DANIEL POV:
It had been a couple of weeks since I last saw Rosita. I had been avoiding seeing her again since then. I had stuck to my guard shirts at the gate and after that I either headed to the Hilltop or back to Father Gabriel's house. Practically the only two safe places I had to hide out at.
Aaron and Eric had decided to throw a dinner for everyone, something of a celebration for breaking free from the Saviors. I planned on staying in the background for the entire night. I was sitting on a couch in their living room, reading a book I had found on the shelf, when I felt someone sit down beside me.
"Hey stranger." I heard the familiar voice say.
I couldn't help it as the smile crept onto my face, I closed the book and looked over. "Hey Rosita."
"You want to get out of here?"
"Definitely." I said, sitting the book on the arm of the couch and standing up. I offered Rosita a hand, and she took it, standing up beside me.
We left Aaron and Eric's house and began walking down the street toward where her house.
"I've missed you." She said, smiling over at me. "Especially since I got out of that house and back into mine."
"Missed you too."
The second we got inside the house, her lips were on mine.
NEXT MORNING
I woke up to sun coming through the window and it took me a second to remember where I was. The second I remembered, I rolled over to face Rosita.
"Morning beautiful." I said, wrapping an arm around her and pressing my lips against her forehead.
"Morning," She said, snuggling into my chest. I rubbed my hand against her back.
I shouldn't have just willingly came back here, not after Eugene and I's little chat back at the Sanctuary. I wasn't her first pick, not even her second pick, for companionship in the apocalypse. And Eugene had been all too happy to inform me of that.
I had been instructed by my father to go and check on Eugene, make sure he wasn't up to anything. When I got to his room, I knocked on the door and he pulled it open after a second.
"Hello." He said, moving out of the way in order for me to get by him.
I walked into the room and sat down on the couch. "Hey Eugene, how's things going?" I asked as he sat down across from me.
He shrugged, "Its fine. Negan is very accommodating." He said, nodding slightly. He looked as if he was almost struggling with something. "Daniel, I think you should know that proceeding with any sort of a relationship with Rosita would probably not be a good idea."
"What do you mean? Eugene, I'm back here now. Alexandria and it's people are the furthest thing from my mind."
"I know your plan, I haven't told anyone. But I know you want to go back, you plan on going back." He said, looking at me. "And I want you to know you shouldn't go back to her. It wouldn't be a smart idea for you. She's just using you to replace Abraham and Spencer."
I recognized the name Abraham as someone who Father Gabriel had told me that my father had killed on Alexandrias first encounter with him. And of course I knew who Spencer was, hell I had watched him die not too long ago.
And after he had died, she pulled out a gun. She tried to kill Negan in retaliation for Spencer.
Eugene cleared his throat, breaking me away from my thoughts. "If they were still alive, you wouldn't be her first choice. Hell you wouldn't even be her second choice. And there's nothing you can do to change that. I wanted to make sure you were making an informed decision."
I stood up, shaking my head. "Eugene, you may think that I want to go back there. But I don't, I'm at home here. I don't care about her or about what pick I'd be. That was just something to pass the time." I said, quickly walking out of the room and slamming the door behind me.
Before I got too far down the hall, I heard him say something else. "Just remember she's just using you as a distraction. Nothing else."
"You're awful quiet." I heard Rosita say.
"Just thinking." I said, pressing my lips against her shoulder. I had tried forgetting what all Eugene had said, but it was still there in the back of my head.
"About what?" Rosita asked, pulling back slightly and looking at me.
"It's nothing, really. Just something Eugene had tried telling me while I was at the Sanctuary. He was trying to convince me that I shouldn't come back here."
"Eugene's smart, but I'm glad you didn't listen to him. I don't know what he said, but it was probably bullshit."
I let a smile slip onto my face. "Nah, he was probably right. But it's okay, cause I don't care. I'm happier here, with you, than I ever was there."
Rosita leant over and kissed me before pulling away and getting up. "We've got to get up."
I raised an eyebrow, my eyes wandering slightly. "Why exactly do we have to get up? Cause I don't have guard shift today, and so I was thinking we could stay here."
"We have to go on a supply run, I volunteered you to go with me, and then I thought we could run by the Hilltop."
I got up after a minute, grabbing my clothes. I got changed and looked over at Rosita, who was getting dressed.
"You're staring." She said, smiling, as she glanced over at me.
I shrugged, smirking. "Not my fault."
TIME SKIP
We had just gotten out of Alexandria and were heading down the road. Apparently Rosita had the idea to head back to the outlet mall that we had first gone to, before heading to the Hilltop.
"So you gonna tell me what Eugene told you?" Rosita asked, glancing over at me.
"He was just telling me how things used to be before I showed up." I said, keeping my eyes deadset out the window. "No big deal. Don't worry about it."
"Okay. Be that way." She said, speeding up.
After that it was silent for the rest of the ride to the outlet mall. As soon as we pulled into the parking lot, and the car shut off, she was out of the car and stalking toward the building. I got out of the car and followed her to the building.
"Would you slow down?" I asked once we entered into the shops area.
"Lets just get this over with." She said, walking into a store.
"You want to know what Eugene told me?" I shouted. She stopped walking in the store. "He told me you were just using me, and that I shouldn't waste my time."
"That's not true." Rosita said, glancing back at me.
I nodded, "It doesn't matter. I came back no matter what Eugene said because I didn't buy into his bullshit."
"Then why were you thinking about it this morning? If you didn't believe him."
"It just crossed my mind. It honestly doesn't matter to me."
"Sure." She said, starting to look through the place for supplies. This is exactly why I hadn't wanted to tell her what Eugene had told me. I knew she wouldn't believe me when I said I didn't give a fuck about what he had said.
TIME SKIP
We had gone through most of the stores and had gotten a decent amount of supplies. Without saying more than two words to each other. And the drive to the Hilltop was equally as quiet.
As soon as we pulled into the Hilltop, I spotted Jesus and got out of the car as soon as she stopped it and made my way over. He looked up with a smile.
"Daniel, it's good to see you."
"Its good to see you too Jesus." I said, forcing a smile onto my face. I didn't look back as I heard the drivers side door slam shut.
"Trouble?" He asked, raising an eyebrow.
"A little. She's pissed cause I told her Eugene warned me that she was just using me while I was at the Sanctuary. And no matter how much I tell her that I don't care about what he said, she's still convinced that obviously I do care."
Jesus nodded, "You both let your tempers get the best of you, you know?" He said, patting my arm. "Come on, let's go take a walk."
"You know how originally I was wanting to stay here, but due to the circumstances I left under I couldnt?" I said, Jesus nodded. "I think maybe now that Negan already knows everything, maybe I should move here."
"You can't run from your problems, Daniel."
"I'm not running from my problems. I'm just saying it might not be the best idea for me to stay in Alexandria." I said, shrugging. "I could help out more here. You all don't really have anyone other than you to do supply runs. I could help with that and protecting this place."
Jesus glanced over at me, "I'm not gonna stop you if you want to join us here. I'm just tell you that it won't help things for you to just pick up and leave Alexandria. You might think it will, but most likely it won't. But if you want to come here, I won't stop you. You're right that we had originally planned on you coming here anyway, so of course you're welcomed here."
We walked up to the house that Maggie was staying in, Jesus opened the door and walked in, with me following behind him.
"Hey," Jesus said, smiling at Maggie, Daryl, and Rosita.
"Hey. Where have you all been?" Maggie asked, smiling at me.
"Walking, talking about the differences between living in Alexandria and living here." Jesus answered, glancing over at me. "I was telling Daniel that I thought Alexandria needed him more than he thought the Hilltop does. He underestimates our survival ability."
Maggie laughed slightly, "We can survive just fine, Daniel."
I nodded, "That's what Jesus was telling me." I said, sitting down in a chair. I glanced over at Rosita, who was looking at me.
Jesus cleared his throat. "I do have to admit that I told him we'd welcome him with open arms though." He said. "If he ever did decide to join us here."
Maggie nodded, "It'd be great to have another person around here. But I doubt you want to leave Alexandria, Daniel."
"You never know, things could change. And I originally planned on staying here anyway." I said, shrugging slightly.
We sat around talking for a while longer before Rosita suggested heading back to Alexandria. Once we were back in the car and outside of the Hilltop, she glanced over at me.
"You want to leave Alexandria?" She asked, stopping the car.
"I don't know." I said, looking over at her. "I don't know what I want to do at this point."
"Daniel, why do you want to leave?"
"I don't know what I'm doing wrong here, I'm really starting to think we can't coexist in one location. I don't tell you something, you're pissed. I finally tell you, you're even more pissed."
Rosita looked away and back at the road, starting to drive off again.
"Rosita, I mean hell, before I went back to the Sanctuary, I thought we were fine. You seemed fine. And then apparently, you were off finding a gun, and having Eugene make bullets."
"That's irrelevant. I could've killed him, I could've ended this whole thing then and there."
"You were practically planning a suicide mission! We were spending every night together, and you were planning on killing Negan and potentially getting yourself killed in the process. And you didn't even clue me in on it."
"He would've died first."
"You want to be mad at me for going back to them, for getting inside information for Rick, fine be mad. But you were gonna get yourself killed. You were gonna leave me in a much more permanent way."
It had been a couple days since I had been back, and until then Father Gabriel hadn't told me much of what I had missed. Instead he was trying to help me understand my importance to the group.
"You ever gonna fill me in on things while I was gone?" I asked, walking into the church where he was sitting.
He had left the house before I hadn't gotten up, and now here I was. Following our now daily routine, since I had gotten back from the Sanctuary. We would meet in the church and spend hours talking about things. It could be anything, life before the apocalypse. Anything.
Father Gabriel let out a sigh, "I suppose I could." He said, I sat down beside him on the pew and waited for him to continue. "It was difficult around here. Rosita blamed me for why she's still alive, for why you and Eugene were there. Because I convinced her not to kill your father the second she got a chance. She waited and instead blamed herself for Spencer and Olivia being dead, and for you and Eugene being there."
"That's ridiculous." I said, shaking my head.
"She told me that if she had died, no one would've gave a damn. But that instead people that the others cared about were gone now."
I glanced over at her, "Rosita, I give a damn about you and I have since we first got close. And you tried getting yourself killed. And if he, or any of the other dumbasses there, had killed you - I don't know what I would've done."
I continued on when she didn't say anything, "So quite honestly, I don't give a damn about what you and Abraham had or what you and Spencer had, I only care about what we have. And apparently at the same time, you were trying to find a way to get yourself killed."
It was quiet the rest of the way back to Alexandria. When we pulled through the gates, Tara and Aaron came over to help unload all of the stuff in the car.
Tara looked over at me after everything was unloaded, "Do you mind covering the rest of my shift?"
I shook my head, "No. I don't mind at all." I said, taking the gun from her. I walked over to the ladder going up to the watch tower. After I was up top, I sat down.
Aaron followed me up the ladder a few minutes later and passed me a bottle of water and a granola bar. "I was instructed to make sure you had water and food."
"Thanks." I said, taking a drink of the water. Aaron smiled and nodded. "So, were you and Eric together before everything happened?"
"Yes, we were. But if you're wondering what I think you are, I've seen plenty of other relationships work out when they didn't even know each other before the apocalypse."