Only Worth Living

"Your carriage awaits, ladies," Negan said flippantly, gesturing to the battered looking people-carrier illegally parked on the sidewalk.

Imogen approached the vehicle with some trepidation, arms folded across her blood-splattered shirt, keeping her shaking hands under control. She didn't know what the hell was happening, only that she was operating on automatic pilot, unable to comprehend the chaos unfolding around her. Anya limped alongside her, eyes swollen, face still shellshocked.

They had left the bungalow and its bodies behind, the words unspoken that it would be the last they'd ever see of the place, Imogen's interlude there over, whilst Anya was now homeless and Negan without where he went to lick his wounds. What Negan and Anya would do next, Imogen didn't know and didn't care. Her only objective was to reach the art gallery, get Michonne and Andre, and then return to the apartment to find Kit. Where they would go, what they would do, were things Imogen refused to face. She only knew she was now living from moment to moment, dictating the pattern of whatever days were still left to her.

"It's quite the chick magnet, isn't it?" Negan said, interrupting her thoughts, leaning against the dented door as he spoke. "Real pussywagon."

Imogen just looked at him, his mocking manner getting on what was left of her nerves, but as her eyes met his, she once again saw that strange fear flicker behind his gaze. Seeing her scrutiny, Negan abruptly turned away from her, flinging open the car door instead, wordlessly indicating for her to get in. She hesitated, realising too late the predicament she'd put herself in, unwittingly entrusting her fate to a complete stranger.

"Fucking get in, kid," Negan snapped, "and stop looking at me like I'm Ted Bundy. I don't hold with that type of shit."

"I've got places to be actually," Imogen snapped, turning on him in turn, "so I can't waste time on a magical mystery tour" -

- "I can drink and drive, sweetheart," Negan said caustically, immediately understanding her indirect insult, "just one of my many skills. But what can I say, I'm a multi-tasking man." He paused for a moment, studying Imogen through narrowed eyes again. "So where does Your Highness want to go? Some art gallery joint, isn't it?" he said dismissively.

Imogen stared at him, startled. "What, you'll help me?" she then said suspiciously, glancing at the still silent Anya, who just stood there, face bloodless.

Negan mulled over her words, tugging thoughtfully on his beard as he did. "Didn't I just save your sweet ass from fucking Bender? Twice, might I add, before and after fucking Bender so conveniently kicked the bucket," he then said, sucking on his teeth. "And what about the shenanigans with the shed and the tempting Tori back there? Didn't I have a little hand in that too, stopping you from walking straight into a shitstorm? Seems like I took quite the trouble"-

- "So why take the trouble?" Imogen cut across him, her voice cracking. "Why not just walk away if that's where you're going with this?"

"Oh, Imogen has her fucking thinking cap on," Negan said, amused against his will. "That's right though, I don't believe in doing something for nothing. So what am I getting out of helping you? Maybe just the satisfaction of saving that fucking fine ass of yours. It would be a shame to let a rack and back like that go to waste just because I was too damn lazy to lift a finger" -

- "Fuck. You," Imogen said coldly, making Negan roar with laughter, the sound ringing around the empty street.

"Quite," Negan then said, patting Imogen almost paternally on the head, making her flinch away from his fingers. "But now I've fucking answered your question, you can answer mine. Why'd you risk your neck for the lovely Anya here? Did you have an... ulterior motive, huh? Let me tell you something though, you'd be wasting your time, since Anya doesn't swing that way, even if it would be super hot to see" -

Imogen abruptly made to turn and leave, but before she could react, Negan was on top of her, grabbing her wrist, halting her in her tracks. "Let go of me," she hissed, trying and failing to pull herself free. "You know damn well why I risked my neck. It was to prove I wasn't a prick like you."

"What, I say jump and you ask how high?" Negan pretended to ponder, looming over her, green eyes glittering oddly.

Imogen finally jerked her arm out of his grip, staggering as she did, Negan catching her by the hips, steadying her. "Take a hike, dickhead," she said through gritted teeth, shoving him away from her, making him stagger in turn, "and the next time you put your hands on me, you won't have any hands."

"We can still have fun without them," Negan grinned wolfishly, enjoying annoying Imogen, "so why should we let some stumps stop the fucking party?"

"Screw you!"

"Oh, I am all yours, sweetheart. Just say the word, kid, and I am there."

"God, I am done with you!" Imogen exploded, rounding on him. "Just fuck off!"

"So you keep saying," Negan said, circling her, "but I think you'd miss me even after such a short acquaintance." Imogen backed away from him, Negan following each footstep, towering over her once more. "Stop screwing around, kid," he said abruptly, his tone suddenly serious, wrongfooting Imogen, "you want a fucking lift or not?"

Imogen just stood there, jaw tightening, caught between the devil and the deep blue sea.

"I'll take that as a yes," Negan snapped, "so get your ass into gear and get in the goddamn car!"

Imogen flipped him the middle finger, before flinging herself into the front seat, cursing Negan under her breath as she did.

"Get in the back, Anya," Negan ordered as he opened the back door, his gaze riveted on the mutinous Imogen, something about the unspoken challenge in her eyes attracting his attention against his will. He had been sleepwalking his way through life since Lucille's diagnosis, but the whispers of the new world were slowly stirring him from his slumber, Imogen awakening him even further.

"No," Anya said in a low voice. "No."

Negan finally turned to face her. "Get in the car, Anya," he said quietly. "Don't make me manhandle you in."

"You just murdered my brother, you bastard," Anya hissed, her mismatched eyes suddenly filled with fury, rage restoring her back to life. "Now you're lining up your latest screw whilst my sister lies dying in her bed. So fuck you and your fucking car!"

"Don't like being ditched, do we?" Negan said coolly, Anya having the grace to look guilty, the colour rising in her cheeks. But she still stood her ground, refusing to get in the car, making Negan's jaw tighten dangerously. "God grant me patience," he said under his breath, half closing his eyes. Before Anya could react, she was swung off her feet and half flung into the back of the car, colliding with the booster seat, smashing her side off it. "There, that wasn't so hard, was it?" Negan said, slamming the door on her angry face. "Now buckle up. It's going to be one hell of a ride."

Imogen edged away from Negan as he flung himself down into the front seat beside her, making the vehicle violently shift sideways with his weight. "Time to hit the road, girls," he announced, pulling the door shut, before patting his pockets down, searching for his car keys. "We are getting the hell out of hell."

"We should call the cops," Anya said slowly from the back-seat, sitting up as she spoke, pushing her pink-streaked hair out of her eyes, "this – this thing – we are in deep shit, Negan, way over our heads."

"Which translates as let's fucking throw Negan to the sharks," Negan snapped. "You think I was fucking born yesterday? You just want to pay me back for braining fucking Bender!"

Anya let out a whimper at his words, cramming her fist into her mouth to stifle the sound, making Imogen wince.

"Ben killed Tori, and then Tori killed Ben, wherein our resident lovebirds then tried to kill us!" Negan bellowed, spit flecking the air. "How that is fucking possible, I sure as hell don't know, but this is the deep shit we are in as you so succinctly put it, so I suggest you get your head in the game and get a fucking grip, Anya!"

Anya collapsed against the window, burying her face in her arms, sobbing like a child. Feeling like she was falling from a great height, Imogen leaned her forehead against the dashboard, her breath coming in shallow gasps. As though standing outside herself, she remembered the weight of the branch in her hands; of the spade almost slipping from her fingers, the heft of it as she raised it above her head, bringing it down upon skull after skull, instinct overcoming conscience.

"Get up, kid," Negan said tiredly, making Imogen raise her spinning head, "God isn't fucking listening."

"I wasn't praying," Imogen said, her voice cracking. "I think it's a little late in the day for religion."

"Amen to that," Negan said, exhaling sharply. "Now strap yourself in. I'm not insured, not that it matters now."

With shaking hands, Imogen did as she was bid, the seatbelt sliding out of her sweating fingers several times, before she finally buckled it. Glancing up, her eye was caught by a battered photo tucked into a corner of the overhead visor, showing a surprisingly debonair looking Negan with his arm slung around a pretty blonde woman's waist, his hand resting on a teenage girl's shoulder, who was balancing a golden-haired baby on her hip, all four squinting slightly against the glare of the sun. But they were all overshadowed by Negan, who was wearing a white shirt buttoned too low, exposing an expanse of broad chest, his grin gleaming white against the backdrop of his tanned skin. He was a world away from the man sitting beside her, healthy and happy, almost arrogant in his fortune at having everything the heart desired.

Imogen recognized the blonde woman as Lucille, her hair suspiciously platinum compared to the tow-headed teenager from the family portrait back at the bungalow. But Lucille's smile didn't quite reach her eyes, the expression strained, almost as if she was playing a part, not quite carrying the illusion off. She looked to be in her late thirties, still carrying some baby weight, her frayed denim shorts straining against her skin, but she was obviously beautiful, the light to Negan's darkness, the blue sky framing them both.

However, it was the children that interested Imogen most, the sight of them startling her despite everything. Not once had Negan mentioned them, not even when he was inflicting his life story upon her, and Imogen's gaze lingered on them the longest, seeing Negan strongly in the teenage girl, having his dark hair and tanned skin, her features a feminized version of his apart from her tip-tilted nose, an inheritance from her mother, Anya possessing the same characteristic. The baby was almost indistinguishable apart from her fair hair and wide eyes, Negan nearly non-existent in the child, the baby barefooted in a fancy frilled white dress, chewing on a chubby fist.

"Tuscany, two years ago," Negan said in a low voice, making Imogen glance sharply at him, "just before the cancer came." Anya let out another sob, making Negan flinch, before swiftly recovering himself. "As you can fucking observe, I was quite the dish back in the day," he said with a wolfish grin, holding Imogen's gaze, "utterly irresistible, your local loveable rogue."

"Really," Imogen said coldly, her fingers curling into fists by her sides.

"Really, really, kid," Negan said, finally pulling out his car-keys, "you'd have been falling over yourself to get into my bed, sweetheart."

"Keep telling yourself that."

Negan just laughed, before ramming the key into the ignition, kickstarting the people-carrier into creaking life. As he drove, Imogen noticed his hands were shaking, gripping the steering wheel so tightly his knuckles were white with the tension. He asked her gruffly where she was going, Imogen reluctantly giving him the name of Michonne's art gallery, a place he surprisingly recognized, Negan not striking her as the type to appreciate art.

As the roads sped past, he put a CD on, signalling conversation was now at a stop, playing Nowhere To Run by Martha and the Vandellas at top volume, Negan mouthing the words with mock exaggeration as he drove.

"So Imogen, what do you do for fun?" Negan asked as the song faded into silence, his question startling her.

"Excuse me?"

"Quit stalling," Negan snapped, glaring at Anya in the rear-view mirror, "and just answer the goddamn question. We're all friends here, aren't we? I mean, there's nothing like bashing in a few brains to bring us all together. So what do you do for fucking kicks, kid?"

Imogen glanced out of the car window, full lips thinning. "Karaoke," she then said abruptly, sensing rather than seeing Negan's mocking grin.

"Karaoke?" Negan pressed, darkly amused. "You don't seem the type to get down to Celine Dion, sweetheart."

Imogen's fists clenched further by her sides. "Well, you should never judge by appearances, then, should you?" she said, her gaze still deliberately riveted on the road flashing past the window.

"Well, maybe one day you'll sing me a song," Negan countered, "maybe some Carpenters, huh? I love them. What a fucking band!"

At this, Imogen glanced at him out of the corner of her eye, surprised at his enthusiasm despite everything. "The Carpenters?" she said sceptically. "You don't look like the twee type."

"You should never judge by appearances, then, should you?" Negan said coldly, turning her own words back on her. Imogen's jaw tightened, and she went back to looking out of the window again, brow furrowing slightly. "What do you sell your soul for?" he then asked abruptly, making Imogen turn around once more, brow furrowing further. "I mean, what do you do to scrape out a fucking living?"

"You really want to talk about this shit!?" Imogen said in disbelief. "As if none of that happened back there!?" -

- "I don't want to fucking think about what happened back there!" Negan exploded, slamming his hand down on the steering wheel as he spoke, making the people-carrier swerve perilously to the left as he briefly lost control. "So tell me what the hell you do to get by!" he then snapped, swinging the vehicle back round, forcing Imogen to grip the dashboard for support.

"I was a waitress!"

"Anything else?"

"I clean."

"Cleaning fucking what exactly!?"

"Houses, offices – if it was crap hours, I had to pick up barwork to make up the difference," Imogen spat, "I did a stint as a toilet attendant on top of other shitty slave labour numbers I don't care to remember. Happy?"

"As fucking Larry," Negan spat back. "So why are you here in hellhole Albany? Holiday?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

"Because I can?"

"Bullshit," Negan drawled, shooting her a sidelong glance, "a girl like you doesn't come to a stick-up-its-ass shithole for a good time. What was it, family? A guy? A gal?"

"It was because my life was up Shit Creek, alright?" Imogen retorted, something stopping her from discussing Kit. "But now I would accept it and be grateful, because that life was a tea party compared to this."

"How so?"

Imogen bowed her head. Kit didn't even know the depths she had sank to, only thinking she was dissatisfied with the cards life had dealt her, that she was tired of bussing tables and of dating deadbeats, spending every weekend at the same seedy spots, using alcohol to escape into oblivion. She had lied to Kit about the state of her life, yet here she was, confessing all to a complete stranger.

"I was in debt," she said, her voice cracking, making Negan glance sharply at her, "like real up-to-my-ears shit. I seemed to be always between jobs, and I had no savings or anything. And when I had a job, it was always slipping through my fingers – they'd find somebody better - somebody that did the dusting right or somebody who would shut their mouth" -

- "What do you mean by that?" Negan cut across her. "You see something you shouldn't?"

"I didn't give two shits if the husband was screwing the nanny," Imogen said bitterly, "but I gave a shit when the same husband tried to grab my arse."

"You seem to give a shit about me screwing my sister-in-law," Negan said idly, swinging the steering wheel round, shooting Anya an ironic look over his shoulder as he did.

"There are levels and limits," Imogen said tiredly, suppressing her desperate craving for a cigarette, "my last job... I was... involved with my employer until he kicked me to the kerb. The fucker fired me. He was... married, but his wife pretended not to know he was playing the field as long as he kept paying the bills. The arrangement suited us all until he got tired of me and moved onto the next moron who fell for his lines."

"So I can't commit adultery but you can be an instrument of it?"

"Your wife is dying!" Imogen said incredulously, making Anya flinch. "There's a bloody difference!"

"So you were screwing your married boss," Negan said slowly, "and I suppose you took him for all he fucking had as well, yeah?"

"If his wife could, I didn't see why I shouldn't get a slice of the pie as well," Imogen said coldly, "we were both earning it on our backs."

"Was he good-looking, charming, debonair?" Negan taunted. "Did he treat you like the lady you so obviously are?"

Imogen glared at him. "He was good-looking, yes," she said stiffly, "and he could charm the birds off the trees. That was the main attraction. Everything else was just... a perk."

"Really?"

Imogen's jaw tightened again, remembering the fancy restaurants, the expensive jewellery, the five star spas and hotels. "What is it to you?" she said tersely. "We're just ships passing in the night."

The corner of Negan's mouth curled upwards. "Maybe because I like you sitting in fucking judgment on me," he said lazily, "that I find your hypocrisy super hot. Underneath your airs and graces, you're a little wild-cat, and my taste runs to claws, me-ow."

"Do you always talk such shit?"

"Well, it beats talking about how the dead are somehow walking, doesn't it?" Negan said, shrugging his shoulders.

Imogen looked away, half closing her eyes, not wanting to remember what her world had become.

"Anyways, like I said, kid, that shirt isn't doing you any fucking favours," Negan then said with disapproval, changing the subject, his choice of subject making Imogen glare at him again. "God, what wouldn't I give to see you in a fitted white sundress," he said under his breath, his green gaze raking her, "with nothing on underneath, the strap slipping off your shoulder, that ivory skin with a hint of honey" -

- "For fuck's sake!" Imogen exploded, rounding on him. "Would you just shut the hell up!?"

"And you would be looking at me just like that," Negan continued, unperturbed, "like you wanted to break my jaw."

"Are you some kind of sick sadist!?"

"No, I just know how to appreciate a woman with spirit," Negan said, shrugging his shoulders again. "You get tired of a broad who agrees with you all the time. What can I say? I like a fucking challenge."

"We are not having this conversation."

"I think you'll find that we are," Negan said dryly. "You and I, we're kindred spirits, kid."

Imogen glanced at him, taking in his long unkempt hair and beer gut; the rancid smell of unwashed flesh and alcohol that emanated from his stained shirt. He had bloodshot eyes and the beginnings of a double chin, with an air of desperation hanging around him, repulsing her. But then her gaze was drawn to the battered photograph hanging high above, forcing her to compare the Negan of then to the Negan of now, and she shifted uncomfortably in her seat, wondering if she really was immune to his perverse charm as she thought she was.

"The messed up thing is you like me anyways," Negan said quietly, reading the conflict in her eyes without his usual mocking condemnation, "whether you like it or not."

I heard that you like the bad girls
Honey, is that true?