Chapter Text
When the sunlight on his face pulled Daryl up from slumber and into the waking world, at first everything was a blurry haze of dream and memory. He snuffled into the pillow and turned over onto his belly, hiding his eyes from the light. In those blissful seconds between sleep and awake, his mind was a blessed blank, but between one breath and the next, the nightmare poured in. Beth was dead. A feeling like suffocating came over him as he remembered everything. The brief seconds he had had to feel her warm and living under his hands. The utter shock of that bitch’s gun going off and the mindless animal rage when he executed her for what she’d done. For what she’d taken from them. From him.
Underneath his cheek, Daryl felt the sheets growing damp with his tears, so he shifted himself to his knees, curled into himself like a pill bug, and pressed his palms to his eyes, trying to breathe in deep. Deep breaths, like she said. Like that time right after the prison fell and the staggering loss had only been a few hours old and he had gone and had a panic attack laying there in the tall grass next to her like a puppet with its strings cut. She had leaned over him—the sun a corona behind her golden head— and grabbed his face with gentle hands, repeating, “Breathe, Daryl, breathe. Deep breaths. Breathe with me. It’s all right. We’re okay. We’re okay. Deep breaths.”
It had taken him what felt like an eternity to draw air full into his lungs, and his pulse to stop trying to jack hammer its way out of his chest. The entire time, her eyes stayed on his, the blue of them an anchor. But his gratefulness was no match for his shame and his guilt- that this girl whose father he loved and failed should have to comfort him? It was unbearable. So he shoved her off, and began the campaign of shutting himself off completely. How he wished now that he could have that moment back, right before he’d barked, “M’fine now. Get off!” If he had that moment to live again, he’d pull her down against him, span her back with his arms, and whisper his thank you, I’m sorry, forgive me’s into her hair.
But she was gone now. No, not gone, dead. She was dead and... she was dead and... singing in the next room?
With a jolt, Daryl opened his eyes. The sight that greeted him shocked him into a strange feeling of paralyzing confusion. He knew this room. It was a real bed he was in, not the backseat of the filthy pick-up where he’d collapsed after digging Beth’s grave. Those were the gauzy white curtains on the windows, and the four cream-colored walls of the first floor guest room where he had spent an evening convalescing after he nearly killed himself searching for Sophia almost two years ago. Everything looking just as it had back then, right down to the family bible on the nightstand.
Daryl knew dreams from reality; his life had been too stark and too cruel for one not to be an escape from the other. His surroundings felt as real as anything—as real as the taste of cold beer or the fur of a rabbit or the smell of gasoline. When he swung his legs over the side of the bed and touched bare feet to the wooden floor, that felt real as well, and so clear now that he could no longer ignore it, he could hear her. Her voice carried some song, though not loud enough that he could make out the words, and all he knew was that even if it was a dream, he had to see her. And if God was kind, maybe hold her just once.
Half-crazed now, Daryl didn’t bother with searching for clothes. In nothing but his drawers he was at the door in four strides, almost expecting everything around him to disappear as soon as he opened it. It didn’t. He rounded the corner, down a straight shot to the kitchen, and there she was. Her back was to him as she washed dishes, and he could hear the words of her song.
By the waters
the waters of Babylon
He didn’t dare move forward. If this was a dream, and it was to dissolve away into the starkness of waking and pain when she turned, then he wasn’t going to do anything to draw her attention. He’d stand and listen to her sing until his legs grew roots into the floor.
We lay down and wept
and wept for thee Zion
And it was so much like some beautiful domestic vision that he knew it couldn’t really be real. Her hands were up to their elbows in dishwater as she sang softly, and the mid-morning sun was streaming through the window, bathing Beth in gold and shining white.
We remember thee, remember thee, Zion
Before his mother began worshipping the bottle in earnest, Marianne Dixon had been Catholic, and when he was very small, she had placed an icon of the Virgin Mary on the shelf above his bed. Her image had been clothed in robes the color of robins' eggs, and there was a crown of stars around her head. His mother had taught him to pray to her... full of grace... blessed art thou... and he, he had tried. But he never felt like he had uttered a truly genuine prayer until this moment, with Beth standing in profile, wearing sunlight instead of a shroud. Please, give her back to me. Give her back. I’ll be the best kind of man there is. I’ll give my own life. Just give her back... or if you can’t, if you can’t, let me stay here forever. Don’t make me go back.
No sooner had Daryl realized he was weeping— huge, gasping sobs—worse even than his cries yesterday as he carried her body down five flights of stairs—than Beth was turning, startled, to stare at him, mouth open. Her face was only blurred by his tears, though, not by the haze of a dream departing, and when he understood that he might be allowed to touch her, nothing could have stopped him.
She managed to stutter out, “Mr. Dixon?” and he could hear it in her voice, how she was younger, so much younger than the Beth in his waking world—not only in body but in spirit—and she hardly knew him, Jesus Christ, she didn’t know him at all but it didn’t matter. He closed the distance and pulled her to him, though he could feel her resisting, which broke his heart a little. If this were a dream, why wouldn’t she hold him in return? He couldn’t seem to stop sobbing though, and now he could hear himself repeating, “Beth? Oh, God. Beth. Are you real? Tell me you’re real. Tell me,” and that seemed to pull the tension right out of her. Always a nurturer, this girl.
“It’s all right. Shush. It’s all right, Mr. Dix... Daryl. It’s all right, Daryl. It was just a dream. You’re fine. We’re all fine. Everything’s going to be all right.”
Shirtless, covered in his own snot and tears, Daryl sank to his knees, pulling her with him, where she continued to patiently bear his embrace, and whisper shaky reassurances into his hair. And that’s how Rick, Lori and Hershel found them moments later.