Someplace Dark Part 2

Daryl had never been good with technology, but he got up the next day and went to a nearby mall. There was a place there that sold cell phones and he got one with a slide out keyboard since testing out the touchscreen had defeated his thick fingers. After learning the ins-and-outs of texting he went off to see if there was any work for him that day at Bolen’s Bikes.

The boss, Jude, was an all right kind of guy. He was up in his sixties, morbidly overweight, and sweated a lot, but he had a good head for business and he didn’t treat Daryl like he was garbage, as most of the so-called good people of the town were wont to do. Jude’s wife Millie had put him on a diet and he’d started to show that he was losing weight, but he was grumpy about being hungry a lot. At the moment, Jude sat in the office taking an insulin injection.

“Hey, Daryl! Come on in. Got a proposition for ya, if you’re interested. Duke Macklin quit this morning ‘cause I wouldn’t let him work drunk. If you’re interested, I’d like to give you the job. You’re the best mechanic I got and you don’t go startin’ shit with the other employees like Duke.”

A permanent job was exactly what Daryl had been looking for. He didn’t grin to show how happy he was. Openly expressing feelings was something he only did around Beth. He nodded, though, and that was good enough for Jude.

“Job pays twenty dollars an hour,” said Jude, looking at the glucose meter and unaware of the look of surprise on Daryl’s face.

Twenty bucks an hour?

Daryl had never in his life had a job that paid that much. He usually subsisted on around nine or ten grand a year. Now he’d be making four times that much. When Jude looked up, he frowned.

“That’s really all I can afford, and it’s pretty average pay for a--”

“No, that’s cool,” Daryl said, realizing Jude mistook his shock for disappointment. “I’m fine with that.”

“Great! You’ll need to be here every morning by 7AM to open the shop at 7:30. You’ll be gettin’ off work at about 4PM every day. Paydays is every Friday at end of shift. Sound good to you?” asked Jude.

“I’m in.”

“Great. Go to Millie’s office. She’ll get the paperwork done. You’re gonna be payin’ taxes now, Dixon, just like the rest of us poor bastards.”

*****

Daryl’s first inclination upon learning he’d landed a permanent job was to call Beth and tell her, but he resisted the urge. He shouldn’t have bought the cell phone. He’d tried to do the right thing by throwing out her number, but he’d memorized it as soon as he’d looked at it. He’d learned it and now he couldn’t unlearn it. Now he had it programmed into his phone and he knew that as soon as he was home later that day he’d be calling her.

A steady job. He’d only tried it once, when he was twenty, but life with Merle had meant hard drinking, women, and hangovers, and more often than not he was too sick to go to work in the morning. He wasn’t going to make that mistake now. He was done drinking.

You can provide for her.

He knew that roughly forty grand a year wasn’t a huge salary, but they could live off it. He could build his credit, get a better house, and a car, and…

And her father would still be dead set against them.

Who gives a shit what Hershel wants? What about what you want? What about what Beth wants?

That was a question he’d asked himself a million times since he’d left Beth’s house the night before. He was always torn between deciding that his and Beth’s happiness mattered more than Hershel’s, and that it wasn’t right to date a man’s daughter without his approval.

The first day of his official employment at Bolen Bikes went by strangely. When he thought of Beth the time crawled. When he put his mind to his work the time flew by.

“Hey, Dixon.”

Hank Loomis walked toward him, his dark skin gleaming with sweat from the hot day. He smiled at him and wiped at an oily rag in his hands.

“Hey there, Loomis.”

“I hear you’ve been hired on full time.”

“Yeah.”

“Good for you, man. You deserve it.”

Daryl nodded at Loomis and watched the young man cruise by. Loomis was a gifted mechanic, and had even given Daryl a few pointers on how to repair things that he hadn’t learned doing the job, or from his father or his brother Merle. It occurred to him the kind of comments he’d have to listen to from Merle if he’d seen Daryl so much as speak to a black man.

Sometimes he caught himself having some of those thoughts creep up in his mind, that he shouldn’t talk to Loomis, that he should keep his distance, but then he would remember Loomis had never been anything but kind to him. The color of his skin didn’t mean anything to Daryl, though he’d been told all his life that blacks weren’t as good as him and that they weren’t meant to mix, in any way.

That was just another thing about his family that Daryl couldn’t understand, and that he had long ago decided he wouldn’t bring into the new life he’d forged for himself when he moved out on his own and kicked his family out of his life.

He was surprised when he walked outside to find his cousin Jenna, one of the only family members he still spoke to, straddling a bike of her own. She’d gone to trade school and had a job as a beautician, but she still liked to ride a bike. She was even on the cusp of opening her own beauty shop and Daryl was proud of her. Not all of their family were losers.

Her long black hair whipped in her face and she turned her brown eyes to him when she realized he was coming out of the shop.

“Who’s the brown hottie?” she asked, but her voice sounded flat.

“Don’t let Gramma hear you say that.”

“Hey, I got a baby by a black man, remember?”

She knew Daryl was the only one in the family that didn’t treat her like dirt for that fact. Hell, he’d been the only one to do anything for either her or her daughter. Daryl sometimes wondered if she loved her daughter’s father, or if she was only with him to spite the family.

“You okay?” he asked. “You look down.”

“I’m not down. I’m just tired. It’s Gramma. They got her in the hospital. She’s got double pneumonia.”

“She at St. Mary’s?”

Jenna nodded. “On a brighter note, Lindsay says hi. She wants to marry you when she grows up.”

Lindsay was Jenna’s little girl, a beautiful child with olive skin and hazel eyes. Daryl grinned at the thought of her and he couldn’t wait to see her again. He’d have to get her something special. “You tell her we’re cousins and that ain’t the kinda thing cousins do?”

“She’s four. She wants to marry everybody, even me,” Jenna laughed. “I think she just wants a wedding real bad.”

“I got a job here,” Daryl said, changing the subject. “Permanent. Just got hired today. Twenty bucks an hour.”

“Daryl, that’s great! I’m really proud of you, Cuz.”

“How do I ask for time off already to go sit with Gramma?”

“You don’t,” she said quickly.

“Jenna--”

“No, Daryl. As much as we feel responsible for family, don’t forget you and me both got scars on our backs from that hateful bitch. How many times she hit us with a belt buckle across the back? And your daddy did the same to you ‘cause his mama and daddy did it to him. You can’t risk your new job to go runnin’ off to the hospital to sit with a woman who’s cursin’ us both to her last breath. You stay and work. I’ll let you know when the old witch passes.”

Jenna kissed him goodbye and he watched her ride off, her silver helmet gleaming in the bright sunlight of early evening. He didn’t wear a helmet himself, though he knew he should. He just trusted his head was hard enough to survive a fight with the pavement. He loved her for what she’d said. He had no inclination to go spend his free hours with a spiteful, bitter shell of a woman he didn't love and who still cussed him, even as cancer and other illnesses ate away at her body. No, he’d rather go home, cook up a steak dinner, and try to get used to texting. Now that he had a steady job, he’d actually use the air conditioning so he wouldn’t roast this summer. After all, he could afford to pay the bill. Yeah, it was going to be a good evening.

Or so he thought.

When he pulled up to his trailer, he found Hershel Greene pacing in the dirt driveway, his face thunderous.

“Where is she?” Hershel demanded.

“How’m I s’posed know?”

“Don’t play dumb with me, boy.”

“I ain’t your boy, Hershel,” Daryl snapped. Fuck respecting this man with Mr. Greene. He was done taking the old man’s shit, especially if it was for shit he hadn’t even done.

“Beth’s gone. Where else would she be but here, with you?”

“I’ve been at work all day,” Daryl said. “I ain’t seen her.”

“You got a job?” Hershel said, as though surprised. “Doing farm work again?”

“No, I’ve got a job as a full-time mechanic, makin’ twenty bucks an hour, if you must know,” Daryl shot back.

Hershel’s brow creased. He looked genuinely surprised. “Good for you. Now let me in so I can talk to Beth.”

“She can’t be here. My door’s locked,” Daryl said, climbing the steps and slipping his key into the lock. “Just go home, leave me the fuck alone.”

“I’m not leaving without her!”

“She ain’t here, goddamn it!”

Daryl went in and intended to shut the door in Hershel’s face, but the old man rudely pushed his way inside the stuffy trailer. He figured fair was fair since Daryl had come into his home unwanted.

It was so hot that he knew at once Beth couldn’t have been inside. She’d have opened a window or turned on the AC, though, he had to admit, the place was spotlessly clean. His wife hadn’t been lying about that. This guy was neater than his Beth. Had she been there, evidence of it would be visible. A magazine on the couch, her shoes in the middle of the floor, something to give her away. There was nothing.

That didn’t stop him from searching the bedroom and the bathroom. He came back and looked Daryl over, as though perhaps Daryl had invented some magical way to hide his daughter in one of his pockets.

“What?” Daryl said.

“If she’s not here where could she be?”

“Did you try calling her?” asked Daryl, as though speaking to a simpleton.

Hershel nodded. “She left her phone in her room.”

“What happened?”

“We had a fight. About you,” he said, sounding unfairly accusatory, as though Daryl had been there to purposefully stir shit between him and his daughter. “She took off into the woods. I figured she was taking some kind of shortcut here and was hiding in your place, but nobody answered. I didn’t know you were at work. She’s been gone all day.”

“When did the fight happen?”

“4:30 this morning, when we got up to get ready to work,” answered Hershel.

He looked genuinely distressed. If he didn’t dislike the old man so much, Daryl would have felt sympathy for him. As it was, he wasn’t particularly inclined to feel anything but concern for Beth.

“Did you call the cops?”

“I tried that just before you came in. They said she’s an adult and that she--”

“An adult? Did you believe them when they told you?” Daryl interrupted. 

“Don’t be a smart ass, Dixon."

“I’ll be whatever I want, Greene. This is my place.”

Hershel pressed on, though is fists were balled tightly at his sides. “They said that she would have to be missing for twenty-four hours before they could step in and do anything. God knows what can happen to her, out there, lost in the woods with no food or water in this heat.”

He had a point, Daryl couldn’t deny it. He was worried too.

“You’re an excellent tracker, or so I’ve heard. I hoped you could track Beth. I just want her safe.”

Daryl nodded. “I am a good tracker. I’ll need to start off from the house, if you don’t mind me stepping foot on your property.”

“Of course you can,” Hershel said, irritated.

“Fine, but let’s make this clear. I go alone. I’ll find her and bring her home.”

“I’ll be in your debt,” said Hershel.

“Whatever. Lock the door behind you.”

*****

Beth was starting to panic.

She’d never had the best sense of direction, but she’d thought she knew the landscape. She’d assumed that once she left her father’s property she’d find the old mill road and she could take that most of the way to the main road. From there she could cut through the trees to Daryl’s place, but she’d gotten turned around nd now she had no idea where she was. All the trees looked exactly alike, and so did the area.

The sun had emerged after a midnight rain and the day was particularly humid. She felt tired and thirsty from hours of walking. She was dehydrating quickly and she knew that if she didn’t find water soon she could pass out, or possibly even die.

What do I do? Why didn’t I bring my stupid phone?

She tapped the flashlight she’d taken with her when she’d stormed off that morning against her hip. She’d been chipping pieces of bark off trees with it, and now she realized she was retreading old territory. Frustration and fear came out in a growl.

A second later it was answered by another growl. Then another. Then another.

Beth had been about to try another direction she hoped she hadn’t already tread when she heard the animals growling. Her stomach clenched in terror. She searched the trees and saw three matted, mangy feral dogs were watching her. They bared their teeth and inched closer, still unsure of her, but growing bolder by the second.

There was no shelter, only trees, and most of them had branches that were too high for her to reach. She was about to panic when she spotted a tree with branches low enough for her to jump and grab if she could get a run up first. She took off. At once the dogs gave chase. Their blood lust and hunger had them snarling as they ran after her.

Beth put the flashlight in her mouth, jumped, and caught the lowest branch on the tree. She pulled herself up, wishing she’d paid more attention to athletics and had built her upper body strength a little more, but she knew she’d be strong enough, especially considering her survival depended on it, to haul her body up onto the branch.

Suddenly she felt a searing pain in her left calf and she panicked as her upward momentum suddenly reversed. She struggled as she felt teeth tear at her flesh. She used her right foot against the tree for leverage and pushed herself up, but another set of teeth gripped her shoe and began tugging her down. She kicked, screamed, cried in terror, and lost her shoe, but finally she pulled herself up. There was fiery pain in her calf but she didn’t stop to examine it, though she could feel the blood all but pouring from her leg.

Below, the dogs licked at the blood drops on the ground. One of them went back some distance, as though mimicking her attempt to get a run up. Beth hurriedly climbed to the next branch, and then one further up. The dog did indeed leap, but it smashed into the lower branch and crashed to the ground with a pained and angry yelp. It, and the other two members of its pack, yelped and scratched at the tree in desperation to get at her.

Once Beth was seated in the crook of two sturdy branches, she dared a glance at her leg. The bite was deep, and some flesh had been pulled out in a meaty mess. She was bleeding profusely. Thinking quickly, she worked her bra off and used it to apply pressure to the wound until she was sure it had stopped bleeding. She thanked God that her father insisted they all have regular rabies vaccine boosters since they worked on a farm with animals, and he often took in stray dogs and cats to foster before finding them permanent homes.

Still, the wound was painful, and Beth’s vision began to blur. She tied the bra around her leg, secured it tightly, and then settled against the tree, testing to see if she would fall if she fainted. She felt reasonably secure and settled down to wait.

It was doubtful Beth would be able to outwait the dogs. They would stay for days if it meant getting to feed. She knew they could sense her weakness. They could smell her blood, which kept their appetites whetted. Even worse, they’d tasted it. No, there was nothing that would get rid of the dogs but a handler, or death.

The predicament Beth found herself in frightened her. She’d have to be missing for at least twenty-four hours before the police would get involved. Her father may not even think to come looking for her until the next morning. If they did come looking, what if they found her, and therefore found the dogs? What if they were attacked?

What if the one who came looking and found her first was Daryl? He’d be one man against three feral dogs. The idea that either he or her father would get hurt because she’d run off like a spoiled child in a snit made her stomach roll with fear. She very nearly vomited. Her head began to throb and her mouth was as dry as dust. The heat was wearing her down and she began to feel very sleepy. Aware she was doing so, and powerless to prevent it, Beth began to lose consciousness.

*****

Daryl didn’t find it at all difficult to pick up Beth’s tracks. She’d left angry, gouging the soil as she stomped off. She’d walked over two miles, heading in the general direction of his place, before she’d calmed down and began to take lighter, more difficult to detect steps. Well, they would have been difficult for a lesser tracker. For him, they were still clear as day.

He situated the water flasks slung over his shoulder and wondered, as he followed her trail, if he would have had the fortitude to send her home if she’d knocked on his door in the early morning hours. He didn’t think he would have, and he forced his mind to the job at hand rather than indulge in fantasies of pulling Beth to him, kissing her, running his hands over her body, and sinking into her wet warmth…

Finally he came upon the precise place where Beth veered off course. She went left when she should have turned right, just past the old mill road. The dirt road was so overgrown from lack of use it was easy to miss if you didn’t know what to look for.

He watched her tracks, seeing she’d gone in circles for a while before shooting off into the forest, heading away from his place, not toward it. Eventually he began to notice that she’d hacked bark off of trees, probably trying to keep track of where she was going. It had done her no good, and he would have to ignore them sine he realized they were going in circles. He’d have to stick to her footprints.

He stilled when saw new prints overlaid on hers. They were paw prints, and they were fairly large. It scared him to find three distinct sets.

“Beth!”

He listened. There was no response.

Daryl took off now, running. He would lose the light soon, and he feared that he’d find Beth torn to pieces by feral dogs. If that happened…

“Beth!”

He saw the dogs then, circling a tree that had blood running down one side. They turned to him, growling, sensing fresh prey within their reach. Daryl leveled the gun he’d brought along for protection at the biggest dog, the one that had blood around its muzzle, and fired, killing it at once.

The other dogs backed off cautiously, prepared to run since the noise scared them, but their hunger kept them around, growling and trying to size Daryl up. He shot again, taking another dog out. The third one bolted, but Daryl took aim and shot it, too, before it could disappear into the trees. He didn’t want it trying to hunt them later, in the dark.

“Beth?”

“Daryl? Are you really there?”

“I’m here, baby. Can you climb down?”

“I think so.”

“I’m coming up,” he said. “I’ll help you. Stay put.”

He was going to climb up after her but she tried to get herself down. He could see by the dazed look on her face she wasn’t okay. He was going to tell her to stay put when she pushed her legs over the edge, tried to lower herself to another branch, missed, and came falling from the tree. He broke her fall, trying to catch her, and it knocked the wind out of him.

“Beth? Are you okay?”

“Tired.”

She was hot. Her skin was dry. He took the flask out and sat against the tree, holding her against him. He poured some into her mouth. She drank slowly. He made sure she got at least two cups into her before he dumped water over her head and soaked her hair and shirt. She started to come around and he gave her another couple of cups to drink.

“I’ve got to get you home,” he said.

“Don’t wanna go,” she said. “Daddy’s not going to let me see you. He’s going to keep us apart unless I make him accept you.”

“We can talk about this later.”

“No,” she said weakly. “Didn’t you mean it when you said you love me?”

“Of course I did.”

“Then prove it. Come back to me.”

“Okay,” he said. “I’ll come back, but you have to promise me you’ll go home.”

“Come home,” she corrected.

“What?”

“Come home. I want your home to be my home. I want to move in with you. I can go to school part time and get a job and help support us.”

“I’ve already got a job,” he said, and told her of his new position at Bolen’s Bikes. She smiled tiredly. “Your father will shoot me if you move in with me.”

“You don’t want me there, fine, but don’t turn me down because of him.”

“I want you there, of course I do,” he said, kissing her forehead. “I want you with me every day.”

“Then he’ll just have to accept you. If he doesn’t, it’s his loss.”

She leaned back and kissed him. He returned it softly, gently.

“Say it again.”

“Say what?”

“You know,” she said, chuckling.

“I love you. Now up you go. I’m going to piggyback you home.”

“Home,” she said, smiling happily, even though she was still exhausted from her ordeal.

“Yeah,” he said, and hoisted her onto his back. “Home.”

*****

She was alive. She was relatively unhurt. She had to have her leg stitched up at the hospital, but otherwise she’d be all right. Now that the danger had passed, Hershel couldn’t wait to collect his baby girl and take her home.

She was emerging from the ER at one in the morning with Daryl Dixon. Hershel, his wife, and his elder daughter Maggie, were approaching. He didn’t like that they were holding hands, but considering Dixon had saved Beth’s life, he’d forgive it.

“Daryl, thank you for saving my baby girl.”

Daryl nodded and shook the hand Hershel offered. “She’s tough, and she’s smart. She’s a survivor.”

Hershel held out a hand to Beth, but she didn’t move. “Come on, Bethie,” he urged. “Time to go home.”

“I agree,” she said. “I’m going home. With Daryl.”

Hershel closed his eyes. He was determined to keep his temper in check this time. A hospital parking lot at one in the morning was neither the place for a family argument nor for him to lose his temper.

“Daryl’s not coming back to the farm, Beth.”

“No, I’m not,” Daryl said. “Beth is coming home with me. She wants to move in with me and I want her to.”

There were smirks on Annette and Maggie’s faces but they wisely kept their mouths shut.

“Over my dead body,” Hershel shouted.

“I’m not having this fight with you, Daddy. I love you,” Beth said, “but this is my decision to make. You don’t have to like it, but you are gonna have to accept it. I’ll be around tomorrow afternoon to pack my things.”

They started toward Daryl’s bike.

“Get back here!” Hershel shouted. “I’m not joking with you, Beth. Get back here!”

“Hersh,” Annette said, as Beth continued to walk away from him. She got onto the bike behind Daryl.

“Beth…” he said, shaking his head.

“Hersh, it’s over, honey.”

“She’s only nineteen. She’s throwing her life away!”

“It’s her life to do with as she will,” Annette told him, holding his face in her hands. “She can still go to school.”

“She won’t go to school. She’s gonna want to play house with Dixon!”

“You’re fighting a war against your youngest growing up,” said Annette. “You, like all fathers, have lost this war. She’s made her choice, and like she said, you don’t have to like it, but you do have to accept it. It’s late, Hersh. Let’s get home.”

Hershel watched Beth disappear into the darkness, feeling as though he’d lost something more than a simple war to keep his baby girl from becoming a woman. He’d lost control. He’d lost her to some man that he didn’t believe was good enough for her. What galled him the most was to know that both Beth and Annette was right. He didn’t have to like it. He hated it, but he would have to accept it was so. He just didn’t think he could ever accept Daryl Dixon as a son-in-law, if they went that far. All he could hope for now was that she grew out of it and eventually broke up with him.

*****

Beth collapsed onto the bed, exhausted and tired from the drugs. They’d given her fluids intravenously and that made her feel better, but the whole ordeal left her sore and sleepy. Daryl collapsed beside her and set the alarm clock on his bedside table.

“Thank God it’s Friday and I have the weekend off,” he said.

He wrapped his arms around Beth and she rested her head on his shoulder.

“You sure about this?”

“I’ve never been surer of anything in my life. I’m home with the man I love. This is right.”

He agreed. This did feel right. She kissed him lightly on the lips before snuggling down beside him. The darkness, the cool air from the AC, and the steady hum of the life in the forest that surrounded them came together to put them into a deep sleep. It was, Daryl would realize the next morning, the best night of rest he’d ever had. 

-End 


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