Bad Bad Ritual | CEGAN

I felt your poltergeist presence in the frame of the bed

The morning after, Carl woke up as alone as he'd fallen asleep. His whole body ached, everything hurt from top to bottom, but he wasn't about to let anyone see it. He sat up in the large bed, taking in his surroundings. Nothing had changed, his clothes were still in a heap by the bed, his hat still over on the sofa, his body still hurt in ways that made yesterday that much more real. The only thing that had changed was the day on the calendar and Carl still had to get up and deal with the shit that had occurred the night before.

Carl had passed out as soon as Negan left for some business negotiations with his men and he was fairly certain he could've been picked up and moved without so much as batting a lash. He wanted to be mad at himself for falling asleep in the first place, for letting his guard down around the enemy, but the events of yesterday had left him bone tired and he had welcomed the black unthinking of sleep.

He didn't know what he had expected when he woke up. Some part of him felt panicky about waking up alone and undisturbed. It made him feel like garbage, used and discarded without a second glance. Tears fell unbidden from his eye. He should be happy that Negan left him alone, but he couldn't fight the feelings of rejection he so feared from rearing their ugly heads up in his chest.

What happened now? Would everyone know what happened? Would Negan have spent all night bragging to his men about what he'd done to the little freak from Alexandria? Would his friends and family take one look at him and be able to see how tainted he had become?

Carl was terrified, not of Negan, but of what he had made him feel, had made his body do. If his intention had been to instill some kind of fear in him, then he had succeeded. His body trembled as flashes of what happened between them came to mind, how scared he'd been, how vulnerable and defeated he felt, how good Negan's hands had felt on his skin, how absolutely mind blowing it felt to be filled by Negan and shatter apart on his thick length.

What the hell is wrong with me?

He wanted a shower. A scalding hot one to scrub the filth of yesterday from his skin.

///

"Goooood mooooorning, baby boy~!" Negan smiled wide as he waltzed in, food tray in hand. He took in the sight of the small boy, tangled in his sheets, sitting in the middle of his bed, pretty as a picture. Carl's lips were pouted from sleep and all that long hair was mussed. It made him smirk to see how the boy's sleepy face was so similar to his well fucked one. The tears shimmering down his face only added to how beautiful he looked and Negan took a sick satisfaction in knowing he was the cause of those tears. "Daylight's a'wastin' and I have shit to actually accomplish today, so get your lazy ass out of bed and come eat."

He knew Carl would wake up alone and confused, wondering where he had run off to, but Negan hadn't predicted the relief he saw trickle across his features. He had just hurt Carl, but the kid was still relieved to no longer be alone and have the only adult he knew there with him; Negan was both his abuser and savior and that carried the heady power to it that he found so addicting. It was such an innocent and purely human reaction and Negan fed off of it.

"I'm not hungry." Carl refused to look him in the eye, hiding behind the curtain of his hair again.

"Don't start that angsty teenage girl bullshit, Carl! You need to eat, so stop being a pussy about it and stuff your damn face." Negan was highly amused with the glare that earned him. "Or, if you'd rather..." He sat beside Carl, brushing a lock of hair back off his shoulder, letting his fingertip trail along the boy's too soft, porcelain skin. "Daddy could feed you, baby boy...you wanting daddy to take care of you?"

Carl flinched hard, jerking his shoulder out from under Negan's touch. He kept quiet, his lips pursed hard, white knuckling the sheets. He had barely acknowledged the older man's presence until he had touched him.