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The song was what she felt, there with him, like this. It started with the words "You don't wanna be my boyfriend" and "I don't wanna be your girl." Did that draw him in from the other room? Had he heard that part? If so, he must know she thought about them as more than friends. Her song pondering whether or not it should happen at all, between them. She soothed her fingers along the keys, the rhythm of the night swaying through her pores and her finger tips.
Daryl was right there, watching. He was always watching. Always protecting them. He was Daryl. All Daryl, all the time. He was all she had. That was okay. Somehow, after all the heartache and loss, after all the pain and anger, somehow, just her and Daryl was okay. Did that mean they should be lovers? She didn't know. Doesn't that get messy? Like the song says? Yes. But how long can they go on without it? How long can they live platonically like a big brother and little sister, like this?
"Keep singin'," he'd said. Daryl loved to hear her play and sing. Even if he usually made false protests. She knew that. Beth knew that before she sat down at the keys. Daryl was out there somewhere and he'd heard her, just like she wanted. But what now? What was she going to do with that now? Nothing? Be good? Like in the song? Just be good? Right? That was the right thing to do. Daryl's like 50 or something. And she giggled at herself. No he's not. Of course not. But still. Just be good. They were being good. This whole time. They were.
Daryl was a gentleman. Maybe not by choice. Maybe because he was broken and abused and shy and hurt. But whatever the reason, he was good to her and didn't pressure her or hurt her at all. He didn't make her think he wanted things she couldn't give. He was Daryl. He was a protector through and through. She might as well have been Judith. Beth smiled. Was she his 'Lil Ass Kicker too? Or Two? Maybe 2.0? She sighed to herself.
Changing the tune she played to something more melodic and old. Something soothing and sleepy. She knew Daryl was still awake. Could see him fidgeting in her periphery. His arm still slung across his eyes, those fingers playing with the air. His other hand couldn't quite keep still either. And she smiled. He was so much like a kid, sometimes. Even though he was all man, to her, most of the time. A grown man who killed and survived and thrived in this crazy world. He was greasy and dirty and a little crazy, too.
Beth's mind flashed to all his outbursts when he was a mean drunk. And all his confessions. He lived a life she'd never fully understand. Except that his father had been much like her Granddaddy. The correlation between his childhood and her dad's put Daryl squarely back in the fatherly category. Did she want him to stay there? He was a grown man, she repeated to herself. He wasn't a boy like Zach or Jimmy. Even her big brother Shawn had never been a man like Daryl. As she gently roused the lyrics of another lonely love song from her lips, she thought of Daryl as more than a father or a big brother. Beth thought of the feelings that coursed through her when he leaned in close, every time, to teach her how to hold the crossbow and aim. Earlier today, he'd held her hand. How did that feel? Did it feel like Daddy or Shawn holding her hand? Did it?
No. But she didn't know what it felt like. Not like Jimmy or Zach. Daryl wasn't boyfriend material. She didn't want to be his girl. In truth, she didn't want to be anyone's girl anymore. She wanted to be a woman. She wanted to be seen as a woman by anybody besides Carol and Michonne, back at the prison. Beth remembered when those women recognized her maturity, rising in her lonely maternal eyes, while she soothed Judith day after day. There it was. That catch in her throat and that pain in her chest. The pain of losing everyone and everything. Except Daryl. It was all she could do not to slip on the keys and belt out an accidental sharp clutter of sound that'd wake Daryl. Wait! He was asleep? He was! She could hear his breathing, rough and ragged, above the sound of her notes.
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Daryl entered the house silently. He'd heard her begin to play while outside on the porch. Now inside, the piano trilling rolled through Daryl's shoulder blades like a whisper, like wings unfolding. He glided quietly down the hall, as if on the trail of her music. Daryl didn't want her to know he was there. So she wouldn't. Then he stopped, as words joined the notes:
"We're alone in our own world
You don't wanna be my boyfriend
I don't wanna be your girl."
"Damn right," were the first words to pop in Daryl's mind. But his heart stopped. Boyfriend? Your girl? How could that be possible? Shit. What was she thinking? Why did he like it? Damn. Daryl was just an old pervert if he thought of her like that. He bit at his non-existent finger nails. He had, of course, thought about her... How could he not? He was a guy. He couldn't help thinking about sex as often as eating or finding a place to sleep safely. More often, to be honest. Even after the apocalypse. But usually those thoughts made him ashamed and unsure. Especially since he'd escaped the prison. Because he was with Beth. And she could not, would not, be that way for him. Could she? No. She was singing about boyfriends, not about that. Girls want emotions. They want tenderness. Not... that.
He couldn't hide anymore. Had to be closer to her as she sang and played.
Laying in the coffin, he listened to a few more lines of the song, about being good. He had to be good to her. He had to be right with her.
But they'd been closing the gap between each other ever since the moonshine. She'd held him as he cried. He'd carried her on his back. He smelled her sweat and her sweet scent as she leaned in to his lessons on tracking and hunting. Daryl was glad he'd hidden his face from her. These were not thoughts he wanted her to see. Beth and Daryl had held hands. He couldn't remember holding hands with any other living person! Ever! And it just happened with Beth! Just like that! Like he did it all the damn time or something! What the hell? He drummed his fingers on his chest.
Beth's song changed. Her mood changed. Before long, it was lulling him to sleep, hard as he tried to fight it. Daryl didn't like falling asleep and leaving her alone without his protection. But, like he'd said, there was only one way in- the front door- and he'd covered it with can alarms, just now. His mind slowed. His breathing too. He let out a huff of air through his nose as his body relaxed from his knees up to his neck. The sweet symphony played in his body and mind, just for him, from her.
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Beth stole glance after glance at Daryl's sleeping form. When she finally got up the nerve, she rose slowly, softly. Beth made up her mind. Holding hands with Daryl had been different, felt different than with Daddy or Shawn or Zach or Jimmy. She'd never be brave enough to try to kiss him while he was awake. But now, she'd know for sure if he felt like a platonic protector or not. She'd know by how it felt to kiss him. Right now. And her foot falls were silent, like he'd taught her. Shimming up to the edge of the coffin, she suddenly thought of Disney's Snow White. She thought of herself as the Prince and Daryl the pale sleeping face with small, upturned lips.
But then she really looked at him.
His lips weren't like the red, red rose... and his skin was more caramel than snow. Looking down at him, she felt her body respond in a way it hadn't since sitting on the back porch with Jimmy, hoping Maggie wouldn't burst out and catch them.
What she was about to do was equally as dangerous as kissing Jimmy anywhere on her father's farm. If she got caught doing this, the consequences might be more severe! She thought of Daryl's rough violence in the moonshine shack, the way his hands gripped and left her sore. Would he jump up and grab her angrily if she woke him? It was enough to make her bail on the whole idea. But then she looked at him again. And those flutters filled her once more. She thought of the Prince, how he bent straight at the waist, all regality over the coffin. He'd placed one hand near Snow's shoulder and leaned down with the gentlest of kisses. Beth knew she couldn't get a hand anywhere near Daryl without waking him. His breaths rose deeply, and fell, all phlegmy and with a few gurgles. She breathed in deep. She couldn't let out a breath when she was close to his skin, or he'd feel it and wake. So, Beth had to hold her breath. She exhaled one last time, breathed in deeply again, then bent at the waist, straight as a board.
Her lips grazed his for no more than a millisecond. Then she slid backwards and away as quickly as he'd ever taught her to move in the woods. She exhaled again. Hard. Sat down at the piano. Started to play a lullaby. She was making it up as she went, trying not to put in notes from "Someday My Prince Will Come." Beth felt it. Whatever the Prince felt when he kissed Snow White. An awakening. A spark. A hint of magic. A moment of destiny. Or something. She shook her head. She was so silly! It was something. But it wasn't all that, alright?! It was like a... a... tingling, maybe? That didn't mean anything. Right? Did it? She shook her head again. Reign it in, girl. He'll never look at you like that. You're not true love's first kiss.
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Everything in Daryl seized up. But he controlled his breathing. Only that. She had to think he was still asleep. He'd been asleep up until the moment she'd inhaled that deep breath before bending over him. His heart was racing. His muscles clenched. Daryl's jaw locked. He wanted to leap up and run like hell. But how would that make her feel? What the fuck was he supposed to do now? She kissed him! Little Bethy Greene... sweet little girl... innocent and loveable and gentleness personified. Beth kissed Daryl Dixon in a coffin. Like Snow White in reverse! He couldn't help the smallest turn of one side of his lips into the quickest of secret smiles.
He'd do something for her. He decided. He'd make her breakfast! He'd talk to her about things. They couldn't move too fast. Couldn't be like a married couple bunkered down in this house overnight. But... they could bunker down, couldn't they? Just stay here a spell and see what happens? That could work. Why live on the run? Especially if this was something new and different, between them. Something to be explored. Right? Or at least felt out or talked out or... Daryl was terrible at this stuff. He couldn't be what she wanted.
But he decided something for sure right then. He'd never give her a piggy back ride again. If he carried her tomorrow or any other day, it'd be like a man carries a woman. He'd scoop her up properly. That was for sure.
Daryl barely slept the rest of the night. But she did. He knew she was passed out deep when he got up in the morning and snuck to the kitchen, fixing them what he dubbed a redneck brunch. And when he excitedly insisted she get in there, that he had a surprise, she didn't move fast enough because of her busted ankle. So, he scooped her up, just like he planned, like a man carrying a woman.
Daryl carried her into what he hoped would be their kitchen, together, for a time. Just to see what happened. Or could happen. Or might. Someday.