Chapter Text
He wakes up to Beth whispering his name. It’s all he can do to hum in response.
“Do you want something to eat? We’re all having supper now, so I can bring something in for you, or you can come join us if you want.” He waves her off, but then his stomach growls. Beth giggles softly. “Alright, I’ll be right back then.”
After he wolfs down the bowl of beans she brings him, he falls back asleep like a stone, and the next time he wakes up, it’s to a face full of hair.
Daryl bolts upright.
He’s nearly scrambling out of bed for his crossbow when he realizes that it’s just Beth. And then he realizes that it’s Beth. His supposed wife. A girl forced to grow up before she should’ve had to. And she got into the same bed as him to sleep, willingly.
He doesn’t know how to feel about this development, but he doesn’t think it bodes well.
He grabs his dirty clothes, shoves his feet into his boots, slings his bow over his shoulder, and books it to the barn as quick as he can. Shame what a man has to do for a bit of privacy round here anymore. Getting changed in a barn where a walker could come in on him any second. But soon enough he’s dressed, snuck his sleeping clothes into his pack by the door where they’ll be clean enough for now, and started skinning out his deer.
Now that he don’t feel like he’s gonna get caught with his hand in the cookie jar for no damn reason, he can relax. It’s a nice morning, and skinning deer is simple. Daryl might have no idea what to do with a wife, but he was practically born with a hunting knife in his hand.
I could give you one or two ideas about what to do with that wife of yours, little brother. He can practically see Merle’s leer.
“Shut up, asshole,” he growls under his breath.
“That deer backtalking you?” Beth singsongs.
Daryl almost takes off a finger. “Good god, woman!” he snarls, spinning around. “You tryin’ to get one of us killed, sneaking up on me like that?”
“I’m sorry,” Beth says softly, and she shrinks into herself, and then all he can see is his mother, getting smaller every time his father opened his mouth, like it would protect her or some stupid shit like that. Daryl wishes the earth would just swallow him up whole, right now.
He turns his head cause he can’t bear to look her in the eye. “Don’t worry about it, girl,” he says in as gentle of a grumble as he can, and hopes she understands it for the apology he means it to be.
But she’s still quiet and fidgety when she says, “I, um. I just wanted to let you know that breakfast is ready. Ain’t much, but it’s something warm.” She purses her lips. “But I could keep it for you, if you need to finish this first. Or I could bring it out if you’d rather?”
His forearms are covered in blood that he’s not quite sure how he’ll get off once he’s done, much less right now. And Beth don’t look like the kind of woman to countenance a man being covered in blood at her kitchen table. He frowns. Eating out here would spare him having to sit through a meal with what has become a real household, something he’d been successfully avoiding since before the farm. But if this is Beth’s household, her table, then that makes it his too. And there’s something primal inside him anxious to claim that right, to have a place everyone agrees he belongs in. To be the one in charge, too, and not just some burdensome outsider. Course he would be eating alone if she held his portion back for him anyway.
But he can’t very well stop what he’s doing now he’s started. Gotta keep the flies off, at least.
“Sounds like a feast,” he grunts. “Keep it warm for me?”
“Sure,” she says, and there’s something in her smile that makes something in his gut warm. Like this is familiar and homey to her somehow. Her momma must have done this for her daddy, when he was out working on their farm.
All the air whooshes from his lungs, and it’s all he can do to grunt an acknowledgment and get back to work.
“He’ll need help with the rest of that deer, Bethy,” daddy says as she clears away the rest of their breakfast dishes.
Beth nods. She may not be Daryl, but Otis had hunted a bit and came home with a buck or two that she could remember, and daddy or Shawn always had to help him skin it out. “I was planning to go out after breakfast. I’ve found some things I think we can keep it in until we can figure out what exactly our plans are for eating it. I wonder if we could preserve any of it?”
Daddy frowns. “I wish I knew how to make jerky without a dehydrator.”
Beth laughs. “Me too.” She kisses the top of his head. “But do you think you and Andre can watch the porridge for me until I get back?”
Daddy looks over and winks at the little boy. “I think we can handle that, don’t you?” Andre nods seriously. “Yes, Bethy, you can leave us in charge.”
She smiles. “Thanks, Daddy.”
Michonne has already slipped out for her morning perimeter check, and she’ll keep an eye out from the porch to make sure that walkers don’t sneak up on them. It’s been such a blessing to have her here, another woman, but one who can take care of herself. Beth thinks that once Daryl gets over being flustered, he’ll see what a Godsend Michonne is too.
Beth blushes at the memory of climbing into bed with him last night, even sawing logs and as clothed as he was – and heaven knows they never even touched! But still, that was the first moment when Beth really felt married. And when he asked her to hold breakfast back for him, for the first time she could imagine living a life with him like momma and daddy’s.
It makes her feel a bit queasy and relieved all at once. And maybe even a little excited. It’s her table, cause Daryl found the house and they’re married. And that means that she gets to be in charge of things, not just the baby of the family that needs to be protected. Now, she’s smack in the center of their little household, all because daddy made them say vows and exchange rings.
It’s crazy that that’s all it takes to turn a girl into a woman: getting married. It’s not like she’s a whole different person now than she was before Daryl put momma’s ring on her finger. But here they are, and Beth’s going to make the most of getting what she’s wanted for ages: to be useful and trusted.
So she grabs up a trash bag she found and other various types of bags and containers that she’s washed up while cooking breakfast and heads out to the barn. This time, she’s careful to make just a little bit of noise when she opens the door. She’s been trying to learn stealth, given the nature of the apocalypse on their hands, but she understands that scaring Daryl is a bad idea – even if he had been more afraid of him hurting her than Beth herself was.
To her relief, he glances up at her as she comes in. “Whatcha got there, girl?”
“Some things I thought you might be needing sooner or later.” She holds out her hands as best she can without dropping anything so that he can get a look at what she’s got.
Daryl frowns in that way that Beth has learned means he’s thinking. “Take all that little stuff back; we’ll haul it into the kitchen in the trash bag and finish cutting it up there. Keep the meat cleaner.”
Beth nods and does as he says, setting her collection of containers back on the counter and trying not to feel stupid. She couldn’t have known, never having done this before, and Daryl hadn’t meant anything by his words, other than just stating facts. Still, today it’s felt like he keeps throwing all her efforts to be helpful or nice to him back in her face. Of course, maybe that’s just because she’s still a little stung by how fast he fled the bed and even the room when he realized she was there, even though it was barely dawn.
Chin up, none of it is personal, she reminds herself firmly. They’ve never talked about what their expectations for this arrangement are, practically speaking. Daryl seems to want to pretend that it doesn’t exist at all, except as a convenient lie to tell strangers. But they’re going to have to be partners when it comes to keeping themselves alive at the very least, and now strangers are living with them. So perhaps it’s a conversation she needs to consider forcing in the near future.
In the meantime, she strides back into the barn with the trash bag hanging out of her back pocket, determined to get her hands dirty. “Alright. So we just need the trash bag. Now what?”
He blinks at her. “What d’ya mean, now what?”
“You promised me you’d start teaching me how to do things like this. Well, I’m here to learn.” He hadn’t exactly, but she figured the teaching angle would go better than, “I know this is a two-person job and you need my help.”
He assesses her carefully before waving her over, knife still in his bloody right hand. “Alright girl, you wanna learn, watch close. The trick is to be precise and make little cuts, like this.” He demonstrates. “You don’t want to cut out good meat, and you can’t leave a chunk of hide on it. Now, you also want the hide to come off in one piece.” And Beth drinks in the knowledge Daryl seems to have been almost born with. Finally, he admits, or comes as close as Daryl ever comes to admitting, that he needs help, and he instructs her on how he needs her to hold the body still or help him tug at the hide.
If Beth hadn’t been raised on a farm, she’d likely feel a lot more squeamish about the whole thing. But she was, so she takes his instructions in stride and enjoys the peacefulness of having a straightforward task to complete in front of her, rather than “make sure everyone is fed today and tomorrow and the day after”. If she’s honest with herself, though, the best part is seeing Daryl relaxed and in his element.
By the time they’re back in the kitchen working up the meat into the containers she laid out, Beth’s discovered that she was right: Daryl really does have a wonderful sense of wry, sarcastic humor. Half the joy of it is the way his understated witticisms are unexpected and delivered without so much as a twitch. She’s also learned that his silences are more complicated than she thought. Actually, he talks a lot, as long as it’s about the work in front of them and not deeply personal about himself. He regales her with multiple stories about his adventures in the woods when he was younger, and he has both her and daddy rolling.
When they’re finally done, it’s midafternoon by the best of her reckoning, and time to start supper. She also puts a pot of plain water on to heat that Daryl scowls at.
“What’s that for?”
“For us to scrub up with. You’d rather use cold water?”
“Nah, don’t suppose.” He moves over to grab a slim orange bottle out of his hunting bag and hands it to her. “Here. That might help.”
It says something about mechanics and grease. “How?”
Daryl shrugs. “Best thing I found to scrub blood off ya after you’ve been elbow deep in deer. So I snatched it up when I saw it.”
And it turns out he’s right, but the fact he has it at all makes her nervous. “You were on a run too? I just thought you went hunting?”
He shrugs again. “Just ran across a tiny bump in the road sort of place. Wanted to see if I could find something.”
Beth raises an eyebrow. “And did you?”
When his ears go red, she can’t help but smile at how sweet and considerate he’s being in his own awkward, Daryl sort of way.
He clears his throat. “Well. Don’t want to ruin the surprise, but…” and he lays a book on the table.
She has to blink a moment or two before the title clicks in her mind and she realizes what kind of book he’s giving her. It’s a guide to living off the grid, which, she discovers when she flips through it in glee, it has directions for tanning hides, smoking meats, treating basic illnesses and injuries naturally, and even how to grind acorn flour, which was probably a little extreme, but Beth supposes there might come a time when she’ll be willing to give it a try.
She doesn’t realize there are tears in her eyes until the pages go blurry. She’s spent so long feeling absolutely useless, and here Daryl has risked his life getting her a book full of things that even he doesn’t know, so that she can do what she’s good at: working in the kitchen and garden and taking care of people. The world might have ended, but there’s a place for her in it after all.
She hardly realizes she’s launched herself at him until he’s tipping backwards and she’s going with him. They hit the ground with an oomph in a tangle of limbs that could not be remotely construed as romantic.
“Oh shit! I’m sorry, I’m so sorry!” She says, scrambling off. And then she realizes that she cursed and slaps her hand over her mouth cause daddy might have heard, and—
Daddy has hobbled into the kitchen from the living room as quick as he can with his crutches just in time to hear that and say, “Beth Greene” in a tone of voice that makes her feel twelve again. Michonne rushes in, sword drawn, panic and then confusion flitting across her face.
And Daryl is laughing. “Shit girl, probably gonna be feeling that bruise on my ass for a week. If that’s how you act when I bring you presents, see if I do it again.” He stands, dusts himself off gingerly, and reaches out a hand to pull her to her feet. “C’mon, Bethy.”
He lets go and saunters outside with his crossbow, presumably to make sure no walkers heard the commotion and are headed their way. Whatever his motivation, she’s glad. It’s bad enough to have her dad and Michonne watching her stare stupidly after him, red as a tomato.
But he called her Bethy.
Daryl does his parameter check in high spirits. He doesn’t know why, precisely… Okay, he absolutely knows why. Ain’t nobody ever grinned that big at him out of pure happiness that he caused. It puts a spring in his step and makes him feel like he’s done something worthwhile in his life, beyond just killing things.
And his ass might hurt like hell, but he can still feel the ghost of her body pressed up against him, all warm and soft. A shudder runs down his spine, and he can feel Merle hoverin’, just waiting to say something nasty. But for the first time in his life, Daryl manages to ignore his brother’s crude opinions. It’s not that he wants to sleep in bed next to her or anything; the idea of touching and being touched casually and consistently still gives him the creeps overall.
But he is warming to the idea of having a companion around, someone who clearly wants to learn what he can teach her about surviving this apocalypse – which really just translates to someone willing to listen to his boring ass. And hold breakfast for him. And be happy when he gives her something stupid like that book. Someone to remind him he doesn’t have to fight the whole goddamn world on his own, now that the last of his blood kin is gone.
And that’s really the thing Daryl’s getting out of this whole marriage deal: kin. The only kind of people who can’t leave no matter how mad you make them or how much they want to. Family ain’t perfect; hell, half the time his brother drove him crazy. But blood’s blood and that has to mean something. Otherwise, who else is gonna stick up for your sorry ass? And there’s only one way to make people kin who ain’t blood by birth, and that’s marrying.
Once he’s killed a few straggling walkers on the borders of what Daryl has come to think of as their land, he heads back in to wash up for supper. He should find a way to rig up a sturdy fence, help keep the walkers out better. They ain’t got enough people to man it really, so they’d still have to carry weapons with them everywhere, but…it couldn’t hurt, especially now that they’ve got the kid to look after.
If he sees another child walker it might kill him.
He’s changed into clean clothes from the dresser in their room and even shaved when Beth calls them in to eat. She sits Hershel down at one end of the table and motions Daryl to sit at the other end, facing the door. This, he realizes with a start, is the seat at the head of the table he’d been fantasizing about earlier this morning. After her father’s settled, Beth sits down on his right, Michonne and the boy to his left, and he can’t help noticing that there’s an empty seat beside Beth across from the kid, as if someone’s missing from their little group.
Got yourself a regular old family dinner here, little brother, for the first time in your whole damn life. But you can’t be content with that, can ya? No, you gotta go thinking about what’s missing from this Hallmark card. What would you even do with a kid of your own? Besides ruin it?
Hershel clears his throat and says grace, so Daryl closes his eyes like he’s learned is the done thing over the past few weeks. And then they’re passing around beans and deer roast and squash fried in corn meal (where did Beth even find that?), and it really does feel like the Thanksgiving dinners he used to see in commercials. Only he’d about kill for some bread. Still, it feels too homey and family-like, and it makes his skin crawl. Dixons weren’t meant to have nice family dinners. So, he latches on to the first thing he can think of to say: “Oughta build a fence round the place here, keep the walkers out.” Then he shovels a mess of beans in his mouth.
Hershel nods thoughtfully. “We’d have to build it high and out of something strong, but it’s a good idea.”
“Any fence would be better than none,” Michonne says like she’s ready to fight them if they disagree. “Keep them things from just roaming free up to the house.”
Daryl nods.
“Maybe we could put up a simple fence while we build a better one. It’d probably be better to have two anyway, right?” Beth says. “I think I saw some barbed wire in the barn.”
“Good thinking, Bethy,” Hershel grins. “If we string up a line of barbed wire about waste height, that should at least hold them back a bit. Give us more time to kill ’em.”
Daryl grunts in agreement. “Tomorrow morning then, bright and early.” Michonne and Beth nod.
It isn’t till supper is over that Daryl realizes what’s about to happen. They’re sitting in the living room. Hershel’s reading a Bible that he found somewhere, and Michonne is teaching the tyke the alphabet with some Scrabble letters. Beth’s thumbing through her new book, and Daryl’s glad that she isn’t looking his way, because if she was, she might see the utter panic on his face.
He’ll have to sleep in her bed again.
Well, he supposes he could pitch a fit and sleep in front of the door, but since he didn’t last night it feels weird to do it tonight. Especially if they’re trying to make this whole marriage thing even halfway believable to the strangers Beth took in. And it’s not like he fancies sleeping on the floor for the rest of his life.
But it’s dusk and soon they’ll have to head off to bed; they won’t have enough light to do anything else. He and Beth will just what? Mosey in and go to bed together? She’ll probably want to change first, and so will he. The thought of being in the same room for that gives him hives. So does the idea of staring up at the ceiling unable to fall asleep because there’s someone else beside him. There hasn’t been since… Well there hasn’t been. Just goes to show how out of his mind old man Green was when he forced this cockamamie marriage thing on him. Daryl can’t even stand anyone sleeping in the same room with him, how’s he supposed to be a goddamn husband to a girl.
He'd never wanted to mess around with Carol, but he’d know what to do with her. She’d make some absurd joke, and he’d roll his eyes and turn his back and that would be the end of it. She wouldn’t expect him to be all emotional and talking about his feelings and shit. Hell, she wouldn’t even force him to think about his feelings. She’d done lived without for so long that she’d learned not to expect that mushy stuff from a man.
Beth on the other hand…sweet, innocent, starry-eyed Beth wears her little heart on her sleeve, and he has the bruise on his ass to prove it. She’ll want all that mushy stuff he’s no damn good at, all the talking and feelings and shit. Hell, she needs it. He doesn’t begrudge her that: she takes her family’s love and mixes it all up and then gives it out to everyone just like sunshine. But when he can’t give her that, she’ll crumple up and become a dull, hollow version of herself, and he can’t bear to watch that happen.
He's just on the cusp of putting down the arrow he’s working on and making up a pallet by the door when Herschel gets up and says goodnight. He’s insisting on being as independent as possible now, so even though Beth snaps to attention and lays down her book, she keeps her seat. Old man Greene caught her almost standing too, because he gives her a knowing look and repeats almost sternly, “Goodnight, Bethy. I’ll see you in the morning.”
Chastened, Beth nods. “Goodnight, daddy.”
“Bedtime for you too, little man,” Michonne says, picking up her protesting son and carrying him away.
And just as the words, “I’ll sleep in here tonight,” form on his tongue, Beth looks up and gives him a blinding smile.
“Well, I suppose it has gotten too dark to read. But it has some really interesting stuff in it. I think I can start on the hide tomorrow – right after we finish the fence.”
Daryl can’t help the way his lips tip up. “Careful there, girl. You’ll tire yourself out.”
“But if I don’t get started on it soon, the hide will ruin, and I can’t let it go to waste, not when I might mess up and have to start all over again anyway. You were out for days gettin’ that deer!”
Do you reckon she knows what that pout does, little brother? You reckon that farm boy was man enough to show her?
Daryl shakes the intrusive thoughts out of his head and finds himself telling her he’ll help her then. “It’s a big job anyway, and we all need to learn how to do it.”
Beaming, Beth stands and offers her hand. “Well, we best get some shut-eye then.” And before he can get out a protest, she’s led him into their room.
It’s weird to think of it as their room, but Beth can’t help it. Mostly, it’s just practical: Daryl has nowhere else to stash his stuff, much less sleep, and she refuses to let him sleep on the floor again for no good reason. Lord knows if he starts that up a second time, he’ll never stop.
It also feels weird to be pulling Daryl into their room, because she has no idea what happens when they get there – not in a dirty way, but in an awkward, “I really need to take my bra off and change out of these jeans” kind of way.
The best guess she has as to social etiquette in this crazy situation is summer camp, so as soon as they’re inside the room, she snatches up her pajamas and bolts for the bathroom to change. She takes her time brushing out her hair just in case Daryl has decided to change too. And to her relief, it works. When she slips back in the room, Daryl’s jeans are on the floor, and he’s tucked up into bed.
Absently, she wonders if the sight of him in those long johns she knows he snatched is as childishly sweet as the sight of him with the blankets tucked up to his chin. It takes her a minute to get comfortable, and even when she does, she can’t fathom managing to close her eyes. It’s nights like this when she misses her ipod almost more than anything else, and the wish she could just curl up under the covers with Taylor Swift singing about boys and pretend that everything is normal – even just for a few minutes – is downright overwhelming. But the resistance she meets when she tries to pull the covers up reminds her that she’ll never worry about boys again. She’s married. To a man.
Beth rolls over on her back and stares at the ceiling. “Daryl?” she asks softly. “Are you awake?”
There’s silence so long that Beth almost gives up on him answering, despite the fact that he ain’t snoring either. But then he sighs and says, “Yeah, girl?”
“Do you think we’ll ever see the others again?”
“Ya want the truth, girl? Or ya want some fairy tale to help ya sleep?”
Beth considers. “I have to believe I’ll see Maggie again. That her and Glen will be happy, maybe they’ll even have a baby, like Lori and Rick.”
“A baby, with the world like this? More fool them.”
Suddenly she’s blinking back tears. “Then what’s the point? What’s the point of all this strugglin’ to survive if there’s no real hope for the future? If we can’t eventually make a place safe enough for people to have babies and for them babies to grow up and have babies of their own?”
When she gets no response, she raises up on her elbows and scowls at him. “Well?” He’s staring at the wall like it’s personally responsible for this whole mess, and somehow that makes her angrier. “You listen here, Daryl Dixon,” she hisses, “Daddy says you’re a survivor. And he’s right. You’ll probably survive longer than any of the rest of us. I suppose I’m nothing more than just another dead girl to you.” She rubs the edge of her bracelet where her left wrist has begun to itch. “But one day you’re going to look around and wonder what you’ve done all that surviving for. And when you do, you’re gonna miss me. And you’re gonna wish you had a baby, some reason to survive tomorrow and the day after that. Something to live for and believe in and worry about keepin’ alive! But you won’t! You’re just gonna be alone and miserable.”
Daryl snaps bolt upright, and Beth hardly has a minute to realize that he ain’t wearing a long sleeve pajama top like she expected, but a wife beater that shows off his muscles in the moonlight just as much as his ripped shirt does during the day. Only he’s paying her more attention than he has since their little wedding ceremony.
“No, you listen here, girl! Don’t you think I want this to be a world where that tyke out there can grow up safe and sound? Course I do! I woulda been the first to protect Lori’s little asskicker if Rick couldn’t. But it doesn’t change the fact that this is a shitty world to have ’em in. So don’t you go gettin’ no ideas about havin’ no babies!”
Beth sputters, sure that she’s gone as red as a fire truck – and so has Daryl, if the horrified look on his face is anything to go by. They stare at each other for an awkward moment until Daryl flops down and pulls the blanket back up to his ear, his back to her. Beth just stares down a him until he grumbles, “And another thing. I swore I’d take care of ya, didn’t I? So don’t be talkin’ like I’ll be walkin’ around after you die or somethin’.”
“I’m sorry, Daryl.” She says softly, oddly touched.
Beth is pulling the covers up to her own ear, her back to his, when he says, “Don’t worry, girl. As determined as your sister is, I’m sure her and her man will be fine. Just wait and see.”
That makes her smile. “Thanks, Daryl. And I’m sure, if Merle’s anything like you, he’s fine too. I bet he’ll catch up with us someday.”
He snorts. “You better hope not.” But he sounds less gruff than he did before.