I think I liked you better when you didn't have a knife in your hand, Peaches

Stages of grief

The days passed slowly by, and apart from Carson's usual check-ups and a subdued Frankie coming in to ask an unresponsive Blake how she was and escort her carefully to the bathroom several times a day, the pair, Negan and Blake, stayed where they were.

The world seeming like it was blurring around them.

Negan had left the room only to use the dank bathroom down the hallway himself, washing his face in the icy cold water beneath the faucet to keep himself awake. He had nodded off just a couple of times, going days without sleep night, just staying sat in that rickety chair beside Blake's bed.

The blonde woman he loved so dearly had barely moved an inch and even when Frankie led her back into bed, her gorgeous green eyes seemed blank, not reaching Negan's and merely remaining fixed to the floor until she lay back beneath the sheets, turning away from him once more.

And despite Negan trying again and again to talk to her, she just stayed sill. Not saying a word to the dark-haired Saviour in return.

Shit.

This was killing him. Little by little.

More than a lack of sleep or lack of appetite ever would.

To not have her even utter single word to him or anyone else in days...

Was this shock? Trauma? Or something else completely?

Carson had tried as much as he could to get her to eat something, telling her that she needed to get her strength back after the blood loss she had suffered, but Blake ignored him....her eyes staying fixed to that wall.

And it was on the third day, that a worried-looking Carson had nodded to Negan to follow him out into the hallway.

Negan had wavered at first before pulling his aching bones from the chair and following the strawberry-blonde doctor out into the gloomy corridor and pulling the door closed behind him.

And here Carson had turned to him, dragging a hand over his tired-looking eyes.

"She needs to start eating and drinking something," he said starkly, shaking his head. "It's been three days and she needs to get some fluids back into her."

He looked at Negan who merely stared back, not quite knowing how to react in his tired state.

"If she doesn't I'm afraid I'm going to have to force feed her through an IV..." he said giving a shake of his head. "A-And I don't want to do that."

Carson gazed at Negan poignantly. But Negan just gave a deep frown, shaking his own dark head at the doctor.

What the fuck did expect him to do?

"S-She won't even fuckin' look at me, Doc," he croaked out, in voice that sounded a world away from his usual deep and playful tone.

Shit, he didn't know how much longer he could cope with this.

Why the hell wasnt she talking to him? Or looking at him?

Did she blame him? Was that it?

"Y-You've got to give her time.." said Carson, but Negan cut across him suddenly, sounding frustrated.

"It's been three fuckin' days!" he said in a raised voice into the doctor's pale face before blinking and staking a step backwards, as though startled at his own anger.

He faltered, his eyes shifting away.

"She doesn't even cry anymore...she just lies there...hell, I don't know what I can fuckin' do," he said running hand down his painfully tired face. "What the fuck am I supposed to do?"