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Restitution
Author's note: As soon as I saw John and Abigail together I knew that I had to write them together. There seems to be criminally few fics about them, so here's my attempt to rectify that!
Probably the most emotional part of the whole game for me was when John returned to his family, and I wanted to capture in writing some of my feelings when he did so. The events of John and Abigail's past in Dutch's gang are vague and infrequently mentioned, so I sort of constructed my own timeline in my head. Hopefully this fanfiction makes some sort of canonical sense. I tried my best to get their voices and mannerisms correct, especially Abigail, which was a fun exercise in itself. Watch out for some possible spoilers, and I hope you enjoy!
Restitution (res·ti·tu·tion)
noun
1. The act of restoring to the rightful owner something that had been taken away, lost, or surrendered.
2. The act of making good or compensating for loss, damage, or injury.
3. A return to or restoration of a previous state or position.
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There was only one thing on John Marston's mind as he raced over the snow-shrouded wilds of West Elizabeth on a mild summer's morn. Flashing sporadically between the black trunks of Tall Trees, the sun strained to show its presence. Dawn's rays were obstructed by the jail bar silhouette of the forest, but in long strips they filtered weakly onto the land below to dye the snow an illusion of wheat and honey. And as the lone rider flew across the woodland, his horse kicking up a fine spray of snow in his wake, his thoughts were not on any of his surroundings. He was not considering the present, or even the glorious, nearly unimaginable future which was soon to await him: instead he recalled his past.
It had been years ago. Almost a lifetime ago, a different era when he had been a young man trying to find himself, trying to justify himself, struggling against his past and attempting to define the vision in his heart for the life he wanted to lead.
"Say you'll be mine, Abigail. Only mine." He remembered that he had wanted to sound nonchalant, relaxed, but that his voice had betrayed him.
"I'm not yours, John, and I never will be. A whore can't belong to one man. She belongs to everybody and nobody."
She had been sitting on a log by the campfire, sewing the holes in their clothes. In those days, riding in the gang, they often stopped to make camp along the dusty trail they were following to their next crime. The horses were tethered, the smoke from the fire melded with the dark shroud of night, and lit by flames Abigail was scowling. She hated when he talked about things like this.
"You can give all that up," he said. It had seemed so simple when spoken aloud.
"Really? You think it'll go away like a bad dream? I've been doing this too long. I wouldn't know how to change." She paused to look over her shoulder, and he knew she was checking to see if Dutch and the others were nearby. "Don't talk to me about this. You know the rest of them could be back any minute."
He came to stand behind her. Her fingers were quick and nimble, threading the needle like she had threaded his heart through her own.
"I'll help you, Abigail. I'll change too."
"You think they'll let us? Don't be stupid, John, it doesn't suit you." Her voice was harsher than the scream of a pistol, more acrid than the taste of gunsmoke. "I'm a hooker and you're a bandit, and that's all we are and all we'll ever be. No point in getting your hopes up or building up dreams. Dreams can't bring back all the men you've killed, and they can't take away the men I've laid. Dreams can't change a life."
He put his arms on her shoulders. She shrugged him off before he could comfort her properly, and he grew frustrated, irritated by the cruelty of existence. He stalked away and kicked at a bucket laying nearby until it rolled on its side. If it weren't for the gang, he could be an good man living an honourable life. If it weren't for the gang, he might not be alive. His head got twisted in circles when he thought about it too much.
John let out a low breath and tilted his head back to look at the stars. They seemed to be hesitant beacons of hope, shining timidly against a backdrop of immense dark so black it was almost blue. When he turned back to face Abigail, his anger had drained away. He said the only thing left to say. "Do it for Jack."
"What are we talking about here, getting married or running away? I sorta lost track of the conversation." The sarcasm in her voice was biting. Then she sighed, put down her needle and thread, and cradled her head in her hands. As she looked up again he saw her eyes flicker briefly towards the makeshift bed on the other side of the camp where their son was sleeping. "This is no life for a young boy. I know it. I wish there was something more for him, John, just as much as you. I wish he could feed chickens and ride horses and do all the things little boys should do. I know he sees what we are, and he sees the bad we do. But what choice do we have?" She couldn't stand to look at him, so instead she gazed down at her palms. "I know it's all my fault. If only I hadn't been so foolish as to get pregnant. And now my only son is running with a gang of outlaws, and the man who isn't my husband can't feed us without killing men..." He realised that she was pausing to swallow dry sobs.
John sat beside her on the log, and this time she did not push him away. He warmed his hands by the fire as she tried to composed herself. Abigail was a proud woman, not quick to tears, grateful that he respected her dignity enough to not remark on them.
"You have to believe that we can escape. I can't say it'll be easy, but plenty of people have hopes and desires, don't they? And they fight day and night for them, because they know that their lives will never be complete otherwise, and even if they fail, it doesn't matter. You and Jack, you're the only thing in this world that has ever made me feel that way. If that's not enough, then nothing ever will be. So the way I see it, we may as well try, else we're barely alive at all. Do you understand? You have to trust me, Abi."
Her tear-stained face seemed ethereal, as fragile as glass by the light of the fire. "I don't want to. It's too frightening."
"Anything worth doing is always frightening, darlin'. That's how you know it's worth doing."
She wrapped her shawl further around her shoulders, and when she spoke he could hear in her voice the terror of change, the awareness that they were so far in now it would be like scaling a mountain to get out. "Where could we even begin? Where do we start?"
"Marry me. You'll be my wife, you won't have to lie with the others no more. I won't let them put a finger on you. I'll protect you and do right by you, Abigail, I swear. And I'll do right by our son." He took her palms in his own, enveloped them in firm warmth of his grasp. "Say that you'll marry me. Say that you will."
What was that unreadable shade in her gaze? Her skin was flushed by firelight, burnt peach and cinnamon. Before she had said the words he felt the caress of her hands, the slight twitch at the edge of her lips, and the heat of her body as she leaned closer, all telling her answer before she said it.
"I will."
They kissed under a patchwork of stars, and the fire thawed their aching hearts. He remembered the way she had pushed her hair behind her ear, the way her eyes and cheeks and lips revealed to him things she could never say, and how she left her sewing forgotten on the ground: all the little things about her he swore he would never forget.
Perhaps it was strange that, as John Marston urged his horse faster towards the small ranch of Beecher's Hope that morning, he did not think about what might await him. Perhaps the possibility was too wonderfully terrifying to comprehend. Or perhaps he knew that, no matter how he might try, he could never in his mind's eye conjure his family as they truly were, never remember all of Jack's boyish curiosity, his idealism, or Abigail's knowing smiles, her quick hands, her loud opinions, and the way she had looked at him when she agreed to be his wife. Perhaps nothing he remembered could be as good as holding them once again in his arms.
And when he got back to them, and when he got back to her, even if she did yell and shout with months of pent-up frustration, and hit him, and squeeze out hot angry tears in the dead of night, he saw then in her eyes for one single timeless moment all the love and longing he had been fighting for, and he knew without a shadow of a doubt that everything, the pursuit, the betrayal, the murder, had been worthwhile. And for that one moment, everything was as it should be. He was home.