Chapter Text
John lets himself watch a while longer, watching a chest rise and fall as reliably as the tide coming in and out. Soon enough, the spell breaks. Jack’s tiny fingers tighten on the fabric of his pants, "What-"
"Shh,” he hurries. “Uncle Arthur's asleep, see."
"Oh."
"You oughta be too. C'mon." Kid’s gonna be cranky in the morning.
Jack picks up his book, "Can I sleep with you and Momma?"
He sighs, but figures he and Abigail are both too tired to have got up to anything tomorrow morning anyway. "Well... just this once. Go on."
With soft skuttering over the old floorboards, he watches his shadow dart down the hall and round the corner, looking the happiest any of them have felt in a while. John scrubs the sleep out his eyes and wants to pull a curtain over the world for a while. He turns to go after him and whether it’s a floorboard groaning under his weight or something outside or God just deciding now is a really good time , the figure under the blankets gives up turning over and a quiet stir turns into a coughing fit.
"Fuck," John swears, hurrying over.
"John?" wheezes Arthur once he's done. "I wake you up?"
“No-” which is true and he’s guilty to think on it, because now he’s so good at sleeping through when his brother’s in pain. “Jack woke me up.”
“Jack-” he coughs, it shudders to a stop. Against every instinct, John hauls him upright- Arthur’s stopped protesting the manhandling, recently. It overjoys and scares him all the same.
“Huh,” he muses, trying to alleviate a little of the awkwardness that comes with holding a grown man this way, “First time you get some sleep and you gotta ruin it for yourself.”
He shifts under his hands, hot to the touch and nothing but heat and bone, “I made sure he didn’t come near- I didn’t-”
“I know.” He wishes he had the luxury of staying so far away, instead of up close and personal with this ghost in this near empty room. “Think you can get back to sleep?”
He answers with coughing, until John feels concerned enough to sit behind him on the bed and lean him forward, every rattling breath near touching his hand through his thin rib cage. “ Alright… alright , brother, c’mon cut that out, c’mon now- just- just breathe…”
He does- no thanks to anything of John’s doing. He lets John maneuver him back to sit against him without trying to get away and John blocks out all the thoughts screaming at him by looking only at the strands of hair sweat strewn across the back of his neck. “Oughta get another doctor here to take a look at you.” The first one came nineteen days ago at gunpoint, leaving a cloud of maybe and might do s behind.
“Oughtn't bother.”
“You’re right- you’re already getting better.” ‘Better’ ain’t what he’d call it, but Arthur is improving on how bad he had been when they first snuck here. Copperhead Landing wasn’t a place to stay long term and so Tilly had suggested a little-known cabin in the woods, long-abandoned and even longer to trek to. Arthur had managed to stay in the saddle for a while, until eventually Sadie had pulled them off the side of the road and John had caught him and half-carried him to the back of the wagon.
“Better…” Arthur breathlessly grumbles about not being allowed to get up. John thinks about how he sometimes has to lie down on the bed while his legs hang over the side to use the chamberpot, ‘cuz his head swims too much to even sit up.
“You’re staying put ‘til then,” he replies firmly. Breaths crackle under his hands like lightning flashes.
“Hmmm. You and Abigail oughta- you oughta get outta here, the Pinkertons…”
“We discussed this same thing already, Arthur. You’re coming with us.”
“I’m keeping you stuck in this cabin where Pinkertons can find you.”
“So far so good- we’re pretty far out, anyway. No one will find us.” Sadie’s gonna bring news once she’s escorted Tilly to town, see if the fuss has died down yet.
Arthur tries to sit up on his own. Fails. “Yeah … So you stay here for me and then when you get your ranch it’s gonna be somewhere warm and dry. That right?”
That’s right. John’s grip tightens, “You acting like it’s a sin for us to care about you.”
“I didn’t- work my ass off to get- get you out- only for it to go wrong because- because-” he’s getting to that breathless state where John always treads very, very carefully and he tries his best not to jar him as he lies him back down on the pillows.
“We’re gonna be fine. And- you know, when we get a place, it’s gonna be yours too, right? Hell if it ain’t half your money in it- but you- you ain’t- it ain’t gonna be the three of us playing happy families and you there only cuz we got a spare room.”
“John…. I ain’t….”
“You ain’t what?”
The look on his face is open and calm, the way the sky is after a storm. “Well I ain’t likely to live ‘til then, first of all.”
“Bullshit”, it’s an excuse which is also the truth and he hates it, he hates it, he hates it.
“All the time Uncle and Bill free-loaded off’a you, ‘bout time you got it back.” Nevermind he’s sick from debt collecting and trying to keep the gang afloat; he’s got a feeling they’re in a fragile place right now and he ain’t minded to give it too much of a shove.
"Yeah, but-" more coughing.
John cradles the back of his skull and tilts his head forward, blood waterfalling down the bedframe and onto the floor- that’s gonna stain for whatever poor bastard runs here next. A handkerchief, damp and pink, gets lost somewhere in the sheets.
“Arthur,” he begs once it’s over and that resigned expression returns, “I just want my brother back.”
A strange look fixes on him, ruined by a cough, “After everything I done-”
“You still guilty about that?” Of course he is, of fucking course he is, “Maybe you shoulda been nicer- maybe I shouldn't’ve run off for a year . Least someone in that fucking camp were thinking ‘bout what I put Abigail and Jack through. You still came to look for me, every single time I needed you- I- I’m still sorry I didn't, after the O’Driscolls, I- shit …” he pulls away and buries his face in his hands. “God, I miss Hosea. And Susan.”
And Arthur, in his weakened state, still manages to find a little left to look for him one more time by putting a hand on his shoulder, gently navigating his boat through the sea of grief. What’s it gonna be like for Arthur once the fever breaks, when he realizes how long it has been and all he has lost? If the fever breaks.He reaches up and puts his hand over the one on his shoulder in turn; red hot and thin, trembling on the tail end of each breath.
John waits for him to start coughing again and uses it as a way to sneakily test his temperature, checks the dampness of his union suit, and the heat of the blankets. “You’re too damn hot. Think we should change ya clothes?”
Arthur barely shakes his head, “No,” he rasps, pleading. “See stars when I sit up.”
“That’s cuz there’s holes in the roof.” There ain’t, but he probably does with how the bags under his eyes are darker than the night sky.
He rolls his eyes and John lets him flop back to the mattress like a rag doll, grabbing a mug from the table and then kneeling on the floor beside the bed. “Drink this.” Holds the mug to his lips, knowing better than to let him try himself, and persists even when he shakes his head. “I ain’t playin around, Arthur, you gotta drink something.” As if half an inch of water’s gonna make up for the weight he’s still losing. As if it’s gonna make up for the months and months he didn’t realize his brother was getting sick, gonna magically make him start looking better enough it don’t hurt to look at him. As if it’s gonna make up for the fact that today, when Arthur was hungry for the first time in months, he had to refuse him the stew because he was coughing too hard to keep anything down and the way it’d burn his throat on the way back up would just make everything worse.
Arthur drinks until he has to cough and cough and cough, doubling up even smaller on the bed and hiding his face so’s to try not to get no one else sick and hitting his caved-in chest with his fist.
John catches his wrist tight, “Stop that,” he chastises with a frown, “You’ll hurt yourself.” He sincerely doubts it, given how strong he ain’t, but Arthur’s always been his own worst enemy.
He hacks mightily, until a wet rose sputters and bursts into life on his sleeve. John forces the water down him again, watching and waiting until his eyes are half shut before moving closer and starting to rub his back. He did this for Abigail once, when she was pregnant and miserable and he was in limbo over the next choice of his life. The one tenderness he both knows how to do and can do well - the irony isn’t lost on him that it’s the only thing Dutch ever did worth anything, either. Unless boring them to sleep with speeches counts. He laughs.
Arthur’s eyes shoot open, “What is it?”
“Thought of something funny. I’ll tell you in the morning.”
He sinks back towards half-sleep without energy for a reply. He hates seeing his brother like this. “Arthur,” he whispers, as the candle gutters out. Without the flame gleaming on sweat he could be twelve again, hoping this big huge stranger he’d been introduced to wouldn't laugh at him for having bad dreams. “The hell are we gonna do?”
And his big brother replies, “You’re gonna... get outta this- this bullshit and- and live with your family. I’ll help. Get somewhere- real far away from Blackwater- on the other coast. Settle down proper.”
John shakes his head, “I ain’t never wanted a little place much. Ain’t a clue how to run it, neither.”
“We can hunt and make fires. Ain’t gonna starve, at least. And we’ll learn- that’s- that’s the thing…. With kids. Teach ‘em everything, but- they teach you how to want a quiet little place. ‘S all gonna be okay, John, I promise. “
It don’t sound no more or no less appealing or frightening, but then he guesses that’s what time is for.
He gives it a minute longer, then whispers, “I meant what I said…. About being somewhere warm and dry.”
A breath stutters and does not catch, “Well…. Alright then.”
In the dark, hidden, Johns smiles. “Plus you know Abigail will go mad if you don’t come with us.”
“Yeah, she’s scarier than you, that’s for sure. Sure- sure shoots better.”
“Hey!” he protests, but he leans in closer- close as he dares.
“Don’t, John, what if-”
“You ain’t gived it to anyone at camp, I’ll be fine. He pulls the sheets up- it’s easier when it’s just Jack and bedtime, but he forces himself to do it anyway. “Try to get some sleep.”
“You oughta-”
“Yeah, alright,” Goddamn it can he ever think about himself for just a minute? Fuck. “I will. But... just… try to sleep. See you in the morning.”
Morning, when he’s gotta face the day again. Gotta… Well, it ain’t morning yet. He tiptoes outside and he’s got no way of knowing, but he does it just like his son.
Runs straight into Abigail, her face the moon hanging in the darkness and when she smiles and talks her mouth makes little stars. “Finally got Jack to sleep. How is he?”
John shrugs, feeling flayed raw in the light of her candle, “Tired, I guess. Too hot. Coughing ain’t better.”
“Ain’t sound no worse from what I heard,” she assures him and he moves to let her slip through the open door, slumping back against the wall and marvelling at how gentle and kind she is and how easy it comes to her. How much he wishes he could be the same- could- could- how much he could actually help, if only he weren’t such a damn fool.
He listens to her soft voice and his desperate wheezing. Arthur was always the gentleman around women and he still is, apologizing for waking her. She tells him off and John nearly laughs for the second time tonight, listening to a grown man surrender to the hurricane she can be when she wants. She does what John could not; turns over pillows, adjusts blankets, helps him drink and when he’s done carefully, tenderly washes his face. Fuck, why didn’t he even think to clean the blood off his mouth?
When she’s done, he’s not asleep but he is closer to that than something awake, looking worse for the blood being gone, the gauntness of his jaw in full relief against the candlelight. John finds he can’t look at her as they slip back to their room and climb into bed on either side of their son.
“Maybe tomorrow Jack can read to him again,” whispers Abigail as they both stare at the ceiling.
John shrugs, “If they want.”
She tuts at him, “Stop sulking over it, John.”
“I ain’t!”
“Shush!”
They both freeze, watching and waiting for the tiny boy curled at the join of their pillows to stir. He doesn’t and John relaxes with a sigh, all the fight going out of him. “I just… hate to see him like that.”
Don’t have to have no light to know the look she’s giving him, “You mean you hate feeling useless.”
“Even Jack’s done better with him than I have.”
“You really think Arthur sees it that way?”
Well, yeah. Of course. Otherwise why’re they having this argument in the first place?
Abigail sighs and moves closer to the middle, curling into the warmth and her hair falling over her cheek. “You’re an idiot. You’re his brother and you’re trying because he’s your brother. Whatever happens, that’s the bit that’s gonna matter the most to him.”
He looks at her. She raises her eyebrow. He raises his. “How’d I find someone so damn smart?”
“You got very, very lucky. Now can we please go to sleep?”
John turns over in kind, curling carefully round his son until his and Abigail’s legs entwine. Her eyes are already closed, making tiny half moons across her skin. He does his best to follow suit, listening out for distress and hearing none.