Chapter Text
Even in the safety of Alexandria, Michonne found herself unable to sleep through the night. It had definitely gotten better since those first few weeks at the safe-zone (on those nights Michonne had found herself waking up almost every hour, the slightest movement pulling her from her sleep), but it still happened sometimes. After all, knowing she was safe did little to dispel the nightmares, or the bad memories that always seemed to surface just as she was getting into bed.
Tonight, however, was different. Tonight, Michonne had woken up in a cold sweat with a pit in her stomach for no reason at all, or, at least, none that she could think of. She knew she hadn’t had a nightmare and she didn’t hear anything in the house that would’ve woken her up. The only thing out of the ordinary was the persistent feeling in her gut that was yelling at Michonne to go check on her kids, preventing her from going back to sleep.
So, Michonne quietly got out of bed, threw on her slippers, and grabbed her sword (you never know what you’re walking into in this world, even in your own home) before tiptoeing out into the hallway. She peered into Judith’s room first, and was glad to see her sound asleep in her bed. Next was Carl’s room, but when Michonne looked inside, there was no one there.
Michonne felt her heart drop and immediately turned around, rushing down the stairs. She had just made it to the last step when she noticed Carl sitting at the kitchen table. Michonne breathed a sigh of relief, finally feeling her heart beat return to normal. Sure, it was definitely worrying that Carl was sitting at the table by himself at two A.M. with a thousand yard stare plastered on his face, but at least Michonne knew where he was.
“Carl?” Michonne said, causing the boy to quickly snap out of his thoughts and reach for the gun strapped to his leg.
“Relax, it’s just me.” Michonne put her hands up by head.
“Michonne?” Carl asked, blinking slowly and reholstering his gun. “Sorry, I thought…”
“It’s okay.” Michonne pulled out a chair and sat down next to him. “What’re you doing down here? It’s late, you should be asleep.”
“Couldn’t sleep.” Carl responded, he still seemed to be a little out of it.
“Why? Is something wrong?”
Carl stared down at the table in silence. It had always been a bit of a struggle to get Carl to talk about his feelings, but he’d been doing a better job of it recently, especially when it was Michonne he was talking to. Rick joked that she was the “Carl whisperer”, and while Michonne always told him that he was being absurd, he might be right this time because Carl was turning back towards her and beginning to speak.
“Eh, kinda.” Carl admitted. “It’s nothing bad or anything like that, it’s just…”
Carl shook his head. “It’s stupid.”
“Hey.” Michonne put her hand on top of Carl’s, which was resting on the table. “Don’t do that. If something’s upsetting you, I want to help. I don’t care how ‘stupid’ it is, tell me what’s going on.”
“Okay.” Carl conceded after a moment. “Okay, well Enid and I were talking earlier and we were just joking about how no one here really gets what it’s like to be out there, but then Enid actually started getting upset about it. She said it was really isolating not having anyone to relate to, and she asked me to tell her about the stuff I’ve been through so that she didn’t feel like she was the only one with a shitty life, and I did.”
“I told her about all the stuff we’ve been through, every single thing.” Carl took a deep breath. “Thing is, when I told her about the night before we got to Terminus, when those men attacked us, Enid said something weird.”
“What’d she say?” Michonne felt her “overprotective mom mode” start to kick in at the thought of Enid saying something mean or insensitive to Carl about what he’d been through.
“Well,” Carl continued. “I was saying how I never really understood why dad got so mad at those men. I mean, plenty of other people have tried to kill us, and I’ve never seen him as angry at any of them as he was at those men. Enid said it made sense, though. She- she said that any parent would have that reaction if they were about to see their kid get… raped.”
Michonne’s heart seized a little at Carl’s words, memories of that night flooding back to her. Memories of Carl crying. Of that perverted man touching her son. Of Carl shaking in her arms when she held him afterwards.
Michonne had been so scared for Carl that night, so scared of what those men were going to do to him. For the following weeks she’d made sure to keep a very close eye on the new men in their group, just in case. Even now, Michonne still found herself watching longer than she needed to whenever any of the Alexandrians talked to Carl. Making sure that none of them were getting too close to him or looking at him in a way they shouldn’t.
“Michonne? Michonne?” Carl was waving his hand in front of her face. “Did you hear me?”
“What? No, sorry.” Michonne said, snapping out of her thoughts.
Carl laughed a little, repeating what he had said before. “I said, isn’t that ridiculous? Obviously Enid’s wrong, so I don’t know why this is bothering me so much.”
Michonne stared at the boy in silence, at a loss for words. Did Carl really not know that that man had been about to rape him? It felt like something that Carl should know, but the more Michonne thought about it, the more she realized that it did make sense that he didn’t know. After all, he had only been fourteen when it had happened, and he didn’t have the internet or health class to teach him about those things. The only way Carl could learn about that stuff was from people telling him, and, apparently, no one had.
“Michonne?” Carl was looking at her strangely, seemingly sensing that something was wrong.
Michonne reached over and took one of Carl’s hands in both of her own. She wished she didn’t have to tell him this. Hell, she wished he’d never even been put in that kind of situation in the first place, but he had, and they had to talk about it.
“Carl, I’m sorry, but… Enid’s right.”
Carl stared at Michonne in shock for a moment, not saying anything, before pulling his hand out of her grasp. He shook his head and stood up, beginning to pace around the room. Michonne wasn’t exactly sure what kind of reaction she’d been expecting, but it wasn’t this.
“Carl.” Michonne stood up and walked over to the boy, placing her hands on his shoulders. “Carl, stop. I know that’s not what you wanted to hear, but it’s the truth.”
“No. No, it’s not.” Carl argued. “That man… he- he was gonna do something bad to me, but not- not bad like that!”
“Yes, he was.” Michonne insisted. “Carl, think about it. Think about the way he was looking at you, the way he was touching you.”
Carl took a shaky breath, he had stopped moving and his gaze had become unfocused. God, Michonne wanted to find that man’s corpse and kill it all over again for putting Carl through this. He was just a child, he shouldn’t have had to go through any of the things he had, but he especially shouldn’t have had to go through that. He shouldn’t have had to deal with being sexually assaulted before he even had his first kiss!
“Oh god.” Carl muttered under his breath, coming back to reality. “Oh god, he was…”
“He was trying to rape me.” Carl looked up at Michonne, tears falling down his cheeks. “Michonne… Michonne, he-he was trying to…”
“It’s okay, it’s okay.”
Michonne pulled Carl into her, wrapping her arms around her son tightly. Carl quickly did the same, pushing his face into Michonne’s shoulder as his body was wracked with sobs. Michonne lifted one of her hands from around Carl’s neck and ran her fingers through his hair instead in an attempt to comfort him, though it didn’t seem to be doing much.
“I’m sorry, Carl.” Michonne said. “I’m so sorry that that happened to you, and I’m sorry that your dad and I didn’t talk to you about it, we should have.”
“I know that this is scary.” Michonne continued, softening her voice. “I can’t tell you that it won’t happen again, but what I can tell you is that I’ll do everything I can to make sure it doesn’t. I’ll always protect you, and I’d die before I let anything happen to you. I love you, Carl. I love you so so much.”
“I know, I know.” Carl breathed into Michonne’s shirt, voice still thick with tears. “I love you too, ‘Chonne.”
Michonne kissed the top of Carl’s head, and she felt the boy relax against her a little. She hoped he’d be able to fall back asleep tonight, he definitely needed the rest. As for her, Michonne was sure that Carl crying like this was yet another memory that would be added to the long list of things that kept her up at night, but she didn’t mind as long as her son was okay.