Chapter 11
Chris watched Morgan.
She had gone outside with Ezra earlier. Whatever Ezra had said to calm her down hadn't worked. She looked brittle.
Ezra was still speaking to her, his hand on her shoulder. Morgan kept her head buried in her hands. Chris wondered what Ezra was saying. Whatever it was, Chris was sure it was better than anything he would have been able to come up with himself. For better or worse, Ezra had a way with words and Chris didn't begrudge her any comfort she could get.
Morgan finally lifted her head. From this distance, Chris couldn't fully see the expression on her face, but he could see the way she nodded to whatever Ezra was saying.
Chris moved away from the window, reassured that Morgan was ok, at least for now.
From below them, the sound of a door opening and closing came, then footsteps up the exterior staircase.
There was a quick knock on the door, then the door opened.
Cheyenne's downstairs neighbor stood there. Chris gave her a silent nod as a greeting. Casey looked around the living room, finally breathing a sigh of relief when she saw Cheyenne in the small kitchen.
"Is everyone ok? I heard…a lot."
JD stood from where he was picking up a picture from the floor. "We're all ok," he said. Chris watched the way the young man squared his shoulders in a show of stoic bravery, even though they had all been rattled by the sudden indoor tornado. He saw Vin hide a smile at JD's bravado.
"What happened?" Casey asked.
Cheyenne answered her. "No idea." She looked around her living room and Chris felt a nudge of guilt for what they were putting the woman through. She hadn't asked for any of them to land practically on her doorstep.
Cheyenne's lips thinned slightly at the sight of her broken things, but she didn't comment on them. "Things keep flying around. Literally flying."
Casey's eyes narrowed in puzzlement. She tilted her head to the side. "Flying?"
Morgan and Ezra stepped through the open door behind Casey as Buck spoke.
"Just about knocked some sense into JD the way we were takin' hits," Buck said, his light hearted tone clearly forced.
Morgan stopped, Ezra nearly bumping into her, her face stricken.
"Did someone get hurt?" she asked.
Buck shook his head. "Nothin' serious. A couple bumps and bruises."
The lights flickered overhead. The glass frame in JD's hand shattered, he jumped back from the shards exploding out.
Casey flinched back, nearly crashing into Ezra. Ezra took Morgan's hand in his, gave it a squeeze.
Chris narrowed his eyes at the way he whispered something to her.
The lights came back on overhead.
Casey's brown eyes were wide, staring at the pieces of glass littering the floor at JD's feet.
"I need—I can't—I need to get out of here," Morgan said. She sounded shaky. Chris moved toward her and she met his eyes. Fear, guilt, and shame all mixed, but none of that made sense.
Casey's face gentled when she looked at Morgan. "I was going to ask you all if you wanted to come to the museum today? It's closed on Mondays. I thought maybe I could show you our American West exhibit and you could tell me what we got right. Or wrong."
"Let's go," Morgan said. "Come on," she said to Buck without looking at him.
Chris could almost feel Buck's sigh of relief. Morgan attempting to push him around, without patience or tact, felt familiar. Something that wasn't changing in the middle of whatever the hell was happening.
"You plannin' on wearing that?" Buck asked.
Morgan looked down at the pajamas Cheyenne had loaned her, then to Cheyenne with a question in her eyes.
Cheyenne didn't laugh at Morgan's silent question and Chris liked her even more for it.
"They're definitely pajamas," Cheyenne said. Most people don't wear them out in public. Jeans or a skirt would be better."
Morgan nodded briefly. She glanced at Ezra before releasing his hand and heading into Cheyenne's room to change.
Ezra watched her go, his expression grim. When he saw Chris watching him, he gave him an unreadable smile and turned to Casey, asking her something about the museum.
Something had changed. Something between Morgan and Ezra. He had no idea what was going on, but he didn't like it.
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Morgan followed Casey through the silent museum. She had been to a museum once. An art museum. Back when Buck was determined to give her experiences that would make her cultured and refined.
This museum was nothing like the art museum Buck had taken her to. There were more than just paintings. There were life size replicas of people, more of those moving pictures, hands on experiences. Morgan couldn't stop staring as Casey ushered them all to the top floor.
Casey stopped at the top of the staircase. She took in a deep breath and let it out slowly. "I've put a lot of research into this," she said. Her eyes darted to all of them. "I tried for historical accuracy more than anything else. But, you know, without first hand accounts it's a lot of educated guesses. So if anything is wrong, it's not because I wanted to insult anyone from your time or—"
"I can't wait to see it," Buck said, cutting off her nervous rambling. He gave her his easy smile. "Can't wait to see what your people thing of our time."
Morgan tried for a smile to reassure Casey. She had no idea how Buck did that. How he could be so natural at charming people and putting them at ease. All she could think of was trying to keep from exploding every light in the museum.
She saw Chris watching her and quickly moved toward the big open room after Buck.
"What is that?" JD exclaimed.
Morgan looked at the life size gallows.
"A gallows?" Casey offered uncertainly.
"Fanciest way of hanging someone I ever saw," JD said.
Morgan didn't miss the way Casey's face fell. Buck must not have missed it either, because he moved closer to JD and gave him a sharp jab to the ribs.
JD's breath burst out and he flinched away from Buck. He turned a disgruntled look on Buck, but Buck flicked his eyes over to Casey and his stern look for JD wasn't missed.
Dawning lightened JD's face. He quickly turned back to Casey. "Did you know I'm from Boston? I didn't move out west until a few years ago…" his brow furrowed. "Or a hundred years ago? When I was nineteen," he clarified. "It's just that looks more like what some jailer would use back East. Where we live now, we just throw a noose over the nearest tree."
Casey paled slightly and Buck shook his head in dismay.
"I mean—it's—you want to show me what else you have?" JD asked.
Casey looked at the gallows again, then forced a smile for JD. "Come on."
The group trailed after her. Morgan hung back, looking at the fanciest mechanism for executing someone she'd ever seen.
"Guess they don't have many hangin's here," a voice said.
Morgan looked up at Chris.
"I guess not," she said.
He moved alongside her as she went to a display of guns.
"There's yours," she said, pointing out a Colt.
Chris studied the display. "Ezra's little wrist shot," he said, nodding toward a small handgun.
Morgan leaned in to read the notation under it. "A weapon reserved for ladies," she said. "Ezra will love that."
Chris' lips twitched and Morgan felt some lightness return. She studied the guns, all familiar objects from their everyday life. And here they were for people to pay money and gawk at like some sort of ancient artifacts.
"A day in the life of a woman out west," Morgan read out loud at the next placard. She looked at the miniature display, her brow wrinkling.
"When have I ever had to keep an eye out for Indians while tending my garden?" she asked.
Chris' humor finally moved his lips into a smile.
Morgan slipped her hand in his and tugged him toward the next display. The distraction and Chris near her kept her mind from running back toward what had happened that morning.
"Hey, look!" JD exclaimed.
Morgan bypassed the tableau of a school room and went to where the others were gathering around JD, Chris alongside her.
"Billy the Kid," JD read, moving to the next statue and the next description.
The group let out a collective groan.
"Ornery little cuss," Buck grumbled.
"Nothing good to say about that kid," Vin said.
"Look at this one, Ez," Buck said, nudging Ezra toward the next statue.
"Wild Bill Hickok," Ezra read, unimpressed. "Quite a moniker you've given him, Miss Wells."
Casey shook her head. "I didn't—that's what everyone calls him."
"He died," JD said, sounding surprised, then flushed. "I mean…I suppose he did. That was—we're—"
"Over a hundred years ago," Cheyenne said.
"What gets him? Got him?" Buck asked, frowning.
Josiah leaned in and read, then straightened with his own frown. "He was shot in the back of the head."
Ezra pushed in past Josiah. "By Jack McCall," he said, his voice tight. "Hickok shouldn't have been in the same county as that snake."
Morgan knew Ezra had met the man more than once. "I'm sorry, Ezra," she said. When he kept staring at the card with a dark look on his face, she felt her heart clench with sympathy. A statue in the distance lifted from the ground and toppled over. Ezra looked at her quickly.
"It's quite alright," he said. "Nothing to get riled about." He said it like a command, his words low for only her to hear.
Morgan fought the emotion. The lights overhead flickered. Ezra met her eyes. She gave him a nod. Ezra put a hand under her elbow and guided her to the next statue.
"Bat Masterson," Nathan said. "You know him, don't you, Chris?"
"We were in the war together," Chris said.
"He died of a heart attack," JD read.
Their laughter at seeing the errors in the museum display a few minutes earlier had faded. The group moved to the next statue.
"Pat Garrett. Died of a gunshot," Nathan read under his breath.
They moved onto Jesse James, William Cody-who for some inexplicable reason had decided to call himself 'Wild Bill' leading Josiah to comment that the man always had a flair for the dramatic, Kit Carson, Sitting Bull…
Gunshot, kidney failure, aortic aneurysm, gunshot…
Everyone they had known was long since dead. Nothing more than a memory in the museum if they were notorious enough. Everyone else, not even a memory.
"Damn," Buck let out on a harsh breath, the single word summarizing the collective emotion falling over them all.
Chris abruptly turned and strode off.
Morgan could see the tension in his shoulders. She looked at Buck, saw Cheyenne looking up at him, her lips in a tight line. Ezra's face nothing more than stone, burying whatever he was thinking. Morgan looked back at Chris, the way he was getting out of there-away from his friends. She hurried after him, the long skirt Cheyenne had loaned her tangling around her legs without the petticoats she would be wearing at home.
Chris went through a door and Morgan wrestled the heavy door open to follow after him.
The room was filled with pottery and beadwork, dimly lit except for a few lights shining on the displays.
Morgan didn't say anything, just waited for Chris to finish pacing the length of the room. When he stopped and didn't turn back, she approached him.
Chris stood, staring unseeing at the floor under his boots. Morgan drew up next to him. She waited, listening to his slow breaths and knowing that was him trying to bury the pain.
She managed to tolerate the silence for a couple beats before she spoke. It didn't matter how long she waited, Chris would be able to outlast her in silence. "You knew most those men," she said.
Chris grunted. His jaw clenched.
Even getting that much from him was a surprise.
"Chris," she said.
A vein in Chris' neck pulsed, his jaw worked.
"I miss home, too," Morgan said, her voice cracking. She swallowed hard, annoyed at the show of weakness. The dim lighting in the room flickered out, back on.
But Chris finally looked at her. Morgan fought against the wave of loneliness that threatened at the thought of everyone they had known being gone.
The door they had come through rattled like it was going to fling open.
Chris wrapped an arm around Morgan and she leaned against the solid strength.
The lights settled back into their warm glow, the door stayed closed and fell silent.
Morgan rested her forehead against his shoulder. Even in this new place, Chris smelled the same. A faint hint of gunpowder, mixed with leather and pine. She drew a long breath, wrapping her arms around his torso and holding on.
Chris tightened his hold on her and Morgan pretended they were back where they belonged, with no bigger problems than Buck's tendency towards overbearing and her bucking against that, Chris always there to keep either of them from completely tearing their bond apart when their tempers flared too hot.
She pretended everything wasn't falling apart.
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