FALLING - by Maria Love (a Negan fanfic)

Chapter 5

I was at the start of my second week living in Alexandria, time had flown by. Each day was the same; wake up, cup of tea, work at the stables, bed. It was like clockwork. As tedious as it sounded, it gave a comforting feeling of making things seem like how they used to. Normality was one of the things I missed the most, but I needed to start accepting that life now was the new normal.

Once I was at the paddock, I gave the horses breakfast before letting them stretch their legs inside the pen for a bit. Ideally they all needed, at the very least, two hours of exercise a day. But I had to work with the limited recourses I had, I knew that once the horses were safely broken in they'd be able to get their exercise on supply runs.

Thirty minutes had passed and there was no sign of Negan, until today he hadn't bailed once. I climbed over the fence and saw one of the supervisors who would stand guard by the paddock when Negan was let out, maybe there was something going on that I didn't know about.

"Hey, did Michonne or Gabriel mention anything about Negan not working at the stables today? It's just he hasn't shown up, so I wasn't sure if there was a change of plans" I asked.

"He won't leave his cell, I told Michonne and she tried to press a reason out of him but got nothing. He said he didn't want to see or speak to anyone, he just wanted to be alone" he explained, and confusion washed over me.

He was absolutely fine yesterday, what could have happened over a course of a nights sleep to suddenly make him become so muted. I nodded and thanked the man before slowly walking back to the horses, my face painted with obvious perplexity. I decided that the best thing to do for now was to carry on with my days work, and respect his wishes. Despite the awful things Negan had done, even he should be entitled to have privacy privileges.

It wasn't until I was working on my own again that I realised how slow the days really were, it made me feel very isolated. I couldn't take my mind off of why Negan decided to not attend work today, it just didn't make sense to me. I'm no psychiatrist, but there were no obvious signs to suggest that there was something wrong. He didn't appear unhappy working at the stables, in fact, the energy I got from him was positive. Like he enjoyed spending his time with the horses and me. So now, all I could wonder was why he suddenly chose to seclude himself. Needing answers, I wondered whether Father Gabriel could give me some clarity on the situation.

*******

"Louise, on God I swear to you, I'm just as much in the dark as you are. He wouldn't tell me or Michonne anything other than 'I just want to be alone', that's all the information we got out of him" explained Gabriel as we sat on a picnic bench next to the vegetable garden. I caught him at the right time just as I was on my way home for my lunch break.

"I just don't understand" I mumble to myself as I furrow my brows in thought.

"He isn't worth your time Louise, he's just a cold blooded killer who is damn lucky to still be alive. There isn't a single compassionate or friendly bone in that mans body, for your own good please forget about Negan and keep your focus on those horses. They deserve your attentiveness a lot more than he does".

"I just- I thought I was getting through to him. There wasn't a single moment where he was being reluctant or difficult, he just did the jobs without complaint. So I know that it can't be the work load, it's something else. It has to be" I say as I ponder over the situation.

"Louise, please listen to me. That man is too shallow for even the walkers to bite, and he's certainly not worth your concern. When he killed Abraham and Glenn, it wasn't to even the score or to save the people around him. It was his idea of making a good spectacle, some men are nothing but fiends and monsters. Some men just want to watch the world burn, and one of them is right in that cell over there. You're good at your job Louise, so for your own sake please just stick to that. Look, I gotta go. Just promise me you won't waste your time over him, I'm sorry but some souls can't be saved" he finishes, leaving me drowning in my thoughts.