Chapter Text
“Roses are red,
Violets are blue,
This kid had a bat…
But no goddamn clue.”
Rest in pieces, Junior.
The kid was maybe eighteen. Nineteen if you rounded up and ignored the baby cheeks. Skinny, too. Real string bean. Like someone forgot to feed him during puberty. Not walker-thin, though. Nah. This one hadn’t starved to death.
Negan squatted beside the corpse and picked up the bat. Aluminum. Hollow. Dented like it hit something—maybe a walker, maybe a person. Maybe a tree, just for practice. He gave it a little swing, half-assed, before scoffing and tossing it back down.
“Jesus, kid. This thing couldn’t split a watermelon.”
He looked at the body again. One sneaker was half off, laces untied. His shirt had a cartoon skull on it. Not the scary kind—more like Hot Topic clearance bin. Something some kid would buy trying to look edgy.
“Lemme guess,” Negan muttered. “You had a bunk bed once. Shared a room with your little brother. You ever wipe your own ass before the world went to shit?”
He sighed and rubbed his forehead.
There was a hole in the side of the kid’s neck. Clean. Sharp. Knife, maybe. Or a screwdriver. Negan had seen that kind of wound enough times to know it wasn’t a walker bite. Too precise. Too intentional.
Someone did this.
“Damn shame,” he said, voice quieter. “Didn’t even get a chance to make your own mistakes. Just got tossed into someone else’s.”
He stood up, his knees cracking like old floorboards, and slid the shovel from his pack. The ground was dry as hell. Hard-packed, sunbaked, and mean. First jab of the blade made his shoulders ache.
“Don’t take this the wrong way,” Negan grunted, “but you’re a pain in my ass.”
He dug.
And dug.
The sun was doing that thing it did—melting into the horizon like a lazy egg yolk. Heat stuck to his neck. Flies started buzzing around the body, and he waved them off half-heartedly.
“I bet you had a name like Logan,” he said, talking to the kid now. “Yeah. You look like a Logan. Or maybe a Dylan. One of those soft-ass, suburban names.”
Another scoop of dirt. Another flick of the wrist.
“Your mom probably drove a minivan. Had one of those ‘My Kid’s an Honor Student’ stickers. Bet she made killer meatloaf. Not that you appreciated it. You probably bitched about it every Thursday, ungrateful little shit.”
He stopped and wiped the sweat from his brow.
“Then one day the news hit. Sirens blaring, neighbors screamin’. Your dad grabbed the camping gear—thought that’d fix it. Your mom cried. And you? You grabbed your little league bat like that was gonna mean something.”
He paused. Let out a quiet laugh.
“You probably thought it made you a badass. Thought you were protecting your family. That’s cute. Real Saturday morning cartoon hero shit.”
He drove the shovel into the ground again, slower now.
“Let me tell you something, Junior. That bat? That idea? That doesn’t protect people. Doesn’t mean jack shit without follow-through. Without blood. Without doing things you’ll never sleep right again after.”
The grave was half-dug now. Dirt clung to his boots, and his hands ached. But he kept going.
“You ever bash someone’s head in, kid? Ever feel their skull pop like a goddamn melon under your swing? No. Course you didn’t. You’d have puked your guts out if you did.”
He leaned on the handle, staring at the boy again.
“You had no fuckin’ clue what you were doing. And you know what? Good. That means you didn’t become someone like me.”
Silence stretched between them. Long and hollow. The kind that made you aware of your heartbeat. Of your bones.
Negan stepped over the grave and crouched beside the kid again.
“You remind me of someone,” he said softly. “A kid I knew. Didn’t last long. Not because he wasn’t smart, or brave, or fast. Just… wasn’t mean enough.”
He started patting the kid’s pockets—not looting, just checking. No wallet. No ID. No knife. Just a folded-up piece of notebook paper. Smudged. Torn.
He unfolded it carefully.
It was a list.
"Get supplies.
Check pharmacy.
Find mom.
Don’t give up."
Negan stared at it.
His lips parted, but nothing came out.
“…Shit.”
He folded the note, tucked it back in the kid’s jacket, and stood.
“You had someone to live for,” he said. “That’s more than most.”
The rest of the grave came faster. Like the earth gave in out of pity. By the time he finished, the stars were peeking out—soft and silent, like they didn’t want to bother anyone.
Negan picked up the aluminum bat, turned it over in his hand.
It was so light.
“You were just a boy with a stick in the dark,” he murmured. “Same as all of us, once.”
He tossed it in the grave. Then the body. Then the dirt.
Each shovelful landed with a thud that sounded too final.
He didn’t rush. He didn’t hum. He just worked, mouth tight, chest heavy, like something old was pressing down on him again.
When it was done, he took two sticks and made a little cross. Tied it with some twine from his pack. He planted it into the dirt and stepped back.
“You made it farther than most,” he said. “Bet your mom would’ve been proud.”
Then, after a moment:
“…Hope someone’s out there still looking for you.”
He turned, walked a few steps, then paused.
“I’m sorry I couldn’t be the one you found.”
And with that, Negan walked into the dark.
Behind him, the wind passed over the grave like a lullaby.