AN: Thanks so much for the reviews last chapter! Another "flashback" and this one is a little lengthy. I like to emphasize Sam's willingness to do anything to survive, but I realized that it might make her vehement refusal of Negan's offer sound contradictory. This flashback will shine light on how she can suppress her high sense of self-preservation to be defiant.
Recently Re-edited: (6/10/19)
Clipped wings, or, "After cancelling her flight, Negan has Sam beat - or does he?"
~O~
~Then~
From the podium stationed house left, a middle-aged man cleared his throat and spoke into the microphone, projecting his voice over the meager audience seated in the rows.
"Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Gastineau County Regional spelling bee. At this time will the contestants please step on stage and take your seats."
There was a controlled applause from the families as the children made their way on to the stage, single-filed in the order that corresponded with the numbers hanging around their necks, marking them like livestock going to auction.
Among them, somewhere in the middle, closer to the end, was Samantha.
The beefy fifth grader in front of her couldn't follow instructions even after two rehearsals and sat down in the wrong seat - Sam's seat - forcing her to step around him and take his instead, throwing the order off and annoying her.
(Already off to a bad start.)
She fiddled with her number, third row back and now on the end, waiting for the proctor to recite the rules, but first there was a contrived summary of the competition's history and the boasting of accomplishments from the event's coordinator that had her attention drifting. The contestants around her were just as uninterested; legs swinging, hands fiddling with loose strings from shirts, fingers finding noses then finding the bottoms of chairs.
The grade levels ranged from as early as third-grade and as late as fifth, providing a miscellany of backgrounds and races, but little skill, if what Sam had seen of this motley bunch so far was their best.
They had been rowdy off stage, loud and excitable. A girl her age tried to talk to her, but Sam had ignored her, letting her monotonous expression chase her off. She wasn't competitive, but winning this competition meant a prize that appealed to her, so she would rather be left alone to prepare.
The girl didn't want to be her friend, anyways. If there had been anyone else other than Sam, the girl would have went to them instead. She was never anybody's first choice. And even if she was, her uncle wouldn't have approved of her being friendly with the competition. If he thought that she was distracted he would correct her, and it never put either of them in a good mood when he did.
"The students you see up here are all winners," the coordinator claimed. "They have worked very hard to get to where they are today."
Sam rolled her eyes, doubtful.
Traditionally, schools would hold individual spelling bees where the undisputed winner would move up to the next level, but nowadays, some parents thought that third and second place were just as good as first and demanded that their subpar children be allowed to go to regionals as well, making the competitions overcrowded and longer.
It was damaging for the kids, because no matter how high they managed to crawl up, advancing only on technicalities rather than skill, someone better would shred them in a state final, and that someone was usually Samantha. She had a reputation for doing just that and was often treated like the bad guy for it.
When the coordinator finally stepped down, the proctor explained the rules. They had to say their given word before making their attempt, and then repeat the word at the end to signify to the judges that they have finished. If needed, the definition and origin of the word, and an example of the word's use in a sentence, would be provided. Misspelling or failure to follow the rules would result in immediate disqualification and they were to exit the stage.
When he finished, the spelling bee started and the first three contestants became the first three eliminated as they misspelled their words.
As they went down the lineup, moving along like marching ants under a magnifying glass, Sam searched the audience, looking for the tailored sport coat of her uncle's. She found him on the end in white pants and brown loafers, one leg crossed over the other as he stared down at his Blackberry. His dark hair was slicked back and bound in a ponytail at the base of his neck while his copper face was twisted into the usual look of impatience and disdain.
It was a habit of his to overdress for small events like these. Not only because he was vain and materialistic, but also because he knew that Native Americans were rarely wealthy and successful, and he enjoyed the novelty of being one.
When it was finally Sam's turn, she made her way to the microphone where the stage lights shined the brightest. She had to stand on the tips of her toes to adjust the mic. When she lowered it closer to her height, she put her hands behind her back to signify that she was ready.
She wore a dark blue (maybe purple) long sleeve dress patterned with red and/or green sparrows (she couldn't tell - red and green were both a dull lime green in her eyes). Her legs were adorned in a new pair of pristine white tights and little black flats with bows on the buckles while her long, black hair was pushed back by a red or green headband.
She looked small and adorable and that was very much intentional. The more cutesy she looked, the younger people thought she was and the more impressed they were when she did well. She in no way dressed like this typically, and never had clothes this nice bought for her on occasions other than when she needed to be seen and not heard.
Her uncle often used her to gain favor or sympathy from his clients. He built her up as the image of his orphaned niece who he had selflessly taken in and was rising like one of his own. When she was in public situations like this, how she looked and everything she did was staged, and candidness was a serious penalty.
"Your first word is, 'piano'," the proctor announced.
"Piano," she repeated into the microphone. "P-i-a-n-o. Piano."
"That is correct."
There was a light applause, betraying just how many in the audience were there to support her, and despite herself, Sam looked at her uncle. It didn't seem like he had looked up from his phone, not even when her voice came out over the speaker system.
She turned on her heel and returned to her seat - and it was her seat, because the beefy kid had misspelled "serf" as "surf". He had requested the definition and an example, both of which had nothing to do with the watersport.
The competition continued with contestants dropping like flies. Sam's attention drifted throughout, but she was able to focus enough, not having to ask for an example or a definition once. Spelling came easy to her. The letters took shape inside her head, and if the word wasn't phonetic, then breaking it down, side-stepping interchangeable spellings and remembering silent letters wasn't any harder.
"Your word is, 'numeral'."
"Numeral. N-u-m-e-r-a-l,' she spelled. "Numeral."
She had always hated this.
She had started doing competitions with her father and she tolerated them because he liked seeing her compete and she liked seeing how proud it made him, but now that he was gone - the lights, the other children, the long, long hours of rehearsing, just didn't do anything for her anymore.
The only reason she was here was because her uncle was a psychopath, and that wasn't an exaggeration.
Her uncle Edward, the brother who owned the casino, was a diagnosed psychopath.
While Sam herself was known to exhibit psychopathic traits, she wasn't a psychopath. She was fully capable of feeling and expressing emotions and empathy, just not always in the way and on the occasions that others would. She wasn't likely to give condolences for a dead loved one, or give congratulations for a healthy new baby. She found apologizing difficult and she wouldn't sacrifice her personal comfort or ignore her instincts for the sake of social approval. She wasn't especially considerate and she wasn't especially compassionate.
However, she would let a person she wronged express their feelings and wouldn't deny that she was at fault. She would give a white lie if it meant sparing someone's feelings, she would give charity if she was in a position to do so, and she would compromise with someone she didn't agree with, especially if it meant coming to a better solution.
Sam felt guilt, remorse, sympathy and humility - even though getting her to express them outwardly was something completely different. She was desensitized and repressed, but she didn't have any sort of social disorder. Some of her behavior might be likened to someone on the Autistic spectrum, but no one could justifiably considered her behavior as severe.
And despite popular opinion, she wasn't a serial killer in the making. If she found a dead animal that was relatively fresh, she would poke around in its insides out of curiosity, but she wouldn't roam the woods, killing rabbits or squirrels with pocket knives. She wouldn't take inappropriate interest in someone getting hurt or killed. In fact, if someone were to fall down and break their leg with an audible crack, bone protruding and bleeding, nothing would make her vomit faster.
She wasn't a humanitarian, but she knew what was right and she knew what was wrong.
"Your word is, 'persuade'."
"Persuade. P-e-r-s-u-a-d-e. Persuade."
Uncle Edward did not feel anything and rarely bothered to fake it for anyone whom he wasn't trying to extort money from. However, for Samantha, he acknowledged her intelligence just enough to spare them both.
Because of his affliction, he wasn't even above using his children for his own gain (although, fortunately for their misguided faith in their father, an opportunity to do so never came up because neither of them were exceptionally, or even moderately, good at anything). So for Sam that meant there was even less of a chance for a sympathetic ear. If her uncle wanted brownie points, he would get brownie points, even if it meant dragging her around kicking and screaming.
But she already knew all that. He had given away the family dog, who Sam had been particularly attached to, without even blinking, and it had shattered her.
"Your word is, 'authority'."
"Authority. A-u-t-h-o-r-i-t-y. Authority."
Her uncle was making her do spelling bee's again. Exploiting her talent for something as pointless as kudos among the casino-goers and the local community was just another blow he dealt to her.
However, he had told her that if she won, she could have Tama's old bedroom; the one she had vacated after her impromptu shotgun wedding for a small rental in town.
Sam currently occupied the spare room in the unfinished basement of her uncle's lofty house. It was always hot and stuffy down there with the only view being dusty Christmas decorations, which was sad, but she wasn't going to kid herself; her life was sad. Even if the room change put her next to her cousin Payat's room, who had just recently discovered both puberty and Internet porn, her uncle's offer had been too tempting to pass up.
It got lonely down there, sometimes.
"Your word is, 'influence'," the proctor announced.
"Influence. I-n-f-l-u-e-n-c-e. Influence," Sam spelled, confident.
After the judges approved, the proctor announced a break. The families of the disqualified made their way out of the auditorium to pick up their children. Sam's uncle had left with the crowd, most likely to take a call, so she didn't wait. She stood from her chair and walked backstage to find the drinking fountain that she knew was there. The water came out lukewarm and the mouth piece was gross. She wished her uncle would give her a couple of quarters to get a bottle of water from the vending machine, but she knew better than to ask.
Hearing voices, she turned to see a man and a boy appear from behind the curtain. The man searched the area looking uncertain.
"Can we go out this door, you think?" the father asked, checking the exit door to make sure they wouldn't set off an alarm. The boy sniffled in response. He was wearing a number sign like Sam; he had been contestant number six.
The father looked back at him, concerned. "Hey pal, what's the matter?"
"I lost on my first try," he muttered, almost in tears.
"That's okay," the father comforted him. "I'm still proud of you for trying. There'll be another competition soon so don't beat yourself up over it, okay?"
Number six didn't seem to wholly believe that everything was okay, but his dad was still able to make him feel better. He used his hand to wipe his dripping nose and then reached out for his dad to hold it. Despite the mess, his dad took it without hesitating. There was the soft promise of ice cream and number six's mood brightening.
Sam felt a twinge of something inside her chest that she couldn't name as she watched the father and son leave through the door.
As she returned to her seat, an Asian girl, who was doing as good as Sam, was sitting in her own chair with her mother standing over her. The mother spoke rapidly in a foreign language, perhaps Chinese, Sam thought, but honestly had no clue. The girl, number fourteen, listened to her mother's tirade, even as it attracted the attention of the people coming back into the auditorium. It sounded like a lecture rather than a helpful pep talk, going by their body language and the mother's taut expression.
This had Samantha observing the other contestants as they returned to their seats, taking them in for the first time as she wondered who had someone banking on their success and who had someone who would still be proud if they lost.
When the competition started back up, Sam looked at her uncle's seat and saw that it was still empty. She couldn't stop herself from frowning. Despite knowing better, the part of her that was still a child sought his approval, but she knew she would never get it.
Before her parents' death, she never knew Uncle Edward to be a happy person, mostly due to the fact that whenever he and her father were in the same room, the subject of the inheritance always came up, and her father's response to that was always the same and it never failed to put his younger brother in a bad mood.
Now that he was dead, Edward wasn't as irritable whenever the inheritance was mentioned, just irritable about his casino profits. There were now only two brothers left and that was something a psychopath could look forward to. He had outlived his two eldest brothers; the oldest, Rubin, and Samantha's father, Augustus. Now he only had to outlive Cormac.
It wasn't until the competition was down to Sam and number fourteen that he reappeared. He sat back down in his seat without a glance towards the stage.
Sam blocked out her feelings and focused. She and number fourteen went into a standoff as they went down the proctor's list, switching off from the microphone almost in a routine. She was impressed by the girl's skill. It had been a while since she had gone one-on-one against another speller. The girl used a lot of the same memorization methods that she did. Ones that were more complicated and difficult to utilize for their age group.
After number fourteen knocked "disastrous" (a difficult word from the sixth grade list) out of the park, Sam replaced her at the microphone.
By now the stage lights were smoldering, beating down on the stage like the sun, and she was ready for this spelling bee to end. She adjusted the microphone and nodded at the proctor.
"Your word is, 'Sanctuary'."
Sam's eyes drifted down over the front row where her uncle was still looking down at his phone. She could win at any point now and he didn't acknowledge this. A voice in her head reminded her not to get upset over a thing that nothing could be done about.
"Sanctuary," she repeated.
Still, he could at least watch her while she took her turn, gift her that, but he hadn't once, and that made anger spark inside her along with a rare arrogance that she knew would get her in trouble, but couldn't stop. She was doing all the work. The only reason they were here was because of her. Uncle Edward only got what he wanted if she did well - if she chose to do well. Uncle Edward only got what he wanted if she decided it.
If he wouldn't even watch her while she was up here, then why should she allow him this? Maybe being stashed in the basement like an undesirable that her uncle's family wanted hidden away was a better situation than she thought. The whole family was rotten to the core.
She was in the position to wipe away all of her uncle's satisfaction, and she took it.
"S-a-n-k-t-u-a-r-y. Sanctuary."
Her uncle looked up over the top of his phone, his expression unchanged but his eyes hard.
"I'm sorry but that is incorrect."
As the proctor announced number fourteen as the winner, Sam exited the stage. She glanced back at number fourteen on the stage with her trophy. Her mother was standing next to her, all smiles now as she clapped for her daughter.
Sam stepped back behind the curtain and let out a shaky breath of disbelief at what she had just done. A smile threatened the edges of her mouth, the first one in months, but she banished it when the curtain was pushed back again and her uncle appeared. His phone was closed and clutched in his hand.
As he approached her, she stared up at him with an unapologetic look. She felt proud. For a moment, she felt power and control.
Just for one, very brief moment - before her uncle slapped it off her face.
It was open-palmed, hitting her across her cheek, hard enough to knock her back on to her bottom. Stunned, she let out a soft grunt as she fell back against the hardwood. The track her mind was on skipped and it took a moment for her to realize what had happened. When she did, her hand came up to touch the burning skin of her cheek, flinching, as she looked up at her uncle in shock.
This wasn't the first time she had been hit, but it was always done by her cousins and other children, never by any of the adults.
"Get your coat, we're leaving," he said, turning away and mumbling under his breath, "fucking waste of time."
She watched him leave, still too stunned to move. It wasn't until the voices on the other side of the curtain faded and the lights were shut off that she finally climbed to her feet. The sound of her new flats tapping against the stage followed her out, her hand still cupping her hurting face as her eyes stung with tears.
What little remained of her broken childhood was left behind on that stage floor.
After that day, Samantha never participated in another spelling bee, and she never let anybody use her for their own gain again.
~O~
~Now~
Sam slowly paced the floor of the apartment she had woken up in. Her arms were crossed under her chest as she traced the small area rug laying in the center of the room with her feet, the fibers itchy between her toes. She had woken up hours ago, feeling groggy and miserable from the familiar tasting concoction that Negan had forced down her throat, but instead of being in her cell, she found herself atop a twin-sized mattress dressed with clean sheets and a quilt.
The factory room-turned-makeshift apartment was one of the more furnished ones in the Sanctuary, usually only given to saviors, with a kitchenette and small sitting area with a table and chairs.
The kitchenette was stripped bare of food, and more notably silverware and cutlery, as well as the shelves on the walls and the wardrobe, but the utilities were fully functional. The generic floor lamp came on when she flipped the switch and the faucet in the kitchenette sink produced clean water. She wasted no time in sticking her head underneath to drink away her cotton mouth the second she noticed it.
She was still barefoot, dirty and wearing her black dress, but now a collection of fingerprint-sized bruises ran down her arms and legs from where she had been held down by Negan's saviors. She had poked around her new surroundings, exploring every inch while theorizing why she was put in here instead of her cell until there was nothing left to catalog and she grew bored, leaving her to idly pace, waiting for someone to come get her. She had already tried the door; it was locked.
Windows lined the wall on one side up near the ceiling. When she had woken up, it had been dark out, but the sky brightened not long after and now it was almost late morning by the time she heard footsteps in the hallway outside the room. The gait was too normal to be Negan's, but it was also to light to be Dwight's or anybody else's she could recognize. She stopped pacing at the sound of keys jingling in the lock before the door opened to reveal one of the few women saviors in Negan's ranks.
Sam had seen this one around; young with curly blonde hair. She had a nose piercing and a relatively fresh-looking neck tattoo that Sam suspected she had gotten to look tougher among her male counterparts, and perhaps to a lesser extent, distract from the acne scars scattered over her otherwise attractive face that she had caked with flaking foundation. She looked around Sam's age, but a name didn't come to mind.
The savior regarded Sam with a critical look, glancing over her frame and crossed arms, checking to make sure she hadn't somehow gotten her hands on a weapon, or fashioned one from something typically harmless.
"I'm Laura," the woman said without a greeting. She had her shoulders cocked back and her small chin raised to look tough despite her size. She held up a drawstring knapsack in her hand, waving it. "I'm here to take you to the showers so you can clean up and then I'm taking you to Negan. I've got a taser in my back pocket, if you try to run, or try to hurt me or yourself, Negan ordered me to use it."
When Sam didn't do anything but stare, Laura shifted her weight to her other foot and squared her jaw.
"You've caused a lot of shit for us since you came here, making the saviors look like idiots and making the workers think that they don't have to follow the rules. I'm not going to pass up the chance for some payback, so believe me, I'm not afraid to use it."
"I never told the workers that they didn't have to follow the rules," Sam said frankly, narrowing her eyes, "and the saviors look like idiots because they are idiots. That isn't my fault."
Laura hid her annoyance behind a scoff, but the sound of her hand tightening around the doorknob gave it away. She stepped to the side to open up the entry way and nodded for the other woman to step through.
"Negan said I couldn't taser you for being a smart ass, but he said I could give you a charley horse, so shut up and follow me before I get mad."
Sam hesitated for a moment before dropping her arms and walking forward. Being taken to Negan wasn't a charming idea, but getting to shower was and after all this time wallowing in her own filth, the concept almost made her lightheaded.
As Laura closed the door to the room, Sam noted the radio clipped to her belt as well as the outline of the aforementioned taser in her back jeans pocket. She pursed her lips, a little perturbed before turning forward and crossing her arms again. There weren't any plans of escaping, or of another suicide attempt, but the disadvantages still put her off.
The halls were empty and so was the shower room. It was difficult to tell if that was deliberate because she wasn't sure where exactly she was in the building. The wings didn't differ all that much in the halls. Laura pushed her into the locker room and she nearly jumped out of her skin when her bare feet touched the tiled floor. Without the steam from the showers to raise the temperature, the locker room was freezing. The blonde handed her the knapsack.
Sifting through it, Sam moved around the privacy wall that separated the toilet area from the lockers and shower stalls. There was a bundle of clean clothing and a fully stocked care package inside. She pulled out the bundle, glancing it over before depositing it on a bench and looking through the package. There were small bottles of generic hair and body soap, deodorant, hairbrush, tampons and sanitary napkins, and a toothbrush and toothpaste.
She was even allotted a razor, but was told by Laura that if she saw any blood, it would be called in. Sam wanted to point out that if she opened one of her arteries, it wouldn't matter if it got called in, but at the risk of getting the razor taken away, she didn't say anything. She liked the good hygiene that came with shaving and she didn't actually want to die, much less bleed out in a dirty shower stall. That was the whole point of going up on the Sanctuary roof, to better her chances of an instantaneous death.
Choosing a stall, she turned the water on high, letting it get as hot as the ancient boiler in the old building would allow. As steam began to rise, she reached behind her back and pulled down the zipper of her dress. It slipped easily from her shoulders and pooled at her feet. Shedding her bra and panties, she pulled back the curtain and stepped in under the scolding spray.
Goosebumps erupted at the sensation and she gasped, taking in a mouthful of steam. Every nerve in her body reignited and her sensitivity was dialed back up to a hundred. She stood underneath the cascade, turning her head downwards to tuck her chin against her sternum while her arms came up to hug herself. Steam fogged around her, trapped behind the curtain and suffocating like smoke.
Sam closed her eyes, letting the water drench her hair so the black locks spilled over her shoulders creating its own waterfall of ink. The heat kept her sedentary as the feeling of being clean again brought her comfort and control.
She grabbed the little bottles of soap given to her and washed her body and hair, scrubbing until her skin burned red. Filth mingled with the suds and she watched as they slipped from her body and were taken down the drain. When the water lessened to lukewarm temperatures, she finally turned it off.
With her arms wrapped around herself to ward off the chill in the locker room, she pulled back the shower curtain and carefully padded over to the bench where her towel was. From the paper towel dispenser, she took a handful and dabbed at her face and arms as she regarded her knew clothes; a pair of dark jeans, an old blue thermal with pilled cuffs and a pair of boots. Once dressed, she walked back over to the toilet area to the sinks. She pulled out the hairbrush and worked at the knots in her medium length hair.
Her hair used to be longer, before the outbreak, reaching all the way down to the small of her back. Her cousin used to mockingly call it her "Pocahontas hair", because it looked like what every non-Native imagined Native hair to look like.
After all the evacuation zones and safe camps had been overrun, and all facets of government and civil order were blown into obscurity, Sam had lobbed off the black tresses, cutting it into a choppy, style-less bob that stuck out in random places. At the time, she had done it because it was more practical, but also because she had been feeling melodramatic.
She had been alone, and not in an angsty, woe-is-me kind of way - literally alone.
There had been no one left on the reservation or in town because the military had evacuated them, but only to be overrun and killed somewhere else later. There had been no one left in all of Alaska, as far as she had known at the time. It had been hard not to feel a punch of melancholy at the pure alone-ness, even for someone like her. It didn't matter how introverted an individual was, people needed people and the idea of being the last living person on earth wasn't appealing outside of a working-Joe fantasy conceived from being overwhelmed by everyday life. It had been terrifying.
She eventually came across other survivors. Some were friendly while others were nowhere near, but the world didn't seem so empty anymore. She didn't integrate with any group, but it was a comfort to know that she wouldn't live out the rest of her days being forced to talk to inanimate objects, desperate for human interaction like in that Will Smith movie - or that Tom Hanks movie - or that Joaquin Phoenix movie - or that...other Will Smith movie.
Laura cleared her throat, loud and deliberate, pulling Sam out of her head. She realized she had been standing there, staring at nothing with the hairbrush stopped halfway through her hair. The blonde told her to wrap it up as she shifted anxiously from foot to foot. Negan had told her not to rush with Sam, but she didn't want to take too long and make him think that she couldn't wrangle the other woman without help. None of them had all day to stand around and wait while the rat daydreamed.
Sam finished brushing her hair and moved on to her teeth, working the bristles over her gums until they bled. The cool mint and the swig of mouthwash that followed burned the inside of her like fire as the denatured alcohol sterilized the build up of bacteria. After placing everything back into the pack and dropping her towel into the laundry bin, she handed the bag back to Laura and let the shorter woman lead her out of the locker room.
Because she no longer wore the black dress that she had left behind in the locker room, people weren't able to easily recognize her in the halls anymore. They climbed the Sanctuary to the very top, passing the wives' bedrooms and entering the parlor, which unfortunately wasn't uninhabited.
Sam heard the faint voices of the wives inside, but before she could prepare herself to come face to face with the lot for the first time, Laura pushed opened the double doors and shoved her inside. As she appeared in the doorway, heads turned and conversations tampered off. She received a mix bag of expressions ranging from soft curiosity to hard contempt.
Negan had seven wives in total, she had already known that, but she had scarcely seen any of them, not since she had discovered their existence months back. She didn't like to judge appearances, but since these women's appearances are their sole contribution to the Sanctuary, she didn't censor her thoughts against what she could plainly see with her eyes; their skin deep attributes. There was a wife for each natural hair color with varying heights and body types. Seven wives, one for each day of the week.
Lounging across one of the love seats with a magazine, was a leggy red head with porcelain skin, a fit figure and a flat chest. Sam, with her deficiency, couldn't see the full vibrancy of her hair. It was a dull, caramel color to her, but with the woman's skin and features, she took a guess that it was actually closer to copper.
Sitting on a faux furred ottoman next to her was a honey blonde with a pixie cut, plump lips, button nose, and an obvious boob job.
Near the windows with a handful of playing cards was a woman with dark hair pulled back into a ponytail who looked decent enough with makeup, but was the least attractive of the lot. Her choice of black dress only highlighted the awkward differences in her figure compared to the others.
Playing with her was a busty and curvy black woman, compact and on the short side.
Sitting on a stool by the bar, there was a brassy haired woman, who was very attractive but wore too much makeup and looked too deliberately groomed, probably to maintain an excessive body hair problem.
Standing next to her was a tall brunette in fishnets with long hair that fell in waves down her shoulders and on to the ample cleavage accented by the leather corset top she was wearing.
Sam hoped there wouldn't be introductions. Maybe they were a group of perfectly nice ladies, or maybe they were as catty as others believed, but she didn't care about finding out.
The only wife who she knew the name was the one who used to be married to Dwight - legitimately married to him - Sherry, but had chosen to become one of Negan's wives, his first wife, even, for the rise in status and freedom to not work for points. Hallway and lunchroom talk revealed that she was the reason why Dwight had been disfigured.
Once a woman has "married" Negan, they had to leave their husbands, boyfriends, significant others for him and fooling around behind his back was a serious offense. At some point, Dwight and Sherry had rekindled the physical aspect of their marriage and got caught, earning the scrawny man the iron; the tool that Negan used for corporal punishment for serious rule-breakers.
When Sam first came to the Sanctuary, Dwight's facial scar had been mostly healed with the exception of a few patches of pink skin, so it had happened not long before she had showed up.
It explained a lot about his current demeanor and why he especially disliked Sam so much. He had told her himself once, when he screamed at her in her cell one night. If he couldn't get away with breaking the rules, neither should she. He had just been a man missing his ex-wife and that led him to do something stupid, but Sam had been a cut and dry thief. He was disfigured for life while she remained, physically, unscathed, and they both knew the only reason behind that was because of her gender. If she were male, she would have been given the iron, too, regardless of Negan's interest in her mechanical expertise.
Of course, that wasn't her fault, but Dwight couldn't exactly vent his anger towards the actual source of his pain.
Or rather, the perceived source of his pain.
Not that she was defending the man, but Sherry didn't have to marry Negan. He always made it a point to explicitly state that. Sam had even heard that Negan gave her choice to go back to Dwight and spare him the iron, but she chose to stay where she was. There were rumors that the woman had a reputation for being a ladder-climber, and that she had shown interest in Negan long before the Sanctuary. They're relationship was on shaky ground now because of what he had done to Dwight, but once upon a time, Sherry had happily gone to her leader's bed - even occupied his spot as his favorite wife.
Most of this was only speculation for Sam, but it didn't seem far-fetched.
Her eyes trailed over the faces staring back at her and eventually landed on the tall one.
She had to be Sherry, because she was obviously the prized one; the one with the nicest clothes and the nicest jewelry. All the other women had their shortcomings, some more than others, but the brunette looked perfect, an absolute fantasy for any touch-starved man trying to survive the apocalypse.
Strangely, her face held only curiosity as she studied Samantha. The others looked on curious as well, but their expressions were mixed with caution, suspicion and contempt, brought on by Sam's reputation and the fact that she had stolen from one of them so she could get the benefits of being Negan's wife without really being his wife.
Sherry seemed genuinely curious of her, though. The Brassy brunette was the only one who looked at her with blatant hostility. If Sam were to take a wild guess, it would be that she was the one most romantically attached to Negan and she saw Sam as another contender for his attention.
And she had been taking up a lot of Negan's attention, lately.
Sam stood in their parlor, her arms hanging at her sides and her face looking disinterested. So disinterested that most of them couldn't look at her for long, pretending to go back to what they were doing, but still giving cursory glances. They were used to looks of lust and awe whenever someone new graced their presence. Stepping into the wives' sparkling boudoir was like stepping back in time when visitors got an eyeful of cocktail dresses, body glitter and high heels. Having someone regard them with a blank expression instead, must feel uncomfortable.
She waited to see if any of them would speak, but it didn't look like they would. Maybe Negan had said something beforehand, or maybe they wanted her to think that they were just as disinterested in her as she was in them. In that case, she truly wished their endeavor the best of luck because that wasn't going to happen easily.
Some people have smiles that can light up a room, other people have frowns that can cause depression. It wasn't difficult to tell which category Sam fell into.
Laura intentionally let the room fester in the tension that Sam's appearance caused. The corner of her mouth curled up as she watched the painful scene. Her eyes shifted between Sam and the group of women, just as curious to see if someone would address the elephant in the room. When no one did, she spoke up.
"Awkward silence, a gay baby is born," she badgered, clamping a hand down on Sam's shoulder. "Come on, the boss is waiting."
She steered her towards a door that didn't lead to Negan's office and knocked. They heard a shout for them to enter and Laura opened the door to reveal a bedroom.
The decor was just as grand as the rest of Negan's floor, with a four poster bed dressed with high thread count sheets, decorative drapes, leather and dark wood furniture, the same gaudy lamps and paperweights littering his office, and even a gazelle mount with its head and unblinking marble eyes...turned towards the bed.
(She hoped that wasn't there for any intentional reasons.)
Negan was seated on the couch near the windows with one long leg propped over the knee of the other and a heavy binder resting in his lap. His leather jacket was draped over the foot of the bed, leaving him in a white t-shirt that showcased a few of his tattoos and the sharp planes of his shoulder poked through the cotton. There was also a pair of rimless glasses on his face, perched low on the bridge of his nose. His bat Lucille was leaning against the side of the couch and there was a tall glass of lemonade on the coffee table in front of him.
He seemed engrossed with the papers in his lap, but once Sam and Laura stepped into the room, his eyes flickered up over the top of his lens and his surprisingly serene resting face was split by his trademark smile. He removed his glasses.
"There she is!" he exclaimed, taking in Samantha from head to toe, "Miss Congeniality, looking so nice and clean. You pretty up like a high class escort."
After he finished shamelessly eyeing the way the blue fabric of her shirt stretched across her breasts and how closely it hugged her middle, he gestured for her to take the seat across from him. As she seat down in the chair, sinking into the high grade leather, Negan pointed with his glasses at Laura.
"Thank you, Miss Laura, for taking such good care of my favorite little gem and making sure she washed behind her ears, but I think I can handle things from here. Why don't you go pick out something pretty from the marketplace, on me."
Laura gave an affirmative nob before turning and walking out of the room, leaving Sam alone with Negan. He chuckled, curling his nose up in glee at her before putting his glasses back on and turning his attention down at the binder in his lap. He leaned further into the couch with a sigh while Sam sat stiff in her chair, her spine straight and her hands on her knees.
"Did you roofie me?" she asked, once the door clicked shut.
"Hmm?" Negan looked up, obviously in the mood to be theatrical, "oh yeah, sorry about that. I would have had you sedated, but the good shit is saved for when we need to do surgery. I'm a practical man, mouse. Doesn't matter how special you are to me, I've gotta put my people first. Hardasses who insist they're not apart of my community get the DIY anesthesia."
"So you used cheap roofies instead?"
"How do you know they were cheap?" he asked, derisively, like he was insulted that she dare call his rape drugs anything but stellar. "Maybe I was a fucking gentleman and gave you the premium shit because I think you're the fucking bees knees, babe?"
"I woke up with an aftertaste. Older forms of Rohypnol are bitter - older forms are cheaper - cheap leaves an aftertaste."
He considered this, his eyes drifting upwards for a moment before smiling.
"Right, that makes sense," he chuckled. "My boys raided a student apartment complex near one of the George Mason campuses and found a bunch of date rape drugs. Don't worry, we don't use them for any nefarious purposes. We just give them to people who need to chill the fuck out for a while. They stay locked up in Carson's cabinets with everything else."
Sam made an ambiguous sound that made Negan chuckle again. There was a short silence between them. The older man was looking at his papers again, his eyes sweeping back and forth from behind his glasses as he mouthed the words he was reading, just like he had done when he had read her journals in front of her. The memory felt like it happened months ago, but it really had been only one. Barely one, even.
"Have you ever been roofied?" he asked, speaking conversationally, as if asking if she had ever found a hair in her breakfast while eating at an IHOP, instead of something inappropriate.
"Yes," she replied, almost as casual.
She realized that she should elaborate when Negan's eyes shot up from his papers with abject panic. The type of panic when a person realized that they might've just inadvertently come across someone's most shameful secret while trying to be funny and were now horrified that they were going to be told about it.
"I did it to myself."
Negan's heart dropped into his ball sack and became a beating third testicle at the scare she had given him, because he had been trying to be funny, only for it to backfire and blow a load in his face, but the relief that it wasn't an instance of a Friday night gone horrible had his shoulders sagging again, the panic fading.
(And thank God for that, because he would've felt like the biggest cockshit.)
The shock didn't subside, though, and confusion was added to the slapstick mix of expressions on his face. He didn't call bullshit, because drugging yourself for some unknown reason sounded well within the realm of possibility for Samantha - right up the alley of 'what the fuck, why the fuck, how the fuck, and, no really, what-why-how the fuck?' that she was always popping a squat in.
He couldn't understand fucking why, and honestly, he was almost too afraid to ask, because unless she told him that she was a retarded kid who took Rohypnol thinking it would get her high because she had chickened out of popping ecstasy with the rest of bible camp, then he didn't see this being a very happy or hilarious story.
But then again, "almost" never helped anybody get their dick wet, globally or historically, so "almost" never stopped him from doing jack shit.
"Why in the mother fuck did you roofie yourself?"
Sam thought for a moment whether or not she should answer, but then figured that it couldn't hurt anything. It happened over a decade ago and all parties involved except for her were died now.
"I wasn't- I'm not, a popular person," she eventually replied. "I thought it would be a practical thing to explore - to know what it was like to be drugged firsthand, in case someone tried to do it to me for real."
"You roofied yourself because people didn't like you?"
Her nose curled up, indignant.
"When you put it like that, it sounds ridiculous."
"Isn't it?"
She sighed, closing her eyes before opening them again. The binder in Negan's lap laid forgotten across his thighs and his glasses were nearly falling of his face, but he was too invested with her to push them back up. His tongue was poking out from between his teeth and he looked enthralled, but his brow was knotted with something that could be mistaken as concern.
"There was a group of girls who hated me," she went on, "they used to make me do their homework for them, but eventually I told them to leave me alone, otherwise I would tell the dean. The meanest one cornered me in the bathroom and told me that they would roofie me and let all the guys take turns raping me."
"You're fucking kidding," he accused, finally calling it. "That's the most fucked up thing I've heard in a while."
"I know, she said that 'all the guys' would rape me and I fell for it. Who is even 'all the guys'? I should have realized that it wasn't a thought out threat."
"What?" Negan breathed, disbelieving, "Jesus Christ, I'm not talking about - I meant the fucking girl!"
She blinked, "oh."
His reaction, like he had just lost all hope in humanity if he hadn't already, made Sam squirm in her seat. She already regretted telling him. She should have ignored his question like everything else brash and crude that he said. She never realized just how odd some of the things she did or said were until she told someone. At the time it seemed like just as practical of a learning experience as anything else.
Taking a roofie just because she had been scared of a couple of bullies sounded like an overreaction to some people, but they didn't know the whole story. They never knew the whole story, and neither did Negan, and Sam being Sam wasn't going to tell him it.
"Who says something so fucking fucked up?"
"She was an angry girl," she said, as if that explained everything. "I doubt her friends would have gone through with it, but I wasn't going to put it pass her to try something at least, so I bought a Rohypnol tablet from a dealer who sold in the park at night and took it alone in my room. There was an aftertaste when I woke up in the morning."
"Still, that's fucked up. Why didn't you tell a teacher, or the dean, or - fuck, your parents? That isn't your run of the mill, juvenile, 'she called me fat', 'she called me a slut' bullshit, that's grounds for fucking expulsion!"
"You don't understand teenage girls," she deadpanned. "Girl bullies aren't like boy bullies. Duking it out with them like the playground bully won't make these kinds of girls leave you alone. Standing up for yourself and winning a fight won't gain their begrudging respect and there's no code of honor that makes them get over it and move on like with boys. Piss them off once and they'll hold it over your head for years. You've got seven wives, you should have an idea of how these things work."
Negan didn't reply, because she was right, he didn't understand teenage girls. Sure, he once taught them, knew their behaviors, but he wasn't about to pretend to know the reason behind half the things they said or did, mostly because there was no reason behind them. He didn't understand them and never felt the desire to. His job had only required him to do two things basically: teach them the curriculum, and make sure they didn't get pregnant while on his watch. Anything beyond that was above his paygrade.
He fixed her with an unreadable look before going back to his binder, mumbling under his breath, "that shit wouldn't have flown with me," and she wondered about it but didn't ask; instead, squirreled it away in her head for later.
"I blame the parents," she offered up, "and rap music."
He looked at her, thrown as he recognized that she had just made a joke before letting out a snort and shaking his head.
Letting the conversation go as just that, a bleak joke, he looked back down at his binder, missing the way Sam's eyes drifted off into a morbid memory.
While she had meant it as a joke, she wasn't entirely kidding. What was really "fucked up" about the whole thing was that the "meanest one" had been her cousin, Tama. She blamed the parents, alright; the couldn't-be-bothered and the psychopath. Tama grew up a very angry person, a perfect molotov cocktail mix of them both.
That wasn't something she was going to divulge to Negan, though.
He cleared his throat, finally putting aside his work on the cushion next to him and removing his glasses.
"Didn't mean to start this off fucking grim," he said, picking up his glass of lemonade, "but considering what happened yesterday, I guess it's unavoidable. You do remember what I'm talking about, right? The roofies didn't scatter your brain at all in that department?"
"Yes, I remember."
"So to clarify, then, you remember trying to fucking fling yourself off the side of my building?"
"Yes."
"You remember giving up."
He said it as an accusation, not a question.
"Yes," she replied.
"You remember trying to take a fucking chunk out of Dwight's arm and-"
"You're not going to make me feel bad about it," she interrupted. "If you're trying to figure out if I'm going to try again, I won't. That was the only opportunity I had to convince myself to do it, because I didn't, and still don't, want to die. I just couldn't go on living with the way things were. It wasn't a lapse in judgment, but it's not something I'll be able to do again unless I get infected and are going to die anyways."
He leaned back into the couch and studied her as he held his drink in his hand. There was a long moment of consideration where he tilted his head to the side and scratched at his beard, letting out a thoughtful hum.
"Alright, fair enough," he eventually said, raising a hand and giving a dismiss wave, "I believe you."
He stared at the half-melted ice floating in his drink as his fingers rubbed at the condensation dripping down the sides of the glass. It took him almost a full minute to move before he leaned forward and placed the glass back on the coffee table. He stayed hunched over, with his arms resting on his thighs and his hands hanging between his legs.
"Look," he sighed, reaching up and pinching the skin between his eyebrows, "I'm tired of this tomfuckery - seriously tired. Congratulations, you did it. You wore me down. Any more of this cat and mouse bullshit and I'm going to be the one jumping off the goddamn roof."
Negan's more obnoxious mannerisms were dropping and she knew this was him trying to be sincere.
"I'm going to level with you," he said, "I'm not going to let you go because I can't let you go, and if you're really as smart as I believe you are, you already know all the reasons why. But politics and public image as an unrelenting motherfucker aside, it's not just about me not being able to let you leave. I don't want you to go."
She gave him a look that would have made him laugh if he wasn't making an effort to be serious. It was a cross between suspicion, doubt and honest to God confusion.
'Yeah, I bet that's a foreign concept to you, you sad, adorable freak of nature,' he thought before continuing.
"I want you to stay here, with me, and not just because of the things you can do for me. I like you. You're a huge shit, but I like you. I like people who think differently from others, always have. Don't get me wrong, I'm still not going to let you leave, you won't wear me down that much, but I just want you to know that you're not unwanted here, by anybody, even if some don't realize it yet. I can tell you've caught shit in your life just being who you are, but I think you'll be surprised how open-minded people are these days, especially around here. You have a place here where you can really shine.
I'm going to make you pay off your debt, there's no negotiating that. I'm tired of having to do things this way with you, but if you rather pay your debt by serving time as a prisoner, then I'll give you that choice. I'll give you a new cell with a mattress so you don't have to sleep on the floor, you'll be fed regularly, you'll be able to shower regularly, you'll be given books to keep occupied, and most importantly, there'll be no more humiliation. I'm done with that, it's not fun anymore and I think the workers get the picture now that my punishments are as serious as they fucking come, no matter how nice your tits are."
He paused, giving her a chance to say something, but when she didn't, he kept going.
"But, if you rather be able to move around the building, have your own room and have access to the things we offer here, you'll have to pay me back by contributing to the community. And if by the end you still want to leave, I'll let you. We'll be squared with no hard feelings. I'll even give you some supplies to help you get back on your feet. If you don't want to be a savior - fine. If you don't want to be a worker - great. You can be whatever the fuck you want to be, just so long as I benefit from it. Work with me, not for me."
"But still answer to you?"
"Everybody answers to somebody in this world, there's no escaping that for any of us, mouse."
"Who do you answer to?"
"Lucille," he said, gesturing to the bat, "fucking duh."
Sam looked down at her hands in her lap, considering his words.
Weighing the options and feeling a little overwhelmed, she stood from her chair. When Negan didn't say anything, she wandered over to one of the windows and pushed back the drapes, looking out the fogged glass with her arms crossed, letting his words sink in. As she did this, Negan reached for his lemonade again, leaning back into the couch with one arm resting along the back. He swirled the glass around, looking at what was left of the ice and pulling a face. Despite it being watered down as hell, he took a drink.
"So, I've been meaning to ask," he said after swallowing and smacking his lips, taking an ice chip between his teeth, "what flavor are you anyways?"
She looked away from the window, arching an eyebrow. Negan smirked at how sexy the look was.
"Excuse me?"
"Your features look vanilla, but you've a shot of something else in you, don't ya, so what's your flavor?"
"You mean my race?" she asked after it dawned on her what he was getting at.
He made a flippant noise while chewing on another piece of ice, staring down into his glass.
"I'm Irish and Native American."
He looked up from his glass with an excited smile, snapping his fingers and pointing. "Native American, that's it! Fucking Christ, that was driving me crazy."
Sam turned her head back towards the window, closing her eyes and exhaling through her nose as she realized where this was going to go.
Whenever someone found out she was Native, there was always a slew of questions that they asked; prominently, what their spirit animal was and if she had ever gone on a spirit journey with mystical guidance from the great spirits of the earth to find her calling in life - the answering being: no. The most "mystical guidance" she had ever gotten on a "spirit journey" was once asking a random passerby whether the new Burger King fell to the left of St. Jameson street, or the right on Hill Avenue (they didn't know).
Stereotypes or even blatant racial slurs barely phased her. Given all that she had been through in her life, it would be ridiculous to get worked up over words, but that didn't mean being asked over and over wasn't annoying, especially when it was Negan, who perpetuated everything.
"I was thinking at first that you were some kind of Mexican," he said, "but when you didn't grow one of those gnarly chick mustaches that they get from not waxing or shaving after a month, I figured not. You and your people's body hair situation is not bad, I gotta say. I've got a wife who would kill for that, especially now that there's no Pretty Kitty salons around to help manage her 'natural garden'. Too bad, it's like a rainforest down there. Serious hippy-grandma shit, except the printer hasn't run out of ink yet, thank God."
Sam turned her head and gave him a withered look that begged him to be quiet, but he either completely missed it or ignored it.
"And don't get me started on her face when she runs out of wax strips. I'm not afraid of a little body hair on my women - fuck like I'm even one to judge - but I swear to God, she looks like Mr. Snuffleupagus from Sesame Street, but don't tell her I said that, though. She'll kick me in my sack."
She should've jumped before Negan even stepped foot on that roof.
"Native american, how magical," he marveled, smiling giddy into his glass before asking: "Hey, what's my spirit animal?"
"Roadkill," Sam snapped.
"I guess you must get that one a lot, then," he chuckled at her pouting. "I think it's a legit question."
"I'm also Irish, but nobody asks me if I've seen a leprechaun before."
"Have you?"
"No."
"Fuck, that would've been cool," he said with fake disappointment before narrowing his eyes at her playfully. "You're one of those lucky mixed fuckers who get all the good traits from their parents and none of the shitty ones, aren't you? Because I once knew a guy in my developmental psychology class who was a mix of Indian and some fucking Norwegian, I think, and he looked like a dog's anus."
Sam decided to bring them back to the original topic of conversation. She hadn't wanted to, but she would do anything to get off this subject.
"If I decide to work, will I get access to the workshops?"
"Woah, slow your roll there," he chided. "Eventually, yes, something like that can be arranged, but I'm not just going to give you free reign of my workshops right off the bat. No, you'll have to earn that. But before you can earn that privilege, you'll need to earn the privilege of being able to work a job on your own, and before you can earn that privilege, you'll need to earn the privilege of being allowed out of my sight for more than ten seconds. See the pattern here?"
"And how do I do that?"
"You'll start by working for me, directly," he replied, "that way I can keep my eye on you."
"Meaning?"
"Well," he gave her a coy smile, "I've always wanted an assistant."
"You can't be serious."
"Oh, I'm dead serious. Everyday you're going to report outside this room, first thing in the morning, ready to be my fucking shadow. You'll make notes on whatever the fuck I tell you to, you'll keep records of whatever the fuck I tell you to, and do whatever the fuck I tell you to."
He raised a hand and counted her new duties off with his fingers.
"You'll plan my schedules for the week, take notes during meetings, schedule appointments, bring me my meals, handle my laundry. You'll take down everything, I want everything to be recorded and documented. I want the story of my 'glorious empire'," he used his fingers for quotations, "to be passed down for generations to come - fuck, you'll even make transcriptions of my fuck fests with my wives if I tell you to."
"I never said it was glorious, or an empire."
"I know what you said, but I all heard was 'I know it might get me killed, but I'm only pretending to be a bitch, I secretly think Negan is the greatest fucking thing since blueberry-flavored lube was invented, I would ride his big swinging dick all night long if only I wasn't a raging boner-killer, I love the Sanctuary, I want to live here forever and ever'. Don't worry, I read the subtext loud and clear, baby."
Sam opened her mouth to express a polite word on what she thought of the nightmare fuel he had just spewed, but he cut her off.
"If you show me that you can behave yourself and play by the rules, you can be given some notebook paper and a crayon to work on your little projects and the fucked up memoirs of an autistic nilhist - or whatever the fuck you are - in the meantime, after you're done taking care of me."
"A crayon? You can't draw up blueprints with a crayon. You can't even draw with a crayon, they're terrible."
"Tough titties," he shrugged, "gotta earn the privilege to use a pencil. You'll be locked in your room every night, so you'll have plenty of time to yourself. If you come up with something juicy that's both plausible and doable with what we've got on hand, then we'll talk, but until then, you'll be my special little worker. You'll stick by my side like a little fucking poodle inside the bag of one of those mini skirt wearing, Botox-filled, bedazzled jean jacket wearing, anorexic Oompa Loompas you see walking around Beverly Hills."
"That reference was so early 2000's, I just heard the echo of an orange sherbet iMac G3 booting up," Sam fired back, holding a hand to her ear.
When Negan scowled at her, she made a show of carelessly dropping her hand. She braced both hands on the coffee table in front of her and stood from her chair like a business man sealing the deal and ready to shove off.
"Now, I won't say that I find your offer ridiculous because I don't want to join in on the beating of an almost two-decade old horse, so instead I'll say that I find your offer ludicrous. I'll work so I can leave, but I won't be your receptionist and maid. So just give me my complimentary Von Dutch hat and I'll roll up out of here on my heelies and you can go back to masturbating to a picture of an underage Hilary Duff."
"There sure as hell ain't going to be any of that smart ass mouth," he warned, glaring. "In case you didn't pick up on my mad vibes, dude, this isn't an offer I make fucking lightly. Either you do this, work off the points you fucking owe me so we can release you back into the wild - where you clearly fucking belong for confusing the shit out of me and making me feel ancient, you bitch - or you'll go back in that cell for the rest of your miserable fucking days. So shut your mouth and just be grateful that I'm giving you a choice in this at all."
"And what's that cost?" she challenged. "How do I earn that privilege? Give you my undying loyalty, my unquestioning respect? My first born child?"
He smiled and waved her words away. "Loyalty and respect don't mean diddly if you don't mean it, and I know you won't ever mean it, and your first born child is probably going to be mine anyways, so that just seems redundant."
"I'd rather get a pap smear from a doctor practicing medicine out of a station wagon parked behind Wendy's."
"Given the state of things, that's probably what the doctors left are doing now anyways, mouse, so watch what you wish for. We all gotta watch what we say. Karma's a bitch, especially now that we don't have the Buddhists to vouch for us and harass us with peace and harmony beads, asking for donations and pretending they don't speak English when we say no."
She scoffed. If that was his argument, then he picked the worst choice.
Sam didn't believe in karma. It was a comforting idea, but she didn't believe in it, not even in the slightest.
For karma to be real, there would have to be a sense of fairness to the world, a reason for why things happen the way they do. But life wasn't fair, was it? And sometimes horrible things happen for no good reason and to the completely wrong people. It would be nice to think that the people who have done bad would one day get their comeuppance for it - and perhaps they do in some sense, maybe they do suffer some misfortune that measures up, but she didn't believed that it was truly in any way correlated.
Sometimes the bully in high school doesn't grow up to be a deadbeat loser. Sometimes the guy who cuts you off in traffic doesn't get pulled over and ticketed. The racist never sees the error in their way of thinking and the corrupt cop never gets caught.
But Negan's tangent was just ridiculous enough to elicit a response, despite her knowing by now that it was pointless and doing so would only encourage him and reinforce the behavior, like a dog drinking out of the toilet.
"Do you even know what you're talking about half the time?" she accused.
"Not in the slightest," he replied, smiling. "Now get the fuck out of here, you ungrateful turd. I'll radio Laura so she can take you to pick out something to wear. I'm running a legit operation here so dress like a fucking professional. I expect you here first thing in the morning - not that there's a chance you won't be because I'm going to send someone to make sure that you are, but you get the picture."
Sam moved to stand from her chair, but then Negan made a sound like he had just remembered something and she reluctantly lowered herself back down.
"Oh, and Dwight's fine by the way, since you asked."
"I didn't."
"Yeah, you got him good - seven stitches, fuck, never would have begged you for a biter," he mused before raising a hand and waving his finger back and forth at her. "No more of that, either."
He didn't vocalize a threat, just leaving it at that, but it was there.
When he didn't say anything else, she stood from her chair, finally free to leave. She made for the door, her hand closing around the knob, but Negan's voice stopped her again.
"Hang on, I'll walk you out."
With her back facing him, she seized up in frustration and closed her eyes against the urge to growl. The sound of groaning leather came as she heard him haul himself to his feet with a grunt and approach her. She turned to face him as he stepped up, closing the space between them and making her crane her head back took meet his gaze.
He let out a wistful sigh, looking down at her. For a long moment he didn't say anything as he stared down at her, smiling.
"I enjoy our talks," he teased, squinting at her and grinning.
Sam rolled her eyes and opened the door.
He motioned for her to go first and she stepped back out into the parlor.
Unlike when she had arrived, the wives didn't turn their heads to look at her when she reappeared. In fact, it was almost as if once they heard the door opening, they looked away from where they had been watching it the entire time and pretended to be preoccupied with something else. The walls weren't thin enough to overhear much of her and Negan's conversation. What were they expecting to hear?
Sam scanned the room, taking in how pointedly each wife was not looking at her. It wasn't until Negan stepped out that they finally looked up. Another tense silence took over as they all seemed to wait; Sam waiting for the wives to do something, the wives waiting for Negan to do something, and Negan waiting for something clever to say.
He looked in between Sam and his wives, arching a brow and frowning at the lack of eye contact.
"Oh damn, you guys didn't introduce yourselves?" he asked, pretending to be surprised. "Was that that awkward-gay baby silence I heard earlier? Jesus, what are we animals now? Are we going to start sniffing each other's asses in greeting instead of saying 'hello'? Well, that's fucking gross. I guess I'll do the introductions since apparently I'm the only one with any Goddamn social skills around here."
He motioned for Sam to step forward so that she was front and center.
"Samantha, let me introduce you to my beloved darlings; this is Sherry, Valeria, Sadie, Tanya, Frankie and Amber," he sounded off, pointing to the tall one, the angry one, the black one, the ugly duckling, the redhead and the blonde, respectively, before leaning in close to her ear and cupping a hand over his mouth. "Don't feel bad if you can't remember all their names, I'm surprised as shit that I did just now. I usually don't."
He had said that loud enough for the wives to hear, only making his voice raspy rather than actually lowering it to a whisper, but none of the women seemed offended.
Negan looked down at her in expectation. She knew what he wanted, but she hoped that if she just stood there and said nothing, he would move on. It took almost a full minute of uncomfortable silence with him staring at her with a smile, unrelenting, before she let out a sigh.
"Hello, wives," she said, dry and unenthused, speaking more to the air above their heads than the ladies themselves.
Satisfied with her response, Negan continued with their introduction, gesturing ostentatiously at Sam.
"Wives, this is Samantha."
"Sam," she corrected.
"Sam," he echoed with emphasis, smirking. "She was just on her way out."
He moved so that she could leave, but as he stepped to the side, one of his wives raised her hand.
"Negan, when do I get my dress back?" the angry one, Valeria, asked.
"Uhh, never," he replied, scratching his chin and pulling a face like that was the stupidest question he had ever heard. "It's Sam's dress now."
Sam watched as the wife became visibly more upset, not at all pleased with his answer. Her eyes widened and her mouth pinched like she had just sucked on a lemon. She stood from her stool despite the hand that Sherry had on her shoulder to keep her still and pointed at the dark haired woman standing next to her husband.
"But she broke into my room and stole it!"
"Don't even start with that shit, Val," Negan rolled his eyes. "I already got you a fucking replacement and you haven't even worn it yet, so don't pretend you're real fucking devastated. You were always complaining that one didn't fit right, anyways."
Val's face blossomed red with vexation as she looked at her husband helplessly, seeing that he could care less about her demand before fixing her glare on to Sam, but the blue-eyed woman stared right back at her, meeting her glare and not flinching. Her icy gaze cancelled out the heat of her new opponent's, making the wife look away with a frustrated growl.
"Besides, it looks better on Sam," Negan said, giving the woman a smile and a wink before looking back at his wife. "You don't have the kind of waist for that vintage shit."
"But I wanted to wear it for you tonight," she cooed, her voice and face softening as she changed tactics.
"There wouldn't be much point in doing that since I didn't fucking ask for you tonight," he replied brutally, making Val gasp.
Sherry pushed off from the bar, attempting to come to a stricken Val's defense, "Negan-"
"Not a fucking word, Sherry," he cut her off, pointing in her direction. "I already fucking went over this with all of you, not even a fucking hour ago. I told you how this was, what it was and how I fucking expect it to go. I'm not dealing with this guarding-my-territory shit every time one of you decides to release your inner bitch because another vagina sets foot on this floor, I don't have the motherfucking patience for it."
Once every dress-wearing woman, whether they had said something or not, was staring at the floor like it was the most interesting thing they had ever seen in their lives, the man backed down.
Negan knew the signs of a male vying for dominance like his dick knew a warm hole in the dark, but years of experience on the front lines of the adolescent battlefield allowed him to also be able to recognize when a female was doing it. Though he had given them all the don't-be-a-cunt-to-my-friends lecture, it had been directed mostly at Val, the frequent offender.
For her to pull her come-hither act in front of Sam in an attempt to clit measure after he had just got done telling her not to do that - it really pissed him off.
Now all the wives were doing that thing that drove him up the fucking wall where they pretended to get scared. They knew better than that. He didn't beat them, he didn't force them into sex when they didn't want it, he didn't punish them for no good reason. Fuck, they didn't even have to talk to him. He didn't fucking like to talk to them, either, most of the time.
There were crystal clear lines for what got them rewarded and what got them in trouble, and the only time they needed to be afraid of him was when they did something that fell into the latter category, like Val had just done, and even then he went a lot easier on them than he did anyone else. This banning together to look meek and defenseless was bullshit they pulled often in front of other people to make him seem like even more of a douchebag. Fuck if he knew why. Hedging their bets, he guessed.
Curious, he threw a side glance at Sam, gauging her expression and smirking when he saw that it was just as indifferent as usual. She stood with her arms crossed loosely under her fine chest, watching the wives curl into each other and looking unimpressed.
"Better get used to each other, ladies," he said, projecting his voice louder than necessarily. "You know how it goes, the one with the tightest cunt gets my attention, and nothing says 'I've got a tight one' like a cutthroat bitch."
Finally reaching her limit, Sam left without a word, slamming the door behind her.
The other women gasped and stared dumbstruck at her not waiting for a dismissal from Negan. They all looked at him, almost trembling at how their sometimes volatile husband would react to her blatant disrespect, but he only let out a howl of laughter, throwing his whole upper body back and clutching his side.
"She's so fucking intense, I love it!" he giggled, clenching his teeth and growling out his choice of adjective.
He let his laughter go on before it tampered off and he sobered up with a rough cough. Without looking at the women still staring at him, he swaggered off back towards his bedroom.
"I've got a lot of shit to do, so none of you fucking bother me."
There was a palpable silence among the harem after he disappeared into his room, letting the sound of another door slamming resonate through their parlor.
~O~
Sam sat alone in her new room, looking at the stack of loose leaf paper and box of Crayola crayons that someone had put on the coffee table while she was out. A tray of half-eaten dinner sat on the counter of the kitchenette while the new items she had picked out from the marketplace laid scattered on her bed.
She was thinking, analyzing everything that happened as she watched the colors of dusk fade through the windows. As Negan had promised, the door to her room was locked and she was left to her own devices until morning. With that time, she compartmentalized. Almost in meditation, she broke down every word that had been said and carefully filed it away under the many categories that made up her labyrinthine mind.
"-it's not just about me not being able to let you leave. I don't want you to go."
Opening her eyes, she braced her hands on the arms of the lounge chair and pushed herself up.
"I want you to stay here, with me-"
Switching on the floor lamp, she wandered over to the wardrobe, reaching her hands out to explore the material of the garment hanging on the front of it. Laura had let out a laugh of genuine mirth when Sam had announced that this was what she wanted.
"I like you."
A knee-length, form-fitting, a-line dress with cap sleeves and a scoop neckline.
A white dress.
The price tag from whatever store it had been looted from was still hanging by the washing label - never been worn - pristine - untouched - incorruptible.
"You have a place here where you can really shine."
On the box of crayons there had been a sticky note, reading: 'Expecting great things from you, Mouse!'
He signed it with his first initial and a little heart.
That, paired with what he had said earlier, was his greatest and most effective strategy yet.
Curling her fingers into the fabric of the dress, she closed her eyes and breathed in deep.
"-you're not unwanted here-"
He was a very clever man, because Sam hadn't felt wanted by anyone since she was twelve years old, and that attempt to win her over cut worse than all of his others.
Fine, she would play his game. Negan had won the last couple of rounds, no doubt, but if he thought that he had her completely beat, defeated, then he was wrong.
She would do the work given to her and keep her nose clean, but she would never be fully complaisant. Samantha had stopped complying with others just because they were bigger and stronger than her a long time ago.
Putting the dress inside the wardrobe and walking back over to the sitting area, Sam picked up a piece of paper and a crayon as she settled back down into her chair.
She got to work that night, but not on plans for the betterment of the Sanctuary. She constructed the key that would reestablish her as a solid player in this power grab between her and Negan - her ace in the hole.
AN: This was a BEAST, so make sure to let me know what you think.
1) I have Sam and Negan contrast a lot because I like them to be foil characters, but in this case, I think they both have psychopathic tendencies (Negan's violence/Sam's lack of social convention), but aren't actually psychopaths. They're capable of expressing genuine emotion, but they can either delay their response, or chose not to react at all (ex: Negan brutally killing/Sam not expressing grief). They're both highly desensitized.
2) With the wives, I'm going to be using mostly the comic versions, with no sick sister/mother backstories. I could care less about Sherry's redemption arch in the show, or whatever they were trying to do with her. And I went with Sherry and Amber's comic appearances. The actress they got to play Amber looks fifteen, so no thanks.
~Scorpiofreak~