"Tilly... pack up Arthur's tent, please."

Tilly looks up from the clothes she was folding into her trunk and nods her head. It had been several weeks since Arthur and the rest left for the bank job in San Denis. After they had fled Shady Belle in the aftermath, they moved around until finally setting up in an abandoned village in the swamp. They thought it would be a short stay. But days turned into weeks and the month slowly bled into another. Arthur's tent was the last one to be packed away, having been set up first with the thought that he would be the first to arrive back but that wasn't the case. A part of her hopes that they are just laying low, hidden away from the men that killed Lenny.

Killed Hosea.

Her heart still hurts when she saw their bodies brought back into camp. Memories of Sean, Davey, Mac, and Jenny's broken bodies; the light in their eyes forever snuffed out.

She wipes at the corner of her eyes as she steps into his tent. The flaps turned down to block the rain and sun. She knows he had taken to sleeping in the room next to hers after her kidnapping. But so much of the tent was still him. The scent and warmth of him still fills the space. She sits down for a moment on his cot, fingering the blanket, feeling the soft but rough fabric underneath her palms.

She half turns and slowly takes the photos tacked up down, looking at each one in turn. She's seen them so many times when she would visit him. The nights they spent quietly talking about everything and nothing. The days they spent sitting near each other, their shoulders brushing lost in their own worlds but present all the same. She pauses in her work, smiling down at the photo of a young Arthur, Hosea and Dutch. Her fingers trace the lines of his face before she sets it aside on his desk with the others.

She stands, unmaking the bed she had made so many times before. Each fold of the blanket or pull of the sheet stirs up his scent until it lingers heavy in the air. She closes her eyes, hands bringing the blanket to her chest as she imagines him coming in and holding her to his side again. Tears fall from her eyes as she places everything in his trunk.

The flower that reminds him of his mother. The books and photos and articles he's collected. The bits of stubby pencils he forgets to throw away. Her fingers pause on the framed photo of Mary. It had been turned down and placed in the drawer of his night stand.

Mary was beautiful.

In all the ways one would expect of a high society lady. But to Tilly she was like a viper. Beautiful but deadly. Her mouth twists into a grimace as she remembers the look on Arthur's face when he had seen her again. He came back to camp, shoulders hunched and tight, face like thunder. He closed the flaps on his tent that night for the first time in a long time and she hated her. Hated the way that she twisted him up like a whirlpool, dashing him against the rocks until he broke. Her fingers ball into fists and she wants nothing more than to smash it to the ground.

But...

But she knows that he'll miss it at some point. When Mary comes calling again. When she beckons her finger and he goes to her, falling overboard once again.

"Tilly, are you done yet?"

Tilly quickly places the photo down on the nightstand, the frame sitting near the edge. As she stands to answer her hip bumps it. The frame wobbles and falls unnoticed to the ground behind the nightstand. Mud and water from the storm quickly obscured it.

The hills of Roanoke grew eerily silent as the sun slowly inched low over the horizon. A sense of melancholy, exhaustion overtook the occupants of the encampment as they each retreated to their tents. They had settled here after the Pinkertons found them in that little shack. Arthur was grateful for Sadie and Charles for keeping everyone together. Mostly he was just glad to be out of the swamp. The wet air stuck to his lungs like tar, triggering his lungs to try to cough up the substance. The air in Roanoke wasn't as humid as Lemoyne but he felt like he could breathe again.

Exhaustion ate at him as he helped finish setting up camp. He had hoped after his extended visit to Guarma that they would rest. Let the heat die down for a few weeks until they had forgotten about them. Let them grieve. But Dutch had announced during dinner that he had a new lead, a new plan.

Arthur just wanted it to be done.

He was tired of running around. Tired of the death and destruction that had been following them since Blackwater. When he woke up in Colter all those weeks ago, a stray thought had floated through his head.

That this was the end.

The end of what he couldn't say exactly but the thought grew louder with each passing day, each passing failure. Sometimes he wishes he had taken everyone and run. Told Dutch to hell with his plans after Blackwater. When the jaws of the law finally showed themselves on that riverbank with Jack after weeks of paranoid anticipation. Maybe they wouldn't be in this mess.

"Arthur, you have a letter…"

Arthur stops near the flaps of his tent, exhaustion pulling his shoulders down, sloping his spine. He turns his head taking in Tilly's nervous expression. He noted the slight bags under her eyes, the healed cut on her cheek and the scrape on her chin from the rough wooden floor. She looked as tired as he was. He reaches for her hand that was tightly grasping the fabric of her skirt. Her cool fingers slowly let go, slipping into his as he squeezes them gently. Dropping her hand he looks around before gesturing for her to follow him into his tent.

He sits on his cot, slowly stretching out his body as he toes off his boots. She lingers by the tent flap, hand back to bunching the fabric of her skirt.

"So," his voice fills the quiet space, the muffled sound of the camp filtering through the heavy fabric, "I have a letter?"

She nods, holding out her hand. The pristine white envelope shining like a beacon in the dark room. And he knows without even opening it who it was from. When he had seen her months before, he had thought that maybe this was a second chance. A second chance at love, not likely, but companionship was probably the better word. The feelings he had for Mary had cooled from their ardent almost obsessive level over the last few years. The hold she had on him loosening with each mile, each turn of the Earth.

He doesn't want to read anything she has to say. Not ever. It just wasn't worth it. He realized that long ago when she had thrown his words back in his face. When she had looked down on him with disdain for his skills. But she still used them, still asked him to be the man she detested. Promises of affection rewarded for a good job done like he was some sort of dog. After he had gotten Jamie back, he had avoided anything to do with Mary Linton. Going as far as to burn any letters he had received, any favors she tried to pry from him. He knew she had written to him shortly before the botched bank robbery, before the trap had been sprung by the Pinkertons and that bastard Bronte. But he never went. He didn't want to see her. Didn't want to hear her wistfully sigh "Oh, Arthur…" as if he were a child as he tried to make her understand why he does what he does. Why he wants to keep the people he loves safe. Yes, he knows there are better ways but it's far too late for that now. Whatever plans they all had, whatever hope they all had before Blackwater, had been shot and unceremoniously left to rot by the side of the road.

His eyes moved up Tilly's arm. His eyes tracing the column of her neck, the small scar on her cheek from one of the Foreman gang. His blood heats at that thought. He wished he had made it in time to spare her any harm. He wishes he hadn't been jerked around and sent off on busy work by Dutch. Three people had been taken from camp. Three. And only two of them had made it back alive. If only he were there to prevent it. If only. This is one of the many regrets he will carry with him every day until the end of his days.

Tilly shifts bringing his attention from his thoughts, his eyes focused on her again. He moves over opening up more of his bed. He hopes that she understands the gesture. Her arm slowly falls, the envelope hidden by the pleats of her skirt. She hesitates before moving over to him, her body sagging in the lumpy mattress.

"I...," he begins, hand reaching for the letter. She gives it to him, the smooth surface feels foriegn under his fingertips. A faint scent floating up from the paper, his nose recognizing it as the one Mary uses. His stomach clenches at the faint yet strong scent and he tosses it away from him onto his dresser.

"Don't you want to read it?" Tilly asks her eyes flicking from the discarded letter to him. He shakes his head, taking his hat off his head to run his hand through his hair.

"Nah, just going to be more of the same."

She nods understanding in her tired eyes.

"How are you really?" he asks softly, their shoulders gently nudging as he shifts back to lean against the wall of the wagon. She moves back as well, her shoulder pressed against his.

"Honestly? Scared. Angry. Tired. I don't know what tomorrow is going to bring or the next day after that."

"Yeah, I'm just living day by day. Hour by hour if I'm being honest."

"That's the only thing we can do."

Arthur hums, head thunking gently against the wood behind him. He feels a slight pressure against his shoulder, eyes cracking open to see Tilly had laid her head on it. His heart beats a little faster and feels the tight spool of stress lessen. The letter lays forgotten on the nightstand. He'll burn it later. Right now all he wants is to be in this moment with Tilly. Wants it to stretch into the next day and the day after that. The future is murky and unknown. Time will only tell if they can make it out of this but for now he welcomes the new feeling swirling in his chest. The way her eyes soften as she gazes into his. He feels like he just woke up from a nightmare and into a dream. A dream of them, of now, of the future. Things he had never considered now pouring into his head. His hand itches to draw them, write them down before they disappear. His heart soars.

"I missed you," she whispers, moving to rest her chin on his shoulder, their eyes meeting.

"Me too, Sweetheart," He whispers back.