You had lived inside Alexandria since almost the beginning. The walls had kept you safe, maybe too safe. You’d learned how to grow vegetables, mend clothes, keep a smile even when you were terrified, but you’d never truly seen the world outside.

When Rick Grimes arrived, everything changed.

He walked through the gates like a storm barely held together, eyes sharp and häunted. He didn’t trust the walls. He didn’t trust the smiles. And when he looked at you, it wasn’t unkind, but it was like he could see right through the comfort you wrapped around yourself.

“You think this place is safe?” he asked you once, voice low, after he’d caught you humming while tending to your garden.

You straightened, defensive. “It is safe. It has been.”

He shook his head, almost pitying. “Nothin’s safe anymore. Not really.”

You wanted to hate him for bursting your bubble. But you couldn’t. Because the more you watched him, the way he held his daughter, the way he never stopped scanning the walls, the way he carried grîëf like a second skin, the more you understood. He wasn’t trying to ruin your peace. He was trying to prepare you.

And, slowly, you wanted to learn.

He taught you how to sh00t, how to swing a knîfë without hesitation. His hands, calloused and sure, corrected your grip, guided your äim.

“Don’t hesitate,” he told you one afternoon, his breath warm at your ear. “Hesitation’ll get you ki!!ed.”

You turned your head slightly, heart racing. “I’m not afraid.”

His eyes caught yours then, blue, piercing, but softened by something unspoken. “I know.”

It wasn’t long before whispers in Alexandria started, how much time you spent together, how you smiled at him when you thought no one noticed. You tried to push it aside, to bury the feelings growing like wi!dfire in your chest.

But one night, after a close call at the gates, you found yourselves alone in the dark, adrenaline still pounding.

“You don’t belong out there,” Rick murmured, shaking his head. “You deserve somethin’ better than this world.”