The blood soaked through your thin baby blue shirt and onto his hands. The crimson colored liquid flowing into the lines on his palms, and begins to stain his skin. The once rough and tan turning to a sticky red.
You could feel them shake under you, and barely ever had you seen Daryl shake. When your body shakes it tends to be a reaction to fear, or worry; something Daryl rarely ever showed he felt.
You could feel it, the searing pain in you side. Like someone lit a fire right there on your skin, letting it burn through like a lit cigarette.
Your breathing was growing more and more labored by each passing minute now, each breath you take getting harder.
Your mind felt like a foggy fishbowl, able to see what was happening and the people around you but you couldn't focus on them.
You can hear the echoing of a steady repetitive voice, "stay with me." being repeated over and over. Each time getting more and more emotional, scared even.
You felt warm, sweat building on your forehead, yet other parts of you began to freeze. It was an odd sensation, but in the back of your mind you knew what the cold meant. And you knew what the warmness of the oncoming fever meant too.
"Hey," The same voice that had been repeating the other phrase waves his hand in front of your eyes. Grabbing your attention, and keeping your eyes focused on him as well as you can. "look at me. Right here, look at me."
His voice began to waver some, as if he was trying to hide what he was really thinking and really feeling. Keeping it inside him, rather than cause you to become more scared and more upset.
"Daryl?" You whisper, and it was instantly like someone wiped away the fog. Clearing your mind, and you could see him now. Bold and beautiful beside you.
Daryl had you laying over his crouched legs, his arms tucked around your body as he held you close to him.
"I'm right here baby girl," He whispers, running his shaking hands through your hair. "right here."
"Don't---" You're cut off by a couching fit overcoming you. "don't let me turn, please."
You beg of him this, as you are able to talk again.
He nods his head, barely visable to the human eye unless you laid on his lap like you were. "I won't."
You knew it was only minutes now, before the bleeding made you pass out. That single thought made your heart rate pick up, afraid to fall unconscious.
"Shh," Daryl says trying to calm you, as you hadn't noticed the small tears slipping out from the corners of your eyes. Running down your face, one after the other. Like rain drops on a window, chasing each other down. "don't start cryin on me."
He'd never handled your crying very well, tears were something that made him uncomfortable. But right now, something inside his heart shifted and for once... He didn't care.
"I don't," Taking a breath you needed in between the sobs, you stare straight up at him. "I don't want to leave you."
Everything you never said to him, things you were going to but never found the time to coming out now in this moment.
"Hey," He said gently yet a hint of sternness in his voice. "Don't talk like that, you ain't leavin me. You ain't, you hear me?"
You nod as well as you can, even when knowing the truth of the matter just as well as him.
"Ye remember when we met?" Daryl suddenly asks you, as he sees you begin to drift a little bit. Capturing your attention with this, your eyes fall back on his.
"Course I do," You smile, thinking back to his long ago it seems now. "called me a dumb bitch, remember?"
Daryl lets out a light laugh, something deep in his throat. "Never been good at first impressions huh?"
You smile at him, you hand reaching up to touch his face. Cupping his cheek, your thumb softly tracing his lower lip. "You made up for it though, didn't you?"
Daryl nods slightly, the feel of your palm on his cheek something he tries to memeorize. So he never has to wonder what your touch felt like.
"Like to think I did."
"You did," You assure him in a whisper. "when you saved me that dolphin necklace that reminded me of my mother."
"And when you let me sleep in your poncho, out on the mattress in the hallway with you when I couldn't in a cell."
"Or that time you pulled me out late at night to look at the stars," You see the corners of his lips begin to softly curve up in a smile of his own. "and you told me they were the second most beautiful thing you'd ever seen."
"I said that?" He jokingly asks you. "wonder what number one was?"
You let out a small noise, unable to let out your normal light and airy laugh. "Shut up."
"How bout that time ye were mad at me," Daryl recalls. "cause I never kissed ye when we were round anyone."
You smile thinking back to that day, "You left for a run the next day, and I remember I came out to say goodbye to you. Even if I was still pissed at you."
Daryl nods, picking up your hand in his and placing a warm kiss on your roughed up knuckles. "Remember what I did when you came by the car?"
Staring up into his eyes, the memory replays in your mind. Causing you to feel more love than the pain you feel coursing through your body.
"You brought your lips down, kissed me hard. Right there. In front of Rick, and Michonne. Glenn, and even Hershel."
It was the day he stopped being afraid of what he felt for you, and started embracing it. Daryl had always wondered how easily Glenn and Maggie could do it, but after he kissed you there in front of everybody he finally understood it.
It wasn't embarassing and it didn't take anything from what he felt for you. It was still a moment between the two of you, and now having them in front of people unafraid, allowed for the two of you to experience more.
Daryl can see the way you begin to slip again, something that once shined in your eyes beginning to dim. "Ye the best thing that ever happened to me, you know that?"
Humming a soft reply, you try keeping your eyes open to look at him once more. "I know."
A drop as soft as a raindrop falls from his eye and lands on your shoulder. "If I hadn't known you, I would've never known what love feels like."
It was then, after he expressed the biggest truth he ever felt to you that you slipt. Out of his grasp, out of his loving hold on you and into a greater one in the heavens above.
Daryl made sure you could be at peace up there, never becoming one of those things crawling the earth. He told you he wouldn't let you turn, and he held his word.
Daryl felt guilty he hadn't told you sooner the depth of his love for you, what it meant to him. But he assured himself you knew, when it was your final moments you knew then just how much your love for him meant. That's what mattered.
A/N: another one that made me cry while writing!! I gotta try writing a happy one again😂😭
