Chapter Text
"Romina, sweetie," Lori breathed out in panic, already halfway in the backseat trying to soothe her twelve year old son Carl. Romani was freaking out just as much as he was, and they both had a valid reason to be. The dead were rising and taking bites out of living humans, the streets were filled with screams of agony and absolute terror from the moment they all stepped outside. "S-Shane's gonna take us to safety a-and everything is gonna be fine, okay?"
It didn't sound like anything was gonna be okay at all, it didn't look like it either.
She couldn't even sign anything, her hands were shaking too much for her to make out any words; It made it all the more fuckin' terrifying that she already couldn't use her voice, a voice she hadn't been born with. She'd already learned that not even a life or death experience would make her vocal chords magically come to life, not even a damn scream had torn from her lips when that-that walker had run at her before Shane had come..
She didn't know if he'd come to grab her because he'd heard her mother screaming for her life at the door, trying to tear the man's teeth out of her neck. Her mother was too old to fight back, Shane knew that and she did too. Shane also knew that Romina couldn't make a single fuckin' noise if it came down to it.. She couldn't scream for help, not like he'd heard her mother do. Or maybe he'd come to her rescue because he'd known her for so long, known that she'd been neighbors with the Grimes for years and had developed such a close relationship with them all.
Was it the cookies that she brought over for him and Rick...? Yeah, they were life saving cookies now.
"We stopped at the hospital already and dad didn't wake up." Carl explained to the woman now sitting beside him, blue eyes teary and voice shaking. He looked so much more like his father than Lori, it made it all the more heartbreaking to find out that he wouldn't be coming with them. Lori, his mother, was a pretty woman with long brunette hair that Romina used to be jealous of until she found out it never curled. As expected from a mother, her hazel eyes were always warm and filled with kindness whenever Romina saw her...
Carl, her twelve year old son, had his fathers blue eyes and brown hair. He didn't have the curl that Rick had, but the shade of his hair was so specific you couldn't even give Lori credit for that. He did have his mother's pale complexion.. That was about it.
'I'm sorry.'
It was something so easy and simple to sign, and Carl was the easiest person to use sign language with because he paid attention to his lessons the most. She was the first person he'd ever met that couldn't speak so.. He had to learn a way to communicate with her. She was so flattered when he used sign the first time, she cried. "It's okay.. At least we didn't get bit, I guess." Carl mumbled, slumping back in his seat in absolute defeat.
Shane came rushing into the car soon after tossing her bags in the trunk, his breath erratic from all his running and having to put down three different people. The walker that was chewing on her mom, her mom and finally.. Her father who'd been by the backdoor taking out the trash.. It hadn't been pretty.
"Okay, okay, alright." Shane rushed out to himself, slamming the car door with so much force that shook the whole car. Yelps of surprise came from the Grimes when he threw the car in gear and immediately took off down the road, his tires screeched from the speed he'd taken off at and fishtailed just a bit. "Everything's fine, it's all fine!"
Now she definitely knew that nothing was gonna be fine. Lori didn't agree with Rick or Shane often, shit she rarely ever agreed with them at all. And now she and Shane were both saying everything was gonna be okay? They couldn't even pretend like they weren't fuckin' terrified themselves, Shane literally just shot and killed three people he had to be scared! And even now, as they drove through the streets they passed by limping corpses and people screaming for their lives; People laid out on the street with multiple living dead people bent over them eating at their insides...
And here Romina couldn't even scream...
She was never even able to watch scary movies growing up, the idea of 'zombies' as Carl said was otherworldly. Her parents had been religious, went to church three times a week and even home schooled her so she wouldn't be tainted by people who weren't them.
They were selfish like that, trying to preserve her innocence for as long as possible so they could feel needed longer than the eighteen years they'd been told their child would need them. It was a family thing ( probably a Puerto Rican thing since the Grimes let people stay over his friends houses all the time ) where if a child could not speak yet that meant they couldn't venture out on their own. You couldn't spend the night at your cousins house or visit friends from school, hell she could barely make friends without a fuckin' voice so it wasn't like she could go many places.. Her parents' logic had always been 'We can't let you stay anywhere if you can't tell us if anything bad has happened to you'. Of course it was said in Spanish; her parents barely spoke English since they'd come to the states so late in their own lives.
The excuse was still used even after Romina learned sign language, her main way of communicating besides writing shit down if people didn't understand sign. Now that she was older, damn near thirty years old, she understood why they'd been so protective of her. Why she was her age still living with them, relying on her parents to ask for help for her... They were the reason the Grimes and Shane even interacted with her at all. It was them who told her to send leftovers to the neighbors, it was them who wanted to get on their good side the very moment they saw the squad car in front of their house.
Romina was different in too many ways... She couldn't speak, that was obviously her biggest tribulation. However... What made her parents worry more was the racist encounters they'd gone through when they were traveling around in Georgia. The Puerto Rican family was on the darker side, with skin that ranged from bronze like Romina to skin that was as dark as the wet bark of walnut wood like her father. They'd been called names they'd never even heard before in English but... The friendly neighbors had been nothing but kind so they'd trusted them enough to ask for their assistance when needed.
"Romina, you good back there? No bites, no scratches?" Shane was late as ever to answer, they'd already been driving for less than five minutes and she knew damn well he should've asked that the moment she got in the car... Hell, the moment he'd kicked open her bedroom door and found her huddled under her bed, he should've asked.
He put a hand to the headrest of Lori's seat so he could twist his body and look in the back seat the same way Lori had done before he'd even got in the car, only for Lori to yell out in panic when his eyes left the road and the car swerved onto a sidewalk for mere seconds before he fixed himself back up. "C-Carl, you tell me-"
'I'm fine, no bites or scratches.'
"She said she's fine, no bites or scratches. I think she's really scared though because her hands keep shaking and every time she signs 'I'm' it looks like she's making a J ." Carl cut him off before he could go on, but only because she'd answered the question as Shane was talking. And of course, he wouldn't be the sassy twelve year old that he was without throwing in a mild complaint. He bit the insides of his cheeks to try and hide his smile when Romina's dark eyes narrowed on him, the world may be ending yet she still had a shimmer of amusement at him throwing her under the bus. If she didn't sign that she was afraid, he shouldn't have said it. He knew she hated when people put words in her mouth..
He wasn't lying though.
"It's okay to be scared, we're all scared." Shane admitted, she was sitting behind him so she could see his big ears moving every time he spoke and when he didn't speak.. They moved whenever he clenched at his jaw and muttered to himself to try and speak logic into whatever decisions he was making as he drove. From what she could tell, they were headed towards the highway. "We all gon' be scared together though, alright? Ya trust me, don't ya?"
He didn't turn his whole body to look in the backseat this time, Lori wasn't gonna let 'em even if he tried. His brown eyes had flown to the rear view mirror to try and see their faces, their faces that were coated in thin layers of sweat. Romina was usually so cool, calm and collected and now her brows were furrowed and her dark eyes shining with anticipation and horror every time they slid to the scene out the car and caught another life lost to the walking dead. As scared as she was, she still nodded frantically. She did trust Shane, she trusted the Deputy with her life more than her own family sometimes.
"Good.. Imma make sure we're all good, we're all gon' be safe."
The drive had taken hours; Hours of tense silences, a quiet game of eye spy between Romina and Carl, and trying their damn hardest not to look out the window every time they heard the grating screams of yet another person being eaten alive. When there was conversation, it was Carl telling Shane and Lori in the front seat what questions Romina was signing in the back that only the adults could answer. Where were they going? How long was the drive meant to be? She knew her parents were gone, because she had to step over them to get out of the house in the first place since her mom was right at the front door.
Her parents only watched Telemundo when it came to the news, and from what she'd seen the last time she saw the station Puerto Rico had definitely talked about a virus bringing the dead to life.. They'd been somewhat warned. Of course, her parents tried to pray everything away while Romina.. Romina was trying to work out in her room to get her strength and stamina up.
She'd always believed in conspiracy theories; Always waiting for the world to end and society to crumble. She didn't think it'd become this real.
Shane drove on the highway for quite a few miles until they hit a traffic jam, a traffic jam that looked like it ran for miles and was obviously not new. People were honking their horns and coming out of their cars to walk further up and figure out what was going on, but they could only walk so far. It was well into the night by now, she wouldn't be surprised if people had dozed off in their cars and had fallen asleep waiting for the bumper to bumper traffic to move.
"We've been stuck here for hours." Lori pointed out in a shaky whisper, glancing at Shane's side profile and then turned her body to talk to Carl in the backseat. "How're you feelin', sweetie?"
"Bored.. Hungry."
She breathed out a laugh at his nonchalant tone, shaking her head a bit at his response before looking at Romani with a raised brow. Her hazel eyes shined with concern, her facial expression saying exactly what she wasn't saying out loud. 'You okay?'
'I'm also hungry, also bored.'
Romina signed with a wheezy laugh of her own, it sounded more like her struggling for air than laughter though and it always made Carl laugh too. He claimed she sounded like a squeaky toy when she laughed too hard.. He wasn't wrong."Romina's hungry and bored too!" Carl chirped for Shane who was trying to be nosey and peek over his shoulder to see what was being signed but his seat and Lori were kinda blocking the way.
"Fine," He rasped out with a sigh, a twinkle of amusement in his eyes when he reached over to his glove compartment to pop it open and dig out two granola bars. "C'mon, y'all. Out the car." All the doors unlocked with a click that had both Romina and Carl perking up in the back before they were following Shane's footsteps of getting the fuck out of his cramped ass car.
Carl was quick to head over to Shane and grab a granola bar to ease his rumbling stomach. Romina didn't go right to him though, and she would've if he wasn't so impatient and made his way over himself. When she'd gotten out the car the first thing she did was stretch her legs out and then her arms and her back, some joints cracked with every stretch much to her satisfaction. Thank fuck she was already wearing a good pair of sweatpants when it all went down, the only bad thing about what she was wearing right now was her black tank top not keeping her arms warm when the sun was down. When it was day time it was fine because it was hot as fuck but now? Goosebumps were riddled across her skin and she was trying her damn hardest not to shake in her slippers. Yes... slippers.
Luckily she had time to grab some hair ties to contain her big puff of curls that she called her hair, right now it was a little wild from a nap she'd taken on the ride. So when she was done stretching, she'd pulled her curls up to the top of her head in a big ol' bun that Carl called 'the pineapple' whenever she did it when she babysat him.
"Said you were hungry, right?" Shane kept his voice low, probably not to startle her when he walked up. The corner of his lips twitched into a barely there smirk when she offered a bashful smile and nod as she took the granola bar he was offering. It was her favorite, double chocolate chunk.
He knew that though, that's why he always kept some in his car..
'Thank you.'
It took him a second to process what she signed, and when did process it his barely there smirk turned into a cheeky smile as he nodded and stuffed his hands in his back pockets to stare off down the row of cars. He did that alot, he looked away from her and she knew it was because he was nervous to keep eye contact but... She can't fuckin' talk... He needed to see her!
'Please look at me.' She found herself thinking often, hoping he'd gain the courage to look at her in the eyes instead of looking away.
No one ever really looked her in the eyes much anyway, they only looked at her hands waiting for her to sign. That's why she begged for it so often.. Just look at me..
"Aye! You know somethin' 'bout what's goin' on 'round here?!"
She jumped at the sudden shout, dear fuckin' lord she hadn't even heard anyone walk up over the sound of distant chatter and running engines. When she blinked herself back to reality she ignored the way Shane had taken a subtle step to block her a bit, it was obvious from his stance that they'd caught him off guard too and he assumed he was going to have to defend her.. It wasn't anyone dead though, it was two men who'd rounded a pick up truck that wasn't too far from where they were.
Both of them had striking blue eyes, the same shade too. From that alone Romina knew they were probably related. The taller one was bald, or balding, and looked like he was probably in his forties or fifties with a wide but strong looking build. To Romina, he looked like the bikers her books used to talk about sometimes. Rough and rugged, dirty shirt and a cigarette burning at his lips. The man beside him really reminded her of those books though..
His blue eyes might've been the same shade as the man next to him, but they were narrowed and calculating... Jumping between her and Shane as if he were already analyzing them before either of them had opened their mouths.
"Nah, just know everyone's stuck for a while." Shane tried to act like he hadn't been startled, clearing his throat and shaking his head to put on that mask of 'I'm pretending like I know what's going on'.
'And the eating people.'
"She throwin' gang signs?"
"It's sign language, Merle." The man who'd been silent the entire time finally spoke, and his voice was raspy as ever and filled with disappointment at the excitement in 'Merle's' voice. At least he knew what sign language was, that'd be less explaining for her to do. Shane licked his lips and let out a forced chuckle, one that was more awkward than anything before he jutted his thumb to his chest.
"I'm Shane, and this here is Romina."
"Merle and Daryl Dixon.. The pleasure is yours."
~*~
Word Count : 2,987
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April 13th, 2026