DANGEROUS LOVE | twd au

Chapter 10:: Crash Landing

The light has gone out. Perhaps it stopped burning ages ago, but she was just too stupid to notice.

Rosita Espinosa is known by everyone, but she knows no one. She has no place to call home. There is no goal, there is no reason to be fighting.

She's tired.

'My condolences,' Negan breaks the silence, still crouching in front of her, reading her face in the sudden quiet after he dropped a bomb on her. He might have been harder on her than he meant to be. 'You take your time,' he reassures her. She's not going to say anything useful in a while, he predicts. This will need time to land with her.

Negan lays his hand on Rosita's shoulder and uses her to prop himself off the ground. He stands up, stretching his limbs with a deep sigh. He looks down at Rosita, still kneeling in her own blood, still completely isolated in her own thoughts. Her body is trembling. Her hair is damp with sweat. Now and then, a clear tear escapes her eyes, and falls straight down onto the ground.

Negan scratches his beard with the palm of his hand, covering his mouth in thought. 'Hot damn...' he whispers. He's outdone himself. Rosita Espinosa snapped like a branch because she hadn't been humbled in a long time.

He gets busy. He walks away from Rosita and sets Lucille down on the couch. Then he picks up the chair that Rosita had thrown at him and carries it past Rosita, placing it back at the table.

Rosita slowly looks up and follows his every move for as far as she can see without turning around. She tries shifting her weight to her right knee, but nothing takes away the worsening pain in her left leg. She grits her teeth when she lifts her hands to look at the torn-open wound. The stitches, with her skin still attached, are lying a few feet ahead of her.

She hears the tap running and Negan filling a glass of water. With him out of sight, she carefully slides her left leg forward to sit on her behind. She breathes deeply in and out when she feels the blood finally flowing to her lower leg again. The pain gets a little better too, but not for long.

'What do you think you're doing?' it sounds from behind her. 'We're not done yet. You didn't really think that was it, right?' Negan asks out of her sight. 'I'm gonna need you back on your knees. Don't think of it as degrading, I don't know, make something up.' He lets out a deep chuckle.

Rosita swallows deeply. 'I'm bleedin' out.' Her voice cracks.

'Right.' Negan facepalms himself jokingly. 'So you'd better keep that pressure coming. Now, don't make me tell you again.'

Rosita's face scrunches up with repulsion. Reluctantly, she folds her hurting leg back underneath her.

'Look at you, swallowing your hate,' Negan says. He takes a big gulp of water. He's coming closer to Rosita. 'You don't have to like me, you see? We just have to work together.' He stops, standing next to her.

His gloved hand presents the glass of water to her. Rosita refuses at first, to drink from the same glass as Negan, but the sight of the water draws attention to her dry throat, and she accepts the glass. She looks up at Negan when tilting the glass to take a sip.

For a second, the thought crosses Negan's mind that she might throw the glass at him. He knows she wouldn't, but just as a precaution, he doesn't wait to see if she will hand it back; he grabs hold of the glass and Rosita releases it without struggling. She jolts her head forward again, clearing her view of the man next to her.