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Jo

I sat up on the catwalk, looking up at the stars. I had been there for hours. Negan had managed to calm the masses, but he had insisted I stand at his side along with Simon. It had made me incredibly uncomfortable. Simon was Negan's second in command, I didn't belong there. But Simon hadn't seemed surprised and Negan had been adamant. He claimed they had all seen me throw myself into the middle of it and it would be better for my 'legend' for them to see me standing beside him unscathed. His words, not mine.

It was odd for me. I had been out of control. I had nearly attacked some of Negan's men. Not just today, but several times over the last week. I expected fear. I had been conditioned by fear. Either I was afraid of them or they should be afraid of me. Negan and Merle had always seemed to be the exceptions. But standing up there not a single person looked at me with fear.

I had turned confused eyes to Negan. He had smiled and leaned towards me, his lips brushing my ear. "What's the matter Hot Friend?" His warm breath on my neck made me think of what it had been like to kiss him. When I kissed him. I looked away quickly, my eyes going back to scanning the crowd, looking for any potential threats because that seemed safer, easier.

"They-aren't afraid of me." I said haltingly, trying to keep my thoughts in order and focus on his question and not my scattering thoughts.

Negan scoffed as though that were the most ridiculous thing he had ever heard. "Of course they aren't afraid of you why the shit would they be afraid of you?"

"Because I'm-" I started to say broken and he knew it. There was a flash of temper in his eyes and I bit my tongue.

Negan made a noise of disgust in his throat. "Where you the one shooting at their beloved leader? Were you the one waving grenades around and threatening to kill everybody? No. You were the one who threw herself into the middle of it trying to save their panic ridden asses. They know it."

"But-" I started again and stopped, frowning as I let his words sink in. When I looked back at him he was grinning away at me. He had recounted the story of what happened in the hallway, but he made it sound like I had been the one to save the day somehow instead of taking the glory for himself.

I would never understand Negan.

When it was finally over I had slipped away as hurriedly as possible. I was overwhelmed. I was overwhelmed by all the people smiling at me and wanting to clap me on the back. I was overwhelmed by my raging emotions. And more than anything I was overwhelmed by Negan himself. He was laughing and performing for the people of sanctuary while I just wanted to go hide somewhere.

It took a little bit of work to ditch Dwight, who seemed to be taking his new duties as guard dog very seriously. But I finally managed and had been sitting alone on the catwalk for several hours now. It was late and I was exhausted. It had been a long day. Waking up in Negan's arms this morning felt like days ago.

Before I had slipped away I made Negan promise to let me know when or if Martinez woke up. Part of me didn't want to be involved, didn't want to see or speak to him again. But I had to know it was over. Negan wouldn't let him live, I had no doubts or qualms about that. If it had been my choice neither man would have made it out of that hallway alive, but we needed to talk to Martinez. We needed to make sure this was actually over. Martinez had always seemed like a follower to me, but I had been wrong before. I didn't want to be wrong about this. The Sanctuary had been under attack almost non-stop over the last week. We couldn't afford to be wrong.

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