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You fell in slow motion and it was funny only because it wasn’t – which made it an oxymoron, but the world never made sense even before it became a bigger nonsensical mess. You tripped and stumbled your way through the motions and maybe if you paced yourself a little slower and you weren’t trying to live so damn fast it would have been a little easier, but you never did learn how to stay still. Instead you learned how to duck from a hurled beer bottle, a raised belt, a meathook fist. Calm and quiet was a concept that did nothing for you, until Rick and Michonne.
You never had a plan for them.
The stuffed rabbit was a raggedy pink thing, buttons for eyes and yellow thread for a perpetual smile, and it found its way from the shelf of a convenience store to your knapsack because of something Rick said in passing the day before. “Carol gave Judith those plastic cups and that’s keeping her occupied, for now,” he’d told you, right before kissing you goodnight and wishing you safety on your run.
You headed straight for Beth’s cell once you came back, and the girl made herself scarce without you having to ask, which you were grateful for. Judith was on the floor, smashing her red plastic cups together and burbling to herself, though she looked up and started squealing the moment she saw it was you. You grinned and presented the rabbit with a flourish, unadulterated joy bubbling up from your core when her mouth rounded up in wonder and her tiny hands stretched out.
“Hey Lil Asskicker, I’m the friendly Mr. Bunny,” you said, bobbing the toy’s head up and down like the Muppets on Sesame Street you remembered seeing once, before pressing it into Judith’s arms. She squeezed its bean-filled body multiple times, learning the feel of this wonderful new creature, right before promptly chewing on the tip of its ear. You had to fight to tug it free from her teeth and thankfully she didn’t fuss over that.
Michonne found you like that, balancing Judith on your knees and rubbing the rabbit’s nose into hers so she squealed with delight. “Care to join the party?” you asked, and looked up in time to see the pained dismay of Michonne’s expression before she sealed it away. She crouched beside you, still as stone, only reacting when Judith started reaching for her.
“No,” Michonne hissed, shying away, and it was a marvel that she was so panicked about a baby when severing heads and limbs didn’t faze her in the slightest. Just as you feared, Judith’s mouth scrunched up and she started whimpering, Michonne’s face in a rictus of unknown emotion when you tried, and failed, to hush her. “Oh, fine, give her here,” she muttered once the wailing started, and at first you were relieved, watching Judith settle against Michonne’s chest like she belonged there, cooing in triumph.
But then Michonne’s lips pressed tight together, tears shining in her eyes as she cradled Judith’s tiny body, and it hit you like a train wreck. You wanted to kick yourself for being so blind to what was there, the carefully molded distance Michonne kept putting between herself and the much younger members of the prison, the ‘A’ pendant hanging from her silver necklace that she’d touch as she stared at nothing in particular. There were some nightmares that didn’t have to wait for sleep, and she had done her best to not cave from the weight of them.
“M’sorry,” you managed to blurt out, and Michonne’s gaze honed in on you in an instant, and you had to look down, ears burning. “I shouldn’t have forced you to –”
She placed a hand on your knee instead, tracing the curve of bone in soothing patterns there when it should have been you comforting her. “You didn’t force me into anything.” Her flimsy smile petered away, and she breathed out slow. “I just. I can’t talk about it. Not yet.”
You nodded, and now would have been the time to say ‘I’ll be here whenever you’re ready’ or something cheesy like that, but you stayed silent, choosing to tip forward and kiss the exposed skin of her shoulder, then Judith’s downy forehead.
Footsteps alerted yourselves to Rick’s presence, and you found him hovering at the entrance to the cell, wearing dirt and sweat and a little smile itching at the corners of his mouth. You still caught yourself looking for jealousy in Rick’s face, even then, but you never found it. His heart was selfish enough – big enough – to hold the two of you close.
“This looks like fun,” he said, his eyes somehow glittering even in the shadows of the walls, and the kiss he gave you was thorough enough to have you glaring as he pulled back so soon, and he just laughed, though he stopped short once he saw the wetness on Michonne’s cheeks. “Are you okay?”
She paused, glancing at you for a second with a sad knowing smile, before hauling Rick into a liplock of her own. “I am now.”
Rick was counting his daughter’s toes, singsonging this little piggy stayed home as Michonne held the giggling Judith up in her lap and you scattered kisses in Michonne’s dreads. There was so much being left unsaid, so many words that should have been woven into the hopeful air surrounding the three of you, words you still didn’t know how to say, but you didn’t mind. You had all the time in the world. Until you didn’t.
The place you called home was burning, Beth terrified and tucked close to you before the shock was replaced by teenage obstinacy, and then she too was gone. It was a miracle you didn’t fall dead from your heart being cloven in two, the worst kind of slow-bleeding wound constantly amplified by your utter loneliness. And then it was another miracle entirely, finding Rick and Michonne and Carl, alive, they’re alive.
Rick’s gaze meet yours as morning breaks, once again a vibrant star-shaping blue now that he’s been rested enough, and you smile back at him, sneaking in a kiss because Carl’s not around to be scarred for life.
“Go check what’s keeping them with that firewood,” he says, his breath beating out a tattoo on your skin.
“Ain’t a damn babysitter,” you grumble, which earns you a peck on the nose and a soft “please?” for your troubles, and so off you go.
Michonne and Carl are already done with their task, it seems, but they’re also talking. Michonne’s back is to you and you can only guess as to what this is all about from the wideness of Carl’s eyes. “I was gone for a long time,” Michonne says as you get close enough. “But then Andrea brought me back. Your dad and Daryl brought me back. You did.”
Carl’s about to say something, but then he finally spots you. “Um. Hey.”
You go to stand beside Michonne, keeping your smile reserved though you want to kiss her too. “Hey yourself. What’s takin y’all so long?”
She sighs, the kind of sigh that has you on your toes immediately. “I was telling Carl about us. All three of us.” Michonne hesitates, then threads her hand in yours. “I don’t know if he’s okay with it.” She squeezes your fingers and you squeeze back, glad to have an anchor in case things get shot to shit.
But they don’t. Carl sets his jaw and straightens his shoulders, tackles you both in a hug that knocks off his ten-gallon hat. “Dad always forgets he needs taking care of,” he says, muffled into your clothes. “I’m glad you both can remind him.”
A ridiculous grin takes up your face, flooded through with a crazy joy. Carl doesn’t sound rusty or unsure, his faith in you absolute, and Michonne’s voice makes you feel like falling all over again. “We take care of each other.”
And you always will.