Chapter Three

Disclaimer: All publicly recognizable characters, settings, ect., are the property of their respective owners.  The original characters and plot are the property of the author.  The author is no way associated with the owners, creators, or producers of any media franchise.  No copyright infringement is intended.

Warnings: Rated Mature for language, gore and adult situations.  Readers under the age of 18 are discouraged from reading.

Scars of Survival
Chapter Three

“There is something beautiful about scars of whatever nature.  A scar means the hurt is over, the wound is closed and healed, done with.”

December 2005

It’s been a whirlwind, these last few years.  My first sexual experience with Daryl was not anything like I expected to be.  He had been extremely gentle lover, although he could be just as aggressive when challenged.  I had figured that out just last October.  It was my year to host the annual Halloween Bash at Backwoods.  I really didn’t think about a costume that year but… I had gone to Nashville last year with my best friend and hit up the Hustler store.  I bought a pink plaid schoolgirl skirt and a black wife-beater that laced up the back in hot-pink, silk ribbons.  So, yeah I added a cotton tale, wore a set of white rabbit ears and a white bow-tie.  I made over three-hundred dollars that night. 

Either way, Daryl had come in early and nearly stabbed the eyes out of any man that so much as looked at me.  Eventually, he ended up fuckin’ me behind the bar because I had stopped him and Jack from starting a bar fight that I was sure the local Army Revs. Couldn’t have stopped.  Jack left shortly after for his Shirly’s, his new girlfriends.  For that I was thankful. 

Shirly was good for a man like Jack.  Jack reminded me of a older version of Daryl.  They both had the same short fuse.  Really short fuse.

It had been a good thing, despite my fears of loneliness and abandonment, Daryl spent every moment he could with me.  Whether it was on weekdays that had been rained out or his regular weekends, he always showed. 

Merle, funny enough ended up buying a place - a trailer across from my mothers - scary, I know.  When Daryl was away he stayed in company PRDM hotels but when he came back to Trenton he had an open invitations to my California King, which trust me he loved. 

My feverous thoughts of Daryl’s sinful lips and hands were brought to an abrupt halt by the man himself, or should I say “those stupid fuckin’ bells”.

Since Jerry had taken to having a three times divorced girlfriend the décor around “Backwoods” has changed quiet a bit.  Gone were the hand tapped pin-ups from Playboy in the men’s room and were replaced by more dignified framed posters from Maxim.  I thought it was a bit more tasteful but for god’s sake, this was “Backwoods”.  Daryl called Jerry pussy whipped every chance he got, which was often now-a-days.  But I had to agree with him that Karen had gone a little too far with the Christmas decorations.  It was like a fuckin’ Ben Crosby movie in here.

It was the noisy slay-bells that caused my head to jerk up from the scalding hot-water the were so heavily trained on.  At first I winced from hearing them for the millionth time today but as soon as I caught sight of those baby-blues you couldn’t pry the smile off my face.  After all, I hadn’t seen them since Thanksgiving.

Daryl had, in recent months been put permanently on my fathers crew, which dad says he knew nothing about.  Whatever.  I knew he was behind it.  It was nice having him under my father’s watchful eye, knowing my father would do anything he could to make sure Daryl stayed safe on the job-site, but unfortunately my father’s crew was popular and it kept Daryl out of town more often than not. 

“Hey beautiful, get this tired man a beer, would ya.”  He said smugly as he peeled out of his heavy coat.  “I brought ya a present.” 

Curiously, I peeked around his hulking frame to see the small figure that was almost completely hidden behind him.  Before anyone could see what was going on I shrieked happily before hurtling myself over the bar Duke’s of Hazzard style and nearly knocking Daryl on his ass I brushed past him. 

A set of steel gray eyes watered from behind thick lenses as I crashed into this shrinking form.  “Poppy!”  I cried, nearly lifting his four-foot-eleven body off the floor as I hugged him tightly to me.  Realizing that I was probably suffocating the old man I let him go, whipping the tears from my eyes before either he or Daryl could catch on. 

“Hey Button!”  He yelled, just as happy to see me as I him.  It had been a year since I had seen him last and if there was any of my family from Florida I missed, it was him.  “Are we just going to stand here all day, I freezing my old ass off.” 

Laughing, I ushered both men to the bar and got them a beer before taking my grandfather’s coat.  It gave me a moment to myself, which admittedly, I needed.  Even though Daryl and I had spent the last two years dating, we had yet to broach the subject of emotions.  Such as the big one.  I knew without a doubt that I cared deeply for the man and I had been more than positive that he felt the same.  But today, I knew… I knew without a doubt in my mind that I would love Daryl Dixon for the rest of my life. 

Tears fell from my eyes before I could stop them as I stood staring at the small coat in my hands.  It wasn’t hard to understand that I wouldn’t be getting many more Christmas’ like these.  Nicholas, Sr. was getting on in age and his health was even worse. The fact that Daryl had driven to central Florida to retrieve the growly little man that refused to fly touched my heart in a way that I didn’t think possible. Having him here for the Holidays was the best gift anyone could have gotten me. 

A warm hand on my shoulder startled me.  Swinging around on the balls of my feet I crashed face first into a familiar plaid shirt.  “Ya alright?”  He asked me, his eyes narrowing with confusion.  I was blubbering like a baby after all and I’m sure Daryl couldn’t understand my tears on such a happy day.

Nodding my head I threw my arms around his waist and squeezed.  “Thank you for this.”  I told him, nearly crushing his ribs one more time before I lifted my head and took his lips with my own.  It was a gentler kiss than the heated ones were normally shared but in my mind the occasion called for it. 

He sighed when our lips parted and kissed the top of my head.  “I just want ya to be happy, Lil.” 

“I love you, Daryl.”  I blurted suddenly. 

His eyes widened for a moment and for that moment, I wondered if I had pushed to hard.  Daryl has never since I’ve known him been good with dealing with ‘the mushy’ stuff as my dad liked to call it.  Daryl must have seen the backpedaling coming because before I could open my mouth to say anything his lips met mine again, harder and hungrier than before.  It lasted for… well, I really didn’t have a clue how long we stood there like that until my grandfather started pounding on the bar with the butt of his bottle. 

“If you two are done swallowing each others faces, get this old man a tub of scotch!” 

Snorting, I looked past Daryl and held up my middle finger as I called.  “Fuck you, old fart.  You’ll be sleepin’ outside with the damn chickens if ya keep it up!” 

He wrinkled his bulbous nose before he stuck his tongue out at me and flipped me the bird.  Daryl looked between the two of us for a second before he shook his head and commented.  “Yer fuckin’ family’s crazy.” 

“Don’t I know it.”  I told him with a silly grin on my face.  “Well, let’s go liquor up the child before dad gets here and I have two children to baby-sit.” 

Amused at my grandfather, who at the moment was sitting at the bar making mock kissing noises and pretending to make out with thin air behind Daryl’s back, I brushed past Daryl and headed back to my post.  His hand shot out and grabbed my arm as I past and spun me around.  “I love ya, Lil.”  He said sincerely, then flushed. 

Patting his arm, I moved to behind the bar to save him further embarrassment from my nosy boisterous grandfather, I stopped dead in my tracks.  “What the fuck is on yer head?”  I asked, still in shock from what I was seeing.

Grandpa smiled smugly and tipped his ugly hat my way.  Jerking his thumb in Daryl’s direction he continued.  “I made big n’ ugly here stop and get it.”

My head snapped in Daryl’s direction so fast I’m sure I’d have neck pains for weeks.  My astonished eyes held his sheepish expression before I had to ask.  “You took him to a strip-bar?”

Daryl shrugged like he didn’t really care but his eyes told me “please don’t kill me”, “Had’ta eat.” 

My eyes slid back to my grandpa and the hideous “Eat At The Nude Café”  complete with pair of stitched on boobs with light-up blinking nipples before the rounded back to Daryl.  “At a strip-bar?”

“It was a café.”  My grandfather interjected on Daryl’s behalf. 

Daryl shrugged again before hiding behind his beer as he took a large swallow just as my grandfather tacked on rather innocently, I might add.  “He only got two lap dances.”   

Beer spewed from his mouth as he choked.  His face was beet red as his eyes burned through the old man who sat there cackling like the fool he was.  “I did not!”  Daryl exclaimed, throwing up his hands to shield himself. 

I tried so hard to glare like I meant it but between how cute Daryl looked all flustered and the priceless look on my dads face as he encountered the whole scene since he had made his silent entrance minutes ago, John Logan and his entire crew behind him, I just couldn’t keep it up.  I laughed so hard I thought I’d might collapse. 

The rest of the night was spent in a haze of bar smoke, badly sung Christmas carols, embarrassing stories of childhood and beer.  It was a night to remember, that was for sure. 

Just as the party winded down I noticed my grandfather starting to doze on his stool.  My dad apparently noticed this also and nodded to me that he was going to take him home.  “Daryl, give me a hand, would’ya.” 

Daryl nodded and assisted my dad in carrying the old man to my dad’s truck but he caught my eyes as he was headed out the door. He was smiling like an idiot as he nodded to me and mouthed.  “Love ya.” 

“I love you, too.”  I mouthed back.

It was the fondest Christmas I’d had in a very long time.

.
.
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July 2006

It was a normal routine really, for me to hang out at Dad’s place on a Sunday if I was so lucky to have the day off.  We’d watch football if it was a good game, sometimes hockey, but more than likely it was the afternoon TNT movie; James Bond, Smoky and the Bandit, Saving Private Ryan.  It was our thing.  So, I really didn’t think much of anything when I entered through his half-glass/half-wood door and he didn’t answer my calls.  Everything was just a normal Sunday until I saw his body, colored and lifeless on the couch, and then it just… wasn’t. 

He was so… blue.  He might as well have been purple.  Either way, it didn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out something was seriously wrong with him.  I had never seen a real dead body before, not really.  I had seen my great uncle Raymond at his funeral after he died in a motorcycle stunt accident, I had seen my dead sixteen year old lover after a car accident, laying prone in his coffin but… this was different.

This was my daddy. 

It was my daddy.

It was hard but I got a hold of myself before I broke down, it wouldn’t do any good now.  But as the EMT from Davidson Co. came flowing through my house, I wasn’t sure what I was supposed to do.  I was so… lost. 

It wasn’t until I called Daryl and hallucinated seeing my father’s eyes blink did I understand that I had no business anywhere near people, living or dead.  The paramedics said that no such thing happened, that is my a matter of messed up muscle matter.  Something about the how the brain dies way before the nerves in the muscles.  I wanted to believe that, but how do you do that.  He twitched.  I saw it.  I don’t care how it happened.  It did.

I wasn’t until the EMT’s moved his… body, that I noticed something that tore my heart into pieces.  It was small, rectangular and chalky white.  I hated to admit, that I knew what it was before it ever hit the ground. 

It was then that I noticed the burnt out cigarette butts left sitting to burn in the handmade ashtray that I had actually made for my grandmother when I was thirteen years old.  It was a one-hundred of that I was sure, it was also a Marlboro, my mothers brand.  My eyes instantly zoned in on that butt.  I knew it was her’s.  From the way it was slightly wet on the ends from where she bit it with her dentures to the slight red lip stain she wore… It was my mother’s.
 
Before anybody, including the paramedics could say a word, I was in my truck, squealing out of my father’s drive and flying down S.R. 136 with one thing on my mind. 

It didn’t take me more than a few minutes to arrive at the run-down, two & ½ Bedroom house that my mom had taken up resident in for the last six years.  My mind was not right when I leaned over my in my passenger seat of my pick-up and grabbed my father’s 9mm out of the glove compartment and fit it snuggly between my skin and the waistband of my jeans. 

I’m not really sure if I even knocked before I kicked the door straight in, it wasn’t really hard.  That fuckin’ door had been dry-rottin’ for the last few years, I damn near took the fuckin’ thing off its hinges when I entered.  Mom looked genuinely shook-up to see me standing in her kitchen, red-eyed and confused. 

When she came at me with a smile on her face, opening her arms for a hug I couldn’t contain my rage.  I hit her… hard.  To hard.  My heart broke when she went down against the linoleum.  My mother had always been a very petit woman, even more so than myself.  But that smile, I wanted to wring her druggie neck. 

When she looked up at me, confused, I took the white, chalky 10mg bar from my pocket and threw it in her face.  “You wanna tell me somethin’, Mama?” 

She picked up the white benzo between her perfectly manicured, red fingernails, studying it like she had no clue what to think.  It did not help my temper. 

I grabbed her wrist, almost feeling it snap between my hands.  I am not now, nor have ever considered myself a physically strong woman… I was just hurt, and pissed.  She cried out, trying to jerk her small wrist from my hardening grip.  “This… this is one of mine.”  she rasped, looking down at it with surprise.

“Tell me somethin’ I don’t know, Mama!”  I screamed.  “I knew it was yours when I saw your fuckin’ lipstick on the cigarette’s in daddy’s ashtray!” 

“So.”  she defended.  “we spent the night together.” 

I drew back, letting her go.  She slid hard against the hard floor under her.  “He’s dead.” 

Her black brows darted up into her hairline.  “What?”  she stuttered.

“He’s. Fuckin’. Dead!”  I yelled.  I was trying so hard not to beat her face into that hard flooring until she just quit breathing.  His life was just so much…

“Why, Mama…”  I asked tearfully.  “Why would you give him that.  You knew.”

Shaking like a leave she tried to defend herself once again.  “We were just having fun.  I gave him those so he could sleep.”

“SLEEP!”  I snarled.  “You knew the medication he was taking. I know yer not dumb enough to not know better.” 

“I-I…”  she stuttered, scared shitless that I was going to hit her again.

“Yer goin’ to fuckin’ rehab, that’s what yer doin’.  Because if you don’t-”

“I’ll go!”  she squeaked, not bothering to let me finish.

Hearing rustling behind me, I drew the pistol from my waistband and slung in the direction of the hall.  Mom’s curly haired boy-toy was comin’ down the hall in a hurry with a metal baseball bat in hand.  I knew he had every intention of smashing my head in.  He stopped dead when he saw the open end of my barrel pointed at his empty fuckin’ head.  Just give me a fuckin’ reason. 

“Drop the bat, Clay, or I’ll splatter yer brains all oava’ tha fuckin’ wall!”  I screamed at him. 

Tears were pouring from my eyes, but oddly enough, I never made a sound; not a sob, a cry or a scream.  I wasn’t numb.  Far from it.  It hurt more than words could express, but I just couldn’t break down yet. 

My index finger was shaking as I struggled with my own loss.  The barrel was grabbed shortly after and Daryl was there, pleading with his eye for him to take the dangerous weapon from my hands.  As soon as the smooth metal met his hands, my legs buckled and the damns broke. 

I couldn’t even begin to tell you how long how long I stood there sobbing in Daryl’s arms before I finally collapsed.  Daryl knew it would happen, or so he told me.  He said that was what happened to some people that lost a person they were really close to.  Understatement.

Several hours later, in the comfort of my own bed and in Daryl’s arms I finally had enough voice to ask,  “How’d you know where I was?”

He snorted lightly.  “When I saw yer truck wasn’ in at yer daddy‘s, I figured I try yer momma’s.  I was halfway there when Merle called: said you came screamin’ into the yard like a banshee and jumped outta yer truck wit yer daddy’s pistol in yer pants.” 

“Yeah,”  I laughed, tearfully.  “I guess I did.”