EPISODE ONE
"friend or foe"
SEASON 8
DARYL DIXON
the dog pants at my feet, looking up at me with his brown eyes and soft, pointed ears as i strap the bags to my bike. i let out a sigh as i look down at the animal, and then my gaze travels up to the cabin where i see her strawberry red hair through the window.
turns out the woman with the shotgun who damned rick and i for stealing two of her horses the day of we fled from that junkyard with a herd on our asses has a name—leah.
a nomad of sorts, just like me. the same dog that lies at my feet was just a baby when he found me in the woods, his owner not too far behind; about six months after the accident on the bridge. grey and i had been going out searching on our own, sometimes together, but i can stay out in the woods much longer than she can.
it was a day i was alone that the dog barked at me and leah pointed a gun at me ... for the second time.
i surrendered, backed away claiming i didn't want any trouble. i thought i'd never see her or her pet again, figured maybe the winter would scare them off and they'd head somewhere else.
it wasn't until two years had passed after rick's accident that i stumbled across a cabin tucked in these woods, the very same one i stand before now.
i didn't surrender or balk this time when i recognized the brown fur of the belgian shepherd, much bigger than the last time i saw him, and the scruffy thing ran to me with a single bark.
circling my feet and letting me pet him, the woman stepped outside of her cabin and stared me down, studied me, this time without a shotgun.
"he doesn't meet anyone out here, that's why he remembers you." she had said. and while that might've been true, i knew the dog liked me because the dog liked me. whether or not i'm the only other human besides her he'd been able to sniff out since birth. "i remember you too. you stole two of my horses right off my lawn, dragged the dead up to my doorstep." she recalled the day rick and i, bloody and limping, coerced those two mares out of their gate for us to ride.
"sorry." i had said, balancing on my feet as i continued to rub my hands through the dog's fur.
i felt leah's eyes on me as i pet her dog. after a while she invited me in, asked if i was hungry, but when i said no, she tied her hair up on top of her head and stepped out of the threshold of her cabin.
after that first walk in the woods together, we did it every time—every time i went out looking for rick, i'd spend the last hours of the day with her, before the sun went down and i went back to alexandria. we'd fish, talk, eat, and i can't explain why i kept coming back, why i seemed to enjoy the company of a woman who could've shot a bullet into my body on two occasions, but i did.
we spent the summer doing those things—fishing, talking, eating—few weeks in between where i'd go back home and she just thought i was elsewhere along the river, but i'd always come back, and she'd always be here.
i always preferred the outdoors, no matter the season. i stayed out here, holed up in leah's cabin last winter. only carol frowned at the idea before i left, said i'd come back in the spring looking like a mountain man; scruffy and starved.
i wasn't starved. maybe a little scruffy, but i was well fed—fish, deer, and the bed was warm too.
i was honest right from the start. toward the end of that first summer we met, the night leah and i sat in the kitchen of her cabin by the window with a bottle of jack to share between our glasses, we told each other everything we wanted the other to know.
it wasn't much, just enough to gain each other's trust and know the first layer of each other. i told her about my home, about alexandria, how it's a couple miles northwest of where her cabin sits in the woods. i told her that's where i go off to when i'm not with her.
she guessed it, actually, that there's someone back home, someone that i love. maybe the whiskey made me show too much on my face when i told her about why i'm out here, how i'm looking for my brother and how all those people northwest are my family.
i shook my head, shrugged, "nah. nah, there was, but ... i gave up on that."
i did.
grey was no more than an old friend of mine, not anyone's property but she is rick's. she was never mine, was never going to be.
it seemed easy enough considering that's all i ever do, push shit down until it's buried too deep to be felt again. i thought maybe bob was right all those months ago when he said i was thinking with my dick and just needed to stop.
then the accident with rick happened.
i thought that'd solidify it more—no time to long for a woman who sees me as a friend, time to man up, time to take charge and find my brother because that's what he'd do for me; for any of us.
we're nearing three and half years since the accident. since i decided i was going to screw my head on straight and focus on what matters—our communities, our people, surviving, honoring the dead. focus on what matters and nothing else.
but fuck, grey matters. she matters to me more than a lot of things that i pretend take precedence. i face that fact every day since it floated back up from the depths of my brain, but still, i try to drown my head in leah, drown myself in her at night in her bed. i try to drown my feelings for grey, try to forget how strong and nagging they are.
leah knows it too. as much as i tell her i don't think about the woman back home anymore, she knows that's a lie.
women always know.
just like how she picked grey out the night i took her to alexandria for dinner earlier this year. winter subsided, it was early april or so, and i wanted her to see my home i always talk about, wanted her to be apart of it, honestly, wanted her to meet my friends.
i never mentioned grey's name, yet somehow leah knew it was her toward the middle of the dinner.
it was just the two of us, grey, spencer, and allison, and when grey stood up from the table, allison going with her to grab something, and spencer darting off to the bathroom, leah placed her napkin on the table and said to me, "so that's the girl you're in love with."
she didn't ask. she just said it, like she somehow already knew.
because women always know.
"will this fit in your pack?" leah steps out of the cabin, her cream, thick sweater buttoned up and her hair down over her shoulders.
"yeah." i take the small journal from her hands.
i had just blinked at her when she guessed about grey all those months ago. my mouth had gone dry and all the words scattered from my head, no where to be found. but the front door swung open and in came eugene, carl, and rosita, all carrying a heavy hunk of a radio.
the rest of dinner had been forgotten at the sight of the radio and all its parts placed in the living room. we all gathered around it, eugene, carl, and rosita breathing heavily from lugging it all the way from the truck. the three of them had gone out that night to scavenge, hunt, search, who knows, but they came back with a shiny new toy for eugene and an ounce of hope for the rest of us.
it was broken, dusty, and missing a piece that only eugene would know the name of, but the word from alexandria is that he's gotten it fixed up and working since then. the only thing missing from it is a connection from someone on the other end.
leah told me the night we finished a bottle of jack that she never stays in one place for too long. maybe a few months, a few weeks, but she always leaves and heads off somewhere else. she's stayed in this cabin the longest. that house she occupied herself in on the road near the junkyard two years ago was just another four walls and a roof that provided her sanctuary for a little while, and that's it.
we're packing our things to head to alexandria, the both of us, for the winter, possibly for good. the cabin is too cold, the walls have thinned and the roof won't last another harsh winter.
so i head back today and this time, i'm bringing her with me. since the last time she was in alexandria, the new construction of the windmill and town hall, really just a place for us to hold meetings or eat a meal or get some quiet time, are finished.
something like pride fills my chest as i see the peak of the windmill as we near the gate. i'm proud of us, our three communities, our people, for coming together and making something for ourselves. even after all we've been through, all we've lost, we keep trying—day after day, after day.
the engine of my bike lowers, quieting as i drop my feet to the ground and let off the throttle. leah hops off the bike from behind me. sasha and bob are the first to greet us with smiles after they close the gate off from the outside street.
this is my home. no matter what changes are made to it, it won't change the fact that this is where i'll always come when i say i'm going home.
but my heart is lodged in my throat as i watch leah and sasha talk, introducing themselves to each other, and i don't know why.
"is it good to be back?" bob claps me on the shoulder. "it's been what, two months? since the end of summer that you've been out in the woods like a wild huntsman."
"yeah," i scoff, untying the black bandana from covering the bottom half of my face. "you were once a wild huntsman too. you miss it? wanna come out there with me and grey next time for some fresh venison?"
"no." bob shakes his head, laughing. "nah, i like it here." he smiles, and i follow his gaze to where he's looking at sasha.
=
i hear the floorboards creak inside as i continue to knock my fist against the white door.
it swings open, grey on the other side.
her gaze immediately drops to the dog running past her feet and into the house. his claws click against the wooden floor as he races down the hall and disappears into one of the rooms.
he barks at something and grey's head whips back around, her eyes finally meeting mine as i stand on the front porch. "i just gave him some water, he doesn't need anything."
"you're here." she smiles as i step inside. "i thought maybe you'd get here later in the afternoon." she says to my back as i'm busy scoping out the downstairs of the house i've only been in a handful of times since she, carl, and judith moved into it.
"nah, got up bright and early and left as soon as we were done packin' things up." i turn, glancing up at the crown molding that lines the ceiling.
"what'd you do to your eye?"
"what?"
a hand grabs my shoulder, and then i'm being inspected.
"gosh, daryl." she sighs at the cut starting just above my left eyebrow that skips over my eye and resumes down my cheek. it's a few days old, still fresh with the skin puffed around the slice, blood dried over as it tries to heal.
tries to heal isn't enough for grey, and she's shoving me into the bathroom down the hall beside the staircase before i can even tell her to stop.
"sit." she points to the closed toilet seat. i sigh, but i do as she says. the warm sun is flowing in from the high window, golden, buttery rays stretch across the white walls and marble-tiled floor.
"how'd this happen?" she asks, rinsing her hands under warm water.
"it's nothin'."
she tears open a pack of cotton rounds and i lower my eyes to the floor as she steps closer to me.
she moves my hair out of the way, "leah didn't do this to you, did she?" she teases.
"no." i grab her wrist, stopping her before the cotton can touch my face. "and you don't gotta do anythin' to it."
all she does is grin at me, and i know she won't give up, so i drop my hold from her wrist, "it was just ... an accident, out in the woods." i tell her, not the full truth but not a lie either.
"she here? leah."
"yeah, she's at my house unpacking some stuff." i watch how she nods her head slightly, focused on what's she's doing to my face. "how do you like this house?" my voice comes out as a rasp.
"i like it." she says, dabbing softly at the part of the cut that's on my cheek.
at the beginning of the year, she, carl, and judith moved in, leaving the old house behind. no one questioned it when they did, everyone knew it was too much to bear being in the other house with rick and michonne's rooms empty on the second floor.
too much pain, too many good memories lurked in those walls and in those rooms with people who were no longer with us, so they left. this house is brighter, a bit bigger, and it's a street behind mine, no longer tucked away on the farthest street in alexandria.
"the sun shines into the living room more here than it did in the other house. i like that." grey says.
she looks good. not happy, because no one loses their boyfriend and raises his three-almost-four-year old in a world where that's the least of their problems and looks happy, but she looks good.
her skin is still tan from the summer even though it's late-october. her hair is long, longer than it was last time i saw her, and although that familiar sadness i always recognize in her eyes is still there, she's as pretty as i've always found her to be.
"done." she steps back, tossing the cotton rounds dotted with some of my dried blood. "not so bad, was it?"
i roll my eyes, "hey, i passed that redhead from the sanctuary on my way over here." i run my hands down my thighs, bracing the balls of my feet into the floor. "the girl who used to be one of negan's wives—"
"frankie." she tells me her name. i never knew it. she must read the confusion on my face because she says, "the sanctuary's done, no one lives there anymore."
"what?"
"nothing's grown up there for months. no crops, nothing, all summer. so they all left last month. some are at hilltop, the rest are here."
"they've been here a month?" i ask, following her out of the bathroom. "maggie's been lettin' them live at hilltop?"
"yeah, she and jesus made room. they wouldn't have survived the winter up at the sanctuary."
"where's negan?" i ask. i didn't see him as i made the short walk to grey's house.
"here." she glances over her shoulder at me as she rounds the kitchen island. "at the old house."
i pause, "the old house?"
she nods, "i think people are scared of it."
i furrow my brows, resting my elbows on the island at the other end of where she stands.
"it's been empty since we moved out. even as new people came in, the new survivors, no one took that house. and we told everyone who came here from the sanctuary that they could pick whichever free house they wanted, even that one. carl and i had talked about it, we didn't care if anyone took it, but still, even with our blessing, no one did."
"why negan then?" i ask.
"he came later than the rest, everyone already had a few days to settle in by the time he showed up; some personal time to say goodbye to his old home, is what he said."
i roll my eyes at the thought of him sitting up at that godforsaken sanctuary that was never a home all by himself, reminiscing all the times he was an asshole. i hope it was a good flashback in his mind, a movie of all the reasons he'll be going to hell, for each whack of his bat and each splatter of blood on his hands.
i might be able to hold a conversation with him now, eat a meal in the same room, trust him on a run, but i hope whatever or whoever meets him after this life, makes him pay for the blood he spilled all that time ago; pay for the anguish he caused my friends.
"he thought it was a waste. an empty house with all these new people moving in, some living with four roommates, and we're bound to get more if survivors keep finding this place, so ... he took it."
i nod my head, pulling my elbows off the counter and stuffing my hands in the pockets of my loose cargo pants, "what about your dad?"
"hilltop."
it's been months since i've seen elijah. the last time i did, i think it was sometime last fall before i left to go back to leah's cabin for the winter. we crossed paths at the bridge camp, made eye contact, and that was it.
grey went years knowing her father was locked away in prison, then a long while of not knowing if he was even alive. when we found out he was, and he was with negan, as nauseating as it was, it ... fit.
elijah was an enemy.
negan was an enemy.
but now they're not. they haven't been for years—technically. ever since rick decided it on the hill that day he spared negan's life.
i wonder if the enemy line has blurred for grey now, not knowing where to place her father—friend, foe?
maybe it'd be easier if he was actually a good man, but the look on grey's face tells me enough—he hasn't come around in awhile.
nothing's changed.
"he still with andrea?" i ask, and grey scoffs, nodding her head.
i bite the inside of my cheek, fighting the smile that's burning the corner of my mouth.
"i never thought we'd become a big happy family with everyone." i say, looking out the window of the living room that's to my right. the floor plan is open, the living room leading into the dining room and across the foyer is the kitchen where grey and i stand. "never thought we'd all call the same place, home."
"there's room for all of us." she says, strumming her fingers against the cool marble of the island. "eugene made contact with someone on the radio. a girl."
my eyes slide back to her.
"we're having a meeting tomorrow morning to tell everyone. it's been a few weeks of them talking and," she shrugs. "eugene thinks he can trust her, he wants to meet her."
i feel the crease between my brows deepen, "i'm away for two months and all this happens?"
grey smiles, stalking around the island and i swallow, trying hard not to let my eyes roam up and down her figure as she does, "well it's a good thing you're home for the winter. you won't miss out on anything."
i hum. yeah, sure, nothing at all.
"where'd that dog of yours go?"
=
room for all of us.
i remind myself of the words grey said earlier, the length of that white kitchen island between us. it's big enough for a family of six to gather around. the dining table could fit even more.
i mourn for her the fact that she may never get that big family who eats dinners together. at least not in the way she probably would've hoped, with rick, if things keep going the way they have been—no luck in finding him.
it eats at me day and night, sometimes taking me from my sleep and waking me up in a cold sweat, rick's voice still in my head from my dream, screaming at me to find him, help him.
the fan in the bathroom turns off, and my eyes drop from looking at the ceiling to the closed bathroom door leah's behind.
it's not her first night here in alexandria, not her first night in my bed. we spent the night i brought her here for dinner with grey, spencer, and allison. but it was only one night, just to head back to the cabin the next morning.
i haven't been home in two months and i'm savoring the coolness of the sheets beneath my bare back as my eyes roam over the four lines that connect to make up my ceiling.
the bathroom door opens and leah steps out into my dark bedroom, only the moonlight shining in. "thank you." she says, talking about the shower as she dries her wet hair with a towel.
i shake my head, "don't thank me. what's mine is yours."
i straighten my arms, flopping back into a supine position on the bed.
i didn't tell grey a lot of things i wanted to earlier. i didn't tell her about how i got the scar on my face, or about the thing in my bag i plan on showing her when the time is right, or about the dreams i have of rick that are the cause of the purple smear under my eyes.
i didn't tell her that, everyday, i think about what she told me that first day we went out along the river looking for rick.
we'll head north, that's what she said, to look for those planes we never saw again and to find what else is out there, but not until we settle things here first, within our communities, within our homes.
as much as i know she wanted to look for rick—day and night, north, south, it didn't matter—she wouldn't have cared if she ran her body ragged looking for him, but she stayed; here, for us, for judith.
it'll be three years in the summer since rick's disappearance, and i wonder when, if ever, will we do what the two of them wanted to do but never had the chance to.
the mattress dips and i feel leah lay down, my back facing her as i stare at the curtains pulled across the length of my window.
i'm not a man of much, not a man of many words as i don't say anymore than i need to. i'm not a man of many talents either as all i'm good for is fucking up and staying alive even at times i'd rather not be.
what i am though, is a man of my word.
i'll find rick, i told myself, told grey, so i will. i haven't lost hope, haven't given up.
even though i've practically scoured the entire state of virginia, and haven't found shit besides the colt python that's wrapped in cloth in my bag, waiting for me to hand it over to grey and carl.
"what are you thinking about?" leah whispers, and i turn over onto my back.
"nothing." i look at her, her high, round cheekbones dotted with light freckles. i stretch my arm out, inviting her in to lay beside me. the sheets ruffle beneath her and she lays her head on my chest. "you miss the woods yet?" my words float out into the quietness of the room.
"yeah. a little." she angles her head, her chin against my chest as she looks up at me, trying to read any bit of emotion on my face. "do you?" she asks.
"mm-hmm." i nod; not a lie. i kiss the top of her head, her damp hair cool against my lips and i tuck her in closer to me. "but it's nice here too."
"it's your home." she says softly, but a bit matter of factly, too.
she knows these people are my family, but no matter how many times i tell her she's my family too, she always has this look on her face; in her eyes the minute those words leave my mouth. like she wants to believe me, truly does, but she can't.
she knows i care for her, but she also knows, or thinks, that in the end, i'll pick them.
when grey comes knocking at my door and says she's had enough and that she's heading north to look for rick and anything else she can find, leah thinks i'll pick her and leave.
i was honest from the start, except ... maybe not about everything.
because she's right.
but i don't even have to say it because the downcast of her eyes i've seen too many times tells me enough, that women always know.
=
a/n
thank you thank you thank you for 98k on this book holy shit.
i hope you enjoyed this chapter and i hope you enjoy the rest to come as i think this 'season' will be the last of this book — not fully decided yet, maybe the story will continue e l s e w h e r e but as for YOUNGBLOOD itself, i think season 8 will be its last :')
but there's lots of chapters to come before then!! gonna be diving into some characters we don't usually see/new characters, backstories/flashbacks to wrap things up and i'm freakinnng excited
thank u ily! please leave a vote or comment, it's free and helps this book be seen & enjoyed by others!
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