You Brought Me Back
Chapter One
***I do not own TWD or anything associated with TWD. It would not be karmically wise to sue me.***
***This will be a multi-chapter story about everyone's favorite samurai. I've taken liberties with her backstory. Sincerely hope you like it.***
Toussaint Robileaux was, when still alive, a professor of Art History at Morehouse. Daddy had never taught anywhere other than his alma mater and never wanted to. She chose to go to Spelman, knowing that it would please him. Though he did not live to see her graduate, she took comfort in knowing it would have made him happy.
She was the youngest of Odette and Toussaint Robileaux's four, and according to both parents, a wonderful surprise. They had planned to stop after her sister Genevieve, but as Mama was fond of saying, life made other plans.
Daddy told her in his deep Louisiana drawl, "As soon as we learned of you, we knew we didn't want a world that you weren't a part of, Peanut."
Peanut was the only thing Daddy ever called her after seeing her curled up on the ultrasound. Odette would smile wide when telling that tale, remembering how sweet and out of character it was to see her usually- stoic husband so captivated by his unborn daughter. From that day forward, she was Mama's Michonne and Daddy's Peanut.
Never for one second did she doubt that he loved her, though those were words he rarely spoke. But it lived in the warmth that was always in his eyes when they talked to each other. It was found in their mutual passion for science-fiction and the works of Akira Kurosawa. It communicated itself in their desire to emulate Martin Luther King. (Though most of the time their reactions seemed more in line with a man once called Malcolm Little)
She liked to imagine Daddy would have approved of Mike, had he met him. Mike was initially a pleasant distraction that became something more, winning her over with his pointed attentions and easy ways. His mind was as agile as hers and many a night they'd spend arguing some obscure philosophical point, only to end up making love after agreeing to disagree.
There were no plans for a kid, not at that stage of things, so the conception of her own little Peanut was also a big surprise. She had wanted a child in a few years, maybe, but not when it actually happened. Life made other plans.
Whether to keep it or not was never really a decision. She and Mike had enough love, enough time and enough money. She could also admit that there was a little ego in there, as the thought of a kid who inherited her independence, Mike's charm and both their brains held some appeal. (During a conversation with her brother Langston she shared these thoughts, only to end up pelting him with the olives they'd been snacking on when he snorted laughter and said she was just as likely to give birth to a serial killer...or a Republican)
When she saw her son on that ultrasound, she cried a little, thinking of her daddy. And there on that screen was her own little Peanut. From that time forward, she never called him anything else. She knew she didn't want a world that this tiny little person wasn't going to be a part of.
She let Mike name him Andre, since to her he'd always be Peanut. After his arrival, everything seemed complete in a way it hadn't been before. She took Peanut to the playground and to the High. They were a progressive family, consuming fine wines, modern art and sengoku-jidai dramas in equal measure. It was idyllic. If there was anything more to want, she didn't know it.
But life made other plans.
The ZA hit, and the world as everyone knew it turned upside down. Nothing was recognizable anymore, including Mike. The man she loved became a sullen, bleak shell of himself that weighed more heavily around her neck than the sling she used to carry Peanut. She worried about it...but was more worried about keeping them all alive in this nightmare landscape.
This would come back to haunt her bitterly, after.
At night, when she would make the silly faces that made Peanut giggle and bask in his cheery good nature, somehow not really affected by all of this, she knew two things beyond a shadow of a doubt.
The first was that even if she had to do it all on her own, she would do whatever it took to carve a future out of this hell for her son.
The second was that even now, beset by threats from all sides, she would never want to be in any world that her little Peanut wasn't a part of.
To Be Continued