Lost | Daryl Dixon

35 - A Place To Call...

First Person POV

"You really think this will work?" Maggie asked, walking beside me as we trailed through the grass and woods, our vehicles securely facing the exit if we needed to run.

I thought for a moment as everything distracted my thoughts, my skin burnt with a sense of liveliness I hadn't felt in a while - a dead woman walking for the past 9 months, even before we left the highway after Sophia. The long grass scratched against my skin and hugged my ankles, as if wrapping around me, wanting me to stop and take count - but the giddyness from finally having a chance off of the road forced me to rip it from its root.

Part of me wasn't hopeful - every place we thought we'd hold was gone in a week at best. We were tired, we were starving, we were ill. Maybe I was delusional when I ran back, high on sleeplessness and kissing the man I'd been slowly falling for day after day. But seeing that building, it was like winning the lottery in the old world.

I looked at her, a large, blooming smile on my face, finally concrete in my feeling. "Look, all of the walkers are in prison uniform," I pointed, my hand tracing the field as her eyes locked, her face scrunched slightly. Mud and dirt decorated her features after so long on the road. "Which means no one else has gotten in. Prisons have a limited size capacity, and, based on the fact the same ones circle certain blocks, we can take the yard securely tonight, and push into the building tomorrow. All we need is one block secure and we've got gates, maybe even left over food and supplies."

She nodded, but her eyes were glazing over Glenn for a moment, looking at him with love in her eyes as he explained something to Carl like an older brother. They were talking about some video game that Carl was definitely too young to remember; but the excitement on his face kept Glenn going. I watched them, my hand lowering from my gesture as I watched the interaction. Would I be like that? I didn't recall such with Shane? At the beginning, it was a childhood crush. As an adult it was lust and a need to be touched with anything but a curled fist. By the end it was a deeply toxic and unsettling prospect - I think I loved him out of familiarity, and not the way I watched them love, at the same age I was when dating and getting accidentally pregnant from Shane.

Now, I edge closer to my thirties, a more mature version of a childlike crush for a man who has been kind, and gentle, and patient for months on end, with shared kisses and secret exchanges, I find myself inspired by the two still in their early twenties, feeling younger once again.

My soft smile upturned more, looking at her again as she realised I'd seen the small glance, the appreciation of love. "You two are so cute." I commented, sugar dripping from my tone as I spoke with sincerity. There hadn't been much of that recently, sweet, relationship things. Lori and Rick were constantly bickering and fighting - I hoped just from the stress of our scenario. I was tired of trying to shield Carl from it as he grew so rapidly into a man. It wasn't just about this baby, but about their son who had to watch the intensity and every unstable nature of his parents relationship.

Maggie blushed slightly, looking down a moment. I chuckled at her, throwing an arm around her shoulders, before pausing in my laughter as Daryl gently squeezed my hand as he walked past, joining Rick at the front.

It tingled and my own face went red, Maggie noticing and grinning herself. I watched as he joined up front, a small glance my way. We weren't rushing into making it obvious, but I wasn't a child, there was no reason to actively hide it, either. But that was more obvious than previously - and based off of our previous behaviour over months of secret flirting on hunts and walker checks, that was intentional. There was something sweet but daring about the flirting; I didn't object to it. It was perfectly reflective of him - I don't think he's one to be romantic, and I have little stomach for it myself, at least, not romantic grand gestures. I also wouldn't view him a poet. The flirting, the teasing, the arguing back and forth - that was our own chess match to play and learn eachother.