As the sun went down on the third of February, Joel stripped off his work gloves and blew into his hands, his breath feeling just barely warm against the hyperboreal air. Joel squeezed his eyes shut and winced as he flexed his hands and tried to get his stiff, frozen fingers moving enough to finish his chores, blowing slowly on them a few more times and finally realizing there wasn't very much he could do to help the frostbitten feeling. He sighed and licked his lips, regretting that act instantly as his saliva froze almost at once on his chapped mouth.
He'd been outside all day; one of his ewes had shown vivid signs of aggression toward the others in her pen that had led Joel to examine her, and he'd found her leaking fluids from her entrance in a way that had shown him she'd had an early embryonic loss. He'd pulled the ewe aside from the crowd of others, given her some extra food and bedding to comfort her, and made sure she wasn't showing any indications of infection. Then he'd had to attend to all the others, many of whom seemed to be doing well in early pregnancies, and to check on his three rams in their far, separate pen. They'd been bickering, probably feeling feisty because of the cold, and he'd had to pull Domino and Tornado apart from one another so they couldn't do any real damage.
At lunchtime, Joel had heated up some leftover stew from the night before that he'd frozen in a pot on the porch out back overnight. He'd taken a warm bowl of the stew upstairs to Ellie and had rested on the bed beside her, kicking off his boots for awhile and muttering to her for a little while about the ewe who had lost her early pregnancy and the way the rams had been literally butting heads all morning and how he'd jammed his shoulder breaking up a sheet of ice in a water trough. Ellie had just quietly eaten her stew and rubbed at his sore shoulder and then bragged to him that she'd been kicked in the ribs so hard this morning by the baby that she'd almost puked. Joel hadn't been able to keep from laughing at that, and then he hadn't been able to keep from kissing her, nor from holding his hand on her belly for a while and grinning like a fool while he felt Charlie rolling around inside of Ellie and pummeling her abdomen like a little lunatic.
"You poor thing," Joel had said, shaking his head and bending down to kiss Ellie's belly. "Hey. Charlie. You be nice to your mama. You hear me?"
Ellie had giggled like mad at that, but Joel had just taken her empty bowl and put his work boots back on and gone back outside to finish up what he needed to do on the ranch. Now, hours later, he'd picked horse hooves badly in need of maintenance and he'd oiled the gates and hinges that had gone creaky in the cold, and he'd hand-clipped a few ewes with nasty matted wool, and he was utterly exhausted and his hands were freezing. He trudged back toward the farmhouse, glancing over his shoulder and reassuring himself that the sheep were fed and watered and sheltered, the barn doors were shut to protect the livestock… Everything was fine. He was a good shepherd, he told himself, just like he'd promised Mr. Roscoe he would be.
Joel went back into the house and stomped the snow off his boots, and he called out for Ellie, but she didn't answer. Thinking she must be sleeping, he went upstairs as quietly as he could, and he was unsurprised to find her on her side dozing in bed when he went into the bedroom. He built up the fire as quietly as he could, and as he moved to change his work outfit into something slightly more "presentable" - just an oatmeal-colored Henley that was clean and in good condition paired with newish dark jeans - Joel heard Ellie rousing behind him.
"Mmm… you still going to Willa's birthday party?" he heard her asking quietly, and Joel hesitated.
"I don't really wanna go without you," he admitted, "but you're the one who insisted I take her present."
Ellie sounded more awake then. "Well, yeah," she said. "I think it would be really rude for you not to go. She organized the whole baby shower. And that was really nice of her. Even if I did hate the dumb game… Anyway. It's like you were saying the day of the baby shower, Joel. Everyone in this town has put their lives on the line for us. Including Willa. So."
Joel pinched his lips and remembered the sight of Willa Wright riding into the forest the day Ellie had been kidnapped. Willa had been badly injured in the diner, but she'd fought through the pain of her injuries, not the least of which had been a shattered jaw, to aim a gun at strangers Willa had never met and to fire on them in order to try and rescue Ellie, Joel, and Jude… it had been too late for Charlie Roscoe. Joel sniffed a little and nodded.
"Okay. Well, I'm sorry you can't come, kiddo."
He glanced in the mirror above the dresser and pulled the hairbrush through his thick hair that had now exasperatedly gone almost completely gray, glancing over his shoulder at Ellie's reflection to see her shrug nonchalantly.
"It can't be too much longer now, right? What, maybe… eight weeks? Nine weeks? Something like that. I'll live."
"Let's hope it's as long as possible," Joel mumbled. He decided his hair was fine, because it was going to get blown all messy on the ride out to Bryce and Jude's house, where Willa's party was being hosted. He glanced to the dresser to see what appeared to be a pair of soft gray shoes there, and he picked them up somewhat curiously, turning around and holding them up to Ellie. "Is this… are these… this is Willa's present?"
Ellie grinned and tipped her chin up proudly. "Yup!"
Joel was confused for a moment, and then he asked, "You made these?"
Ellie tipped her head. "They're felted slippers. Guess where I found instructions for felting, Joel?"
He shook his head, baffled, until Ellie reached for the stack of magazines on her bedside table and held up an issue of Teen Vogue. On the cover was splashed a loud headline that announced the magazine was New for 2003! Ellie brandished the copy of Teen Vogue like a weapon and then flipped through the issue, which was dog-eared and frayed, and then she found the page she wanted and read aloud,
"Want to try a fun new craft this winter? Here's how you can make your own cozy felted slippers! First, clean and fluff out some raw wool (we recommend picking some up from Michael's or JoAnn's). Then, trace your feet on a piece of paper and add an extra inch all around. Cut out the pattern and lay it on a layer of wool that's a few inches larger. Wet the wool with warm water and add some soap. Roll up the wool and pattern tightly and rub it back and forth on a hard surface to cause the wool fibers to mat together. Rinse and reshape the wool, then let it air dry. Once dry, trim and shape it to fit your feet. You've now got a unique and comfy pair of slippers! Obviously, I had to guess and get as close as possible with the size of Willa's feet, but I think they'll work fine. It wasn't hard. They'll be cozy around her house."
"Wow." Joel raised his eyebrows and studied the felt slippers. He nodded, impressed, and said again, "Wow. Okay. Well. Nice work, kiddo. I'll tell her you sent birthday wishes and you wish you were there."
"Don't get so drunk you fall off Guinness on the way back, please," Ellie teased as Joel pulled on his Carhartt winter coat, and he rolled his eyes and smirked at her. He leaned down and planted a kiss on her lips and murmured,
"I love you."
"Mmm. Not half as much as the other way around."
"Well. We can fight about that later," Joel whispered, and then he pulled away from her and left.
Joel stumbled back up to the table in Jude's living room, where a beautiful cut crystal punch bowl that had been salvaged from some Yampa house or another had been filled all the way up at the beginning of this party with very alcoholic moonshine, apple cider, lots of cinnamon, and dried orange slices. The punch was fucking delicious, Joel thought. It was especially delicious right now, on his third glass of the stuff. Fourth glass? Oh, God… fifth? Joel didn't really know anymore.
He hadn't really been a consummate drinker in years. Not since Boston. Very occasionally, in Wyoming, when he'd been alone with Ellie, he'd let himself slip and had allowed his head to swim with a bit too much liquor. But it had never been anything like the habits he'd developed in Boston. And, in large part, that was because in the years since he'd met Ellie, nothing like tonight had ever happened.
Tonight, when he'd arrived at Willa's birthday party, a few people had already been there, milling around inside the upscale house built on the large cattle ranch outside of town, made before the Outbreak from hand hewn logs and filled with luxury Western adornments. The birthday guests already started snacking and drinking, and worse than that, there had been pills. Somehow, someone had gotten ahold of a fistful of hydro from the Denver QZ. It was one of the cowboys on the cattle ranch, apparently, who had desperately ventured into the QZ in search of macrolide antibiotics for the dreaded Bovine Respiratory Disease that was spreading through the herd. One of the shits from the cattle ranch had dared to go all the way to Denver for cattle antibiotics and had come back with fucking opioids.
Bryce Crane had seemed blissfully unaware of all this; she'd been bounding around the party like a fucking bobblehead when Joel had arrived. Willa, too, had happily greeted Joel with a brief kiss on his cheek and hadn't seemed affected by anything. Dr. Emerson, who may well have given a fuck about the presence of hydrocodone at a Yampa social function if he'd known about it, had just been chatting contentedly in a far corner with Otto Oaks as the two older men slowly sipped drinks and chewed thoughtfully on some jerky.
But Jude Wilder had pulled Joel aside to a quiet corner, and he'd held out his grubby little paw with a hydrocodone in it like a fucking gift, a Kubrick smirk painted across his wretched handsome face. Joel had heard himself snap an inquisition at Jude. Where had the pills come from? How did Jude know they were legit and not laced with something that was gonna make them all keel over? What had he paid for them? Who knew he had the pills? Did the little shit-for-brains have any idea how fucking dangerous it was to get into drugs? Huh? Did he?
And then Joel had snatched the fucking pill out of Jude's palm, and he'd popped it into his mouth and he'd gulped it down with the moonshine punch he was clutching… because Joel Miller was a fucking coward, he thought. He was a coward who couldn't resist the allure of a drug he hadn't taken in years, a drug that had dulled his physical pains and the much more agonizing mental torment he'd felt for ages in Boston. So when Jude Wilder had proffered him a hydro, out of nowhere, Joel had grabbed it like a feral animal, like an out-of-control child.
Forty-five minutes later, he was deep into the effects of the drug, and he'd had far too much alcohol with it. His mind was a swimming disaster zone. There was a birthday party happening. He knew that. Somewhere behind him, people were singing the birthday song from the old, extinct world to Willa. Joel swigged from his glass of alcoholic punch and mumbled along with them, his voice a low, garbled mess,
"Happy birthday to you… Happy birthday, dear Willa. Happy birthday to you."
Joel held his glass up to toast Willa and turned around, stumbling a little again, and he said very loudly, almost shouting, "Ellie made you shoes. Out of wool. Willa!" People gave him odd looks; he could tell they were odd looks. But he just smiled a little, his mouth feeling like a crooked grimace, and he shrugged and said, "She found instructions in an old magazine for making wool shoes. Isn't that ironic… don't you think? It's like raaaaaaaaain… on your wedding day. It's a free ride… when you've already paid."
"Oh, my God." Bryce Crane looked absolutely horrified, clapping her hands to her mouth, and Joel crinkled his face and knocked back the rest of his moonshine punch.
"Psh. What. What? You don't like Alanis Morissette? Jesus, Bryce."
The whole room had gone very quiet then, and Jude started to make his way toward Joel, though he, too, seemed to be staggering and faltering a bit in his own intoxication, and when Jude said soothingly,
"All right, Joel, buddy…"
Joel's eyes sprang open and he scoffed loudly, slamming his empty glass down hard on the nearby table. He shoved so roughly at Jude's shoulders that Jude stumbled backwards and fell to the ground, and Joel growled at him,
"I'm not your fucking buddy, boy. What are you, twenty fucking years old?"
A strange look crossed Jude's face, and as he scrambled to his feet, looking almost as bad off from the hydro and the moonshine as Joel, he shrugged and slurred, "I'm older than your pregnant child bride, old man."
Joel snarled and lunged before he thought properly. He wound up and punched Jude with all of the force he could muster, and there was an eruption of screams and gasps in the birthday party as Jude went flying backward against the side of the flagstone fireplace. He collapsed hard against it, his head crashing onto the stone as he fell. Joel's fist had made hard impact with both his nose and his cheekbone, and that was evident immediately from the way blood started streaming unfettered from Jude's nostrils, drizzling down off his chin and staining his pale denim shirt with burgundy pools.
"Oh, my God! Oh! Oh, my God!" Bryce was shrieking, sprinting across the living room and crouching down alongside Jude, cradling his damaged face in her hands and arms, patting his cheeks to try and rouse him, and yelling for someone to get wet rags. Dr. Emerson was immediately at Jude's side. Joel scrambled forward to try and attack Jude again, but people were grabbing him and yanking him back, dragging him away. He was stumbling, dizzy, numb. The room was spinning.
"What the fuck, man?" yelled one of the young men who worked on the cattle ranch with Jude, and Joel had to wonder if he'd been the one to go out to Denver to get the hydrocodone. Joel glared at him for a moment, then looked at Rhea Campbell, who just seemed very disappointed in a way that made Joel's heart sink. He couldn't stand that, for some reason. He ripped his eyes from Rhea, unable to look at her.
He was being pulled into another room, into a kitchen, and a door was being slammed shut. He was being shoved down into a chair. He was deeply confused, until he realized he was eye to eye with Willa Wright, who glared straight at him and snapped,
"Joel Miller, what the everliving fuck just happened? Ellie is gonna want an answer and I'm gonna need a damn good one, so you better start talking, my man."
Joel's mouth fell open, and he tried to formulate an answer, but then his eyes just welled heavily. Suddenly he felt his bearded jaw being squeezed tightly by an unforgiving hand, and Willa snarled at him,
"You come to my birthday party and you make a violent scene like that, make that kind of a fool of yourself, your pregnant wife is gonna need an explanation from me. Talk, Joel."
He huffed a breath and nodded. "Jude gave me hydro. I don't know… he got it from the Denver QZ. One of his guys from the cattle ranch did."
He met Willa's eyes, feeling very drunk and very blurry. Willa narrowed her gaze at him and shook her head, looking profoundly confused.
"Hydro," she repeated. "Hydrocodone? The drug?"
Joel scoffed. "Yeah, Willa. The fucking drug."
Willa crinkled her face, appearing disgusted. "You know, Joel, you didn't seem the type."
He raised his eyebrows. "No?"
Willa stood upright and put her hands on her hips. "No. Mr. Roscoe told me he thought you were a good man."
For some reason, something broke inside Joel at that. He bent over a little and buried his head in his hands, thinking that popping a pill, and maybe even punching the very punchable Jude Wilder didn't make him a bad man, but all the things he had done in the last twenty-four years sure as shit did. If Charlie Roscoe had known the truth about Joel Miller, would he have said what he'd said when he'd been dying on the forest floor? You're a good shepherd and a good man. Would he have told Joel to take his farm? If Charlie Roscoe had known that Joel had ferried drugs and guns, had killed so very many human beings, had stabbed clickers through their skulls, had slaughtered cannibals and cult members, had slain the Fireflies to get Ellie out of the hospital… if Charlie Roscoe knew all of that, would he have still said it, Joel wondered? You're a good shepherd and a good man.
Joel did not feel like a good man right now.
"Audrey!" Joel heard Willa snap sharply, and when Joel looked up with bleary eyes, he saw a furious Audrey Oaks storm through the kitchen door, and Willa demanded of her, "Bring Jude Wilder in here. Now. With your dad. I'm serious."
Audrey just nodded gravely. Joel was aware then that there were a few of the larger men from town standing around him, and he suddenly didn't think he would be allowed to just get up and leave the party, even if he wanted to. It occurred to him, then, that he'd come here very lightly armed; he had brought Mr. Roscoe's Smith and Wesson revolver at his hip, but nothing else. The fact that going to a birthday party with only one fucking gun constituted being barely armed made Joel feel very depressed, for some reason, and he choked out a strange little noise as he glared at Willa and said hoarsely,
"I'm fucking tired, Willa, and I'm fucking scared because of the baby, and you don't know the half of it when it comes to the past, so -"
Willa let out a hideous scoff and shook her head, and she sneered down at Joel as she pushed his face up so he would look at her properly. She stared at him for a long moment and then said,
"Fuck you, Joel Miller. You think you're the only one around here who's scared and tired? You think you're the only one with a fucking past? How about Ellie, huh? You think she's scared and tired? Hmm? You think Rhea Campbell has nightmares? Huh? Fuck you and your excuses, Joel."
His mouth fell open then, and he tried to say something, but Willa ripped her hand from his face and shook her head, curling up her lip and tossing her long braids over one shoulder as she hissed,
"You ought to be ashamed of yourself. Think of who's waiting at home for you, motherfucker. Charlie Roscoe didn't die so you could get fucked up and punch out Jude Wilder at my birthday party while Ellie sits pregnant at home and you… yeah, you know what? Fuck you and you being sad and scared and tired, and fuck your past."
Joel's heart was hammering badly then, and he tried again to defend himself to Willa, but then he realized there was nothing at all he could say, that he didn't deserve any kind of defense at all. So finally he just choked out,
"Yeah, you're right."
The kitchen door slammed open again, and Joel startled as Jude Wilder came staggering into the room, tightly holding a wet rag to his still-bleeding face. He glared daggers at Joel and tossed up a hand helplessly, still very evidently drunk and a bit high on hydro, his pale blue eyes bleary as he swayed before the chair where Joel had been slammed down. Beside him, Otto Oaks planted his hands on his own hips and barked,
"Well. Go on, boy."
"I'm sorry. I fucked up." Jude's voice was muffled badly, by the wet rag and probably by a broken nose. He sniffled and then looked pained by having done so, wincing and taking a moment to collect himself as he shifted his weight and found his balance. He leaned onto Otto's shoulder and looked like he was going to vomit, but then he finally murmured, "Nathaniel went all the way to the Denver QZ himself to get the macrolides… the herd needed… antibiotics…"
Jude paused then and shut his eyes, seeming queasy and dizzy. He tightened his fingers on Otto's shoulder, but Otto insisted again,
"Come on, Jude."
Jude pried his icy eyes open and met Joel's gaze, shrugging helplessly again as he adjusted his hold on the bloody rag on his face.
"I honestly don't know how… I don't really wanna know how Nate got the hydrocodone. He said it was the same guy who sold him the antibiotics. I dunno; he said… he tried it in Denver, that it was good shit. I thought, Joel… I thought it would be fun, that you'd… I didn't think it would be a problem."
Joel squared his jaw and seethed. He shut his own eyes and scoffed softly. His own voice was still blurry from moonshine and from the pill he'd taken as he informed the younger man, "You know, Jude, I got way too much fucking experience with hydro to know for damn sure just how much of a problem that shit is. And let me tell you, kid, that while it accomplishes something or another, it isn't exactly fun."
He let all of that hang in the air for a good long while, drumming his trembling fingers on the knee of his dark jeans, and finally he heard Jude say quietly,
"Well. They got Nathaniel out of here, I guess. I shouldn't have said what I said about Ellie. Calling her a… um… I'm sorry."
Calling her a fucking child bride, Joel thought with great irritation, but he just nodded stoutly and shrugged as he grunted, "Shouldn't have taken the pill from you, I guess, and I probably shouldn't have broken your damn nose at a birthday party. So."
"I dunno if it's broken," Jude mumbled, but Joel snorted and informed Jude dismissively,
"I'm the one that hit you, kid; that nose is broken as fuck. Watch that orbital, too."
"Look," Joel heard Otto Oaks say in a low, sharp voice that left absolutely no room for equivocation, "The world these days is a difficult place. We all gotta look out for each other. We got enough to worry about keeping an eye out for runners and clickers coming out the woods and swarming this place, or Raiders riding in here, or, you know… strangers."
He said that part very meaningfully, and Joel knew why. He thought of the bullet that had gone through Charlie Roscoe's torso, shooting him off his horse, the way Willa and Bryce had been attacked in the diner, the way Rhea Campbell had rallied Yampa riders to go out into the woods to rescue Joel and Ellie and Jude. He shut his eyes and felt nauseated.
"We've all been hurt," Otto Oaks continued. "We've all been hurt real, real bad. Some of us have lost our children; some of us have lost our parents. Some of us remember comfortable homes, and some of us grew up in QZs. Absolutely none of that matters now. Do you all understand me? Yampa is home now. This place is not going to tear itself to pieces like the rest of the world has done; we look out for each other here. So I expect you all to take care of each other. I expect better of you. Jude, Joel, I mean the both of you! You understand me?"
Joel let out a quaking breath and finally raised his eyes, nodding a little and whispering, "Yes, sir."
Jude nodded, clutching the bloody cloth to his face. "Yes, Mr. Oaks."
Otto jabbed a finger at Jude and said very seriously, "I'm gonna take Nate the same fucking thing; anyone brings drugs into Yampa, they'll get a swift one-way ticket to Fort Collins with instructions not to come back. And don't you ever let me hear you call Mrs. Miller a fucking child bride again, boy, you understand me? Vile slander. You be respectful or you stay silent, Jude Wilder."
Jude just nodded again and glanced and Joel, and with another little shrug, he repeated once more,
"I'm sorry."
"Yeah." Joel cleared his throat. "Me, too. For the… nose. Face."
"And you." Otto turned on Joel. His face was very serious then. "You and Ellie showed up in this town not even a year ago, and, let's be honest, Joel, we trusted you, and everything was fine for a while, but then it very much was not. People got hurt. Charlie Roscoe died. And that is what it is, but don't you dare take the hospitality and the welcome of Yampa for granted, or you will be shown the door. You understand me?"
Joel's eyes welled, but he nodded. "Yes, sir."
Otto sighed heavily and put his hands on his hips again. "Joel, I think you ought to get going home so Willa can enjoy her birthday party."
Willa coughed out a laugh and shook her head. "Otto. He's not in any state to ride home alone right now. He'll fall off his horse and freeze to death halfway between here and the sheep ranch."
"Take him upstairs to one of the guest rooms and let him sleep it off," mumbled Jude, still sounding more than a little drunk and still a bit high. "Once he's a little… a little steadier, he can, uh… he can ride home."
Joel just nodded and said in a hoarse voice, "I'm sorry."
"It's done. It's over. We're moving on," Willa said sharply. "It's not gonna happen again. That's the only thing that matters. I'm gonna go look at those felt slippers your wife made for me."
She stomped rather determinedly out of the kitchen, and Otto Oaks heaved Jude Wilder out after her, leaving Joel slumped where he sat with a few of the other men from Yampa at his sides.
The Roman numerals on the antique clock in Jude and Bryce's guest bedroom had read half past three when Joel had cracked his eyes open and dragged himself off the bed in the still, quiet space. He had still felt slightly woozy and a tad unsteady on his feet, and his head had been pounding with a wretched headache. He'd been vertiginous enough that he'd had to clutch the railing tightly as he'd descended the curving stairway in the luxury house where Bryce and Jude lived, trying not to make much noise as he crept out of the place where Willa's birthday party had been happening hours earlier.
He glanced around and sighed deeply, remembering what Otto Oaks had told him when he'd still been fucked up. He and Ellie had appeared in Yampa, and the people here had welcomed them and taken care of them, had sacrificed their well-being and their lives for them, and if Joel didn't show gratitude for that, he would be escorted out of town. Then Joel remembered what Willa had snapped down at him, her smooth dark face twisted into an expression of disgust.
Fuck you, Joel Miller. You think you're the only one around here who's scared and tired? You think you're the only one with a fucking past? How about Ellie, huh? You think she's scared and tired? Hmm? You think Rhea Campbell has nightmares? Huh? Fuck you and your excuses, Joel.
Joel gulped hard as he pulled himself into his saddle outside the elegant custom hand hewn cabin and guided Guinness across the cattle ranch through the darkness, the snowy fields illuminated by very dim moonlight and little prickles of starlight. Joel felt shame crackle through his veins as he rode as fast as the bitter winter wind and the snow would allow Guinness to trot, and it still took a solid twenty minutes or so until his bay gelding pulled up onto the sheep ranch. He picked up speed as he neared his own farmhouse, seeing the picturesque home he shared with Ellie shadowed in the dark night and feeling the rhythmic thud of Guinness' hooves as his saddle swayed beneath him.
His stomach twisted and sank as he felt the impact of his closed fist crashing against Jude Wilder's face, as he heard the young man taunting him about his pregnant child bride, as he realized he'd made a fool of himself after taking a pill and chugging moonshine. He could hear Willa berating him ferociously, sparing him not an ounce of mercy, could hear Otto Oaks meting out judgment and commanding Jude and Joel and reconcile, laying out the way Yampa was going to function in the hellscape the world had become in the decades since Outbreak Day.
The shame Joel felt now stung and burned so badly that taking breaths was a monumental effort, and not just because of the cold air of the dark early morning. He swallowed past the thick knot in his throat as he put Guinness away in the barn, rushing to haphazardly toss his tack onto poles and racks with little care. He threw a blanket onto Guinness without bothering to brush the gelding, though he did put some water into Guinness' bucket and tossed a fresh hay bale into the horse's stall before he yanked the barn door shut and jogged up to the farmhouse.
He pulled the door open and shut it with quick but deliberately silent movements, and he kicked his boots off and then padded swiftly up the staircase on the balls of his feet. He caught his breath on the landing at the top of the stairs, and his eyes watered suddenly as his throat went tight and his pulse refused to slow in his veins. He felt almost overwhelming guilt, melding with what lingered of his intoxication and the horrid sense of disgrace he'd been feeling ever since Willa and Otto had put him in his place. He dragged his palms, which were sweating despite the cold outside, over his jeans, and he took a long breath to steady himself. He shut his eyes for a moment and whispered to himself,
"Pull yourself together, you dumb old fuck."
He finally balled his fists and opened his eyes, and then he walked slowly toward the bedroom he shared with Ellie. He expected to find the room chilled, with the fire having burnt low, with Ellie lying on her side asleep in the bed. She would have drifted off hours ago, Joel thought; it had to be near four in the morning now.
But the fire was built up and raging, and when he stepped into the bedroom, Ellie was sitting up in bed, dressed in sweatpants and a t-shirt and one of Joel's big hoodies, not tucked under the quilts. Her legs were extended straight out in front of her, and Joel was surprised to see that she had sneakers on atop the bed. She had her arms crossed tightly atop her ever-growing pregnant belly, and she was glaring angrily ahead of her, streaks marking the places where tears had streamed down her puffy red face. She ignored Joel entirely when he came into the bedroom, and she didn't respond at all when he shifted on his feet and said quietly,
"Um… hi. Morning, I guess."
She just stared straight ahead and tightened her crossed arms around each other. She blinked quickly a few times, and Joel could see that her eyes had long since run out of tears. He gulped and took a few careful steps further into the room, chomping on his bottom lip, knowing Ellie hadn't had a wink of sleep. He carefully unsnapped and then unzipped his thick Carhartt coat, peeling it off and tossing it across the top of the dresser and then slowly stripping off the oatmeal-colored Henley he'd worn to Willa's birthday party. As he started to unbuckle his jeans, he heard Ellie's voice snap from behind him,
"Did you have a good time, Joel?"
His hands stilled on his belt, and he sighed heavily. He did his belt back up and turned around to face her, tossing his hands up helplessly as he admitted,
"Look, it's all gonna come out eventually… small town and all that. I'd much rather you hear it from me, so."
Ellie narrowed her eyes and pursed her lips, but she said nothing at all. It was unnerving, Joel thought, the way she was just glaring at him. She didn't interrogate him; she didn't sarcastically demand to know if he'd been off fucking some other woman, or taunt him with puns or japes or any of the cruel, mocking barbs he'd come to expect from her over the last few years. No. She just cinched her crossed arms atop her pregnant belly, and she glared at him with an intensity that made him shiver, and finally, Joel took a few steps toward the bed on legs that quivered beneath him, and he said in a voice he tried to keep gentle and steady,
"You and I have shared… a little bit… with each other, Ellie, about our pasts in the Boston QZ."
Ellie tipped her head. "Yes, Joel. I was a child in a FEDRA school, and you were a murdering, gun-trading drug smuggler. Right?"
Joel squared his jaw. "Something like that, unfortunately. And you know that I… um… I drank a lot. Because of the pain. Because of… Sarah, and… I took pills, and…"
"Joel." Ellie shrugged and scoffed, giving Joel a skeptical look as she demanded, "What in the fuck does anything from the Boston QZ have to do with Willa's birthday party and you rolling home at four o'clock in the morning?"
Joel felt his cheeks go hot. He suddenly felt a profound, aching need to be near Ellie just now. She wouldn't want him, he thought, but he couldn't just stand here staring down at her. He stalked around the bed and climbed up onto it, situating himself atop the quilts beside Ellie. He reached to thread his hand beneath her elbow, but she pulled away a little and gave him a hard look, saying angrily,
"Tell me what's going on."
Joel licked his lips and nodded. "Um. Nate. Nathaniel. The guy who works on the cattle ranch."
"I know who Nate is." Ellie rolled her eyes, and Joel just nodded again.
"He went all the way to the Denver QZ on his own. He had to get a bunch of antibiotics… some of the cattle here got a bad infection and… they were gonna have a huge loss. They had the right antibiotics in Denver. Anyway, Nate went to get them. But… he decided to get hydrocodone, too, and… at Willa's birthday party, Jude Wilder… he gave me some."
Ellie's mouth fell open. For a second, she was silent, and then her eyebrows went up and she demanded incredulously, "Jude Wilder drugged you?"
Joel choked out a little noise and shook his head. "N-No. He… he offered me a pill and I -"
"Oh, so you chose to get high." Ellie nodded, her face suddenly looking oddly serene. Joel's heart started racing then, and he shut his eyes and whispered frantically,
"Listen, I'm sorry. It was stupid. It was really fucking stupid, because, yeah, I drank… a lot, and then I… was… loud, and…"
"You were loud," Ellie repeated in a dull monotone, and Joel felt like he was going to vomit all over the bed. He gripped Ellie's elbow hard, feeling like he was drowning and he needed her to stay afloat, but she snapped at her, "You're fucking hurting me!"
"Sorry! I'm sorry." Joel wrenched his hands away from her and slid back on the quilts, and he stared at her, wide-eyed and panicked. He held up his shaking hands, feeling as jittery as if he'd consumed ten cups of coffee instead of like he was coming off of booze and opioids. He tried to catch his breath and finally panted, "I made a fucking fool of myself, but then Jude called you my pregnant child bride, so I lost my shit with him and I punched him hard, broke his nose, I think, and I -"
"He called me your what?" Ellie's voice cracked then, and she recoiled a little. Joel huffed, burying his face in his hands. He was dizzy again, and he explained to her anxiously,
"It's fine. It's fine. He and I worked it out with Willa and Otto. We worked it out. I broke his fucking nose for it, Ellie, and he apologized. We were both wrong; everybody was being fucking assholes. Otto was right. This place is supposed to itself together, or we'll be just as bad as the rest of this fucking wasteland of a planet. It's fine. He apologized. I broke his nose. It's fine."
"Just because you say it's fine doesn't make it fine!" Ellie snarled the words aggressively, and Joel raised his gaze to see that she was swiping roughly at her newly wet chestnut eyes as she sniffed and said to him, "I'm not a fucking child bride! First of all, I'm not a child! I grew up, Joel. And that asshole doesn't know half the shit I've had to do on my way to growing up, by the way! And, anyway, I was never a bride, child or otherwise. I never had a wedding like Bryce is gonna have with Jude, so. Who does he think he is, calling me a fucking child bride? I knew I should have done so much worse to him than pouring fucking cider over his fucking head."
Joel just stared at her, bewildered and unsure of what to tackle first. There was so very much buried in everything she had just spewed, and Joel just took a few breaths as the fire in the bedroom crackled and snapped, as Ellie slammed her palms against her eyes and then rubbed at her pregnant belly like she was soothing herself, wincing a bit after a moment. Joel felt concern as he watched her face pinch, but she held a hand up and whispered,
"Kicks. It's just kicks."
Joel gulped past the knot in his throat, suddenly hearing Willa admonishing him, You ought to be ashamed of yourself. Think of who's waiting at home for you, motherfucker. Joel reached out to cover Ellie's hand on her abdomen with his own, and when she flicked her eyes up to his, he shook his head a little and murmured,
"I'm so fucking sorry, baby girl."
Ellie just breathed then, slowly, deeply, with a little tremor. Tears, new ones, dragged down her cheeks to cover the salty tracks that had already been all over Ellie's face when Joel had come into the bedroom. She shut her eyes as her fingers cinched beneath Joel's hand on her belly, and she mumbled in a distraught little voice,
"If you'd just told Jude you didn't want the fucking pill, Joel…"
"Yeah. I know." Joel sighed and rubbed at her hand with his thumb. "I am… really fucking sorry, baby girl."
"I am not a child bride." Ellie's voice snapped and rattled, her breath hitching a little with a slight gasp, and Joel nodded.
"I know." She'd said she hadn't been any kind of bride at all, that she had never had a wedding like Bryce was going to have with Jude. Joel pinched his lips into a hard, straight line, and he blinked a few times before Ellie mumbled,
"Both of you ruined Willa's birthday party. She didn't deserve that."
"No. She didn't," Joel agreed. "I'll find a way to make it up to her. Jude and I… um… he and I, we'll be copacetic. Otto will set Nathaniel straight for buying drugs in Denver. Yampa is a good place full of good people. I'm not gonna be the one to fuck that up."
Ellie pursed her lips and nodded slightly. She stared at Joel for a very long moment, her brown eyes looking dull, tired, and sad in the glow of the fire. She sniffled and then rubbed at her nose and her eyes with the back of one hand. Finally, she whispered,
"I'm so tired."
"Yeah. I bet." Joel frowned. He glanced down to the sneakers she wore. "You should… um… try and get some sleep. You should go to sleep and you should sleep until your body can't sleep anymore. Okay?"
Ellie hesitated for a moment and then finally said, "If you hold me."
Joel was shocked at that, shocked that she would allow him to stay in bed with her, let alone touch her. For some reason, he expected her to scream at him, to punch his jaw and call him a filthy druggie, to berate him some more for coming home so late. But instead, she just kicked off her sneakers and slid off Joel's big hoodie, and she nestled onto her side under the quilts. Joel arranged himself behind her, spooning up against her, his body so much bigger than hers. He wrapped an arm around her and cradled her belly, feeling the little fluttering of Charlie's kicks against his fingers and palm, and he touched his lips to Ellie's hair as he murmured again,
"I am so fucking sorry, Ellie."
"Okay." She sniffled a little, and Joel said again, somewhat desperately,
"I'll try and fix it. I'll make it up to Willa. Things will be okay with Jude… I'll make sure it's all good with Otto. I won't ruin things for us here. I promise."
"Okay." Ellie was quiet for a long moment, and then she finally whispered, "Sing me to sleep, Joel. Please?"
He hesitated, but then he cleared his throat and sang the first thing that came to his mind, an old country song by Eddy Arnold. He leaned his head against the pillow behind Ellie and brushed his fingers along her belly, along the place where their child was growing inside of her, and he sang in a low, gentle voice,
"Make the world go away, and get it off my shoulder. Say the things you used to say, and make the world go away. Do you remember when you loved me before the world took me astray? If you do, then forgive me, and make the world go away. Make the world go away, and get it off my shoulder. Say the things you used to say, and make the world go away. I'm sorry if I hurt you. I'll make it up day by day. Just say you love me like you used to, and make the world go away."
By the time he'd finished the entire apologetic song, Joel realized that Ellie's breathing had gone steady and slow, that she'd fallen deeply asleep wrapped up in his arms, and he kissed her shoulder blade and rolled a little to lie comfortably with her cradled and tangled against him.
He still felt like a complete fool, like a weak imbecile who had spoiled Willa Wright's birthday party, who had violently demonstrated a lack of gratitude for people who had given him and Ellie everything, all over a verbal slight and some poor judgment. But it could all be fixed, Joel thought. Even Otto Oaks had said it could all be fixed. And Ellie had seemed, in the last moments she'd been awake, to have been in some state of forgiveness, or at least amnesty, in terms of Joel's transgressions.
In a few hours, he'd have to heave himself out of this bed to feed and water the horses, to muck the pens and spread out alfalfa hay, to check the health of his flock, to fix any broken fence posts or repair any machinery or tools that needed it. He would need to ride into town in the evening and go to the diner, to apologize profusely to Willa Wright, to make amends with Otto and Jude, so that he and Ellie and their baby could have a future here.
In a few hours, Joel would have to haul himself out of this bed to be the good shepherd and the good man he'd promised Charlie Roscoe he would be, the good shepherd and the good man Charlie Roscoe had declared Joel to be with his final words.
But for now, Joel could just lie here, holding Ellie, cradling their child, breathing in the quiet air, apologizing to her with every exhale.
Author's Note: Ahhhhh, the angst! The angst! But Joel's nasty personal past was bound to catch up with him sooner or later, right? Yikes. And while the people of Yampa are downright incredible, Otto's right - they have absolutely no patience for people coming in and upending the stability and peace of the place, whether that means locals bringing in drugs or outsiders bringing in violence.
I can't tell you all how much I appreciate you continuing to read this story, and feedback/reviews at this point in the saga is truly just so, so motivational. Thank you so much! Again, sorry this chapter's length ran away from me a bit, but I do hope you enjoy.