Disclaimer: I do not own any characters from "Sons of Anarchy." They are the property of Kurt Sutter and Fox Network. No money is changing hands in the writing, reading or distribution of this story.

Chapter 38

Tig stirred in his sleep, a vaguely familiar sound slowly pulling him from it. Having lived in the clubhouse dorm for so long, he was well acquainted with that gagging, retching sound a few doors down, but his half asleep brain processed the noises as some sort of dream. There were always a lot of noises living out here in the woods that semi-woke him each night, mostly squirrels bounding across the roof in the early morning hours, or dropping their acorns onto the house from some impressively high tree branch. Maybe now the fucking squirrels were puking on the roof, what couldya do? Wait, what? Even half asleep, that didn't make any damn sense, and now he was more awake than he was sleeping, stretching a little, but noticing there was way too much room in the bed. Could squirrels even puke? No, Jesus…don't start the whole cow thing again! Too much room in the bed…why? His eyes sprang open, greeted by darkness, but he could easily see that Joss wasn't there next to him. "Joss!" He called out, demanding an answer, trying not to sound as frantic as he was feeling, but the only answer he got was another gagging, retching sound from in the bathroom. He sat up; the light was on in there. "Son of a bitch…" he groaned to himself, getting to his feet but not really wanting to go in there, but part of him felt like he had to…what if she was vomiting blood or something serious like that? Love…it really did suck…so far it had made him acknowledge that it existed in the world, then in his life, then made him catatonic and now it had him assigned to puke duty!

Joss was on her knees, one hand clutching the toilet bowl, the other trying to hold back all of her black hair, she was gasping for breath and dripping with sweat. She didn't look at him or even act like she knew he was there, but then, she was a little bit distracted. "Hey," Tig said as he watched her, finally moving from the doorway after a few seconds of watching to make sure nothing was about to…spew forth. It seemed safe, she wasn't that big a girl, didn't eat damn near enough to suit him, so she had to be empty by now…but just as he stood beside her, Joss heaved and lunged forward again, another avalanche of her stomach contents chunking into the bowl. Oh fuck! He cringed, wondering why he'd bothered to get out of bed for this, but he was here now, so all he could do was grab the ends of her hair for her and look the other way.

Joss was gasping again, her body no longer frozen in that uncontrollable, gut hoisting position, and she was easing away from the bowl, sitting back on her knees as she reached for the toilet paper roll, yanking off a piece to wipe her mouth with. Tig didn't want to, not really, but he knew just to satisfy the panicky alarmist inside him, he had to take a quick glance at what she'd brought up, just to make sure it wasn't blood, or bile or whatever else that might have made him worry about it having been in there if he didn't just man-up and check it out. But, there was nothing more ominous than olives, rennet free feta cheese, and the peas and carrots she'd washed the thick chicken gravy off of and then eaten after he'd told her to pick them out of the potpie for him. Tig breathed a small sigh of relief, then cringed again, reaching passed Joss and about to flush, but looked at her for a moment. "We done here?"

Still trying to get her breath, Joss only nodded. Tig hit the handle and moved to close the lid too, but then thought twice about it…she'd already surprised him once. "Sorry," Joss managed to say to him, her breathing a little more normal, but no improvement in her pallor or perspiration. A new worry struck Tig…but Joss must have sensed his fear. "Don't!" She looked at him humorlessly. "Don't ask! You know I'm not pregnant!"

"Baby, I was going to ask if you had a fever," he countered, but really, the possibility of a fever had only just occurred to him a second ago. He stood, got her a cup of water from the tap, bending down again and handed it to her, noticing just how wet her hair was with sweat, and her nightshirt too. Damn, did she have a fever? Tig pressed his hand to her forehead, but he wasn't exactly sure what he was feeling for…she was living, she always felt warm.

Joss shook his hand away and moved to lean back against the wall behind her, slowly sipping the water he'd given her. "I'm fine," she insisted, looking like she was pissed with herself or something now.

Tig cocked his head at her and shook it. "Yeah, I puke five or six times a day when I'm 'fine' too."

She sighed. "I mean I'm not sick or anything," Joss's color seemed to fade even more and she closed her eyes as if there was something horrible in front of her she didn't want to be seeing.

"It's probably the way you eat," Tig couldn't resist bringing that facet into the conversation, but she just looked at him pleadingly to not be getting on her case about that now, and so he dropped it. It wasn't fair to harass her when she wasn't feeling good; she wouldn't do that to him. Fuck, did that make them equal? Because property patches weren't about equality! Okay, take control! "What is wrong with you?" He suddenly demanded, then gave her a foreboding look. "You better not be going bulimic on me, little girl!"

Joss rolled her eyes at him. "Oh yeah, that's it! You caught me!" She snipped at him, but Tig was managing to hold himself in check, she was having a bad night; that was obvious. Joss sighed in annoyance next. "Tig, for real! C'mon, please?"

Okay, that was a stupid thing to say, he realized that now. Joss quickly apologized though, even as Tig had decided to make it up to her by grabbing a washcloth from the towel rack, folding it over a few times then running it under cold water, handing it down to her to wipe her sweaty face and neck with as he took a seat against the bathroom wall beside her. "So, what's wrong?" He asked, but this time he was just asking, no show of force or power, he was just concerned.

"I don't know," Joss sighed, but didn't look at him, just buried her face in the cool washcloth like she wanted to hide. "I had this dream…"

"That must have been some dream!" He replied, looking at her like it was something he'd never heard of before, but in truth, Tig had dreams that reduced him to the same kind of state once or twice himself, less than a year after he'd returned state side…and then again not too long ago, for days after 'that night,' only then, he hadn't had to dream anything to get where Joss now was. "About what?"

Joss took the washcloth from her face and lifted her hair, pressing it to the back of her neck next, but she stared straight ahead. "I don't even really remember…it was just…something atrocious, something I couldn't believe I'd done, and there was no taking it back."

Tig was nodding, yeah, he'd been there too. "Whatja do?" His arm slipped around her sweaty shoulders. His poor little, dark, perfect angel…she'd never been diagnosed, but it had been clear to him for a long time that she had the same Post Traumatic Stress Disorder that effected him…the "spider monkey" was part of that too. Well, at least he knew how to be there for her when she needed him to be. He heard Joss sigh, but it ended in a sniffle; she looked over at him with her eyes growing glassy and red, shaking her head. He nodded, understanding. "Okay, we don't have t talk about it now," he said softly, pulling her a little closer to him, Joss laying her head on his shoulder. "We'll just sit here awhile," he took her hand and held it in his lap. "Let you figure out where you are again, and when you know it's okay, and you feel safe, we'll talk about it then."

He felt her nod then lean closer, her eyelashes fluttering against his neck…that had driven him so wild the very first time she'd done it years ago, and it still did. "Thank you," Joss murmured, wiping at her eyes with the hand Tig wasn't holding and then brushing her damp bangs off of her forehead. She was quiet for an entire two or three minutes but he could tell that tears were pouring from her eyes, though Joss made no sobbing sounds. Tig waited patiently, letting her feel whatever it was he knew she had to feel, or go through, there was no other way back from this, he knew that. "Tig," her voice was shaky and weak, but he'd been surprised to hear it so soon.

"Yeah?" He asked, softly stroking his fingers up and down her arm in a soothing manner.

"I really do want a gun." Joss trembled a little as she said it.

He sighed; he hadn't been able to quite figure out this request of hers. He was thinking more along the lines of a dog, or a cat or a coatimundi…something like that when she'd said she wanted something…but a gun? What the fuck was a coatimundi? No, focus on the gun. "I'm not saying 'no,' okay?" He said, turning towards her even though her head was still on his shoulder. "But, why do you want a gun all of a sudden?"

Joss shrugged her shoulders. "I don't know, I guess this thing with…Jax just sorta got me thinking."

"About blowing him away?" Tig asked half tickled to death and half worrying about what went on in that head of hers. "Holy puking squirrels, Joss! Probably not the most recommended strategy at this point in the game."

"What?" For a moment Joss's funk was broken by what he'd said as she looked at him strangely…Tig trying to think of how to explain that little outburst, but Joss had decided it wasn't worth hunting before he even could think of a rationalization, and she'd moved onto something else…thankfully. "No, that's not what I was thinking," She replied, ignoring Tig's half smirk, fueled by thoughts of Jax being blown away…and the puking squirrels. Joss sighed again. "It's just that Gemma has a gun, and hell, even Tara has a gun! But I don't."

"And what? The three of you gonna hit a bank?" Tig laughed, and then realized that Joss was laughing too. Good, she was feeling better, the residual shell shock wearing off. "Have the Laurens drive the get-away car?"

"No," she sighed, but he knew she still smiled, at least for a few seconds before she raised her head off of his shoulder and looked at him in the eyes. "But I do want a gun, and I just wanted you to know that I didn't just say that, and that I'd forget about it in another day or two."

"I know," Tig nodded, taking the wash cloth from her and dabbing at her eyes a little now. "I'm on it, I am. And then I'll teach you to shoot."

Joss's brow furrowed. "But I know how to shoot," she said. "I think we both know that."

"No, baby," Tig smiled at her, she was so damn cute, thought knowing how to shoot meant knowing how to pull the trigger. "You know how to kill, but that's not the same thing."

"But it's the most important thing, right?" She asked, and there was something in her eyes that made Tig look twice.

She'd been acting a little funny the night she'd first asked him for a gun, and now this? "Alright, I wanna know what the hell you were dreaming, and I wanna know now."

Joss looked down and didn't look up again, her lower lip quivered a little bit and she took a ragged breath. "It was about the thing that scares me the most in life…"

"Which is?" Tig asked, getting a little impatient with her now, this 'sit and wait' stuff really really not something he was cut out for.

Joss finally looked up, her eyes locking into his. "Hurting you."

Chapter 38; Part 2

There had always been something comforting about being in Clay's presence, with or without Tig's being nearby, and that hadn't changed, no matter how tightly knitted Joss knew she and Tig were now. Even though there hadn't been any run for the guys to come home from, Gemma in her 'not to be argued with' way had set another date for dinner, and informed Tara and Joss of it. Just like before, Jax and Tara were the first to leave, citing the baby of course. But Tig and Joss had stayed, only instead of being in the kitchen helping Gemma with the dishes, Joss was out on the back deck with Clay, helping him with his arthritic hands, while Tig busied himself in Clay's basement workshop/library, looking through Clay's endless collection of "Guns & Ammo" magazines. Tig had said he'd pretty much made a decision about a gun for her, but said that he wanted to check one more thing about a magazine for the piece he was thinking of, and Joss hadn't argued. She needed that gun!

And Clay had needed relief from the pain in his hands. Gemma had mentioned a few days ago about how Clay wasn't able to grasp and turn a doorknob some nights after wrenching nuts and bolts all day, and also working his throttle and break. She'd always known Clay's hands bothered him, it became apparent most nights when they'd play video games together in Jax's old room, and Joss had wished she could have done something for him then. But now she was able to, having been researching arthritis and relief from it for the last three days, until she was confident she could come up with something that would give Clay some respite and reduce the inflamed joints better than anything that came from the drugstore. When she'd gone to Tig and asked for money to buy some herbs and a mortar and pestle, and told him what it was for, he'd readily handed her the cash, saying, "Let me know if you need more!"

"It smells a lot better than the sports creams," Clay commented as he sat in the oversized Adirondack chair with all the scrolling, tattoo-ish looking designs burned into the wood. Joss knelt beside him, gently smearing the paste she'd made onto the back of his hand.

She smiled. "That's because there's cinnamon in it." She said, rubbing it deeply into his skin, but careful not to press too hard over the sore joints of his knuckles. Clay was a deceptively big guy; Tig was taller than him by an inch or two, but Clay's hands were like the paws of a bear. Gemma had said he used to work out when he was younger, and the remnants of that remained, his shoulders were big and so were his upper arms. He must have really been a powerhouse once, and it made Joss so sad to think that arthritis was now making the glories of his broad, strong frame and thick arms a moot point. She smiled a little sadly and a lot hopefully up at Clay as she took his big hand in hers, dipping into the little tin of the poultice she'd made and working it into each finger now. There was a significant age difference between her and Tig, but she'd be there even more for him than she was for Clay, when the time came. "This should work better than the sports creams too, because the sports creams are only a counterirritant, makes your skin feel hot so you notice that and not the joint pain."

"Is that all that shit does?" Clay asked, looking almost betrayed. Joss nodded apologetically, but it all seemed to give Clay some hope suddenly. "Man, maybe I'm not as bad off as I think I am then!"

"Maybe!" Joss smiled, hoping that was it too. She gently turned his hand over and began to rub the poultice into his palm. "If this works, I'll make some more, and put it into a better travelling container, and that way you'll always have it when you need it."

"That is feelin' a little different," Clay said glancing down at how she rubbed the reddish, brown cream into his hands. "What's in there besides cinnamon?"

Joss had worked on this concoction for a day or two…Tig testing it out, but then it wasn't very effective being that any arthritis he did have was not very prominent. He'd liked how it tasted though…Tig…Joss rolled her eyes even now, but focused on the attention she gave Clay's hand. "Capsaicin from some chilis I bought and dried, because it honestly deadens nerve endings after the initial burning and stinging, some ginger, twenty ground up aspirins, and the cinnamon, all mixed into some emu grease to make it applicable."

"Emu grease?" Clay questioned, a little put off as he looked down at her. "What happened to being vegetarian?"

"Well, it's not like I ate it!" Joss laughed up at him, finished with one hand and taking Clay's other hand. "You got my pork-chop at dinner, didn't you?" She asked as if reminding him, and thanking him at the same time. "And yeah, emu fat absorbs into the skin faster, so not only does it carry the aspirin and capsaicin into the joint faster, it also means your hands won't be slippery if you're trying to work or ride."

"Huh," Clay kind of grunted, testing out the hand that she'd already treated, giving his fingers a bend or two, then nodded his head at her as she worked his other hand. "You think of everything, dontcha, little one?"

Joss smiled, earning Clay's approval, knowing she'd made him happy, meant just about as much as it did to have Tig's approval, but it filled two very different places within her. "For certain people." She answered, so happy that she'd been able to help. "I even dried some marigold petals, ground them up and threw them into this batch. Marigold is an anti-inflammatory, and I also remember reading that Henry the eighth's fifth wife, Catherine Howard, used to treat the abscess on his leg with marigold." Joss said, still smiling up at Clay as she rubbed his hand. "I thought that if it was good enough for a king, it was definitely good enough for you, Clay!" She smiled even more, happy to see how Clay smirked proudly down at her, but then she laughed a little. "Of course, he did cut her head off…so I hope this doesn't end that way!"

Clay chuckled. "I think you're safer than most." He said, lifting the hand that Joss had finished with and bending his fingers a few more times, this time much more rapidly and smoothly than the first time. "Hey, look at that!" He beamed down at her. "Not one day of medical school and you've got me almost good as new!"

Joss only smiled again, wanting to really bask in the light of that comment, but she couldn't, because it had been meant as a hidden dig at Tara. Clay never said anything bad about her, or acted rudely or standoffishly towards her, but he'd always made it clear that Joss was much more a part of the family than Tara, and sometimes, even Jax. Joss turned his other hand over and began to rub the poultice into the palm of that hand. "Great! I'm so happy you're feeling better, Clay!"

Clay nodded then sighed, like maybe something was wrong, and Joss began to feel a little bit nervous. She was about to ask if everything was okay, when Clay looked down at her. "Tig says you've been having some problems sleeping lately."

What? Tig talked to Clay about her waking up and getting sick from that dream of betrayal she'd had? She hadn't told Tig what it was all about, or that it involved Opie, but she'd made clear that she'd done something against her man in that dream, and when she'd woke up, unsure of what she'd done and what she hadn't, her body had just needed to purge itself in some effort to get the vileness out and be 'clean' again. She'd had two rather sleepless nights since the Opie dream, so afraid of dreaming about him again. Tig must have been worried about her if he'd confided in Clay about this. Hmm…how did she fix this without it becoming something she really didn't want it to be, before someone, somehow figured out what her intentions were with Opie? She looked up at Clay and laughed a little. "Well, if I'm having problems sleeping, that's probably because I sleep with Tig."

Clay laughed a little too, but then shook his head down at her. "You know what I mean, Joss," he said, his tone of voice conveying that they were going to talk about this, like it or not.

Joss sighed too, looking down like she'd disappointed him, and feeling like she had. "I…" but she didn't know what to say, and wasn't about to say what she could say. "There's just been a lot of things going on with me lately…I'll be okay eventually, I'll make sure of that."

"Alright, that's good!" Clay nodded his head as she went back to rubbing poultice over each one of his fingers. "But look, Joss, we may have never talked about it, you and me, but I know what you've been through, I know what kind of shit you had to deal with growing up," he said, looking down at her seriously, freezing her at attention with his gaze. "We don't have to get into it, unless you ever want to, but I want you to know that there's help out there for you, beyond me and beyond Tig even. And if you ever wanna get that help, and for some reason I doubt would even exist, Tig isn't for it, you come to me, and I'll make sure you have what you need." He looked at her for awhile, Joss so stunned. "Okay?"

She nodded, but then Clay had commanded her to without needing words. "Wow," she gasped, looking dutifully up at him. "Clay, I don't know what to say…thank you!"

"That's alright," he answered, settling back into his giant, ornately decorated Adirondack chair. "I just want you good," he said, then glanced up towards the kitchen window and listened for any sounds, then looked back down at Joss. "I never said this to you either, and you don't tell anyone about this, not even Tig!" Clay's blue eyes were positively alight, making Joss nod her head furiously all over again, nearly holding her breath as she awaited what he'd say next. "When the day comes that I can't turn the throttle even with the miracle you mixed up, I'll do everything in my power to make sure your man succeeds me. The 'heir apparent' is not who everyone assumes he is."