she wants more than anything is to stay with Daryl longer.
Part of it is the comfort his presence brings, and part of it is the discomfort. She feels so many things because of Daryl Dixon, and she wants them all.
She stops at the front desk and asks for his room number, and then runs up the stairs full speed. He's on the fifth floor, and by the time she gets there, she's breathless and filled with sudden nervousness. She stands outside the door for several minutes to calm herself.
The memory of his eyes takes the worry right out of her. Daryl needs a hug. Daryl needs to know she's okay. And she needs to know he's okay. Truly. Eyes on and hands on is the only way that's gonna happen, for either of them.
She knocks, and the moments between her hand striking the wood and it swinging open feel interminable. His eyes widen on an intake of breath and Beth forces herself to say "Hey." It doesn't sound cool at all, but there's nothing to be done about it.
His face softens, though, and he just stares at her for a beat as if he doesn't believe she's real. "Hey," he says, his voice low so that she feels it more than she hears it.
He steps back half a pace, shoving the door all the way open so she can slide in under his outstretched arm. She feels like she's darting in before he can change his mind, and any nervousness she felt fades completely. All she cares about is making him feel good. He takes his time turning around, but she wraps herself around him instantly, not letting the distance or silence lengthen.
He feels so good against her, warm and hard, and her eyes fall shut as she buries her nose in his chest. She says, "I'm so sorry," and breathes him in all at once.
His ribcage expands on a shaky breath, but his voice is steady when he says, "Don't worry about me." His hands are under her hair almost before she realizes it, pulling her head away from his body so he can see her face. The tears come out of nowhere, emotion choking her, only to get worse when he continues with, "They hurt you? Whoever took you that night?"
She blinks rapidly until her tears subside. She nods her head. "But I got away."
His fingers curl infinitesimally against her neck, sliding out to caress her cheeks. She can see the anger in him as easily as she feels it within herself, and it's strange how she doesn't want that for him. She just wants Daryl to be happy, to know that she's okay, to believe the way he had for the space of an hour before it all went to hell that one time. She wraps her hands around his wrists, squeezing hard. "'Member that gun I got off that Walker?" she asks him, waiting for the recollection to dawn in his expression. "It was tucked in the back of my pants, and they never checked me. I waited until most of 'em fell asleep and then I shot 'em all, right in the head."
As soon as the words leave her mouth, something in her body breaks. Like a literal dam inside her. Unlike when she'd told Pastor Gabriel and his tears hadn't moved her at all, Daryl's lack of reaction opens the way for everything to pour forth.
She cries like she never has. Or like all the times she didn't allow herself to cry times about a million.
And this time, it's Daryl holding her, and his voice telling her he's proud of her. This time it's the safest place in the world to reveal that she's not the girl she used to be.
She's someone else now. She's someone who belongs with Daryl.
By the time she comes out of the storm of emotion, he's got her cradled in his lap, and they're sitting on his bed. Beth knows she ought to feel less comfortable here, alone with a man--and not just any man, but probably the most dangerous one she's ever known, and by dangerous, she means the one who matters more than any of the others combined together.
She is physically safer in this walled city, but she's actually genuinely more vulnerable than she's been since the turn. It won't be Daryl's memory that strengthens her anymore; it will be Daryl's actions, his thoughts, and his feelings, and everything about him that can make or destroy her world.
She rubs her face against his shirt and then realizes what a mess she is, and how she just left a trail of snot across his shoulder. "Oh, gross," she murmurs, wiping at it with her hand.
She feels his chest move in a little chuckle. "No big deal, got lotsa clean clothes now."
It flashes through her mind again, that quote from her mom's book, A man who's worth your tears will never make you cry. She's about to find out, she guesses.
She laughs softly, too, leaning her head on his shoulder. "Wanna know why I killed them?"
He side-eyes her, but there's no hesitation. "'Cause they fucking deserved it?" He says it like a question, but it's not really. She always knew that's what he'd have done.
In truth, she had done it so when she died, it was on her own terms. She had never imagined that a few days later she would stumble across Carol, Judith, and Tyreese. It had been the hand of God in her life, and looking back now she can fully see that if what she'd done was so wrong, she would never have made it to D.C.
It's funny to realize God gave her Daryl right before He let the most horrible thing that could happen to her happen.
The Lord giveth; and He taketh away, says her daddy's voice in her head.
Now.
But then, then it had been Daryl's voice. "I could hear you, in my head. I don't think the good ones survive. I was gonna survive. Or at the very least, I wasn't gonna let that be what got me. Walkers can't help what they are; bad men can. You had every reason in the world to be bad, and you're one of the best people I know. And I knew you woulda killed them. There was three of 'em. I had exactly three bullets." A breath escapes her, and the tightness in her chest lifts. She looks away from his face, from the intensity of his eyes. "Poetic, right?"
He snorts a laugh, and Beth feels a smile tug at her lips. His fingers brush gently up her chin before drifting over her cheek. "You ought to write a ditty about it," he says, his voice rich with their shared memories.
She can feel her face go hot at the things she's written, scribbled in notebooks since last she saw him. She imagines he'd be embarrassed to know she's written ditties about him, but he'd probably want to hear them anyway, even if he pretended he didn't.
"I'm not one of the best people you know, Beth," he says.
She would snort herself at that, but she knows he just doesn't see it about himself--at least not yet. She'll have to sing him a song someday, just so he can get it. But that's not today. Today, she just says, "Bullshit. You got me through this, Daryl Dixon, without even bein' there. Best. Person. Period." When his mouth opens and she knows he's gonna try to talk her out of it, she lays a finger over his lips. "Hush."
His eyes smile, even if his mouth doesn't, and Beth realizes he likes it when she bosses him. She likes it, too. She likes that he gives into her in little ways that are actually huge.
"See that, over there?" he asks, dislodging her finger when he tilts his head in the direction of the desk on the other side of the small room.
She follows the path of his eyes, and sees a dark-colored lump sitting atop the desk. "What?" she asks before it registers what she's seeing. Her breath catches and she springs to her feet. "Is that my bag?"
"Yup," Daryl says, and she can't miss the glee in his tone. Glenn's insistence that Daryl had been nothing but surly and miserable since they'd met up with him is nothing but legend now. She's glad that he obviously no longer feels that way. She loves that he seems to be as sentimental as he would accuse her of being--correction: he's probably more sentimental. (That's why he'd yelled at her about Zach and Jimmy, she realizes.) She grabs the bag, practically hugging it to her chest as Daryl goes on. "Still got your spoon in it and everything."
The spoon.
He's sentimental even when he had no idea he needed to be. If she hadn't already been certain, this is the moment when she would have known for sure. She loves Daryl Dixon with every fiber of her being, with every inch of her body, with every beat of her heart.
She'll never let them get separated again.
After that first night, they spend every one together. She tells Carol that she'll be sleeping at Daryl's until she can coax him into sleeping at their house and Carol smiles and shakes her head.
"I already invited him. But maybe what he needs is the invite from you."
Beth tucks that away for an appropriate time.
Every chance she gets she slides in the fact that his strength kept her alive, and most times he scoffs and shrugs it away, but she knows it's sticking somewhere inside him. If he hears it enough, he'll start to believe.
And besides all that, spending every possible moment with Daryl is all she wants to do. She craves his fingers on her skin, or the easy way he holds her hand, in public and private. She loves the smiles that come more and more frequently, and she and Glenn can't help but catch each other's eyes and give thumbs up when it happens when they're all together.
For all that the two previous years had been full of horror and loss, those first few weeks after they're all reunited in D.C. are some of the sweetest times she's ever known. Even when she tells Maggie about what happened when she was separated from Daryl, it's not so much as to unburden herself and weigh Maggie down as to show her sister how alike they are; they are warriors in different ways, but they are more the same now than they ever were as children. Life has led them to it, molded them into people they don't quite recognize sometimes, but who they are nonetheless proud to be anyway.
The one thing Beth does is go to each member of their family and make her declaration about Daryl. She does it for two reasons: one, she doesn't want there to be gossip about it (and she knows there would be, she and Daryl gossip about Rick and Michonne all the time, but they keep it just between them); and two, she doesn't want Daryl to have to deal with everyone asking him what's going on. He seems more than pleased to be her boyfriend, though neither of them have uttered that word, but she knows it would freak him out if everyone started in on him about it.
She protects him the only way she can; she tells everyone that she loves him, that she's with him, and that they aren't to harass him about it in anyway.
Rick makes a crack about how he always said she was the new sheriff, and when she gives him a look, he immediately stops smiling. Somberly he salutes her. "Yes, sir, officer, sir," he deadpans.
Carl giggles and she points a finger at him. "I mean it. No teasin' Daryl! You know how he is."
Father and son exchange looks and swear their allegiance.
Beth's glad, because she would have played the Michonne card if she had to. When it comes to Daryl, she's dead serious.
They start having these moments that remind her of the darkened kitchen of the funeral home. Their eyes catch and hold too long, or a word gets said between them that's loaded with meaning that neither of them is entirely willing to move on just yet.
Or at least, Beth isn't quite there, and if Daryl is, he gives no indication.
(Well, his body gives certain indications, but he studiously ignores that. Beth follows his lead, even though she's starting to have a similar problem. It's just that nobody can tell when it happens to her.)
She finds herself wanting to kiss him, though, more and more with each passing day. The urge becomes more frequent until she seems to exist in a world that only consists of Daryl's lips, and how her eyes are drawn to them. She wonders what they'll feel like, and how he'll taste, and what it would be like after they've kissed, because she genuinely thinks the hardest part is just getting the first one out of the way.
She almost does it one night as they're settling in to bed. They've been sleeping for weeks now on the twin bed in Daryl's dorm, which is silly because she has a double bed back at her house. She's hinted at him coming there at night, but she can tell he's not comfortable with it, so she drops it. The close quarters are at once exactly what she wants, and mildly aggravating at the same time, and she imagines he feels that just as she does because she's seen the heat in his eyes as he looks at her.
"G'night, Beth," he murmurs, his lips pressed to the top of her head.
She tips her neck back, and when their gazes connect, the proximity of their lips is too close to ignore, at least for her. She wants to bridge the distance so badly her body is instantly thrumming with energy, but his hand surrounds the back of her neck and tucks her up under his chin again.
He falls to sleep long before she does, and the frustration she feels keeps her awake half the night. In the morning, she's lying atop him in a position she could only have orchestrated while unconscious, and she can't stop herself from leaning forward until her lips are on his. He was awake before her, and she can feel the hard ridge behind his zipper as it presses up into her belly. A breath hisses out of him as she slides her body over his, but there isn't anything slow about the way his mouth opens beneath hers.
Maybe he was just waiting for her.
His hands slip under her shirt as she lifts herself up and moves her legs to straddle him fully. His palms cover her breasts, and Beth arches into them because of the relief it brings. It only lasts a split second, but the fact that it happens the way it does, so fast, that he obviously has wanted to touch her for ages makes Beth's heart soar and her head spins. And right before he pushes her off him, he squeezes her breasts with a reverence that equivocates just what she thinks she already knows about Daryl.
But then he shakes his head and all but jumps off the bed. He looks terrified, and aroused, but mostly terrified. Beth doesn't have much experience with this herself, and her brain isn't working all that fast because all she wants is to feel more of his lips and hands on her body.
"Daryl--" she starts.
But he blurts, "I'm gonna go," and runs out the door almost before he finishes speaking. She just lays there staring at the wood paneling after it slams behind him, dumbfounded.
Then she gets angry.
She doesn't go straight home. Instead she rides her bike up to the Washington Monument and parks it before walking down to the reflecting pool. She pulls her socks and shoes off, dipping her feet in, remembering how Lydia once told her that before the turn something like that would get you into trouble with D.C. cops. Nowadays, nobody cares about that sort of thing. Despite it being summertime and tourist season (tourism isn't something that's revived just yet, and nobody's really sure it will ever be a thing again), there were only a few people milling around the area.
There was also a time when anger filled her up and there was nothing to be done about it. She had felt paralyzed by the way things had gone, by some of the things that had happened, by the fact that she didn't know where most of the people she loved were; now, everything is different. Feeling mad makes her want to solve it, makes her want to figure out what the hell's going on with Daryl, makes her want to get him back to that place where he told her things that he'd never said to anyone.
Not that they don't talk, because they do, but they have lots of comfortable silences, too. She knows that's what he likes best. Being with her, but not having to say much.
The memory of him angrily yarding on her arm, pulling her down rickety steps, and forcing his crossbow into her arms blindsides her. The honesty that poured out of them both that day had been alcohol-induced.
Maybe that's what they need now. Only Beth doesn't want to get lit to get Daryl to tell her how he feels; she wants him to just tell her. And maybe part of it was that now that they were doing this, he'd come to realize he didn't really want to. Maggie had asked her not but a couple of days ago if the way she'd felt about Daryl when they were apart was different now that they were back together.
She had answered easily that it was the same, if only more. And right up until he ran out on her, she'd thought it was the same for him.
You know what assuming does, girl, her daddy whispers in her mind. It makes an ass outta u and me.
She gets to feet, grabs her shoes and shoves them in her bag. It only makes her angrier to think of him leading her on, letting her sleep with him every night and acting like he was the happiest guy in the world. She had believed those romantic notions she put on him, and as she pedals hard towards home, she doesn't let herself think about this might be her own damn fault.
She walks in the house to find Carol and Michonne laughing while Judith does some new, cute thing that they haven't seen before. Rick and Carl aren't there, but Beth doesn't have time or patience to wonder where they are.
She just asks, "Michonne, will you do me a big favor?"
She knocks on his door, and then turns the handle, not waiting for a shout out from him. Turns out he's not there, and she wonders how long she might have to wait. Carol had told her he stopped by earlier that day, so she figured he must be out looking for her.
Which on the one hand seems good, but the other part of her is scared and unsure in a way she's never experienced before. She's a mess, every emotion she can name coursing through her in rapid succession, but since anger is the one that keeps her from crying, she tries to hold on to it the hardest.
It's probably only an hour before he finally shows up, but that's long enough for her to be sitting comfortably on his bed with her game face firmly in place.
"Have a seat, Mr. Dixon," she commands, and he about jumps out of his skin.
"Holy shit, Beth," he mumbles, his eyes cutting to her, vague irritation coming out of his expression. He hadn't known she was there until she spoke, and it startled him, but not enough. It'd be nice if he'd start yelling at her because she knows that will amp up her adrenaline, but he needs alcohol in him for that to happen.
So.
She points to the desk chair she situated in the center of the room.
He sits down where she indicated, but his gaze searches her face after he spies the bottle of alcohol sitting on the floor. "Where'd you get that?" he asks.
She knows what he wants to know is how she got it, so she answers what he means instead of what he asked. "I asked Michonne to buy it for me. I told her it was a present for you, so she didn't question it."
He stares at her for a long moment before leaning down to grab the bottle. He laughs a little and his eyes come back to her face, as though he's expecting her to be laughing with him. "She didn't question that I'd hate Peach Schnapps?"
Beth is grateful for his reaction because it only makes her more annoyed. "I told her it was a private joke."
"Beth--"
"I'll go first," she says, cutting him off. Maybe he doesn't get what she intends here, but she hadn't brought him a drink. She brought him a confessional. "I never ran out on someone when they were trying to share something super important with me."
He continues to watch her, and slow horror seems to spread across his face as she snatches the shot glass off the floor and thrusts it towards him. "Drink," she demands.
The longer he looks at her, the more his discomfort shows. It's like those awful afternoon talk shows she watched when she was a kid and someone had come to confront their baby daddy on national television. He takes his time, but eventually pulls the cap off the Peach Schnapps, dumps some in the shot glass, and then drinks it. "Yep," he grumbles, making a face to show his displeasure. "Just as gross as I remember it."
She waits until he looks at her again, then says, "It's your turn."
"This isn't a good idea," he says, and she swears he almost smiles, but it doesn't fully form on his lips. "C'mon, Beth. I'm here, and I'm ready to talk. 'M sorry about--"
She interrupts him with, "Just play the game, Daryl," because if this is it, if this is where he's gonna tell her something that will break her heart, she suddenly doesn't feel prepared at all for it.
Maybe if he says it in this stupid way she's directing, it will hurt less.
But then he doesn't say anything, and her heart starts to thud so hard her chest hurts, and she wishes she'd never done this at all. It was better before, when Jimmy was just gone and she didn't care, or when Zach was gone and Daryl had cared more than she did.
If only she could go back to that.
Finally, she prompts him again with, "Your turn." Her voice is surprisingly steady, but her hands are curled into fists and she's about to explode into a million pieces.
"I never..." he begins, his tone soft, almost too quiet for her to hear. And then he pauses again, killing her slowly. Clearing his throat, he opens his mouth and the words finally come out, reluctantly. "I've never...I've never...had sex...with someone I love."
Then he lifts the bottle to his mouth and takes a long swallow, shuddering as it goes down his throat. Beth finds herself utterly speechless when he adds, "And I'm scared shitless, Beth. God's honest truth. Do with it whatever the hell you want."
There is something profoundly terrifying about Daryl Dixon when he shares his deepest, inner-most feelings. Of all the things Beth stirred herself up over all day long, somehow that had not been even on her short list of possible answers; just like day he broke down about losing the prison and his depth of anguish over her father had surprised her, had won her over.
Had made her pain and his pain the same, a shared thing that bound them together.
And now. Well. Now what they share is so much more than that.
She has loved him all this time, been in love for long enough that she can't quite remember what it was not to love him, but this moment is something more. The emotion that fills her chest, that seems to fill the space between them, and the room itself, is both stifling and like being released from restraints.
She falls to her knees on the floor in front of him, saying words and grabbing at him. None of it registers, none of it has any sound, not when she can see his face and the palpable extent of his feelings for her overwhelm her.
Only she would try to talk herself into the idea that Daryl doesn't care at all when he cares so much. Only she could fall for that lie when she never had before.
Only she could fail to see how what is between them means more to both of them than anything else ever has. She knows she's babbling that she loves him too, and there are tears on her face, but then his hands are there too, and somehow she's on his lap, kissing him like crazy.
And he's kissing her back, hard, and his hands clamp around her butt pulling her down on top of him, and it's way more than kissing already, but Beth is fine with it. She can't, after what he just said, think of this ending any other way. She wants to be his first in this way, because he'll be her first in every other way that counts.
This is what counts, right here, right now. Nothing that happened to her before even matters anymore.
She wants him to understand completely, so she ends their kiss to reach between them and grab the hem of her t-shirt. She pulls it off, and when Daryl's eyes go south, landing on her breasts, they respond, even through her underwear. She can feel a throbbing throughout her body, and the confines of her bra are practically offensive. She just wants him to pull it off her, put his hands there, or even his mouth.
He licks his lips in what she can only hope is anticipation, but he says, "Beth," breathlessly, his eyes coming back to hers. "Wait--" he says, but she lays her hand over his mouth and shakes her head at him. She cannot be held responsible for what she might say or do to him if he tries to stop what's going on here.
His eyes beg for understanding as he says, "I don't wanna hurt you." His hands urgently cup her face and he looks deeply into her eyes. "Or scare you. You been through bad stuff, and I'm--I'm like fuckin' nuts here, listen, feel." With one hand he finds hers and mashes it flat over his heart. It's an erratic, thunderous echo of her own, and the power it gives her knowing she affects him like he does her is priceless. "I don't wanna..." he says again.
"You won't," she says. "Daryl, seriously. You've been acting like I'm made of glass this whole time. And I'm not, remember? I made it. I survived. I'm here. And I trust you. When I'm with you nothin' can hurt me. Nothin'. Especially not you." He would never willingly hurt her, and that's something she's always known even if his actions earlier that day had made her doubt it. Now, she can never forget it so she pushes against his hold and brings her mouth back to his. The hand on her face holds her back just enough that she can't get her lips fully on his. She lunges suddenly, surprising him. Her teeth sink into his bottom lip, and she feels the sound he makes in his throat more than hears it. Beneath her, his body is already hard, but his hips surge up under hers. "Please," she says, her voice showing the need she has, too. "I wanna be with you."
Which is the understatement of the year. She needs to be with him, to have what he holds in his heart for her be the thing she associates with the vulnerability of her naked body.
His eyes clench shut and his chest expands under her hand. She slides her fingers through his, wrapping her hand around his. She wants to be that close to him, everywhere, so she tells him in a soft whisper. "See. Like that." He opens his eyes slowly, and she continues, "I wanna be with you, like that." The impact of how intimate it feels, how intimate it is, ripples through both of them.
She knows he won't try to stop it again.
She tugs her hand free and starts to undress him. His shirt has snap buttons that pull apart under her fingers quickly, and the expanse of his chest and belly come into view. He's lean, probably underweight considering, but every inch of him is hard muscle, from years on the road, and maybe even his life before that. The way his stomach trembles as her fingers run down it makes her thighs ache and she grips him tighter with her legs even though there are too many layers between them yet. It's easy enough to eliminate at least one barrier, though, and as she eases his zipper down, his breath whooshes out of him.
She has seen a grown man's (boy's?) penis before, but Daryl's is different. She doesn't have too much time to think on that because the way he throbs in her hands makes her blush, and laugh, and coo at him like he's a kitten. She manages to say his name, but if he finds her silly, she can't tell. When she hazards a glance at his face, his eyes are squeezed shut again and a muscle in his jaw is prominently showing.
Neither of them is particularly skillful at this, but it doesn't seem to matter one bit.
She leans into him to kiss him while keeping her hands busy, running up and down the length of him and then squeezing so that his breath hitches again. When she curves her palm around the end of his shaft the skin there moves, she feels a wetness that makes her very conscious of the steady throbbing between her own legs, and his hips buck upwards again. With a whimper that sounds like her name, and the thrust of his tongue inside her mouth, she knows she's hit the right spot.
She wants to explore more, wants to learn everything about him, but she also wants him inside her, and that urge is stronger than anything else. She climbs off him and he whimpers again, his eyes opening, and wild look of loss crosses his face. She waits for his gaze to connect with hers and then she gets rid of the rest of her clothes, first her jeans and panties, then her bra.
The way he looks at her as she disrobes is criminal; or at least it gives her the sense of everything naughty and forbidden that she has ever been warned away from in her life. By her daddy, by sermons in church, by some sense of conscience she's not sure is reliable.
It's chased by a thrilling twinge of pleasure, or happiness, or something even greater than those two ideas.
Joy. Pure joy.
She keeps thinking she's already experienced the moment where she loves him the most, but he keeps surprising her. His eyes openly worship her body, which causes her both a sense of pride and a flood of embarrassment. They are conflicting emotions, she supposes, but then again everything she's felt all day long has been one long conflict.
But that fight is about to be over.
His gaze traces every exposed curve and plane of her body, and the tightness that has already affected her nipples and the space between her legs seems to increase even more.
She needs him to touch her more than she needs her next breath.
"Beth," he says just as he reaches out, curling his hands around her waist. They drift downward, so warm and caressing she can barely stand it. Then he brings her back down on his lap and she can't stop the smile that spreads across her face.
She's about to have Daryl Dixon. Who woulda ever thought that would happen?
She slips her hand between them to touch him again, but his is already there, and he seems to want to do it himself. She just lifts herself up slightly to make the connection easier. His voice is rough, sending shivers through her when he asks, "You sure?"
He's right there, so close that she can feel the barest hint of him against the wetness waiting for him. A sound rushes up her throat, half frustrated moan, half indelicate laughter, because of course he has to ask, one more time. So she tells him the whole truth, so he'll know, nothing doubting. "This mornin', I just wanted to make out. But now? Yeah, Daryl. I'm sure. I've never been more sure of anything, ever." She shifts her hips forward so that he's just barely inside her. His breath catches again, his bottom lip drawn up between his teeth. "Don't be scared," she finds herself whispering; she knows she's saying it for both of them, about a lot of things.
Gratitude swells through her as she takes him into her body. The pressure is immense, but the emotion is overwhelming, filling up all the empty places, both figuratively and literally. She realizes then that she's not afraid, because she can't be. The safest place anywhere for her will always be with Daryl. Has always been Daryl.
First, he grabs her head, kissing her for all he's worth but then he helps her move against him, his hands sliding from her bottom to her hips and back again. She can hear the helpless sounds falling from her lips, and he seems to be trying to catch them with his own, his mouth brushing hers rhythmically. Still, he manages to ask, "You okay?" and she can see he believes her when she nods her head.
It builds inside her, something more than the friction of their bodies. It's the emotion that he gave her the night she was taken; when she had said Oh and now that too is the best descriptor. The physical sensation is incredible, the way his body moves inside hers, and it all gathers and explodes, radiating through both of them.
But it all goes back to the depth of feeling between them, and she can't stop herself from breathing out, "I love you."
He lifts her up and that makes something more intense swell between their bodies, causing them both to cry out a little. "I love you," he gasps. Then his hands move again, to the small of her back, clenching and holding her hard against him. He makes a sound unlike anything she's ever heard--desperate and beautiful, like she's killing him and giving him life at the same time. She feels the heat of him pouring out inside her, and she realizes sex--making love--is something so complicated and messy and mind scrambling. No wonder he'd been unsure.
If she'd really understood, all her angst would have been entirely different. How could you ever be with someone like this, and then not be?
Her daddy had tried to tell her, back on the farm, when he was worried about her and Jimmy (and there had been nothing to worry about). He'd said this sort of thing was for life, that you shouldn't just casually do it.
She tightens her arms around Daryl's neck and hangs on with everything she's got. Her father would know, that with this man, Beth has found exactly that. In a different world, at 18, that might be terrifying, but in this world, it's consolation to so many other things.
It's the healing Pastor Gabriel promised would come in time.
In Daryl's arms she loses everything, and then finds it again.
...chapter three...
Author: badboy_fangirl
Fandom: The Walking Dead
Characters/Pairings: Beth POV; Daryl/Beth (past Beth/Zach); with appearances by everyone else.
Word Count: ~7200
Rating/Warnings: NC-17 / Spoilers through all of season four. MENTIONS OF RAPE, POSSIBLE TRIGGERS.
Summary:
Author's notes: This is a companion/continuation fic to Empty Handed. You may read it without having read the first fic, but it won't make as much sense, IMHO. Also, many thanks to Cricket for the beta.
Previous Chapters: [1]
You're not alone
Together we stand
I'll be by your side
You know I'll take your hand
If she thought the memory of his eyes was provoking, it's only because she hadn't been as aware of his gaze before when it had been on her.
Now, wherever she goes, whatever she's doing, she can feel him watching her because he really is. In her office, he's mostly talking to Carol, but his eyes keep straying to her, drifting over her like familiar fingertips. And then all the way to the Housing Department, she can feel it again.
That night at the big dinner the Sanchez's throw for them, she's seated straight across from him purely by accident, and every time she looks at him he's already looking at her. Even when she glances at him in horror as Rick talks about the people who held them hostage in Terminus, who made them listen to others being tortured in an effort to keep them in line, and who eventually forced them to kill or be killed, his eyes are steady and full of something disconcerting in a completely different way.
She knows he wants her, even though he'll never say it. In fact, she thinks Daryl might never have a real secret from her ever again, because when he's staring right at her, there's just no room for speculation. She can feel different parts of her warming up at the thought. At the blatant appraisal, the obvious appreciation, the pure adoration.
She is 18 years old, she knows that romantic notions are supposed to be part of her every day thought processes. She is unprepared for just how romantic Daryl is in the flesh, because he'd been pretty damn romantic in her imagination. She'd been rescued again and again by the thought of him, but it pales in comparison just being in a crowded room with him.
She feels badly that Maggie wants her attention, wants her to come and curl up under a blanket and talk all night with her like they did when they were kids, when their biggest worry was lying to their daddy about what they were fighting about. All she wants to do is be with Daryl, but she knows she can't do that, not tonight. She manages to hug him goodnight, sliding up under his arm, causing him to jump like a Walker got him, but then when he realizes it's her, his arm tightens painfully, crushing her against his chest.
She whispers, "Goodnight, Daryl Dixon," and watches him swallow. He nods his head at her, his mouth in a hard grimace, but he might as well have shouted something devastatingly private because the emotion in his eyes makes her whole body feel hot.
She's not sure how she manages to let Maggie take her away. Carol leads them all back to the house, and Maggie talks non-stop. She talks about getting out with Sasha and Bob, searching high and low for Glenn, for the miraculous way they were reunited, and Beth understands that all her praying hadn't been in vain. She listens because at this point she doesn't have much to say anyway, and it's taking all her self-control to stay still. As much as she wants to hear what Maggie's saying, and be with her sister again, Daryl is this pressing issue, this thing that's hanging unresolved.
She knows she'll see him tomorrow, but that feels like a lifetime away. After nearly six months of dreams and fantasies, the real thing is so close, but so far at the same time.
About an hour later, Glenn intervenes, and for the first time in her life Beth thinks she could kiss her sister's husband.
"Maggie?" he says, wedging himself between the two sisters. "I hate to do this, interrupt all this and everything, but I'm exhausted. I need to sleep, and I need to tell Beth something, so you're gonna have to stop talking, okay?"
Maggie flushes, embarrassed in that way that doesn't really bother a person when they're with their family. She nods, clapping a hand over her own mouth to silence herself. Her eyes shine brightly, her joy at being there so loud Beth can still hear it even when her voice has stopped.
She feels the same way, she truly does. She just has a lot of it to go around at this point.
"I just wanna say," Glenn begins. The earnestness that endeared him to their entire family right from the start encases each word. "That it would be real nice if you could talk to Daryl and make sure he knows you don't blame him for anything bad that happened out there. He has beat himself up this entire time, ever since you got separated. And, seriously, Beth, I saw him smile, twice, tonight, and it was a freaking miracle, because he hasn't smiled since we found him again. He's barely opened his mouth to talk unless we forced him, too, and most of that was sad or mad or both. I just...it's really important that--"
Beth throws her arms around her brother-in-law so hard it knocks the wind out of him. "Thank you, Glenn. Thank you." She jumps to her feet. "I'm sorry, Maggie. But I gotta go. Okay? I'll talk to you tomorrow, I swear. And the day after that, and the day after that. We'll talk all the time. But right now, I gotta go."
Maggie's still got her hand clamped over her mouth as she nods her head in agreement. Beth should have realized if anyone would understand, it was her sister. She stopped at nothing to find Glenn.
It isn't that Beth cares more for Daryl than the rest of them; her joy at being reunited with everyone was immeasurable, even Bob and Sasha, whom she hadn't known very well. She's been happier thinking about how excited Tyreese would be to see his sister than anything else.
It's just different with Daryl. And the urgency coursing through her body to be with him, just in his presence, is unlike any other experience she's ever had.
She runs out to the garage to find the bike she bought a few weeks earlier. She peddles hard, all the way to the dorms.
She leaves her bike just inside the door, not caring to lock it up. She knows this building well, it's where she lived herself when they first arrived in D.C. And if someone wants to steal her bike she's fine with that; it's just another reason to stay longer with Daryl.
Because the one thing she wants more than anything is to stay with Daryl longer.
Part of it is the comfort his presence brings, and part of it is the discomfort. She feels so many things because of Daryl Dixon, and she wants them all.
She stops at the front desk and asks for his room number, and then runs up the stairs full speed. He's on the fifth floor, and by the time she gets there, she's breathless and filled with sudden nervousness. She stands outside the door for several minutes to calm herself.
The memory of his eyes takes the worry right out of her. Daryl needs a hug. Daryl needs to know she's okay. And she needs to know he's okay. Truly. Eyes on and hands on is the only way that's gonna happen, for either of them.
She knocks, and the moments between her hand striking the wood and it swinging open feel interminable. His eyes widen on an intake of breath and Beth forces herself to say "Hey." It doesn't sound cool at all, but there's nothing to be done about it.
His face softens, though, and he just stares at her for a beat as if he doesn't believe she's real. "Hey," he says, his voice low so that she feels it more than she hears it.
He steps back half a pace, shoving the door all the way open so she can slide in under his outstretched arm. She feels like she's darting in before he can change his mind, and any nervousness she felt fades completely. All she cares about is making him feel good. He takes his time turning around, but she wraps herself around him instantly, not letting the distance or silence lengthen.
He feels so good against her, warm and hard, and her eyes fall shut as she buries her nose in his chest. She says, "I'm so sorry," and breathes him in all at once.
His ribcage expands on a shaky breath, but his voice is steady when he says, "Don't worry about me." His hands are under her hair almost before she realizes it, pulling her head away from his body so he can see her face. The tears come out of nowhere, emotion choking her, only to get worse when he continues with, "They hurt you? Whoever took you that night?"
She blinks rapidly until her tears subside. She nods her head. "But I got away."
His fingers curl infinitesimally against her neck, sliding out to caress her cheeks. She can see the anger in him as easily as she feels it within herself, and it's strange how she doesn't want that for him. She just wants Daryl to be happy, to know that she's okay, to believe the way he had for the space of an hour before it all went to hell that one time. She wraps her hands around his wrists, squeezing hard. "'Member that gun I got off that Walker?" she asks him, waiting for the recollection to dawn in his expression. "It was tucked in the back of my pants, and they never checked me. I waited until most of 'em fell asleep and then I shot 'em all, right in the head."
As soon as the words leave her mouth, something in her body breaks. Like a literal dam inside her. Unlike when she'd told Pastor Gabriel and his tears hadn't moved her at all, Daryl's lack of reaction opens the way for everything to pour forth.
She cries like she never has. Or like all the times she didn't allow herself to cry times about a million.
And this time, it's Daryl holding her, and his voice telling her he's proud of her. This time it's the safest place in the world to reveal that she's not the girl she used to be.
She's someone else now. She's someone who belongs with Daryl.
By the time she comes out of the storm of emotion, he's got her cradled in his lap, and they're sitting on his bed. Beth knows she ought to feel less comfortable here, alone with a man--and not just any man, but probably the most dangerous one she's ever known, and by dangerous, she means the one who matters more than any of the others combined together.
She is physically safer in this walled city, but she's actually genuinely more vulnerable than she's been since the turn. It won't be Daryl's memory that strengthens her anymore; it will be Daryl's actions, his thoughts, and his feelings, and everything about him that can make or destroy her world.
She rubs her face against his shirt and then realizes what a mess she is, and how she just left a trail of snot across his shoulder. "Oh, gross," she murmurs, wiping at it with her hand.
She feels his chest move in a little chuckle. "No big deal, got lotsa clean clothes now."
It flashes through her mind again, that quote from her mom's book, A man who's worth your tears will never make you cry. She's about to find out, she guesses.
She laughs softly, too, leaning her head on his shoulder. "Wanna know why I killed them?"
He side-eyes her, but there's no hesitation. "'Cause they fucking deserved it?" He says it like a question, but it's not really. She always knew that's what he'd have done.
In truth, she had done it so when she died, it was on her own terms. She had never imagined that a few days later she would stumble across Carol, Judith, and Tyreese. It had been the hand of God in her life, and looking back now she can fully see that if what she'd done was so wrong, she would never have made it to D.C.
It's funny to realize God gave her Daryl right before He let the most horrible thing that could happen to her happen.
The Lord giveth; and He taketh away, says her daddy's voice in her head.
Now.
But then, then it had been Daryl's voice. "I could hear you, in my head. I don't think the good ones survive. I was gonna survive. Or at the very least, I wasn't gonna let that be what got me. Walkers can't help what they are; bad men can. You had every reason in the world to be bad, and you're one of the best people I know. And I knew you woulda killed them. There was three of 'em. I had exactly three bullets." A breath escapes her, and the tightness in her chest lifts. She looks away from his face, from the intensity of his eyes. "Poetic, right?"
He snorts a laugh, and Beth feels a smile tug at her lips. His fingers brush gently up her chin before drifting over her cheek. "You ought to write a ditty about it," he says, his voice rich with their shared memories.
She can feel her face go hot at the things she's written, scribbled in notebooks since last she saw him. She imagines he'd be embarrassed to know she's written ditties about him, but he'd probably want to hear them anyway, even if he pretended he didn't.
"I'm not one of the best people you know, Beth," he says.
She would snort herself at that, but she knows he just doesn't see it about himself--at least not yet. She'll have to sing him a song someday, just so he can get it. But that's not today. Today, she just says, "Bullshit. You got me through this, Daryl Dixon, without even bein' there. Best. Person. Period." When his mouth opens and she knows he's gonna try to talk her out of it, she lays a finger over his lips. "Hush."
His eyes smile, even if his mouth doesn't, and Beth realizes he likes it when she bosses him. She likes it, too. She likes that he gives into her in little ways that are actually huge.
"See that, over there?" he asks, dislodging her finger when he tilts his head in the direction of the desk on the other side of the small room.
She follows the path of his eyes, and sees a dark-colored lump sitting atop the desk. "What?" she asks before it registers what she's seeing. Her breath catches and she springs to her feet. "Is that my bag?"
"Yup," Daryl says, and she can't miss the glee in his tone. Glenn's insistence that Daryl had been nothing but surly and miserable since they'd met up with him is nothing but legend now. She's glad that he obviously no longer feels that way. She loves that he seems to be as sentimental as he would accuse her of being--correction: he's probably more sentimental. (That's why he'd yelled at her about Zach and Jimmy, she realizes.) She grabs the bag, practically hugging it to her chest as Daryl goes on. "Still got your spoon in it and everything."
The spoon.
He's sentimental even when he had no idea he needed to be. If she hadn't already been certain, this is the moment when she would have known for sure. She loves Daryl Dixon with every fiber of her being, with every inch of her body, with every beat of her heart.
She'll never let them get separated again.
After that first night, they spend every one together. She tells Carol that she'll be sleeping at Daryl's until she can coax him into sleeping at their house and Carol smiles and shakes her head.
"I already invited him. But maybe what he needs is the invite from you."
Beth tucks that away for an appropriate time.
Every chance she gets she slides in the fact that his strength kept her alive, and most times he scoffs and shrugs it away, but she knows it's sticking somewhere inside him. If he hears it enough, he'll start to believe.
And besides all that, spending every possible moment with Daryl is all she wants to do. She craves his fingers on her skin, or the easy way he holds her hand, in public and private. She loves the smiles that come more and more frequently, and she and Glenn can't help but catch each other's eyes and give thumbs up when it happens when they're all together.
For all that the two previous years had been full of horror and loss, those first few weeks after they're all reunited in D.C. are some of the sweetest times she's ever known. Even when she tells Maggie about what happened when she was separated from Daryl, it's not so much as to unburden herself and weigh Maggie down as to show her sister how alike they are; they are warriors in different ways, but they are more the same now than they ever were as children. Life has led them to it, molded them into people they don't quite recognize sometimes, but who they are nonetheless proud to be anyway.
The one thing Beth does is go to each member of their family and make her declaration about Daryl. She does it for two reasons: one, she doesn't want there to be gossip about it (and she knows there would be, she and Daryl gossip about Rick and Michonne all the time, but they keep it just between them); and two, she doesn't want Daryl to have to deal with everyone asking him what's going on. He seems more than pleased to be her boyfriend, though neither of them have uttered that word, but she knows it would freak him out if everyone started in on him about it.
She protects him the only way she can; she tells everyone that she loves him, that she's with him, and that they aren't to harass him about it in anyway.
Rick makes a crack about how he always said she was the new sheriff, and when she gives him a look, he immediately stops smiling. Somberly he salutes her. "Yes, sir, officer, sir," he deadpans.
Carl giggles and she points a finger at him. "I mean it. No teasin' Daryl! You know how he is."
Father and son exchange looks and swear their allegiance.
Beth's glad, because she would have played the Michonne card if she had to. When it comes to Daryl, she's dead serious.
They start having these moments that remind her of the darkened kitchen of the funeral home. Their eyes catch and hold too long, or a word gets said between them that's loaded with meaning that neither of them is entirely willing to move on just yet.
Or at least, Beth isn't quite there, and if Daryl is, he gives no indication.
(Well, his body gives certain indications, but he studiously ignores that. Beth follows his lead, even though she's starting to have a similar problem. It's just that nobody can tell when it happens to her.)
She finds herself wanting to kiss him, though, more and more with each passing day. The urge becomes more frequent until she seems to exist in a world that only consists of Daryl's lips, and how her eyes are drawn to them. She wonders what they'll feel like, and how he'll taste, and what it would be like after they've kissed, because she genuinely thinks the hardest part is just getting the first one out of the way.
She almost does it one night as they're settling in to bed. They've been sleeping for weeks now on the twin bed in Daryl's dorm, which is silly because she has a double bed back at her house. She's hinted at him coming there at night, but she can tell he's not comfortable with it, so she drops it. The close quarters are at once exactly what she wants, and mildly aggravating at the same time, and she imagines he feels that just as she does because she's seen the heat in his eyes as he looks at her.
"G'night, Beth," he murmurs, his lips pressed to the top of her head.
She tips her neck back, and when their gazes connect, the proximity of their lips is too close to ignore, at least for her. She wants to bridge the distance so badly her body is instantly thrumming with energy, but his hand surrounds the back of her neck and tucks her up under his chin again.
He falls to sleep long before she does, and the frustration she feels keeps her awake half the night. In the morning, she's lying atop him in a position she could only have orchestrated while unconscious, and she can't stop herself from leaning forward until her lips are on his. He was awake before her, and she can feel the hard ridge behind his zipper as it presses up into her belly. A breath hisses out of him as she slides her body over his, but there isn't anything slow about the way his mouth opens beneath hers.
Maybe he was just waiting for her.
His hands slip under her shirt as she lifts herself up and moves her legs to straddle him fully. His palms cover her breasts, and Beth arches into them because of the relief it brings. It only lasts a split second, but the fact that it happens the way it does, so fast, that he obviously has wanted to touch her for ages makes Beth's heart soar and her head spins. And right before he pushes her off him, he squeezes her breasts with a reverence that equivocates just what she thinks she already knows about Daryl.
But then he shakes his head and all but jumps off the bed. He looks terrified, and aroused, but mostly terrified. Beth doesn't have much experience with this herself, and her brain isn't working all that fast because all she wants is to feel more of his lips and hands on her body.
"Daryl--" she starts.
But he blurts, "I'm gonna go," and runs out the door almost before he finishes speaking. She just lays there staring at the wood paneling after it slams behind him, dumbfounded.
Then she gets angry.
She doesn't go straight home. Instead she rides her bike up to the Washington Monument and parks it before walking down to the reflecting pool. She pulls her socks and shoes off, dipping her feet in, remembering how Lydia once told her that before the turn something like that would get you into trouble with D.C. cops. Nowadays, nobody cares about that sort of thing. Despite it being summertime and tourist season (tourism isn't something that's revived just yet, and nobody's really sure it will ever be a thing again), there were only a few people milling around the area.
There was also a time when anger filled her up and there was nothing to be done about it. She had felt paralyzed by the way things had gone, by some of the things that had happened, by the fact that she didn't know where most of the people she loved were; now, everything is different. Feeling mad makes her want to solve it, makes her want to figure out what the hell's going on with Daryl, makes her want to get him back to that place where he told her things that he'd never said to anyone.
Not that they don't talk, because they do, but they have lots of comfortable silences, too. She knows that's what he likes best. Being with her, but not having to say much.
The memory of him angrily yarding on her arm, pulling her down rickety steps, and forcing his crossbow into her arms blindsides her. The honesty that poured out of them both that day had been alcohol-induced.
Maybe that's what they need now. Only Beth doesn't want to get lit to get Daryl to tell her how he feels; she wants him to just tell her. And maybe part of it was that now that they were doing this, he'd come to realize he didn't really want to. Maggie had asked her not but a couple of days ago if the way she'd felt about Daryl when they were apart was different now that they were back together.
She had answered easily that it was the same, if only more. And right up until he ran out on her, she'd thought it was the same for him.
You know what assuming does, girl, her daddy whispers in her mind. It makes an ass outta u and me.
She gets to feet, grabs her shoes and shoves them in her bag. It only makes her angrier to think of him leading her on, letting her sleep with him every night and acting like he was the happiest guy in the world. She had believed those romantic notions she put on him, and as she pedals hard towards home, she doesn't let herself think about this might be her own damn fault.
She walks in the house to find Carol and Michonne laughing while Judith does some new, cute thing that they haven't seen before. Rick and Carl aren't there, but Beth doesn't have time or patience to wonder where they are.
She just asks, "Michonne, will you do me a big favor?"
She knocks on his door, and then turns the handle, not waiting for a shout out from him. Turns out he's not there, and she wonders how long she might have to wait. Carol had told her he stopped by earlier that day, so she figured he must be out looking for her.
Which on the one hand seems good, but the other part of her is scared and unsure in a way she's never experienced before. She's a mess, every emotion she can name coursing through her in rapid succession, but since anger is the one that keeps her from crying, she tries to hold on to it the hardest.
It's probably only an hour before he finally shows up, but that's long enough for her to be sitting comfortably on his bed with her game face firmly in place.
"Have a seat, Mr. Dixon," she commands, and he about jumps out of his skin.
"Holy shit, Beth," he mumbles, his eyes cutting to her, vague irritation coming out of his expression. He hadn't known she was there until she spoke, and it startled him, but not enough. It'd be nice if he'd start yelling at her because she knows that will amp up her adrenaline, but he needs alcohol in him for that to happen.
So.
She points to the desk chair she situated in the center of the room.
He sits down where she indicated, but his gaze searches her face after he spies the bottle of alcohol sitting on the floor. "Where'd you get that?" he asks.
She knows what he wants to know is how she got it, so she answers what he means instead of what he asked. "I asked Michonne to buy it for me. I told her it was a present for you, so she didn't question it."
He stares at her for a long moment before leaning down to grab the bottle. He laughs a little and his eyes come back to her face, as though he's expecting her to be laughing with him. "She didn't question that I'd hate Peach Schnapps?"
Beth is grateful for his reaction because it only makes her more annoyed. "I told her it was a private joke."
"Beth--"
"I'll go first," she says, cutting him off. Maybe he doesn't get what she intends here, but she hadn't brought him a drink. She brought him a confessional. "I never ran out on someone when they were trying to share something super important with me."
He continues to watch her, and slow horror seems to spread across his face as she snatches the shot glass off the floor and thrusts it towards him. "Drink," she demands.
The longer he looks at her, the more his discomfort shows. It's like those awful afternoon talk shows she watched when she was a kid and someone had come to confront their baby daddy on national television. He takes his time, but eventually pulls the cap off the Peach Schnapps, dumps some in the shot glass, and then drinks it. "Yep," he grumbles, making a face to show his displeasure. "Just as gross as I remember it."
She waits until he looks at her again, then says, "It's your turn."
"This isn't a good idea," he says, and she swears he almost smiles, but it doesn't fully form on his lips. "C'mon, Beth. I'm here, and I'm ready to talk. 'M sorry about--"
She interrupts him with, "Just play the game, Daryl," because if this is it, if this is where he's gonna tell her something that will break her heart, she suddenly doesn't feel prepared at all for it.
Maybe if he says it in this stupid way she's directing, it will hurt less.
But then he doesn't say anything, and her heart starts to thud so hard her chest hurts, and she wishes she'd never done this at all. It was better before, when Jimmy was just gone and she didn't care, or when Zach was gone and Daryl had cared more than she did.
If only she could go back to that.
Finally, she prompts him again with, "Your turn." Her voice is surprisingly steady, but her hands are curled into fists and she's about to explode into a million pieces.
"I never..." he begins, his tone soft, almost too quiet for her to hear. And then he pauses again, killing her slowly. Clearing his throat, he opens his mouth and the words finally come out, reluctantly. "I've never...I've never...had sex...with someone I love."
Then he lifts the bottle to his mouth and takes a long swallow, shuddering as it goes down his throat. Beth finds herself utterly speechless when he adds, "And I'm scared shitless, Beth. God's honest truth. Do with it whatever the hell you want."
There is something profoundly terrifying about Daryl Dixon when he shares his deepest, inner-most feelings. Of all the things Beth stirred herself up over all day long, somehow that had not been even on her short list of possible answers; just like day he broke down about losing the prison and his depth of anguish over her father had surprised her, had won her over.
Had made her pain and his pain the same, a shared thing that bound them together.
And now. Well. Now what they share is so much more than that.
She has loved him all this time, been in love for long enough that she can't quite remember what it was not to love him, but this moment is something more. The emotion that fills her chest, that seems to fill the space between them, and the room itself, is both stifling and like being released from restraints.
She falls to her knees on the floor in front of him, saying words and grabbing at him. None of it registers, none of it has any sound, not when she can see his face and the palpable extent of his feelings for her overwhelm her.
Only she would try to talk herself into the idea that Daryl doesn't care at all when he cares so much. Only she could fall for that lie when she never had before.
Only she could fail to see how what is between them means more to both of them than anything else ever has. She knows she's babbling that she loves him too, and there are tears on her face, but then his hands are there too, and somehow she's on his lap, kissing him like crazy.
And he's kissing her back, hard, and his hands clamp around her butt pulling her down on top of him, and it's way more than kissing already, but Beth is fine with it. She can't, after what he just said, think of this ending any other way. She wants to be his first in this way, because he'll be her first in every other way that counts.
This is what counts, right here, right now. Nothing that happened to her before even matters anymore.
She wants him to understand completely, so she ends their kiss to reach between them and grab the hem of her t-shirt. She pulls it off, and when Daryl's eyes go south, landing on her breasts, they respond, even through her underwear. She can feel a throbbing throughout her body, and the confines of her bra are practically offensive. She just wants him to pull it off her, put his hands there, or even his mouth.
He licks his lips in what she can only hope is anticipation, but he says, "Beth," breathlessly, his eyes coming back to hers. "Wait--" he says, but she lays her hand over his mouth and shakes her head at him. She cannot be held responsible for what she might say or do to him if he tries to stop what's going on here.
His eyes beg for understanding as he says, "I don't wanna hurt you." His hands urgently cup her face and he looks deeply into her eyes. "Or scare you. You been through bad stuff, and I'm--I'm like fuckin' nuts here, listen, feel." With one hand he finds hers and mashes it flat over his heart. It's an erratic, thunderous echo of her own, and the power it gives her knowing she affects him like he does her is priceless. "I don't wanna..." he says again.
"You won't," she says. "Daryl, seriously. You've been acting like I'm made of glass this whole time. And I'm not, remember? I made it. I survived. I'm here. And I trust you. When I'm with you nothin' can hurt me. Nothin'. Especially not you." He would never willingly hurt her, and that's something she's always known even if his actions earlier that day had made her doubt it. Now, she can never forget it so she pushes against his hold and brings her mouth back to his. The hand on her face holds her back just enough that she can't get her lips fully on his. She lunges suddenly, surprising him. Her teeth sink into his bottom lip, and she feels the sound he makes in his throat more than hears it. Beneath her, his body is already hard, but his hips surge up under hers. "Please," she says, her voice showing the need she has, too. "I wanna be with you."
Which is the understatement of the year. She needs to be with him, to have what he holds in his heart for her be the thing she associates with the vulnerability of her naked body.
His eyes clench shut and his chest expands under her hand. She slides her fingers through his, wrapping her hand around his. She wants to be that close to him, everywhere, so she tells him in a soft whisper. "See. Like that." He opens his eyes slowly, and she continues, "I wanna be with you, like that." The impact of how intimate it feels, how intimate it is, ripples through both of them.
She knows he won't try to stop it again.
She tugs her hand free and starts to undress him. His shirt has snap buttons that pull apart under her fingers quickly, and the expanse of his chest and belly come into view. He's lean, probably underweight considering, but every inch of him is hard muscle, from years on the road, and maybe even his life before that. The way his stomach trembles as her fingers run down it makes her thighs ache and she grips him tighter with her legs even though there are too many layers between them yet. It's easy enough to eliminate at least one barrier, though, and as she eases his zipper down, his breath whooshes out of him.
She has seen a grown man's (boy's?) penis before, but Daryl's is different. She doesn't have too much time to think on that because the way he throbs in her hands makes her blush, and laugh, and coo at him like he's a kitten. She manages to say his name, but if he finds her silly, she can't tell. When she hazards a glance at his face, his eyes are squeezed shut again and a muscle in his jaw is prominently showing.
Neither of them is particularly skillful at this, but it doesn't seem to matter one bit.
She leans into him to kiss him while keeping her hands busy, running up and down the length of him and then squeezing so that his breath hitches again. When she curves her palm around the end of his shaft the skin there moves, she feels a wetness that makes her very conscious of the steady throbbing between her own legs, and his hips buck upwards again. With a whimper that sounds like her name, and the thrust of his tongue inside her mouth, she knows she's hit the right spot.
She wants to explore more, wants to learn everything about him, but she also wants him inside her, and that urge is stronger than anything else. She climbs off him and he whimpers again, his eyes opening, and wild look of loss crosses his face. She waits for his gaze to connect with hers and then she gets rid of the rest of her clothes, first her jeans and panties, then her bra.
The way he looks at her as she disrobes is criminal; or at least it gives her the sense of everything naughty and forbidden that she has ever been warned away from in her life. By her daddy, by sermons in church, by some sense of conscience she's not sure is reliable.
It's chased by a thrilling twinge of pleasure, or happiness, or something even greater than those two ideas.
Joy. Pure joy.
She keeps thinking she's already experienced the moment where she loves him the most, but he keeps surprising her. His eyes openly worship her body, which causes her both a sense of pride and a flood of embarrassment. They are conflicting emotions, she supposes, but then again everything she's felt all day long has been one long conflict.
But that fight is about to be over.
His gaze traces every exposed curve and plane of her body, and the tightness that has already affected her nipples and the space between her legs seems to increase even more.
She needs him to touch her more than she needs her next breath.
"Beth," he says just as he reaches out, curling his hands around her waist. They drift downward, so warm and caressing she can barely stand it. Then he brings her back down on his lap and she can't stop the smile that spreads across her face.
She's about to have Daryl Dixon. Who woulda ever thought that would happen?
She slips her hand between them to touch him again, but his is already there, and he seems to want to do it himself. She just lifts herself up slightly to make the connection easier. His voice is rough, sending shivers through her when he asks, "You sure?"
He's right there, so close that she can feel the barest hint of him against the wetness waiting for him. A sound rushes up her throat, half frustrated moan, half indelicate laughter, because of course he has to ask, one more time. So she tells him the whole truth, so he'll know, nothing doubting. "This mornin', I just wanted to make out. But now? Yeah, Daryl. I'm sure. I've never been more sure of anything, ever." She shifts her hips forward so that he's just barely inside her. His breath catches again, his bottom lip drawn up between his teeth. "Don't be scared," she finds herself whispering; she knows she's saying it for both of them, about a lot of things.
Gratitude swells through her as she takes him into her body. The pressure is immense, but the emotion is overwhelming, filling up all the empty places, both figuratively and literally. She realizes then that she's not afraid, because she can't be. The safest place anywhere for her will always be with Daryl. Has always been Daryl.
First, he grabs her head, kissing her for all he's worth but then he helps her move against him, his hands sliding from her bottom to her hips and back again. She can hear the helpless sounds falling from her lips, and he seems to be trying to catch them with his own, his mouth brushing hers rhythmically. Still, he manages to ask, "You okay?" and she can see he believes her when she nods her head.
It builds inside her, something more than the friction of their bodies. It's the emotion that he gave her the night she was taken; when she had said Oh and now that too is the best descriptor. The physical sensation is incredible, the way his body moves inside hers, and it all gathers and explodes, radiating through both of them.
But it all goes back to the depth of feeling between them, and she can't stop herself from breathing out, "I love you."
He lifts her up and that makes something more intense swell between their bodies, causing them both to cry out a little. "I love you," he gasps. Then his hands move again, to the small of her back, clenching and holding her hard against him. He makes a sound unlike anything she's ever heard--desperate and beautiful, like she's killing him and giving him life at the same time. She feels the heat of him pouring out inside her, and she realizes sex--making love--is something so complicated and messy and mind scrambling. No wonder he'd been unsure.
If she'd really understood, all her angst would have been entirely different. How could you ever be with someone like this, and then not be?
Her daddy had tried to tell her, back on the farm, when he was worried about her and Jimmy (and there had been nothing to worry about). He'd said this sort of thing was for life, that you shouldn't just casually do it.
She tightens her arms around Daryl's neck and hangs on with everything she's got. Her father would know, that with this man, Beth has found exactly that. In a different world, at 18, that might be terrifying, but in this world, it's consolation to so many other things.
It's the healing Pastor Gabriel promised would come in time.
In Daryl's arms she loses everything, and then finds it again.
...chapter three...