Rick slid one hand up Michonne's spine and cupped it around the back of her neck. He placed the other on her hip, holding her in place while he licked and sucked her neck and shoulder.

"Careful," she warned as he pulled her closer to him.

"Hmm?"

"Don't want to get my hair wet," she explained, motioning to her locs, which were pulled up into an elastic.

Wordlessly, Rick reached behind his back to push the shower head downward, away from her, and quickly resumed his task. She stroked her fingers through his wet locks, closing her eyes and letting him position and play with her body as he liked. When she felt his hardening cock nudging against her midsection, she whimpered and took a bite out of his shoulder.

He reached behind her for a bar of soap. As he lathered it up between his hands, she got wafts of the scent that she'd come to associate with him. No hints of cedar wood and peppermint, which companies loved to dump into men's soaps. This was fresh, clean, and crisp. And light enough that it never masked the natural smell of his skin.

Rick began to rub his sudsy palms up and down her back, eventually making his way to her ass. He lingered there, stroking her skin in wide circles and dipping his fingers between her buttocks. Gradually, he worked his way to her stomach, then up to her chest. With one soapy breast in each hand, he began to roll each nipple with his thumbs.

Michonne heard him mumble a question, but in her thickening haze of lust, she didn't hear what it was.

"What?" She asked.

"Are you hungry?" He repeated. She opened her eyes, and found him looking back at her. Casually. Like he expected her to carry on a conversation when he was touching her like that.

"Yeah," she managed.

"What for?" He lowered his head back down to her neck.

"I...don't know," she murmured.

Rick adjusted the shower head again, just enough to rinse the suds from Michonne's body. She felt him reach for the soap bar again. This time, he handed it to her, and turned around. "Can you get my back?"

She rubbed the bar between her hands, then began to massage his back, alternating between her palms and her fingernails. Rick stepped under the spray to rinse off. His hair soaked up the water and matted against his scalp. Michonne spotted a bottle of basic, drugstore shampoo on the rim of the tub and picked it up. She poured a conservative amount into her hand and began to work it directly into his scalp.

She smiled to herself when a low hum began to emit from him, as she was confident he had never experienced the satisfaction of a scalp massage before. He dropped his head back to allow her better access. After working her fingertips all over his head, she urged him back under the water for a rinse.

Rick moved to turn around but she planted her hands on his waist to keep him facing front. She reached for the soap again. After lathering up, she began to rub down the front of his body. Her hands glided over his chest and stomach, then settled between his legs. She worked the soap into the thick patch of hair there, but avoided the organ protruding from it.

"French toast," she said.

"What?" Rick said after a moment. She smirked at how distracted he sounded.

"I'm hungry for French toast. Can you make that?" She couldn't. No matter how many times she tried, she could only achieve a burnt exterior with a raw center.

"Uh...I don't have any bread. I know a place we could go though."

"Where is it?"

"It's uh…" He trailed off, leaving the answer unfinished, and reached for one of her teasing hands, brought it directly to his hard dick. His head fell back again as she began to stroke her soapy fingers up and down his shaft. When she smoothed her other hand down to his sack, fondling him gently, he began to moan.

In no time at all, he was pulling her hands away from his groin and turning to face her. He smashed his mouth against hers. His lips and tongue were hot and wet from the steady stream of water. She went for his dick again, but he was holding her so tightly against him that she didn't have enough room to get a rhythm. Where they stood, pellets of water rained down on his shoulders and splashed her in the face, but she didn't care. His tongue was in her mouth, his dick pulsing against her stomach. Her mind was only on one thing.

"Let's get out," she implored, knowing that they didn't have any protection with them in the shower.

Rick ignored her, and awkwardly dropped to his knees on the shower floor. He pushed her gently against the wall opposite the shower head, and urged her to place one of her legs on the rim of the tub, exposing her pussy to him completely. Realizing his intentions, she interrupted him.

"No, no… Let's go to the bedroom." She bit her lip in anticipation, thinking about how she would get on all fours for him, how his cock would fill her with ease.

"Just a little…" He promised.

As she could have predicted, just a little was not enough for either of them. Rick began by spreading her lips apart and placing his tongue directly on her clit. But he didn't move it. He kept it maddeningly still, until Michonne was rolling her hips into his face and whimpering in frustration. When he started to take long, slow licks from her, her patience snapped. She buried her fingers in his hair and held his head in place while she ground herself into his face.

Rick responded by bringing both hands to her ass, pulling her toward him with a rhythm that matched her own. She could barely breathe, between his attentions and the thick air in the shower. He moved his tongue steadily, driving her sensation higher and higher until her orgasm crashed down on her.


"Okay, here we go…" Their waitress set down Michonne's tea, the cup knocking against the saucer as she lowered it to the table. Then, a mug of coffee for Rick.

She fished out a handful of sweetener packets from her apron and set them in the center of the table, even though they already had a full supply. And she gave them two straws, even though they didn't have any water to use them for. She was moving oddly - deliberately - slow, and her eyes continuously darted back and forth between her two customers.

Rick, with whom she was on a first-name basis, gave her a knowing glance and her face fell in disappointment. She straightened up, smoothed out her apron, and after giving one last sweet smile to Michonne, walked away.

"It's 'cause I've never brought someone here before," Rick explained, leaning across the table so only she could hear him. "They don't have anything better to worry about, I guess."

Michonne nodded her head, then looked across the restaurant to see their waitress, the cook, and the hostess all looking at their booth. They all scattered and pretended to be busy when she caught them staring.

Rick chuckled. "I'm sorry."

She waved it off. They seemed nice, even if a little nosy.

After moving their morning activities from the shower to the Rick's bedroom, they cleaned up - again - and headed to a small diner a few blocks from the house. It was a new place, and Rick admittedly preferred the diners he'd gone to growing up. But this one was Carl's favorite, and according to the boy, they had the best French toast.

That day, the stifling heat had finally broken, giving way to dry air and a cool breeze. Rick wore jeans - the same pair she'd seen him in a couple of times already - and a Henley shirt. Michonne was, of course, stuck with her same outfit from the night before. Rick, however, had loaned her a soft, grey sweat jacket of his to obscure her braless tits.

"So, do I have you for the whole day? Or do you have plans?" She asked.

He shook his head. "I was thinking of calling Shane up, maybe getting in a game of basketball… But he's not going anywhere."

"Neither am I."

Rick smiled, then lowered his head. "It's just as well, though. If we're going to keep having sex, I need to eat."

Michonne laughed and reached for a couple of sugar packets for her tea. They both flavored and stirred their drinks in silence.

"I talked to him about you, yesterday. Shane."

"Really? What did you say?"

"I told him your name, what you do. How we met. He wants to meet you."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah. But we don't have to rush into all that. I'm glad he knows, though. He can finally stop trying to set me up."

It sounded like Shane had been eager for his friend to find someone else after his divorce. Or maybe he was just eager for him to get laid. Either way, it told Michonne how much the man must care for Rick. That made her smile.

"He likes to play match maker?"

"He likes to try."

"You want to know something?"

"Mhmm," he said without hesitation.

"I'm glad he failed," she said.

"Yeah," Rick agreed. "I can only imagine who I'd be sitting here with otherwise."

"And… The fact that you haven't seen anyone since your divorce, and I'm the one who's showing it all to you for the first time again… I like it."

Rick smirked at first, then a strange look fell over his face. He opened his mouth to speak, and closed it.

"He might've succeeded. One time."

Michonne sat back in her seat, feeling curious but not altogether surprised. "So you did date?"

"I didn't date. I went on a date," he clarified. "Truth is, I forgot about it until now."

"I guess that's why there wasn't a second."

"Tell me about it."

"Alright. So, you had a date. But what about what we talked about in my bedroom before?" She asked, playfully, already knowing the answer.

She could almost see memories of that day flickering behind his eyes - her unbuttoning his clothes, him burying his nose between her legs, her coming after just one thrust, begging him to go deeper… "Now, that…" His voice got deeper, raspier. "You were definitely the first one to do that."

She felt herself grow warm from the way he was looking at her. They'd had sex over and over for the past four days, and every time she thought her body was spent, it proved her wrong. Still, a person could only handle so much. She searched for a way to dispel the tension before she wound up dragging him out to the car.

"So, what happened on your date?"

"Nothing. Less than nothing." Rick looked like he wanted to leave it at that, going back to his coffee. But Michonne stared him down until he relented.

"A few months back, a friend of mine from another precinct had a bunch of us out at her place for a barbecue. Or, I thought it was gonna be a bunch of us. It ended up being Shane and me, and our friend, and her new neighbor. This woman who'd just moved to Georgia. And… Well, to make a long story short, she and Shane decided that me and this neighbor might want to get to know each other."

An exasperated grin pulled at Rick's lips as he remembered the events of that evening. He took a sip of his coffee.

"We started talking. And it wasn't so bad. She was divorced, too, had two boys. One was Carl's age. She actually reminded me a lot of Lori... So, we went out for dinner about a week later. And ten minutes into it, I realized I wasn't ever gonna see her again."

Michonne raised her eyebrows. "And why was that?"

"At first, it felt good." He shook his head, as if he'd said the wrong thing. "It felt familiar. That's why I gave it a chance. But I was sitting there in that restaurant and I saw myself walking into the same life that I already knew didn't work. And it hit me...it wasn't what I wanted."

"And what do you want?"

"Somethin' else," he said, simply. They both quietly sipped from their cups, letting the obvious answer - that the thing he wanted was sitting right in front of him at that very moment - hang in the air.

"But," Rick eventually continued. "When you only know one thing, one person, for so long...you think that's what you're supposed to be looking for. That that's how it's supposed to be. I had to let that go."

"I'm happy you did," she confessed, understanding that if he hadn't, he'd probably be miserable now. And he definitely wouldn't be sitting here with her.

"Me, too. Not just for me, either. I don't want to bring somebody into Carl's life who isn't gonna stick around. And if it happens anyway, I at least want to make sure it was worth it."

Another obvious conclusion gone unspoken. She was worth it. That's what he was saying. And after everything that had transpired between them over the last couple days, it didn't come as a surprise. But there was something about hearing him say that he wanted to bring her into his son's life, and that he wanted her to stick around. As he opened himself to her over and over again, she couldn't help but feel the need - not the obligation, but the acute, incessant desire - to open herself up to him, too.

Their waitress approached their table with their food - French toast for her, scrambled eggs and hash browns for Rick. Their conversation halted, as conversations tended to whenever food was served. Rick dug into his food without adding any salt or pepper. Michonne unwrapped a small package of cold, whipped butter, watched it melt and pool in the divot of her short stack.

"We were pregnant."


Rick froze, a forkful of eggs halfway to his mouth.

We are pregnant. That's what he thought she'd said. As in, him and her. Right now. But in a split second, he realized he'd misheard her. She was saying, she was pregnant. Before they met. With someone else. With Mike, of course.

"We weren't trying. It just...happened," she continued, while he tried to listen to her words and piece together his own thoughts at the same time.

She was pregnant. That's what she said. Not, We had a kid. She didn't have a kid. She was pregnant. And now, she wasn't.

"We decided to keep it. But soon after, I lost it."

Rick watched her intently, trying to read her emotions. There were no tears. Her voice didn't hitch. She met his eyes straight on. She didn't seem like she needed any comfort. He wanted to give it anyway, but he didn't know what to say. Michonne picked up easily on his loss for words.

"It was a long time ago," she said.

"Still… I'm sorry," he replied, lamely. "Do you know why...?"

She shook her head. "No. They just happen sometimes. A lot, actually."

"I didn't know that," he said. In all his years with Lori, they'd never experienced a miscarriage. "Are you...are you okay?"

"I am. The truth is, sometimes I feel bad that I don't feel bad enough. I mean, it all happened so fast. I was just getting used to the idea of it, then it was over."

"You don't have to feel anything but what you feel. Maybe it just...wasn't the right time."

"Maybe. Probably." She lifted the syrup dispenser and poured copious amounts over her food. "I wonder if I could get some bananas for these…" She mumbled absently.

Rick scanned the room for their waitress, but she was out of sight.

"Right before I lost it," she continued. "I was at this little corner shop that made hand-stitched clothes. And I saw these cute little baby booties. I bought a pair in yellow. Very gender neutral," she added jokingly. "I still have them. I keep them in my dresser drawer. I'm not sure why."

He nodded. He didn't know either.

"If you don't mind my asking...is that why you and Mike ended things?"

She nodded. "I always thought he would be the one, but after that, it was never the same. He begged me for us try again, right away. I thought we should wait. He thought I didn't want to have a family with him… Maybe I didn't." She took a sip of her tea. "Eventually, I broke it off."

"That's why he keeps coming around," he ventured a guess, feeling more sympathy for this man than he had before. "He still loves you."

"I don't know," she smirked, humorlessly. "I think he's still in a lot of pain, and he thinks I'm the person who can fix it. But I can't."

She picked up her knife and fork, and cut into her French toast. Syrup gushed out of them and onto her plate. She paused.

"That was the really hard part of it," she said. "Not the miscarriage. But, what happened after. Watching your relationship - someone you love - fall apart in front of you, and not being able to stop it. I couldn't put it back together. I tried."

Now, that, he had experienced.

"I don't know if I can do that again."

"What makes you think you'll have to?" He asked. She didn't seem to have an answer for that. "I'm not Mike. Even if that...happened to us one day, it doesn't have to end up the same way."

She looked at him with pure grace in her eyes. "I know."

But knowing it was different than feeling it. Different than living it. And that was okay. They didn't have to be perfect going into this. They didn't have to be completed self-assured, wholly adjusted to all of the curveballs life had thrown them. He'd told her just as much the previous morning.

He cocked his head to the side, looking her straight in the eye. "I'm glad you told me. I'm proud you felt like you could. I still don't have any answers for you, but..."

He reached across the table and cupped her elbow gently in his palm.

"We can just be happy while we figure it out, right?" He proposed. "I think we deserve that."

"Yeah. I think we do." She reached across the table and caressed his stubbled jaw. He leaned into her palm, planted a quick kiss on her wrist.

At that moment, the waitress returned to their table. She stood awkwardly, clearly sensing that she was interrupting something. "How is everything for you guys?"

"Everything's great, thanks," Rick kept his eyes on Michonne while he answered. "Do you think I could get some sliced up bananas for my girlfriend?"

"O-oh, w-well, yes. Of course. Be right back." The waitress scurried off, anxious to get back to the kitchen and divulge the information Rick had just casually given her.

"I get the feeling," Michonne spoke through a grin. "That something unstoppable has just been set in motion."

Rick chuckled. "Yeah, I'm gonna have everyone up my ass when I get back to the station this week."

But, he didn't mind.

"Of course," he realized. "This means I'm gonna have to tell Carl sooner than later. I wanna make sure he hears it from me. Is that...okay with you? This soon?"

"Yes," she said, sincerely. "What do you think he's going to say?"

"I think he'll be alright with it. Like I said, he loves his step-dad."

"Not as much as you, though," she assured.

He laughed. "Yeah, you're probably right about that. But really, even if I get a little jealous sometimes, I'm glad Jeff's there for him. There's a lot of kids that don't even have one parent to love them, to care what happens to them. My son has three. He's lucky," he finished, matter-of-factly, and took another sip of his coffee.

"And if he's real lucky, and if I'm lucky...maybe, one day, he'll have four." He watched her for a reaction.

Michonne continued to cut up her food into bite sized pieces, and with each slice he could see the smile on her face getting just a little bit wider.

"Yeah," she said, finally, and shoved a large portion of French toast into her mouth. "Maybe."