Born 2 Be Wild-A Merle Dixon love story

Chapter 28

  Most of the camp didn't sleep that night. Pretty much all of the adults kept watch in case another herd passed through. The next morning I sat with Daryl in his tent, still trying to wrap my head around everything.

"I still can't believe he's just gone. Do you think he'll come back?"

"I don't know Jess. We need to leave here today. I don't want to be here if another herd comes through."

"But what if Merle comes back?"

"I don't really think he's coming back."

"Wait. You think he's dead?"

Daryl didn't respond, he just looked away from me. My heart felt like it was ripping itself apart, but I had no tears left to cry. I need Merle to come back. He has to come back for me. If not for vengeance, if not for Daryl, then for me. I laid back on Daryl's sleeping bag and closed my eyes. He left the tent and zipped up the door behind him.

I left the tent a few minutes later, on the hunt to find something to do. Andrea was still holding Amy beside the RV. She looked like her entire world had just crashed down around her and I knew exactly how she felt. Lori was knelt beside her trying to get her to leave Amy, but it wasn't working. Andrea wouldn't speak to her.

I joined the guys in helping drag away the bodies of the walkers. Rick approached Andrea this time. Before he could get a whole sentence out she pulled her gun on him and cocked it. Everyone looked in their direction at the sound. He did the smart thing and backed away slowly. I continued on with my work, debating on a different approach.

As I was dragging a walker to the fire I heard Glenn shout.

"We don't burn them! We bury them. Understand?" He was looking at Daryl with hurt in his eyes. "Our people go in that row over there." He pointed to the field where graves were dug.

Daryl didn't look happy about it but he and Morales dragged the body towards the field.

"You reap what you sow!" Daryl shouted to everyone.

"You know what? Shut up, man." Morales told him.

"Ya'll left my brother for dead. You had this coming!" Daryl walked away angry.

I knew he wouldn't want me around so I kept working. About a minute later I heard Jacqui shout.

"A walker bit Jim!"

I dropped the walker I was dragging and watched the guys circle him.

"Show it to us." Daryl demanded, still holding a pickaxe.

Jim picked up a shovel in hopes of defending himself. This didn't look like it would end well. T-Dog grabbed him from behind and Daryl lifted his shirt. There was a big red bite mark on his stomach. It was still bleeding.

Jim kept repeating that he was okay, until he walked over to the end of the RV and sat down in the shade. Daryl gestured to me to join the ring of people forming by the fire. Daryl was of course the first person to speak.

"I say we put a pickaxe in his head and the dead girl's and be done with it."

"Is that what you'd want if it were you?" Shane responded.

"Yeah, and I'd thank you while you did it." Daryl answered.

"I hate to say it. I never thought I would but maybe Daryl's right." Dale added.

I looked at him in surprise. I was not expecting that. I don't know what I'd do with Jim. I wouldn't kill him now, he's donw nothing wrong. Besides try to hide it but I understand why he'd do that.

"Jim's not a monster Dale, or some rabid dog." Rick said.

"I'm not suggesting-" Dale tried to answer.

"He's sick. A sick man. We start down that road, where do we draw the line?" Rick asked.

"The line's pretty clear. Zero tolerance for walkers or them to be." Daryl answered.

"What if we can get him help? I heard the CDC was working on a cure." Rick suggested.

"I heard that too. Heard a lot of things before the world went to hell." Shane added.

"What if the CDC is still up and running?"

"Man that is a stretch right there."

"Why? If there's any government left, any structure at all. They'd protect the CDC at all costs, right? I think it's our best shot. Shelter, protection."

"Okay, Rick you want those things. I do too. Now if they exist they're at an army base. Fort Benning."

"That's 100 miles in the opposite direction." Lori chimed in.

"That is right. But it's away from the hot zone. Now listen, if that place is operational it would be heavily armed. We'd be safe there." Shane responded.

"The military were on the front lines of this thing. They got overrun. We've all seen that. The CDC is our best choice and Jim's only chance." Rick told him.

Daryl looked back at Jim and adjusted his pickaxe. "You go looking for aspirin, do what you need to do. Someone needs to have some balls to take care of this damn problem!" He said running at Jim.

Rick pointed his gun at Daryl's head again, for the second time in two days. He cocked it and Daryl stopped.

"Hey! We don't kill the living."

Shane stepped between Daryl and Jim. Daryl lowered his pickaxe.

"That's funny coming from a man who just put a gun to my head." Daryl told him.

"We may disagree on some things, not on this. You put it down. Go on." Shane said to Daryl.

Daryl slammed the pickaxe down then stormed off again. I decided to talk to Andrea. I walked slowly over to her and stood.

"I came to pay my respects."

She looked over at me but didn't talk or move, so I sat down.

"Did I ever tell you how I lost my mom?"

"Cancer, wasn't it?" She asked.

"Yeah. I dragged her to every doctor, every test. After all the surgeries and the chemos, she was ready. She accepted it, you know? But I never could. I spent the last few years so angry. I felt so cheated. She didn't come back into my life until I was an adult. After she left when I was a kid. Since she passed, Amy was the first new person that I cared anything for."

She gave me a weak smile and took somepink tissue paper out. It was the necklace she had gotten for Amy. She showed it to me before we left to try to find Merle. Amy would have loved it.

"This is her birthday?" I asked her.

"Her birthday was always a week long event. But I somehow always missed it. I was away at college or too busy for kid's parties. She'd call all excited. I always told her that I'd make it home and I really always meant to, but I never made it past that phone call."

"I know things are hard enough for you without adding guilt into the mix." I told her.

She took the mermaid necklace out of the tissue paper and placed it around Amy's neck. I took that as my cue and stood up. I walked back towards where Daryl was, still taking care of the dead. He and Carol were talking so I stopped. She took the pickaxe from him and slammed it into Ed's head until it resembled a busted watermelon.

I heard a growl and turned around. Amy had come back as one of the undead. Andrea spoke to her for a moment, then took her pistol out and killed her. I had a whole new respect for her. I know how hard that must be.

I helped Daryl wrap our dead in bedsheets and load them into the back of his truck. He went on to the gravesite but I stayed at the camp. I found Carol and tried to put my arm around her in a sympathetic way.

"I know this will sound cliche but I know how you feel. My dad died when I was a teenager. What time he wasn't beating the hell out of me he was coming into my room at night. I know exactly how it feels to mourn someone but be so damn glad that they're dead."

She looked at me with shock. "I had no idea Jessica."

"No one still living besides Daryl and Merle do. It gets better. He won't be here to torment you or Sophia any longer."

"I wanted to kill him myself." She started to cry.

"I know. I can't tell you how many times I held a frying pan over my daddy's head while he was passed out. I could never do it though. Daryl and I actually ran away from our hometown because of him. We were seventeen. He finally found us not long after that. He was going to kill me. Thankfully my mother was there. I didn't find out she was my mother until afterwards. But that's a story for a different day. If you or Sophia ever need to talk about it, just let me know."

She nodded her head and I gave her a hug. I walked off before I could start to cry. Part of me still missed that son of a bitch. But most of me is glad that he's dead.

After I'd pulled myself together I walked to the grave site with everyone else. When I got there Andrea was dragging Amy into a grave. Dale was trying to help, but she wouldn't let him. He helped her out of the hole then we buried the rest of our dead. I stayed behind to help cover the graves. I had too many things that I didn't need to think about.

When all the graves were covered Daryl and I walked back to the campfire. We sat down and I leaned my head against his shoulder.

Rick and Shane came back from their sweep of the outskirts of camp. Shane got in the center of where we were sitting and took a deep breath.

"I've uh. I've been thinking about Rick's plan. Now look, there are no guarantees either way. I'll be the first one to say that. I've known this man a long time. I trust his instincts. I say the most imprtant thing we need to do here is stay together. So those of you that agree, we leave first thing in the morning. Okay?"

That night I slept in Daryl's tent with him. I don't give a damn what people had to say about it although I'm sure they said a lot. It was too lonely in my tent by myself. We slept at opposite sides and didn't touch each other the whole night. I felt much safer with him there.

The next morning I packed up my stuff in the backpack I'd looted from the same sporting goods place I got my axes at. I didn't have a whole lot to pack so it didn't take very long. I took my tent down and packed it. When I was done I joined everyone else.

"Alright, listen up. Those of you with CBs, we're gonna be on channel 40. Let's keep the chatter down, okay. Now you got a problem, don't have a CB, can't get a signal or anything at all, you're gonna hit your horn one time. That'll stop the caravan." Shane instructed. "Any questions?"

"We're uh. We're not going." Morales spoke up.

"We have family in Birmingham. We want to be with our people." His wife added.

"You go on your own, you won't have anyone to watch your back." Shane warned.

"We'll take the chance. I got to do what's best for my family."

"You sure?" Rick asked Morales.

"We talked about it. We're sure."

"All right." Rick said

Shane and Rick gave Morales a pistol and a box of ammo. I wasn't very close to the Morales family so I didn't join in with the hug fest.

I got in the truck with Daryl. Merle's motorcycle in the back and we headed off down the bumpy mountain road for the last time. This trip seemed promising but I dared not get my hopes up.

We had to stop before we got there, the hose on Dale's RV radiator blew. We were standing around the RV, weapons at the ready trying to figure out what to do when Jacqui came out of the RV.

"Ya'll it's Jim. I don't think he can take anymore." She went back into the RV.

Shane and T-Dog decided to drive ahead to try to find a gas station while the rest of us stayed here. Rick went into the RV to see Jim while the everyone else stood around outside.

Rick came out of the RV with a troubled look on his face.

"Jim wants us to leave him here. It's what he says he wants."

"And he's lucid?" Carol asked.

"He seems to be. I would say yes." Rick answered.

"Back in the camp when I said Daryl might be right and you shut me down, you misunderstood. I would never go along with callously killing a man. I was just gonna suggest we ask Jim what he wants to do. I think we have an answer." Dale said.

"I agree with Dale. It should be up to Jim." I said. "That's what I'd want, a choice."

"We just leave him here? We take off?" Shane asked. "Man, I'm not sure I could live with that."

"It's not your call. Either one of you." Lori told them.

Shane and Rick finally agreed and carried Jim to a nearby tree. I stood at the bottom of the hill with Daryl. Goodbyes are too hard for me right now. I did give Jim a short wave before I followed Daryl back to the truck. I'm going to miss him. He was a good man.

We finally made it to the CDC not too long after we left Jim behind. There were dead bodies and Army sandbags piled up in the streets outside. We all piled out of our vehicles and slowly made our way to the CDC building. Looking around at the scene before us, I wasn't very hopeful.

We made it to the front doors without incident. Just some very awful smells. Shane and Rick started banging on and trying to open the doors, but nothing happened. Then a few walkers started to get up. Everyone was upset and Daryl was angry, again. After a short argument we decided to go, but Rick didn't want to.

Rick started banging on the door as hard as he could and yelling.

"I know you're in there. I know you can hear me. Please, we're desperate. Please help us. We have women, children, no food, hardly any gas left. We have nowhere else to go. If you don't let us in, you're killing us! Please! Please help us. You're killing us! You're killing us!"

Right as Shane was getting Rick dragged away the door opened and light flooded the street. We all turned in shock to look at the open door way ahead of us.