AN: Short oneshot here that had been sitting unfinished for awhile now. I finally went ahead and wrote the rest of it a few days ago. Enjoy.
They weren't far. Jackson was close. It was getting dark though, and late, and really fucking cold. It was raining, too, which only made it worse. It was the type of rain that weighs a person down, drenching and chilling them to the bone. Too warm to snow, barely, but cold enough that their nose, lips, face, fingers and toes went numb. Oddly, snow was the preferable option. At least then they wouldn't be soaked and nearly freezing. Instead they'd be covered in only a light layer of snowflakes, much like the mountain tops towering above them, the lucky things already covered in a dusting of the white stuff. They had climbed to a pretty high elevation, but not quite high enough to escape the rain.
Ironic. It seemed like everywhere they went, everything they did, was always an almost, or a so close, but just not enough, only enough to keep them alive but nothing more.
Joel, lying on the cold, stone floor of some dilapidated shack they retreated to for the night, heaved a sigh and glanced through the window. It was still torrential downpour outside. Raindrops pinged and slammed into the thin, sheet-metal roof above. That sound taunted him. Its persistent presence reminded him of the fact that they were both cold, shivering and soaked, hungry and weary, and so close to reaching their destination, but still had to wait one more day.
He ran a hand through his hair. It was ice cold to the touch, still a little damp. The top of his head pointed towards the small fire he put together in hopes to keep him warm. It was sort of working, or so he thought anyway. At this point he wasn't sure. The fire was so pathetically small it seemed like a joke, just another item of cruel irony they had to deal with.
With fingers wet from his hair, he wiped a hand down his face, closed his eyes and took a deep breath.
He couldn't be here. He wasn't here. He wasn't in the middle of Wyoming, nearly freezing to death. He wasn't sprawled out over a cold, slab floor, lying near a pitifully sized fire in some rundown piece of shit. He wasn't trekking across the country to find his fucking brother whom he hadn't seen in years. He wasn't transporting a small redhead, all in the name of some... ridiculous notion that she was a cure for mankind. No...
He was somewhere else. He was somewhere in the tropics. He was on a beach, where it was warm. The sun was out. His toes were dug into a nice, toasty mound of beautiful white sand. In his hand he held a Corona Extra topped with a juicy lime, and he was listening to the sound of crashing waves while watching Sarah playing in the wa-
He grunted, both eyes popping open as he did so, and a particularly strong chill slithered up his spine. A chill sourced from something far colder than the ambient biting cold that nipped at his nerves.
Staring blankly at the ceiling in silence for awhile, arms crossed in a sad attempt to retain some amount of body heat, seemed like the only thing to do. But turning off his brain tonight was proving to be difficult. He huffed in annoyance, goddammit, because of course he was still here. And of course he was still with this little sprite, who lay on a moldy, torn up mattress no more than ten feet away.
He rolled his head to the side and looked at her. She was on her side, shivering, shaking, curled into a tiny ball and attempting to sleep. At least that's what it looked like she was trying for. They had no blankets, nothing to keep them warm. They had nothing other than their clothes, gradually losing one item after the other from struggles with Bandits, Hunters or whatever other encounters made them flirt with death.
He sighed. And he probably didn't know it, but his face melted at the sight of her, even if only slightly. Just go to sleep old man, do what she's doin' an' it'll be tomorrow before you know it. He quietly snorted at the thought, because even though the days were hard, the nights, especially ones like this, were even harder.
For some reason sleep was now a rare commodity. It was easy to come by before Pittsburgh. Especially for him, where being utterly exhausted and weighed down by everything was a constant that never left him be. And she, growing up in the current state of the world and knowing nothing else, learned to doze off with ease at a young age, even with an empty belly and in the most uncomfortable and coldest of places.
But those nights, sleep-filled nights, were long gone.
Because now those nights were rare at best, and just the act of falling asleep, let alone trying to stay asleep, was difficult.
Nightmares now plagued her young and vivid imagination every night. She'd twitch, twist and turn atop whatever surface she lay upon and toss her head about; sometimes she'd wake up screaming with her shirt soaked in sweat. He'd do his best to ignore it, always rolling over to face away from her. That somehow made it better, because for some reason seeing her in anguish was becoming... well, as little as he'd like to admit it, harder to handle. A strange thing that was...
And for him, despite the exhaustion that seeped into his bones years ago, falling asleep now took hours; he was constantly on edge, always on the defensive, reacting to every little sound and immediately climbing up the ladder of consciousness from the quick shots of adrenaline that followed.
But why?
He looked towards the ceiling once again, took a deep breath rife with frustration, then lightly shook his head. Back in Boston, there were some mornings when Tess had to shake his tired ass awake, because otherwise he'd end up being late or missing a shipment from Bill altogether, but now when you need it the most you can't fuckin' do it? Tssht, figures...
More irony. Cruel world. Although he'd be a liar if he said he wasn't used to the irony. That was just the way the world worked these days. It took everything from him but forced him to survive; to suffer and struggle. Sometimes - no, not sometimes, more often than not - he wished it would just take his life, finally, for good. In some morbid, weird and fucked up way that seemed like the better option. And why not? It took away his home and his brother, it stripped him of his... humanity, and it even tore away his little girl and ransacked his... everything... Sarah...
His hands curled into fists and his jaw set, going rigid as he clenched his teeth. Then almost instinctively, without thought, he rocked his head to the side again and observed Ellie. The petite, small-framed redhead was still tightly curled into a ball, shivering and vibrating as she tried to sleep. Her arms were bent at the elbows, hands tucked into small fists with her knuckles mere centimeters from her lips. Her auburn ponytail was still sopping wet from the rain, leaving a large, damp spot on the back of her sweater that mocked all of her feeble attempts to keep warm.
"Jesus Christ..." he said under his breath, voice coming out a little pained. He wondered if she'd endured the same amount of cruelty and tortuous irony he had. She was so young, but forced to rapidly mature in a world that punished the weak. Did she really know anything else? Or any other way to go about life?
It didn't take him long to pick up on her independent and tough-as-nails persona. Though at first it was hard to fully accept that such a strong and tough organism could even exist within such a little, delicate and breakable form. And sometimes, during quiet lulls on their journey, he wanted to ask about that mysterious scar above her eye. Maybe it would shed some light on what kind of fourteen years, or... childhood, if you could even call it that, she endured. But he never pried, always keeping himself at a distance. At least he tried to, anyway. It was easier that way, being detached, cold and dismissive. As far as he knew that was the only way to survive.
"Poor girl..." he softly said with an exhale, almost on accident, but also felt a bit guilty, because was he actually now feeling sympathy? Empathy? A connection with this little girl? Goddammit Miller...
Maybe he couldn't help it, since protecting her became some weird, instinctual habit. He lost count of the number of times he, without a second thought, unleashed all of his protective wrath and saved her from something; all of his pent-up, unbridled fury boiling over whenever he detected even the smallest of threats. He always told himself it was in the name of Tess, to uphold his commitment to her and take this little girl to Tommy's like he promised. But fuck something deep inside whispered otherwise, and he gave every effort to squash that away because that voice, that internal... whatever the fuck you want to call it he didn't even know... what the fuck was that? He figured he'd shut and locked the door on those feelings long ago, Sarah, the past... everything, all of it.
Hell, he stopped "feeling" much of anything the night she died in his arms. But now, actually taking care of - dare he acknowledge it, even cringing a little and letting out a muffled grunt as he did so - taking care of a little girl other than Sarah had him twisted and confused.
Thanks to the nearby, shivering, tiny auburn-haired girl, his emotions, which he thought were mostly dead forever, were now stretched thin and fucked up beyond all recognition. She was unearthing things he buried away ages ago.
So now he was feeling something. And that was better - worse? - than feeling nothing. Even if that "something" was feeling himself being gutted to the point he thought his innards were on the verge of spilling all over the floor when he did protect and take care of Ellie; someone other than Sarah. It made him feel guilty. It made him feel... wrong. But in the weirdest of ways it also felt good, as much as he didn't want to admit it. One could even say it was therapeutic. It was painful, sure, but at least he was feeling something, and you should'a known this would happen, 'cause now you're free-fallin' straight for a puddle of shit you ain't got the boots for.
Though, Ellie protected and saved him just as many times, if not more. So perhaps this was all mutual, both of them simply using the other as a means to an end. It was always better to be miserable together instead of alone, right? And then after Jackson they'd split and say goodbye forever. Just a means to an end, that's all it was... right?
He wished it, said it, desperately wanted to believe it, maybe even did at times. He hoped one of these days he'd wake up and accept it like a devout Christian accepts scripture to be the word of god, the ultimate of all things.
But that was silly. That was bullshit. And no matter how hard he tried to convince himself otherwise, he sure as hell fucking knew it was bullshit.
His eyes scanned her again, then returned their gaze towards the ceiling once more as he took a long, slow and deep breath. Kid better not be gettin' attached to me, 'cause tomorrow we're goin' our separate ways. But was that for her sake? Or for his? Fuck if he knew at this point.
He rolled over onto his side, back towards her, and mindlessly stared at the wall while listening to the rain. Why can't you just fall asleep goddammit? After tomorrow, everything would go back to normal. He'd make his way back to Boston. Maybe he'd get there alive, maybe he wouldn't, either outcome was fine. At the very least he'd be alone again, just how he liked it. It'd be quiet and he'd no longer have to indulge those talkative, carefree moods of hers where she asked a billion questions about anything and everything they saw. He'd be by himself, all alone and unable to hurt anyone else or cause harm, knowing the longer this girl stuck around him, sooner or later he'd get her hurt or... killed. He failed to protect Sarah, what the fuck made him think he could succeed this time around?
He closed his eyes and sighed again, Christ you're a mess, making every effort to focus on the frozen and uncomfortable slab floor, which had his back and shoulders aching to no end. Just dump her off onto Tommy, forget all this crap an' move on with your shitty life.
Then much to his chagrin, possibly relief, he heard her shift and whimper. He squeezed his eyelids shut even harder and grimaced, don't do it Joel. But just that pitiful sound told him how cold, miserable and uncomfortable she was.
He tried to ignore it, really tried, but he... just. Fucking. Couldn't. Something willed him otherwise, and after a few seconds of silence, he rolled back over. He looked at her once more, noticed the blueish tinge in her lips, the extra-pale color in her cheeks that only seemed to enhance those decorative freckles of hers, and the constant quivering and shivering that still gripped her whole body. He made a face, unable to resist his eyes wilting at the sight. He closed them once more and pinched the bridge of his nose, taking another deep breath, goddammit... you're all in now an' you know it.
He tilted his head back and looked for his jacket, which was still drying above the fire. He slowly rose to his feet, cursing under his breath all the way up, then tiptoed - as much as Joel Miller could tiptoe - towards it. He had to be as quiet as possible because there was no way in fucking hell he could let her see what he was about to do, let her see a morsel of empathy slip through the cracks of his hardened exterior, even as ridiculous as it sounded.
What the hell was he gonna say when they woke up in the morning? A ghost did it? Tssht, now you're really goin' crazy. Girl was young, even held onto a sliver of innocence and childlike wonder, but she sure wasn't stupid. She was actually pretty damn smart and wise; weird, strange and eccentric at times, but smart and wise nonetheless. He learned that on day one.
He plucked his jacket off the makeshift hanger above the fire. It was warm and felt divine covering his callused and freezing hands. If he were a weaker man he'd put it on for himself. But that wasn't him, and fuck how unfortunate that was. So of course he didn't.
Instead, he did exactly what he originally intended. He carefully and gently laid it over her, covering her tiny, balled-up frame in the thing until only her lower legs and head peeked through each end. Within seconds her shivering ceased. She tenderly shifted, and her frozen, small fists loosened as her fingers uncurled inches from her lips. She wiggled her toes a bit, the short motion of the dainty little things hardly noticeable hidden in her socks. Then a peep, some delicate sound of relief, satisfaction and... comfort, trickled out of her.
He made a face, biting his tongue as if he were trying not to smile, feeling proud of himself like he'd just done some good deed. But it was a good deed. It was the kindest thing he'd done in years.
And that... just that fact alone was so depressing but also so fucking special all at the same time.
"There ya go Ellie," he said, voice soft, muffled and quiet, as if saying those words was far too difficult. He slowly turned to walk away, but hesitated before fully turning around. He glared at the floor, firmly dragged his fingernails across his brow and grimaced in frustration, his teeth gnawing at his lower lip like something deep inside was urging him to provide for her just a little bit more. He shook his head and huffed, goddammit Joel...
He turned back around, softly grumbling something unintelligible under his breath while doing so. He slowly reached a hand out, gradually lowering it towards her. It was shaking, but he told himself it was just because of the cold. He gently touched her shoulder and let his hand rest there for a brief second before giving her a sympathetic pat and rub. "Sleep well kid," he said, knowing tomorrow everything was about to change. As if all of this, their journey and the past few months, had just been a long and meaningless dream, nothing more.
He nodded and slowly turned around, letting his hand linger for as long as he could while he pulled away. The jacket was on her, not him, but somehow he felt warmer. His palm certainly did, perhaps still clinging to the warmth leftover from her. And his heart was beating a bit faster, maybe he was nervous or... scared of something; he wasn't sure, didn't even really want to acknowledge it.
He laid back down in his spot, exhaling as he flopped onto the floor, then looked at her once more. Her breathing was patterned, and he heard that faint, soft sound that always escaped her nose when she slept. She wasn't shivering and the pinkish color in her lips was already returning. She didn't seem cold in the slightest.
...And...
Fuck. He exhaled, chest caving from the crushing pressure of... something.
There it was, the most subtle, fragile and delicate of smiles peeking across her lips.
He sighed and rubbed his brow, resigning himself to the fact that what he did may have just been the nail-in-the-coffin, the nail-in-the-coffin for tomorrow. He didn't even have to specify what, because he sure as hell already knew.
You ain't okay.
He's not okay at all. He's the furthest from okay, because this girl's got him in trouble. Deep trouble. And he knows it.
AN: I had wanted to do a oneshot, or something that took place between Pittsburgh and Jackson for quite some time now. But I just never came up with much until this. And actually, in a really weird way, after reading through it, I realized that this is loosely a metaphor for my entire experience with The Last of Us and how these two characters have... well, changed me and affected my life. Cheers.