So I felt the itch for a second story. This first part is really just a short taster but I am hoping to update regularly - guess we'll have to see if that happens to not.
And yes, the title was inspired by David Bowie. Enjoy (hopefully).

Sitting in the dingy room of the cheapest motel he could find, Daryl Dixon pulled out a crumpled piece of paper.

The dated wallpaper around him had faded, peeled off in areas and simply worn away in others. The tv was chained to the wall, which would make sense if it actually worked – but who in their right mind would try to steal a broken set with a hole in the screen?

The bathroom was really just the worst he'd seen, and that included the one he had grown up with in that rotten cabin, the one filled with the echoes of pain and broken memories.

But sat amongst all this, on a very questionable bedspread atop an uncomfortable mattress, his head was reeling with thoughts of doubt and resentment; how had he lived through such an abusive childhood, hurt his best friend through his own actions, left said best friend by following his dumbass drug-addled brother to God knows where, only to find he'd made a huge mistake. And all by the age of only 18? It didn't leave him much hope for the rest of his life if he'd fucked up bug time so young.

All these thoughts came to a staggering halt when he laid eyes on the worn photo he had been keeping as his only treasure these past few months. The corner may be slightly torn, a crease going through the shoulder of the petite blonde, but with her blue eyes and loving smiling, her image had kept him held together.

He was going to have her back in his life if he had to wade through hell in the process.

He was going to see Beth Greene again.

X-X-X

She didn't know how long she'd been staring at it. The smiling faces looking back at her from the frame, the glass like a barrier between then, and now.

Then, they were together, the only life she had ever known. She was an everyday teenage girl, with two parents and two annoying siblings. And a best friend.

But now there was really only nobody. That's why she sat huddled on the sofa, engaged in some surreal staring match with the frozen faces on the mantelpiece.

She was aware of the tv no more than a few feet away, but it was meant as more of a distraction, a way of fooling herself that she wasn't alone. Noise to fill the cold, empty house.

To the outsider, Beth Greene had certainly taken some hits. But that had passed. Except she was good at making them think that.

She was always trying to pinpoint when her life had plummeted so bad. When she lost half the people she loved.

It was when he left.

Daryl Dixon.