I thought the first chapter should be a flashback to show you guys a little bit of how things used to be between Lucy and Negan.
And how much things have changed for her since then. There will be more flashbacks dotted throughout the story but I thought this was a good point to start at because this chapter is the first stage in the breakdown of who Lucy and Negan once were.
Hope you guys like it and thank you so much for reading!
Chapter one Mommy ?
Five years earlier
It had been a week, a week since Mom had told me to go to my room and stay there until Dad came back. She said it was because she didn't want me to see her like this anymore.
She didn't want me to watch her die.
She said Dad would be back any day now. That was a week ago and I hadn't even caught a glimpse of him.
What if he wasn't coming back?
I know he would never not come back unless something had stopped him.
One of those monsters I had seen and heard about on the news.
Real life monsters.
I could hardly believe it when it all started happening.
In fact i didn't believe it at first. It sounded insane, things like this just didn't happen outside of a Tv screen.
I was one of those of have to see it to believe it kind of people so one day I snuck out of the house hoping to find proof for myself or hoping to prove that this was all just some kind of weird, scary prank my Dad had cooked up to scare me.
I didn't have to go far until I found the precious proof I had been searching for.
I walked down to the edge of the street hiding behind trash cans, trees and bushes trying to be stealthy just incase it actually was real.
I turned the corner and nearly screamed when I saw one of those things ripping apart our neighbour, Mrs Nelsons Great Dane Dotty.
I should have ran back home as soon as I saw it.
It was a woman. Her skin had turned a lifeless grey, almost white but not quite. The skin on the left side of her face was rotten and coming apart. Otherwise she looked fresh as if she had died mere hours ago.
She was feasting upon Dotty, she had torn her open and was pulling apart her insides stuffing Dotty's organs into her over eager mouth.
I had never been so disgusted in my life but I couldn't move. I couldn't stop myself from starring at the gruesome scene before me.
I could feel my stomach churning and my mouth was getting wet. It would always do that, produce more saliva when I was I was going to be sick.
I felt dizzy and touched the lamppost to steady myself but then I lurched forward and vomited all over the pavement.
I wiped my mouth and looked towards the scene again to see her already looking at me from her crouched position beside Dotty.
My green eyes met her glazed over grey ones.
They were the most mesmerising eyes that I had ever seen. Not mesmerising as in they were the most beautiful eyes I had ever seen. They were mesmerising in the way that they seemed to be completely dull and dead but actively alert and awake at the same time like she was tracking every shift my body made. There was no thoughts behind those eyes just muscle memory, action and I was the next target.
I froze as she slowly and rather unsteadily stood up started stumbling towards me. She was making these grunts and moans as if she were getting excited at the possibility of another meal.
It was stupid, so stupid but all I could think about was how on earth was she not full? Dotty was big. The first time I first saw her when I six I told Mom and Dad that Mrs Nelson was walking a horse down the street!
She was a few paces in front of me when my brain finally started cooperating with my body. I turned and sprinted back around the corner and up the street that my house was on. I don't think I had ever moved so fast in my life which makes sense because I was literally running for my life!
I ran up the steps that led into my house stumbling on the last one in my haste to get inside. I was so panicked that I practically threw myself through the front door.
Once I was on the other side I quickly and very clumsily slid all the locks into place. I breathed out three very shaky breaths and then looked through the peephole.
After a few seconds I saw her wandering past the house her head snapping back and forth jerking from left to right looking for me.
I shivered.
I waited at least twenty seconds before I decided it was safe to turn my back.
I turned to go towards the stairs and up to my room and I nearly died all over again because my Dad was standing between the stairs and Me and he was furious.
My Dad was the only person on this earth who could make me cry without saying a word. His silent fury was enough to rattle even the bravest of people. He had a stare that made me want to disappear into nothing just so I could get away from the feeling of shame and disappointment I felt whenever he looked at me like that.
And I could tell that he had never been more disappointed in me than he was in that moment.
It was more than that though, he looked scared.
My Dad Hardly ever looked scared.
In fact the only time I had seen him look like that were the times when he would look at my mom and something in his eyes would crumble. Like when she had be resuscitated in the hospital, when he thought that he was going to lose her.
That's when I knew he wasn't really angry.
He was terrified.
He had been going out of his mind in those ten minutes that I was gone.
He had his bat in his hand and his coat was half shrugged on. He was on his way to the door to go outside when I came in , he was going to look for me.
Suddenly I felt a thousand times worse for making him feel like that.
He was already going through so much with my Mom.
He was terrified that everyday was going to be his last with her, we both were and now those crazy man eating monsters were roaming the streets and I just decided to to run head first into it when I had absolutely no idea how to defend myself.
I was an idiot.
No worse than that, I was a terrible daughter.
My lips started wobbling and my eyes were watering. I ran into him full force and wrapped my arms around him. I was shaking when he opened his arms accepting me into his embrace and hugged me back.
He placed one hand on my head and stroked my hair gently squeezing me tightly with the other.
Soothing me.
I didn't deserve to be soothed.
It wasn't until a few minutes later that I realised he was shaking too.
That was nearly seven months ago when it all started and it had been nearly seven weeks since my Dad had left looking for medicine for my Mom.
He was desperate to keep her alive as long as he could and I was too but I also saw weary my mom was getting and sometimes I wondered if that was what she actually wanted.
To keep on living in constant pain, deep down I know we are being selfish that she's only holding on for us but an awful, disgusting part of me doesn't care.
We need her.
I need her.
I had been staying in my room like Mom told me to. Only leaving long enough to go to the bathroom across the hall. I had enough food and water in here to last me at least three more weeks but I was so bored and I couldn't stop thinking about Mom.
Was she okay?
Did she have enough food?
Enough water?
Was she lonely?
Was she in pain?
I had made a habit of laying under my bed ever since my Mom got sick.
Since Dad had left I had been coming to lay under here more often then usual.
It just felt safer under here like I could hide away from the rest of this insane world forever.
Most of the time I felt like a frightened, trapped animal burrowing deeper and deeper into the ground hoping to escape the danger of the world above.
The day my Mom was diagnosed I ran up to my room and hid under here. Dragging one of the blankets off the bed and hooking my toothless teddy under my arm. I had been obsessed with him since we had all went to go see how to train your dragon together. Dad had surprised me after the film with him and I had treasured him ever since.
It was one of the last times that everything was normal.
One of the last times we went out as a family before Mom got sick.
I had been laying under here for hours when my dad came into my room. He panicked slightly when he couldn't find me but quickly located me when he heard my sniffles.
He face was soon level with mine as he crouched down to look under the bed.
Our eyes connected for a few seconds and I felt like we were both thinking the same things.
What are we going to do?
How could we cope without her?
She was dying and there was nothing either of us could do to stop it, it could only be slowed down. We were living on borrowed time and it could be a week from now or a year but it was coming that was the only certainty about it.
Suddenly he was shuffling himself along the floor, well it was something between a shuffle and a strange army crawl. Both of us were tucked under my little twin sized bed lying beside each other.
It was very odd, my Dad was a big guy and I could tell he was a little uncomfortable stuffed under an 11 year old little girls bed but it made me smile.
He shifted and bumped his head against the bottom of my bed base and I laughed, he started laughing too.
We were laughing so hard that we couldn't breath and I realised it was the first time I had really laughed since Mom started getting sick. Dad had always been good at that, making me laugh.
Once our laughter had settled down I turned to him with a slightly forced smile on my face and said
" what are you doing here?".
He lifted an eyebrow at me and gave me his smuggest I'm your dad and I can do whatever I want look.
When my Dad smiles he does it with his whole face, wide, full and bright. He always has a look of mischief about him.
"What do you mean? What am I doing here? This is my house Lucy" was his response.
I shook my head and bumped my shoulder with his.
"Don't play dumb Dad, you know exactly what I meant. Why exactly are you here under my bed?".
I placed my hand on my chin and pretended to think very carefully.
"Or maybe you weren't playing and you're actually just dumb" I joked with him.
He pretended to look hurt and put his hand over his heart saying with a pained face squeezing it out like every word was hurting him
"my my Lucy Lucy Lucy whatever happened to that sweet little girl I raised who followed me around everywhere I went for three weeks because I dared to leave the house without her?. She would never make fun of her Dad like this , Oh how I miss her". He looked down at the door as he said that last part as if he were remembering a lost relative.
He could be so dramatic sometimes.
I laughed and said "you know it wasn't about that, I thought you had forgotten to take me to the comic books store. You knew it was new comic book day and that I considered a deep betrayal".
He quickly looked up again feigning a shocked expression and said " I would never, ever! Forget about new comic book day! As if I would pass up spending time with my best girl" he scoffed and then smirked at me.
I smiled to myself and the conversation stopped for a few minutes.
Everything felt better when Dad was there like the world just might stop falling apart between our few spoken words, exchanged smiles and laughter. He never even needed to say anything. Him being here, knowing he was here made all the difference in the world.
"Hey dad" I said to him
"Yes Lucy?"
"Thanks" I said curling into him and settling myself into his side. He didn't say anything back, he didn't need to. I was happy and I knew I was safe. I would always be safe with him.
I sighed looking at the creme Coloured carpet beside me where he used to settle himself whenever I was scared.
God I miss him.
I miss how things used between him, Mom and me. Before all of this started before everything had gone to hell.
To be honest things went bad for us long before the dead started rising and coming back to eat us all.
Cancer Pancreatic Cancer.
That's when my apocalypse started. When Mom started getting sick, when she got the diagnosis, when she had to start chemotherapy, when she stopped breathing in her hospital bed right in front of us, when all of her hair fell out, when all of the hospital bills started coming in, when I came home from school early one day and saw Dad leaning over the kitchen counter crying, crying.
My Dad was crying.
I had spent every day of my life with him and that was the only time I had ever seen him cry.
It scared me more than anything else had in my life up until that point.
He was my superman and he looked defeated.
When I finally realised that I was going to lose her no matter what I did. She was going to die not a maybe or someday in the far future when I had grown up and had kids of my own.
She was dying and soon.
My apocalypse started nearly a year ago and it was far from over.
I shook myself from those thoughts and looked at the watch that was on my left wrist.
It was one fifteen am.
I hadn't even noticed.
I had been twelve for a whole hour and fifteen minutes.
"Well happy birthday to me" I whispered to myself.
A very somber feeling came over me. How had it been just a year ago?
My eleventh birthday when Dad, Mom and i went ice skating. We had the best time.
We were all horrible at it, I was the worst at it by far.
I had absolutely no coordination on ice. I was slipping and sliding everywhere.
I ended up not being able to stop myself from skidding right into some poor eight year old kid and very ungracefully face planted the ice.
There was blood everywhere. The kid vomited at the sight of it and I fainted because he had vomited all over me. I guess that was karma for me knocking him down like that.
We ended up in the emergency room I had to get six stitches.
Afterwards we were in the car my Dad turned the radio on and dancing queen came on. My Mom and I had just watched Mamma Mia the night before so we thought it was amazing and immediately began singing along to the words which was hard because I had just gotten six stitches on my face but I wasn't about to let that spoil my birthday.
It took some convincing but eventually Dad joined in. We all belted out the notes and couldn't hit a single one between the three of us but we were together and we were happy.
Well now I'm finally twelve I guess.
Twelve and alone, on my birthday, God this was so depressing.
There was suddenly a loud thud that echoed throughout the house.
It sounded like it came from downstairs, in the basement where Mom sleeps. I tried to sit up but I forgot I was under my bed so instead I ended up bashing my head against the frame. God I have got to stop doing that, I'm going to end up with brain damage before I'm twenty.
There it was again.
That sound.
I scrambled out from under my bed and ran for the door.
What if Mom was struggling to breath and was trying to call for help?
What if she was dying?
I raced across the hallway and nearly tumbled down the stairs. I ran through the living room and made my way towards the basement door.
Ever since Mom got sick she had been sleeping down here.
I think she wanted to hide how sick she really was from me, she didn't want me to be around it all the time.
She had no idea that I still heard her cry out from pain sometimes , that sometimes I would hear my Dad begging her to hold on for just a little bit longer into the early hours of the morning. That I would hear them argue about it.
He needed her and she was ready to die.
I heard gasping and moaning on the other side of the door.
"Don't worry Mom I'm here, everything is going to be okay I'm coming in".
The moaning got louder. She was scared.
I grasped the handle and pulled on the door but it wouldn't budge. Why was it locked?
I was panicking, completely freaking out my Mom needed me and the door was locked. Dads not here it's my job to look after Mom, I have to do something, I need to get through the door.
I tried to think of something, anything.
How could I open the door? Why on earth was it even locked in the first place?
I ran at the door pushing my body up against it as hard as I could but it was no use it wouldn't move.
"Mom I can't get in, Mom please tell me what to do"
I heard nothing back.
"I...I... Can't do this, I don't know what to do" the moans grew louder, she couldn't even talk.
I screamed in frustration and started hitting, kicking and lashing at the door throwing myself up against it in desperation.
Then I had an idea. It was a stupid idea but better than no idea at all.
I ran towards the kitchen and started opening all the drawers. Dad keeps his emergency gun in here somewhere I just have to find it.
I'm pulling draws completely out and emptying them onto the floor , nearly ripping the doors off the cabinets as I scramble to look inside for the gun. I looked in pans , the fridge , in the microwave.
I sank to the floor sobbing uncontrollably. I couldn't find it for all I know Dad took it with him when he left. Now Mom was going to die and it was all my fault.
"No, No , No No No No No NO NO NOOOO!!!" It was like I wasn't in control of my own voice, I was making sounds I knew that, my mouth was opening and my chest was vibrating but i couldn't hear anything.
I feel like I've died.
I hit my hands against the floor and pulled at my hair. I wanted to punish myself. I should never have left her alone, I should have protected her, stayed with her.
Dad trusted me to take care of her and I've utterly failed.
I put my head between my legs and cried into them. I had no idea what to do next but I have to try anyway.
I looked up from the floor and saw it.
The gun.
It was strapped underneath the table stuck there with what looked like duck tape.
Thank god oh thank God. If there even is a God in this world. It didn't seem like it with the way things were going in this world.
Maybe there was a God but maybe we got it wrong maybe God wasn't this all loving benevolent being. Maybe he was just as sick and twisted as the rest of humanity. Why would he make us this way if he wasn't?
Maybe he was just like us only he had the power to torture us all, to tare our lives apart, to take them, and maybe he liked it.
That option seemed more likely than the all loving and caring crap the church tried to force on everyone. Shoving the idea of this immense being full of light and beauty that only used his powers for good down our throats.
I didn't believe it, not really, the devil had originally been his favourite son after all he had to get all that wickedness from somewhere. I reckon he just got too powerful and god didn't like the competition.
I scrambled forwards on my hands and knees and reached for the gun.
I picked and peeled the duck tape away frantically until my finger nails bled. It was finally free from the tape and I quickly snatched it into my hands.
It was heavier than I expected really heavy actually. Why did no one ever tell you how heavy guns actually were?
I looked at it for a few seconds, I had a gun in my hand.
A gun.
I had a gun, in my hand.
I had never held a gun before.
I didn't know how to use it I had never fired a gun but I had to try. It couldn't be that hard, could it?
I raced back towards the basement door.
I was standing in front of it again, the weapon felt like a bomb in my hand ready to explode. I felt like any second it was going to magically go off and shoot me in the foot.
I braced myself, aimed the gun and squared my shoulders.
I was scared.
I turned my face away , closed my eyes and squeezed the trigger six times at the door.
Six shots went off.
I wasn't ready for the force I felt when I fired the gun. I stumbled back several steps until my back slammed into the wall behind me and I fell to the floor my butt crashing into the hardwood.
I gasped in shock I wasn't expecting that at all.
I opened my eyes and looked to see if I did anything. I was trying to aim for the lock like I'd seen in the movies but what I did wasn't exactly what anyone would call aiming.
I hadn't hit the lock not even close but the glass near the top of the door was loose and cracked the bullet still lodged in the middle of it.
I dropped the gun and did the only thing I could think to do in that moment. I bashed my hand into the glass finishing what the bullet already started.
It was warm.
My hand was warm and... wet?
Was that blood?
Was it my blood?
I didn't feel any pain my senses seemed to have dulled and heightened at same time.
I stuck my hand through the open glass panel and reached for the lock stretching my arm as far as it would go.
My fingers brushed the lock.
I stood up on my tip toes straining as far as I could.
I touched the lock, I turned it.
I couldn't even hear Mom anymore.
I hope she's okay.
I said a silent prayer before entering.
Please God let her be okay.
I opened the door.
I stopped.
I stared.
"Mom"
"Mom"
"Mommy?"
I couldn't move, couldn't breathe, couldn't think.
Thinking of all those horrible scenarios I had imagined while I was fighting my way to get into this room.
To get to her.
I imagined her dying, struggling to breath.
I imagined finding her unconscious.
I imagined finding her on the floor because she had struggled and fell while trying to get to the door to call for help.
I imagined her already dead lying limp on the bed like a rag doll.
I hadn't imagined this.
She was sitting up on the bed. A plastic bag was over her head and a bottle of pills lay empty beside her. She had done this to herself, she had choose this, she had killed herself.
On my birthday or was it before then, had she been like this for days and i had no idea?
I felt angry then shame, devastation and angry all over again.
She wanted this but could I really blame her?
I did, for a few seconds at least. I had to be angry, I didn't want to let the other emotions in. Anger was safer. Less soul destroying.
She... she was one of them.
How was she one of them? She hadn't been bitten. I couldn't make sense of it, I couldn't think straight.
She must having been moving around for a while the lamp on the bed side table had been knocked over and smashed. That must of been the sound I heard. The one that made me come down here.
She was snarling at me, reaching for me, My Mom wanted to kill me.
To do what that woman had done to Dotty.
I was her daughter but these things didn't seem to have any recognition of who they used to be. I wasn't her daughter anymore just a meal that had delivered itself to her.
But she was still my Mom. That was her.
I sank to the floor right beside the door where I was standing. There was glass everywhere but I didn't care. Let it cut me, I want to hurt, to bleed to, to feel something.
Why wasn't I crying? why wasn't I screaming?
My world had just been shattered and all I could do was stare at her. The woman who had brought me into this world, the woman I loved above all others.
How long had I been sitting here?
A few hours?
A day?
More? I didn't know. I had no concept of time.
Loss it was a crushing, bruising force it crippled you. Left you weak, vulnerable.
It's funny how losing someone can hurt you physically my chest was tight and heavy. My breaths were laboured. It felt like the weight of my feelings was pushing down into me crushing my heart in the process.
Why was it so hard to breathe?
I suppose it was all in my head, I wasn't hurt, not really my hand cut but it had stopped bleeding. The pain in my chest seemed to override any pain I was supposed to feel from the wound.
I haven't cried since I was trying to break in here. I felt tense like I was always on the verge of tears but they wouldn't come.
I was certain I would cry when she eventually died.
I guess I was wrong about that.
I felt empty but I was in more pain than I had ever felt before, I don't know if that makes any sense at all.
The anger had subsided.
I wish it would come back.
I don't want to feel like this.
I would take any other feeling over this.
All this pain and empty, pointless thoughts.
I kept wondering when she did it. How long she had been like this. She had been alone when she died. I always thought that I would be with her.
I wasn't with her when she died she was alone, did she hesitate? Was she scared or was it easy?
Was it a relief?
Was she finally happy again?
I heard a loud bang come from the front of the house, I didn't move.
Rushed footsteps through the house soon followed the bang, I still didn't move.
I didn't care who it was. Let them kill me. Let it be over, let me be with her.
They were in the room now, with me. I still didn't move all I could do was stare at her.
"Lucy?".
That snapped me out of it. I think that sound was the only thing in the world that could have. That voice.
He was here.
He was finally here.
I was afraid to look at him, I was afraid that when I looked up that he wouldn't be there. That it was all in my head.
He was in front of me now. Crouched down before me and grasped my shoulders firmly.
"Lucy Lucy LUCY!" He was shaking me now trying to get me to move to look at him to do anything.
All I could do was whisper " I didn't want her to be alone, I wasn't here when she... She died alone.
She shouldn't be alone again". I didn't even recognise my own voice. It sounded hollow, void of any emotion. Too calm.
He pulled me into his arms and i collapsed into him. It was like a weight had been lifted off my back, I didn't realise how exhausted I had been until now.
It was safe. I was finally safe.
I could relax now.
I could rest.
I clung to him and cried, finally.
I cried and cried and cried and cried and cried again.
I didn't cry again for years after that.
