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The weather up on Brokeback is nothing if not unpredictable.
They’ve already had frigid cold and deep snow, so a storm shouldn’t be of any surprise to Jack Twist. But it sneaks up on them—the temperature slowly dropping, the wind blowing stronger. The sky grows darker and Jack keeps tilting his gaze upwards, eyeing the clouds, wondering when they’re going to need to start to worry.
Jack can feel Ennis’ mood shift with the weather.
As the wind picks up, Ennis gets quieter. It’s strange to see Ennis curl back into his shell after Jack spent damn near a month trying to drag him out of it. He isn’t sure if it’s the oncoming storm or the approaching descent back into town that’s pulling Ennis away from him, and with his silence, there's no real way to know for sure. Either way, he doesn’t like it one bit.
And it doesn’t help matters when the wind blows over their tent and sends it spiralling off into the trees.
“God damn it!” Jack curses loudly, scrambling after whatever bits of their camp aren’t nailed down. “Ennis, a little help over here?”
Ennis’ jaw is tight as he strides over to the food, packing it all up into a crate. He doesn’t reply.
Jack rolls his eyes. “You think the cans of beans are gonna fly away? Ennis, help me with the damn blankets!”
“Don’t you yell at me, Jack Twist.” His voice is tight—tighter than usual.
“Help me, then, and I won’t have to yell!”
When Ennis brushes past Jack to grab their packs, his shoulder jostles roughly against his own. Jack isn’t so sure it’s accidental.
“We can’t stay out here,” Jack tells him. “The fuckin’ tent’s gone, and there’s nothin’ we can do about the sheep now. We gotta just hunker down and deal with the damage in the morning!”
He’s trying to scramble to pick up everything he can, not wanting to lose the rest of their supplies to the wind or the rain. He can feel the first few drops spatter onto his shoulders, and he knows that Aguirre won’t take kindly to them needing to replace half their things a week before the end of the summer. Jack doesn’t want to jeopardize their chances of getting to come back and do the job next year. If he can just keep as many things safe and dry as possible, this all might not be so bad. Lightning flashes overhead and thunder makes the ground shake, and Jack picks up the pace as the rain really starts coming down.
Jack’s arms are loaded up as full as they can be with supplies when Ennis grabs him roughly by the collar.
“Ain’t no good if you get your stupid ass killed,” Ennis says gruffly, tugging Jack out of camp. “Get over here.”
They don’t go far before Ennis shoves him into the entrance to a small cave, but by the time they’re both out of the rain, they’re soaked through to the skin.
“Goddamn storm,” Jack curses, leaning his back up against the wall as he stares out into the sheet of water now pouring down over the mouth of the cave. “All our stuff. We’re gonna be in trouble these next few days.”
“We’ll survive. It’s only a week.”
Ennis' back is facing him.
“What’s your problem, huh?” Jack asks, looking up at him. He crosses his arms over his knees. “You’ve been turning sour like a lemon all afternoon. The storm really got you wound this tight?”
Ennis’ voice is so quiet, Jack has to strain to hear him. “Don’t like this weather.”
“Of course not, y’idiot,” Jack says, a note of affection in his voice in spite of himself. He’s never been able to understand what exactly it is about Ennis that makes his body feel warm. That makes him want to reach for him, all the time, and hold him skin on skin. “We’re gonna spend half the morning runnin’ around after our stuff once this settles down. And god knows what’s happening to Aguirre’s sheep right about now. This weather's terrible.”
Ennis turns, and to Jack’s surprise, there’s more emotion in his face than he’s expecting to see. He’s learned, these past few months, how to read the little twitches in the lines of Ennis’ skin. He knows him better now than he thinks maybe anyone ever has.
And he knows, now, that Ennis is afraid. And it isn't because of the weather at all.
“Hey, get over here,” Jack says, his voice gentle, extending an arm for Ennis to come and settle at his side. Without much more prompting, Ennis does, scuffing his boot against the floor of the cave as he slides down to lean against the wall, too. Jack shifts so their shoulders are pressed right up against one another.
They sit like that, quiet, for a long time. The rain and wind carry on their violent back and forth outside the mouth of the cave, the darkness lit up every so often with flashes of lightning. It feels cold and unforgiving, and if he's being honest, Jack’s grateful that Ennis is here with him.
“Do you ever think...” Ennis says finally, breaking the silence. His voice is soft, as always, but Jack can hear him easily over the pounding weather. “Do you ever wonder if God’s tryin’ to tell us something?”
Jack blinks at him, surprised. He’s not sure Ennis has ever mentioned God. “What, with this nasty weather?”
Ennis jerks his head downwards in response, muttering a gruff affirmative.
Jack’s heart goes out to him. He knows this can’t be easy on Ennis. They’ve said, over and over, that what’s happening on Brokeback is only between the two of them—that this doesn’t concern anyone else back in town. That this is a life lived totally separate from the real world. But Ennis’ real world, down there, is bigger than Jack’s. This has to be harder for him. Ennis has a woman waiting for him—a real woman, one ready to say her vows and bear his children as soon as he comes down from the mountain in a week.
Jack tries to forget about all that, most of the time. It's easier that way.
“No,” Jack says, lifting his arm to wrap it around Ennis’ shoulders. “I figure God’s got a hell of a lot more to do than to watch two cowboys on a mountain for a couple of months.”
He feels Ennis’ body relax next to him as he rests his head on Jack’s shoulder. “I hope so.”
“It’s just a storm, Ennis.” He presses his lips into Ennis’ hair. “It’s just a storm.”
They fall asleep like that, pressed up against each other as the storm howls outside. In the morning, they stumble blearily out into the sunshine to survey the damage around their camp. And with each piece of debris that they clear, with each hour that ticks away and brings them closer and closer to the end of the summer, Jack keeps repeating those words in his head.
It’s just a storm.
Maybe, eventually, he’ll start to believe them.