Barely Alive // TWD // Daryl Dixon

Chapter 11 -- Clean

"It's only when someone really shows their vulnerability to another,

and is accepted, flaws and all, can he or she really feel loved."

- Brownell Landrum, A Chorus of Voices: DUET stories Volume III - Adult Version

When I woke up I was on a bed, a blanket was covering my body up to my ribs. I was wearing the same clothes except they had taken off my sweater and my shoes.

"Cecilia," someone muttered softly and right after I felt warm lips on my forehead.

Daryl was sat next to me on the edge of the bed, holding one of my hands with both of his until I opened my eyes, when I did, he used his other hand to delicately caress the top of my head.

"Hershel injected you some of the antibiotics, you'll be fine," Daryl informed me. "He cleaned your wound on your face. He checked for some more on your body but he didn't find anything that bad."

"You saw it too?" I asked him weakly, I was ashamed of how my body looked, full of bruises, mostly on my arms, shoulders and face.

"No," he said and I knew he was being honest. "But he told me there were a lot of bruises, I'm so sorry."

Daryl kissed my forehead again as his eyes filled with tears, making me want to cry as well. This wasn't his fault, it was Sean's and if anything, it was mine too, for being so naïve and stupid.

"For what? You have nothing to do with this."

"I should have protected you," he said. "I should have let you come with me on that run, I should have been here for you."

"You can't always be here, Daryl. This is not on you. Sean's messed up, he planned this for months."

"How exactly did he do it?"

"What?"

"Got you away, Oliver said something," Daryl said as he looked right into my eyes. "Said you and Sean were told by Rick to go check the snares but Rick never told him that."

"I figured. I was so anxious to go out that I agreed to go with him and I saw Rick talking to Sean before he left so I assumed it was true," I said, remembering that day. "I should have stayed, why couldn't I see it?"

"This isn't your fault, he's a psychopath! He played with your head, he was... cunning," he told me. "What did he do to you, Cecilia?"

I just shook my head, not wanting to remember it or think about it, I looked down and saw my hands, there were bandages around my wrists like if I had made cuts on them, I knew how badly hurt they were due to the rope around them for days. I bit my bottom lip and took deep breaths, trying to stop some tears to come out of my icy blue eyes. Besides, everything was too embarrassing, I wasn't sure if I could tell Daryl.

"Alright, let's start little by little," he told me in a soft tone. "What happened to you in your face, that cut?" he said pointing to the side of my head. "What did he do?"

"He... he, uh, he hit me with the butt of the gun," I told him weakly, letting a tear falling down my face, which I wiped away quickly, as I remembered why he did that but I refused to tell Daryl, even when he asked, I just shook my head at him.

Short flashbacks of the last six days went through my head as it were a short movie. I closed my eyes tightly and shook my head but the images wouldn't go away, especially the events that followed that blow to my head.

"Cecilia, Cecilia!"

"I want to shower," I told him instantly as I opened my eyes and looked down at my body, I felt dirty, as never before.