Until the Earth stops turning
This is in response to a request by @littleshelly0619 who needs Caryl oneshots based on āGoreckiā by Lamb. Thank you so much for tagging me in a music fic request - I tried my best.
The knock on the front door of her little house startled her out of her reverie as she sat on the creaky kitchen chair, looking out at the small graveyard, the crooked markers leaning in all directions on the sunken graves. Her heart started pounding - had someone new found the house, was this a new danger about to assault her, or was it someone from the Kingdom coming to bring supplies for her?
Careful not to make a sound, she rose from the chair, her eyes darting around the yard to make sure that nobody was spying on her through the window - and just how thoughtless had it been of her to sit here so openly without paying attention, just letting her mind drift?
Slipping out of her sneakers and holding them in one hand, she padded to the front door on socked feet, avoiding all the floorboards she knew would creak if she stepped on them, and rose to her tiptoes to look through the peephole set high into the door. At this point, she was poised to fight, to defend herself - or run if there were more than two or three people waiting out there. With one last glance she made sure that her backpack, boots, and jacket were ready and waiting within armās reach - never again would she be taken unaware, unprepared.
Lining up her right eye with the spyhole, she felt her pulse throbbing throughout her body, her blood singing in her veins with excitement, her heart in her throat. She was ready for anything as she finally looked outside - but not for this.
Her breath left her in one long drawn-out āwhooshā and she all but fell back from her tiptoes to her heels, reeling, head spinning, hands going numb.
He was facing away from the door, away from her, his eyes on the road and the garden, making sure that nobody had followed him here - but even without the wings adorning his back she would have known him anywhere, even in the dead of night. The sun slanting in from the west was highlighting the tips of his too-long hair, painting the tip of his ear peeking out of it a bright red.
For some reason, he wasnāt carrying his bow, and seemed to be rubbing his right shoulder with his left hand. With his right, he was loosely holding a rifle, aimed at the ground.
It appeared that he had heard her exhaling even through the door, for he whirled around to stare at the door, squinting against the late-afternoon sunlight drenching her porch with liquid honey, the light so thick it almost seemed she would be able to scoop handfuls of it out of thin air.
He sounded raspy, weary, exhausted. There were fading bruises on his face, and a woundedness, a vulnerability, that she hadnāt seen in him since their search for Beth in Atlanta, since the night at the shelter, and the moment the contents of his bag had spilled on the floor between them. Something had clearly happened to rattle him badly since she had left, but he seemed to be unharmed - and he had found her.
Her mind flashed back for just an instant to a heavy metal door opening on squealing hinges, to Daryl looking into the isolation cell and then leaning down to make sure she was still alive.
To his hand on her chin as he tilted her head up so heād be able to look into her eyes, his touch all but searing her skin.
If she just refused to open, would he force his way in?
Certainly not. This was Daryl, and he had always respected her wishes, her need for space, for time alone.
Would he stay, and spend the night out in the open, in the garden or on the porch?
That, she could definitely see, for his need to protect her after she had run away like she had would be overwhelming.
Taking a deep breath, bracing herself for the onslaught of emotion that was going to come from him, she reached out, her fingers folding around the door knob and turning it slowly, slowly.
His face seemed to crumble before her very eyes as the door opened. He let out a shuddering breath, his eyes filling, and she saw that he was trembling from head to toe, the tension of his search for her leaving his body, all his defenses down the second he saw her. His chapped lips parted slightly but he didnāt speak, and she had time to note that he had lost weight.
His eyes were open wounds in a face that, for these precious moments, was completely unguarded, showcasing his fear for her, his longing, his sheer, overwhelming relief at finding her.
He took one step toward her, closing the distance between them, and his arms were around her, not crushing but cradling her to his chest, and she felt his racing heart, and his fluttering pulse where her face touched his neck.
A sound escaped him, a mixture between a whimper and a moan, as his head sank onto her shoulder. They both inhaled deeply, and she smelled sweat, blood, and damp earth on his skin as her arms finally came up to return his embrace, her fingers sliding up his back over the smooth, sun-warmed leather of his vest and the worn, threadbare wings sewn onto it.
Her heartbeat stuttered for a moment. Hearing her name from his lips for the first time tore away all her defenses, all her reasons for staying away, and she was left speechless for long moments. She could feel him swallowing, shuddering, breathing deeply to regain control over his emotions.
How had she been able to stay away from what he was offering for so long, voluntarily, hoping that the pain would just go away if she kept ignoring it? How had she been able to leave the need in herself unmet for all this time?
She knew without a doubt that he would do whatever she asked of him, that he would leave again if that was what she wanted. Obviously, she would explain her reasons, and ask him to understand, but she had no doubt that he was going to comply with her wishes. He had always respected her needs, he had, in fact, been the first man to do so, and it was one of the reasons why she ā¦
Now that the door was open, now that she was holding him in her arms and being held by him in turn, there was no denying any longer what she felt for this man. No denying that she would raze cities to the ground to save him, would cross oceans to reach him.
No denying that she would love him until the Earth stopped turning, just like he loved her.
And she silently promised herself, promised both of them, that she would give in to this flood of emotion once she had sorted out her issues and come to terms with what she had done, and would continue to do to keep him safe. They would need to talk, and they would both need to be patient just a little longer - but there was no denying that her heart felt calm only with him, that all they had done had led to this moment of him in her arms, and her in his, that he would keep her soul safe like a treasure, because that was what she was to him.
He lifted his head, his hands cradling her face, her skin growing warm and then hot under his touch, and then she felt his lips on her forehead before he said it again, his voice warm and gentle and full of love and longing, sinking into the word as if it meant āhomeā to him.