Prettyinpinkgal: And now things get interesting.

Disclaimer: I don't own "Tuck Everlasting".

FOSTER EVERLASTING

CHAPTER TWELVE: BLOODY SKIES

The rest of the day was spent in an odd mix of uncomfortableness and peace. Everyone liked each other well enough, but there was a mysterious tension that nonetheless existed between Winnie and the Tucks and between James and Jesse. It was no longer anything painfully obvious, but it existed barely visible under the current of pleasant conversation.

As Winnie wanted to get some air-the cottage was rather overheating with so many people in at once, and the summer sun beating down through the windows-Jesse followed her soon after, with the excuse that he wanted to make sure the horses had enough water.

He found Winnie sitting in a tree, leaning against it with her eyes closed. Some light shined through the leaves and made little sun spots on her cheek. For a moment, he stood transfixed, until he quickly caught himself and felt ashamed, thinking of the love of his long life sitting with the others.

"I love this tree," Winnie said, startling him out of his guilt. Her eyes were still closed. "I've often sat up here to relax over the past thirty years. It's the easiest to climb, you know."

"Yeah," Jesse said with a brief grin. "I know. I used to climb it all the time myself in order to escape Miles."

"I remember how much he used to scare me when I was little," she laughed. "He's a sweetheart, really."

"I don't know where you got that. He's as soft as a cactus," retorted Jesse, climbing up to sit on the branch near hers.

"You just say that because you're brothers. As I understand it, siblings are supposed to get at each other's throats."

"That's family for you," Jesse sighed playfully.

"Yes. That's family."

Jesse glanced at her, but saw she did not look sad. Instead, her eyes were turned to the setting sun.

"Winnie!"

The two glanced down and saw James, who nodded briefly at Jesse in acknowledgement before turning to the girl. "I'm heading home," he said. "I'll see you later."

"Can I see you tomorrow?" Winnie asked. "I don't want to bother you if you're busy."

"Oh yes, I'm swamped. So much to do and so little time and all that." Jesse noticed he grinned quite often when he was with Winnie.

And Winnie was smiling back at him, waving chipperly. "All right, then tomorrow it is! Good night!"

"Good night. Nice meeting you, Jesse," he said politely.

"Same to you," Jesse said, a touch colder than he normally would be.

James walked off, and Jesse noticed Winnie staring at him. "What?"

"What was that?" she asked.

"What was what?"

"You sounded a little...not like you. Almost a little mean. Why?"

Jesse blinked. No one else would have noticed. He barely noticed it. So how did Winnie see right through him? Was it just because they went back so far, or...?

He didn't let himself go there. "I'm just tired."

Winnie snickered. "Oh, yes, I heard about that. You nearly slept through lunch! How could anyone still be tired after that?"

"Give me a break," he groaned. "I didn't sleep well last night, all right?"

He noticed her laughter's abrupt stop, and he saw she was looking...like her heart was aching. He opened his mouth to say something, but what could he say?

"Sorry," she said softly. "Is it my fault? I didn't mean to make everything so...complicated. I didn't realize it would be complicated at all."

"Don't apologize, Winnie," Jesse said, grabbing her hand before either of them knew what he was doing. "It was my fault. I...I was just so happy, back then. It was the first time I had been close to someone besides my family in ages. I spoke without thinking through too much. I saw a chance at hope, and I told you to drink the water before I let that hope slip away. But over the years, I convinced myself you were too smart for something like that. I'm sorry."

"Too smart," she growled, and she snatched her hand away. "I'm sorry for being so dumb then in drinking the water!"

"That's not what I meant, Winnie," he whined. She wasn't paying him any mind, though; she was already busily climbing down.

"You know what bothers me the most?" she cried once she was safely on the ground. Jesse didn't want to know. He didn't want to know how deeply he had hurt her. He was not-rather, might not be, his mind whispered-in love with her, but he was her dearest friend in the world, and she was his, and he did not want to be the cause of her grief.

"You didn't come back," Winnie hissed, obviously fighting herself to keep from crying. "Not once, not even to check. You know these woods like the back of your hand. If it was too soon to return to Treegap, you could have taken another route. You would have known I'd wait for you forever in this little house.

"But you didn't. You assumed that the declaration you made to a stupid child would be forgotten and ignored. But you knew-should have known-that you were all I had! You knew I was all alone with that family of mine! You knew I would have taken your words to heart...Good heavens, Jesse Tuck, your words sustained me through all the primming and ordering and constricting...

"Even if you didn't love me, I was fine with that. I might put up a fight sometimes, but I almost always listened to you. If you didn't love me, didn't want to marry me, I was fine with that. So long as we could travel together and be each other's friend, I would have been fine! I would've been fine if I could only be an unofficial part of the Tuck family.

"And then you met her."

Here her voice broke, and now the tears started falling. And Jesse continued to sit in the treetop, because he had no energy to climb down. He was drained, beaten, as only a man with no hope of death could be. But Winnie interpreted his distance as another way he was too far from her, and she cried all the harder. She did not even notice the wetness on Jesse's cheeks.

"I can't be part of your lives anymore. I can't be the Girl That Might've Been Part of the Tuck Clan. I can't be the awkward little burden, the unwanted, stupid girl!"

Crickets of the night were playing their songs as silence fell like a brick...no, like an ocean between the two, because Jesse still could not say a word, and Winnie felt him pulling away again.

"I might've been happy, Jesse," she said finally, her voice cracking extremely only when she came to his name. "I did care for my family, although they made me miserable back then. Perhaps they would still be alive, at least for a little longer, if I had stayed. Times changed. I wasn't patient enough. We're in the 1920s, and there's so much freedom granted to women now, much more than I thought we'd ever have, anyway. I could have been married by now, had children. Perhaps I'd be on my way to being a grandmother someday. Perhaps the life I dreaded then would have contained much happiness if I had tried to live it. Perhaps I would have married James" -she did not notice Jesse's tensing- "and we would have traveled together. He's a good man. I knew that then, and I'm more sure of it now. I do not-could not-love him, but we would have been friends. And our children...I think I would have loved them. At least, I would have showed them more love than my mother showed me.

"I disobeyed Tuck because of you, Jesse Tuck."

She was waiting for him to speak, but Jesse feared he could not. He closed his eyes, wiped them quickly, swallowed several times and hoped to God that whatever thing that popped out of his mouth would be the right thing.

"I'll still go traveling with you, if you like."

Oh, sweet merciful heavens, that was pathetic. But it wasn't as bad as he had feared.

One look from her, though, drew any future words away from his grasp. "No, I can't," she told him. "I would be a third wheel. Natasha, as kind as she is, would not like the woman in love with her hu-husband tagging along. And you wouldn't be happy, and neither would I. So I'm leaving before you all leave me alone again."

Winnie turned, walked away, and entered the Tucks'...her...home, and Jesse was distantly impressed that she had not slammed the door behind her.

He watched nighttime fall as his spirit did the same. No matter what he did, it was the wrong thing. He would hurt Natasha, or he would hurt Winnie. He couldn't toy with them, not again. If he had to hurt someone, he needed to stay consistant and not change his mind about Natasha.

But what if that was the wrong choice?

Jesse groaned, not even noticing that his bottom was getting rather sore from sitting in the tree for a few hours now.

And then he noticed the rustling.

For a moment, he felt sheer relief that he was in a tree-immortal or not, being attacked by an animal would hurt-and then he felt stupid, because it was only James.

James?

"What are you doing back?" he asked, but his voice trailed off. Something was wrong. Even in the darkness, he could sense it.

Quickly, Jesse slid down from the tree and looped an arm around the man, helping him inside. He didn't seem to be injured, but perhaps it was mentally...

Natasha gasped when they entered, quickly helping the pale James slide into a chair. Mae went right to getting a pot of tea ready, Miles interrogated Jesse and Tuck surveyed James in his quiet way, as if figuring out a puzzle.

Winnie entered the room. "What's wrong-James! Oh my goodness!" She flew to his side, and it was only the sight of her that brought him back from whatever cold place he had drifted off to.

"He's dead," he muttered disbelievingly before burying his face in his hands. "Walt's dead. They killed him."