I thought of this one shot after I listened to 'Home' by Blue October, so I would recommend listening to the song as you read my writing. Thank you so much for viewing!

"Carl," Rick called from the kitchen. Carl came in a moment later, dragging Enid behind him. "What?" He asked. Rick grinned at him. "It's midnight. You know what that means."
Carl groaned and Enid smiled as she bid farewell to Carl's parents. Michonne smiled and waved while Rick nodded at her. The two parents watched Carl kiss Enid's cheek before watching her as she walked out the door to make the trek two houses down to go sleep with Maggie and Glenn. She disappeared into the darkness but flashed her porch light twice to let Carl know she got home safe. Satisfied with her return, Carl re-entered his home and glared at his father.

"What's wrong Carl?" Rick asked.
Carl shook his head at him.
"What? Are you mad because I sent your little girlfriend home?"
Carl's lack of an answer, but ever intense gaze confirmed Rick's thoughts, so he defended himself. "Look, I think you're the lucky one. Your mom and I weren't allowed alone until we were 18. We always went on dates in public or sat in one of our living rooms with our parents. I'm being nice here. You always complained about not being a kid. Now, this is what things would have been like in the Old World."
"Maggie and Glenn don't kick me out until they go to bed."
"Maggie and Glenn are younger than us and they sympathize more with both of your hormones more than Michonne and I do."

Carl groaned at his father's reference to hormones and put his head down on the table. Michonne chuckled and said, "Go upstairs and make sure Judith's still asleep in her crib please. Then you should head to bed too."
"Okay Mom," Carl muttered, pulling himself up from the table. He hugged his father and kissed his mother before dutifully marching up the stairs.

"You know, he's not a bad kid," Michonne said thoughtfully as she plugged in the CD player. Music filled the kitchen and somewhat covered the noise of the faucet from Michonne's dish washing.
"Here. Let me help you. You take forever," Rick offered, strolling over to stand next to her at the countertop.
"I take offense to that."
"It's just dishes, 'Chonne. Shouldn't take that long."

"It's dishes. I love doing dishes ever since we got, Rick conceded and said, "Sorry babe, I didn't realize that's why you liked doing them."
She nodded him and handed him a sparkling clean pot that they had cooked spaghetti in. Rick would have just rinsed it out (it only had pasta and water in it!) and called it a day. Yet, Michonne scrubbed the damn pot for five minutes, simply because she could. Because they could afford the time and the resources to do something so dull, monotonous and boring without repercussions.

At the end of the night Michonne hung up her dish towel and turned around, surprised to see Rick standing there with a hand out.
"Might I have this dance?" he asked, with a goofy grin on his face.
"You're such a dork," Michonne laughed, but allowed him to take her hand.

He pulled them together, continued to hold her one hand, but placed his other on the small of her back while she rested her head on his chest and brought her other hand up to hold his shoulder.
"What's with the dancing? Michonne spoke into his shirt, as she swayed with Rick.
"The moonlight makes me romantic," Rick shrugged.

"You know I love you right?" Rick asked.

"Of course I know you love me. I love you too babe."

"I'm so in love with you baby," Rick murmured into her hair as he clutched her close to him. He kissed her neck gently, trailing his tongue over the spots that he had left hickeys on the night before. She nestled herself against his body, rubbing against him, not to arouse him, but just simply to feel closer to him. She whispered, "Do you think the kids are happy?"
Rick sighed, "I want Judith to know only this world."
"What about Carl?" Michonne pressed.
"I think he's very happy here. He's got his little girlfriend and his family back in order. I'm a bit calmed down, and I'm less of a savage and more of a human. His little sister is alive and doing well despite not having all of those damn early development things that were all the rage before everything went downhill. But most importantly, he's got a mom."

Michonne looked up and grinned at him. "I love being a mom again. I'd really missed it."
"I know, and it's a shame you lost that chance for a while, because you are damn good at it.
Her smile faltered as she thought about her son.
Rick recalled, her, "Hey, hey, let me see that smile again. It's in a three way tie for my favorite smile in the world."
Hearinig Rick's dumb joke made her smile again as they resumed their swaying to the music. Her arms wrapped around his neck and his went to her hips. When eventually they both found themselves yawning a little too frequently, they separated wordlessly and Michonne turned off the music while Rick cut the lights and he took her hand to walk up the stairs.

In the bedroom, she turned around, facing away from Rick, as though she were shy of him seeing what was underneath as she shed her clothes. He chuckled at her and kissed her shoulder blade, letting his lips stay pressed against her magnificent ebony skin to say, "You act as though I don't know every single piece, curve and inch of your body inside out and backwards. You are committed to my memory."
Michonne shivered at the passion in his words, knowing she would never be able to compare to Rick's power in his words. She just couldn't articulate her feelings the way he could.

So instead of even trying to, she simply said, "We should get you into bed."
"Why just me? Do you plan on leaving me in the middle of the night?"
"You're an old man, you need more sleep than me."
"Old man?" Rick scoffed. "You're only five years younger than me!"
"Shush, gramps. I don't want you to overexert yourself," she teased.
"I'll show you overexertion," Rick grumbled.
"Oh yeah?" Michonne asked, intrigued. She walked towards Rick seductively, biting her lip, practically begging him to pull off her top.
He blushed and said, "Not tonight. I'm a little tired."
"Oh, I see how it is," Michonne grinned.

"I may be tired," Rick said. "But I never get tired of seeing that smile. Never have, never will."
"You're so corny," Michonne complained as she crawled into bed with him.

She decided to try one of his grand gesture type things with the words.
"I'm really proud of you babe."

"Huh?" Rick asked from where he had been dozing off. He snapped his full attention to his lover (he knew she hated that word, so he only used it in his head).

"I'm really proud of you," Michonne repeated. "You've done a really good job leading us here, and building this place up. The kids are safe, we're all safe. Maggie and Glenn are starting their family. There are even love triangles again." She had to add the little dig at Abraham, Rosita and Sasha, because otherwise she would have felt just a little too sappy.

"I couldn't have made our home without you," was his simple reply, and it was just as overpoweringly passionate as Rick always was.