Look at us baby, up all night
Lucille waited anxiously for Negan to come home. She'd called him almost twenty times now. Yes, it seemed excessive, but, so did him staying out so late. She had already texted Simon who confirmed that Negan left the bar at around 7 o'clock. It was nearing on 4 in the morning now.
So here she sat in their living room in her pajamas and nightgown. It was dark and she hadn't bothered to switch on a lamp because she was too anxious to move, too consumed by fear. Negan had always been a drinker, but sometimes he took it too far. Lucille was afraid that tonight was finally the night that he took it too far, and that her husband wouldn't come home to her.
Lost in her thoughts that consumed her, Lucille barely registered the sound of Negan's motorcycle revving up the street and parking in their driveway. Half of her believed that she just fantasized the noise, but then here came Negan through the front door, flipping on the light switch. As soon as he saw her, he paused, but Lucille didn't think anything of it. She was out of her chair and in his arms in two long strides. When she collided with him, she lost her breath and burrowed herself inside his black leather jacket, tucking herself inside. "Negan, I was so worried."
His arms finally wrapped around her and Lucille grounded herself to him. Negan petted his hand through her hair and crooned in his low, gruff way, "The fuck you worrying about me for Lucille? No matter what I'll always come home to you." He kissed the crown of her skull, some of her hair catching in his stubble as he pulled away. "Fuck, I gotta shave this shit."
She was so relieved to have Negan home with her again that Lucille didn't bother asking where he was or why he didn't call. Negan didn't smell too strongly of liquor and he didn't look like he'd been out fighting. This was the first time this had happened in their marriage. Lucille let it all go. "You can shave in the morning, Negan. Come to bed." Standing on her tip-toes, she attempted to kiss him, and Negan let her, however he was unusually passive. She pulled away, surprised at Negan's lack of ardor. Normally he couldn't keep his hands off of her. "What's wrong, baby?"
"Nothing, Lucille, sweetheart." Negan tried kissing her again with more vigor this time, but Lucille could tell it was forced. They'd been trying to have baby for almost a year now, but it hadn't happened naturally yet. Lucille had started planning doctor appointments, but didn't tell Negan, not wanting to concern or put pressure on him. She never wanted the sex they have to become a chore for them. It was always supposed to be for love, so that they could never get enough of each other.
Gently, Lucille pulled away again, careful not to hurt his pride. "No, Negan, it's alright. It's late anyway. Let's just go to sleep." She stroked his cheek fondly, her palm itching against his facial hair. Negan pressed a kiss to her hand gratefully before he took her hand and followed her to bed. Once in their marriage bed, they collapsed together and Lucille took it upon herself to help rid Negan of his boots, jacket, shirt, and jeans before she wrapped them up in the blanket, cocooned together. Her husband fell asleep as soon as his head hit the pillow, so Lucille wedged herself under his arm, and followed him to the land of sleep after.
Tearing our love apart
That sole incident become the first of many. Negan would go out to drink after getting off work at the car dealership, and Lucille would eat dinner alone, sit at home alone, wait for him – all alone. Eventually, she started sleeping alone, trusting him to be able to stumble into bed with her. For the most part, Negan did. Sometimes he reeked of booze or his cologne or sweat, and sometimes he forgot to undress himself. On the mornings Lucille woke up with her head pillowed on his chest, she wouldn't ask questions. But on the mornings she woke up clinging to her side of the bad while Negan snored with his back to her, she'd quietly get up and leave.
At first, Lucille continued to let it all go, believing Negan capable enough to not get himself hurt out there. These incidents would happen every once in a while, maybe once or twice a month. They were so infrequent that to Lucille they weren't worth arguing about. But as the days went by and Negan started coming home late with more regularity…
It was with a start one day that Lucille realized that their routine had changed. She'd just finished cooking dinner, and Negan wasn't home. He'd had the forethought to text her that he'd be late coming home, and Lucille had made spaghetti. Half of it was already packed away in containers for Negan to have whenever he'd finally come home. As Lucille sat down at the kitchen table to dig into her dinner, she froze in place once she saw that she hadn't even bothered to set Negan's place at the table. Somehow, she'd been expecting this.
Her heart spasmed with pain, wondering what she did wrong to drive him away. Was it because she wasn't pregnant yet? Was she not satisfying him enough? The more she thought about, the more Lucille's pain gave way into anger. She and Negan had stopped having sex as often as they once did. Lucille couldn't remember the last time he'd even touched her for more than just a kiss. Where had all their love gone? When did it go cold?
When Negan came home, Lucille wasn't the doting, concerned wife she was that first night. She wasn't the trusting wife either, sleeping easily in their bed just waiting for him to cuddle with her. Lucille was a hellion. What started out as a simple question – "Where were you?" – turned into an inquisition.
"I told you I would be fucking late," Negan said as he pulled off his jacket on tossed it on the couch. It made Lucille's eye twitch, but she she'd let the jacket go in favor for knowing just where he was.
"That doesn't tell me where you were."
"Shit, can't a guy fucking breathe before you start laying it into me? Fuck, gimme a break. It's been a long, damn day."
"Of course!" Lucille mocked, throwing up her hands. "Spaghetti's in the fridge."
"My fucking favorite," Negan grinned at her and made a beeline for the kitchen. Lucille watched him go, wondering where her kiss was. "Any fucking beer left in the fridge?"
Following him to the kitchen, Lucille stood in the doorway like a shadow. "You don't need to drink anymore if you went to the bar tonight, Negan."
"I didn't go to the fucking bar," Negan said as he pulled the spaghetti out of the fridge and put it in the microwave to reheat. Again, Lucille wanted to harp at him to put the spaghetti on a plate since she knew he wouldn't eat that much and she also knew that that plastic didn't do well in the microwave. But that was trivial, so she let it go, just like she'd be letting it go that he was coming home whenever he pleased.
"Then where were you?"
"Why does it fucking matter? I'm home now!"
"If you don't have anything to hide, Negan, then you can just tell me where you were."
"Who the fuck said I was hiding anything?" Negan raised his voice at her. He squinted at her suspiciously, kicking back on his heels. "You been talking to Simon?"
"No, I haven't." Lucille stood her ground firmly. "Why? Should I be asking Simon where you were instead?" She made her way to the phone, calling back to Negan over her shoulder, "Maybe Simon can give me some direct answers."
"Are you fucking married to Simon now, Lucille? I'm your fucking husband. Get back here."
Rounding on him, Lucille raised her voice right back. "No, Negan! I'm married to you! I'm you wife! So just tell me where you were! I have a right to know!" Her index finger stabbed him in the chest, right over his heart.
He grabbed her wrist and pushed her hand away, his touch firm but never too rough. "You can't just fucking trust me?" Switching tactics, Negan's voice softened as he became sincerer, "I told you before Lucille that no matter fucking what, whatever shit that pops up, I will fucking always come home to you." Negan reached out, attempting to placate her with a hug and a kiss.
That wasn't going to work on Lucille anymore, though. Sweet words wouldn't distract her from this or be enough for her anymore. She wanted answers more than his affection right now. Withdrawing from his reach, Lucille's tone was frosty and frigid, matching the ice in her eyes. "Just tell me where you were, Negan." Part of her wanted to promise him that she wouldn't be mad so long as he was honest, but Lucille couldn't force her lips to shape the words. Those words were stuck in her throat, choking her, tasting like ash, because she knew that it would be a lie.
For a long moment, Negan stared at her, deliberating with himself. Lucille could hardly breathe, she was so anxious to know the truth. But Negan shook his head, and still refused to tell her.
They continued to argue about it, raising their voices until they were screaming. Lucille was sad to think that before she and Negan once to yell and scream for the pleasure – the neighbors were used to that kind of noise from their house. Now Lucille was wondering if she'd have to deal with a noise complaint later.
At the time, though, she didn't care. She was just so angry, yelling at Negan and him shouting right back of her, his colorful language even more explosive and colorful. Eventually, he just walked away from her and jerked his jacket back on. "Fucking Christ, I don't need any of this shit, least of all from you, Lucille."
Well she wasn't letting this go again, so Lucille followed, noting that since Negan hadn't wiped his boots when he came in, there was mud tracked all over her hardwood floors. She had just mopped today, too. "Where are you going now, Negan? Back to where you were? To Simon? To the bar? To the mall? To work? Just tell me where! Tell me now!"
"I'm fucking going out! What the shit does it look like?" Negan barked at her, teeth bared in anything but a smile. The front door slammed behind them, and Lucille stared at it. Her legs refused to follow him any further. She was broken out of her heated reverie when the microwave beeped at her loudly, signally Negan's spaghetti was done.
Stomping back to the kitchen, Lucille yanked the spaghetti out of the microwave, burning her hands on the plastic. She hissed in pain and dropped it into the trashcan. As she stood at the sink, soothing her hand with cool water, Lucille's eyes were drawn to her wedding ring, sparkling on her finger. Instantly, her energy and anger was sapped away. She was alone again. Negan was gone again. And she finally, finally cried.
Aren't we the same two people who lived through years in the dark?
Before Negan, Lucille had nothing. She was stuck in a dead-end job, unhappy with herself, no hopes for her future. Negan was in a similar way, and the only reason they ran into each other was because Simon pushed Negan in her direction. From the moment they both saw each other, they were lost to their passion and their love. They became inseparable, and it took less than six months for Negan to find the right ring for her and propose to her. They were married in under a year as well. For five happy years, they were stuck in that blissful honeymoon stage that all newlyweds had.
The only thing that was missing from their home and their life was a baby, and God knows both Lucille and Negan wanted one. At first Lucille was surprised that Negan would want a baby, but then again, she should have known better. Negan coached at the high school, so he adored kids. Sometimes he'd invite some of his students and athletes or even the younger neighborhood kids over to play ping-pong in the garage. Lucille liked to watch them whenever she'd bring them lemonade and cookies, often times pretending that it was their own children Negan was teaching how to play the game.
Her Negan may be rough around the edges, but they loved each other. Even now when they hit a stumbling block in their marriage, Lucille was confident that Negan would never raise a hand to her. Negan may be a violent individual with a quick temper, but usually he blew off his steam with his sports. He was very competitive as well, cursing the kids as he played them in ping-pong. But Negan abhorred unnecessary violence and especially violence against the weak. It didn't matter if it was women, the elderly, children, animals – Negan didn't think any man was a man if they beat someone or something smaller than then. And though she and Negan stopped having sex as well (he didn't even come home most nights anymore, and when he did, he slept on the couch), Lucille didn't have to worry that Negan would force himself on her. He was not an animal, and even when he was drunk, he was never, ever that bad. At heart Negan was a good man. Lucille wondered where that man went.
What Lucille couldn't say with confidence anymore was if Negan still loved her. And Lucille couldn't answer that question for herself honestly either.
Every time I try to walk away
For all their explosive argument filled with accusations and curses and low-blows – Lucille couldn't bring herself to leave. She wasn't of the mind that he should leave either. The whole point of her starting the fights was so that Negan would stop leaving her. Lucille wasn't going to pack his bags for him, she had no plans to go to courthouse to get divorce papers. In her heart, she believed they could work through this. After all, she wasn't so naïve to believe that their marriage would be perfect. Every marriage had its problems, right? That didn't mean it had to end in divorce.
But the longer this went on, the less Lucille believed that this could be mended. So long as they kept arguing, though, Lucille was going to hold on to her hope. Arguing meant passion, and passion means you care. When you don't care, there's no passion, and then that meant this was really over. But it wasn't over because she and Negan still screamed like cats and dogs.
It was like Lucille said, though. She wasn't naïve. Lucille knew that there had to be someone else. Negan was cheating. And it hurt to know that the man who promised to love her was seeing other women – fucking other women. Those arguments about his infidelity were the worst.
"I know what my own perfume smells like, Negan! That isn't mine!" She'd screech at him like a harpy. "Do those sluts even know you're married?"
"Don't fucking call her a slut!" Negan snarled back, getting in her face.
Lucille's voice dropped to a tight whisper. "You're only seeing one other woman?"
"Doesn't that fucking make you feel better?"
"No, it makes me feel worse." Several women mean Negan's only thinking with his dick, but one woman… She must be very special to cause Negan to stray from his marriage. But maybe she wasn't. Lucille had once believed she was special to Negan, too. "So, does she know about me?"
"No," Negan softly confessed.
Of course, Lucille isn't surprised. "If you're not going to be honest with me, you can at least be honest with her," she told Negan bitterly. Before he could argue back with her, Lucille asked him another question. "Do I know her? Do I know who she is?"
"No," Negan whispered.
"Is she…" Lucille was even afraid to ask this, because she didn't think it was true. But, she also didn't think that Negan would ever cheat on her either. "Is she a student?"
"No! Fuck, Lucille, what kind of sick fuck to do you fucking take me for?!"
Relief flooded through her. "A cheating fuck," she quipped and before they could dive back into arguing again, she quickly – desperately – asked him, "Do you love her?"
Negan didn't give her a direct answer. He just repeated what he had been telling her for the past few months. "I love you, Lucille. No matter what, I'll always come home to you."
Tears spilled down Lucille's flushed cheeks, dripping off her chin. This was not the first time she had cried in front of him during one of their arguments, and it wouldn't be the last either. "I don't want that, Negan. I just want you to stay at home with me, to just be with me."
He shook his head at her. "Lucille, I can't fucking do that."
The tears stopped coming, and Lucille willed them away, angrily wiping her face and blinking them back. "Then at least make sure that slut keeps her whore lipstick off your clothes. She can wash them instead of me."
And just like that, they were back to arguing again. "I told you not to fucking call her that!"
"I wouldn't have to call her that if you'd give me a name! Tell me who she is!" Lucille screeched again, so loud her ears were ringing and her throat hurt, "Does she suck your dick just as good as I did? Does she fuck you just right? What does her pussy taste like, Negan? Is she juicy? Is she soft? Is she younger than me? Thinner than me? How beautiful is she?" The tears were back, bitter and angry and hot as they ran down her face. She caught a few in her mouth, salting her lips, and Lucille was ashamed to think that the only way she could get kisses anymore were from her own tears over Negan.
But was that better than nothing?
Something makes me turn around and stay
It had finally come to a head for Lucille. Negan finally told her the woman's name, and confessed everything. "I met her at the fucking dealership. She drove in some Ford piece of shit, and just looked like she was having a bad fucking day. I got her a good deal on a car, told her about the bar, thinking that a fucking drink or two would cheer her up. When I met her at the bar fucking later, I got so damn drunk that I ended up fucking her in that car that I sold her."
This hurt Lucille to hear, but she wanted to know everything. "Is she beautiful? Is she better at fucking you than me?"
"She is fucking beautiful, but you are fucking beautiful, too, Lucille," Negan beseeched her.
"Save it, Negan," Lucille held up her hand.
Abashed, Negan reluctantly continued, "It was a mistake, a fucking mistake at first, I swear to Christ."
"Don't say that, Negan," she said tiredly. She'd been more and more tired lately.
"I fucking mean it, Lucille!"
"How can you accidentally keep fucking her?" Lucille asked him plainly, no underlying heat to her question.
"I just, just," Negan actually started to stutter, "I couldn't stop thinking about how she felt. Shit, I was weak, Lucille."
"Yes, Negan, you were." She wasn't going to make him feel better when she herself felt like shit.
"Lucille, what's fucking wrong with you?"
"You should be asking yourself that, Negan. I'm not the cheater." But then Lucille sighed, "But there is something wrong. The OBGYN contacted me today."
"What?"
"We were trying to have a baby, Negan," Lucille began to explain. "We had been trying for a while now. I just wanted to know if there was something wrong with me. And I was right." Looking him in the eye, she told him, "I have ovarian cancer. Stage four. Removing my ovaries won't be enough. They'll have to take my fallopian tubes, too. My uterus, my cervix. Even then, I have to undergo chemotherapy, too."
The more she talked, the more Negan crumpled in on himself until he had collapsed on the couch on his side. For the first time, Negan cried. Lucille felt strange. She'd been the one crying before – hell, she did cry at the doctor's office – but now, all her tears were spent. First spent on Negan, then spent on the baby that they would never have. None were left to be spent on herself.
"Lucille," Negan sobbed and reached out to her with both hands. She let him touch her, but refrained from touching him herself. "Lucille, Lucille, fuck I'm so sorry. I should've been there for you. Fuck, fuck, our baby. Oh, fuck. Lucille. I'm sorry. I'm such a piece of shit." He pulled himself up, hanging off of her, wrapping her arms around her lips and pressing his forehead to her belly. Lucille felt like it was a cruel parody of what this could have been.
This moment could have been Lucille telling Negan to drop the woman for her, his wife and mother of his child. And Negan could be sobbing over how big of a piece of shit he was as he'd make promises that he'd never leave her or their baby. He'd promise it to her womb where his seed could be growing. But he was doing none of that now. The only thing that was growing in Lucille was something trying to kill her.
Though she wanted to cry, Lucille couldn't. Out of all the things it took to have Negan realize that he was wrong, to have him abandon the other woman, it took her having cancer. Lucille was dying, and she didn't even have to strength to weep for herself.
Out of instinct, she placed her hands on Negan's shoulders, gently petting his hair and curling her fingers over the back of his neck. He was sobbing so loudly and hard into her stomach that she could feel him soak her shirt with tears and snot so much that it clung to her skin uncomfortably. She was the sick one, and she was comforting her cheating husband. That irony wasn't lost on her. She was drawn out of her thoughts when Negan's sobs starting to become intelligible again through his curses. "I promise you, Lucille, I will come home to you. I love you."
The empty promise fell deaf on Lucille's ears. "I love you, too, Negan," was Lucille's robotic response.
And I can't tell you why
Was it strange that Lucille felt like things had gone back to normal after that? Because in truth it was anything but that. Once she started going through treatment, Negan hardly ever left her alone and he never stayed out late anymore. He didn't tell her that he had gotten rid of that other woman, but he didn't need to. Lucille knew that he didn't.
In a way, things couldn't have worked out better for Negan. His old wife was dying and soon enough he'd be with a new wife. Bitterly, Lucille contemplated whether that woman would give him a baby and he'd be happy. Or maybe this vicious cycle would start all over again. Would his new wife get cancer and die, too? Maybe he'd give her some venereal disease. Lucille didn't want to consider that Negan learned his lesson and decided not to stray anymore. That would just be too cruel and unfair to her.
But, she didn't wish the other woman death even on her worsts moments when it felt like her blood was sluggish in her veins, made of shards of glass, death by a thousand cuts. She didn't even want Negan to suffer anymore, though she was suffering. All she wanted was to turn back the clock and catch this cancer sooner. They could've adopted together… but again, maybe it's for the best that they never had a child. For one, a child can never save a marriage, and Lucille thinks it's unfair to think that a baby can solve everyone's problems. For another, it was hard enough just watching Negan sit beside her in his chair. She couldn't imagine having a little boy or a little girl sitting there as well, watching her die.
Negan was strong, though. If he could love this other woman, then he could get over her death. Sure, he'd blame himself for a while, but Lucille didn't doubt that he'd put himself out there again. Maybe having a child as something to remember her by would help him, but Lucille brushed that thought aside. He'd find some other way to remember her by. Hell, maybe he'd name a dog after her. She and Negan had always wanted a dog, too, and Negan especially so since he hadn't had a dog since the one he had as a kid – a mutt named Bisou – died. Having a dog as a namesake would be just fine with Lucille.
It was towards the end that things started to get hard. Lucille knew there was no hope for her. But Negan didn't know – or maybe he did but he still clung to hope anyway as a means of showing his devotion to her. One day when Lucille just lied there fitfully, too in pain to take a nap and throat too dry to speak, Negan made another confession to her.
Sitting at her bedside, Negan propped his elbows up as though in prayer, and Lucille in the hospital bed was the makeshift offer. Lucille didn't want to think about if she was the sacrifice for the alter or the saint he was praying to. Both were too much responsible for her. He leaned his chin into his hands, beard scruffy and long. Negan had never gotten around to shaving. Then after drawing a deep breath and slowly exhaling, Negan began to speak in a wavering voice full of tears;
"Lucille, I am the biggest piece of shit husband in the world. I'm such a piece of shit that if it were a fucking contest, I don't even deserve to win because I'm so shitty. God, Lucille," and Lucille couldn't tell if he were referring to her or God, "I'm sorry for fucking cheating. I should've never done it. I should have fucking savored what time we had left together. Fuck."
It became too much and he lapsed into silence, but it didn't last long. Voice tremoring, he started anew, "I did what you told me to, Lucille. I fucking told her about you, told her that I couldn't be with her because I was taking care of you." His eyes had closed a long time ago, but when he opened them again there were tears in the depths and they clung to his dark, long eyelashes, sparkling like damn stars. "And she fucking left me."
Slowly, Lucille turned her head towards Negan, and it took all her strength to do it – and of course, it hurt. She could say something sweet, she could lie to him. 'She doesn't deserve you, then, Negan.' Or she could say what she's really thinking: 'That woman was stronger than me.' Because Lucille never found the strength to leave Negan, she just couldn't. But Lucille had a feeling that if she said that, that Negan would argue with her no matter what. If she tried to be sweet, he'd say he's a piece of shit who doesn't deserve love, but if she said what the felt, he'd only say she was so much stronger having lived through him and cancer. Well if cancer is a battle, Lucille felt like she was losing, and she couldn't be that strong is she was dying, right?
Without prompting, Negan continued, "I always thought that it was fucking me, that I was the fucking reason we couldn't have a family. I thought I was shooting fucking blanks, I got careless. And then I got her fucking pregnant."
The heart monitor stuttered and Negan quickly glanced at it and back at Lucille fearfully. He said that and one of the shards of glass in her vein caught in her heart, sticking there painfully.
"Lucille," Negan trailed off and then started again, "I got her fucking pregnant. And we were gonna have that baby together. I'd have stayed with you, there would have been split fucking custody or whatever. I would've given you a baby, Lucille, even if it wasn't yours, but we'd raise the baby together when it was my turn. You would have been a kickass momma, Lucille. You know that, right?"
Her eyes fell shut, and it was getting harder to breathe. Negan took her hand, her skin like paper crumbling in his touch.
"But now I won't even have the chance to raise that fucking baby, Lucille. Not with you and not fucking without you either." He paused. "When I told her that you were…fucking dying… she went and got an abortion. And she fucking left me."
That shard of glass in her heart slowly started to twist, and again the heart monitor stuttered. Lucille couldn't open her eyes, they were too heavy. She couldn't squeeze Negan's hand, that was too difficult. She wanted to cling to life for him, but she couldn't. God, without her, he'd really be left alone.
"I told you that no matter what Lucille, I'll always come home to you. I fucking promise you that. I will fucking love you for forever, Lucille. I fucking love you. Fuck, fuck, fuck."
And Lucille finally believed him, and she can't tell you why even if she wanted to. Because then she just died, and Negan kissed a moving corpse's forehead goodbye before he left that hospital and never came back.