Double Crossbow (Daryl Dixon) [The Walking Dead]

Chapter 52 ↣ How could we live without her?

"Come to me, squeeze my hand, know my loneliness, and give me the love, the strength to prevail on the perilous road before me."

— Dang Thuy Tram

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Kathryn

BLINDING WHITE LIGHT. That's the next thing I saw. It took a good minute for my eyes to adjust, and when they did, there wasn't much to see. I was surrounded in white. My hand fluttered to my hip, expecting my knife to be sheathed there, but I was just met with denim.

"You've grown so beautifully," a voice said behind me.

I whipped around so see a woman standing in the distance. How had I not heard her?

"You say that as if you know me," I replied, growing increasingly more panicked at being trapped in a small white box.

I saw the corners of her mouth turn up. "I suppose you're right. I only wish I could've known you." The woman approached. I tried to step back, but only found that my legs had decided to root themselves in place.

She came to a stop right in front of me, and as I looked at her properly, my knees almost gave out. It was the woman I only knew from a picture. She had my nose and cheekbones and hair and see through pale skin, or perhaps I had it backwards. She gave me all those things.

She picked up my arm, and I didn't fight her. She glanced at the spot where a long scar resided. I followed her gaze and did a double take as there was no ugly crooked line down my arm.

"This is some kind of fever hallucination isn't it?"

She laughed lightly. "It can be whatever you want it to be, Kat." I crinkled my nose, and she noticed this expression. "Hmm, did Brendan not carry on with that nickname? That's what I always called you. My little Kat."

"No. He did," I said lowly.

Lyn stopped and looked me dead in the eye. Her eyes were strikingly blue. "I hid money in your bedroom closet underneath the loose floorboard. It was going to be for our new life together. We were going to go to Paris, where I would teach and you could grow into an opera singer or an artist or...whatever you wanted. Life, I'm afraid, had different paths for us."

My mind was spinning like a top. I had found that hiding spot, assumed that my father had forgotten he had put that there, or it had been the past owners. From then on, that's where I also hid my possessions. There was no way this was happening. "Wow, so I finally get him to stop talking in my head, and it gets replaced by hallucinations of the other dead parent?"

Lyn only smiled and turned her gaze away to one of the walls. "I like him," she said.

"Who?"

"The young man that placed a ring on your finger of course. He's rather dashing in a rugged sort of way. I had hoped you'd meet a scholar and travel the world, but I suppose someone who loves you that much will do quite nicely."

Lyn turned back to me, and for the first time, I felt my heart tug towards her. It was quiet here. Peaceful. She clicked her tongue. "You can't stay. I would love to finally get to know my pride and joy, but you can't leave that man. Not yet. We'll have eternity later. For now, stop carrying the weight of my death, and focus on the life it gave."

A booming 'No' echoed in the room, causing me to jump. Lyn's soft smile grew sad. She placed a hand to my cheek, and said, "You were all I ever wanted."

Daryl

"No, no, no, no," I muttered as Hershel stood besides Kath, trying to get her to breathe once more.