Emotions and feelings were foreign to Daryl Dixon; they were a language he couldn't speak. All his life it had been that way, he was never taught about the things he felt just what he shouldn't. No one showed him how to handle what he felt, only to push them down hard enough until they disappeared.
His father raised him through pain and punishment, he never learned positive emotions from him. The only things Merle felt in his life were anger and lust, and like their father they weren't positive things Daryl wanted to know. It wasn't surprising to him that he turned out the way that he did. Guarded, angry and oblivious to others feelings.
But when you entered his life.. It all changed.
He had heard about the sensation called butterflies, but never gave it a second thought. He thought it was silly, stupid even. His brother told him that crushes were for sissies, and that turned Daryl further away from the idea of ever experiencing one.
But with you, when he met you that early summer day back when the world had just started to fall apart, he wondered if butterflies were the explanation for the uncomfortable feeling in his stomach.
If butterflies were the reason he felt sick every time he had to talk to you or be beside you. Why his mouth went dry and his cheeks would flush pale pink. He wondered if butterflies were responsible for the reason he watched you ever chance he got, but never dared talk to you on his own. Daryl wondered if that nervous fluttering that coarsed through him were the crushes everyone spoke of. The sensation that made butterflies erupt inside his gut and swirl endlessly in his mind.
Was it butterflies he felt, or something else?
He knew of the sappy type of films where the guy got the girl, or the girl fell for the wrong kind of guy. The films where the woman admitted her feelings for the man and the man confessed he felt the same. The ones where they rode off into the sunset together, the movies that had happily ever afters. He hated those films.
Although, Daryl was never sure if he hated those films because they were stupid and his brother made sure to tell him so. Or if he hated them because they showed him a life he would never get. A perfect ending was never in the cards for a Dixon, Daryl knew that much.
But when he watched you on the farm, your long hair blowing in the wind and your smile wide with happiness, he felt like he was not only watching one of those silly romance movies but in one. The sunshine shown down on you like a spotlight and the vast green field was a background of beauty behind you.
Daryl could still feel those fluttering butterflies. He realized the more he tried to push and crush the butterflies down and away, that only made them multiply. But what had changed with the butterflies he felt before and the ones he felt now, was the placement. They had fluttered upward, into his chest. Making his heart hammer harder when you were near, and he swore he felt his heart skip a beat when you kissed his cheek one night.
When they were in his stomach and deep in his gut, he could ignore them sometimes. But as they grew harsher inside his chest, he couldn't. He couldn't ignore the feelings inside him that he wasn't familiar with. The sensation growing at a rapid pace inside of him. He didn't know what it was he was feeling, and he wasn't sure if it was good for him or if it would slowly kill him.
Was it still butterflies he felt, or had it grown into something else?
His brother always told him to keep women at arms length, because once they got in they never left. Daryl believed in that advice at the time, but now he wasn't so sure. His brother told him that when a girl confesses her feelings to a man it's a trap. Trapping the man into saying them back and making them stay with them. Daryl believed that too, until you told him your feelings.
The thumping and aching in his chest was almost painful as you looked at him, your face illumitanted by the bright moonlight flooding in through the prison bars. Your words were gentle and calm as if trying hard not to scare him off. You confessed your feelings to him, unable to hold them in any longer.
Daryl felt the constricting in his chest he had pinpointed as butterflies, but now there was something different. Something that made him want to step closer to you and kiss you. Something that made him want to tell you he liked when you were around him. That he liked seeing your smile and hearing your laugh, that he liked the smell of something sweet like honey in your hair. It was something he had never felt before and it made him fearful. The power this unknown emotion held inside of him.
It was so strong that it broke down his tall brick walls he had built up and he felt them shatter to the floor. It was so mighty that it overpowered his judgement and took the wheel. That unknown feeling that had been blooming inside of him finally expressed itself.
When the words were out in the air that he liked you in the same way you liked him, and when your lips were gently touching his own... He felt something new. He didn't know his body could handle a new unknown emotion but he was proved wrong. This one overtook his senses and made him feel blind. Until his eyes locked with yours and then for the first time in his life, he saw clearly.
Was this love?
Daryl heard of how love was the most powerful thing in the world, but he never believed it. How could a stupid weak emotion be more powerful than a riffle or his crossbow? More powerful than a grenade or even the emotion of hate if he had to go down that route. It wasn't until you that his thoughts regarding it changed.
He wondered if love was what brought a small smile to his face when he woke with you still dozing in his arms. If love was responsible for the feeling of anticipation and relief when he got back from a run and you were there waiting. He questioned if love was the source of his new found hope when everything fell apart at the prison yet you found him after being separated. He couldn't help but think was it love that helped him stay in the naive community with you when all he wanted was to leave.
Was it love that made him feel lost without you? Was it love that made him feel like he won a prize he never thought he could win? Was it love that made the world now feel a little bit better with you there? Was it love that made his heart beat faster when it came to you? Was it love that made him feel for once like he could get one of those happily ever afters they painted in the movies.
Was it love?
Daryl knew the moment he gave himself up for your safety, he knew it when you were the only thing on his mind while he was brutally tortured. He knew when your arms held him tighter then ever before when he finally came home.
Daryl realized he knew it all along, the feelings and emotions he never learned. He knew what they were all along... This was what it felt like to be in love. And this was what it felt like to be loved.
This was love.
A/N: I love this one so much!❤😍One of my favorites I have to admit!
