Quinn & Negan, in the forest

It was dawn, the sun was about to come up. As I was sitting beside Negan, staring into nothing, thinking, Negan suddenly woke up and became fully alert. He looked around quickly.

"Hey. Good morning," I said. He looked me in the eye and let out a sigh. "Bad dreams?" I asked. He nodded silently.

He fixed a stray hair on his forehead and leaned his head back, against the tree we were sitting by.

"Dreams are helping to process," I said. Negan nodded.

"Yeah…"

"We're going back to Alexandria in the morning," I told him. He nodded again.

"Okay"

"I have to tell you something," I said, it couldn't wait. He looked me in the eye. I continued. "Maggie is back."

Negan frowned his eyebrows.

"What?" he asked. I nodded to assure him. I looked at him very seriously and continued:

"I was thinking… maybe we should leave. Leave Alexandria and just… be. The two of us," I said, I was examining his reaction. He was definitely not expecting this.

"Are you sure?" he asked. "You want to leave Carol and Daryl?"

"If we can live in peace, then yes," I said.

He straightened his back and turned to face me.

"You don't want to leave them, they are your family, you said that."

"Carol once left, because she didn't want to lose any more people," I said, thinking out loud.

"And by the time she came back, she lost some anyway…" he said. "And she did come back, eventually. For a reason," he said very seriously.

"I don't want you to die," I said. "I'm scared of Maggie. And I don't want you to live among people who hate you."

"I can handle their hatred. And I'm not scared of Maggie," he said. "We have a better chance of surviving if we stay with the group. Believe me, there are a lot of other groups out there, like the whisperers. If we stumble upon them while it's just the two of us… we have barely any chance."

"I know. But I don't want you to live in misery because of their hatred."

"Doesn't matter," he said with a slight smile. "As long as you stay with me, I don't care about what they think."

I was speechless for a moment, looking him in the eye, then I silently nodded.

"I'm going to talk to Maggie. I have to tell her," I said. "Come what may. Maybe she will take it better if she hears it from me," I said. Negan nodded.

"Okay."

I glanced at the sky while Negan didn't take his eyes off of me. I turned my gaze back at him.

"It's almost morning. We should be ready to go," I said and I stood up to start packing. Negan did the same. As we finished packing, we glanced at each other then we headed back to the others. They were all packing stuff on wagons. Negan helped them without a second thought. I glanced around and I spotted Carol, I approached her.

"Hey" I said.

"Hey," she turned to me.

"Is everything okay?" I asked. She nodded, smiling slightly.

"Yeah."

"I'm sorry I raged out on you back at the tower," I said genuinely.

"It's okay. Things are not easy for you now," she said understandingly.

I nodded, then I changed the topic.

"Did something happen to Daryl? He was somehow strange," I said.

"What do you mean?"

"I don't know, he seemed nervous or… I don't really know, what is the right word."

Carol let out a sigh and stepped closer to me.

"He almost kissed me," she said in a whisper. I gasped.

"Really? FINALLY!" I said a little bit louder than I intended.

"Sssh!" Carol shushed me, smiling.

"That's finally something! I'm so happy for you!" I said in a quieter way. Carol was blushing.

"Well, better than nothing," she said still smiling. She acted like a shy little girl really. I glanced at Negan, that's when I realized he was standing face to face with Maggie. My blood ran cold in an instant.

"I have to go," I said and left Carol alone. I hurried to Negan.

When I got closer I saw that they weren't talking, Maggie was just staring at him, then she left without a word. Judith was standing there, speechless. Negan had guilt all over his face. I stepped to him.

"What happened?" I asked.

"She just came out and got startled. I told her I didn't escape, they let me out. She killed me with her eyes, then left," he said. I let out a sigh.

"It's not going to be easy," I said.

"I can talk to her," said Judith, who was still standing there, watching. Negan smiled at her.

"Thank you, Miss Grimes, but I can deal with my shit," he said.

"Language!" Judith frowned her eyebrows at him.

"Right. Sorry," said Negan smiling.

I had to smile at the sight of them, they were so cute.

"I'll talk to her, Jude, don't worry about us," I said. She nodded and smiled at us, then she left in Carol's direction.

"Cute little angel," I said still smiling.

"Yeah," said Negan, he was smiling too.

"We should go with the next group," I said. Negan nodded.

"Maybe we should go by ourselves. To avoid Maggie," he said. "Or wait a little."

I nodded.

"Yeah, we should probably wait a little."

There was a random wagon, I sat up onto its platform. Negan stepped in front of me, he seemed to be deep in thoughts, I reached up and caressed his cheek. He looked me in the eye. Suddenly a thought rushed to my head and I started talking without even thinking it through.

"Do you remember the night of the storm? When I got stuck down by your cell?" I asked, I figured he was thinking about Maggie, so I wanted to distract him, but I was not ready to confess my feelings to him yet, so I just talked without thinking.

"How could I forget?"

"I think that was the first time I realized I had a crush on you," I said. He smiled, his cheeks went slightly red.

I was putting it mildly because right after that I fell in love with him, but I wasn't ready to say that to him.

I continued anyway.

"When I had that panic attack and you said "Everything's gonna be alright"… I thought about it ever since, every time I was scared. I was hearing your voice inside my head…"

His smile faded away. He moved closer, put his hand on my cheek and kissed me slowly. It was our most romantic kiss so far. We were kissing slowly for quite a long time. When we parted, he caressed my cheek, then hugged me tightly. I buried my face in his chest. It felt so good to hug him. We heard someone was approaching. Negan let me go and turned around to see who it was.

"We should get going, lovebirdsl," said Carol.

"We're coming," I said and I hopped off of the wagon and grabbed my backpack. A couple of people arrived to arrange the wagon, while we followed Carol. I walked faster to catch up with her.

"Have you seen Maggie?" I asked.

"Yes. She went out to find her people. Daryl accompanied her."

I frowned my eyebrows. Carol continued.

"I told Maggie that I let Negan out and that he was with the whisperers when Hilltop fell."

"Gosh, Carol…" I exhaled sharply. "That doesn't make our situation easier."

"I won't lie to Maggie. She will take it better if we are honest with her."

I nodded in agreement. She continued:

"Daryl told Maggie that the situation is complicated. And he went with her, to try to ease up things a bit. I think he'll tell her about Lydia and Alpha."

"Okay," I said, thinking. "Did you really regret letting him out?"

Carol looked me in the eye.

"I don't know. He got the job done, he helped us a lot, but I'm not sure about his role in destroying Hilltop," said Carol quietly. "Maybe he got carried away and took a bigger part than we realize."

I shook my head disapprovingly.

"I don't think so."

"Don't worry, I still got your back," she said. "I'm going to help you with Maggie. Daryl too."

I nodded and smiled at her.

"Thanks."

As we were heading to Alexandria, I stopped for a second to wait for Negan. He didn't catch up with us, he let me talk to Carol in private.

"I didn't want to eavesdrop," he said when he caught up with me.

"I know. Thank you," I said. He nodded. I continued. "Maggie is not around, so…" I said without finishing the sentence, instead I took his hand. He looked at our hands as our fingers intertwined, then he smiled at me.

We headed back to Alexandria. I felt a kind of peace and calm. They say the calm before the storm, but there's a calm after the storm as well. That was what I was feeling. Or just the calm before another storm?

…

Author's notes: Listen to "Diamonds" by Rihanna.

Thank You for reading! ❤