The cold light of dawn rose over the trees, cutting through the murky, dark windows of the watch tower and casting a thick line of sunlight across my closed eyelids. I heard the soft sound of Daryl’s voice as he called my name, whispering for me to wake up, and felt my eyes squeeze shut in response. An irritated groan escaped me which succeeded only in making the man hovering over me laugh as he gently kicked my side.
“Come on,” he mused with a light chuckle.
“Early,” I grumbled in response.
He snorted. “Rick’s already out in the fields.”
“Well, clearly, Rick has lost his mind, hasn’t he?”
Daryl lowered himself into a crouch beside the mattress I lay upon, looking down at me with a bemused expression I could only just make out through my squinted eyes. Reaching out a hand, he pulled the coarse blanket from atop me, tossing it into a pile by my feet. “Get up. We’re takin’ that kid of yours on a run today, ‘member?”
I slowly slid up into a sitting position, lifting a hand to run it through my messy, white-blonde hair. “Stop calling him “my kid”.”
Daryl rose from his crouch. “He hangs off ya like a damn newborn. What else you want me to call him?”
“His name, perhaps?” I suggested with a smirk as I climbed up onto my feet, tying my hair up into a messy ponytail as I went.
Daryl snorted, turning toward the hatch that lead to the staircase.
“That’d be too much to ask, though, wouldn’t it?” I muttered to myself with a sigh as I followed behind him, rubbing sleep from my eye.
Ever since we’d brought Mason back to the prison, Daryl had treated him with varying amounts of mistrust and disdain. I didn’t really understand why. The kid had been nothing but a gem this past month. He’d worked his ass off to earn his place here and had been nothing but courteous to everyone he met. Sure, the poor guy followed me around like a lost puppy sometimes, and I’d lost count of the amount of times I’d caught him giving me heart-eyes from across the room, but seriously? He was harmless. Daryl’s issue with the guy was beyond my realm of comprehension.
We reached the courtyard in the midst of breakfast. Carol was standing behind the makeshift brick barbecue, slicing up pieces of the deer Daryl and I had caught the day before. As we walked through the pergola, a chorus of “good morning’s” greeted us from the men and women sitting on the picnic tables that had been built in front of the barbecue. Daryl, as per usual, seemed oddly thrown-off by the chipper greetings thrown in his direction. Carol and I shared a bemused grin as she handed the two of us a bowl of venison each.
“Just so you know,” she remarked with a grin. “I liked you first.”
I snorted a chuckle. “Don’t let them hear you say that. You’ll start a riot.”
Daryl, with half a mouthful of venison, grunted a half-hearted, “Shut up.”
Carol chuckled softly before turning around to look at the young kid standing off to the side, behind the second, still smoking barbecue. “Patrick,” she said, offering the carving knife to the kid. “Want to take over from here?”
“Yes, ma’am,” Pat responded earnestly.
He was a good kid, Patrick. Around Carl’s age, with dark hair and thick rimmed, round glasses. He’d been a permanent fixture in our “book-club” since he’d arrived, alongside his father a handful of months ago. The poor kid had always tread somewhat anxiously around both Daryl and I, as if he were afraid we’d bite him, though lately he’d begun to come out of that shy shell.
YOU ARE READING
The Monsters Among Us ➳ Daryl Dixon
Fanfiction𝘋𝘢𝘳𝘺𝘭 𝘋𝘪𝘹𝘰𝘯/𝘖𝘳𝘪𝘨𝘪𝘯𝘢𝘭 𝘍𝘦𝘮𝘢𝘭𝘦 𝘊𝘩𝘢𝘳𝘢𝘤𝘵𝘦𝘳 Not human. She was not human. They all knew it. Could almost feel it, but couldn't make sense of it. That was why they were afraid. Not because of what she used to be Before. But...
