A/N: Part 3 in my Nashiville!AU. Follows Inside my Head (there's a Record that's Playing) [Part 1] and We're Alone in our own World [Part 2]. I'd recommend reading them first. There's a time jump, more children than music, and my attempt to write a song fit for The Brothers Dixon. Title taken from 'A Life that's Good', which is an actual song from the show Nashville.
This is what happens when I watch Nashville and The Walking Dead right after one another. Enjoy
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She has a miscarriage on the eve of the start of her national tour.
The tour doctor confirms it with a sad sigh. Did you know you were….
No. she had no idea.
She is in New York, in a hotel, alone, her children, her husband back home and in that moment, she feels eighteen again, afraid and isolated and so terrified of the future. she blames the strenuous rehearsals, the long hours of promotion. She blames herself and she wonders if he will too.
So she makes the decision not to tell him.
They don't keep secrets. Save this one.
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Daryl Dixon takes to fatherhood like a duck takes to water and all those terrible clichés his mother-in-law tends to use.
Mother-in-law. Fatherhood. If he had thrown around those words ten years ago, he might have thought he were in the midst of a fever dream. Or jacked up on Merle's pills.
But this is no dream, no high. Okay, maybe a high of a different kind. But right now the reality is his stubborn and wilful seven-year-old daughter refusing to take off a black-fringed shawl because while it's all well and good to play 'Stevie Nicks' at home, you can't wear that get-up to school.
"Daddy!" she pouts, "Mama lets me!"
This isn't Daryl's first rodeo, however. Fixing her with a child-appropriate glare (that she won't fear anyway, that girl has him wrapped around her little finger), she shakes his head.
"Your Mama let's you wear the hat, Lila," he says sternly, "don't play me for some fool, girl."
With a huff and a sigh, she stomps back to her room. He spares a glance at the kitchen clock, the morning already feeling longer than it should.
"What are we going to do with your sister, Jack?"
From his seat at the kitchen table, his four-year-old son simply laughs.
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"I miss you," she breathes down the line. This is their routine. She calls before the children go to bed, he calls after and even eight years later it is breathy sighs and whispered promises and the timber of his voice making her feel like she's coming undone.
"Fuck, baby," he sighs, sounding exhausted, "I have no idea how you do this everyday."
She giggles, because yeah, it's easy when it's both of them, working as a team. Easy when she can fight with her wild, opinionated, free-spirited daughter and he can goof off with their son. And when he was in Europe, there was her Mama and Maggie helping out so she never felt out of her element, never felt like she was drowning without him.
"You can call my Mama, you know," she says softly, "fly the kids to the farm for the weekend, her and Daddy would love that."
"Yeah," he says, trying to brush her off. She knows him by now, knows that even though her folks love him, he doesn't like them to think he can't handle things, like he can't be a good father, a good husband.
She knows all his insecurities, just as he knows hers.
"Took Lila to Walmart today," he murmurs, "made me buy a poster of you, made me hang it right above her bed, string some of those twinkle lights you women love so much around it."
"She did?" Beth says softly, swallowing the lump in her throat.
"Checked on her while I was shutting up the house and you know what she was doing? She was talking to it. Pretending it was you."
A sob catches in her throat, audible and jarring.
"Hey, hey," Daryl says quietly, "don't be sad, okay? I'm only telling you so you know how much your babies miss you. Because I know Lila was being a brat on the phone and I know that would have gotten you down."
"She's so much like Maggie," Beth hiccups.
"Well, if Jack is anything like Merle, then god help us all."
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'Uncle' Merle is a constant presence in their house, even when his wife isn't on tour. There are still pills, and there are still wild nights that hit the gossip rags the next day, but he never brings that around his children. Never would do anything to harm them.
(Dixons look after their own.)
When Jack gets a cold and can't go to day care, Daryl has to cancel their studio session. He hates wasting their time, but he hates leaving his kids home with a stranger from some nanny service even more.
Merle, like most things in life, isn't phased, and instead shows up at his front door, a six-pack in one hand, a bucket of chicken in the other.
"Let's get writing, baby brother."
Despite fatherhood, despite paparazzi photos of The Brothers Dixon walking around carrying a little girl in a tutu and a little boy in a cape, they are still the bad boys of country music. Maybe it's still a bit scandalous, Daryl Dixon marrying a girl almost 20 years his junior. Maybe it's the clashes with the media, who get too close to his children, to his family. He's hit reporters, he's been sued. His anger gets the better of him when his family's involved and he doesn't imagine a time in his life when it won't.
He'll do anything to ensure their safety and happiness.
"Hey little man," 'Uncle' Merle grins, feet up on the coffee table. His son, clad in snoopy pyjamas, rubs his eyes, curling up between them on the sofa.
"Daddy, my head hurts."
Daryl's quick to grab some children's asprin and a cup of water, which the young child swallows eagerly.
"Whatca doing, Uncle Merle?"
"We're making gold, kid," he chuckles, pencil between his teeth.
"Gold?"
"We're writing a song, little man," Daryl settles beside his son, pulling the guitar back in his lap, "you wanna hear?"
Jack nods eagerly, Merle barking a laugh.
I've got one hand on the steering wheel
The other on my gun
And when we hit the interstate
Oh boy, you had better run
I've seen the bruises, I've seen the marks
I know you had your fun
And I'm coming for you buddy
By the morning you'll be done
It's dark and it's rough and he knows that his four-year-old son won't understand it, will hopefully never understand it, at least the meaning behind it, the weight it holds for both his father and uncle. But as much as they joke Jack is like Merle, raising hell and causing chaos, the kid has a way of observing quietly that makes him in more ways like Hershel.
Deep down, Daryl is grateful for that.
"Do you have any songs about astronauts?" the child mumbles sleepily, Merle snorts a laugh.
"We'll work on one, kid," Daryl chuckles, and the smile his son gives him almost makes him want to write one.
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She feels fat.
The dress is too shiny, too tight. Too everything she isn't. She misses skinny jeans and sundresses and her cowboy boots.
She misses home.
Beth never feels like herself on photo shoots, but accepts that feeling with as much calm grace as she can muster. She feels like she's playing dress-up with Lila, but there's more make-up, more lights, and more people analysing every detail.
It's not real. It's all a part of her pretend world.
Pretend world. That's how she explains to Lila the music industry and everything that goes along with it. The red carpets and the award shows. The fans that will approach her for autographs or photos in the street. When she asks her Mama why she's on television, on the radio, in magazines.
Lila is seven and Beth is so painfully aware that any day now she will realise that her parents are famous and her life will never be normal.
And god, it breaks her heart every single time.
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They don't tell you fatherhood is exhausting.
Sure, they tell you it's equal parts hard and rewarding. Sure, they tell you that some days you'll feel like 'Dad of the Year' and others a complete failure.
They don't tell you that running after a four year old and a seven year old, day in and day out, will make you feel older than your years.
"That would be too easy, wouldn't it son?" Hershel chuckles, watching as Lila, Jack, and Maggie and Glenn's son brandish plastic swords, play-acting as pirates, Glenn playing the role of villain.
"Daddy!" Lila screams, "You can be a sea monster!"
He shakes his head, a smile curling at the corners of his mouth.
"You know, I'm a multi-platinum artist."
"Is that so?"
"I'm kind of a big deal."
Hershel laughs again.
"We all think we are, until we have children."
"What are we then?" Daryl asks, Jack tugging on his arm, pulling him towards their game.
"Whatever they want us to be!" Hershel calls out, "Even if it's a sea monster."
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The thing about award shows?
They. Are. Terrible.
There's nothing Beth enjoys less than wearing some dress the critics will probably hate, being blinded by camera flashes, and being forced to socialise with people she dislikes/doesn't know/intimidates her.
She is a country princess. Compared to the likes of Beyonce and Katy Perry, she belongs in a different universe.
But since day one, there was Taylor, guiding her through the minefield that is the music industry. She knows which ones to flag now, can see the patterns, recognise the signs. The young up and comers all clawing for the crown and she lets them because there is no such title.
Life is more than stadium tours and platinum records.
Life is more than make-up endorsements and private jets.
It's lazy winter Sundays, everyone curled up together in bed. It's family dinners, her children and nephew chasing fireflies in the yard. It's her husband's gruff I love you when they go to bed and when they wake up, no matter their moods. It's her heart, fuller than it's ever been, just about ready to burst.
And when her babies call her the next morning (Mama, you looked so pretty!) and her husband (Baby, I miss all of you), it's easy to forget about the life she lives, the one full of fakery and falsehoods, and yearn for the one that's real, the one that's true.
It's the only one she'll ever need.
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"We have twenty minutes," his wife gasps, his hands already dragging her panties down her legs. Daryl nips at her neck and she gently pushes his mouth away, capturing his bottom lip between her teeth.
"No marks, baby," she whispers, "they'll be cameras."
"Fuck, girl," he moans, hand inching up her dress, fingers seeking out her wetness, stroking reverently, "you're dripping."
"Seventeen minutes," she pants, "your brother will kill us if we're late."
"Don't care," he murmurs, "been too long."
And oh god, it has. It's been five weeks. Five long, dry weeks. Sure, there were phone calls and Skype that took a decidedly sexual turn, but his hand isn't the same as her mouth. Or her hand, as he's so kindly reminded when she grasps him, stroking firmly, making him groan.
It's twenty years since their first album launch. Twenty years since The Brothers Dixon stepped out of the backwoods of Georgia and into country music's spotlight. Their history is equal parts success and scandal, dropping from one label to another during a time when Merle's offstage demons were too big of a battle to face. There was jail for one Dixon, exile for another, but that was what it took to get them back on track. In this business, they are notorious. They are like no other. Simply because they do not give a fuck.
"Your brother…" she moans, as his fingers stroke her clit.
"Stop talking about my fucking brother," he growls, "when I'm trying to fuck you."
And maybe that's what does it. This is the moment where she snaps, even after eight years, especially after eight years. When as much as he yearns for her to be naked in their bed, that is not their reality. Their reality is nightmares and upset stomachs and fears of the dark. Their reality is two young children who see them as heroes and protectors and he'll put fulfilling that fantasy above everything else in his life. Sometimes even above her.
But she understands. They've been married for eight years, so of course she does.
So it's these moments that they cherish. When the children are at the grandparent's and they're in a room that is not their own and they can pretend that this is eight years ago and there are all the hotel rooms and private planes and limousines they can imagine and quickies in cramped spaces and red lips around his cock and her scent still lingering on his fingers as they pose for photos on the press line. Where he fucks not his wife, not the mother of his children, but the eternal darling of country music. Who is wanton and cursing and begging for release.
He's fucking her against the door when Merle starts pounding on it from the other side. And she's moaning and whimpering and he's telling her to fucking cum, ignoring Merle, ignoring their time restrictions, ignoring everything except for the sensation of her walls clamping around him, vibrating and pulsating.
They will be late. But they are The Brothers Dixon, the outlaws of country music.
And they don't give a fuck.
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Maggie frets and fusses, barking orders and checking items off lists. Today she's playing for some bigwig's wife; an intimate gathering of 300 and Maggie understands the value of these jobs. It's schmoozing at an A grade level and at the end of the day, after the guests leave, satisfied with their celebrity encounter, there's a pay cheque that makes her blush.
She slips into her makeshift dressing room, Maggie shooing away the make-up artist and stylist, claiming the need for a 'sister moment'. They're her people, so they smile and take it in good stride.
"You wanted a word, Bethy?"
"I'm going to take a break after the tour," Beth blurts out, feeling nervous, awaiting Maggie's wrath.
"Good," she trills, giving her stage outfit a once over, "I think we could all use a couple of months-"
"An indefinite break," she interrupts and Maggie freezes, the room going silent.
"Beth…"
"I've been wanting to do this ever since Jack was born."
She's never done well in silence, preferring her noisy, chaotic life. She's never thrived in the quiet moments where she feels too vulnerable, feels too much like sixteen, alone, and weighed down by her grief.
"Beth," Maggie sighs, rubbing her face, "I don't want to do this now."
"Neither do I."
The difference, however, always has and always will be their definition of this.
"You know how it goes," Maggie says firmly, albeit sadly, "an album every two years. A big tour. Six months off. If you announce a break, there's no guarantee your label will keep you on. And what will you do? Stay home and play housewife while your husband gallivants around the country? Or will you pack up your kids, your life, and follow him from city to city?"
"Why do you make me feel so guilty for wanting those options, Maggie?" Beth feels the tears welling in her eyes, threatening to overflow and ruin her make-up.
"Bethy-"
"No," she sniffs, dabbing at her eyes, "I've missed so much of their lives. Every day, Daryl tells me about something new Jack and Lila did and my heart aches so damn badly. We bought that house so we could raise a family and make music and instead I'm writing songs in hotel rooms and reading my children bedtime stories via Skype."
"I know," Maggie murmurs, "I know it's hard. You think I don't miss my son? I don't miss Glenn?"
"I know you do," Beth whispers, "but I'm not like you, Maggie. I've never been okay alone. I always wanted to be a mother and now that I am one, I don't feel like I'm giving it 100%."
Maggie sighs again, rubbing her hands over her face, quickly glancing down at her watch, before giving her sister a cautious look.
"Is this about the miscarriage?"
She shrugs. She shakes her head. She nods.
It is and it isn't.
"It's about doing right by my children."
The ones that are and the ones that could have been.
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She's running late. It's fine, and it isn't.
It's fine because he knows she's killing herself to be here for this. That her plane was delayed and she's in a car now and for the past month she's been saying that nothing on this earth will stop me from attending my little girl's first dance recital, and Daryl knows she'll make it, he has that faith because she gave it to him.
He just wishes she would hurry up. He's getting sick of being hit on by women, like his eight year long marriage means shit.
It's at the last possible second when she slips into the seat next to him, red faced and out of breath and when they announce Lila's group, he presses a kiss to her forehead and murmurs just in time.
And she is. Always is. Always makes it just as she promises. And the kids are out of sync and cute and his little girl clearly has Dixon feet, but she's beaming and when he shoots a glance at his wife, she has tears in her eyes like this is the most beautiful thing she's ever seen.
And hell, maybe it is. Maybe it's the fact that they're here, despite their careers, despite the darkness they've both lived through. Despite the scar on her wrist and the scars on his back. Despite every voice telling him that he won't be a good father except for hers.
It's always been hers.
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Jack wants to go trampolining for his birthday.
Well, scratch that, Jack wants to go to space, but Daryl spins it so the four-going-on-five-year-old can understand. Weightlessness. Flying. Hotdogs.
The kid is sold.
So they rent out the place (celebrities and privacy and Daryl will always grumble about money, despite the fact they can afford it) and slap on a space theme. Jack wears his space costume and Daryl won't dress up (ever), but Merle does, because he's always on the hunt for rich divorcees.
She sips iced tea with her mother as her son jumps around with his friends, joking about how those kids are going to sleep well tonight.
And watching Glenn, Maggie, Daryl, and Merle pegging dodge balls at each other, the adults probably will be too.
"I remember when that boy was born," Annette murmurs quietly, Beth glancing up, surprised.
"Mama…"
"You nearly didn't make it. He nearly didn't make it."
She remembers. Of course she remembers.
"You were out for three days and your daddy was trying to prepare him for the possibility of raising a little girl all alone."
"I made it, Mama," she swallows thickly, "and Jack made it."
"Oh, he never doubted Jack," Annette chuckles, watching now as Daryl jumps, his son upside down on his shoulders, "said to me, 'ma'am, that boy here is a Dixon and if there's anything that Dixons are good at, it's surviving'. You, you had lost so much blood. The doctors didn't like your odds. But he never left your side, not for a second. That brother of his stood guard outside the ICU, watching your son, watching him fight."
"I know," Beth murmurs, voice thick with emotion, "Maggie told me after."
"'Ain't no Dixons dying today'," Annette quotes quietly, "we could see from the first day Daryl held Lila that he would be an amazing father. Merle, however, that was the moment I realised that he would protect those children with every fibre of his being. That's why Hershel advised Daryl to make Merle Jack's godfather."
"I didn't know that," Beth whispers. She wipes away the tears that threaten to fall as she watches Merle and her young son, jumping and laughing.
"I know you look at that little boy and see Merle some days, and Hershel others," Annette smiles sadly, "but you know who I see? I see Shawn. I see my boy so much that it's like watching an old home movie."
"Shawn would have loved Jack," Beth agrees, looking at her son in a new light.
"They would have been thick as thieves."
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Bent over his bike, he's distracted when a figure steps into his light. His small daughter casts a large shadow and were his wife here, she would wax poetically about Greene women and forces of nature. Natural disasters, he joked once and rather than scowl she smirked and showed him exactly what kind of damage she can inflict.
The best kind, as it turned out.
"Daddy?"
"Princess?"
Yeah, he's a fool for this kid.
"When is Mama coming home?"
God, that question kills him. Lila understands, to a point, why Beth does what she does, why she's away all the time. Understands that it's work, but at the same time she's starting to realise that it's more than that. That it's a whole other life that she leads, they lead, and can only hide for so long.
But not forever.
"Next week, baby," he murmurs, taking in her brown cowboy boots and sundress and braids, looking every bit a miniature version of Beth.
"Daddy?"
"Yeah, Princess?"
"How did you hurt your back?"
He had forgotten that he'd chosen to work without a shirt. Forgotten, because the day was so warm and he was certain that he would be able to hear approaching footsteps, but didn't account for the tiny ones or how engrossed in his work he would become.
His daughter traces one of the more prominent ones with her fingers.
"Do they hurt, Daddy?"
He swallows thickly. There's no malice in her words, no disgust or pity; nothing but the curiosity he's so well accustomed to, what with being the father of two creative, adventurous children. Still, he has to fight the urge to turn away, to grab his shirt and shrug it on, to hide his past.
"Nah," he replies, "not for a long time."
"How'd you get them?" she asks, her fingers still tracing his back, "did you fall out of a tree?"
He could lie. He could make up some story; paint himself a daredevil, a hero. But he thinks of Beth. Thinks of Merle.
"My father."
Scrunching up her face, Lila moves from behind him to sit before him, her feet straight out in front of her, hands trying to touch her toes.
"Why?"
"Sometimes," Daryl murmurs, "sometimes daddy's don't treat their kids how they should. Sometimes they hurt them instead of love them. My daddy wasn't a good daddy."
It's hard to say, but it's true.
Lila absorbs the information quietly and he waits for her to do so. She throws her arms around his neck.
"You're the best daddy in the world," she breathes, his arms tightening around her tiny frame, "I'm sorry your daddy was mean."
It's funny how her tiny arms make him feel so whole.
"Thanks, Princess."
"Maybe," Lila pulls away, looking all kinds of serious, "you should get Mama to kiss them better? She's real good at that."
He chuckles at the innocence of her suggestion, pulling his daughter closer, pressing a kiss to her forehead.
"That's a good idea, baby."
He tickles her to break the tension and her laughter makes his heart soar and his mind forget about the marks.
These children, they have a habit of making him forget.
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"Morning."
She groans, burrowing her face further into Daryl's chest, snuggling down deeper into the blankets.
"It's barely morning, Daryl."
"It's five-thirty," he presses a kiss to the top of her head, "your children will be awake soon."
"Let me sleep, please."
"Shouldn't have jumped me at 2am," he chuckles, "should have just gone to sleep if you were so tired."
"I need you more than sleep," she moans, rolling over, grabbing his shirt from the floor and slipping it over her head.
Trailing lazy kisses down her neck, she slips back into bed, wrapping herself around him.
"What's this I'm hearing about a sabbatical?" Daryl murmurs, throwing on his sleep pants, much to her dismay. She plays with the smattering of hair on his chest, stroking it fondly, taking great pleasure in the gooseflesh that bursts from his skin.
"Who told you?"
"The label," he says quietly, "trying to get me to talk you out of it, I guess."
"What do you think?"
She waits for his reply with bated breath. Sure, she knows in her heart that he'll support her no matter what, but she still worries that maybe she's making a rash choice. Maybe her sister and the label heads will be right, that she'll miss it too much and to take time off this early in her career is a bold move and maybe a bad move. That if she's not relevant, she's nothing. No one.
"I'll support you whatever you do, baby, you know that," he tells her firmly, "You don't want renew your contract? Don't. You want to come on tour with me? Nothing more would make me happier."
"I can't do both," she says quietly, "I thought I could, I really did. But no one wants to hear songs about a girl who misses her family, not when the solution is so simple. Maybe I'll write music on my own terms. No more 'album every two years'. An independent label, smaller venues, creative freedom. That would be nice."
"What do you want?" Daryl asks, his fingers running through her hair.
"You. The children. Our families," She smiles brightly, "music. That's all I'll ever want. All I'll ever need."
Right on queue, right on schedule, two pairs of tiny feet come bounding into the room, throwing themselves onto the bed. Jack lands heavily on her leg, but the pain quickly fades when her son wraps his arms around her, burying his face into her neck.
"All you'll ever need, huh?" Daryl grins, their daughter lying across them, her head in her lap and her feet on his stomach, talking faster than Beth's brain can process at this time in the morning.
"All I'll ever need."
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In helping Lila find her passion, he never thought it would be so obvious.
Music.
She's a songbird like her Mama, takes to the piano too (though he figures he'll get her a guitar for her birthday, just so she has the option).
But god, if that doesn't make him proud.
He's not naïve enough to call it the family 'business', knows well and good that this industry is fickle and talent can only take you so far. You need determination, you need fire in your veins. You need to be able to take a punch, pick yourself up, and fall down again. You need to have metal in your heart because it's not enough to make music, not enough to live and breathe it. You need to bleed it, bleed for it.
And lord knows, they have bled.
But Lila is seven. Lila is seven with parents who have started from nothing to become something and she'll never struggle, never fight like they did, because sometimes your DNA make-up is the best reference you can have in this business.
He figures he can only try and guide her. Let Merle's career serve as a cautionary tale and her Mama's serve as an ideal one. Let Maggie teach her grace and strength, let Glenn teach her to be brave and take risks. Let Hershel teach her compassion, let Annette teach her kindness. Let her little brother teach her how to protect. Let him teach her how to fight. Let her Mama teach her how to love.
Let her be the best parts of everyone who loves her.
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"I'm sorry I didn't tell you."
It's funny, this cabin. How it brings out all their secrets and all their fears. All their dreams as well. But Daryl paces, hands in his hair, footsteps heavy and rage simmering just below the surface.
"It was six months ago, Beth."
"I know," she whispers, staring at her hands.
This was supposed to be their anniversary weekend. This was supposed to be romantic and some kind of re-enactment of their past, but instead he's angry at her and she's feeling guilty as hell.
"I didn't know how to tell you," she says softly, "I didn't even know how to process it."
"We would have processed it together," Daryl snaps, getting close to her, getting up in her face, "you can't have a miscarriage and not tell me! Fuck, Beth! That's not something you can keep from me!"
"I didn't do it on purpose!" she cries, stepping away, "it was the night before my tour, I was alone! I was scared-"
"So you should have called me!" Daryl yells, "I would have flown to New York. We would have gone to the hospital. Not just some tour doctor giving you the news in some random hotel room!"
"You know why I didn't tell you?" Beth sobs, wiping her eyes furiously, "I didn't tell you because I was relieved. Because I was afraid of being pregnant again. I was afraid of the possibility that I might actually die this time. I was afraid of leaving you!"
"Beth-"
"All anyone told me after was how you were a wreck," she wipes her nose on her sleeve, "how you didn't sleep or eat. How Merle was with Jack and Maggie had Lila. How you shut down for three days. And I felt so guilty, because I was the one who convinced you that we should have another baby. I was the one who wouldn't take a break from work, who kept touring until I was showing and even after that I was always working. If I died, it would have been my fault. And I couldn't – I can't risk doing that to you again. Not ever."
She takes a deep breath, reaching out to him once more. He doesn't pull away this time, merely folds into himself, hair hanging in his eyes, heels of his palm pressing into his eyes.
"I should have told you," she whispers, her hands going to his hands, gently prying them away, encasing them with hers, "I should have told you the moment I knew. Should have called you, crying and incoherent for you to come put me back together. Like only you know how. I should have done it differently because we don't have secrets until we do and that's how it starts. That's how people start to fall apart. I don't want to lose you, Daryl. I can't lose you."
"Some days I need you so much it scares me," Daryl murmurs, glancing up with glassy eyes, meeting her tear-filled ones. His hand, previously entwined with her own, reaches up to tuck a strand of hair behind her ear, fingers dragging down her cheek to gently curl around her neck. She shivers against his warm hand, inching closer, tilting her head up. Their foreheads meet; blue gazing into blue and this is the moment. This is the moment that will inspire albums worth of songs. This is the moment where she knows they will be okay.
They'll be better than okay.
"I'm never afraid when I'm with you," Beth breathes.
It's heartfelt declarations and solemn promises. It's their vows, part two. It's the same old song, with a new tune.
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He gazes out the plane window, forever mesmerised by the wide expanse of blue and puffs of white. He didn't leave Georgia until his twenties, for a long time thought he never would. That it would just be him, living in his old man's trailer, him long gone, but the memories still bright and harsh. He would pick up work where he could, live off the woods, wait for Merle to blow in and out of town. Like usual.
Back then, he never imagined in his wildest dreams the return of Merle and his sudden, determined decision to head to Nashville. He never imagined the decision would drastically change everything.
But here he is, Daryl Dixon, going on twenty years since Merle threw his guitar case at him and told him to pack your shit, little brother, we're gonna make that town ours. Here he is, in a private jet. Merle grumbles about selling out, about missing the tour buses, the drunken, smoky hazes, but Daryl's a different man now. Different and better, he decides, because he doesn't miss the after parties, doesn't miss the drugs or the slew of women. Because you can't miss the things you didn't really care for in the first place.
She's beside him (where she belongs, a little, possessive voice whispers), the end of her tour, the start of his. The kids watch Frozen, while Merle sleeps off a hangover. It's the sort of dysfunctional domestic bliss he never thought he'd have, not before Nashville and certainly not in the years of his career before he met her.
But eight years on, it's familiar and good and something that he refuses to take for granted. He knows he's not the perfect husband, knows he's stubborn and possessive and over-protective. Never had nothin' worth protecting until you, he once told her, years ago, before the children, when this was new and he was unsure and worried that every move he made would be the wrong one. She was always certain, always sure; her lyrics nothing but confident declarations of faith. In herself, in him, in them.
It kills him and resurrects him, all in one breath.
"Glenn's gonna pick us up from the airport," she murmurs softly, the arm rest between them raised so she's nestled against his chest. He wants to touch her, all of her, like he did last night after his show, after she surprised him on stage, all denim and leather and smoky eyes, accompanying them on a couple of the old hits. And the audience loved it and he loved it and he showed her how much, after, in their hotel room, with the children asleep in the next room. All soft touches and gentle kisses and reverent whispers and her coming undone as he worshiped every part of her, her whimpers and muffled moans driving him wild.
"Maggie already at the farm?"
"Yeah," she smiles, playing with the buttons of his shirt, "they arrived yesterday."
"She know about your little stunt?" he asks, smirking.
"Yeah," she giggles, "woke up to at least a dozen texts. 'You decide to reinvent yourself NOW?' I think she's finding it hard to adjust to not doing anything, she's not good at being idle."
"She'll find something," Daryl murmurs, pressing a kiss to her forehead.
"Yeah? Why, you guys looking for a new manager?"
Daryl snorts loudly, the children glancing up at him quickly, before turning their attentions back to the film.
"Pretty sure your sister would kill us, babe. Or Merle might go to rehab just to avoid her."
"Hmm, perhaps you have a point," Beth teases, "don't think I'd very much like to have a dead husband and a sister in jail."
He chuckles again, and she beams, blue eyes sparkling mischievously and he thinks that this is one of his favourite moods, when she's his co-conspirator, his partner in crime. When they're completely and utterly simpatico.
"Besides," Beth sighs, "I didn't reinvent myself. It's just a different side of me."
Yeah, she's completely right. She is a million contradictions and it should be confusing as all hell, but he gets it. He gets her. She's someone who refuses to be pigeonholed, someone who refuses to be told how to act, who to be.
If she were, she wouldn't have fallen in love with him. She wouldn't be with him.
And that haunts him more than any memory from the past.
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.
.
"You know, I was terrified when I found out I was pregnant," Beth murmurs to her husband, watching their young daughter, perched between Maggie and Glenn, opening a present. Jack sits with Merle, stretched out on the floor, the younger of the two running a matchbox car up the other's leg.
"You ain't afraid of nothing, Greene," Daryl retorts, shaking his head, "don't play with me."
Their daughter is eight. Some days, Beth can't believe she is the mother to an eight year old. It's amazing and frightening, knowing that her and Daryl have raised this little person, who is someone that is half her and half him, but completely unique.
"I took three pregnancy tests in a bathroom in Madison Square Garden, with Maggie standing right outside the door, passing me bottles of water," she chuckles, "I was twenty-two – heck, I had fifteen minutes before I was due on stage to sing 'Twenty-Two' with Taylor. And for those five minutes, all I could think about was the lyrics and how there was a strong chance that I would be spending the rest of twenty-two with swollen feet and a weak bladder and stretch marks. And I was afraid for all the wrong reasons."
"Probably felt like the right reasons at the time," Daryl murmurs, slinging an arm around her waist, "and you got over that. Took me a hell of a lot longer."
"But you did," she smiles brightly, "and you're an amazing father."
It's cute how he blushes, how he refuses to acknowledge her praise. Refuses to acknowledge any praise, even from Lila and Jack themselves. Because there are mugs and cards and hugs and kisses and all the things that should cement in his mind that he is killing at the father thing, but she knows he's still plagued with self-doubt, still carries the mental scars as well as the physical.
"Fine," Beth keeps it light, keeps it teasing, "don't believe me. We'll just conveniently forget how Jack always wakes you up when he has a nightmare and the way Lila pitches a fit when I pack her school lunch because I make the sandwich 'all wrong'."
"You use too much peanut butter," he grumbles, "gotta increase your jelly ratio. And the girl hates the crusts."
"Parenting 101 with Professor Daryl Dixon," she teases, "how did I get so lucky?"
"Don't be stupid," he comments lightly, "don't you know I'm the lucky one?"
She rests her case.
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Their favourite game is hide and go seek.
Maybe it's the tracker in him, watching the ground for small footprints and disturbed foliage. Following the laughter in the wind, the rustling of branches, followed often by deliberate silence. His children don't know how to tread quietly, to go about unseen. Never have had to, never will. He doesn't know a childhood filled with sunshine and laughter, doesn't know what it entails, but he's part learning, part making it up as he goes along.
It seems to be working. They're happy children, spirited children, in part because of him. Yeah, him.
He can't believe it either.
He follows the tracks back home. Lila's getting better at this game, sharper senses, wilder temperament. More Dixon than Greene, Hershel commented once, and Daryl felt something akin to pride. It knocks him askew, but these children, they managed to right him, every single time.
The clues are easier when he gets to the porch; two pairs of sneakers, haphazardly placed on the shoe rack, a clear after thought. He lets the porch door bang behind him, signalling his arrival. Giggles are instantly hushed, footsteps silenced and, with a smirk, Daryl makes his way into the kitchen.
Beth is humming to herself by the sink, peeling apples for dessert. Wrapping his arms around her from behind, he presses a kiss to her neck, as she sighs and leans into him.
"Haven't seen a couple of feral kids come past, have ya?" he smirks, kissing her again, his hands wandering lower. She giggles, slapping his hands away, turning in his arms to give him a chaste kiss on the lips.
"Afraid not," she replies, eyes twinkling, "perhaps they're in the barn?"
Her eyes, however, dart downwards, towards the kitchen table. The ends of the tablecloth swish in the air, but there's no breeze today, and definitely no breeze that is accompanied by frenzied shushing.
"Guess I'll check again," he says loudly, moving to stand beside the table, "but first…"
With a flick of his hand, he flings the tablecloth up, crouching to their level, and is met with squeals and laughter.
"Found ya."
Laughter only increasing, they slam into him, knocking him to the ground with a solid ooof. Beth hovers over them, grin plastered across her face. Bending, she gives him a quick kiss, but his children have other ideas, sprawled all over him and all he can do is give Beth a shrug and a smirk and all she can do is smirk right back.
This is his family.
This is his life.
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