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It Only Hurts When I Breathe

Chapter 5: Sentenced to Life

"Come on, Beth."

She was laughing, running after him up the stairs to the guard tower. He held her wrist tight just to make sure she was with him.

"Oh..." Beth gasped as she stumbled on a step, but she wouldn't fall. Daryl wouldn't let her. He held her wrist high so her knees didn't hit the concrete.

"Almost there, Lil' Bit."

Closing and locking the hatch, he pressed Beth against the wall, tripping up a little, and falling against her harder than he should've. Beth just laughed as he steadied himself, hand against the wall beside her. Daryl went in for a kiss, but she pressed a firm hand against his chest.

"Stop." She was breathless and beautiful, so full of life, and she absolutely didn't mean stop. "What if Maggie and Glenn find us?"

"This ain't their tower. They take the north. Why'd you come up here with me if you didn't wanna..." He gave her the look, and she knew exactly what he meant without him even having to say it.

"I do, but..."

"But what?" Daryl didn't let Beth answer because she let him catch her lips.

Daryl felt so young and alive. Beth nipped at his lower lip, a warning, and he pulled away. This was a side of her he hadn't felt before, so he was willing to listen to what she had to say...but that nip...it set him on fire.

"But what?"

"Don't you need to be somewhere? You'll be missed."

Her eyes were so intense now. They were trying to tell him something he didn't understand.

"Got it covered. Got Bob on it. The new guy. He wanted to help out." Bob...the new guy...?

Beth allowed him to slide his hand under her shirt, traveling up the soft skin of her side...her skin wasn't as warm as usual. She tilted her head, baring her neck so he could kiss it, turning herself over to him. Beth's hands were in his hair, her hips arching against him. God, he wanted her...she was everything. The playful moment passed though, this was serious...real. Pulling away from her, so he could see her face, make sure she was okay with what they were doing...she'd gone serious too.

"What about my Dad?" Was that sadness he heard in her voice...sadness, now?

"Well, if Hershel finds out, I guess I'll just have to have that serious conversation with him no matter how painful it's gonna be for me. Gotta do this right, Beth. I'm gonna talk to him either way."

She deserved everything to be right. But it couldn't ever...could it? Hershel...

The Governor rolled right up to our gates. Maybe if I wouldn't have stopped looking...maybe 'cause I gave up...that's on me. And your Dad...maybe...maybe I could've done something...

Hershel was dead. And Bob, he was dead...the prison...it was gone too. Beth was...

He felt the tears on his cheeks, and she saw them. It was just a dream.

"Shhh...no...don't..." She tried to soothe him as Daryl buried his head at her shoulder in her silky hair. "Daryl, look at me...we have this moment."

It was just a dream...a fucking hallucination.

"You're dead...I let you die..."

"No, Daryl...no...please...leave it..." She begged.

"You're not real."

"I am. I'm here...with you." Daryl felt her grab his hand, felt her lips press against it...he wanted to die...didn't wanna let her go.

"Why are we here? If it's a dream...I wanna be with you, back in our house, on that snowy morning...or in our bed together..." He begged, but somehow he knew Beth didn't have the power to take them there.

"We can't go back there. You woke up...know it wasn't real now. That dream's over...this one...you're picking the places." Her voice was sad too. How could she be sad when she wasn't real, just a figment of his imagination?

"We? You weren't even there..." that might be the hardest part of this truth that he faced. He had the dream to hold onto, but Beth, she had nothin'. "I was dreaming up fairytales while you were..."

Daryl didn't know the full extent of what Beth went through...but she was beaten...broken...and in the end, she died. That's all he needed to know. There were tears in her eyes. How could a fucking dream hurt so much?

"Why'd you do it, Beth...why'd you do it? We were right there...I...I was right there...we were almost..."

They were almost reunited.

They were almost together.

They were almost...

Almost...

She brushed her tears away, shaking her head, the look in her eyes telling him she didn't have an answer to that.

"When they brought Carol in, I don't know how, but I knew you were alive...that there was still a chance for us to be...together..." Beth hesitated at the end, when she said together, like she didn't know if that was what he would've wanted. It was breaking him. "But...but...when they let me go...when I was walking towards you, somehow I knew it was over before it even started. I was already dead."

Her words stopped...it was a pained pause...a deep breath before she continued...a shudder he could feel against his body.

"Everything I did...I couldn't control. It was like, for some reason, the universe stopped, reversed course, erased my future, and wrote my death instead...it decided I didn't get to live..."

"I could've saved you...I didn't even try...I could've stopped you..." Daryl hadn't done shit. No one had done shit for her when she needed them.

"No...there was nothing you could do...somehow...that bullet was meant for me..." She tried to reassure him.

"Why are we here...the prison?" He had to move away from her death...it was too painful.

"I don't know. This is your dream now, your story."

Daryl crossed the guard tower to the big window where he could see one of the inner courtyards. Beth fell in beside him, he felt her slip her fingers between his. He gripped her hand tight. It all felt so real. Looking down, he saw himself...how was that? He was getting ready for a run. Zack was there. What...were his dreams gonna remind him of all the people he'd lost on his watch? If this was it, he wasn't ever sleepin' again...but Beth, she was there beside him, holding his hand...that would be worth anything. And she was in the courtyard too, talkin' to Zack, kissing Zack. Something strange was building inside him, something he hadn't been able to name in that moment...but he'd felt it. Jealousy. He'd had no right to Beth then, but he'd felt it...was feelin' it again watching the scene play out like God from above.

"What was that you said?" Beth looked up at him from where she was standing, not letting go, holding his hand like their lives depended on it.

Her eyes were glistening, but he didn't know if it was from the tears or something else. Daryl watched himself watch Beth walk away in the courtyard, feeling ashamed of what he'd said to Zack, but this was just a dream.

"What did you say?" Beth pressed the question, more lightness and joy in her voice now.

"It's like a damned romance novel..."

She smiled, leaning into his side.

He realized why he was there...the prison. That was where the earliest seeds of them had been planted...that's where him and Beth started...jealousy...and then she had hugged him...comforted him when he went to her to tell her Zack died.

"Daryl..."

It was Rick, but Rick hadn't been with them there that day in the courtyard. Daryl watched as the vision of him and Zack disappeared and Rick came out of the door into the yard.

"Daryl," Rick called again, looking up to the tower and seeing him before he had a chance to duck with Beth and hide...from what...the inevitable?

"You should go with Rick. He needs you." She wasn't sad or bitter, just beautiful selfless Beth.

"I can't leave you...all alone...in the ground."

"I'm not there anymore." Daryl turned to face her, knowing their time was coming to an end. "But I'm here, as long as you remember me..." Beth touched the center of his chest lightly where his broken heart was struggling to beat, fighting to keep him alive. "And I'll come to you here...in your dreams...as long as you want me."

Beth let go of his hand, letting go of him.

Feeling reality pulling him out of his dream, away from Beth...Daryl realized he'd been sentenced...sentenced to life...

Notes

Comments

I am so sorry, but I can't read this one :( I am reading your other two stories, but I just can't handle with that. I don't want to see him dead, it will break my heart. Your writing is so beautiful and addictive, so alive. Thank you !

Deadone Deadone
10/28/15

This was heart wrenching & beautiful!

AmIdoneyet? AmIdoneyet?
5/15/15

That ending and how everything came together-you don't even need my praise anymore. Not at all because you get it, something that I don't think the writers on the show ever did or ever will. Beautiful.

cougars1 cougars1
1/25/15

Seriously, I don't want to ruin this for anybody who hasn't read yet, but some of these details, especially that gunshot-you know what I am talking about. You have me bawling my eyes out from last chapter, then this was something different. That last section of dialogue, I can hear that being said so clearly.

cougars1 cougars1
1/25/15

Seriously, I don't want to ruin this for anybody who hasn't read yet, but some of these details, especially that gunshot-you know what I am talking about. You have me bawling my eyes out from last chapter, then this was something different. That last section of dialogue, I can hear that being said so clearly.

cougars1 cougars1
1/25/15