"Singularity" Chapter 44: "Look for the Light" [44/49]
Title: "Singularity" Chapter 44: "Look for the Light" [44/49]
Fandom: The Last of Us (first game only)
Characters: Ellie, Joel, Tommy, Maria, OCs
Pairings: Joel/Ellie
Warnings: Underage
Word Count for this chapter: 8,760
Rating (for fic as a whole): R
~
Why did I ever care about this?
That was the question that kept popping into Ellie's mind when she tried to do something fun -- or what she used to consider fun. It all seemed so pointless now.
All the fuss being made over the play was just... absurd. The hours and hours of rehearsing... painting sets... making costumes... figuring out what to do for sound effects and lighting... and for what? A couple hours on stage, for three nights. Then it was done. Over with. Finished. After like two months of preparation. Everyone working so hard to achieve the goal of... what, exactly? Proving they can memorize lines and sing songs... to provide meaningless entertainment for the town, for just three nights? Why the fuck doesn't everyone just go watch the movie? It has REAL actors, and real sets that will look a hundred times better. Oh -- and it's WAY less work.
Movies might have interested Ellie if she could watch them alone. The library was just too... obnoxious? Yeah, maybe... like, there were couples and families everywhere. So many more now than there used to be, it felt like. Did I really not notice before? It wasn't that they had new people; there hadn't been any newcomers at all in the past month or so. And she'd familiarized herself enough with the Idaho people that she could at least recognize who was who. Instead of seeing people as individuals, she found herself categorizing them as something apart from her. She just couldn't see past the label to the actual person. Because the labels were mocking her, reminding her of what she'd had and lost... or of what she'd almost had...
Her heart just wasn't in anything now. Joel wanted her to spend more time with her friends? Well... maybe she didn't feel like rolling dice and making up stupid stories about ogres and trolls and clerics. She couldn't even be bothered coming up with a cool scenario with which to kill off her character -- she told Wyatt to use her death however the fuck he wanted in order to best serve the campaign (and she could see he was pleased at the prospect, even though Clicker wanted to just send her character away, leaving the door open to the possibility of a return)(...of course, this was only after he'd whined and begged and pleaded for her to keep playing, to no avail).
As for video games... what was the point of hitting buttons or whatever to clear a level, only to have another level to do, and another, until eventually you get to the end -- hooray! Then what do you get? ...Absolutely zip! Only the realization that it was all just a big waste of time! She made some remark like that to Clicker, and he'd tried to tell her it's fun, and it's really rewarding and satisfying to complete stuff, and to see what happens with the storyline. She knew what he meant, because she used to feel that way, too. Used to: now she had to bite her tongue to keep from reminding him that it was all just pixels on a screen, and it all amounted to exactly nothing.
One that might have been an exception? Her secret Sims game, featuring 'Melanie and Joey' Sims -- Melanie with black hair and Joey with red (he still had the beard, though, because she just couldn't bear to change that part) -- where she couldn't figure out how to get Joey to accept Melanie's advances (and forget about having him make a move on her! He would just glare at the camera with a look of disgust on his stupid little pixelated face). In the end, she had to cheat and age up the Melanie Sim. Once they were both adults, Joey had noooooooo problem letting Melanie have her way with him. Unfortunately for them, it wasn't the fun escape into fantasy land Ellie had hoped it would be (torture, much?), and she killed the game without saving before they did much of anything together. It just pissed her off too much. She stopped short of actually deleting that game off of there permanently...
After all... we're on a BREAK. We MIGHT get back together...
Would she suddenly care about all this stupid shit again if they did?
On the slightly-less frivolous side, story time at the library with the little kids also felt like a waste of time... but she understood that the problem was her, not the kids. Kids loved goofy stories about dancing giraffes, or eating eggs and ham that are green -- and usually she enjoyed their silliness and their enthusiasm for such stories. Just... ugh -- not now. She completely blew off her first gig (first one After Joel, that is) because she just couldn't stomach the thought of faking it that hard. Like, she really had to get her perk on to do the voices and be all animated and shit, which the kids had come to expect from her. She wasn't up for it, so she justified skipping it by thinking of it as better to not be there at all than to do a piss-poor job, then went horseback riding instead. Which prompted a guilt-trippy visit from Deborah that evening. "You should have found a replacement, or at the very least, let me know you wouldn't be coming" and "you made several of the children cry -- Lacey was inconsolable." Ellie had spat back something cynical about teaching them life lessons about disappointment. And no, they weren't too young to learn at age two or three -- she had started learning all about that at birth. (And "inconsolable" -- really? The girl was a fucking toddler -- Ellie highly doubted she was upset for all that long.)
Ellie did actually feel bad about it the next day, though. Bad enough that she went and apologized to Deborah, and promised she would uphold her next scheduled time. Surely she could fake it for a fucking half hour out of her day, right? She could even go horseback riding afterward if she wanted to. Being around the kids would probably make her feel at least marginally better in the end, even if she didn't feel like being with them to begin with. It had happened before... although whatever had been troubling Ellie in previous instances surely hadn't been as monumental as being Joel-less.
Nothing was as fun as it used to be -- there was just no getting around that -- but riding was the thing that probably came the closest to approximating fun. And she had already learned her lesson about playing favorites with the horses. No, she wouldn't be doing that anymore. Since returning to Jackson last month, she'd made it her goal to ride a different horse every session. Since there wasn't an endless supply available, there would be repeats, of course, but she was still able to rotate enough that she didn't get overly attached to any one particular horse.
Other than that, working at the farm was the only thing Ellie really wanted to do. The sense of satisfaction she got from that was better than any fucking video game. If she thought about it too hard, she could conclude that farm chores were meaningless, too (the repetition or sameness of them, day in and day out... sustaining life, cycle of life, blah blah, yeah, sure, okay... but wasn't life itself pretty fucking meaningless?)... she just tried not to think about it too hard. The time went by faster when she was busy, and she needed the time to go by as quickly as possible. All she wanted to do was fast forward to the day that Joel decided to come back.
And he would come back. Of course he would. He fucking promised. Yes, he'd broken promises before, but he wouldn't break this one. She just... she wouldn't fucking let him break this one.
...Yeah. Like I have any say in it?!
If Joel didn't come back... like, on purpose... well, Ellie would have to believe he never really loved her, if he did that. The fact that he would choose to be away from her for so long already meant that she loved him more, obviously (but she had always known that, deep down). That was bad enough. But she had no way of knowing if he was even still alive. Surprisingly, that was actually harder to live with than the possibility of him coming back solely to dump her ass for real. She had always thought she'd rather him be dead than to be alive but not want to be with her... but now it felt like the opposite. I'm supposed to be WITH him when-- UGGHHH--
The whole thing just made her so angry sometimes! Why does Joel get to decide everything all the time? Why doesn't it matter what I want? Doesn't he know he's torturing me, every day he stays away?! Doesn't he CARE?
The nights were killing her. She didn't sleep at all that first night. But she did get an idea... and it turned out to be a good one. She didn't want to hang out in the pit or talk to anyone there about music, but she did peruse the cassettes in the library in search of one she could play on her walkman every night when she went to sleep. Something sad. She spent a great deal of time making the perfect selection -- and then she didn't bother checking out the cassette at the counter. She didn't work on her special project there anymore (it was the ultimate waste of time), but after all the hours she'd put in at the library in the past, she figured they owed her one. (Besides, most people didn't care much about the cassettes because it was hard to find ones that still worked and machines that could play them.) (And besides that -- all she took was a dinky single.)
Ellie played the fuck out of that cassette. The lyrics weren't a perfect fit, which was pretty standard for old world creations, but it was about a guy leaving a girl, and the guy just goes on with his life all la-di-da while the poor miserable girl pines away for him pathetically. She cried herself to sleep on more than one occasion, which was actually preferable to staring at the ceiling all night. And even though it sucked, obviously, there was something oddly satisfying about it, too... almost like when she indulged the sadness, she was honoring her love for Joel? Something along those lines. Sometimes, she could swear she felt him stroking her hair... soothing her with promises of his return. Obviously, it was just a trick her mind was playing on her... but it was an effective one when she was yearning for sleep, and Ellie leaned into it whenever she could.
Maria was still getting up with Grayson in the middle of the night... usually only once now. Ellie had offered to take that feeding, that first night when she couldn't sleep at all (obviously, that night was out of the question, because it would require a little preparation, but maybe in the future?), and Maria had refused -- allegedly not even because she despised the breast pump thingie. She said if Ellie was awake at that time, she was welcome to pop over to the room for a visit, but Maria expected Ellie to fall into a sleep routine soon enough, and since she worked lots of mornings at the farm, she needed her rest at night. Ellie found it kind of painful to be around the little dude at first... due to him being a baby and all... but she got over it surprisingly quickly. She was able to look beyond his label... maybe because she already loved him so much? Grayson seemed to love her, too. He smiled at her a lot. It was impossible not to smile back at him. He was so cute!
And he did get over his little virus or whatever with the help of that medicine; it turned out to be nothing serious. But Joel doesn't know that... if he cares about his nephew, shouldn't he at least be checking back in to make sure he's okay?
Yet he didn't.
There was also the chance that Ellie really was pregnant this time. According to her calendar, she was now officially late. Which, again, wasn't unusual for her, just... we had soooooo much sex! And I feel nauseous sometimes... I think? No puking, but her stomach wasn't exactly happy these days. Surely Joel realized there was a chance... right? Would that bring him back? Or would the thought of her possibly lying to him about it again fill him with fresh anger?
Ellie already knew she would never, ever lie about that again. That, or anything else! (...welllllllll... except when she was brutally honest with herself, she had to admit that lies could be highly effective tools and were not necessarily all bad. Just -- she would definitely never again lie to him about being pregnant.) Joel, however, had no way of knowing this, so it might work against her. He might decide he needed to stay away so long that Ellie couldn't possibly lie about it -- like nine fucking months.
She would die if he stayed away that long! Literally die.
Or, maybe the subject was permanently closed in Joel's brain now, and it wouldn't even occur to him that she might have gotten pregnant during those last few days together. If she'd had more time to think, she might have mentioned it to Joel before he left... or she might have decided to leave well enough alone. Joel wasn't stupid; the possibility would have occurred to him. If she remembered correctly, she'd even alluded to it during her confession. Maybe it didn't register, though? With everything else I was saying...
Still. He had to realize there was a chance. What he decided to do about that was up to him. Given her tendency to try to manipulate situations to her advantage, Ellie couldn't truly fault Joel for leaving; in his eyes, it was perhaps the only way things would remain his choice.
Which... was also weird to think about, because to Ellie, it felt like Joel was always calling all the shots! She had to remind herself that she did hold some influence over him, even if it didn't always feel like it. Enough influence that he felt like he had to get away from her to get a better perspective on things.
She wondered if Joel was right about pregnancy tests not being accurate so early. There was even less time that had passed now than there had been for the fake baby, so... Ellie figured she'd better wait. Maybe if she missed another period, it would be enough time?
That first day off work... that was the worst. Ellie didn't know what to do with herself. She didn't even make it through half the day before she just went down to the farm and took over for someone (most people were happy to have time off). It wasn't so much that she didn't know what to do without Joel there -- it was more that she didn't want to do any of the things she used to like. And horseback riding... Joel had said it was bad for pregnant women. Maybe I ought to stop that, too, just in case? Like... it's probably too early for it to matter, but... if this turned out to be her one and only chance to have Joel's baby...
Even if Joel never came back, she wanted it! A piece of him with her always? YES-- sign me up for that! As painful as the subject had become, she couldn't deny that she wanted it. Just as fucking badly as she had wanted the fake baby.
The second day off without Joel (which happened to be the very next day) was even worse -- it was Sunday. One week after the start of the 'whirlwind,' which was what he had dubbed those days. Sunday... the day they should have taken the jeep out for a joyride... and spent the whole day together, just the two of them. Like old times. Then, as if knowing that wasn't bad enough, things got even worse: she actually got her fucking period.
How could this happen?! After all that sex we had, I didn't get pregnant?
She had felt various degrees of crummy all week... apparently due to sleeping and eating less, not as a result of her abandoned scheme to get pregnant. (Having a broken heart was pretty painful all on its own, as it turned out.) Shifting gears quickly from mourning a non-existent baby, she couldn't help thinking about ~what might have been~... if only she had kept her big fat stupid mouth shut. The blood she was seeing in the toilet right now could have represented their lost baby... they would mourn it, and bond over the shared pain, and still get married anyway -- because Joel had said so. He had said "no matter what happens." (Of course, that promise obviously hadn't encompassed finding out about her scheme, but she could hardly hold that against him.) ...I would have had to avoid him for a while so he didn't take me straight to the clinic, but then I would go tearfully tell him what happened... I'd keep my bloody underwear as proof... maybe I was too scared to tell him right away, or too upset... and he would hold me and we'd cry together and stuff... and after however long you're supposed to wait, we could try to get pregnant 'again.'
But nope! She had fucked all that up by wussing out. By feeling too guilty. So she had done the proverbial right thing, and lost Joel because of it. What good was doing the right thing if it led to the wrong outcome? Fuck that. Joel didn't even want that baby. He only talked himself into wanting it cuz he thought he had no choice. He would've got over it really quick and we would never talk about it again and it would just go away. If I could've just... UGGHHH, why did I have to feel so guilty? Joel never feels bad about HIS lies. Why can't I be like that?
If I was like him, WE WOULD STILL BE TOGETHER RIGHT NOW.
Even though her period wasn't causing her much physical discomfort this time, Ellie decided to keep the day off instead of going down to the farm. But she didn't especially want to be around Maria and Grayson today, either... she sure as fuck didn't want to go to the library, with the socializing areas always busier on the weekends... she kind of wanted to take a walk around the lake, but ultimately decided to go to her (their?) house -- for the first time since that fateful day.
She took off her shoes and got all the way into their bed, under the covers and everything, and had herself a good, long, self-pitying-as-fuck cry. Thanks to getting her period, her only guarantee of keeping Joel had gone down the drain along with the would-be fake baby. Gone were her fantasies of announcing the news to Joel when he returned. Of course, the good fantasy -- one that included a happy reaction -- was already ruined. Joel would not have been pleased to hear it, to say the least, and he probably wouldn't have believed her until she had the not-a-doctor Aiyana confirm it for him.
But he would have stayed with her -- and that was the important thing. He might hate her for getting pregnant on purpose like that, but he would never hate his own child. She was the asshole -- the child was an innocent. And if people who didn't even love each other could make things work when they had a kid...
I would've made him fall in love with me again -- I KNOW I would have! All she had to do was never ever lie to him again (at least not about anything important), and be super sweet and nice to him all the time. She would never use sex to manipulate him -- and there would be no fucking, only ~making love~. She would do whatever he wanted, all the time. (He always acted like that wasn't what he wanted her to do, but OF COURSE IT FUCKING WAS. How could it not be?)
Now, of course, she had to quit torturing herself with those thoughts, because that scenario was never going to happen. Unless she managed to talk him into goodbye sex... maybe he'd let me handcuff him, so I could make sure he came inside me! Then he would HAVE to come back and check on me at least once to see if I was pregnant...
So much for not using sex to manipulate?
Ugh -- just... she could see it both ways. Manipulation did serve her well sometimes.
What was it Joel had accused her of doing... using sex as a means to an end? Well, if it fucking worked... -But that wasn't the reason she had suggested it. It hadn't even occurred to her until later. Mainly, she just really really did not want that rapey time to be the last time they ever made love. She almost felt like she could stand him leaving her forever, if they had just one last good time...
...Oh, who am I kidding? It would still be totally fucking devastating if he left her permanently, not just on this break -- which was hard enough to bear, even knowing it was temporary. But it would just be nice to... go out with a bang? Ha. No, more like... to part with tenderness and love... or for it to affect Joel so profoundly that he decides he DOES want to be with me after all...
Which he might decide anyway. Ellie did feel hopeful about that possibility. She just had to weigh that against the bad, and try not to let that hope swell up too much. Any time she thought about the way he'd looked at her when he left that day, she felt a spark of hope... then she would force herself to remember the way he'd looked at her when she confessed what she had done. Both of those had occurred in the same day. The loving one happened last, but it could have been fueled by the emotions that got stirred up over leaving her or something. He had said he would always love her, could never hate her... yes, but he'd also said plenty of other bullshit about them not being good for each other. And he honestly seemed to feel like his sincere, heartfelt gesture of asking her to marry him was a sign that he'd lost his mind.
He didn't want her to think about all this? Well, tough shit. She didn't usually lay around in bed crying like this or anything, but he had lost his mind if he thought she could just bop around town without a care in the world, happy as a clam (...why were clams so happy, anyway? As far as Ellie could tell, their lives sucked ass).
"Ellie?"
Her heart leaped into her throat--
...but only for a second. Her name was accompanied by a knock. Joel wouldn't knock like that. And even if he had decided to knock today for some reason (maybe she'd actually locked the door this time?), the voice was a little off. Slightly higher-pitched.
"Ellie, are you in there?"
Yep, it was Tommy. ...Tommy's back!
Ellie had mixed feelings about that. She was thrilled for Maria and Grayson... not-so-thrilled for herself. This whole thing is his fault!
She heard the front door opening. If she could ever just remember to lock the damn thing...
"Ellie?"
"In here," she called to him, although she quickly rolled over to face away from the doorway. In case he didn't know she was still pissed.
She could feel him hesitating in the doorway. He came in after a few seconds. "Maria told me you were over here... I'm gonna let a little sun in, if you don' mind. It's a beautiful day out."
It wasn't that dark in the room with the curtains drawn, but the gloomy atmosphere suited her current mood more than the sunshine did. She buried her face in the pillow in protest. Why did I have to tell Maria where I went? ...Because she'd gotten into that habit. Because Maria truly seemed to care about where she went and what she did... but also because Ellie felt responsible for Tommy being gone, and if Maria needed anything... if something happened to Grayson... okay, well, I guess Tommy can take over now in the feeling protective department. From now on, I'll just do whatever I want and not tell a soul.
She felt the weight of him sitting on the bed down by her feet. "Guess you still hate me, huh?" he asked.
Brilliant observation. She didn't reply.
"Maria also told me... you've been a little distant."
Oh my God... the brilliance is BLINDING... what exactly did they expect from her?!
"A little sad," he added, scooting up a little and laying his hand on the lump that was her back.
She didn't flinch or tell him to fuck off or anything; she just didn't move.
"Glad you made it home safe," he continued.
...Oh yeah! -Maybe he saw-- "Did Joel find you?" she asked, finally turning her head to look at him. She even deigned to make eye contact.
"No."
...That was apparently all he was going to say. Which was fine, since that answer indicated there was nothing useful she could glean from furthering this conversation. She smothered her face in the pillow again.
"Sweetheart, listen... I know you're upset. I know you don't wanna hear things like... this is for the best, or... someday you'll understand..."
"You're right -- I don't," she mumbled. "So don't say it."
His hand patted her a couple times before withdrawing. "I am sorry you're so hurt by it all. He should've thought of that before--"
"He should've thought?" Ellie turned to glare at him, then decided to go ahead and sit all the way up because it felt kind of silly to exude anger from such a submissive position. She scooted back against the headboard to get a little farther away from Tommy, crossing her arms over her chest. "We were just fine until you barged in here and ruined everything. Why couldn't you just leave us alone? It's not like we were going around... flaunting our relationship or anything. And we weren't hurting anyone!"
Tommy gave her a disgustingly pitying look. "I know it feels that way. But it was hurtin' you, in the long run."
"No it wasn't! Joel would never--" ...Well, I can't actually say he would never hurt me, now, can I. Pfff. And that wasn't entirely Tommy's fault. But he started it! "He wouldn't have hurt me at all, if... ...He only left because you didn't give him a choice."
"It was a mutual agreement. And I wasn't even here, the second time he left."
That second thing was true, of course, but Ellie didn't really give a fuck; it was still basically Tommy's fault for giving Joel the idea in the first place. "Did Maria tell you he's coming back?"
"Yes. It's good that he left for a while, though. Gives the two of you some time to... process things. On your own."
She snorted. "I don't need to process anything. I love him. I will always love him. And if he comes back here and says he never wants to see me again, then..." Her voice wavered; she couldn't even stand to think about that possibility. "Then you won't see me again either." ...Um, what? What am I saying?
"I don't think he'll say that," Tommy replied gently. "But what do you mean, I won't see you again?"
"Nothing. Actually, since you're back now... I'll get out of your hair and move back in here. I was only staying cuz Maria--"
"I don't want you to do that." He smiled a little. "We like havin' you in our hair."
What a dumb expression that is anyway... I literally have not touched anyone's hair in that house except Grayson's! "Uh, you won't anymore. You liked the old me. The happy one. Happy cuz I was with Joel," she added pointedly.
"We'll take you any which way."
She eyed him suspiciously. "Why?"
"...Why? Because we love you. We want you around."
She squirmed and looked away after hearing that 'love.' Is he really that dumb? How can he LOVE me? "But I already told you... I hate you for what you did. I still do, you know. That hasn't changed."
"You're angry. I get it. But we're still family."
What the fuck is he smoking?! "Joel is my family. If he doesn't want me anymore, then... I don't have a family," she said quietly.
"We'll always be your family, honey. Even if you hate us. Whether Joel's here or not."
Fuck... she felt her throat constricting. She stared at her lap. "No... without Joel, I'm nothing. To anyone."
"That ain't true. Not at all. There's a lot of people here who care about you. And... if you really don't wanna live with us, I know Esther would love to have you. But I do hope you'll stay with us."
He must be a masochist. "Why do you wanna live with someone who hates you?"
"Well... maybe I'd like the chance to make you not hate me, yeah?"
Ellie wished he would quit being so fucking nice. It was getting her feelings all mixed up. At least with Christine, the feeling is completely mutual -- not confusing at all!
"What did you mean before? When you said I wouldn't see you again?" he persisted. "Were you just talkin' about movin' out?"
She didn't know what had prompted her to say it... but now that she thought about it, she really would have to leave Jackson if Joel didn't want to be with her. She'd be too hurt -- and too humiliated -- to stick around. Even if Joel didn't stay, how could she keep living here, where she used to live with him? She figured he'd probably want her to stay here, where she'd be safe... but if he left her for real, then fuck what he wanted. Would he chase after me? Or just let me go?
"Ellie?" Tommy prompted her; she must have been quiet too long.
I need a back-up plan... "I don't know what I meant by that, really... except... well, maybe..." She glanced at him. "Maybe I should go try to find the Fireflies... if there are any left. So they can finish what they started last year."
The look of alarm on his face was wholly satisfying. "What? Why the hell would you do that?"
She shrugged. "I dunno... why not? At least that way my life would mean something..."
"Your life does mean somethin'! See, this is exactly why you an' Joel need time apart. You got all caught up in--"
"Don't blame this on Joel, too!" she spat out. "We didn't do anything wrong. We fell in love. And he didn't want to. He fought me on it for a really long time."
"Oh, I'm sure."
She didn't like the way he said that, all sarcastic-like. "He did. He's not the monster you seem to think he is. He didn't... play me, or manipulate me, or whatever -- he loved me." And I hope he still does...
"I don't think of him that way. I wouldn't even exactly call him a predator. I think--"
"Of course he's not!" Ellie cried. "He's not some kind of child molester pervert!"
"I think it happened by accident," he continued, ignoring her outburst. "I think he got real attached to you, an' things started to get muddled up in his head. But instead of--"
"I'm not gonna just sit here and let you bash Joel," she declared. "I don't care what you think, because you're fucking wrong about him!"
He held up his hands placatingly. "All right... I wasn't tryin' to bash him."
"But you were. Maybe you can't help yourself. -You know how me and Maria get along these days? We don't talk about Joel. If you want me to not hate you, that's a good first step."
Tommy nodded. "She said she's tried to talk to you about the whole thing, and you always shut it down."
At least Maria would drop it after one attempt; if nothing else, she didn't seem to have the energy to fight with Ellie. Or maybe she's just more respectful of my wishes? "Yeah -- because she's wrong, too. She's on your side."
"There's no sides. ...If there were, we'd both be on your side."
"Pfff. No one's on Joel's side. His own brother even turned against him."
Tommy chuckled at that. "Me'n'Joel have been on opposite sides of things... for a long while now. But for the record, I did not turn against him. If I can help him in any--"
"That's such bullshit! He doesn't need your help. There's nothing wrong with him. He just needs you to... not lay a fucking guilt trip on him and make him think if he stays with me, he's not 'doing right by me' -- whatever the fuck that means -- like, seriously, whatever he's doing now is not right by me. No fucking way."
Tommy just sat there for a minute. Thinking, she presumed. "Like you said... let's not talk about Joel," he said. "At least not right now. I'm concerned about your... how you said you'd go to the Fireflies."
"Only if Joel doesn't want me," she clarified. That was the most important part! "It is my choice. I can do whatever I want. You even said so last year, remember? Joel never adopted me, so I'm free to come and go as I please."
Tommy gave her a look. "That ain't exactly true. You're still a minor."
"Not really, though -- I don't have any parents. No real family. Even Joel isn't family, technically." She would always consider him family in her heart, no matter if he disowned her or whatever, but by Jackson law, they were not related -- and if the technicality suited her, she would recognize it.
"Well, maybe Maria'n'me should adopt you."
...the fuck?! "You would do that just to make it like... illegal for me to leave here if you don't want me to?"
"Not just. It's somethin' we could talk about, though..."
So if me and Joel got back together... I'd be fucking my uncle? She almost snickered out loud at the thought. "It doesn't matter -- if I really wanna get out of here, I can."
"Yeah... we noticed that. How the hell did you do it?"
Shit! Why did I have to bring that up? She would just give him a nonsensical answer, like she gave anyone else who asked. "I tapped my shoes together three times and said 'there's no place like home.' " (She liked that one.)
"That don't even make sense. If it makes it so you can leave home..."
Oh, oops, I said it wrong... She shrugged. "I don't question the magic. Besides, I have other homes, don't I?" Not that she was welcome in any of them nowadays...
"If there's somethin' we've overlooked in the security of this place, don't you think that's somethin' I oughta know about? It shouldn't be that easy for anyone to get out. Means it might be just as easy for someone to get in. Someone bad."
Ellie just rolled her eyes; she didn't feel like she was putting the town in jeopardy by not revealing her method. She had heard of kids sneaking out before. By the time she and Joel had arrived last year, it was part of the patrol's job to check the perimeter for weaknesses. Everyone was scared shitless of the electric fence, so the only successful escape she was aware of in their time had occurred during a power outage (debunking the myth that the fences ran on an emergency generator when the power was out) -- and that one wasn't even really a success because a guard had spotted the kids from the tower and alerted the patrol to go pick them up immediately. The tree they'd climbed to get over the wall had been chopped down, as Ellie recalled. Poor innocent tree...
"Fine, don't tell me. But... please. Ellie. Do not set out lookin' for the Fireflies again. You're so young. You have so much life ahead of you yet."
A life that's meaningless without JOEL... but she didn't need to say it out loud. She was pretty sure Tommy got the picture. Maybe she should stay at their house... if he saw how miserable she was day in and day out, would he finally start to realize how real her love for Joel was? I can see it now... "Ellie, I'm so sorry. We were wrong. You and Joel obviously belong together. Let's go find him and tell him so."
...Yeah, that wasn't the most realistic fantasy, she supposed... but could she change his mind about her and Joel? Maybe that was the key! If she could change Tommy's mind -- Maria's, too -- then when Joel came back, if he was still wavering on the decision, they could give him the nudge he needed to take her back!
So... how should I play this? Cold and hostile? Or... more dignified-like? Yeah... like, maybe they think this "I hate you" stuff is immature. It would be more MATURE of me to be quiet and withdrawn, going about my business with like... resolve, or whatever, but no JOY...
"You promised Joel you wouldn't do that," Tommy was saying. "At least not without talkin' to him first. And you know he only added that part 'cause he reckoned he would talk you out of it."
She snorted. "Yeah, I know." Talk her out of it or lock her up. One of the two. He had tried to make it feel like she had a choice... but I didn't, really... so, now that he's gone, what's to stop me? What had been a throwaway comment to Tommy suddenly felt like a real possibility. A light at the end of the torture tunnel. Dead people don't feel pain...
"We were right in that room out there -- I remember it like it was yesterday," Tommy recalled, bringing her right back to the memory as well. "I knew Joel loved you, before that... but that really sealed it, for me. The look on his face when you agreed not to leave. The way he... talked about adoptin' you, an' everythin' like that..."
Ellie made sure to look him in the eye now. "He meant that, you know. We weren't like... together. Not way back then." She hated that Tommy thought less of Joel for having romantic feelings for her in the first place, but she didn't want him to think that she and Joel had just been playing him all along or something.
"Guess it's a good thing you said no. That would've been a real mess." He chuckled to himself. "No wonder he never wanted to talk about it again. Told me to forget the whole thing, whenever I brought it up. I thought you just needed more time... and figured maybe he was a little gun-shy, after you turned it down."
Ellie didn't remember it ever coming up again -- not with Tommy, anyway. It was kind of a little joke between her and Joel... except he didn't really think it was funny, so she tried not to go there. I wonder how many people have turned down both adoption proposals AND marriage proposals by the same person? ...and if I had said YES to either one, Joel would still be here right now... "I didn't know you guys ever talked about it after that day. Joel never mentioned that. But I don't need parents anyways. I'm sixteen, not six. Don't say it -- you're never too old to need parents."
"It's true. Sixteen is still very young."
"Then I don't want parents. Especially ones who run my boyfriend out of town," she grumbled.
"Understood. Although... that's what parents do, for their daughters. No one is good enough," he added with a grin.
His amusement irritated Ellie. Like Joel was the equivalent of some asshole kid trying to get in her pants or something. "The good enough thing is bullshit. Especially when the daughter is the one who's a piece of shit."
"What are you talkin' about? You think that's true just 'cause you said and did some things when you were angry?"
No, I think that because of the ginormous LIE I told Joel that made him fucking PROPOSE before I went and ruined his little fantasy. But Tommy didn't know about any of that, and he certainly didn't need to know. She just decided she'd do the 'lie of omission' thing and let him assume that a non-response to him meant that he was right. Lies lies lies... that's my specialty! She fiddled with her fingers in her lap.
"Honey, don't worry about that. We understand."
You don't understand JACK SHIT! she seethed. Honestly, though, she did owe him an apology for her behavior on the day she left. She had apologized to Maria and said she would go pick out another lamp for that room from Ghost Town. Since that was her room now, and she really didn't need the light (the night light sufficed), she hadn't done it yet. She was kind of waiting for the right mood to strike her. No doubt it would make her miss Joel... because the abandoned houses reminded her of being Outside, which always reminded her of Joel, and also because the two of them used to rendezvous in there, before going to California. Anyway, would they resort to doing that again, if they got back together? Would it even be possible with the Idaho people beginning to move into there -- with more on the way -- or, worse, if Tommy was still hell-bent on keeping them apart?!
Right... I have to win Tommy over to Team Joellie (as Sophie would say). It was sure to be a long battle. And she wasn't going to be all sweet to Tommy right away -- she certainly wasn't going to let him harbor this foolish idea of fucking adopting her.
"You can just forget about adopting me," she told him coldly, looking up from her hands to deliver an icy glare to match her tone. "I'll never agree to it. Not for you, or Joel, or anyone else. I don't need anyone looking out for me -- I can take care of myself. And I definitely don't need anyone telling me what I can and can't do. Fuck that. I'm my own person... my own boss. Because guess what: the only person I can count on is myself. It's always been that way, and always will be that way." I just... FORGOT for a while, when I was with Joel. ...okay, so like, for almost two whole YEARS. But I remember now.
The sympathy on Tommy's face made her look away again. "I know you're hurtin' right now," he said gently. "And you're pissed. But you can count on other people... people who care about you. Maria'n'me... we'll always be here for--"
"I can count on you guys to ruin my life, you mean?" she snarled. "Yeah. Awesome. Thanks for that."
"You know that wasn't my intention. And it ain't even true. But you're entitled to your feelin's... I'll leave you be." He started to get up.
"Yep, you can go back to your real family now," she muttered.
...And he sat right back down. "You are my real--"
"Okay okay -- I didn't mean it. You can go. I wanna be alone anyway." She slithered back down under the covers, coiling herself enough to not make contact with Tommy. She didn't bury her face in the pillow this time; she stared at the wall, her angry expression on full display.
"I'll stay if you want me to. It jus' seemed like you--"
"I just said I wanna be alone," she gritted out. Why the fuck didn't I just let him leave?!
He kept sitting there, like he hadn't heard her.
Oh my God... even Joel probably would've lost patience with me by now! She hadn't even heard so much as a sigh out of Tommy, this whole time. Her rudeness didn't seem to faze him at all, either. "Are you deaf? I want to be alooooone."
"All right, I hear you. Hope to see you at dinner later." He stood up for real this time; in doing so, something about his mannerisms reminded her of Joel. The way he... fixed his shirt or something...
Well, they ARE brothers... For one mad second, she thought about flinging herself into his arms and just pretending he was Joel. If she closed her eyes... maybe for a few seconds I can feel like... I dunno... GOOD? Loved?
But that was stupid. She had hugged Tommy before, plenty of times... but he had never held her the way that Joel did. And he never would. It would be too hard to pretend. Joel could not be replaced -- not by his brother, and not by anyone else.
There was something else she wanted to ask Tommy about before he left because it had been weighing on her, and she didn't want to wait until dinner (besides, she would probably go eat with Annie's family, now that Tommy was back). "Tommy?" she called to him when he reached the doorway.
He turned around. "Yeah?"
He's probably expecting an apology for my rudeness... well, tough shit. "Did your group make it back okay?"
He hesitated. "We can talk about that later."
Shit! She sat up again. "What? What happened?"
"It's all right. They're mostly okay."
Fuck fuck fuck-- "Who isn't?"
"Dexter. But don't worry, he's gonna be just fine. We took him to the medical center an' they fixed him up."
Ellie hoped he wasn't downplaying it to lessen the guilt. She liked Dexter -- he and Amanda were the couple in town with the second-biggest age gap (a piddly twenty-three years). And she wished Joel would adopt the guy’s if-you-don’t-like-it-you-can-go-fuck-yourself attitude regarding the age difference, but whenever she suggested as much to Joel, he scoffed at her and told her it wasn’t the same thing at all (even though it totally was). She hated that Dexter had gotten hurt while out searching for her. "You mean Idaho, right?" Otherwise Tommy would have said 'the clinic,' presumably...
"Right."
"What happened?"
"Uh... we had a lil' run-in with a couple guys who reckoned they could help themselves to our horses while we weren't ridin' 'em."
"Shit! So what happened with Dexter?"
"Took a bullet to the chest."
Ellie's jaw dropped. "...And he's okay?!"
"He was lucky. It lodged itself in his rib cage... missed hittin' any major organs, though. He'll recover."
"Fuck... does Amanda know? She must be freaking the fuck out." And probably wants to kill me!
"She's on her way there now."
"By herself?!"
"No no, Max said he'd go with her."
"Okay, good." She had always thought of Amanda as kind of a wuss. Ellie probably should have gone with her, really... as punishment or something... but oh gee, they already left, so that torture was out (ha). And fuck -- I can't leave town! I might miss Joel's return! What if he came back only to say a more permanent goodbye, but then didn't wait for her to come home? What if she got back from escort/bodyguard duty or wherever only to find some lousy fucking note?! No, Ellie wouldn't be setting foot outside of Jackson for any reason. Not until Joel came back.
And it still mildly amused her that Max had gone out to help look for her even though he was the one who had helped her escape. It had been hard to keep a straight face the other day when Maria had listed him among the searchers. Tommy's group was the last to return (and now she knew why)... so at least now it was confirmed that no one had died on her account. As long as Dexter pulls through!
"Don't feel bad about it," Tommy told her (was he reading her mind?). "He knew the risks. Everyone did. It's just... it is what it is."
Ellie let that dumb expression slide. "Did you kill the hunters? Thieves... whatever." -No, BANDITS -- that's what Jacksonites tended to call them... Ellie had latched on to Joel's 'hunter' term and it had just stuck.
"One of 'em. The other got away... and we just let him go, on account of Dexter bein' hurt. No time to chase after him."
"Shit -- what if he finds Joel?!"
"Then... I reckon the dude ain't got long to live. My brother is... hands down, the best killer I know. And no, I don't mean it in a good way... but I s'pose it's good for now."
"Fuck yeah it's good for now. For always." It was silly to worry about one fucking hunter anyway. She could hear Joel scoffing at her in her head: "You thought THAT little bastard might've bested ME? I thought you had more faith in me than that."
Tommy looked like he wanted to say something else... but apparently, he couldn't find the words, because he just stood there.
"I am glad you're okay," she ventured. "For Maria's sake. And Grayson's."
"And I'm glad you're okay," he tossed back with a smile. "For my sake."
She started to return the smile, but remembered she hated him in time to stop it from fully forming, and she laid back down in a hurry, her back towards the door. She listened as his footsteps receded into oblivion, leaving her alone with her sorrows again.
That's what I need to do to make it through today... recede into nothingness... To pull so far inside herself that she felt nothing. She used to be pretty good at it. Maybe the possibility of being pregnant had kept her hopes for a sunny future with Joel buoyed enough that she couldn't? But that was gone now. Joel was gone, too, and maybe she had to quit thinking about holding on until he came back. The truth was, he might never come back. Either due to breaking another promise, or because something awful happened to him... the not knowing was the hardest part.
So... how long do I wait before going to find the Fireflies? ...What was that stupid saying they had? "When you're lost in the dark, just look for the light..."
Ha. She was lost, alright. And the 'light' they would provide for her was... of the darkest variety. It would have to be a last resort -- so 'last' that she couldn't even think about it right now, even as a comfort plan, because what if Joel was gone for years... on purpose? What if it took him two years to decide he wanted to be with her eighteen-year-old self, but she gave up on him after only one?
That would be tragic on two levels -- because if he came back and found out where she had gone... assuming she could find a Firefly or two who wanted to kill her to further their vaccine research, and that Joel learned what had become of her... Regardless of whether or not he wanted to be with her, it would literally kill him! She knew him well enough to know that.
As angry as she was with Joel, the idea of that happening still stabbed her heart in a real mushy spot.
Back to plan A, then: suck it up. Tough it out. Endure and survive. Just... keep breathing.
~Continue to Chapter 45~
Fandom: The Last of Us (first game only)
Characters: Ellie, Joel, Tommy, Maria, OCs
Pairings: Joel/Ellie
Warnings: Underage
Word Count for this chapter: 8,760
Rating (for fic as a whole): R
~
Why did I ever care about this?
That was the question that kept popping into Ellie's mind when she tried to do something fun -- or what she used to consider fun. It all seemed so pointless now.
All the fuss being made over the play was just... absurd. The hours and hours of rehearsing... painting sets... making costumes... figuring out what to do for sound effects and lighting... and for what? A couple hours on stage, for three nights. Then it was done. Over with. Finished. After like two months of preparation. Everyone working so hard to achieve the goal of... what, exactly? Proving they can memorize lines and sing songs... to provide meaningless entertainment for the town, for just three nights? Why the fuck doesn't everyone just go watch the movie? It has REAL actors, and real sets that will look a hundred times better. Oh -- and it's WAY less work.
Movies might have interested Ellie if she could watch them alone. The library was just too... obnoxious? Yeah, maybe... like, there were couples and families everywhere. So many more now than there used to be, it felt like. Did I really not notice before? It wasn't that they had new people; there hadn't been any newcomers at all in the past month or so. And she'd familiarized herself enough with the Idaho people that she could at least recognize who was who. Instead of seeing people as individuals, she found herself categorizing them as something apart from her. She just couldn't see past the label to the actual person. Because the labels were mocking her, reminding her of what she'd had and lost... or of what she'd almost had...
Her heart just wasn't in anything now. Joel wanted her to spend more time with her friends? Well... maybe she didn't feel like rolling dice and making up stupid stories about ogres and trolls and clerics. She couldn't even be bothered coming up with a cool scenario with which to kill off her character -- she told Wyatt to use her death however the fuck he wanted in order to best serve the campaign (and she could see he was pleased at the prospect, even though Clicker wanted to just send her character away, leaving the door open to the possibility of a return)(...of course, this was only after he'd whined and begged and pleaded for her to keep playing, to no avail).
As for video games... what was the point of hitting buttons or whatever to clear a level, only to have another level to do, and another, until eventually you get to the end -- hooray! Then what do you get? ...Absolutely zip! Only the realization that it was all just a big waste of time! She made some remark like that to Clicker, and he'd tried to tell her it's fun, and it's really rewarding and satisfying to complete stuff, and to see what happens with the storyline. She knew what he meant, because she used to feel that way, too. Used to: now she had to bite her tongue to keep from reminding him that it was all just pixels on a screen, and it all amounted to exactly nothing.
One that might have been an exception? Her secret Sims game, featuring 'Melanie and Joey' Sims -- Melanie with black hair and Joey with red (he still had the beard, though, because she just couldn't bear to change that part) -- where she couldn't figure out how to get Joey to accept Melanie's advances (and forget about having him make a move on her! He would just glare at the camera with a look of disgust on his stupid little pixelated face). In the end, she had to cheat and age up the Melanie Sim. Once they were both adults, Joey had noooooooo problem letting Melanie have her way with him. Unfortunately for them, it wasn't the fun escape into fantasy land Ellie had hoped it would be (torture, much?), and she killed the game without saving before they did much of anything together. It just pissed her off too much. She stopped short of actually deleting that game off of there permanently...
After all... we're on a BREAK. We MIGHT get back together...
Would she suddenly care about all this stupid shit again if they did?
On the slightly-less frivolous side, story time at the library with the little kids also felt like a waste of time... but she understood that the problem was her, not the kids. Kids loved goofy stories about dancing giraffes, or eating eggs and ham that are green -- and usually she enjoyed their silliness and their enthusiasm for such stories. Just... ugh -- not now. She completely blew off her first gig (first one After Joel, that is) because she just couldn't stomach the thought of faking it that hard. Like, she really had to get her perk on to do the voices and be all animated and shit, which the kids had come to expect from her. She wasn't up for it, so she justified skipping it by thinking of it as better to not be there at all than to do a piss-poor job, then went horseback riding instead. Which prompted a guilt-trippy visit from Deborah that evening. "You should have found a replacement, or at the very least, let me know you wouldn't be coming" and "you made several of the children cry -- Lacey was inconsolable." Ellie had spat back something cynical about teaching them life lessons about disappointment. And no, they weren't too young to learn at age two or three -- she had started learning all about that at birth. (And "inconsolable" -- really? The girl was a fucking toddler -- Ellie highly doubted she was upset for all that long.)
Ellie did actually feel bad about it the next day, though. Bad enough that she went and apologized to Deborah, and promised she would uphold her next scheduled time. Surely she could fake it for a fucking half hour out of her day, right? She could even go horseback riding afterward if she wanted to. Being around the kids would probably make her feel at least marginally better in the end, even if she didn't feel like being with them to begin with. It had happened before... although whatever had been troubling Ellie in previous instances surely hadn't been as monumental as being Joel-less.
Nothing was as fun as it used to be -- there was just no getting around that -- but riding was the thing that probably came the closest to approximating fun. And she had already learned her lesson about playing favorites with the horses. No, she wouldn't be doing that anymore. Since returning to Jackson last month, she'd made it her goal to ride a different horse every session. Since there wasn't an endless supply available, there would be repeats, of course, but she was still able to rotate enough that she didn't get overly attached to any one particular horse.
Other than that, working at the farm was the only thing Ellie really wanted to do. The sense of satisfaction she got from that was better than any fucking video game. If she thought about it too hard, she could conclude that farm chores were meaningless, too (the repetition or sameness of them, day in and day out... sustaining life, cycle of life, blah blah, yeah, sure, okay... but wasn't life itself pretty fucking meaningless?)... she just tried not to think about it too hard. The time went by faster when she was busy, and she needed the time to go by as quickly as possible. All she wanted to do was fast forward to the day that Joel decided to come back.
And he would come back. Of course he would. He fucking promised. Yes, he'd broken promises before, but he wouldn't break this one. She just... she wouldn't fucking let him break this one.
...Yeah. Like I have any say in it?!
If Joel didn't come back... like, on purpose... well, Ellie would have to believe he never really loved her, if he did that. The fact that he would choose to be away from her for so long already meant that she loved him more, obviously (but she had always known that, deep down). That was bad enough. But she had no way of knowing if he was even still alive. Surprisingly, that was actually harder to live with than the possibility of him coming back solely to dump her ass for real. She had always thought she'd rather him be dead than to be alive but not want to be with her... but now it felt like the opposite. I'm supposed to be WITH him when-- UGGHHH--
The whole thing just made her so angry sometimes! Why does Joel get to decide everything all the time? Why doesn't it matter what I want? Doesn't he know he's torturing me, every day he stays away?! Doesn't he CARE?
The nights were killing her. She didn't sleep at all that first night. But she did get an idea... and it turned out to be a good one. She didn't want to hang out in the pit or talk to anyone there about music, but she did peruse the cassettes in the library in search of one she could play on her walkman every night when she went to sleep. Something sad. She spent a great deal of time making the perfect selection -- and then she didn't bother checking out the cassette at the counter. She didn't work on her special project there anymore (it was the ultimate waste of time), but after all the hours she'd put in at the library in the past, she figured they owed her one. (Besides, most people didn't care much about the cassettes because it was hard to find ones that still worked and machines that could play them.) (And besides that -- all she took was a dinky single.)
Ellie played the fuck out of that cassette. The lyrics weren't a perfect fit, which was pretty standard for old world creations, but it was about a guy leaving a girl, and the guy just goes on with his life all la-di-da while the poor miserable girl pines away for him pathetically. She cried herself to sleep on more than one occasion, which was actually preferable to staring at the ceiling all night. And even though it sucked, obviously, there was something oddly satisfying about it, too... almost like when she indulged the sadness, she was honoring her love for Joel? Something along those lines. Sometimes, she could swear she felt him stroking her hair... soothing her with promises of his return. Obviously, it was just a trick her mind was playing on her... but it was an effective one when she was yearning for sleep, and Ellie leaned into it whenever she could.
Maria was still getting up with Grayson in the middle of the night... usually only once now. Ellie had offered to take that feeding, that first night when she couldn't sleep at all (obviously, that night was out of the question, because it would require a little preparation, but maybe in the future?), and Maria had refused -- allegedly not even because she despised the breast pump thingie. She said if Ellie was awake at that time, she was welcome to pop over to the room for a visit, but Maria expected Ellie to fall into a sleep routine soon enough, and since she worked lots of mornings at the farm, she needed her rest at night. Ellie found it kind of painful to be around the little dude at first... due to him being a baby and all... but she got over it surprisingly quickly. She was able to look beyond his label... maybe because she already loved him so much? Grayson seemed to love her, too. He smiled at her a lot. It was impossible not to smile back at him. He was so cute!
And he did get over his little virus or whatever with the help of that medicine; it turned out to be nothing serious. But Joel doesn't know that... if he cares about his nephew, shouldn't he at least be checking back in to make sure he's okay?
Yet he didn't.
There was also the chance that Ellie really was pregnant this time. According to her calendar, she was now officially late. Which, again, wasn't unusual for her, just... we had soooooo much sex! And I feel nauseous sometimes... I think? No puking, but her stomach wasn't exactly happy these days. Surely Joel realized there was a chance... right? Would that bring him back? Or would the thought of her possibly lying to him about it again fill him with fresh anger?
Ellie already knew she would never, ever lie about that again. That, or anything else! (...welllllllll... except when she was brutally honest with herself, she had to admit that lies could be highly effective tools and were not necessarily all bad. Just -- she would definitely never again lie to him about being pregnant.) Joel, however, had no way of knowing this, so it might work against her. He might decide he needed to stay away so long that Ellie couldn't possibly lie about it -- like nine fucking months.
She would die if he stayed away that long! Literally die.
Or, maybe the subject was permanently closed in Joel's brain now, and it wouldn't even occur to him that she might have gotten pregnant during those last few days together. If she'd had more time to think, she might have mentioned it to Joel before he left... or she might have decided to leave well enough alone. Joel wasn't stupid; the possibility would have occurred to him. If she remembered correctly, she'd even alluded to it during her confession. Maybe it didn't register, though? With everything else I was saying...
Still. He had to realize there was a chance. What he decided to do about that was up to him. Given her tendency to try to manipulate situations to her advantage, Ellie couldn't truly fault Joel for leaving; in his eyes, it was perhaps the only way things would remain his choice.
Which... was also weird to think about, because to Ellie, it felt like Joel was always calling all the shots! She had to remind herself that she did hold some influence over him, even if it didn't always feel like it. Enough influence that he felt like he had to get away from her to get a better perspective on things.
She wondered if Joel was right about pregnancy tests not being accurate so early. There was even less time that had passed now than there had been for the fake baby, so... Ellie figured she'd better wait. Maybe if she missed another period, it would be enough time?
That first day off work... that was the worst. Ellie didn't know what to do with herself. She didn't even make it through half the day before she just went down to the farm and took over for someone (most people were happy to have time off). It wasn't so much that she didn't know what to do without Joel there -- it was more that she didn't want to do any of the things she used to like. And horseback riding... Joel had said it was bad for pregnant women. Maybe I ought to stop that, too, just in case? Like... it's probably too early for it to matter, but... if this turned out to be her one and only chance to have Joel's baby...
Even if Joel never came back, she wanted it! A piece of him with her always? YES-- sign me up for that! As painful as the subject had become, she couldn't deny that she wanted it. Just as fucking badly as she had wanted the fake baby.
The second day off without Joel (which happened to be the very next day) was even worse -- it was Sunday. One week after the start of the 'whirlwind,' which was what he had dubbed those days. Sunday... the day they should have taken the jeep out for a joyride... and spent the whole day together, just the two of them. Like old times. Then, as if knowing that wasn't bad enough, things got even worse: she actually got her fucking period.
How could this happen?! After all that sex we had, I didn't get pregnant?
She had felt various degrees of crummy all week... apparently due to sleeping and eating less, not as a result of her abandoned scheme to get pregnant. (Having a broken heart was pretty painful all on its own, as it turned out.) Shifting gears quickly from mourning a non-existent baby, she couldn't help thinking about ~what might have been~... if only she had kept her big fat stupid mouth shut. The blood she was seeing in the toilet right now could have represented their lost baby... they would mourn it, and bond over the shared pain, and still get married anyway -- because Joel had said so. He had said "no matter what happens." (Of course, that promise obviously hadn't encompassed finding out about her scheme, but she could hardly hold that against him.) ...I would have had to avoid him for a while so he didn't take me straight to the clinic, but then I would go tearfully tell him what happened... I'd keep my bloody underwear as proof... maybe I was too scared to tell him right away, or too upset... and he would hold me and we'd cry together and stuff... and after however long you're supposed to wait, we could try to get pregnant 'again.'
But nope! She had fucked all that up by wussing out. By feeling too guilty. So she had done the proverbial right thing, and lost Joel because of it. What good was doing the right thing if it led to the wrong outcome? Fuck that. Joel didn't even want that baby. He only talked himself into wanting it cuz he thought he had no choice. He would've got over it really quick and we would never talk about it again and it would just go away. If I could've just... UGGHHH, why did I have to feel so guilty? Joel never feels bad about HIS lies. Why can't I be like that?
If I was like him, WE WOULD STILL BE TOGETHER RIGHT NOW.
Even though her period wasn't causing her much physical discomfort this time, Ellie decided to keep the day off instead of going down to the farm. But she didn't especially want to be around Maria and Grayson today, either... she sure as fuck didn't want to go to the library, with the socializing areas always busier on the weekends... she kind of wanted to take a walk around the lake, but ultimately decided to go to her (their?) house -- for the first time since that fateful day.
She took off her shoes and got all the way into their bed, under the covers and everything, and had herself a good, long, self-pitying-as-fuck cry. Thanks to getting her period, her only guarantee of keeping Joel had gone down the drain along with the would-be fake baby. Gone were her fantasies of announcing the news to Joel when he returned. Of course, the good fantasy -- one that included a happy reaction -- was already ruined. Joel would not have been pleased to hear it, to say the least, and he probably wouldn't have believed her until she had the not-a-doctor Aiyana confirm it for him.
But he would have stayed with her -- and that was the important thing. He might hate her for getting pregnant on purpose like that, but he would never hate his own child. She was the asshole -- the child was an innocent. And if people who didn't even love each other could make things work when they had a kid...
I would've made him fall in love with me again -- I KNOW I would have! All she had to do was never ever lie to him again (at least not about anything important), and be super sweet and nice to him all the time. She would never use sex to manipulate him -- and there would be no fucking, only ~making love~. She would do whatever he wanted, all the time. (He always acted like that wasn't what he wanted her to do, but OF COURSE IT FUCKING WAS. How could it not be?)
Now, of course, she had to quit torturing herself with those thoughts, because that scenario was never going to happen. Unless she managed to talk him into goodbye sex... maybe he'd let me handcuff him, so I could make sure he came inside me! Then he would HAVE to come back and check on me at least once to see if I was pregnant...
So much for not using sex to manipulate?
Ugh -- just... she could see it both ways. Manipulation did serve her well sometimes.
What was it Joel had accused her of doing... using sex as a means to an end? Well, if it fucking worked... -But that wasn't the reason she had suggested it. It hadn't even occurred to her until later. Mainly, she just really really did not want that rapey time to be the last time they ever made love. She almost felt like she could stand him leaving her forever, if they had just one last good time...
...Oh, who am I kidding? It would still be totally fucking devastating if he left her permanently, not just on this break -- which was hard enough to bear, even knowing it was temporary. But it would just be nice to... go out with a bang? Ha. No, more like... to part with tenderness and love... or for it to affect Joel so profoundly that he decides he DOES want to be with me after all...
Which he might decide anyway. Ellie did feel hopeful about that possibility. She just had to weigh that against the bad, and try not to let that hope swell up too much. Any time she thought about the way he'd looked at her when he left that day, she felt a spark of hope... then she would force herself to remember the way he'd looked at her when she confessed what she had done. Both of those had occurred in the same day. The loving one happened last, but it could have been fueled by the emotions that got stirred up over leaving her or something. He had said he would always love her, could never hate her... yes, but he'd also said plenty of other bullshit about them not being good for each other. And he honestly seemed to feel like his sincere, heartfelt gesture of asking her to marry him was a sign that he'd lost his mind.
He didn't want her to think about all this? Well, tough shit. She didn't usually lay around in bed crying like this or anything, but he had lost his mind if he thought she could just bop around town without a care in the world, happy as a clam (...why were clams so happy, anyway? As far as Ellie could tell, their lives sucked ass).
"Ellie?"
Her heart leaped into her throat--
...but only for a second. Her name was accompanied by a knock. Joel wouldn't knock like that. And even if he had decided to knock today for some reason (maybe she'd actually locked the door this time?), the voice was a little off. Slightly higher-pitched.
"Ellie, are you in there?"
Yep, it was Tommy. ...Tommy's back!
Ellie had mixed feelings about that. She was thrilled for Maria and Grayson... not-so-thrilled for herself. This whole thing is his fault!
She heard the front door opening. If she could ever just remember to lock the damn thing...
"Ellie?"
"In here," she called to him, although she quickly rolled over to face away from the doorway. In case he didn't know she was still pissed.
She could feel him hesitating in the doorway. He came in after a few seconds. "Maria told me you were over here... I'm gonna let a little sun in, if you don' mind. It's a beautiful day out."
It wasn't that dark in the room with the curtains drawn, but the gloomy atmosphere suited her current mood more than the sunshine did. She buried her face in the pillow in protest. Why did I have to tell Maria where I went? ...Because she'd gotten into that habit. Because Maria truly seemed to care about where she went and what she did... but also because Ellie felt responsible for Tommy being gone, and if Maria needed anything... if something happened to Grayson... okay, well, I guess Tommy can take over now in the feeling protective department. From now on, I'll just do whatever I want and not tell a soul.
She felt the weight of him sitting on the bed down by her feet. "Guess you still hate me, huh?" he asked.
Brilliant observation. She didn't reply.
"Maria also told me... you've been a little distant."
Oh my God... the brilliance is BLINDING... what exactly did they expect from her?!
"A little sad," he added, scooting up a little and laying his hand on the lump that was her back.
She didn't flinch or tell him to fuck off or anything; she just didn't move.
"Glad you made it home safe," he continued.
...Oh yeah! -Maybe he saw-- "Did Joel find you?" she asked, finally turning her head to look at him. She even deigned to make eye contact.
"No."
...That was apparently all he was going to say. Which was fine, since that answer indicated there was nothing useful she could glean from furthering this conversation. She smothered her face in the pillow again.
"Sweetheart, listen... I know you're upset. I know you don't wanna hear things like... this is for the best, or... someday you'll understand..."
"You're right -- I don't," she mumbled. "So don't say it."
His hand patted her a couple times before withdrawing. "I am sorry you're so hurt by it all. He should've thought of that before--"
"He should've thought?" Ellie turned to glare at him, then decided to go ahead and sit all the way up because it felt kind of silly to exude anger from such a submissive position. She scooted back against the headboard to get a little farther away from Tommy, crossing her arms over her chest. "We were just fine until you barged in here and ruined everything. Why couldn't you just leave us alone? It's not like we were going around... flaunting our relationship or anything. And we weren't hurting anyone!"
Tommy gave her a disgustingly pitying look. "I know it feels that way. But it was hurtin' you, in the long run."
"No it wasn't! Joel would never--" ...Well, I can't actually say he would never hurt me, now, can I. Pfff. And that wasn't entirely Tommy's fault. But he started it! "He wouldn't have hurt me at all, if... ...He only left because you didn't give him a choice."
"It was a mutual agreement. And I wasn't even here, the second time he left."
That second thing was true, of course, but Ellie didn't really give a fuck; it was still basically Tommy's fault for giving Joel the idea in the first place. "Did Maria tell you he's coming back?"
"Yes. It's good that he left for a while, though. Gives the two of you some time to... process things. On your own."
She snorted. "I don't need to process anything. I love him. I will always love him. And if he comes back here and says he never wants to see me again, then..." Her voice wavered; she couldn't even stand to think about that possibility. "Then you won't see me again either." ...Um, what? What am I saying?
"I don't think he'll say that," Tommy replied gently. "But what do you mean, I won't see you again?"
"Nothing. Actually, since you're back now... I'll get out of your hair and move back in here. I was only staying cuz Maria--"
"I don't want you to do that." He smiled a little. "We like havin' you in our hair."
What a dumb expression that is anyway... I literally have not touched anyone's hair in that house except Grayson's! "Uh, you won't anymore. You liked the old me. The happy one. Happy cuz I was with Joel," she added pointedly.
"We'll take you any which way."
She eyed him suspiciously. "Why?"
"...Why? Because we love you. We want you around."
She squirmed and looked away after hearing that 'love.' Is he really that dumb? How can he LOVE me? "But I already told you... I hate you for what you did. I still do, you know. That hasn't changed."
"You're angry. I get it. But we're still family."
What the fuck is he smoking?! "Joel is my family. If he doesn't want me anymore, then... I don't have a family," she said quietly.
"We'll always be your family, honey. Even if you hate us. Whether Joel's here or not."
Fuck... she felt her throat constricting. She stared at her lap. "No... without Joel, I'm nothing. To anyone."
"That ain't true. Not at all. There's a lot of people here who care about you. And... if you really don't wanna live with us, I know Esther would love to have you. But I do hope you'll stay with us."
He must be a masochist. "Why do you wanna live with someone who hates you?"
"Well... maybe I'd like the chance to make you not hate me, yeah?"
Ellie wished he would quit being so fucking nice. It was getting her feelings all mixed up. At least with Christine, the feeling is completely mutual -- not confusing at all!
"What did you mean before? When you said I wouldn't see you again?" he persisted. "Were you just talkin' about movin' out?"
She didn't know what had prompted her to say it... but now that she thought about it, she really would have to leave Jackson if Joel didn't want to be with her. She'd be too hurt -- and too humiliated -- to stick around. Even if Joel didn't stay, how could she keep living here, where she used to live with him? She figured he'd probably want her to stay here, where she'd be safe... but if he left her for real, then fuck what he wanted. Would he chase after me? Or just let me go?
"Ellie?" Tommy prompted her; she must have been quiet too long.
I need a back-up plan... "I don't know what I meant by that, really... except... well, maybe..." She glanced at him. "Maybe I should go try to find the Fireflies... if there are any left. So they can finish what they started last year."
The look of alarm on his face was wholly satisfying. "What? Why the hell would you do that?"
She shrugged. "I dunno... why not? At least that way my life would mean something..."
"Your life does mean somethin'! See, this is exactly why you an' Joel need time apart. You got all caught up in--"
"Don't blame this on Joel, too!" she spat out. "We didn't do anything wrong. We fell in love. And he didn't want to. He fought me on it for a really long time."
"Oh, I'm sure."
She didn't like the way he said that, all sarcastic-like. "He did. He's not the monster you seem to think he is. He didn't... play me, or manipulate me, or whatever -- he loved me." And I hope he still does...
"I don't think of him that way. I wouldn't even exactly call him a predator. I think--"
"Of course he's not!" Ellie cried. "He's not some kind of child molester pervert!"
"I think it happened by accident," he continued, ignoring her outburst. "I think he got real attached to you, an' things started to get muddled up in his head. But instead of--"
"I'm not gonna just sit here and let you bash Joel," she declared. "I don't care what you think, because you're fucking wrong about him!"
He held up his hands placatingly. "All right... I wasn't tryin' to bash him."
"But you were. Maybe you can't help yourself. -You know how me and Maria get along these days? We don't talk about Joel. If you want me to not hate you, that's a good first step."
Tommy nodded. "She said she's tried to talk to you about the whole thing, and you always shut it down."
At least Maria would drop it after one attempt; if nothing else, she didn't seem to have the energy to fight with Ellie. Or maybe she's just more respectful of my wishes? "Yeah -- because she's wrong, too. She's on your side."
"There's no sides. ...If there were, we'd both be on your side."
"Pfff. No one's on Joel's side. His own brother even turned against him."
Tommy chuckled at that. "Me'n'Joel have been on opposite sides of things... for a long while now. But for the record, I did not turn against him. If I can help him in any--"
"That's such bullshit! He doesn't need your help. There's nothing wrong with him. He just needs you to... not lay a fucking guilt trip on him and make him think if he stays with me, he's not 'doing right by me' -- whatever the fuck that means -- like, seriously, whatever he's doing now is not right by me. No fucking way."
Tommy just sat there for a minute. Thinking, she presumed. "Like you said... let's not talk about Joel," he said. "At least not right now. I'm concerned about your... how you said you'd go to the Fireflies."
"Only if Joel doesn't want me," she clarified. That was the most important part! "It is my choice. I can do whatever I want. You even said so last year, remember? Joel never adopted me, so I'm free to come and go as I please."
Tommy gave her a look. "That ain't exactly true. You're still a minor."
"Not really, though -- I don't have any parents. No real family. Even Joel isn't family, technically." She would always consider him family in her heart, no matter if he disowned her or whatever, but by Jackson law, they were not related -- and if the technicality suited her, she would recognize it.
"Well, maybe Maria'n'me should adopt you."
...the fuck?! "You would do that just to make it like... illegal for me to leave here if you don't want me to?"
"Not just. It's somethin' we could talk about, though..."
So if me and Joel got back together... I'd be fucking my uncle? She almost snickered out loud at the thought. "It doesn't matter -- if I really wanna get out of here, I can."
"Yeah... we noticed that. How the hell did you do it?"
Shit! Why did I have to bring that up? She would just give him a nonsensical answer, like she gave anyone else who asked. "I tapped my shoes together three times and said 'there's no place like home.' " (She liked that one.)
"That don't even make sense. If it makes it so you can leave home..."
Oh, oops, I said it wrong... She shrugged. "I don't question the magic. Besides, I have other homes, don't I?" Not that she was welcome in any of them nowadays...
"If there's somethin' we've overlooked in the security of this place, don't you think that's somethin' I oughta know about? It shouldn't be that easy for anyone to get out. Means it might be just as easy for someone to get in. Someone bad."
Ellie just rolled her eyes; she didn't feel like she was putting the town in jeopardy by not revealing her method. She had heard of kids sneaking out before. By the time she and Joel had arrived last year, it was part of the patrol's job to check the perimeter for weaknesses. Everyone was scared shitless of the electric fence, so the only successful escape she was aware of in their time had occurred during a power outage (debunking the myth that the fences ran on an emergency generator when the power was out) -- and that one wasn't even really a success because a guard had spotted the kids from the tower and alerted the patrol to go pick them up immediately. The tree they'd climbed to get over the wall had been chopped down, as Ellie recalled. Poor innocent tree...
"Fine, don't tell me. But... please. Ellie. Do not set out lookin' for the Fireflies again. You're so young. You have so much life ahead of you yet."
A life that's meaningless without JOEL... but she didn't need to say it out loud. She was pretty sure Tommy got the picture. Maybe she should stay at their house... if he saw how miserable she was day in and day out, would he finally start to realize how real her love for Joel was? I can see it now... "Ellie, I'm so sorry. We were wrong. You and Joel obviously belong together. Let's go find him and tell him so."
...Yeah, that wasn't the most realistic fantasy, she supposed... but could she change his mind about her and Joel? Maybe that was the key! If she could change Tommy's mind -- Maria's, too -- then when Joel came back, if he was still wavering on the decision, they could give him the nudge he needed to take her back!
So... how should I play this? Cold and hostile? Or... more dignified-like? Yeah... like, maybe they think this "I hate you" stuff is immature. It would be more MATURE of me to be quiet and withdrawn, going about my business with like... resolve, or whatever, but no JOY...
"You promised Joel you wouldn't do that," Tommy was saying. "At least not without talkin' to him first. And you know he only added that part 'cause he reckoned he would talk you out of it."
She snorted. "Yeah, I know." Talk her out of it or lock her up. One of the two. He had tried to make it feel like she had a choice... but I didn't, really... so, now that he's gone, what's to stop me? What had been a throwaway comment to Tommy suddenly felt like a real possibility. A light at the end of the torture tunnel. Dead people don't feel pain...
"We were right in that room out there -- I remember it like it was yesterday," Tommy recalled, bringing her right back to the memory as well. "I knew Joel loved you, before that... but that really sealed it, for me. The look on his face when you agreed not to leave. The way he... talked about adoptin' you, an' everythin' like that..."
Ellie made sure to look him in the eye now. "He meant that, you know. We weren't like... together. Not way back then." She hated that Tommy thought less of Joel for having romantic feelings for her in the first place, but she didn't want him to think that she and Joel had just been playing him all along or something.
"Guess it's a good thing you said no. That would've been a real mess." He chuckled to himself. "No wonder he never wanted to talk about it again. Told me to forget the whole thing, whenever I brought it up. I thought you just needed more time... and figured maybe he was a little gun-shy, after you turned it down."
Ellie didn't remember it ever coming up again -- not with Tommy, anyway. It was kind of a little joke between her and Joel... except he didn't really think it was funny, so she tried not to go there. I wonder how many people have turned down both adoption proposals AND marriage proposals by the same person? ...and if I had said YES to either one, Joel would still be here right now... "I didn't know you guys ever talked about it after that day. Joel never mentioned that. But I don't need parents anyways. I'm sixteen, not six. Don't say it -- you're never too old to need parents."
"It's true. Sixteen is still very young."
"Then I don't want parents. Especially ones who run my boyfriend out of town," she grumbled.
"Understood. Although... that's what parents do, for their daughters. No one is good enough," he added with a grin.
His amusement irritated Ellie. Like Joel was the equivalent of some asshole kid trying to get in her pants or something. "The good enough thing is bullshit. Especially when the daughter is the one who's a piece of shit."
"What are you talkin' about? You think that's true just 'cause you said and did some things when you were angry?"
No, I think that because of the ginormous LIE I told Joel that made him fucking PROPOSE before I went and ruined his little fantasy. But Tommy didn't know about any of that, and he certainly didn't need to know. She just decided she'd do the 'lie of omission' thing and let him assume that a non-response to him meant that he was right. Lies lies lies... that's my specialty! She fiddled with her fingers in her lap.
"Honey, don't worry about that. We understand."
You don't understand JACK SHIT! she seethed. Honestly, though, she did owe him an apology for her behavior on the day she left. She had apologized to Maria and said she would go pick out another lamp for that room from Ghost Town. Since that was her room now, and she really didn't need the light (the night light sufficed), she hadn't done it yet. She was kind of waiting for the right mood to strike her. No doubt it would make her miss Joel... because the abandoned houses reminded her of being Outside, which always reminded her of Joel, and also because the two of them used to rendezvous in there, before going to California. Anyway, would they resort to doing that again, if they got back together? Would it even be possible with the Idaho people beginning to move into there -- with more on the way -- or, worse, if Tommy was still hell-bent on keeping them apart?!
Right... I have to win Tommy over to Team Joellie (as Sophie would say). It was sure to be a long battle. And she wasn't going to be all sweet to Tommy right away -- she certainly wasn't going to let him harbor this foolish idea of fucking adopting her.
"You can just forget about adopting me," she told him coldly, looking up from her hands to deliver an icy glare to match her tone. "I'll never agree to it. Not for you, or Joel, or anyone else. I don't need anyone looking out for me -- I can take care of myself. And I definitely don't need anyone telling me what I can and can't do. Fuck that. I'm my own person... my own boss. Because guess what: the only person I can count on is myself. It's always been that way, and always will be that way." I just... FORGOT for a while, when I was with Joel. ...okay, so like, for almost two whole YEARS. But I remember now.
The sympathy on Tommy's face made her look away again. "I know you're hurtin' right now," he said gently. "And you're pissed. But you can count on other people... people who care about you. Maria'n'me... we'll always be here for--"
"I can count on you guys to ruin my life, you mean?" she snarled. "Yeah. Awesome. Thanks for that."
"You know that wasn't my intention. And it ain't even true. But you're entitled to your feelin's... I'll leave you be." He started to get up.
"Yep, you can go back to your real family now," she muttered.
...And he sat right back down. "You are my real--"
"Okay okay -- I didn't mean it. You can go. I wanna be alone anyway." She slithered back down under the covers, coiling herself enough to not make contact with Tommy. She didn't bury her face in the pillow this time; she stared at the wall, her angry expression on full display.
"I'll stay if you want me to. It jus' seemed like you--"
"I just said I wanna be alone," she gritted out. Why the fuck didn't I just let him leave?!
He kept sitting there, like he hadn't heard her.
Oh my God... even Joel probably would've lost patience with me by now! She hadn't even heard so much as a sigh out of Tommy, this whole time. Her rudeness didn't seem to faze him at all, either. "Are you deaf? I want to be alooooone."
"All right, I hear you. Hope to see you at dinner later." He stood up for real this time; in doing so, something about his mannerisms reminded her of Joel. The way he... fixed his shirt or something...
Well, they ARE brothers... For one mad second, she thought about flinging herself into his arms and just pretending he was Joel. If she closed her eyes... maybe for a few seconds I can feel like... I dunno... GOOD? Loved?
But that was stupid. She had hugged Tommy before, plenty of times... but he had never held her the way that Joel did. And he never would. It would be too hard to pretend. Joel could not be replaced -- not by his brother, and not by anyone else.
There was something else she wanted to ask Tommy about before he left because it had been weighing on her, and she didn't want to wait until dinner (besides, she would probably go eat with Annie's family, now that Tommy was back). "Tommy?" she called to him when he reached the doorway.
He turned around. "Yeah?"
He's probably expecting an apology for my rudeness... well, tough shit. "Did your group make it back okay?"
He hesitated. "We can talk about that later."
Shit! She sat up again. "What? What happened?"
"It's all right. They're mostly okay."
Fuck fuck fuck-- "Who isn't?"
"Dexter. But don't worry, he's gonna be just fine. We took him to the medical center an' they fixed him up."
Ellie hoped he wasn't downplaying it to lessen the guilt. She liked Dexter -- he and Amanda were the couple in town with the second-biggest age gap (a piddly twenty-three years). And she wished Joel would adopt the guy’s if-you-don’t-like-it-you-can-go-fuck-yourself attitude regarding the age difference, but whenever she suggested as much to Joel, he scoffed at her and told her it wasn’t the same thing at all (even though it totally was). She hated that Dexter had gotten hurt while out searching for her. "You mean Idaho, right?" Otherwise Tommy would have said 'the clinic,' presumably...
"Right."
"What happened?"
"Uh... we had a lil' run-in with a couple guys who reckoned they could help themselves to our horses while we weren't ridin' 'em."
"Shit! So what happened with Dexter?"
"Took a bullet to the chest."
Ellie's jaw dropped. "...And he's okay?!"
"He was lucky. It lodged itself in his rib cage... missed hittin' any major organs, though. He'll recover."
"Fuck... does Amanda know? She must be freaking the fuck out." And probably wants to kill me!
"She's on her way there now."
"By herself?!"
"No no, Max said he'd go with her."
"Okay, good." She had always thought of Amanda as kind of a wuss. Ellie probably should have gone with her, really... as punishment or something... but oh gee, they already left, so that torture was out (ha). And fuck -- I can't leave town! I might miss Joel's return! What if he came back only to say a more permanent goodbye, but then didn't wait for her to come home? What if she got back from escort/bodyguard duty or wherever only to find some lousy fucking note?! No, Ellie wouldn't be setting foot outside of Jackson for any reason. Not until Joel came back.
And it still mildly amused her that Max had gone out to help look for her even though he was the one who had helped her escape. It had been hard to keep a straight face the other day when Maria had listed him among the searchers. Tommy's group was the last to return (and now she knew why)... so at least now it was confirmed that no one had died on her account. As long as Dexter pulls through!
"Don't feel bad about it," Tommy told her (was he reading her mind?). "He knew the risks. Everyone did. It's just... it is what it is."
Ellie let that dumb expression slide. "Did you kill the hunters? Thieves... whatever." -No, BANDITS -- that's what Jacksonites tended to call them... Ellie had latched on to Joel's 'hunter' term and it had just stuck.
"One of 'em. The other got away... and we just let him go, on account of Dexter bein' hurt. No time to chase after him."
"Shit -- what if he finds Joel?!"
"Then... I reckon the dude ain't got long to live. My brother is... hands down, the best killer I know. And no, I don't mean it in a good way... but I s'pose it's good for now."
"Fuck yeah it's good for now. For always." It was silly to worry about one fucking hunter anyway. She could hear Joel scoffing at her in her head: "You thought THAT little bastard might've bested ME? I thought you had more faith in me than that."
Tommy looked like he wanted to say something else... but apparently, he couldn't find the words, because he just stood there.
"I am glad you're okay," she ventured. "For Maria's sake. And Grayson's."
"And I'm glad you're okay," he tossed back with a smile. "For my sake."
She started to return the smile, but remembered she hated him in time to stop it from fully forming, and she laid back down in a hurry, her back towards the door. She listened as his footsteps receded into oblivion, leaving her alone with her sorrows again.
That's what I need to do to make it through today... recede into nothingness... To pull so far inside herself that she felt nothing. She used to be pretty good at it. Maybe the possibility of being pregnant had kept her hopes for a sunny future with Joel buoyed enough that she couldn't? But that was gone now. Joel was gone, too, and maybe she had to quit thinking about holding on until he came back. The truth was, he might never come back. Either due to breaking another promise, or because something awful happened to him... the not knowing was the hardest part.
So... how long do I wait before going to find the Fireflies? ...What was that stupid saying they had? "When you're lost in the dark, just look for the light..."
Ha. She was lost, alright. And the 'light' they would provide for her was... of the darkest variety. It would have to be a last resort -- so 'last' that she couldn't even think about it right now, even as a comfort plan, because what if Joel was gone for years... on purpose? What if it took him two years to decide he wanted to be with her eighteen-year-old self, but she gave up on him after only one?
That would be tragic on two levels -- because if he came back and found out where she had gone... assuming she could find a Firefly or two who wanted to kill her to further their vaccine research, and that Joel learned what had become of her... Regardless of whether or not he wanted to be with her, it would literally kill him! She knew him well enough to know that.
As angry as she was with Joel, the idea of that happening still stabbed her heart in a real mushy spot.
Back to plan A, then: suck it up. Tough it out. Endure and survive. Just... keep breathing.
~Continue to Chapter 45~