☆ — Guest 1337

When you hand over the yarn version of him—spiky blue hair, camo gear, and all—the light glints in his eyes, making him look like a little kid receiving a brand new toy.

“You… made this? In this place?”

His voice carries genuine warmth, cutting through the cold air.

He tucks the plush into a pouch on his vest, claiming it’s “lucky” and will help keep him alive in rounds.

When the killer goes "friendly", he’ll pull it out and sit somewhere near where everyone is, absentmindedly fiddling with its yarn hair. It reminds him of home and what he’s fighting for.

☆ — Taph

The moment the plush hits his palms, Taph lets out a delighted coo that soothes your ears.

“🤩❗👆, 🤏❗” (Perfect! It’s me, but smaller!)

He hugs it so tightly you worry about the yarn seams.

He keeps it tucked into his robe during rounds—every so often you’ll see a little yarn wing sticking out when he rushes past.

In the cabins, he makes it “perch” next to his bed, like a tiny companion watching over him while he rest.

☆ — 007n7

He’s sitting outside his cabin steps when you give him the yarn version of himself, burger hat stitched in perfectly.

He stares at it for a long moment, in shock that someone will even give him something do precious.

“I… I don’t deserve this here, but… thank you.”

He says quietly, voice heavy with regret, as he holds it so tightly to check if it's all real.

He keeps it on a small shelf by his bed, where the lantern light can reach it. It’s one of the few gentle things in his otherwise broken world.

Some nights, you can hear him talking to it in low tones, like it’s a stand-in for someone he’s lost.

☆ — Elliot

You deliver his yarn twin to him while he’s busy baking pizzas over the small cabin stove.

“Well… look at me. Guess I’m officially delicious and adorable.”

He teases, holding the plush next to a pizza slice.

The plush gets a spot on the highest shelf in his cabin, “to keep it safe from the damp”—but really so he can see it while he contemplates about life.

Still, he keeps it spotless and mends any loose threads immediately.

☆ — Builderman

You hand him the plush outside his cabin while he’s working on reinforcing the barricade seperating the killers from the survivors.

His brows lift, and a rare smile spreads across his face.

“Huh. Guess even in this nightmare, someone can still build somethin'… worth keepin'.”

He inspects the stitching like he would a project, nodding with approval.

The plush is placed right above his workbench in his cabin, where the soft lantern glow hits it just right.

On long, silent nights, you can sometimes hear him mutter,

“Don’t worry… I’ll keep ‘em all safe”

☆ — Chance

You hand him the yarn plush—fedora, clockwork headphones, and all—while the moonlight filters through the cabin window.

Their cocky grin flickers for a second when they see it, something softer showing before they mask it again.

“Guess I’m collectible now.”

He jokes, but he keeps it close—maybe closer than you’d expect.

When no one’s looking, they'll rest it on their desk and quietly spin a coin beside it, like they're letting it “gamble” with them.

Sometimes his gaze lingers on it a little too long, like he’s remembering someone else’s face.

☆ — Noob

The moment you give them their plush who has bright yellow yarn skin, little green pants, and blue shirt—they gasp, then laugh nervously.

“Wait, is this… me?!”

They hug it tight like they’re scared it’ll get taken away.

They keep it by their food stash in the cabin, claiming it’s their “taste tester” before trying snacks.

When rounds get too scary, they’ll pull it out from their bag and squeeze it for comfort before moving on.

Sometimes they talk to it like a friend while drinking up bloxy colas, as if it can help them calm down.

☆ — Two Time

They turn the plush over in their hands, eyes narrowing with curiosity at the little yarn tail and spawn symbol you stitched in.

“You even got the Spawn correct!”

They exclaim, impressed and ready to recruit you again.

They place it neatly on their bedside table in the cabin, facing the door—“to keep watch” they say, though there’s an edge of ritualistic reverence to the way they arrange it.

Sometimes, in the dead quiet of the night, you’ll hear them whisper to it as though it’s part of a private prayer.

If anyone else tries to touch it, their dagger comes out before the hand gets close.

☆ — Dusekkar

He takes the plush gently in his fingers, the glow from his pumpkin head lighting it up.

“A yarn-made twin, I now possess, crafted with care, I must confess.”

Places it in the pocket of his belt where it peeks out like a little guardian ember.

On quiet nights, you’ve spotted him sitting by the fire, setting the plush across from him and speaking in rhymes as if holding a conversation.

☆ — Shedletsky

The moment you hand over the yarn version of him, his eyes widen before he bursts into a goofy grin.

“You even got my shirt right…”

He chuckles, turning it over to admire your work—it was nothing like those massed produced ones usually found in a market.

Keeps it on a shelf above his bed in the cabin, where it watches over him.

Sometimes he stages mock sword fights with it to make the others laugh. The plush usually “wins.”

Still, when a round gets particularly rough, you’ll see him glance at it like it’s a silent little comfort.

“It could get warmer, you know,” you say suggestively, and you hear his chuckle vibrate against your body.

“Don’t tempt me, woman. But I’m—” His sentence is separated by a large yawn. “—dead tired.”

Arthur grows heavy, but you keep your arms wrapped around him, tracing shapes in his greying hair. The world’s still dark outside, no sign of sunrise, and in the hush you count out the seconds by the rise and fall of his back, the answering flutter of your own chest. A slow, giddy ache stirs in your chest, an ancient note calling up through the cracks in the floorboards. The house settled, a sound like a sigh, and the wind outside is a long, slow moan. You can almost forget the children down the hall, the endless round of chores waiting at cockcrow, the splitting headache that will hit when the light finally comes. For now, it’s fine to lie here, older and grayer but alive, pressed close by Arthur’s steady heart.

The question floats from your lips into the dim light, soft as the dust motes suspended in the sliver of moonlight through the curtains, making its descent to allow the sun to rise. "How long has it been?"

Arthur stirs against you, his consciousness hovering somewhere between dreams and reality. "Hmm...?" His voice is gravel-rough with sleep, warm breath ghosting across your collarbone.

"How long have we been married?" Your fingers trace the weathered landscape of his shoulder, mapping familiar terrain beneath the covers.

"Legally or...?" A smile curls in his words, though his eyes remain closed, lashes casting feathery shadows on his cheeks.

You tap the crown of his head where silver threads have colonized what was once a tawny brown. "You know what I mean."

Despite his teasing, he answers without hesitation, as if the number is etched into his bones. "Thirty-two years."

"You count the year before Isaac was born?" Surprise colors your voice as you peer down at him.

Arthur shifts his weight, the mattress dipping beneath you both as he nestles his face between your breasts. His ear presses against your nightgown, seeking the steady drum of your heart. "Makes sense, don't it?" he murmurs, his words vibrating against your skin like the purr of a contented cat. He doesn’t let you answer right away, stretching the silence as if it can hold up the weight of the years. “And anyhow, we was us before we signed any paper,” he mumbles, letting his hand drift to the familiar dip of your waist, as though to hold the proof of it. “Nobody needs to tell us we wasn’t,” he says, and you feel the hug of his arm anchor around your ribs.

A log slips in the stove down the hall, a distant thud that throbs through the winter-still house. You run your hand down Arthur’s back, counting the notches of his spine, the puckered scar on his shoulder, counting off the tally of accidents and misadventures that were stitched into both your skins. You remember the stories behind each one clearly—you’d nursed half of them yourself, felt the grit of gravel and the stickiness of blood, heard him try to laugh off pain as if it never bit hard. Every mark was proof. Every scar a new chapter.

You think of the time he fell off the hayloft, landing hard enough to lose a day. Or the way he looked, white as milk, when he showed up at the back porch with his palm split to the fat from a carving tool. You remember it all, and while thankful, you’re surprised he’s lived as long as he has.

“Are you ever going to slow down, my love?”

He doesn’t answer right away, but lets out a deep breath. “Ain’t that what I’m doin’ now?”

You chuckle at that. “I mean, quit working so hard. Retire. Let the men you hired do the hard work.” You feel an ache in your chest as you try to plea with him. “I don’t want you getting yourself killed climbing cherry trees or riding green horses.” You then nuzzle the top of his head with your nose. “I want you to outlive me. I couldn’t bear to live my life without you…”

He hears the ache in your voice, feels it like a physical thing between you in the darkness. His calloused thumb traces small circles on your hip bone. He isn't a fool—the mirror shows him the silver threading his temples, the crow's feet deepening at his eyes, the way his knuckles swell after a day's labor. But his arms still bulge beneath his union suit, his back still straightens against the weight of feed sacks. The thought of sitting idle while younger men tend his orchards makes his jaw clench. As long as blood pumps through his weathered heart, he'll provide for you all—you with your chestnut hair now streaked with silver, Jonnie with her father's stubborn chin, delicate Annabelle with her books, and young Augustus still needing a firm hand to guide him. The war left empty chairs at neighbors' tables, and the Spanish flu's ghost still haunts the graveyard with its row of small stones, but they survived. Whatever comes next—drought or depression or another damned war—they'll need his shoulders, broad as barn doors, to weather it.

“You'll outlive me, darlin'," he says, voice muffled against your nightgown, the words vibrating through the cotton to your skin beneath. "I'm older than you by six years and worn out by twice that."

"That still doesn't answer my question." You run your nails against the ribbed texture of his union suit, tracing slow zigzags from the broad plane between his shoulder blades down to the small of his back, where sweat always pools after a day in the orchard. His muscles twitch and relax under your touch like a horse settling under a familiar hand. "You're dodging me, Arthur Morgan, same as you've done since 1889."

His body quivers in your arms, not from cold but from the effort it takes to swallow whatever words claw at his throat. In the gloom, you feel the struggle roll off of him—a tautness in his muscles, the way his jaw works back and forth, the almost childish stubbornness that lurks beneath that mountain.

“We can go on a vacation," you offer, your hushed voice budding with excitement like the first green shoots after winter. "Just you and me. The children would love to see their sister and Jack again, or Isaac and Noissette can have them over. They miss little Jaques and Louise."

Jaques and Louise. His grandchildren. The twins will be seven years old this spring, all skinned knees and sticky fingers, the little French phrases they say as confusing as they are entertaining. He pictures them racing through the orchard like fawns, the same way Alice once did in her overalls. 

Alice, oh, Alice, who calls now to excitedly tell you both about the swell of her belly and the kicks that keep her up at night, is living quietly with her husband a few hours away. She’s already on her second child, in quick succession of the first. He still pictures her wrapped up in her mother’s arms when he stepped into that small cabin that day. Oh, how different things would have been…!

Arthur's weathered hand returns to the hollow of your hip beneath the quilt. "Is that supposed to make me feel older, darlin'?" he asks, voice rough as bark against your sternum.

You huff at that. “That wasn’t my goal, but does it make a point?”

He remembers one of the last conversations he had with Hosea, before he died, saying that he wished he had slowed down long ago. When Bessie died, he should have quit right then and there, left the gang to go live out his days in peace and quiet. “Don’t forget to take your time, Arthur,” he said solemnly. “Enjoy what you’ve made. What you’ve accomplished. I…I am so proud of you, son.”

He is grateful for that time, those last few years with Hosea—evenings spent on the porch swing with whiskey warming their throats, mornings fishing the glassy lake where mist rose like ghosts, conversations that mended what Arthur thought was broken beyond repair. Those trips to Canada were worth it, and to think it nearly slipped through his fingers like creek water, if Charles hadn't reminded the old fox that his past and the people in it can be entirely separate. 

After Hosea’s passing, John later described how Hosea's face had gone pale as chalk when he mentioned Arthur's name, how he'd knocked over his tin cup, spilling coffee across the rough-hewn table as he swore he'd never set foot near the Marston place if they showed up. He insisted that it was out of self-preservation, but it was also to keep Arthur from returning to his own past. He himself left it, and he was worried that reuniting would somehow ignite that desire in Arthur to find his way back to the life he had left behind. But somehow, Charles' quiet persistence wore down that old con man's resolve like water on stone.

Arthur thinks about your question again. Will he settle down?

“Alright, darlin’,” he sighs. “I’ll take it easy.”

He feels your lips once again on his head. “Thank you, Arthur.”

“And we’ll take that vacation.” He laughs, the rumble in his chest shaking the bed as if a horse had rolled in the mud beside you. “Don’t mean I’ll like it, though.”

A laugh bubbles up from your chest, honeyed and inviting, while your fingertips drift across the landscape of his skin, causing goosebumps beneath his clothes. "Oh, I suspect you might enjoy it after all..."

Arthur's muscles lengthen with a low, satisfied groan before he shifts his weight, drawing you against the warm wall of his body, the mattress dipping as he rolls over. You chuckle excitedly, eagerly, as you anticipate his hands, rough and battered but gentle, sliding beneath the hem of your nightgown, working their way up to cup your waist. His breath, now less shivery, warms the hollow between your throat and shoulder, and you feel the tips of your ears burn in the cold air. He kisses the sensitive shell of your ear and down to your jaw, lips mapped by memory. His palms, broad and strong, knead the soft flesh of your hips. For a moment, you let yourself float—forgetting the brass alarm on the dresser, the creaking floors, the endless scrape of winter on glass. The world shrinks to the heat of your bodies, forgetting the age of them, and returning to a place where pain doesn’t exist.

Just him.

And just you.

And you’d do it all over and over again.

***

Dear Alice, 

I am so glad that I finally convinced your father to take that vacation. I do confess that while trying to choose a place to go, it was rather difficult—simply because we’ve been all across the county. I offered Europe, but your father dug his heels. He was not going to do that. But you can’t blame your poor, old mother for trying, can you?

But it’s been so long since we’ve been to California. Of course, you were so little then, I carried you everywhere, and was too busy trying to stay alive to really enjoy the beaches. You know, they have shaved ice on nearly every street corner here? At least, it appears to be, not that I am one to complain. It is much warmer here, and the ice cools me down. 

Enough about my little musings, or I will be here forever. Your father suggested I should only write a letter every once in a while so I can focus on our time together while we’re out and about. I think it is a splendid idea, as I will not keep to the writing desk the entire journey.

Give my love to your husband, and take care of yourself (let him handle the toddler!). I look forward to returning home and spending time helping you prepare for your baby’s arrival. I am excited beyond words, and cannot help but hope that it will be a boy, so you will have both a boy and a girl. Wouldn’t that be marvelous? I will write again or give you a call from the bed and breakfast’s telephone when I can. Maybe even pick out a postcard with a nice picture of the coast. 

All my love,

Your mother

***

“Smile…!” And with a soft click, the stranger takes the picture with your camera. “I think it took.”

You chuckle softly; you won’t know until you get them back from the developing company, but thank the man anyway. “We thank you for doing that.”

He meets you halfway in your stride, and you take the camera back from him, and he waves politely as he walks away. 

“I think I blinked,” Arthur says lowly to you as he approaches, his hand finding the small of your back. Your focus is on the camera, rolling the film over so a new picture can be taken. 

“And I think my hat was lopsided. No matter, it adds character, then.” You turn to your husband and tuck your camera away in his satchel. “Let’s keep walking.”

Arthur has been watching you this whole time, still under the spell you put on him years ago. He knows you don’t care for your crows' feet or smile lines, or the silver in your hair, but he loves all of it. It is almost a compliment to watch you grow old, that he gets to be here to do it with you. 

He loves the way your lashes curl naturally, how your lips, though thinned out some, still feel intoxicating when he kisses them. Your skin, softer and beginning to wrinkle now, still feels warm beneath his fingers. Fifty-three looks good on you. 

Not acknowledging even what you’ve been saying the last two minutes, he reaches to let his forefinger gently graze your cheek. “You want some more shaved ice?”

And as though you were a dog who spotted a squirrel, your brown eyes lift, still doe-eyed and radiant, and they sparkle with eagerness at the mention of your newly-found favorite sweet treat. “Do you have to ask?”

He chuckles at that, moving his hand away to offer you his arm. “Let’s go, then.”

You take it, and as you turn, a slight breeze catches, threatening to take your hat off your head. You quickly reach up to hold it steady and laugh at the situation. “I’ll be red like a lobster if I lose my hat…!”

“But’chu will be my lobster.”

You risk losing your hat to slap your husband on the arm. “Oh, you stop that.”

***

Arthur does his best to not show his age as he lays out the large blanket, taking advantage of the breeze to get it to splay out and spread softly on the sand. “This good, darlin’?”

You nod your head, absentmindedly slipping off your shoes as you hold two cups of shaved ice with cherry syrup. Your wide-legged pants move like a skirt in the breeze, and you think to yourself how grateful you are that you’re wearing cotton instead of those wool stockings and bathing suits like the other women are wearing on the beach. 

Wearing black outside on a day like this seems foolish, and even then, you couldn’t imagine wearing those in public. Things have certainly changed. 

“You gonna sit down, darlin’?” You blink away your thoughts and look down to find Arthur already sitting down and rolling up his cotton pants. “Gettin’ a little lonely down here.”

You chortle at that and find a spot across from Arthur in the blanket. You stretch out your legs and lean back on the support of your arms, letting your eyes lift to look over Arthur’s head and to the ocean rolling in on itself against the beach. 

A silence falls between you, your thoughts wandering again, and Arthur enjoying the sounds of the waves behind him. He prefers the view of you to the ocean, and doesn’t feel the need to turn around. He can see the tense look in your brow, finding it contradictory to the insistence on your part to relax all of the time. Seems like you should take your own advice. 

“Hey,” your husband calls out to you, soft, almost hushed, and you lower your eyes to meet his, and you see him now lying on his side. “Give me your feet.” You look at him with an inquisitive brow, but cross your ankles and stretch your toes in his direction, wiggling them as he scoots closer. Arthur’s hands are sand-gritty but careful, and he lifts your right foot with both palms, cradling it with embarrassing reverence. Despite your uncontrollable response to pull your foot back, he starts to knead the arch, working out the fasciitis right tenderly, but firm enough that you can feel it. You have to bite your tongue for a moment or two longer, until the warmth of his hand provides some relief. Once he feels you relax and you let your chin lift, he smiles to himself and begins to work his hands up your left calf, slipping his hands into your pant leg. That’s when you close your eyes and let out a deep exhale. 

He watches as the sun hits your face, the late afternoon glow. Shaved ice already forgotten, melted down to nothing after you had set the cups in the sand beside you. His eyes follow the scattered freckles on your skin, and how they disappear beneath your partially open shirt collar. The light makes you shine like an angel, a celestial being that could tell him the location of heaven. If he were any wiser, it would be right here. 

You open your eyes to look out at the ocean, its rolling foam crashing into the shore. Children play at its edge, their parents standing close by. Some movement catches your eye, and you see a young couple holding hands as they walk along the beach. The man stops momentarily, causing his woman to be pulled back suddenly. When she pivots back to him, he pulls her close, meeting her smile with a loving kiss. 

Oh, to be young again. You could do without all the gang escapades and Dutch’s plans, but to be younger and to have more time. 

You’ve heard about these new fads, radium creams, and "Laird's Bloom of Youth,” and while you’ve been tempted to try to make yourself more youthful, it all just sounds like a bunch of snake oil. No potion or cream can turn back the wheels of time.

And yet…

“There are women my age who dye their hair…” you begin to say out loud, looking down at him as he continues to knead a sore muscle in your calf. “Would you want me to color the gray out of my hair?”

“What? No…” he sets your leg down almost instantly, rising to a sitting position. “I ain’t gonna ask you to change, darlin’.” He moves closer to you, reaching out a hand to tuck your curls behind an ear as you tuck in your chin.

“But you’ve always liked my hair, and it’s turning white now…”

“Like a halo,” he answers quickly to disperse your self-doubt. He lets his finger linger against your cheek, making goosebumps almost rise on your neck. 

“I am no cherub, Arthur, nor a saint.”

He grins, sly, and sets his hand on your knee. “Don’t have to be, to have a little god-given light about you.” And he leans in to kiss you. The compliment curls in the hollows of your throat. Always this man, and always the same—it is like poetry, how the words hit you as sweet as honey and twice as thick, and you let them slide down into memory for later when you will want to recall them. Arthur’s mouth is soft and rough all at once, chapped from the wind but careful on your lips. A real kiss, not for show. The kiss that knocks the taste of winter from your mouth and replaces it with salt and sunlight. You’ve always been greedy for it. You’re greedy now, even if the shape of your hunger has trimmed down to something smaller, more private, less a forest fire and more a candle stub in a jam jar.

He draws away slowly, letting the kiss linger as long as it can, then tilts his head, blue eyes shining with amusement. “You wanna walk in the water, don’t’chu?”

It’s as if he can read your bones, the way he can get you to think of something else. “We don’t have to,” you start, determined not to seem childish, but your feet are already flexing, ready for the cold shock.

Arthur frowns for a split second, considering the state of his knees and the effort it’ll take to stand, but then shrugs and smiles the kind of smile he usually saves for the children. “Why the hell not?” He pushes to his feet, joints creaking under the old wounds and the miles, and offers his hand. “We took this trip for a reason, didn’t we?”

You look at his hand, his callouses in his large palm. You mull it over for a few seconds more before shrugging. “Aw, the heck with it.” You take his hand, letting yourself be pulled up, his palm warm where yours is cold and a little sticky from melted ice. The sand grits between your toes as you straighten and step off the blanket into the sand, and Arthur steadies you with an easy regrip at your hip. He doesn’t bother brushing off his pants; the salt air clutches at the fabric anyhow, outlining the ridges of muscle and bone. The two of you walk, drifting along the beach’s slope, where the wet-packed sand is cool and flecked with black grains. Arthur leads a half step ahead, always vigilant, scanning for stray driftwood, broken shells, glass.

“Always looking out for me,” you think aloud, and the thought lands heavy and sweet as a ripe fig.

“I ain’t gonna let no one else do it," Arthur answers soflty, and his hand doesn’t leave your hip. You see the children from before, now closer to the water and trying to collect shells before the waves return again. He leads you to a vacant spot on the shoreline, his hand leaving your hip to take you by the hand. “You wanna take this slow, or…?”

The ocean water laps over your toes and begins to soak into your pants. Truth be told, you don’t really care; you just love the way the water feels. It’s invigorating, and, combined with the nostalgia of youth, Arthur’s swooning eyes, and the feel of his hand in yours, makes you want to laugh and spring and jump. 

“I sort of…” you begin to say. “just—wanna get right in.”

Arthur watches you with a raised brow. “You mean, get in or…?”

“I mean charge right in, up to my neck.”

“But, darlin’…” Arthur chortles. “You just got done tellin’ me to take it easy, and now you wanna act like a school girl?”

You turn to look up at him, eyes twinkling. “And why not? It isn’t like we’re building a house or running the orchard. I just wanna run into the ocean!”

He can’t help but smile at you, those doe eyes of yours full of life and wonder. “What changed your mind?”

Without thinking much about it, you lean in quickly and give him a kiss, long and hard, taking in a deep breath before letting your lips part in a satisfying smack. “You.”

You watch the wrinkles in his eyes multiply as he smiles, see the silver in his hair, and the spots in his brow from working in the sun too long. He nods toward the water. “Go on then.”

You shake your head, pulling back on his hand. “Oh no, no, you’re not getting outta this, Mr. Morgan…”

Arthur lets you drag him forward, both of you picking up speed as bare feet slap wet-packed sand and tidewater squishes between your toes. Your laughter, pitched high and reckless, tangled with the white noise of surf, louder than you’d mean it to, attracts looks from a few sunburnt children and their bored mothers.

Arthur’s lungs almost give out when that cold Pacific water bites into his shins, but he digs his heels and powers through the wall of sensation, holding tight to your hand as you drag him, squealing, toward the next breaking wave. You shriek at the chill, your hat forgotten as the brim promptly flopped off and bobbed away. You whoop, the sound brighter than anything in you in years, and turn to see Arthur blinking ocean out of his lashes, water dripping from his eyebrows.

He is grinning like a schoolboy, clothes plastered to him and hair flat against his brow. 

“Well, you look like a drowned coyote,” you shout at him, the laughter bubbling up your throat as you skirt sideways from the next breaker. 

“Better than a wet cat, I guess,” he says, squeezing your hand and tugging you so you nearly topple. Your feet tangle, knees buckling, and you crash together against his chest, his arms instantly wrapping around you, more reflex than romance, steady as always. The sharp cold stings your skin, teeth rattling, but the feeling makes you cackle louder. You kick at the water, splashing his shins, and the next slap of a wave catches you both at the waist.

You can’t stop laughing, even as the next wave smacks you hard enough to stagger you forward. Arthur’s hands clamp on your arms to anchor you. The water is only up to your knees, but the surf sucks at your calves, spinning you off balance. You clutch his forearms, and his skin is solid and warm and lined with old scars. For half a second, you are weightless, as if carried by the tide, your cheek pressed into the hollow of his chest. 

And there it is—Arthur’s laugh, that deep, rolling baritone like thunder behind a hill. It is a living thing. No matter how foolish or glorious life has and will become, some things will always make sense—like this. Like him, like you. He wipes the salt spray from his nose and drags you back up, closer to the shore, and brings you close to his chest.

And that young couple who passed by you earlier, you can catch the tail end of the woman’s words. “…I wanna be like that when we get older…”

And you could just swell up with pride.

You close your eyes for just a moment, letting the Pacific wind tug wet through your hair, salt stinging your eyes, and hear the echoing beat of Arthur’s heart.

You are so happy.

You feel Arthur’s finger graze your cheek again. “What say we head back, hm?”

After a moment longer, you nod your head and let Arthur guide you back to the dry sand, his big hand wrapped around yours, his thumb rubbing slow circles into the base of your palm. The salt water clings sticky to your skin, and your teeth knock together as the last chill overtakes you. Above, gulls pick their way through the soft hush of wavering cloud-light, treading the air as they might just float off the spinning earth. You bend over to pick up the blanket, shaking off the sand, and dab your face dry with it. Arthur wrings out the bottom few inches of his rolled-up pant legs, making a great show of stoicism, but his jaw is clenched in an overly heroic display, even when he’s clearly miffed. You stifle a smile and hand him the blanket. He dries off his arms and shoulders, then reaches behind you to wrap the blanket around your back and draw you in, enveloping you in his arms.

Something red catches your eye, and turning your head to look down, you see the two cups of what used to be shaved ice.

Your bottom lip juts out as you stare at the melted puddles of cherry-red, the cups seeping into the sand like tiny tide pools. "Oh..." The disappointment in your voice is childlike, genuine. "I forgot I had those."

Arthur only chuckles, the sound rumbling from deep in his chest, his eyes crinkling at the corners where salt water has dried into fine white lines. "You want me to get’chu a new one?" His thumb traces a damp strand of hair from your temple.

You look back to meet his eyes, those ocean blue irises that have watched over you for decades, now soft with affection in the golden afternoon light. "Yes, please."

***

The bathroom door creaks as you push it open, towel-dried hair still damp against your neck. Your eyes scan the empty armchair where Arthur usually sits with his journal or a dog-eared paperback, but the room holds nothing but silence and the fading afternoon light through half-drawn curtains.

“Arthur…?” you call out softly, hoping that he is just around the corner in your suite. The suite’s silence feels a little too thick, a little too expectant, like the pause after someone spits a tooth and everyone waits to see what’ll happen next. You walk barefoot through the entry, carpet rough against your still-damp toes, robe tight around your body. You muse that he might have gone downstairs to bring up dinner, the idea of a supper with just the two of you instead of in the dining hall with other guests appealing.

You figure you can change into your clothes while you wait; there's no sense in sitting around in your bathrobe.

The closet is a wooden armoire with a smell like old cedar, and as you open the door, the scent is overtaken by a brush of lavender sachet—standard housekeeping, always more refined than typical hotel methods. You’re about to peel off your robe when you hear a strange tapping on the glass window.

tic-tic-tic!

It is faint. Maybe nothing but a seagull bouncing off the siding, but the tap drags prickling gooseflesh up your arms—tic-tic-tic!—insistent enough to draw you to the window. The glass is shrouded behind the voile curtains, the breeze making them float in the air momentarily.

You crane your neck, lean into the pane, and slide two careful fingers between the curtain and the glass, pulling the fabric back to get a full view of the world beyond your room. The view beyond shimmers with salt haze and sunset, an endless stroke of orange over the Pacific. Far below, other guests dot the colonnaded terrace or stroll the promenade, and the horizon swells in blurred ripples, the world smeared in gold and red by a sun slipping off-edge. The hotel’s trellis, with its tangled nest of bougainvillea and morning glory, circles just below your window—if you stick your head out to look down and see it—but nothing in view to explain the noise. You’re just about to let the curtain go, when you almost—almost—jump out of your skin at a new, sound—like branches snapping—this time from your left.

A shadow looms on the balcony, outlined against the gold-lit ripple of the sea. Your heart stutters.

“Kind of a nice view, ain’t it, madame?”

Land sakes, it is Arthur!

“What!” you shriek, almost catching the attention of people below. You then lower your voice and stick your head out of the window carefully, not wanting to do anything and jeopardize the hold he has on the trellis frame. “What are you doing…?!”

He smiles sheepishly behind a low grunt as he stabilizes himself, feet planted on the second-story ledge. “Couldn’t get the lock on the damned door open, so figured I’d take the scenic route,” he said with a flair of sarcasm, and his eyes flicked up—hoping to impress, but you can see that there is a deliberate reason that he has decided to climb up the trellis.

“I know you aren’t doing this for your health,” you venture, sticking your head further out of the window. “You realize that this is the second floor…?”

“Don’t this—?” He pauses, readjusting his grip. His plan was better in theory, and now that he is up here, he’s begun to realize that while he is still strong for his age, he isn’t as strong as a twenty-five-year-old man. “Don’t this remind you of somethin’?”

You click your tongue at his absurd question. “Yeah, it reminds me how foolish you can be sometimes—!”

“I know you ain’t a princess in need of rescuin’…” he starts. “But this feels like a tower…!”

You feel your body freeze and your eyes widen. It is as though you just got struck by lightning, but in this case, a memory. Back home, in Utah, when the town was still named after the Dwyers.

You were in your hotel room, staring a young man down as he climbed up your trellis.

You remember.

“Arthur…” you gasp, meeting his eyes. “You…”

“You almost reacted the same way,” he muses, his voice a half-grimace, half-chuckle. He grins, but the effort of holding himself up is starting to show in his jaw, the lines along his chin going tight. “Darlin’, you gonna let me in, or am I gonna get arrested out here for loiterin’?”

You shake your head. “You should get down, it isn’t safe for you to keep going!”

Arthur flashes his lopsided smile. “Ain’t a thing to it, sweetheart.” He barely gets the words out before a rut in the wood gives way, and his left foot slips an inch. The jolt sends a spark through you, and you instinctively grab the window frame.

“Hurry, hurry!” You pat the windowsill, beckoning him to climb. “Get in, before you fall…!”

You reach toward him, palms open, as he scales the final stretch of trellis. His forearms tense with each pull upward, veins mapping rivers beneath sun-weathered skin. Though you stand safely inside, your chest rises and falls in rhythm with his labored breaths—as if your body remembers what it means to climb toward something wanted.

When you can finally reach his shoulder, you grab onto it with both hands, bracing your feet against the inner wall. Arthur grunts, teeth bared, and heaves himself up the last stretch. His shoes scrape heavily on the painted wooden ledge, his breath ragged as he shoulders his way through the open window into your arms. He nearly stumbles forward and, for a brief slippery second, you’re sure he’s going to topple over backwards and concuss himself on the tile floor. You catch him by the wrist with both hands, dragging him the rest of the way until he collapses, half on you and half on the rumpled wooden floorboards. The whole experience has you catching your breath, but you find yourself laughing despite it.

“So much for relivin’ memories,” he pants, and he pushes himself off of you and to his feet.

You lie on the floor just a bit longer, still giggling, and the memory lapses over you like a second tide. Still on your back, you pat your chest and feel the tremble drain out through your fingertips and into the old pine planks beneath you. Arthur’s shoes tap close and then stop, and for a moment, there is only the breeze and the distant slap of the curtain against the partially opened window.

“You alright, darlin’?” Arthur asks, concerned to find you still on the floor.

“Yeah,” you pant. “I’m fine.”

After a second longer, he leans down and offers you a hand. “Here…”

You glance at his fingers—knuckles still broad and rough, hand calloused but surprisingly elegant, scar running like a faded crack across the back from that time with the wire fence and the runaway cow. He’d barely let you clean it, griping and whingeing about the size of the needle when you stitched him up, but now he flexes it without a care. You take his hand and let him draw you to your feet, the memory of being hauled up from a ditch or onto a horse or into a moving train car braided so tight with your muscles that being held like this feels as common as breathing, as sacred as prayer.

When you stand up, you recinch the rope about your waist, as though propriety matters right now. You clear your throat, and Arthur quickly turns to avoid your gaze, now embarrassed for having tried to be romantic.

“Arthur…”

“Naw, it’s alright, I got it.” And he heads to the window, with the intent to close it.

But that isn’t what you were even about to say. “…Wasn’t even thinking about the window,” you start, voice low and careful, “but if you're tryin’ to put a show on for me, it’s a damned good one.”

Arthur glances back over his shoulder, his face half-shaded by the falling night, the lines at his mouth crease and jaw all doubled up in a half-smile, like he can’t settle on how to react. He stands awkwardly for a beat, hands on the sill, then shrugs his whole upper half and mutters, “Well, it seemed more poetic before the rot caved in that step.”

You feel another tide of heat crawl up your neck. “I—I never forgot that day, you know,” you venture, hugging yourself. The world outside is silvered, sea-wind smudging the stars, and inside it is just you and the pulse in your throat.

Arthur fidgets with the window pane until it falls down, and he secures the latch. “Neither have I.”

“Sometimes I wonder if that was the time when—” you stop yourself with a chortle. You’re not making much sense, anyway. 

But even so, he knows what you mean. “Me, too.”

Your brow lifts, the skin crinkling like parchment paper. "You do?"

Arthur nods, his broad shoulders still facing the window, the amber glow of sunset catching the silver threads in his hair. "Yeah. Kinda foolish to think about that, especially now that time’s passed and he is in his thirties..." He finally turns around, weathered shoes creaking against the floorboards, his eyes—still that impossible blue—meeting yours across the dimming room. "But if it was, it is almost...special...you know? I mean, we was happy at that time."

You smile, feeling the familiar warmth spread across your chest like honey. "Very happy."

He scratches the back of his neck, calloused fingers moving against sun-leathered skin, the gesture transforming him into that shy young man with dirt on his boots and hope in his eyes—not the confident gunslinger who'd tipped his hat at you across a crowded restaurant. "I just...want you to feel special all the time. To not worry if I'll stop lovin' you because you're changin'. It's just life."

You feel your shoulders drop, tension melting away like snow in April sunshine. The knot between your shoulder blades—one you hadn't even realized was there—unwinds itself. Even if you don't doubt his love for a second, hearing it aloud feels like rainfall after drought. "I know," you whisper, the words barely disturbing the air between you.

He walks up to you, shoes clopping softly on the floorboards. You let him take you by the waist, his calloused fingers splaying across the curve where your hips begin. Through the thin silk of your robe, his touch burns like whiskey, warm and familiar. He traces the outline of your body as if committing it to memory all over again. "And I find you...so temptin', Mrs. Morgan," he murmurs, voice rough as sandpaper but gentle as a prayer. "It's torture sometimes."

You feel the glow of his confession radiating through you, sparking dumb, giddy heat behind your ribs. You close your eyes just long enough to savor it, then open them to him—the way he hovers as if afraid to break the moment, the way his hands gentled on your waist. His wedding ring, the one you bought him for your twenty-fifth anniversary, still bright and true despite the years of wearing it, bites a spark of gratitude from your throat. You let your hands roam up, linking behind his neck, and drag his big, heavy head down to yours. This time you’re not laughing; this time it’s deliberate, something slow and steady and hungry. “We can’t have that…can we, Mr. Morgan…?”

He hums at your reply just before your lips meet, hungry and urgent, a petty theft of years lost and found again as Arthur presses your back. He groans, hands finding the hollow at the base of your skull, curling in the wet ropes of your hair, greedy for the pulse of your heartbeat at your throat.

You welcome his hands, the way they slip off your robe effortlessly, how they wander your body as he whispers praises in your ear. It is no wonder at all that you give in to him so easily, and once he is no longer restricted by clothing, any soreness from the day is completely forgotten. The old ache in his left hip, the one he’s lived with ever since he fell off that young stallion a few years ago, is cast to the wayside as he finds his rhythm alongside you; inside you. Body and soul. 

It is always the weight of him you’ve craved, the bone-deep surety of his body crowding out the uncertain evening, the way his hips slot against yours, and the way every bit of you that ever felt hollow comes up full, brimming, like a glass shivering to overflow.

It is morning, and you lie cocooned in its light and tangled sheets, the hush only broken by the quick, shallow breaths as your heart fights to slow itself down. Your legs ache in places that make you want to laugh for the sheer ache of it. You turn your head on the warm pillow, face pressed into creased linen, and find Arthur at your side with the loose-troubled breathing of a man who’s run a race and knows he’s won for the day. His hand droops, palm down across the bedspread, wedding band glinting. He snorts awake at your movement and cracks one eye, smile showing in the half-shadow of his jaw.

"So, was it worth the climb?" you ask, the words dry in your throat but curling up warm at the edges.

“Let me put it this way…” His hand moves to find yours, and your fingers clasp around his. “If I had to climb that thing every day for the rest of my life, I’d do it.”

You smile, feeling the corners of your eyes crinkle with the genuine warmth of it. "And if I had to help you climb into the window every day, so would I."

He snorts, a gruff sound that rumbles from deep in his chest, his weathered face crinkling at the corners. "Shut up."

You grin wider, your teeth catching the last golden light filtering through the curtains. "Oh, you know you love me."

And his eyes—blue as a summer sky, fringed with lashes gone silver at the tips—soften like butter left in the sun. The hard lines of his face melt away, leaving only the man you've always known beneath the years. "Oh, I know."

"And don't you forget it, Arthur Morgan," you whisper, his name on your lips still tasting as sweet as it did decades ago.

“I won’t.” He whispers, and he squeezes your hand tighter. “I won’t.”

***

It is a beautiful place. He is glad she picked it out beforehand. They went out walking one day, taking their sweet time, hands never letting go, and she pointed it out to him. “This is where I want us to be,” she said sweetly, her silver hair letting loose in the light breeze. “The sun can set on our stones, and it will be just the prettiest picture.” She turned to him and kissed him, then. “Remind me to get my camera later.”

He wasn’t too eager to talk about it, the thought of either one of them being in the ground was something he wasn’t ready to face, but she did not much care for his discomfort. When spring came, she would drag him out there again, basket in tow, checking the fragile green shoots for rabbits or frost and pointing out the aspen tree that anchored the far corner. “Plenty of room for the whole family,” she said casually. “That is, if the children want to be buried here. It’s hard when they all grow up and get married or find their way away from us. I imagine it would be hard to choose.”

Arthur always figured he’d be buried beneath the mountain, or tossed off some nameless ridge like the outlaws before him. The idea of a tidy family plot, hemmed in by aspen and crocus, seemed like an absurd joke until she started nagging him about it. For the past two years, she’d worn him down with gentle reminders about the cost of family and how beautiful a good death could be. Maybe she believed she could trick fate by planning ahead—keep the reaper at bay with a well-tended border of lilacs and painted stones.

But it didn't keep Death away for long. The harsh winter of ‘44 froze the marrow in her weary bones, turned her fingers ice cold, and stole her breath in visible puffs that grew fainter each day. The war was bleak enough, it being the only thing ever discussed on the radio, and the only thing worth looking to was spring. But when the first crocuses finally pushed through the thawing earth, she followed them. On the evening of May 7th, 1945, she closed her eyes for the final time—slipping away while Arthur's calloused thumb traced circles on her paper-thin skin, his cracked lips pressed against her temple, whispering promises about summer fishing trips and orchard picnics she would never see.

By morning, it was announced that the war was over and peace would begin to take the world once again.

But not for Arthur. 

He loved her. Oh, God, how he loved her.

“You were supposed to outlive me, darlin’,” he says with a quivering tongue. He can still see the shape of the marble marker through his blurred vision, tears hot and heavy as they bead at the end of his eyes and stream down his weathered cheeks. “The grave ain’t gonna be satisfied until I’m lyin’ next to you. I promise.”

Even if Augustus hadn’t taken over the orchard and horse breeding business, Arthur would’ve never sold it. He made his children promise to let it carry on through the family forever, as long as it would last. It’s survived the Dust Bowl, blight, land taxes, drought, and two wars, and it, too, will survive his death.

He will tell her what she has missed when he sees her again, if there is a place for him. And when they are both bones under the aspen shade, with wildflowers growing from their sleeves, it won’t matter that the world changed, that horses gave way to cars, and the world went on without them.

It is a beautiful place. The light hits different on her stone this time, as though the heavens knew this day was special.

Fifty-six years together. 

“Happy anniversary, darlin’.” And with a steady movement, he bends over his stiff body to place some Harrison’s yellow on her grave. “Death ain’t partin’ us.”

“Daddy?” a soft voice calls out to him. Slowly rising, he uses the support of his cane to turn around. Jonnie Beatrice stands a few feet away, eyes dark and soft as her hair bouncing off her shoulders. She shivers a bit, the coolness of the spring breeze swirling around her, and she pulls up the collar on her wool jacket. “Isaac just pulled up.”

He stands rigid a moment, hand awkward on the cane, as the clamor in his chest makes it hard to get breath. He wipes at his cheek, rough with stubble, and tries to banish the red from his nose before Jonnie gets close. She’s grown into her mother’s height, drawn thin with the long face of the Morgans and the sad, burned-in wisdom of her mother. Arthur leans into the cane, letting the ache in his knees distract him from the bigger thing gnawing at his insides.

Jonnie reaches for his arm out of habit, like she is still a girl unsure of her steps, but stops herself, knowing her father’s pride. But he takes her offered hand, guiding it back to his arm, where she links it gently. They move slow, careful, the way old people and small children do. On the other side of the meadow, the aspen groves clatter like coins in a tin. Arthur feels every year, every season spent on this patch of dirt, and lets the hush lie across his shoulders.

“She’d like to see the cherry buds, now that they’ve come out,” Jonnie says softly. While she grieves the loss of her mother, she uses very few words to say it. She’s always been that way, and she looks at her father the same way she always has, with a gentleness he has never quite understood how he deserved. In silence, they cross the sodden grass, his boots soaking up earth and the hem of her skirt, just below the knee, following the breeze as she lets him lean into her when the ground softens underfoot.

Arthur clicks his tongue. Why would any woman in their right mind wear a short dress like that in a Utah spring? “You oughta wear somethin’ that you ain’t chitterin’ in, June Bug.”

“It’s the fashion, Daddy.”

“And when is you gonna marry? You can’t keep lookin’ after me forever.”

Jonnie pats her father’s hand. “I’m forty-five now, Daddy. I’m set in my ways.” Truth is, she is happy with the life she has, owning her own pawn shop over on McKinley street and traveling the globe for the next shiny thing to collect. “Any fella that can put up with me is either broke or broken, and I got enough collectables around the house as is.” Her smile is her grandmother’s but undeniably her mother’s, too—something in the corner of the mouth, a secret lazy twist. “Besides, you’re still enough of a handful for me.”

Arthur grunts at that, a low chuckle rumbling up in his ruined chest. Since Eliza died, Jonnie has come to live with him back at the homestead, returning to her apartment on weekends and leaving only to go shopping or check in on her store. Arthur feels indebted to her and knows that after his recent fall, taking care of him isn’t easy. But as stubborn as she is, he wants to do as much for himself as he can. 

He pats her hand softly. “Maybe so, June Bug. Maybe so.” He walks with her up the lane, past the scuffed stones and the slanting fence rail, to where the orchard’s first blush of pink-breasted, the branches like a young woman after church, all bright and bashful. He pauses, chest heaving, as the frost-spangled grass catches a shaft of sun and makes the world look new again. Arthur squints against the glare, blinking until his eyes adjust to the budding light.

He keeps thinking she might walk over the hill, as though two years haven’t passed since her death, and that they are young again and just fixing up the place.

You drive a hard bargain, Mrs. Morgan.

Then make like Mr. Morgan and kiss your wife.

Jonnie lets him feel whatever he is feeling, letting him go back to good memories to get him by. She’s known him all of her life, and knows how this place can take a person back to a place where times were better. Whether it be the sound of their boots muddying through the thawed grass, the smell of distant smoke and wet earth, or the slow, stubborn warmth in the air, this home is a safe haven. It is why she and her siblings all agreed that he would stay here until his last breath.

After a moment longer, Arthur blinks at the beaded tears on his lashes and pats Jonnie’s arm. “Let’s keep goin’, sweetheart.”

They reach the end of the orchard, where just up the hill is the house. Three cars are parked on the gravel, one being Jonnie’s, the other two belonging to Alice and Isaac and their families.

Arthur shakes his head. “Cars…hell.”

Jonnie suppresses a chuckle, and they continue up the hill. Arthur slows down a bit, and his pride won’t let him apologize, but Jonnie doesn’t care. 

At the top of the porch steps, Jonnie hangs back, letting Arthur catch his breath before she opens the door. Inside: the jangle of laughter, clatter of glass, the low thrum of two radios playing in opposite rooms. A wave of lilac and roast chicken and old woodwork meets Arthur at the threshold, and he allows himself to take a few steps forward as Jonnie closes the door. 

“Hello, Papa,” Abigail Celeste greets, holding baby Birdy Lou, her firstborn child, as she passes by on her way to the parlor. “Mama said dinner will be done soon.”

Alice, that bootstrapper. As soon as she takes charge of anything, everything and everyone turns into a well-oiled machine. Her experience as a nurse in the First World War taught her that, as it was what kept her from thinking too much about her husband as he fought in some other country. When the war finally ended, and they were reunited, it wasn’t long before she had her first baby, and the world didn’t stop spinning. Hardly ever has. 

Out of all of his girls, Alice took Eliza’s death the hardest. The bond they had was something sacred, and it didn’t help that Eliza died just a few hours shy of her birthday. 

He wants to go see her, and without announcing it to Jonnie, he putters his way along toward the kitchen. Two of his great-grandchildren, Julia and Jean, come running by him, and he has to stop himself short of bumping into them. He doesn’t mind; the laughter and joy in children is something she loved and welcomed. It reminds him of her, even if it aches sometimes.

He smiles and carries on.

The door feels a little heavy, but he manages to push it open. The room is just as busy as the rest of the house; the Morgan women hard at work making a delicious meal. He sees Eliza’s cookbooks open on the kitchen table, the fragrance of fresh bread and boiled potatoes filling the air.

“How much longer on that roast, Annabelle?”

Annabelle sticks her head out of the oven, a fork in her hand, with steam coming off it. She brushes back her chestnut colored hair, her brown eyes bright and alert. “I’d say fifteen minutes at most. It really took to that marinade.”

Alice nods her head in approval, turning away to continue whisking something in a bowl. “And what of the Brussels sprouts, Louise?”

Louise—now a grown woman, doctor’s wife, and still the only one who can burn water—stares glumly at the skillet as if it had personally insulted her. “Just as soon as I can get the flame to behave,” she mutters, fiddling with the gas burner. A low blue tongue licks at the pan, which is mostly charred sprouts and what looks like three tablespoons of butter. She curses something in French under her breath. She’s always hesitated to help when asked to assist in the kitchen, but coming from two sides of culinary geniuses in her family, the pressure has always remained. “We have any more fresh ones that I can cook?”

Arthur wiggles a bit at the disaster, then lets himself slip quietly over toward the window, where Alice stands whisking the life from a bowl of cream, face set tight, jaw stubborn.

But even so, she doesn’t miss a thing. “Hi, Daddy,” she says. Despite being in her fifties, she still looks barely older than she had in her nursing school graduation photo, her sharp cheekbones now cast in finer lines, like the lines of a well-used map, or the veins of the leaves her mother pressed in books each autumn. Arthur watches, helpless to the pride and sorrow that tumbles together in his gut, as she wipes the splatters of cream off her wrist onto the apron at her waist, knuckles white where she grips the bowl. She puts the bowl down for a moment and turns to face him, brushing hair back from her forehead. “It’s almost ready,” she says, voice thick and raw at the edges. There’s something under her mouth, words dammed up in her throat, and she keeps them there until, with trembling hands, she reaches out for him and pulls him close.

Arthur nearly cracks in half. She hugs him, tighter than a bear trap, and he stiffens—just a second—then lets himself fold, stiffness in his shoulder eases against her cheekbone, her father’s tobacco-and-applewood scent in her hair. She is trembling, just the faintest quiver at first, but when she finally lets go, she sniffs harshly, trying to regain composure. “You wanna go rest a while? Jack and Isaac are in the parlor with the babies.”

Arthur grunts, “Not tired. Not yet,” and squeezes Alice’s hand once before she lets go, nodding and stepping back toward the counter to retrieve her bowl. The kitchen is a chaos of glass and sunlight and steam, and for a moment, he just watches the bright blur as branches tremble in the window and the women’s voices overlap with the cooking and laughter and smell of rosemary and lemon zest. The world narrows to the here and now—the women, the home, the faint warmth of the kitchen as the oven thunders and pops and the window rattles with a spring wind. Looking back at Alice, he can almost see Eliza standing there, the concentrated look on her face and the way her tongue pokes out the side of her mouth when she needs to whip the heavy cream into submission. For a second, he has to brace himself on the counter, lightheaded. The world blinks in and out, and he tastes the electric tin of grief under his tongue. Dear God, she is gone.

Arthur draws a breath wild with rosemary and the tang of sweat. For a second, he has to rest his hand heavily on the counter’s edge, waiting for the kitchen to settle—or for his heart to catch up, whichever happens first. The thudding in his ribs is sharp.

“Dad…” Annabelle’s voice comes through softly. When he opens his eyes, Arthur sees her standing beside him, setting a fresh loaf of bread on a trivet. “Come with me…” And she offers a hand to him.

She leads him out of the kitchen by the elbow, voices and warmth tapering off behind them, into the front parlor where the lamps were still off, and the room glows blue with watery spring twilight. Books and magazines tower on the coffee table, cluttered with the relics of children and then grandchildren—card decks and pencils, a battered chessboard mid-game with carved knights bent from decades of hands.

Jack and Isaac sit at opposite ends of the blue velvet sofa, the baby bird of his grandchild burbling in Jack’s crooked arm, while Isaac thumbs absently at the cuff of his shirt, nerves stitched tight into his jaw. Abigail plays with her baby cousin on the floor, her own child being held by the grandfather at the moment.

“You’ll have it by next week,” Jack says. “I’ve dug up quite a bit on this real estate thing…”

Isaac nods. “That’s good to know. I’ll have my paralegal begin to compile all of our exhibits, and I’ll start drafting my petition in the morning.”

Jack chuckles, holding out his finger for Birdy to hold onto. “You better wait a little longer. If Alice hears we’re talkin’ about work, she’ll have my head.” Birdy’s fat fist closes around Jack's finger, and he grins lopsidedly. “My, this one’s got a grip already. What’re you feedin’ her, Abby?”

Annabelle guides Arthur to a worn-out armchair, hovering over him as he settles in.

Abigail looks away from her father bashfully. “Dad, that isn’t an appropriate question.”

The child gurgles, clutching his thumb with surprising force, eyes bright as glass marbles. Once Arthur settles comfortably into the armchair, Annabelle takes a blanket out of a nearby basket and drapes it across his knees. “Comfy, Daddy?”

Arthur nods at her. “Thank you, sweetheart. You go on back to the kitchen, now.”

Annabelle gives him a quick squeeze on the shoulder and gracefully heads back toward the kitchen, her footsteps muffled on the braided rug. Glass rattles softly in the next room—someone pouring what sounds like lemonade, or maybe bourbon. Arthur blinks hard and lets his gaze drift to the blur of the parlor window as Isaac and Jack continue their conversation.

“So, how are your folks? Last letter Dad got was from a few months ago, and they don’t call much.”

Jack shrugs his shoulders, the wool of his cardigan bunching at his collar as his eyes drift toward Arthur, lingering on the papery skin of his father-in-law's hands. A shadow crosses his face before he clears his throat. "They're doin' fine. Ma spends most afternoons in her garden—those heirloom tomatoes are takin' over half the yard now. Pop's still whittling those little wooden birds, has a whole flock of 'em lined up on the mantel. Alice and I plan on drivin' up there when the hawthorns finally bloom, as they’re late this year. Maybe Alice and I can convince the kids to come along with their families. Rachel and her family, even Albert, have already gone up there twice this year.” He shakes his head. “Makin’ their big brother look bad.”

Isaac shakes his head, the corners of his mouth lifting in a smile that doesn't quite reach his eyes. "It's strange havin' an empty house, isn't it? All those bedrooms with the doors closed, no loud music, or curfews…”

Jack nods, absently smoothing the baby's wispy hair with his thumb as she lies back in his arm. "Lord, yes.” He nods over to his daughter. “Abigail Celeste only just got married and gave me this grandchild, and Arthur Charles packed up his record collection for that dormitory across the state. Some mornings I wake up and listen for footsteps that aren't there anymore. Both are barely twenty years old, but I feel old."

“You feel old?” Isaac laughs. “You aren’t the one who’s spent thirty years in a courtroom. I went to my twenty-fifth reunion, and nobody recognized me at first. I had to wear a name tag like the rest of the sad faces.”

“You could always retire. Leave it to us young folks.” Jack winks at his daughter as she continues to play with Emmett Arthur on the floor. She grins before turning away again. 

Isaac laughs at that. “I guess I should have become an investigative journalist like you.”

Jack nods. “Maybe so.”

“But…I’ve been talkin’ with Noissette…and I’m thinkin’ of running for Judge next year.”

Jack’s eyes widen. “You are?”

Isaac shrugs, as if the idea weighs less than it does. “Just feels like the next right thing. The circuit court’s been run by Kevin Patterson since Reconstruction, and he’s already promised the Governor he won't seek another term.” Isaac’s voice flexes and goes tight, his hand palming restlessly at the arm of the chair, gaze half-lost at the lamplight pooling in the rug. “If it comes down to it, that courthouse’ll go up like a chalk drawing in the rain, but I think I owe it to her. To Mom and—” Here he casts a look at Arthur, still sitting quietly in his favorite chair, voice nearly lodging itself in his throat, “—to you, Dad. You always said to do the job right.” The words tangle and catch until they nearly choke him out, but Isaac makes himself look up and meet his father’s eye. “I’ll do right, Dad. I ain’t gonna let you down.” He snorts, as if the topic embarrasses him. “I’ll ugly up the campaign trail in her honor, that’s for damned sure.”

Jack grins, a wide, honest thing, then salutes with his free hand. “She’d have said, ‘Just don’t forget about your family when you’re out there savin’ folks.’” 

Arthur listens, half-shrouded behind his eyelids, letting the words rattle around in his chest like loose cartridges in an old pocket. Funny how the world keeps turning with or without his say. He’s proud of his children, even if he never can quite figure out how to say it straight; pride is always hardest to show, but easiest to feel, and he wonders if one day that won’t be true of grief, too.

Arthur nods his head. “We was already proud of you, son. Still is.”

Isaac smiles softly at that. “Thanks, Dad. I love you.”

“Love you too, son.”

The room falls into a soft racket, babies squirming, old arguments rehearsed with new faces, and Arthur, though not tired, lets himself close his eyes and sink back into the chair. The parlor vanishes in a blink, awash in the damp gold of porch-light as the front door flares open again. The voices from the kitchen sharpen a notch, just loud enough that Arthur can tell someone is fussing over what was brought in, and an excited shriek from Louise, which says enough.

He can hear the kitchen door open again, and doesn’t bother to open his eyes to see who just arrived.

Jack announces it for him. “Oh, hello, son, you got it—? Oh…” He hushes himself suddenly, almost giving away the secret of what his son, named after his grandfather, holds in his hands.

Arthur Charles's voice drifts from the doorway, warm and low like his father's. "Hey, Dad. Hey, Uncle Isaac." There's a pause, and Arthur feels the weight of his grandson's gaze settle on him. "Is he asleep?"

Arthur keeps his breathing even, his eyelids still as pond water. The charade of sleep feels like a small rebellion, a private joke between himself and the darkening room.

"Probably," Jack chuckles, the leather of the couch creaking as he shifts. "Been nodding off since before you got here."

Footsteps pad across the braided rug—Arthur Charles's distinctive gait, slightly heavier on the left foot from that old baseball injury—followed by the soft click of a bedroom door closing, the mysterious parcel safely hidden away.

Behind his closed lids, Arthur feels genuine drowsiness creeping in like evening tide, washing over the shores of his consciousness. His limbs grow heavy, thoughts untethering from their moorings, and he surrenders to the gentle pull of sleep that had only been a pretense moments before.

***

Daddy..." A soft voice pulls him from the warm darkness, gentle as a breeze through summer curtains. Arthur's eyelids flutter open, heavy as old shutters. Alice leans over him, her face haloed by the amber glow of the table lamp. Her fingers make small, comforting circles on his cardigan sleeve, the gold of her wedding band catching the light with each movement. Chestnut hair—now threaded with silver at the temples like fine strands of moonlight—cascades past her pearl earrings in waves that remind him of her mother's. "Dinner's ready. The roast you like. You wanna come join us?"

Arthur straightens in his seat and works the ache from his neck, squinting through the blur as Alice helps him to his feet. She’s careful, hands gentle but firm at his elbow—too much like her mother in the way she fusses, hovering close without crowding him. Behind her, he can see family members on their way to the dining room, just across the hall.

He gets to his feet and reaches for his cane, and they walk together.

As they enter, Arthur takes in the general sweep of the crowded dining room, the old oak table still supporting the weight of platters and bowls. Every seat is full—Isaac at the end, with his wife Noissette and Jonnie seated on each side of him. Jonnie looks up at Arthur, her eyes sharp behind horn-rimmed spectacles, and smiles. Annabelle shepherds children into their chairs with pert commands; Franklin already corralling the salt and bread to his side of the table just as his father, Augustus, chides him silently with a look.

Alice, Noissette, Louise, Annabelle, and Jonnie have pulled out all the stops for the anniversary. There are sprigs of plum blossom tucked into blue mason jars, candelabras winking in the gloomy evening, hand-sewn linen napkins, and polished silver stacked at every setting. The air is thick with roast and root vegetables, the tang of gravy, yeast, bitter apple, and a background thrum of old tobacco and lemon honey. Soft laughter, chink of glass, the way a sentence rushes and then stalls as all eyes land on him and Alice. They pause at the edge of the table, and for a moment, Arthur feels a touch of tremor in his chest. For every empty place at the table—Eliza, Hosea, and all the rest—there stood twice as many living, breathing souls. Maybe that is how she wanted it, all those years ago in their bedroom when they talked about the cost of family. Maybe she knew that loss was inevitable, but wanted everyone to remember the feast, not the famine.

Alice arranges him at the head of the table, tucking the chair close, then hurries round to help her granddaughter Emelia as she’s about to knock over the gravy boat whilst reaching for a napkin. Arthur plants both hands on the table, letting in the feeling of the soft cotton tablecloth under his palms, remembering the years of meals eaten here—sometimes in celebration, sometimes in silence heavy as stone.

Alice commands the start of grace, her voice proud, and the words caught up with every accent she’d picked up along the way. Arthur bows his head, waiting for the hush to gather in the room, and Jack says a quick blessing.

Benjamin, Augustus' youngest son, breathes a sigh of relief at the brevity of his uncle’s prayer. “Thank God, I’m starvin’…” and reaches for the first thing he can get his hands on: a slice of bread.

“Mind your manners…!” Esther, Augustus’ wife, scolds, reaching across the table to swat his hand. “You wanna eat at the children’s table since you’re fixin’ to act like one?”

Arthur tries to conceal his grin, remembering the times when Eliza had to scold Augustus for doing the exact same thing. Then his heart begins to ache again.

But the ache in Arthur's chest soon dissolves as Isaac rises from his chair, punch glass held aloft like a beacon against the gathering dark. “I’d like to propose a toast…” He raises it higher as others follow suit, sweat shining above his brow as the room stills. “To my mother and father,” Isaac begins, the words rough and stilted—but he does not pause, nor let the old nerves creep along his tongue. “To the two folks who taught us what it meant to work hard and make a home. And not just with their hands, but with their hearts, too.”

The liquid in his glass trembles, catches the light. Isaac’s voice steadies, louder now, carrying through each corner of the dining room. “We wouldn’t have nothing if it weren’t for you, Dad. For you and—” Noissette reaches a hand to squeeze her husband’s arm in a comforting gesture, others beginning to sniff softly. “—and to Mama. To every lesson she taught, every story she told, every mornin’ you both got up early and got yourselves and us through another day. I don’t think a single one of us’d be here now if not for you two, and if we could do it all over again, we’d want the same folks raisin’ us. So here’s to you, Dad. And to Mama, may she rest in peace." He then holds out his glass, swallowing thickly once. “To Arthur and Eliza. Happy Anniversary.”

“To Arthur and Eliza.” And everyone clinks their glass with their neighbor. 

“Thank you, son,” Arthur says, voice gone rough and tight. “Shoah am glad to have all of you here with me. Eliza, she–family was everythin’ to her…”

The silence at the end of the toast comes heavier than the clink of glass, a hush swelling behind every ribcage. The punch tastes of peach syrup and saccharine and the burn of memory. Arthur can’t swallow for a second, but he tips back his glass with the rest, the burn washing down the lump in his throat. 

And soon, plates pass from hand to hand, big helpings for the little ones, small, careful portions for the adults, but more than enough to go around.

Every bite that Arthur takes is like revisiting a memory, each dish a recipe of Eliza’s make, created with care and love that comes through in every ingredient. Alice really outdid herself with the planning of this.

She watches her father eat in silence as conversations swell around him, the gentle upturn of his lips as he lets the gravy puddle around his mashed potatoes. It is like being given a second helping of memory, the echo of her voice behind every instruction scribbled in the margin of the cookbook—“use the gold potatoes, never russet!” and “double the pepper” with footnotes of, “he loves it with extra butter” and “use the leftovers for soup the next day.” She wanted to make this as special as she could, but now seeing him there at the end of the table, she has only two more chances to make it so.

So, as everyone nears the end of supper, the time for dessert approaches. She gently scoots her chair back, the old oak legs scraping against the worn floorboards with a familiar creak. Jack's eyes flicker up from his half-empty plate, a question forming in the slight furrow of his brow. 

"Where're you going, love?" His voice carries just enough to reach her ears but not disturb the conversations humming around them.

She lifts her chin towards the kitchen, where yellow light spills through the doorway. "I'll be right back," she whispers, her fingers briefly squeezing his shoulder. "Just make sure no one leaves." The anticipation in her eyes betrays the surprise waiting beyond the swinging door.

In the kitchen, three peach pies wait on the windowsill, still glistening with warm syrup and flakes of dough. Alice reaches for the oven mitt, stops, and instead grips the old tin pie server—her mother’s, notched at the handle from decades of use. She can almost hear the remembered scrape of it against the blackened pie plate, the way her mother used to set aside the first uneven slice so no one would see. All at once, she feels the heaviness in her own hands, the tremor that comes with moving her mother’s things, the private, weighted hush of being the only one alive who remembers how she was always the one to trim the crust with the paring knife, slow and careful, so no one else would have to eat the burnt bits.

She serves the pies herself, as tradition dictates—three thick wedges, syrup pooling at the base, crust dark and fragrant. Taking the cream she painstakingly whipped earlier out of the Frigidaire, she dollops it on each piece, then takes them in her hands. She isn’t a waitress, nor ever worked as one, but manages to carefully make her way back to the diningroom.

The hush that follows her return to the table is thick enough to spread a hush on bread. All eyes follow the pie like an altar offering as it circles its way to Arthur at the head of the table.

“For you, Daddy,” Alice says warmly.

He sits up a little straighter, the old coil of pride and embarrassment tangling in his chest as he sees the first plate—the big wedge with the golden crown and the sugared crust, the cream already softening to rivulets. The sight of it damn near undoes him—tremor in his chin, the whole world coming hot behind his eyes.

…I'd sure like some of that pie that I had on Sunday.

Pie?

Shoah, it was pretty good. Who makes it?

I–I do.

Oh, you do, do ya? My compliments.

His voice cracks as he speaks, but he manages: “Thank you, Alice, sweetheart. God almighty that’s beautiful.” He places his trembling spoon down, pie untested just yet, and presses a fist to his mouth, the knuckles going red and white—unsure if he’ll even make it through the next swallow. The table was quiet at first, utensils stilled, a hush rolling through the room heavier than even the hush, the crust and syrup and cream. Arthur forces himself to look at Alice—not just the pie, but Alice—and memorize her face for as long as he can still see it.

“Aren’t you gonna try it, Papa?” Abigail Celeste asks encouragingly as she readjusts Birdy in her lap, and Jack gives her a gentle look, shaking his head.

Arthur hesitates a moment longer, then forks the first bite. The crust shivers, the peach flesh slides like a memory onto his tongue. Not a whisper of bitterness lingering in the fruit, only sweetness and the tender give of a perfect ripeness. It doesn’t matter that it was made from store fruit and not right from an orchard, or that the crust is imperfect; it is pie, and he can nearly taste her in it. He barely sets the fork down when the ache in his chest returns, and he chokes on a little snort of a sob, one he barely manages to stifle before it gets loose in the room. It’s suddenly too hot in here. The tablecloth’s pattern swims in his sight, and the smell of cinnamon and cream cuts sharply through the center of his nose. Is it always going to be this way?

Arthur stares at the pie, at the creamy pooling and the way the syrup bleeds into thick rivers. Damned if he wasn’t near useless. Even after all these years, the smallest thing can just level his whole person, make him soft and hollowed out. He pushes at the inside of his cheek with his tongue and covers his eyes with his hands as he weeps in front of his whole family.

“Oh, Daddy…” Annabelle sighs empathetically and begins to rise from her chair to go comfort him.

“Daddy, I’m—” Alice starts, guilt overwhelming her. “I’m so sorry, I should’ve never have—”

“No, little lady—” Arthur manages to say, and he chokes a groan as he tries to suppress his sobs. “It ain’t your fault, I’m just—” Annabelle wraps her arms around him, and he leans into her softly. “I just miss her…”

The room falls into a reverent silence, broken only by the soft clink of a spoon against china and the muffled sniffles Arthur tries to contain. Alice's mind races with what-ifs and whys, each thought sharper than the last, pricking at her conscience like the tines of her mother's silver dessert fork. This was all just a terrible idea—the carefully arranged place settings, the recipes pulled from yellowed index cards, the peach pies cooling by the window where her mother used to stand. She watches her father's shoulders tremble beneath Annabelle's embrace, his weathered hands covering eyes that have seen too much loss. But her siblings had all nodded enthusiastically when she proposed the dinner, their voices overlapping with eager suggestions. Are they all to blame for the tears now staining the tablecloth her mother had embroidered decades ago?

Jonnie then gets up, joining her little sister in embracing her father. “Why don’t you and the men head into the living room, Daddy, while we women clean up the kitchen?”

Isaac's smile breaks across his face like dawn, grateful for the diversion. "That sounds like a swell idea, JB." He clears his throat, the sound like gravel under tires. "I think the young men around here could use some sage advice from their grandfather..." His eyes, the same deep brown as his mother’s, find each of the young men in turn—Alexander with his slouched shoulders, Franklin picking at his napkin's edge, Benjamin still clutching his fork. Isaac tilts his chin toward the living room, a gesture as familiar to this family as breathing. "Boys...?" The word hangs in the air, gentle but unmistakably a command.

The next generation of Morgan men all rise in unison—each old enough now to be called young men, but still prone to dragging their heels when Uncle Isaac’s tone promised “advice.” Arthur forces a huff out of his chest and shambles up from his chair, patting Annabelle’s hand where it still rests against his sleeve.

Jack takes it upon himself to rise as well, his chair scraping softly against the worn floorboards. He turns to his wife, noticing how the lamp light catches the dampness in her eyes. His calloused fingers find the sleeve of her Sunday dress, thumb brushing against the soft blue cotton. "You alright, love?" he whispers, his voice barely audible above the clink of silverware. Alice clenches her jaw until a small muscle flutters beneath her skin, her gaze meeting his through eyes glossy as rain-slicked windows. The silence between them speaks volumes. "You want me to help you clean up?" he asks, his wedding band catching the light as his hand hovers near hers.

She shakes her head, swallowing hard against the stone lodged in her throat, feeling it scrape all the way down. "You go on..." she manages, her voice thin as tissue paper.

Deciding not to push it, he leans in close to kiss her softly on the cheek, then turns away to help Isaac and Augustus escort his father-in-law to the living room.

“Alright, I think I will serve the children some pie.” Imogen rises from her chair, then turns up to look at Annabelle. “Is that alright, Mother?”

Annabelle lingers by her father's empty chair, her gaze following him until he disappears into the living room. Only then does she turn to meet her daughter's questioning eyes. "Yes, darling," she says softly. "Let the children have their pie."

***

“They was called the O’Driscolls.”

Benjamin, Alexander, and Franklin all lean forward on the sagging floral couch, their shoulders hunched like cats about to pounce, eyes widening to catch every word. The lamplight catches their eager faces, gold almost dancing in their eyes. Isaac can't help but grin with a knowing look, the deep lines around his mouth crinkling like well-worn leather, as he watches his nephews' feigned boredom dissolve into naked fascination at the first mention of their grandfather's gunslinging days.

“And you fought these guys all the time?” Benjamin asks. “Sounds like the mafia gangs I’ve read about in the magazine Uncle Jack writes.”

It's true that Jack had once spent countless nights hunched over his desk, poring through ledgers and newspaper clippings, tracing the tangled web of Salt Flat's underworld—the way “The Lion” Luciano's men moved whiskey through the sewers beneath the city, the precise locations of basement speakeasies with their hidden entrances behind barbershops and laundries. The investigation consumed him during those dark months when the Great War still echoed in his dreams, when every backfiring car sent him diving for cover. The meticulousness required to map each connection between corrupt officials and mob enforcers had given his trembling hands purpose, and when he finally laid his evidence before Isaac, who, once the state prosecutor, had smiled that wolf's smile that meant justice was coming.

But Arthur shakes his head. “Them boahs are chickens compared to these gangs. Mafia fellers like to hide and pay folks under the nose. Outlaws…they do it right to your face.”

Alexander, the most skeptical of the three, glances at Franklin and mutters, “Guess who’s still around, though? And it isn’t the gunslingers.” The other two snicker, but Arthur’s jaw sets and his hand flexes over the crook of his cane, knuckles whitening. He can still feel the ache that runs up the cane when he squeezes, the sweet-and-sick memory of powder and blood pooled deep between his knuckles. The boys don’t notice the shift in his jaw or the pulse in his throat, but Isaac, who'd once watched men die at his father's feet, catches every nuance. He waits, eyes on his father.

Arthur stares at the rug between his boots, the old brown and cream pattern blurring at the edges. The question knots his gut for a moment, but he answers as smoothly as ever. “Once, in Nevada,” he says, keeping his eyes on the floor. “I was aimin’ to rob a stagecoach. It was an easy stop, was gettin’ ready to have Javier open the door, but there were women and children inside.”

The boys stop their snickering and listen.

“Did you rob them?” Alexander asks.

Arthur leans forward a bit, looking at his grandson dead in the eyes. “What’chu think I did?” He studies his grandson, weighing the sharpness in the boy’s gaze. “Let ‘em keep their money. They needed it more than I did.” The ice in his voice tells the boys it isn’t up for debate. “Some men shoot first, then open the coach. I ain’t never been that sort.”

Benjamin’s eyes widen. “Did they report you to the law?”

Arthur leans back in his chair and looks toward his eldest son. “Isaac, fetch me your mama’s scrapbook.”

Isaac was up and across the room almost before Arthur reached the end of the sentence. He moves with the old habit of a man who has fetched things for his father since boyhood: no wasted motion, no questions, just a nod, his knee popping as he rose from the armchair to cross to the glass-fronted bookcase before anyone else could even guess where to look. He comes back with the battered leather-bound album, edges curled, corners blunted by decades of hands and sunlight. Isaac hands it off, and Arthur lays it open in his lap, the paper yellowed and stiff as tree bark.

He flips past the pressed wildflowers he had given to Eliza over the years, old seed packets, turkey feathers, and magazine articles recalling her children’s accomplishments. Photographs of Alice after winning horse races, and Isaac’s certificates for good grades. Finally, he finds the newspaper clipping, from all the way back in the 1890’s.

“Here,” Arthur says as he holds the book out. “Read that article out loud for us.”

Franklin rises from the couch and takes the scrapbook, returning to his place between his brothers, and begins to read aloud.

Wales & Figaro, one of Nevada’s prestigious stagecoach companies, has the honor to present a badge of valor to one of its employees, by the name of Terrance Riggs, for courageously fighting off a band of robbers.

According to Mr. Riggs, he was transporting a group of passengers toward Lake Washoe, when he was stopped by a pair of young, masked men, who had their weapons drawn.

“I thought I was done for,” explained Riggs. “They seemed to know what they were doing, and I had no means to defend myself or my passengers.”

But it wasn’t to be so, for these men, who had appeared to have the intent to rob and kill these innocent people, did something remarkable.

“They gave me a gun,” Riggs said, also noting that it was the largest of the two, who seemed to be in charge, who ordered Mr. Riggs be given a Springfield rifle, in very good condition, and gave some advice on spotting any further trouble.

While still in shock, Riggs was then told to check on his passengers before leaving. After promptly checking on the women and children aboard, Riggs drove off, resuming the journey to Lake Washoe.

But the trip was far from over, when a second band of robbers appeared, their guns blazing. Terrance Riggs, now armed and slightly more prepared thanks to the advice he received, managed to fend off the attackers, all four in number. He attributes his survival to the earlier intervention by the mysterious pair.

“I feel out of sorts to say this, but they were Providential,” said Riggs. 

It was discovered, after reporting the event, that the second band of thieves was none other than the remnants of a notorious gang of outlaws: the O’Driscolls. Their leader had been rumored to have been killed a year or two ago, but it is now clear that their methods are more sporadic, given their approach and quick demise.

Mr. Riggs is now praised as a hero of Washoe County, and is now pushing for the policy that drivers be permitted to carry firearms for Wales and Figaro.

The three boys lift their eyes in awe, almost speechless.

Arthur decides to deliver the sage advice that was promised. “There’s a lotta things I ain’t proud of doin’, boahs, but I ain’t never regretted doin’ a good thing. I was part of a gang, I rode long, fought hard, and robbed folks. You’re right, Alexander. Those of us who ended up livin’ is because we left. We learned that bein’ a man ain’t about gettin’ what’s yours, it’s about givin’ what you have.”

The boys lapse into a stunned hush, the article slipping between their knees as they stare into the middle distance, jaws slack. Arthur feels a prick of satisfaction; not pride, exactly, but something close—a rightness, like a bone mending along good lines. At the time, he didn’t much believe in Providence, not after the things he had seen and done, but love, forgiveness, redemption—the ability to change and live a better life—those things had to come from somewhere.

“Arthur—” Jack starts, interrupting Arthur’s thoughts. “We got company.”

Arthur looks up and sees the rest of his family come in through the doorway. Arthur Charles, with a grin on his face, enters the room, followed by Jonnie, Annabelle, and Imogen. The little children, now hyped up on pie, come squeezing their way in and settle on empty places on the couch and on the floor, after receiving looks from Esther and Alice’s eldest daughter, Elizabeth, with her baby in her arms.

“Daddy…” Jonnie says, taking the parcel in Arthur Charles’ hands. “We had this specially made in Salt Flats…” She walks over to him and places the large parcel in his lap. “Happy Anniversary.”

He stares at the parcel, feeling the weight of it in his lap. It’s a large square, its edges sharp and firm. It hardly makes sense, sitting here with this broad, mysterious square in his lap, wrapped up in pale blue tissue and a ribbon as tight as a cinched saddle. Arthur works the knot free, mind blank for a second, hands clumsier than they should be now that everyone is staring. He peels away the tissue slowly, not that his hands can move any faster, anyway. 

With just the gentle tearing of the paper, the last of the wrapping falls away. Arthur finds himself looking at a perfectly square picture, matted in eggshell-colored paper and set already inside a heavy wooden frame. It is a photograph—the sort that costs real money, the kind that is done professionally and must be placed behind glass.

Arthur remembers such an event: their family photograph, taken the spring before Eliza’s passing.

The photograph captures the entire Morgan clan—a living family tree. Jack and Alice with their brood: Elizabeth, Atticus, and the twins: Abigail Celeste and Arthur Charles. Elizabeth Marie leans slightly toward her husband, their daughter Emelia between them. Abigail, with the ring on her finger promising her fiancé’s return from the war, sits beside her twin. In the back row stand Isaac and Noissette with their grown children: Jacques (accompanied by his wife and young son Jean) and Louise (with her husband and Julia). Louise's arms are empty—Emmett would arrive months later.

At Arthur's feet kneels Jonnie, her face tilted up toward him in the armchair. Nearby stands Annabelle with Harold, his protective hand resting on Imogen Grace's shoulder.

Augustus and Esther form the center of their own constellation: Anne, Franklin, Alexander, Benjamin, and Wilimena clustered around them. James, who would later become Anne's husband, exists somewhere beyond the frame, still unknown to them all.

Finally, his gaze settles on the figure in the second armchair—Eliza, her weathered hands folded in her lap, her face a map of the years they'd traveled together.

Eliza.

Their last family picture.

A hush builds in the room, air thick with memory, as Arthur stares into the crisp grid of faces—Augustus’s stoic jaw, Franklin’s sheepish grin, the hard shine of the studio lamp finding the deep crow’s feet at Arthur’s own eyes, and above and behind it all, Eliza’s likeness: her mouth, smiling like she just said something funny but didn't want him to catch it. The camera caught her in the act, the joke still hovering at the edge of her lips, lines radiating from her eyes as if she’d been squinting at some absurdity just before the shutter fell. Everyone else in that picture looked tense or stiff, hands folded neat as a funeral—except Eliza, her mouth finding mischief in every crack of light.

Arthur’s jaw aches. He’d been clenching it without meaning to. The picture is heavy. He slides a knuckle over the glass, thumbprint smudging in the halo of smudged light, the warmth of his own skin making an odd halo over the ghost of her face. He can’t help the way his hand hovers over her, like he is afraid she’ll vanish if he touches the glass too hard.

“What do you think, Daddy?” Jonnie’s voice is soft and sensitive, hoping that he isn’t upset. “Alice was really worried it wouldn’t make it on time for tonight’s dinner.”

Arthur Charles nods his head. “She really was. Mama would’ve beat the livin’ sh—” Jack cuts him off with an elbow into his son’s back, and Arthur Charles looks back at him. “—ow…!”

But Arthur can’t grab words for a minute. He knows everyone is watching—his kin and their kin and generations’ worth of ghosts, all perched on the point of a pin above his scalp—but the ache behind his sternum locks up his jaw.

After a long, slow blink, he manages, “Sure is somethin’…” he sighs, then looks up to meet their faces. “Thank you,” he says again, the words snagging in the rough spot of his throat. He presses the photo flat to his sternum, as if he can warm it through the glass, then sets it carefully against the arm of his chair while he blinks the brightness from his eyes. “It’s gonna look nice up on the wall, so I can look at it when I’m missin’ you folks.”

“Missin’ us? Dad…?” Augustus asks with a half-chuckled smile. “If you want us to come over more often…”

Arthur lifts a hand, shaking it. “No, son, I weren’t tryin’ to make you feel guilty. I know you all got busy lives.” Then he grins mischievously. “Especially you, with them five kids of yours.”

Those gathered chuckle at that, and Augustus rolls his eyes. He and his wife wanted to have at least five children, and they knew what they were getting themselves into; they just didn’t know quite how much. “I suppose you’re sayin’ that from experience?”

Arthur nods. “You know I am.” The laughter settles down once again, and Arthur rests his hands in his lap. “Thank you for the picture, all of you.” As he glances over each face, each person one he has loved and thought about, he notices a face is missing. “Where’s little lady?”

Jack speaks up quickly, not wanting to encroach on his wife’s privacy. “She’ll be back in a minute or two, Arthur.”

Arthur nods, still concerned, but decides to let it be. 

The celebration of Arthur and Eliza’s undying love continues on for another hour, until the first yawn of a child starts, then others soon follow. Those who are parents soon take it as their cue and begin to gather up their things, help clean up after the last bit of pie, and bid their farewells to Arthur. 

“Goodbye, Papa,” Abigail says while she readjusts baby Birdy in her arms. “Henry really wishes he could’ve made it to this.”

Arthur pats her lovingly on the shoulder. “You just tell that soldier of yours to stay safe out there.”

“I’m just glad the war is over,” she sighs. “He sticks to the base now.”

Arthur nods, giving Abigail’s arm a soft squeeze. He lets her words echo—glad the war is over—like he needs to hear them twice just to believe it himself. He eyes the baby in her arms and the way Abigail glows, proud and exhausted, the old sense of time passing trickling in, years settling on him the way the sun settles on a stone wall. “You know you can always just come live with us, Papa. Spare you the trouble of this big house by yourself.”

Arthur snorts so quietly it is mostly in his head. He looks at the empty parlor from the window as they stand on the front porch, the empty chair where she used to sit and read when the days were quiet. He can’t bring himself to leave here. He looks back at his granddaughter, so young and full of life. “I’ll be alright on my own for a while longer,” he says. “But if you ever got a mind to come around, you know where I’ll be.” He says it for everyone, even if he can’t find the words for it. The porch smells of thawed mud and woodsmoke, and Abigail, rocking Birdy gently to keep her asleep, smiles up at him before she goes down the steps and to Jack’s idling car. The tail lights flicker as her twin brother piles in, waiting for the rest of the Marstons to join them.

“So long, Dad…” Isaac says, making Arthur turn again. “We will come over next weekend once my jury trial is done.”

Arthur nods, reaching up to squeeze his son’s shoulder. “Lookin’ forward to it. You tell me when you’re gonna start your campaign. I wanna help you win.”

Isaac grins from ear to ear. “I will, but it will be a while yet.” There is a hidden request in his words, his hand reaching for Arthur’s and squeezing it tight. “You know?”

Arthur nods solemnly. “I know, son. You just become judge, alright?”

After a second longer, Isaac nods his head. “Alright, Dad.” His eyes become glossy, goodbyes never being easy for him. “Love you, Dad.”

“Love you, son.”

They embrace, then Arthur lets his firstborn son go. He watches as Isaac steps down, his wife and adult children, and their families following behind.

It isn't long before Annabelle herds her brood toward the door, her husband juggling leftover dishes while she sounds off plans for tomorrow like a secretary. Augustus follows with his caravan of children—five whipper-snappers in descending heights like organ pipes, the smallest one, Wilimena, draped half-asleep over his shoulder. The porch boards creak under their collective weight as they rush down the steps.

Once they get inside, Arthur’s grandchildren stick their heads out of the automobile windows, cheeks flushed pink against the evening chill, waving frantically as if they might never see him again. The cars pull away, taillights glowing red through wisps of exhaust in the twilight, packed so full of bodies and casserole dishes that the chassis ride low to the ground.

Arthur loiters in the doorway after his children leave, letting the last swells of commotion—car doors thumping, snow tires scrabbling the ruts—settle in the twilight hush. He braces his palm against the jamb, gaze tracing the grooves in the floorboards, the shallow scuffs laid down over the decades, the streaks grown pale and then dark again with each oil and shellac. He can see, clear as if it were yesterday, the small tracked lines from roller skates cut years ago by the twins and how he had scolded them for it, then looked the other way as Eliza laughed, saying that that was the point of living—to wear down one thing after another, and laugh about it as you go.

“Daddy…?”

His breath almost catches, the softness in her voice almost uncanny, but as he turns around, he finds it to be Alice. Sweet, loving Alice.

“Hey, little lady. Been wonderin’ where you was.”

She looks down at her feet for a minute, a hesitation in the way she bites her lower lip. When her eyes finally meet his again, she takes a steady step forward. “I’m so sorry that I made you so upset. I should’ve known better—”

Arthur holds up his hand. “No, sweetheart, don’t feel bad about it. It ain’t nothin’ to do wit’chu.”

“But I see it in your face…” She studies him a moment, thinking back on how he clenched his jaw and continually caught his breath throughout the evening. “I put my medical bag back in the car, maybe I should check your blood pressure again before I—”

“No, honey, I’m fine.”

Something in her gut twists like a dishrag being wrung out. Her nurse's instinct—the one that made her bolt upright at 3 AM when a patient’s breathing changed two rooms away—prickles at the base of her skull. The pallor beneath her father's weathered tan, the slight tremor in his left hand when he reached for his punch glass, the way he keeps pressing his palm flat against his chest as if to steady something inside. She moistens her lips, weighs her words carefully, knowing how stubborn he gets when fussed over. "Well, maybe I should stay here with you for the night," she offers, voice deliberately casual. "Jack can come get me in the morning—"

Arthur's voice comes out firmer than intended. "Alice." He waits until her eyes—doe-like as Eliza's had been—lock with his. The porch boards creak beneath him as he shifts his weight, letting his maple cane clatter against the weathered clapboards. His calloused hands, spotted with age and trembling slightly in the evening chill, reach for her soft ones. "You done a wonderful thing," he says, his voice catching on the evening breeze, "gatherin' everyone out here in this old house, fillin' it with the smell of your mama's recipes again." He swallows hard, Adam's apple bobbing beneath the loose skin of his neck. "She would've been touched by that, seein' all them little ones runnin' around her parlor. You can't help it that my heart aches for her—it's just what fifty-seven years of love does to a man." His thumbs trace circles on her knuckles, the way he used to when she was small. "I don't want you drivin' away with any regrets weighin' you down, you hear? None. I want you to go on and live your life. Go on with that family of yours. Love 'em hard, just like your mama taught you."

The way he is saying these things—with that finality in his voice, that distant look in his eyes that seems focused on some horizon she can't see—makes her chest tighten like a fist. His words hang in the air between them, heavy with unspoken meaning. She notices how his fingers, once strong enough to break a wild horse, now tremble slightly against hers. The evening shadows deepen the hollows beneath his cheekbones, and when he smiles, it doesn't quite reach his eyes. "Daddy...?" she whispers, her voice small as it was when she was five and afraid of thunderstorms.

“Don’t’chu worry about me, little lady, you forget, I got Jonnie here with me. She’s got nobody, and you’ve got many people that need you; savin’ lives and teachin’ the new nurses out there to do the same. We talked about all this before, remember?”

“Yeah, but…” she stammers, as she clutches his hands tightly. “But I need you.” She can’t hold back the tears. Not this time. She lets them break out, not like the slow drip of rain on tin, but an outpour that catches him off-guard, her face burying itself in his shirtfront. He feels her entire body shake with it. For all her strength of will, she cries without one ounce of control, releasing every knot and ache the anniversary has knotted up in her. 

Arthur doesn’t care that his shirt is soon soaked—he just closes his arms around her and holds on, his chin pressed to her scalp the way he’d done when she was little and had cuddled up to him close after a nightmare. “I want you to stay strong and healthy and live a long, full life,” she cries. “You need to be here for as long as you can…”

Arthur chuckles, a warm rumble that starts deep in his chest and rises like creek water over smooth stones. "Ain't that what I've been doin'?" The words hang in the porch air, mingling with the scent of pine and coming frost. After a moment, Alice eases herself from his embrace, her tear-streaked face tilted up toward his. Her expression—eyebrows arched high, lips slightly parted—holds such raw bewilderment that the laugh lines around Arthur's eyes deepen, crinkling like the blueprints he used to fold at his workbench. “Sweetheart, it ain’t like I can get any younger.”

Her brow pinches, all the years of medical training and motherhood betraying her age. "That isn’t funny, Daddy," she whispers, the little girl in her voice rising to the surface.

He grins, not quite sheepish, not quite mean, and shrugs as if it really makes no difference at all. “Would you rather I lie to you, little lady? You know I’m too honest for that.”

Alice swipes the back of her hand across her eyes and snuffles. She wants to say more, to unfold every ache and worry in her ribcage, but the words wad up in her throat. And Arthur is no fool; he can see that—the way her shoulders are hunched, the way she sets her jaw—how the past two years she’s stood on this very porch, clutching his work-ruined hands in both of hers—her father’s hands, the only thing in the world that ever made her feel safe.

She tries to memorize every detail: the gnarled veins beneath gold-tanned skin, the perfect oval of his nails, the exact pattern of the warp in his sleeve, the faint bay rum aroma of his aftershave, the uneven edge of one thumb where a nail had split and has never grown back right. She wants to keep all of it, every last scrap of him, pressed between memory and bone like petals in a book.

When Arthur feels like she can let go, he gives her a gentle squeeze, then smooths her hair. “You gonna be alright?”

She draws a jagged breath, then lets go of him, dabbing her cheeks with her sleeve. “I’ll be okay.” She tries for a smile, the kind he used to coax out of her like she now does for her own children, and it’s not quite the same, but it’ll do. “You better not go dyin’ any time soon, Daddy. Or I’ll…I’ll never forgive you.” She tries to laugh, but the words catch and flutter like a trapped moth in her chest.

“That’s my girl,” Arthur says, watching her, and for a second she wonders if he’ll pull her into another hug. Instead, he taps his temple with one finger. “You know your old man. Harder than hell to put down.”

She tucks a smile behind her palm, jaw still shaking a little. “I know,” she manages.

Seeing that she’s going to be alright, he pats her shoulder one more time. “Now, you go on. Jack’s been patient enough.”

She nods once, leaning in to kiss him on the cheek—his whiskers prickly against her lips—and turns to head down the steps. He watches her go, the porch light catching the silver threads in her hair. When she reaches the bottom, gravel crunching under her sensible shoes, she pauses mid-stride, shoulders rising with a deep breath before turning around. "I love you," she says, her voice carrying across the yard like a hymn, and Arthur offers her a soft wave, his weathered hand trembling slightly against the darkened sky.

And he watches her get in the car and drive away.

He shivers, the spring wind still mean as a snake, and turns to find Jonnie waiting just inside the entryway. She leaned against the door frame, arms folded, not pushing but making it clear that she’s got a schedule to keep. “You’re past curfew,” she teases.

“Past curfew,” he repeats, as if he didn’t hear it, and he sees her dark eyes roll behind her glasses.

“You’re lucky I’m patient.”

“Like a saint, June bug.” He turns, chuckling, and begins to follow her inside. “Like a saint.”

***

“It’s gonna get a little chilly tonight…” Jonnie says as she unfolds a large blanket. With a quick toss, she lets it fly, spreading it out and draping it over his bed. “You need anything else before I get a fire goin’?”

Arthur, already in his long nightshirt and wool socks, shakes his head as he brushes past her. “Naw, sweetheart. I’ll be fine. Just keep my window cracked, I want some fresh air.”

“Fine. Alice said something about checkin’ your heart rate…”

Arthur starts to wave her off, but Jonnie's fingers find his wrist, pressing gently against the blue veins there. Her eyes fix on her watch face, lips moving silently as she counts. The bedroom grows quiet except for the faint ticking of the mantel clock. Arthur swallows his protest, watching her concentrated expression until she finally releases him with a satisfied nod. "Nothing to worry about there," she says, patting his arm.

“See?” Arthur questions with a lilt, his large hand reaching for his bedcovers. “You all need to stop worryin’.”

“We just want you to be happy and healthy, Daddy."

He begins to crawl into bed, his joints creaking like old floorboards as he settles against the stack of down pillows that smell faintly of cedar and aftershave. She doesn't offer to help him, though her fingers twitch at her sides, allowing him the dignity of pulling his own weight. The quilt—one her grandmother had stitched decades ago—rustles as he draws it up to his chest.

"Happy and healthy," he repeats, his voice a low rumble like distant thunder.

"You need a hearin' aid or somethin', Daddy?" she teases, moving to the brass lamp on his nightstand where a dog-eared Farmer’s Almanac sits waiting for tomorrow.

He chortles a reply, a sound like pebbles tumbling in a creek bed, as he tugs the covers higher until only his weathered face peeks out. "Very funny."

Just as her hand reaches the knob to kill the light, casting long shadows across the floral wallpaper, she leans forward to kiss her father on the forehead, her lips meeting his weathered skin. "Goodnight, Daddy."

“Goodnight, June Bug.”

sound of her steps on the wood floor, she closes the door behind her. The room falls silent, with not even a breeze outside to lull him to sleep. Arthur listens to the sound of his breathing—shallow and ragged like a torn paper bag—while his eyes adjust to the darkness. The familiar shapes of his bedroom emerge one by one: the hulking silhouette of his oak dresser, the curved back of the rocking chair where his wife once nursed their babies, the tarnished silver frame on the nightstand holding a faded family photo. Moonlight spills through the thin curtains, painting silver rectangles across his quilt that tremble slightly with each beat of his tired heart.

It is after a long while that his thoughts give way to the weight of his body, a vacancy adrift to let him fall asleep. First, it is his feet, then his knees, then his hands, then his gut, until eventually the world withdraws behind his eyelids and leaves him with nothing but the sound of breath and the slow, tidal hush of blood in his ears.

***

A dull pain stirs him awake, a vise-like tightness that spreads from his breastbone outward like frost creeping across a windowpane. He opens his eyes—wide at first, pupils dilating in the darkness—as his mind fumbles to make sense of the sensation. It is his heart, a suffocating weight as though someone had placed his wife's old flatiron directly on his chest. The pressure builds until each shallow breath becomes a labor that leaves no room for calling out. His eyes dart frantically around the shadowed room, skimming past the familiar silhouettes of furniture until they find themselves drawn toward the window where the thin curtains flutter. And he sees a halo of light, pale as a winter moon, bleeding into the night sky just beyond the horizon.

It is almost morning, and the sun will rise.

It is beautiful.

And his wife’s words echo in his mind. 

There’s something beautiful about being at peace when the time comes. A still morning, or even surrounded by loved ones. Even being alone. Don’t you think, dear?

She was right. It is a beautiful time to die.

He knows it now with bone-deep certainty, like recognizing the first notes of an old familiar song. The crushing vise around his chest isn't just pain—it's a doorway. Each labored breath draws him closer to that threshold where the mortal world thins. The ache that's lived in him since they lowered Eliza into the ground—that hollow space behind his ribs where her laugh used to echo—was never just grief. It was Death’s hand reaching back through the veil, patient as always, waiting for him to heed its call.

The call to send him back to her, all this time.

His hand instinctively clutches his chest, the pain increasing, but he knows that it is no use to try to fight it. Jonnie could come running, phone a hospital, but an ambulance wouldn’t reach him in time to save him, and it would only prolong his agony.

He had once imagined an ideal death would be to see the setting sun, to think of all the good times he had that way. But this, this is more than life could ever give.

He is grateful. Grateful for the time he’s had with his friends. His loved ones. John, Charles, Abigail, and all those who fell before. He’s lived a good life. Eighty-four years is more than he would have ever expected with a life like his. An orphan. A vagabond. An outlaw. A thief. A father. A lover. A fighter. A grandfather, even. He’s seen the change of time through two wars, a financial crisis, drought, even the reinvention of the wheel. Washing machines, airplanes, television. He didn’t deserve it, but somehow fate, or God, even, thought that there was something in him worth saving.

He takes in a sharp breath that catches like a rusty hinge halfway through, a guttural moan escaping his lips and rattling against his teeth. His body arches slightly against the mattress, old muscles tensing one final time against the inevitable, fingers clutching at the quilt with the desperate strength of a drowning man. Through pain, he keeps his rheumy eyes fixed on the horizon, where the darkness is slowly yielding to a wash of amber and rose, the first molten edge of the sun spilling gold across the distant pines.

It isn’t morning yet. 

Just a little longer. 

“Eliza," he pants, her name escaping like a prayer between shallow gasps. His body finally begins to surrender, muscles melting into the quilt his wife had stitched with hands he can almost feel now, cool against his burning skin. The golden light spilling through the curtains paints the room in honey, catching dust motes that dance like memories above him. Such a beautiful morning to leave this world—the scent of pine drifting through the cracked window, birdsong just beginning to weave through the dawn air.

Such a beautiful morning, and he has to go.

And he is at peace with it.

Eliza.

..

..

.

She was in his heart when he closed his eyes, and she will be there when he opens his eyes once again.

FIN

It is Sunday morning, and golden sunlight filters through the thin curtains as you watch Arthur's calloused fingers work each wooden button through its hole. His broad shoulders flex beneath the worn cotton as he tucks the shirttail into his trousers. You pull the patchwork quilt over your head, burrowing into the lingering warmth and scent of him, as if the fabric might somehow anchor him here and prevent his inevitable departure.

After securing the last button, he hooks his thumbs into his suspenders—faded leather worn smooth from years of use—and draws them up over his shoulders with a soft snap. He turns toward the bed, expecting to see your face, but finds only a small, trembling mound beneath the covers. The corners of his weather-beaten face crinkle as he smiles, a face still young but with eyes that have seen too much hardship. He recognizes your silent protest against goodbyes, finding unexpected tenderness in this childlike gesture. His boots make soft steps into the sod floor as he approaches the bed with deliberateness.

Arthur's voice comes low and gentle. "Now, Eliza..." His weathered fingers reach for the quilt's edge, but your knuckles have gone white with the force of your grip. A brief tug-of-war ensues—him patient but insistent, you, stubborn as winter frost—until the heavy fabric surrenders with a soft whoosh. Beneath lies your body curled tight as a fern before spring, knees drawn to chest, arms wrapped around yourself. The morning chill pebbles your bare skin as you uncoil slowly, drawing the blanket back around your shoulders like armor, though he's memorized every inch of you in the night's intimacies.

You sit up against the rough-hewn headboard, the quilt clutched at your collarbone. He kneels before you on one knee, hat already in place, ready for the trail. The dust motes dance in the air. You say nothing, but your eyes—wide and liquid as a startled doe's at the creek's edge—begin to glisten with tears that refuse to fall.

"I have to go," he whispers, his voice like gravel over velvet, "but I ain’t gonna leave you here like this. I need to take you home."

"So I'll stay this way, and won't come out of the bed."

"Eliza, please."

"Please, don't go."

His eyes soften, but the resolve in his tone does not change. "I have to; I've been gone too long. They need me. They all do."

And your tone matches his, only your eyes continue to glisten. "But do they appreciate you? Do they care about you as much as I do?"

"In their own ways, they do." He eyes your exposed shoulder and the way your hair falls against your cheeks and down your neck. His body doesn’t want to go, but he has a family, albeit an unorthodox family: a curious couple and their two unruly sons, and other members that he hadn't yet told you about, but it is his family. The only real family he has ever known. They are outlaws for riches, but it isn’t about the money. Not to Arthur. But he doesn't blame you for how you feel, for you don’t fully understand his ways. But in each act of intimacy, time and again, you have bound your heart to his. Little does he know that he is your family, in an unorthodox sort of way.

"You know that I will come back to you," he attempts to reassure you.

You blink, and a solitary tear falls down your cheek. He reaches up and uses his thumb to wipe it away.

"I know,” you say in a soft whisper, words not coming easily right now. “Please let it be soon."

He finds your waist beneath the quilt's patchwork warmth, his calloused fingers pressing into the soft flesh where his hands had methodically caressed last night. As he stands, he lifts you against him, your bare feet dangling above the packed-in sod. His arms encircle you completely, like iron bands forged in tenderness. He buries his face in the crook of your neck, inhaling deeply—lye soap and woodsmoke and something uniquely yours. His stubble scrapes your skin as he commits this scent to memory, tucking it away like a treasure to sustain him on lonely trails. The ache to return to you burns in his chest, but uncertainty shadows it. Dutch's grand schemes always promise fortune but deliver peril, spinning tales of wealth that end in gunpowder and blood. Arthur has heard Dutch's midnight musings about recruiting more men—safety in numbers, Dutch claims—but they both know the truth: when something needs doing, when lives hang in the balance, Dutch turns only to Arthur, his most loyal soldier.

"Put on your clothes and get’chur things, I'll be outside saddlin’ up Boadicea."

"Okay," you sniff.

He sets you back down and doesn't look at you as he heads out the door. Combing your hair back with your fingers, you locate her clothes off the floor and begin to put them on.

Stepping outside, Arthur breathes the morning air. Hearing birds sing in the distance, he takes a moment to watch the sun rising higher into the sky. He has a long ride ahead of him and will need to leave soon if he is to make it before dark. He locates the saddle resting on a hitching post and lifts it up. Whistling for Boadicea, she comes trotting over to him, whinnying happily.

"Hey, girl," he greets, and he swings the saddle over onto her back. Taking a moment to make sure it is cinched properly, he slips some sugar cubes into her mouth. "There, have this." He takes a brush from the saddlebag and goes over her coat until it begins to shine. The rhythm of the brushing and the steady quiet of the outdoors take his mind to a calm place. He begins to imagine what life could be like if it were always like this. Him having someone to come home to, with maybe a ranch and a family. Dutch and Hosea could finally have the life that they want, and he could go off and find his own.

But he knows what he has to do to get there, and how to go about doing it. That is what he is leaving for. You seem to understand that, and so maybe, one day, it will matter.

He hears the squeak of the door opening and turns to see you in the dress you wore the night before. You have part of your hair pulled up, letting the rest of your hair fall down your shoulders. Your soft, chestnut brown hair. You are the embodiment of femininity: all softness with a fire inside. You swing her coat behind you and begin to slip your right arm into one of the sleeves. You continue to look down at the ground, your lips flattened.

He leaves Boadicea and approaches you tentatively, knowing the delicate state you are in. It has been hard for you, too.

"Hey," he whispers, lifting your chin. You finally lift your eyes to look into his.

You want to tell him you love him, but you are afraid. You are afraid that he won’t say it back.

But you say nothing.

He reaches into his coat pocket and pulls out a spare key to the padlock. He takes your left hand and gently places the key into your palm.

"Here. Now you can come here anytime. If you need to get away or wait for me. You'll have a safe place to go."

You only nod, but you are grateful.

"I'll see you soon," he forces a smile and leans in to kiss you. When his lips touch yours, you don’t respond, which saddens him, and he pulls away. "Let me take you home."

***

The ride was quiet, but you held onto him tightly, conveying more than you were willing to say. He wasn’t much of a conversationalist like he usually is, often regaling you with tales of his adventures and the more mild dangers he encounters. Instead, he kept to the road, watching the world pass by as you both made your way back toward town.

Wisps of chimney smoke curl against the morning sky like ghostly fingers beckoning you home, the town's silhouette shimmering in the distance. Arthur pulls Boadicea's reins with a gentle tug, her hooves crunching to a halt on the frost-dusted path. He dismounts in one fluid motion, his spurs jingling softly as his boots hit the ground. His face is a mask of practiced stoicism as he extends his weathered hand to help you down, his calloused palm rough against your skin.

Once your feet touch the earth, Arthur's lips part slightly as if to speak, his eyes flickering with unspoken words. He leans forward, the familiar scent of leather and tobacco enveloping you, before he catches himself and pulls back. His jaw tightens as he swallows whatever goodbye he'd intended. With a sharp inhale, he turns away, the leather of his saddle creaking as he mounts Boadicea again. The mare's muscles ripple beneath her chestnut coat as they trot away, kicking up small clouds of dust. You force your gaze toward town, each step on the rutted road deliberate, your throat burning with the effort of holding back tears that threaten to spill like summer rain.

But you turn back.

And you start to run to him.

"Arthur!" you cry at the top of your lungs, your voice cracking as you sob. "Arthur!"

He whips around at the sound of your voice, his eyes widening beneath the shadow of his hat. Without a moment's hesitation, he slides from Boadicea's saddle in one fluid motion, his boots kicking up dust as he sprints toward you. The carefully constructed walls around his heart crumble with each thundering step.

His calloused hands find your waist, lifting you as if you weigh nothing. Your skirts billow around you both like a storm cloud as he crushes you against his chest. You cradle his stubbled face between your trembling palms, tasting salt and desperation as your lips collide. A sound escapes you—half-sob, half-moan—that seems to echo across the empty plains. His mouth moves against yours with the urgency of a dying man granted one final wish, the scent of leather and gunpowder filling your senses.

"I've got to go," he rasps against your lips, his voice rough as gravel, warm breath mingling with yours in the cold morning air.

"I know," you whisper through tears that leave glistening trails down your flushed cheeks, the words barely slipping through the narrow space between your still-hungry mouths.

His arms loosen reluctantly, lowering you until your feet touch the cool, hardened earth. His fingers linger at your waist, digging slightly into the fabric of your coat as if anchoring himself against the current pulling him away. Finally, with visible effort, he pries himself from you, each inch of separation a fresh wound, and you force your hands to fall away from him, surrendering to the inevitable.

"Goodbye, Eliza."

"Bye, Arthur." You step back, and he jogs back to Boadicea. Getting on her quickly, he gallops off, not looking back this time. You hold out a hand, a desperate attempt to reach him, to be with him for as long as you can, not waving, but as much of a goodbye as any other. "Come back to me!"

Thank you for reading!

I want to extend my gratitude to all of you who have stuck with me for over a YEAR to read what I have written. It means so much to me that you would take the time to read over 500,000 words and either leave a like, reblog, or a comment. Really, I appreciate it so much. I also want to honorably mention HHwrds, @fofokaifu, tffjr83, and @photo1030 for your consistent feedback and praise. I really looked forward to reading what you had to share, and, to be honest, it really helped motivate me to keep going. Thank you for sticking with me this long!

If you're interested, I have a "soundtrack end credits playlist" for you to enjoy. These are some of the songs that would frequent my head (in addition to the ones I'd quote/share at the beginning of each chapter). Here is the post (songs listed not in any particular order).

 Louma'li Jinjahl looked sheepish. "Also brought out a few...undesirable qualities in a few."

 Milo North: "Ick."

 Berrod Armstrong eyed Lou for a moment and inclined his head slightly.

 Louma'li Jinjahl: "You're really lucky ya didn't end up lickin' it."

 Berrod Armstrong: "At -first-, we decided to let the La Noscean an' Lominsan authorities handle it. We arranged for the crystal -- the Prism, we called it, to be collected by the Yellowjackets an' taken back to the city proper for the Arcanist's guild to keep in their custody." He rubbed his face then, "Really wished it all stayed there, but the Gods had different plans it seemed. They cordoned off the streaked area, but a couple of our people got samples of the dead white rocks. They were harmless if you didn't let it touch flesh."

 N'hara Tia: "Also got samples of some of the sea creatures it killed. Not the prettiest sight."

 Orion Llewelyn stroked the lizard in his lap, attempting to lull the creature to sleep. It was having none of it with all the people around and hissed.

 Soyer Perera entered and remained silent. No greeting and not motions beyond walking and picking a spot.

 Berrod Armstrong made a face at the mention of the dead sea creatures, but nodded to acknowledge it. "Least chalky fish don't stink..."

Berrod Armstrong: "Anyroad, a couple weeks later the Arcanist's guild called us up for our help with a matter involvin' the crystal. Apparently since we were the once who had 'experience'--" He made quotation marks with his fingers then, "--with it, we were the ones they wanted. Turned out they tried to cast some standard protective stuff around it for safe keepin', but the crystals amplified the magic to the point that it got a bit -too- well shielded. We were hired to work with a fella named Hartsald to  break that shield. From the reports it seemed like one hell of a job, but nothin' catastrophic, an' nothin' the team that went couldn't handle."

 Berrod Armstrong turned to offer a tip of his chin to Soyer by way of greeting.

 Soyer Perera nodded but made no sound.

 Berrod Armstrong: "We used the success of that job to curry some favour with the Arcanist's guild, to the point where we managed to get a sample of the crystal for the company for our own to study. Unfortunately, a couple weeks after -that-, we got another missive from the guild. Hartsald had gone missin', an' from the investigation we launched into it, he'd gone barkin' mad before he vanished. He'd been drawin' nonsense on maps, rippin' up books, writin' over an' over again about somethin' called -blàths bloigh-. No language I'd ever heard of. With the help of those of us gifted in understandin' such things, we learned that it means 'blooming essence'. An' so the hunt for Hartsald began."

 Natja Bafsk breezes on in like she was here all along, peering around and filing her nails into even pointier points.

 N'hara Tia brought a hand to the bridge of his nose. Not a fun assignment…

 Milo North: "Baths Bentlow, yeah."

Milo North: "... Blowfly."

Milo North: "... Blarfs."

 Orion Llewelyn: "Spoilers: He was found."

 Natja Bafsk nods her head agreeably at Milo's valiant effort, knowing damn well she can't do anything better.

 Berrod Armstrong: "The hunt led us to the Blac--" He quickly and apologetically eyed Jancis in the distance, "Uh, the Twelveswood, where the search team encountered all sorts of mischievous magics. Weird plants, floaty-stuff. The reports were...wild. Even though that was dealt with, apparently the team came into contact with an anomaly that caused the same whitenin' effect from the cliffs in Costa. I still...don't really understand what I read about what the team there saw, but everyone came outta it okay."

 Berrod Armstrong: "Mostly, anyroad."

 Louma'li Jinjahl: "And one overly animated annoyin' blue...person."

 Berrod Armstrong: "Ah, aye. Jock whatsisballs."

Louma'li Jinjahl couldn't remmeber how many Jock-Jocks it was.

 Zachary Evans mouthed the phrase 'blue person' in absolute confusion.

 Louma'li Jinjahl: "Jock-Jock somethin' Jock, covered in woad an' crazy, aye."

 Milo North: "Somethin' made outta Light."

 Bayan Dataq cracked a small smile. This was getting good. Now there were blue people. He wondered what strange Eorzean people that was.

 Milo North shivers at the memory.

 Berrod Armstrong: "He'd been hired to find Hartsald too -- an' now we know by who. But I'll get to that in time."

 Louma'li Jinjahl had a sneaking suspicion of the 'who' but he'd be happy if fate decided to surprise him. Lou just nodded along with Berrod's assertion that they'd get to it, in time.

 Berrod Armstrong: "Arcanist's guild hadn't made any headway either, an' so as more time went on, the more everyone feared Hartsald was dead. You know how it goes with missin' persons. Anyroad, -another- issue popped up in Mor Dhona that we went to investigate. After what happened in the Shr...er -- -Twelveswood-, we were expectin' to find Hartsald. Instead, we found a Hyuran fella with an axe an' way, -way- too much power. The team went in, accompanied by one Grave Shadow as an observer, the reports said. The Hyur -- Breaker, or Baby or whatever -- was subdued an' separated from a prismatic crystal that he'd been given with the promise of power. It was there that the monk twin ladies some of y'all came to know were sighted for the first time."

 Orion Llewelyn leaned over to Bayan with a hushed voice, "That's where I came in." A thumb was jerked in Berrod's general direction.

 Bayan Dataq nodded. The cast of characters was getting a bit much for him to keep track of, but he was doing his best.

 Jancis Milburga looks thoughtful, "And that odd sludge that came off of him."

 Soyer Perera || It occured to Soyer that it was around this time he had joined the Company too...He had a faint smile at the thought.

 Berrod Armstrong: "Breaker was pretty badly affected by what had happened to him. He wasn't an enemy, not really. Just someone who'd gotten a raw deal. We took care of his recovery an' such,an' in doing so, found out he had a connection to those twins...like -- a thread. Oh--" He consulted his book then, "I shouldn't forget the group out in the ruins of Nym either. After the Hartsald incident, we went to investigate some aetherial spikes there an' did battle with an entire group enhanced with shards of prismatic crystal. It wasn't enough to make 'em -crazy- powerful, so they got taken down smoothly enough. One of 'em was above the rest though...Astrologian gal with a -weapon- made with one of the crystals in it. Our first encounter with a prismatic weapon."

 Milo North: "Someone had fun lickin' crystals."

 Zachary Evans shifted from foot to foot before finally deciding on doing squats. The whole chain of events had given the young man a surge of nervous energy.

 Louma'li Jinjahl: "An' she up an' ran before we could finish kickin' her arse. Seems Shadow got to her though an' finished things."

 Natja Bafsk 's expression slowly takes a turn for the morose, more and more.

 Bayan Dataq 's face gave away he didn't really approve of leaving a mark alive in a hunt, but didn't say anything.

 Zachary Evans: "I'm not exactly sure of -how- comfortable I am working with Shadow again...wherever the Shadows are, things go from worse to catastrophic."

 Sarij Rahzersyn: "Alright, focus folks."

 Zachary Evans: "Sorry, chief."

 Sarij Rahzersyn: "And listen tah what Berrod has tah say, ya can ask shite after."

 Natja Bafsk nods to Sarij Rahzersyn.

 Berrod Armstrong: "It turns out that the Astrologian gal didn't quite get away -- so proven by a box sent to us by a -mysterious benefactor- at the time. It contained the prismatic weapon...broken, though that didn't make the crystal itself any less potent. The box itself was made with...arcane stuff written on it that turned it into a kind of compass that pointed us north, to Coerthas. Again, we decided to investigate, an' the team sent met -- another arcanist? Nah -- a uh, a--" He checked his notes, "Nymian-styled Scholar. He didn't quite have a prismatic weapon, but his -faerie- was made of the stuff. From what I read, his spellwork was...damn powerful."

 Tiergan Vashir blinked at that. "His /faerie/ was made of /crystal/?"

 Berrod Armstrong: "Aye. Bright an' colourful an' glitterin'...an' -potent-."

 Autgar Bloode: "Yes, his fairy was a crystal. He was very strong."

 Orion Llewelyn looked away to take a swig of his drink.

 Tiergan Vashir frowns deeply, brow furrowing.

 Berrod Armstrong: "Was around that time that our study into the crystal itself showed us some of what it was capable of. Like allowin' me to conjure as if it was nothin', for example. Healed a gash on my own arm with a twig an' it didn't even leave a scar." He offered his arm as proof.

Berrod Armstrong: "I should note that the crystal samples in our possession went up to two. The weapon, an' the sample we got from the Arcanist's guild."

 Jancis Milburga furrows her brow at Berrod's arm.

 Tiergan Vashir: "Did.... you have much conjurying ability before or did you go from none to suddenly proficient?"

 Berrod Armstrong: "I tried to learn once. They were nice about tellin' me I would never be able to do it."

 Aulen Mistbreaker was totally not taking a nap or anything as he showed up late.

 Berrod Armstrong: "I don't have a lick of castin' talent, sad to say."

 Orion Llewelyn: "Shame, that."

 Louma'li Jinjahl: "Ya punch things better anyways."

 Zachary Evans: "That's...disturbing. Granting that much power out of the blue is dangerous."

 Autgar Bloode: "You've got plenty of other talents chief."

 Tiergan Vashir: "So these crystals can turn anyone into a skilled mage."

 Berrod Armstrong: "Nnnh -- well, I knew the -motions-, I just never made anythin' happen, you know? But that crystal changed that."

 Milo North: "Or jus' let you throw enough power at a spell."

 Orion Llewelyn: "An' those of us already skilled t'start with, well..." Orion leaned back.

 Milo North: "That it makes it look like you can do it."

 Soyer Perera frowned at that--he hadn't been told they could do that too.

 Berrod Armstrong: "Go on," He urged Orion.

 Milo North: "Scarier thought is what happens when someone like fuckin' black mage casts one of their clever lil' spells with the power of one of these."

 Natja Bafsk nods to Milo North.

 Orion Llewelyn: "Huh?" He sputtered. "Oh I've got nothin'. Just sayin' I can imagine how it'd be like for those of us with a lick o' talent an' skill."

 Milo North: "Power and the nuance to properly use it."

 Berrod Armstrong nodded, "Aye."

 Tiergan Vashir: "Is that why Mountain's Shadow has an interest then?"

 Martin Adler: "Probably." Martin grunts.

 Autgar Bloode: "Save the questions folks."

 Aulen Mistbreaker spoke up. "Well... back on the beach. A simple spell I used turned a small flame into a massive pyre by just being near the damn thing."

 Berrod Armstrong: "Aye..."

 Berrod Armstrong: "Alright -- back to Breaker an' his ability to trace the twins...much like the box had become a compass that led us north, he led a team of us south into the Sagolii to follow the twins' trail. From what I read, the trip was an interestin' one. They utilised their crystals to their full potential and put up a hell of a fight. It was hard, but our team won out with Breaker's help. Poor bastard ended up abed again, an' we took the twins into our custody. Treated them well, mind you."

 Natja Bafsk smiles, but with a notable twinge of sadness.

 Jancis Milburga: "Had to, those crystals were embedded."

 Berrod Armstrong: "That fight was an' educational one, 'cause we learned about the flawed crystals. Turns out that they were not only different to the samples we had, but they had awful effects on the user. Uh --" He consulted his book again, and began to read directly off of it.

 Orion Llewelyn: "They amplified the user's flaws."

 Milo North: "They got real ugly?"

 Berrod Armstrong: "Our samples achieved perfect resonance with the user's aether. Perfect prisms. The flawed crystals however, sought to compensate for their imperfection by resonating oppressively and affecting the user's aether in a detrimental manner -- usually to the tune of illness or behavioural changes."

 Berrod Armstrong: "Aye, what Orion said."

 Louma'li Jinjahl: "Not ugly enough to not fluster Autgar."

 Autgar Bloode would remember that.

 Orion Llewelyn snorted, "Not that kinda flaw. Made angry people angrier an' that kinda thing."

 Bayan Dataq: "Weaknesses?" he asked softly.

Berrod Armstrong: "After some questionin' -- gentle, mind you, we never treated 'em badly," We learned that -Hartsald- was apparently creating the flawed crystals and temptin' people to power with 'em. First the twins, then he tried to get 'em to bring Breaker on board. S'what was happenin' when we met the lot of 'em in Mor Dhona. What was most interestin' is that they said that we couldn't just go -find- Hartsald. He had to be -summoned-. The ritual to do it was queer as all hells."

 Tiergan Vashir: "Summon. Like some sort of voidsent?" There was audible distaste in his tone.

 Milo North: "You can summon other stuff, too. Kinda."

 Berrod Armstrong: "I would think that if the ritual wasn't...downright stupid."

 Orion Llewelyn wavered a hand before Bayan at his question. "Sorta like that."

 Berrod Armstrong: "Once again a team went out -- to the Cloud Sea up above the Spine. Aether's rich there an' it was far away from people just in case things got hairy...which they did. Still don't really understand what happened, but they called him. He was strange, with bright blue eyes with rings in 'em," He gestured at his own eyes, ever one to talk with his hands, "Talkin' funny too, not nearly the same as he was before. Borin' an' kinda stodgy."

 Bayan Dataq perked up a bit. Sounded like the red haired hyur was describing him. Badly, but still.

 Berrod Armstrong: "Seems like he tried somethin', but the team figured it out and put a stop to it before he finished. Unfortunately, one of the twins got turned into a plant -- or was it eaten by a plant...?" He checked his notes again, "Ah, she got turned into a bush. When they finally managed to put Hartsald down, a big ol' pair of flowers grew. One spat out the twin, the other...Hartsald's body. The -real- Hartsald. Poor bastard had been dead all along, an' somethin' was wearin' his face. Accordin' to what I read, he'd been killed long before, even though he wasn't rottin'."

 Milo North: "So.... Voidsent."

 Soyer Perera frowned a bit deeper. If he were the type to be ungrammatical, he'd say this entire thing was getting curiouser and curiouser.

 Jancis Milburga swears to Nald'thal quietly.

 Soyer Perera: "That doesn't sound like a voidsent."

 Berrod Armstrong shook his head. "Would be simple if it was. Read more like a ghost to me."

 Orion Llewelyn: "Aye, I'm inclined to agree with Berrod."

 Bayan Dataq shook his horned head. This is why he preferred sheep and horses. Less magic and spirits. More things that were simple to skewer with his lance.

N'hara Tia: "This whole fiasco gets worse and worse when you really stop and think about it..."

 Orion Llewelyn: "Like....another soul." He offered up.

 Tiergan Vashir: "A ghost that turns people into plants and grows flowers that hold bodies?"

 Milo North: "A ghost who makes people inta plants? Ashkin ain't that powerful. Or smart."

 Milo North: "Mosta the time they jus' moan about how much it hurts or whatever."

 Berrod Armstrong: "Team came back, though the affected twin hadn't regained consciousness. Reks examined her, an' it turned out there -- wasn't a soul in her body. I dunno how that was possible, or how it worked, but that's what happened. We decided to keep her safe, an' her sister didn't leave her side. Breaker was fully recovered an' decided to go out there an' try to make some headway."

 Berrod Armstrong: "Took a couple weeks, but he came back...different. He'd acquired a bit of prismatic crystal, which somehow -fused- with him while he slept. It...made him strong. Real strong. I dunno if he's immortal now, but I know it's real hard to hurt him. Or was. We had to press him for answers, but even when he finally caved an' tried to give 'em to us, he couldn't speak of it, or even write of it. He'd been hexed, and pretty badly."

 Berrod Armstrong: "The same night he came back to us, somethin' happened to the unconscious twin. Long story short, whatever had been masqueradin' around as Hartsald jumped into her, pulled a switch on us, an' ran off into the night. Was a damn mess, I'm told. Her sister an' Breaker went off to try an' find her."

 Natja Bafsk stares down at her lap, ears drooping backward.

 Berrod Armstrong: "'nother couple weeks went by. Breaker an' Rookmin -- ah aye, that was her name -- kept in contact, wrote to us an' stuff...an' then the contact stopped. Stopped for a worryin' while, with the last place they mentioned bein' Tailfeather up in the Dravanian lands. Of course, we sent a team up to find 'em..." He rubbed the back of his head then, "An' what a time that was."

 Berrod Armstrong: "There were so many things -- a cave full o'gold dust. Talkin' to dragons...followin' the trail on a whole. The trail led to a white, magical coffin' with the words 'Let sleeping beasts lie' on it. Anybody who tried to tamper with the coffin got...frozen? Stilled -- though it came at a cost to the coffin's aether. With enough people triggerin' it, it eventually ran out, an' broke open."

 Milo North: "W..."

 Orion Llewelyn: "Nothin' like brute forcin' some magic."

 Milo North places his face into his hands, "You opened the magic box sayin' please dun open."

 Jancis Milburga: "And good we did." Her tone is sadder after the mention of gold dust.

 Tiergan Vashir visibly tenses up at this portion of the tale, shoulders locking. He glances back towards Jancis once before his jaw sets and he looks to Berrod again.

 Louma'li Jinjahl: "To be fair, at least we did it an' didn't die. Can't say if someone else woulda lived if they did the same."

 Berrod Armstrong rubbed at his face with one hand. "I'm glad I can just give the facts here now, because at the time it was confusin' as all hells. Breaker, as it turned out, had been jumped into by the Hartsald-wearer. It was a bad combination, because Breaker himself was fused with a prismatic crystal an' powerful as all hells. Not only that, but in tryin' to resist the thing tryin' to ride him, he unleashed -- well, a beast, is the best way to put it. Y'all would be interested to know that one Mountain Shadow showed up, yellin' at the team for openin' the coffin. He looked pretty chewed up. Even lost consciousness, I think."

 Cerina Borlaaq gave a very audible grunt of pure /disgust/ at the mention of Mountain, however, she didn't say anything about it.

 Orion Llewelyn finished off what remained of his drink.

 Berrod Armstrong: "We know now that Rookmin and Breaker had found the other twin -- Sumintra, which is when the...thing...jumped from her to him. Apparently Mountain was on their trail an' used that coffin thing to subdue the thing -- which we opened. Ah well. Anyroad...there was a fight. Details...don't matter. There was a fight that we won. Autgar managed to kill the thing...for good. Breaker was safe, though the twins were missin' still. Both of 'em this time."

 Jancis Milburga glances back at Martin briefly before gazing at Tiergan for awhile, silently echoing Berrod's words.

 Milo North: "Course he put a cryptic phrase on the fuckin box instead of, I dunno, -something explainin' exactly what was inside-."

 Berrod Armstrong: "Mountain got extracted from the area an' we dealt with the fallout as we always do. Got some blessed quiet for a while after that. We needed it."

 Louma'li Jinjahl: "An' he wrote it in ways that only people versed in an arcane science could understand. Coulda gotten better results with a slab o' wood an' some paint."

 Orion Llewelyn: "That's got me wonderin' though. It /was/ quiet for a good bit. Us meetin' here though..."

 Orion Llewelyn: "does that mean somethin's happened?"

Berrod Armstrong: "Quiet couldn't last, I suppose, 'cause who else came marchin' up to our gates a few weeks later but Mountain himself, with the balls to ask us to -leave it all to him-. Didn't need to consult leadership to outright refuse that, no matter how much I'd like to wash my hands o'this stuff." He smiled at Orion then, "I'll get to that in a lil bit."

 Milo North: "Really. Is "There is an awful monster in here, this box is keeping it from killing you. No touch.' So hard? Fuckin' Mountain."

 Orion Llewelyn: "Wait, he came /here?/ What'd he want?"

 Orion Llewelyn: "Oh well, I guess you just said that." he leaned back again, slightly less agitated.

 Sarij Rahzersyn: "To be fair... even if he wrote that people would have opened it."

 Berrod Armstrong: "Aye. We said no an'...he was uh, awfully gracious an' decided that in the event of our refusal, -he- would leave it entirely to -us- instead. Apparently it'd be one or the other, so long as it meant we no longer clashed. So he officially withdrew from the matter, an' shared with us some information, includin' the whereabouts of some missin' people. The scholar, the twins, an' the Astrologian."

 Mholi'to Valrei offered the room a brief wave as he walked over to an open spot to stand. He was quiet for now as to catch up on the current conversation.

 Berrod Armstrong: "Apparently he'd convinced them all to withdraw from the whole ordeal, an' has managed to keep 'em safe in his own way." There was an unconvinced shrug from him, but he went on, "He also handed over his prismatic crystal -- the Scholar's faerie. We have three samples now."

 Cerina Borlaaq: "So it is only a matter of time before he tries to swoop in again." She huffed. "We should have just cut him down when he showed up at our doorstep."

 Orion Llewelyn: "He gave ya his faerie...?" Orion bunched up his brow.

 Berrod Armstrong: "Hmn. Oh -- aye, though it turned back into a chunk o'pretty crystal when it left his side."

 Orion Llewelyn ran a hand along his jaw, pensively, saying nothing further.

 Sarij Rahzersyn: "Kindly keep murder plans to yerself. Mountain is a company owner of a known company and on the level in the terms of the governing bodies."

 Sarij Rahzersyn: "I don't feel like going infront of a judge again."

 Milo North: "I ain't sayin' anything about killin'. I'm thinkin' it real loudly though."

 Cerina Borlaaq: "I did not ask for your assistance, Sarij. But do not make this company bend to him again."

Berrod Armstrong: "Speakin' of which, couple folks from here parleyed with 'im an' made some requests, one o'which he granted." Very carefully did he pull an envelope from between the pages of the book he'd been reading his notes from. The envelope was handed across to Autgar, though in stretching to do so, Berrod held it dangerously close to the candle's flame. "Ah -- shite, whoops. There y'go."

 Bayan Dataq was starting to wonder why everyone was talking about some mountain. And why everyone hated a geographical feature.

 Natja Bafsk peers over at the envelope questioningly.

 Autgar Bloode plucked up the letter and held it infront of him on the table without a word.

 Dylan Skye: "...What is that, Autgar?"

 Orion Llewelyn leaned back forward, eyes shifting toward the envelope as well and then to Autgar.

 Orion Llewelyn: "Aye, what he said."

 Mholi'to Valrei took a few steps closer to Autgar to peek over the man's large shoulders out of curiosity.

 Sarij Rahzersyn: "I am saying.... stay the hells away from 'em and not deal wtih em, so if as ya think he tries tah get his fingers involved wit us... we got solid feet undah us rather than having the Immortal Flames kicking in the door again to arrest folks."

 Autgar Bloode elbowed Oli. "We can talk about it when were all caught up."

 Bayan Dataq 's eyes shot open, and then he looked to Orion for clarification. “What kind of company was this anyroad?"

 Mholi'to Valrei frowned as he was lightly jabbed. "Fine, fine," he grumbled. His curiosity still burned bright, but his eyes were forced back towards Sarij. "Honestly, the best thing to do in my opinion would be whatever the hells we intended to do before he showed up. Regardless of what he's offerin'. He smells like trouble."

 Louma'li Jinjahl looked on skeptically as this was unfolding. He didn't have history with Shadow, but at this rate, he was hating him just out of spite.

 Cerina Borlaaq: "That has certainly worked for us in the past when it comes to dealing with him, yes? Because he has not managed to weasel himself into the company, and out of what ever--" she waved her hand in front of her in frustration, "solid ground you are talking about. Figured you would know that better than anyone else."

 Sarij Rahzersyn: "This company is not a wetworks." Sarij replied simply. "Berrod feel free tah continue."

 Cerina Borlaaq scoffed loudly, but decided not to press on.

 Autgar Bloode was scanning over the letter before he returned it to the envelope and rested it on the table infront of him.

 Berrod Armstrong nodded at Autgar, then at Sarij. "I agree that we have to be careful. He's got a legitimate thing going an' -if- he means us ill, which I'll never rule out, he's gonna get us tangled up in a lotta legal shite before the final blow. Either way -- if he says he's out, I agree with Oli there...we press on like he's not around. Granted...it might mean followin' some of his...advice."

 Soyer Perera: "And what's wrong with that?"

 Jancis Milburga nods in agreement. "Coincidence."

 Berrod Armstrong: "Or rather, followin' his methods. He said that he wanted to dissipate the crystals by givin' their aether to the land -- it's why Breaker was put in that coffin, to drain him of the prismatic aether he'd been fused with -- and contain that thing inside him too."

 Soyer Perera: "Provided it doesn't harm anyone or the land itself--we have enough mages here to confirm if the method would actually put it back into the land, right?"

Mholi'to Valrei: "Then make sure that information is verified independently somewhere else. Facts are facts, regardless of who's sayin' it. Are you sure that it's the best method, all things considered?"

 Berrod Armstrong: "So we have three samples. I want us to begin lookin' into ways to gettin' these crystals smelted down into the land, for lack of a better term. Once we find a way to do it safely, that's how we'll handle any o' the prisms we come into contact with goin' forward."

 Berrod Armstrong: "Aye, those things are a menace in man's hands."

She was just mesmerizing in the moonlight. Arms wrapped around his shoulders in a gesture that would seem romantic to any stranger walking by - Two young people sharing their love in the middle of a war - he knew it was nothing but a sweet act of a friend. Something that blended so naturally in their relationship; small touches and smiles that although were meaningless, meant everything in the world.

“I don’t see what the problem is!” Wearing her short, thick heels made her reach a near eyes level with him, and staring into those baby blues wasn’t easy, for sure. “You’re about to be the last eligible man in New York. You know there’s a three and a half million of us here?”

“Well, I’d settle for just one.” Steve looked back at the woman walking beside him, her chin tilted up and a smile brighter than the lights decorating the Science fair they were headed to. She was scared. Terrified even. How on brand of her to mask her face with feign confidence just for his sake. “I can’t believe they’re takin’ you.”

“Yeah, me neither. But, you know, they’re practically taking everybody these days.”

“Not me.”

She sighed, they have had that conversation more times than she could count, “It’s because going there would be like committing fuckin’ suicide Steve. Not like, just straight up killing yourself.”

Steve inhaled, a quick answer nearly rolling off his tongue before he decided otherwise, catching a glimpse of an ill expression on her face, “let’s just...let’s just forget it, ok? It’s your last night. We should enjoy it.” - “Please tell me if she’s alive, sir. B-A-R-“

“I can spell. I have signed more of these condolence letters today than I would care to count. But the name does sound familiar. I’m sorry.” 

It was as if his heart sank down to his feet, his throat suddenly drier than the driest desert, and everything seemed so, so wrong. This wasn’t supposed to happen. Not to her. Not right now.  - An awfully suspicious man hurried down the hall, only stopping when he saw Steve. His gaze was disturbing, blood freezing. Watching intensely at him not with defiance, not even fear, but admiration. 

The small man glanced at the room he just left, ultimately deciding to escape when he saw Steve sprinting towards him. He could easily catch up, of course. But Steve heard something, it was small and uncertain, but it was something. And if that man decided that this room was worth coming back to in the middle of a riot - he should at least check it out.

Ignoring what could have been an easy catch of a man that probably would’ve been a great source of information to everyone back at the base, he then chose to follow the voice. He wasn’t there to take prisoners, after all. He only did this to find-

“Bucky?  Oh my god.” And just like that, he could breathe again, and if she wasn’t restrained to that bed like an animal, looking like she had seen a ghost, he would’ve kissed her right there and then.

“Is that…”

“It’s me, it’s Steve.” She looked like she was dreaming, staring into the abyss like she saw right through him.

“Steve?”

“Come one.”

“Steve.”

She got up, still deeply fazed, but it was really Steve there. He grabbed her face for a moment, holding it between his large hands but immediately letting go. He wanted to tell her how he felt, but it couldn’t be now.

“I thought you were dead.” He said instead, bringing his palms to caress her shoulder and  hoist her up from the table when a large bomb exploded too close to them.

“I thought you were smaller.” - The bar was dusty. Small particles of nothing were carried lazily by the air, and her first thought was that she felt just like them, moving around without real purpose, not even flying because she lacks the ability to navigate. The air is just too powerful.

Her second thought was that she was being too philosophical for this time and place, and that this joint desperately needed to be cleaned. Of both dirt and men. If she sees another hungry gaze scanning her top to bottom she might start a goddamn brawl.

Steve appeared around the corner, sporting a wide grin that dazzled her even under the unflattering light. She still had trouble recognizing him in that new look; so being used to search for the smallest man in the room, she often missed the biggest one. At least his smile stayed exactly the same, dare she even say it gotten bigger. And that smile could only mean one thing.

“See, I told you. They’re all idiots.”

“How about you?” Steve sat next to her, arms crossed on the wooden counter, “you ready to follow Captain America into the jaws of death?”

“Hell no.” She pursed her lips and smirked, doing anything to avoid Steve’s eyes, “that little guy from Brooklyn, who was too dumb to run away from a fight.” She swallowed and finally looked up, a smile less wide but more genuine, “I’m following him.”

Steve was held captivated by the fading blue inside her eyes, the tortured expression heaving on his chest when he realized that for once in her life, she couldn’t pretend to be okay for him. He glanced down instantly, the corner of his mouth twisting up as he sighed, fully regretting his request.

She nudged his shoulder, reading his face all too well and letting him know it was okay with the only way she knew, “but you’re keepin’ the outfit, right?” - “Hang on! Grab my hand!”

The wind screamed in his ears, gravity nearly wins and the taunting of the rapid air shots drove him out of his mind. You’re not gonna make it. It said. You’re not gonna make it and she’s going to die, because of you.

He shouted to Bucky one last time, tears prickling at the corners of his eyes as the metal rod she held so dearly suddenly began to give in to the pressure. Steve forced himself to move closer, nearly losing grip himself as he reached down as far as he could when one end of the shaft tore off from the train, surrendering to the power of the wind. The other end creaked one more time, and then she was too far from him, hanging violently by a thread that failed her miserably.

Steve had no choice but to watch his best friend’s face twist in fear as she fell down to the clear mountains, her hand still reaching for him.

Everything around him turned into white noise except the small figure that seemed so foreign over the spotless background. She almost looked like she was flying.

It wasn’t until Steve lost sight of her that he realized his grasp is so loose he’s nearly falling himself. - Since the moment a metal hand smashed their window and kidnapped their hostage from a moving car, everything started going south. Well, even souther than it was to begin with. 

And now, Steve was caught in one of the most intense, demanding fights he has ever fought while being shot at by multiple people he once considered colleagues. Natasha was injured, he didn’t know how bad it was and he couldn’t afford checking on her.

And that man, that man he fought was incredibly strong, and more importantly, he used Steve’s strength against him. Flipping him over like he was nothing and snatching his shield from his hands, blocking every single punch Steve threw at him. He had never seen anything like it.

Just when he managed to gain the upper hand, to get his shield back and block that god-awful arm that gave that, thing, too much advantage, he tore his mask off. Her, mask off.

Bucky rolled on the hard asphalt but didn’t hesitate for a second to get up again, turning around with her face exposed. She looked at Steve with eyes that were lacking any expression. Flat and empty with no hint of recognition. Almost like the day he found her in that Nazi facility. 

Everything stopped again. Like it happened every time he saw Bucky; his surroundings quieted down and the only noise he could possibly hear was the loud ringing in his ears. Only there and then Steve realized how desperately he missed her.

“Bucky?”

“Who the hell is Bucky?” - She was wearing a black dress. Looking beautiful than ever with her hair neat on her shoulders. Light years from how she looked today. He supposed it didn’t matter, because it was still her, he was certain.

Today he fought the same Bucky that told him she’s with him till the end of the line. That saved him when he was completely alone. That made it very clear she was his family. That was the Bucky he knew, not the one that tried to kill him. Even being encircled by collapsing chunks of metal burning with fire and three bullets in him he didn’t fail to remember that.

“I’m not gonna fight you. You’re my friend.”

“You’re my mission.”

“Then finish it. Cause I’m with you till the end of the line.” 

Something clicked inside Bucky’s mind. Maybe it was the glimpses of a forgotten key hidden under a brick or just the bruised face that in another life, she spent hours fixing with impromptu bandages and boiled water. 

Whatever it was, something primal and raw screamed frantically at her to stop what she’s doing. Because what she was doing was, for some reason, very, very wrong. - Steve’s heart squeezed inside his chest as he entered the small space he could barely call an apartment. 

Bucky didn’t have much. A few improvised shelves made of wood and bricks piled on each other and a mattress that simply laid on the floor, one single pillow on top of it. He scrunched his nose disapprovingly, no one deserved to live that way. Especially not her. 

Steve scanned the place again and stepped forward, a book with a hard, black cover caught his eye, similar to the ones he saw on the stand to his right. He moved it gently, letting the chocolate bars on top of it slide down as he opened it at the last marked page.

The notebook was well kept, but clearly very used. Steve could tell it was read many time before, the pages worn and overcrowded with words and side notes and pictures. Most of them his own. 

He realized he stared too long into his own eyes when he felt a presence behind him, Steve decided to turn around as he considered it a good sign he wasn’t dead by now.

“Do you know me?”

“You’re Steve.” Her hair was longer now, and the black cap did nothing to mask her piercing eyes. Under all that, she was still herself, “I read about you in a museum.”

Steve nearly huffed and set the notebook to his side, letting her know he read it, “I know you’re nervous, and you have plenty of reason to be. But you’re lying.”

She was stiff, uncomfortable in her own skin, almost afraid to speak the next words out loud, “I wasn’t in Vienna. I don’t do that anymore.”

“Well, the people who think you did are coming here now. And they’re not planing on taking you alive.”

“That’s smart.” She said, eyes burning up as she pushed down tears, “good strategy.”

“This doesn’t have to end in a fight, Buck.”

The both of them could clearly hear the footsteps approaching behind the door. Mean sounds on innocent floor that were getting closer and closer by the second. The only sound she could focus on was the way her long lost nickname fell from Steve lips so naturally. 

“It always ends in a fight.” Bucky sighed, looking physically pained to say that.

“You pulled me from the river. Why?” Because I know you.  Because I remember you. Because you’re Steve. Because…I love you.

“I don’t know.”

“Yes, you do.” - She looked so soft in a white tank. It was the simplest thing, but Steve nearly hugged her one more time before she was gone again.  It was time for him to pretend to be okay for the sake of her, since she so obviously wasn’t.

Her arm was gone, she could barely bring herself to smile, and Steve hated everything about it.

He wanted her to stay with him, to let him take all her bad thoughts away, to kiss that freckle on her collarbone that he noticed the day he met her. But, for years Bucky was stripped from any right she had on her life. Now she was finally able to make a decision that is good for her. 

Steve couldn’t possibly take it away. - “Steve…”

He thought he’d be numb to this by now. How silly of him.

Losing Bucky hurt like the first time, it came crushing down his chest like an airplane, heavy weight physically grounding him to the dirt and taking away his precious ability to breathe. She was lost, again, and he had no choice but to helplessly watch her, again.

They’ve lost each other countless times by now, yet somehow, the world brought them together. And Steve managed to waste every single opportunity he was given. Every single one. That’s the only thing he could think about, sitting on the dirty ground and clutching what used to be the love of his life.

The dust floated away from his fingers as his mind replayed the sight of her falling to her knees and disintegrating away quicker than he could register. The way she muttered his name just before disappearing will hunt him for a long time. - She was standing next to Sam, gesturing him to move forward into a future she knew he deserved.

Steve handed him a brand new shield, and Bucky nodded when Sam looked back, searching for reassurance and validation all at once.

“Are you sure about this?”

“Well,” Steve beamed, stepping down from the machine and onto the ground, ”after I put the Stones back, I thought...maybe I'll try some of that life that Tony was telling me to get.” He glanced at Bucky, smiling shyly and looking down again.

Sam glanced back one more time, confirming what he always knew when he saw the red blush coloring Bucky’s cheeks. He smirked, nodding at the both of them.

“Thank you. I’ll do my best.”

“That’s why it’s yours.”

Steve once swore that if the world would be kind enough to give them another chance, he will not waste it. So, even though it was a love story that’s been spread through decades. Steve didn’t have the patience to wait a single second more. “I love you.” He said, grabbing her by the waist and burying his head in the crook of her neck.

His breath was warm on her skin as she squeezed him closer to her chest. Her eyes nearly reaching eyes level with him.

“I love you, too.”

----

A/N: I’m merely trying to prove a point here. If you think what you’ve seen on screen is not the same thing you just read, then, you’re in for a surprise buddy.  What would happen if Bucky was a girl, a woman. Would that validate their relationship more? For some people I think that’s the case. 

*** I will also note I’m only into s.8 Arya and Sandor being romantically involved w each other. Only an 18+ yr old Arya here folks. 

Also a couple of these are just stupidly cheesy and for my own dang fantasies. 

Oh Comely - Neutral Milk Hotel:  Oh comely // I will be with you when you lose your breath // Chasing the only // Meaningful memory you thought you had left

I Hope That I Don’t Fall in Love with You - Tom Waits:  I can see that you are lonesome just like me // And it being late, you'd like some some company // And I hope that you don't fall in love with me

bury a friend - Billie Eilish:  Your talk'll be somethin' that shouldn't be said out loud // Honestly, I thought that I would be dead by now  // Calling security, keepin' my head held down // Bury the hatchet or bury your friend right now

It Will Come Back - Hozier:  Don't let it in with with no intention to keep it // Jesus Christ, don't be kind to it // Honey don't feed it, it will come back

Can’t Help Falling in Love(cover) - MountainCity:  Would it be a sin // If I can't help falling in love with you?

Song for a Guilty Sadist - Crywank:  How rude of me to bring my thoughts into your bedroom. // Is it condescending to be so scared I might hurt you?

Creep - Scott Bradlee(cover):  Whatever makes you happy // Whatever you want // You're so fuckin' special // I wish I was special // But I’m a creep

Cherry Wine - Overcoats(cover):  Calls of guilty thrown at me // All while she stains // The sheets of some other // Thrown at me so powerfully // Just like she throws with the arm of her brother.

In the  Woods Somewhere - Hozier:  I clutched my life // And wished it kept. // My dearest love I'm not done yet // How many years // I know I'll bear // I found something in the woods somewhere.

Closer - Nine Inch Nails:  My whole existence is flawed // You get me closer to god // You can have my isolation // You can have the hate that it brings // You can have my absence of faith // You can have my everything

Desire - Meg Myers:  Honey, I wanna break you // I wanna throw you to the hounds, // I gotta hurt you, I gotta hear from your mouth

My Blood - Twenty One Pilots:  If you find yourself in a lion's den // I'll jump right in and pull my pin // And go with you

As it Was - Hozier:  And the sights were as stark as my baby // And the cold was as sharp as my baby // And the nights were as dark as my baby // Half as beautiful too

Before I ever Met You - BANKS:  Before I ever met you // I never knew that my heart could love so hard // Before I ever met you // I never knew I would be enemies with disregard // Before I ever met you // I never knew that I liked to be kissed for days // Before I ever met you // I never knew I could be broken in so many ways

Here You Come Again - Dolly Parton:  Here you come again // Just when I'm about to make it work without you // You look into my eyes and lie those pretty lies // And pretty soon I'm wond'rin how I came to doubt you.

Dire Wolf - Grateful Dead:  When I awoke, the Dire Wolf, six hundred pounds of sin, // Was grinning at my window, all I said was "Come on in". // Don't murder me, I beg of you, don't murder me. Please, don't murder me.

To Be Alone - Hozier:  It feels good, girl, it feels good // Oh, to be alone with you

Hallelujah - Jeff Buckley:  And I've seen your flag on the marble arch // And love is not a victory march // It's a cold and it's a broken Hallelujah

Can’t Nobody Love You- The Zombies:  'Cause they don't know how to love you // Like I do

Love is Blindness - Jack White:  Love is clockworks // And cold steel // Fingers too numb to feel // Squeeze the handle // Blow out the candle // Love is blindness

NFWMB - Hozier:  If I was born as a black thorn tree // I'd wanna be felt by you, held by you // Feel the power of your hand on me

Go Your Own Way - Fleetwood Mac:  Loving you // Isn't the right thing to do // How can I ever change things // That I feel

I’m on Fire - The Staves:  At night I wake up with the sheets soaking wet // And a freight train running through the middle of my head // Only you can cool my desire

Woke Up New - The Mountain Goats:  On the morning when I woke up without you for the first time // I felt free and I felt lonely and I felt scared

Young Blood - Noah Kahan:  And if you want, I can tell the truth // That this life takes a toll on you // I spend nights stitching up the loose threads of my soul //  In the morning I'm bulletproof

Hold On - Tom Waits:  She closed her eyes and started swaying // But it's so hard to dance that way // When it's cold and there's no music // Oh, your old hometown's so far away

If I Loved You - Delta Rae:  If I loved you, life would be easy // There'd be no truth that I'd be scared of // I could walk through every valley // And you'd light me with all of your love 

when the party’s over - Billie Eilish:  But nothing is better sometimes // Once we've both said our goodbyes // Let's just let it go // Let me let you go

The Night We Met - Lord Huron:  I had all and then most of you // Some and now none of you // Take me back to the night we met // I don't know what I'm supposed to do // Haunted by the ghost of you

Moment’s Silence - Hozier:  What yields the need for those who lead us oh so morally // Those that would view the sin we do through their deformity // Who view the deed as power's creed is pure authority // This moment's silence when my baby // Puts her mouth on me

bad guy - Billie Eilish:  So you're a tough guy // Like it really rough guy // Just can't get enough guy // Chest always so puffed guy // I'm that bad type // Make your mama sad type // Make your girlfriend mad type // Might seduce your dad type // I'm the bad guy, duh

I Love You Like an Alcoholic - The Taxpayers:  One last kiss, I love you like an alcoholic. // One last kiss, I love you like a statuette. // One last kiss, I need you like I need a broken leg.

Fell in Love with a Girl - The White Stripes:  but sometimes these feelings can be so misleading // she turns and says are you alright? // I said I must be fine cause my heart's still beating

Whore - In This Moment:  But let me tell you something baby // You love me for everything you hate me for // I’m the one that you need and fear // Now that you’re hooked, it’s all becoming clear // That all your judgments that you placed on me // Was a reflection of discovery

Closer - Kings of Leon:  She took my heart, I think she took my soul // With the moon I run // Far from the carnage of the fiery sun

Love Song for a Vampire - Annie Lennox:  Oh loneliness, oh hopelessness // To search the ends of time // For there is in all the world // No greater love than mine

Big God - Florence + the Machine:  You keep me up at night // To my messages, you do not reply // You know I still like you the most // The best of the best and the worst of the worst

Ouija - Beacon for Ghosts: I should have known I’d be misunderstood //  in every story you heard I was the antagonist // But I can’t hurt you, and even if I could // I’ve forgotten what it was that I even wanted vengeance for  

Last Night on Earth - Green Day:  I'm here to honor you // If I lose everything in the fire // I'm sending all my love to you

Started - Iggy Azalea:  I started to say sorry, but fuck that shit // You started out hatin', now you love my drip // Ayy, bitch, they lookin' at me, they not lookin' at you // I don't mean to be rude, I'm a ten, you a two  

Otherside - Avi Kaplan:  wrapped around my skin // pulls me deeper // drags me back again

I Can’t Go On Without You - KALEO:  Oh so what is left but a broken man? // 'Cause nothing hurts like a woman can

Happier - Marshmello, Bastille:  When the evening falls // And I'm left there with my thoughts // And the image of you being with someone else // Well, that's eating me up inside

Graceless - The National:  All of my thoughts of you // Bullets through rotten fruit // Come apart at the seams // Now I know what dying means

Furr - Blitzen Trapper:  Yeah, we would gladly get our fill // Howling endlessly and shrilly at the dawn // And I lost the taste for judging right from wrong

Beggin for Thread - BANKS:  So I got edges that scratch // And sometimes I don't got a filter // But I'm so tired of eating // All of my misspoken words // I know my disposition gets confusing // My disproportionate reactions fuse with my eager state // That's why you wanna come out and play with me, yeah // Why?

Take Me To Church - Hozier:  I'll worship like a dog at the shrine of your lies // I'll tell you my sins and you can sharpen your knife // Offer me that deathless death // Good God, let me give you my life

Go to War - Nothing More:  Every feeling in my bones tells me to lash out // And tell you, "fuck off" // You've got my heart and I've got your soul // But are we better off alone? // With every battle, we lose a little more // Remember everything that we died for // You are everything that I die for

Kissing You Goodbye - The Used:  On my own, I'm nothing, just bleeding // I'm not kissing you goodbye

Follow You - Bring Me The Horizon:  So you can drag me through hell // If it meant I could hold your hand // I will follow you 'cause I'm under your spell // And you can throw me to the flames // I will follow you, I will follow you