These Wicked Games (Daryl Dixon)

Chapter Fourteen - Sometimes

"Please be patient with me. Sometimes when I'm quiet, it's because I need to figure myself out. It's not because I don't want to talk. Sometimes there are no words for my thoughts." - Kamla Bolaños

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DARYLS POINT OF VIEW -

This was the third night I had returned and the third night I'd got a fleeting glance of her sat up there.

I don't think she knew that I knew.

Sometimes I came back a few minutes early and I watched her from the woods just trying to figure out what she was doing.

Could she not sleep?

Was she scared?

Had something happened?

Or, and the more remote possibility, was she worried? About me?

The latter seemed the least plausible.

No one had ever worried about me my whole life 'cept my mom. Not my dad, not Merle, none of these guys, they trusted me yeah, but they just expected me to be ok.

I went and did my thing and no one questioned it. I dunno how I felt about that.

But she, she seemed worried.

Good lord she'd fallen asleep outside with my vest in her arms!

And I didn't know how I felt about that either.

Ever since I'd met her she...sparkled. I mean she confronted me the other day, no one had ever done that.

The only thing that bothered me was that even though it was a sparkle, it was kinda dull. Like something was clouding it.

I couldn't resist just looking at her, even in the dark I could see the sheen of her dark hair, the recognisable gait as she walked up and down the balcony that had become her sanctuary the past few nights.

I could practically see that smile, a smile so rare that I could swear it was a figment of my imagination.

It was moments like this that I felt that dull ache in my chest as I recalled the harsh words I'd carelessly thrown her way.

There was no reasonable excuse.

I just couldn't handle my own thoughts and I shamefully took it out on her. This little bird.

I rubbed my dry, dirty hands over my face in an attempt to rub away the guilt and replayed the night in my head.

The walker heads I left around their camp.

The deer blood I'd poured all over their tents while they were hunting.

The screams that I had echoed around the woods from my own lungs whilst high up in the trees.

I had them running scared.