Fic: A Stormy Night (Comfortember)

[csi_sanders1129]

Title: A Stormy Night
Chapters: 1/1
Author:csi_sanders1129
Genre: Family.
Ratings: K+
Word Count: 1017
Pairings/Characters: Daryl Dixon/Rick Grimes, Judith
Synopsis: In which a storm keeps Judith awake.
Comments: Written for Comfortember 2020, Prompt: Cuddling. Set in a universe where Alexandria was actually safe and everyone got to live more or less happily there. Comments and kudos would be awesome. Enjoy!

Daryl's always been a light sleeper. Even before the world went to shit – as a kid, he never knew what would trigger his father's temper, never knew how fast he'd need to be clear of it. When he got older, it was usually the cops he was avoiding. They'd come down on whatever shithole place he and Merle were crashing in, and the two of them would need to bolt as quickly and as quietly as possible.

In their new world, though, the skill had proven to be even more invaluable. Nothing and nowhere was safe. Walkers could hit anytime and that kind of constant vigilance was a little bit easier to deal with when he was confident that the slightest sound would wake him.

Now that they've settled in Alexandria, beyond reasonably secure walls, he sleeps a little deeper, but not by much.

For instance, tonight the sounds of a storm roiling overhead have kept him up. The winds picked up since he crawled into bed. The rain beats a constant staccato beat on the roof and the thunder has been near constant. But, it's not the only thing keeping him awake. As the storm starts to crest, he hears the sound of tiny feet trudging down the hallway. Then there's the creak of the bedroom door as it opens, and a little whimpering cry as the footsteps approach the bed.

"Can't sleep?"

Judith shakes her head, stepping into view, and he scoops her up onto the bed with him in one quick move that makes her giggle, just a little bit. "I don't like the storm," she admits. He thinks of the storm that hit when they were making their way to Alexandria a few years back, when she was just a baby. Facing what was probably some degree of hurricane and a horde of walkers all at once. He's glad she doesn't remember that. But, still, in a world with so many scary things to worry about, he's almost glad it's something so normal and childlike a fear. At least it's something he can protect her from.

"It'll be over soon," he promises. "But it is awfully noisy, isn't it?"

The little girl nods and buries her head against his chest in an attempt to block out the storm. "Uh huh," she says, and then, sniffling, "Daddy'll be back soon, right?"

"Yeah, in a little bit," he assures her. Rick's on watch duty tonight, unfortunately for him. "You wanna sleep with us tonight?"

He gets another sniffly, "uh huh," out of her in response.

Another flash of lightning hits, creeping in around the edges of the blinds on the bedroom window and casting the room in an eerie glow. Thunder follows nearly immediately. The storm is probably directly overhead now. He realizes what he can do to help her not be quite so afraid. "Do you know how to tell how far away the storm is?"

She shakes her head again and looks up at him with wide, curious eyes. "You can do that?"

"Yeah," Daryl tells her. "You have to count the seconds between the lightning and the thunder. The more seconds, the further away it is. You wanna try?" he asks, and he gets an eager nod in reply. They wait in silence for the next flash of lightning and he counts with her, but they only get as far as, "one…" before the next rumble of the thunder interrupts them. Judith looks alarmed by how many numbers they didn't get to, but Daryl's quick to reassure her, "Next time it'll be further away."

Sure enough, the next time they count, they get through, "one… two… three…" before the thunder crashes. "See? It's moving away."

Judith smiles in relief and sits up, now more interested in tracking the progress of the storm than hiding from it. They make it up to four this time.

Daryl sits up, too, propped up against the headboard of the bed. She clambers over him, and she settles at his side, as the two of them keep counting. Six seconds. Seven. Nine.

By the time the storm is ten seconds away, it's diminished considerably in force. The rain has let up, too, now more of a soothing, steady rhythm than before. It's likely helping lull Judith back to sleep, he thinks, as he mostly only gets incoherent mumbling for the next count. "Not so bad now, is it?" he asks.

"No," she agrees, blinking up at him with tired eyes.

She's asleep not long after that, still curled up against his chest, but Daryl continues to track it as it moves off. The wind and rain slow from torrential downpour to light drizzle, the lightning and thunder grow progressively infrequent. Still, he's awake. He catches the sound of boots on the steps, then moving down the hallway, but those are familiar noises. It's just Rick, back from his shift on watch. Daryl tracks his movements as the other man slips into the bathroom, no doubt in desperate need of a hot shower if he was out in the storm, and sure enough, soon after, Rick joins him, still toweling off his hair.

"I see we have a guest," Rick whispers, upon spotting his daughter asleep on Daryl's chest. "Storm wake her?"

Daryl nods, pulls the blankets aside so Rick can join him once he's changed, "Yeah, but we got through it."

"Want me to take her back to her room?"

He thinks of the things that kept from sleep when he was young. He didn't have anyone to chase away the storms or the nightmares or the monster under the bed any more than he had anyone to chase away the actual dangers like his father or his own poor choices. Judith, though, she does. "Nah, let her stay."

Rick agrees easily. He climbs into bed with them and helps wrangle Judith into a more manageable position so that Daryl can actually lie down again. She ends up settled between them, safe from all sides as the last traces of the storm fade away in the distance.