Walking Dead 1. Chapter 1

**Bad Decisions: A **_**Walking Dead **_**Oneshot**

**By: Storychan **

**Takes place directly after s4e12, "Still". After burning down the distillery, Beth is still a little out of it. Just out of it enough to want to make some bad decisions with Daryl. But will Daryl let her? Daryl/Beth. Don't like, don't read! **

After they set the distillery on fire and flipped it off, they kept walking into the cold night, and Daryl found himself smiling. This was the same stupid kind of shenanigans he and Merle had got up to as teenagers, he thought. Breaking things, raising hell, not giving a damn. Being optimistic about life. Yeah, he remembered when he was like Beth – before life, loss, and the apocalypse had beaten it out of him. That was why he had let her drink, and all of that. Why not? The whole world was gone to hell anyway, so why not let the kid have something that made her smile?

Daryl, up til this point, hadn't had reason to smile in awhile. Mostly, he'd been trying not to cry. His brother had always told him to be a man, and men don't cry. They tough it out. They keep the same, surly face on and stay pissed off at the world. He could leave Beth her coping mechanisms, because they were no worse than his shoot-everything strategy for feeling better in this new, goddawful world. When he shot walkers with his crossbow, or those smug bastards' portraits with darts at the country club where Beth found the Schnapps – _No way he was letting her have stupid, fuddy-duddy drinks like that – _he felt good. If drinking and flipping everything off made Beth feel good, he'd let her go for it. Good was so hard to come by these days.

He'd gotten pissed off at her, earlier, when he was drunk, because he always thought she'd had more good in her life than him, and yet she thought she had things so bad now. She didn't get it.

Or maybe she did, a little. They'd both lost everyone else – Rick, Carol, Michonne, Maggie – Daryl had been willing to accept that he'd never see them again, now. Beth….She hadn't, tho. She still believed. Or at least, she tried to. Daryl had been surprised to hear her admit she wasn't all happy and junk, after all. But then, who would be, in a world like this, where everybody was dying and nobody was staying dead?

Daryl thought he'd rather be by himself, so he wouldn't have to feel the pain of losing anybody anymore. He'd lost his brother not too long ago – the person he'd been following aimlessly his entire life. But now, Beth was aimlessly following him. And he couldn't just leave her, could he? She wouldn't leave him alone. She'd made him admit who he was before the world went to shit. She'd made him talk about how he _really _felt, and admit she wasn't the one he was really mad at. He was mad at himself, for losing everybody. He'd thought about just being by himself, but it occurred to him as he walked silently beside her in the cold Georgia night air that he didn't want to be without her. He'd prefer not to lose her, too.

He didn't say this to her, of course. He didn't say anything. He'd always been a man of few words. He shouldn't have talked so much tonight. He shouldn't have screamed how unfeeling he thought she was for acting like she didn't care that two of her boyfriends were dead. Of course she cared. He should've known that. She just didn't show it. He didn't show much, either. They were quite the pair, weren't they? He remembered, through the alcoholic haze he'd put himself in, that he might have called her a bitch during their little fight. He supposed he should apologize for that. He didn't really mean it. He'd told her he was a dick when he was drunk. He tried not to be as much of a dick when he was sober.

He really should learn to shut his mouth, he guessed. But…it had felt so good when he opened it, told Beth everything, got it off his chest. And if he thought about it….It had felt good when she had grabbed him and hugged him from behind, wrapped her arms around him and tried to comfort him, even after all he'd said to her. He wondered why she was so nice to him. Was it just because they were the only ones out here?

They were alone together. In all off the supply runs and walker fights, all of everything, he wasn't sure he'd been alone with just her for this long before. It felt strange, but he realized it didn't feel bad.

"You wanna make camp for the night?" Beth asked, stunning him out of his reverie. They were in a clearing in the woods now. He supposed this was as good a place as anyway, so he nodded at her wordlessly before setting up a campfire.

"We gonna be eating snake again tonight?" Beth asked with a grimace. Daryl rolled his eyes. It was all they had, wasn't it? She should be lucky he had kept leftovers from lunch. He handed some to her, and she took them. Yeah, she'd eat them if the alternative was starving, wouldn't she?

"You need water?" Daryl asked, holding up the old coke bottle half-full of water he'd been carrying around.

"Nah," Beth replied.

"You're not still a little…y'know, are you?" Daryl asked with a sigh.

"Drunk, you mean?" Beth chuckled. "What if I was?"

"Well, having some water will fix that right up," Daryl suggested, slouching against a tree. "Take it."

"What if I don't want to fix it up?" Beth said, her voice a challenge.

Suddenly, Daryl looked straight at her. At her mussed blonde hair and the crazy look in her pale eyes. She was definitely still a little out of it. _Damn, _he thought. _Figures she'd be a lightweight. Little girl like that. _

"If you stay like that," Daryl warned, "You won't be alert. You need to stay sharp when there's walkers in the woods 'round here. It'd be a bad decision to not look after yourself, girl."

"What if I wanna make some bad decisions?" he heard Beth purr, and then turned around and saw that she was standing right in front of him now, looking down at him with a slight grin.

"The hell do you mean?" Daryl asked, backing up. "I'm tryin' to make sure you don't get yourself killed, alright?"

"I'll die eventually," Beth replied. "I'm aware of that. I'm ok with that. But tonight, I wanna _live_." She crouched down so that her face was right next to his own. "Y'know what I mean?"

"Have some water, kid," Daryl growled, shoving the bottle between their two faces and then standing, trying to get her out of his way. _She has no idea what she's saying. _

"I'm not a kid!" Beth cried, staggering towards him again. "I'm a woman! I've grown up, not that you've noticed!"

"What are you talking about, Beth?" Daryl asked, trying to get Beth to sit down, have some water, shut up before she said or did something she regretted.

"You treat me like a little girl you got to look out for!" Beth shrieked. "I've proven today that I can take care of myself. I've proven tonight that I'm not as innocent as you think."

"So what?" Daryl scoffed. "What is it you think you want now?"

"You," Beth said softly. "I want you, Daryl." And suddenly she was all up in his face again, throwing her arms around him again, and then suddenly her face was so close to his….she leaned gently towards his lips….

"No!" Daryl protested, turning his head away. "What in the Sam Hill do you think you're doing, Beth Greene?"

"I want you," Beth repeated, unbuttoning the top button of her shirt. Daryl tried not to notice. "Kiss me," she begged. "Hell, do more than kiss me, if you want."

"I want you to stop!" Daryl scowled. He shoved her off of him. "Stop, and think, you stupid girl!"

Beth backed away, eyes wide. She flushed a deep shade of red. "I'm sorry," she muttered. "I'm an idiot. Of course…of course you wouldn't want me like that…."

"It's…..not that I don't want you," Daryl confessed, finally, still refusing to look at her. "Dammit, Beth, it's not that I haven't noticed that you're eighteen now, and that, hell, you look it. I've noticed that your body and mind have changed. Don't think I haven't. It's probably wrong of me. You've got to be too young for me. Your daddy would kill me if he knew how I was looking at you…."

"My daddy's not here," Beth reminded.

"You think that makes it alright?" Daryl roared. "No, it makes it a hundred times worse, because every time I look at you, I think of your old man, I think of how I watched him lose his head, and I think about how nobody is left in this world to look after you, to worry if you're drinking or not, if you're ok with everything's that happened or not, if you're….if you're comin' on to guys twice your age because you're half-drunk and you're too stupid to realize it's all wrong for you or not! Dammit, Beth, you're my responsibility now. I'm all you got. I can't….mistreat you, like that…."

"What if I wanna be mistreated?" Beth asked.

"Shut your whore mouth!" Daryl growled. "Just cuz your daddy's gone and can't shoot any guy that looks at you twice doesn't mean you can start acting like a damn whore and trying to get it on with the first guy you see!"

Beth's eyes widened. She looked stunned, and maybe like she was going to cry. Daryl knew he'd gone too far. This was why he shouldn't be around people, because he said shit like this. How was he supposed to fix this now?

"It's not because you're the first guy I see," Beth said calmly, strongly. She wasn't as fragile as he thought. "It's because you're _you_, Daryl. You're the only one I want. The only one I've wanted for a while now."

"W…what?" Daryl blinked, taken aback. "What're you sayin'?"

"I'm saying I like you," Beth confessed. "I like you a lot, Mr. Dixon."

"Why me?" Daryl blurted, before he could stop himself.

"I feel safe around you," Beth explained. "I feel like you'll protect me, but I also feel like you won't control me….I like the way I feel when I'm with you. I really enjoyed spending time with you today. Drinking with you, talking with you….I want to do….other things with you. Is that so wrong?"

"It's not just that it's wrong for you," Daryl clarified. "It's that it's wrong for me. I can't take advantage of a girl, a naïve girl who's never even gotten drunk before, whose daddy was a man I respected, who doesn't know what she's doing…."

"It's not taking advantage," Beth promised. "It's what I want, and I'm legal now, ain't I? Or is it that you don't want me," she frowned. "That you're not interested in me, because I'm young and I'm not as mature and sexy as Maggie, or Michonne, or Carol….."

"You're plenty sexy," Daryl argued. The truth was, when they'd hid in the trunk of that abandoned car last night, when he'd spent the whole night with her so close to him, in his lap basically, shaking and scared and clinging to him, he'd…..he'd liked it. Could a man really spend all night that close to a woman's body and not feel something? Damn, he'd been able to feel every last curve Beth had developed. He'd wanted to reach out and touch them, then and there. When she'd wrapped her arms around him earlier, when he was drunk and screaming at her, he'd liked it, and he'd wanted more of her hands on him. And when she'd started playing "Never Have I Ever" in the distillery…damn, of course he'd had to ask where she learned that game! Because every girl he'd ever played it with before had been looking for something, hadn't they? All of their "nevers" had turned dirty pretty fast, and then had turned to "Wanna try it now, Daryl?" and he hadn't said no, had he? Every time he'd hung with those filthy redneck broads his brother liked and drank with them like that. He didn't think Beth was that same kind of girl. She had to be better than that, right? But….

She was staring at him now, eyes full of desire, begging to be touched by him. They were alone, and she was right, she wasn't a kid, she was a woman. And he was a man. A man who had gone without for far too long…

"C'mon," Beth begged. "If you want it, you can have it. Any way you want it. I don't care if it's a bad decision! If the dead hadn't started rising, if the whole world hadn't gone crazy, I'd be in college by now, making bad decisions all over the place! Getting plenty wasted and going home with the bad boys. Staying out late, flipping off anybody who said anything about it, not having a care in the world. That's what being young is about, isn't it? Growing up, going wild. Making a few bad decisions before you get old. Not thinking you're going to die every day and eating snakes in the middle of the damn woods, living like you ain't even human anymore. I don't have a school to party at, I don't have a home to get kicked out of, I don't have friends my age to be bad influences on me, I don't have a boyfriend to fool around with, the only drinking I can do is by stealing from somebody a walker ate. Dammit, Daryl Dixon, you are the only bad decision I have left to make."

"That's true," Daryl grinned. "I may be the only bad boy you got to play around with. And trust me, girl, I want to. But not tonight."

"What?" Beth railed. "Why?"

"You're drunk," Daryl sighed. "You can't really make a decision right now, good or bad. You might not even remember this in the morning, and that's why I ain't scared to say yes, I do want you. But not like this."

Daryl looked up at Beth to see what she was going to say next. But when he looked at her, he saw that she had fallen asleep. He chuckled to himself. Yeah, he did envy her. The way all her life's bad decisions were still ahead of her. The way she was still young enough to not be afraid to make them. The way she was young enough to still believe.

He stood guard that whole night, watching her sleep with a slight smile on his face, as he kept the walkers away. It felt good to smile, for once in a long while.

%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%

"Oh Lord, why's the sun so damn bright?"

Daryl woke up the next morning, unsure of when he'd fallen asleep, to the sound of Beth whining.

"My head hurts so much, Daryl!" he heard Beth cry as he sat up. She was splashing her face in the water from their bottle, trying to shield her eyes from the sun with her other hand.

"It happens," Daryl laughed. "Welcome to your first hangover, kid."

"I'm not a kid!" Beth protested.

"Oh…..I know," Daryl replied knowingly. "I definitely know."

"Huh?" Beth blinked. She put her hand down and looked at him. "Hey, what happened last night? Did I say anything strange? I was really out of it and I don't quite remember what happened."

"Nothing happened," Daryl assured her. "Nothing at all."

"Why're you laughing like that?!"

"I ain't laughing," Daryl said. "I'm just thinking, Beth….You're going to make a lot of bad decisions. All young people do. You're just lucky that you got a grown man whose made enough bad decisions already to know which ones are the kind worth making."

"Huh?"

"Nothing," Daryl smiled. "Come on, grab your water bottle, let's get going and see if we can stay out of trouble."

Trouble – yes, trouble was exactly what little Miss Beth was going to be. But Daryl found that, somehow, he didn't quite mind.


	2. Chapter 2

_**Nobody Knows: **_**A **_**Walking Dead **_**Oneshot**

**By: Storychan**

**Plot: Nobody knows the love Daryl has lost. Nobody knows what Daryl and his love did before he lost her, either. And he'd prefer to keep it that way. Daryl/Beth!**

**Ok, guys….**_**Bad Decisions **_**was supposed to be a stand-alone oneshot – no updates, no sequels. A self-contained little piece of Bethyl. But then y'all started favoriting, and following, and reviewing like crazy, begging me for more…I never expected that this little oneshot – my first Bethyl AND first **_**Walking Dead **_**oneshot – would get so much attention! But I'm really honored that you enjoyed it so much. And so, by popular demand, I'm giving y'all, my wonderful fans, one more oneshot: a sequel to **_**Bad Decisions **_**that takes place mostly in Daryl's head during the beginning of 4x15 "Us", but with flashbacks to 4x13 "Alone" that include actual uh, romantic content, because y'all asked for it. **

**Wow, I used a lot of "Y'alls" in that paragraph. My semi-recent move to Georgia, and the amount of time I had to spend in Daryl's head to write this, is really starting to affect me. -_-**

**Oh, well….enjoy, everyone, and don't forget to review! **

"_You must've lot a real good piece of tail". _

The comment really pissed Daryl off when it came out of Len's mouth. He almost stabbed the guy right there. _How dare he talk about Beth like that, _he thought. _How dare he talk about her like she's some damn piece of meat. He don't know her. He has no idea who this girl is I've lost. _

Daryl himself hadn't realized just quite what he'd lost, either, until she was gone. Disappeared into that damned car, and he hadn't been able to do nothing for her. She hadn't just been a "piece of meat" to him. He'd tried so hard to not think of her that way at all. She was eighteen. Not a crime to touch, no. But it still felt wrong. It still felt like Hershel would hate him if he knew these thoughts he was having about his little girl. He wasn't here to stop Daryl from having them, or even from acting on them, but like he'd told Beth when she was drunk in the woods that night, that only made him feel guiltier. He'd resisted Beth, that night, when she'd thrown herself at him. But nobody had known how hard it was to do. He'd wanted her. Desperately. When she'd reached out, begging to be touched? He'd almost done it. What she was telling him to do. Even though she was drunk, drunk enough that he'd be arrested for doing that if the law still operated and the world hadn't descended into anarchy and shit. There was no law now. Rick, who had been a sheriff….before, had no authority now. There was no authority. Guys like Len could do whatever they want, take whatever they want. Daryl supposed he could, too. But just because he had the freedom to didn't make it right. That was the difference between Len, and these other new men in the group he'd found, and him. Daryl wouldn't do the wrong thing just because he knew he wouldn't get caught. Just because nobody knew he was doing it.

There was a lot nobody knew about Daryl. Nobody had known who he'd been…before, after Merle, the only witness, had died. Nobody, that is, until he'd told Beth. He'd confessed things to her he'd never told anyone. He'd trusted her and her alone with his secret. He wasn't sure why. He supposed it was because of her…purity. _Damn, that just sounds creepy, _he thought. _Saying you like her because she's pure. If you're trying not to sound like a pedophile, you ain't doing a hell of a job, Dixon. _

But that wasn't what he meant, anyway. It wasn't her innocence – the way she'd never gotten drunk before, or done anything else "risky" – that appealed to him. It was the purity of her spirit. That sheer…incorruptibility. She'd been thrown in to the same twisted, broken world he had. A world where people you love keep dying, and then not staying dead, and then dying again, but this time because of you. It was sick. This brave new world of death and hunger, danger and pain, could make anyone sick to their soul. Good people were stealing now. Killing, too, just to survive. Daryl had truly started to believe that nobody in this world was still good, not when you had to become selfish, heartless just to live through the night. That some people might even be happy the world had ended, because now they could do whatever they damn well feel like. Humans were naturally bastards, he figured, just waiting for the opportunity for society to tell them it was OK.

But Beth was different. She did things nobody else would think to do. She thought about burying the dead when they were trying to eat her. She thought about thanking people, in notes, for supplies they were taking. She still thought about being good to people, even when there was no reason to. Or rather, she didn't need a reason. Beth was just…good. She was a real good girl. And Daryl? He knew he was a bad boy. Nobody knew just how bad of a boy –no, a man- he'd been.

That night, at the funeral home, when Beth had been playing her music, Daryl had liked it. He hadn't heard music since….since he didn't even know when. Nobody thought about music anymore. They were too busy thinking about which house to raid, or which walker was going to try and bite their brains out next. Nobody else thought like Beth did. And that was why Daryl wanted to keep her around. Why his feelings for her weren't just about how nice her ass looked as he stared at it from the coffin he was sleeping in while she played, not looking at him, oblivious. He was sleeping in a coffin…That was some damn symbolism for you, wasn't it? It was like he was this vampire, lying in wait for the innocent girl to turn her back, so he could, what…attack?

No, he wasn't like that. But he was surprised she knew that. He was surprised she trusted him. Especially when he'd grabbed her so roughly the other day outside the distillery, trying to force her to shoot walkers she didn't want to, with her screaming for him to stop. He'd thought about the way he'd treated her when he was drunk and he hated himself. A girl like that deserved to treated with gentleness, with care. A girl like Beth deserved better than him.

He knew why he wanted, why he more than wanted, her. But what he didn't understand was why she wanted anything to do with him. _I suppose, _he figured, _I could ask her. _But the trouble was she didn't remember last night. She didn't remember coming onto him, she didn't remember admitting she wanted him so bad. He wondered if now, sober, playing her sweet piano songs in the near-dark, she still would want him. Maybe that desire had faded with the alcohol. It wasn't like he could ask _that. _He'd made the choice not to tell her what happened that night, to pretend it never happened and that they could still just be friends. _But the problem is, _he realized, _Even if she doesn't know she said she wanted me, I know that I said I wanted her. I admitted it, and now I can't stop thinking about it. About how bad I want to be more than friends with this girl. But I don't even understand why she wants to be friends – to be even that – with a guy like me. I got to figure it out. _With that thought in mind, he propped himself up in the coffin and called out to her gruffly, "C'mere!"

The music stopped suddenly as she turned to face him with bright, curious blue eyes. "What is it, Daryl?" she asked sweetly.

"Just….c'mere," Daryl growled. He didn't know how to talk to her. He probably sounded like an ass. He wanted to speak sweeter to her, because that was what she deserved, but he didn't know how.

Beth strolled over to him, propping her elbows against the coffin's edge and placing her hands under her head, which she tilted inquisitively. "Is something the matter?" she asked. She was standing so close to him. His face wasn't that far from hers. He tried to back up but hit his head on the open coffin lid. "Son of a bitch!" he swore without thinking.

"Are you hurt?" Beth asked, concerned, drawing closer instead of backing away. _Shit. _She placed a tender hand on the back of his head to check for bumps. He winced. "Don't touch me like that, girl," he warned.

"I'm sorry," Beth said nervously. "Did I hurt you?"

"No," Daryl grumbled. "No, pain ain't what I'm feeling, you stupid girl. Dammit, don't do this to me!"

Why had he yelled that? He'd been rude to her again! He looked up, expecting to see offense or even fear in her face when he did. Instead, he saw that she was blushing furiously. _Oh, sweet Jesus, _he realized suddenly. He'd just admitted how her touching him made him feel! _Now you've screwed everything up, Dixon. Hope you're proud of yourself._

"If me touching you doesn't hurt…" Beth quickly figured out. "Daryl, does that mean it feels…good?"

Now Daryl found himself blushing. Why? Why did he flush and get nervous like a damn teenager when it came to her?

"Doesn't matter," Daryl muttered, trying to look away.

"It matters," Beth argued, and suddenly she was grabbing the back of his head again, turning it so he was looking her in the eye. "It matters because touching you feels good to me, too."

"W-what?" Daryl found his heart racing. Beth wasn't drunk now. She was stone-cold sober, and she was still saying she wanted to touch him. Was this real? "You….you ain't know what you're talking about, girl. You should just back away from me, before you do something stupid…"

"Don't treat me like a child!" Beth cried. "Like I don't know what I want, Daryl! I'm an adult, and I'm in my right mind now, so you've got no excuse to turn me down this time!"

_This time? _"Hold on now…are you telling me you…_remember _what you said to me when you were drunk?"

"Yes," Beth confessed. "I do. Of course I do! But when I saw you trying to pretend like it didn't happen, I assumed it was because you didn't want me like I wanted you. Like you only said you did to make me feel better…"

"I meant every word," Daryl drawled in a low, husky whisper. "I do want you, Beth. I definitely meant that."

"Y-you did?"

"Hell yeah, girl."

Beth smiled, and leaned forward. Daryl brushed her away. "Hold on now!" he cried. "Now, you listen – I also meant it when I said it was wrong for me to just…do what I want with you, now that your old man is gone, just because we're alone, and I ain't going to get caught, and because nobody's going to know…"

"Why not?" Beth pleaded. "Why can't we do this? We're both adults, aren't we?"

"Just because you're an adult doesn't mean you got to start doing that," Daryl explained. "Back when the world were a more human place? Good boys and girls didn't just…touch each other, not without making, I don't know, some kind of commitment first!"

"Is that what you want?" Beth asked. "Do you want me to commit to you? You're asking me to – what? Go steady?"

Those were such childish terms. Daryl was a grown man, and back in the day, he hadn't been a good boy. He hadn't made any kinds of commitments with women before he grabbed them and brought them to his truck, or his house, or wherever he could get his hands on them. He'd never been the "go-steady" type before. That smacked of an innocence he'd never really had. But Beth…she was the "go-steady" type. Always had been. Maybe that was why he wanted that with her. Because it felt like the right thing to do. No, it was more than that. He really cared about her. He wanted to _stay _with her, until one of them got eaten by walkers or whatever. No…he wanted to believe that they could stay together _without _getting eaten by walkers. He wanted to survive with her. He….he loved her. _When the hell did that happen? _Daryl wondered. _When did I start caring so much about this girl?_

"Yes," he confessed, finally. "I want to….go steady. But if you don't want that…if this is just, some, I don't know, bad-boy crush you got, or some daddy-issues thing, some desire to be a bad girl all of a sudden you got goin' on…."

"I want that," Beth replied, and Daryl's eyes widened. "I want to _belong _to you, Daryl, but I thought there was no way you could ever want to belong to a girl like me. I'm not the strongest, or the sexiest, or the coolest girl in the group, and I know that…"

"Them other girls ain't here right now, is they?" Daryl purred passionately. "The only ones here right now is you and me."

And suddenly Beth was flinging herself over the side of the coffin, and then she was in it with him, and her arms were wrapping around him, and then her lips met his, and he couldn't hold himself back anymore. He grabbed her roughly and pulled her on top of him and kissed her, hard. His desire knew no restraint anymore as his tongue surged forward into her mouth, and she accepted it eagerly before responding with her own. Her thumb digged into his short sleeve and explored his bicep, then his clavicle. Her other hand ran over his ass before twisting up inside his shirt, clawing at his back. He couldn't believe her ferocity. He couldn't believe Beth, good-girl Beth, pure-as-pure-can-be Beth, hot-farmer's-daughter-in-his-forbidden-fantasies Beth, was touching him like this. It felt so good. Better than he'd even dreamed. And oh, he'd dreamed. When they were sleeping on the cold forest ground, his wicked thoughts had been red-hot. He'd felt ashamed of them, but now there was no shame. Only need. His hands slipped into her shirt as well as he cupped her lower back with one strong hand and grabbed the back of her neck to drive the kiss deeper with the other. And then she was pulling his shirt off and staring at his muscular body lustily. _Was this really happening?_

She reached out a nervous hand and touched his abs and he purred. A low, deep noise in the back of his throat. He hadn't expected to do that. But then she started moving her hands all over his chest and he was doing it again. But then her hands dipped lower, reaching for the belt on his pants. "Whoa," he said, forcing her to pause.

"What?" Beth asked. "Don't you want more?"

"Yes," Daryl panted, "oh, _hell _yes." How long had he been waiting for this? When he'd carried her over the threshold of this place because of her injured foot – getting a good handful of her ass in the process that he'd tried to play off as accidental – she'd felt like his bride. When he'd eaten with her and drank with her, just her, it had felt like something couples did. And when he'd resisted her when she'd begged for his touch in the woods, it had been the challenge of his life. He wanted this, so much.

"So what's the matter, then?" Beth insisted, staring down at him with hungry eyes.

"You just decided to belong to me five seconds ago," Daryl considered. "Don't couples usually wait a little longer than that before they go all the way?"

"Nobody has to know," Beth reminded.

"Well, that's true," Daryl admitted. "But, Beth, you're the one that taught me that just because nobody's watching to see if you're gonna be good, and respectful, and all that, that don't mean you shouldn't be."

"You're right," Beth sighed, and took her hands off of him, reluctantly. "I do want to be good. I leave thank you notes for people like I learned in etiquette class, and I bury the dead because that's what society does. I do these things because just because society isn't here anymore, doesn't mean we just let all of society's standards fall apart. Because even if we don't turn into walkers, if we don't have respect for each other, we're not human anymore, Daryl."

"I have a hell of a lot of respect for you, Beth," Daryl replied. "I love you."

"You mean that?" Beth asked.

"I do." Daryl sighed. "But…"

"But what?"

"But why do you love me?" Daryl asked, eyes searching hers desperately for an answer. He hadn't wanted to lose himself in the heat of passion with her. Well, alright, maybe he had wanted it a little, but when he'd called her over here, that hadn't been his intention. His intentions had been honorable. That counted for something, didn't it? He wanted to be good to her. He didn't want to use her, or rush her. He wanted to give her all that she deserved.

"Why?" Beth blinked. "Well, I suppose it's because you've always been good to me." Had he really? Daryl wondered. He'd almost taken advantage of her intoxication the other night, and now he'd pawed her like an animal, he realized, a wave of guilt washing over him. He almost missed what Beth said next: "You've protected me from every kind of danger. Even myself – when I decided I had something to prove, you made sure I didn't get hurt in the process. You've done right by me, ok? Saving my ungrateful behind from walkers when I tried to run away from you. Trying to teach me how to track and fight. Carrying me here after I hurt myself. Putting up with my inability to make up my mind – whether I want to drink and go wild with you, or preserve all the goodness this world once had and play fancy piano and be respectable. Whether I want you to leave me alone, or hold me close. I've been a brat, and you've been there for me through all of it. You respect my goodness, but you also don't judge me when I want to be bad. Why do you think I wanted to drink with you? Because I knew you wouldn't tell me that I was a kid and I wasn't supposed to. You accept all that I am in ways the others don't. That's why I love you, Daryl."

"So…we really love each other, don't we?" Daryl found himself grinning. Beth nodded.

"Well, then," Beth smiled, "I suppose there's no rush." And she lay her head against Daryl's still-bare chest and just held him, and they fell asleep, just like that.

When Daryl woke up in Beth's arms the next day, at first he thought it was just another dream. But then he remembered all that happened the night before, and he couldn't suppress his smile. He wanted to tell someone _I got her, I got the girl! _But there was nobody there to tell. Rick, Carol, Michonne, Glenn, Maggie…they were all gone, somewhere. Now that he thought about it, they might not approve anyway. Especially Maggie. Dang…what would she say if she found out he'd made out with her little sister? She'd probably smack him. Maybe shoot him. But…he was so blissfully happy. _Maybe, _he thought, _it's better that nobody knows. _

But then the walkers came, and then the car had taken off, and Beth was in it, and Daryl wasn't. And he didn't know where she'd gone. He'd sunk to his knees when he realized he'd lost her. He'd pinned all his hopes on that girl, and now he might never see her again!

_I shouldn't have trusted her, _he thought. _I should've known it was too good to be true when we said we'd stay together. _

_I should have known a guy like is always gonna wind up alone. That a girl like her was going to wind up missing. _

He knew that, so why had he tried to keep her with him? Why was he so damn mad now, so depressed, like some lovestruck emo teenager? He had to find her, didn't he? But he didn't have any damn leads. He wanted to go put an arrow through a walker's head, to scream, to scream at himself for having, even for a little while, that stupid delusion called hope. He'd lost her. He'd lost the one thing he believed in. Now, he wanted to be alone.

But that stupid group of guys had found him, and now Len was in his face.

"_You must've lot a real good piece of tail"._

Len didn't know he'd lost so much more than that. He'd lost someone he truly loved. He'd lost faith, now that she was gone and he didn't know how to get her back. Len had no idea. Nobody did. He wasn't going to tell anybody, it was none of their damn business.

Nobody knew what Daryl was missing. But Daryl knew that no matter how long it took, he had to get it – her – back.


End file.

Walking Dead, Romance