Work Text:
20 years and that was it,
He wasn't even worthy enough to protect his family
From 1st to what may as well have been the last
At first it was “you need a break, you can’t do everything”, then “I just want to give the others a chance” then “No”
It wasn't just him, Arthur and John had been left to, they were their kids and the best men they had yet still weren't good enough
Micah had just swooped in and knocked them off the board
He'd tried warning him
That he was only saying what he wanted
But apparently he was just jealous and didn’t want to see him happy
Dutch Van Der Lin had finally lost it
Sometimes Hosea dreamed about before, when it was just them. He loved to gang but he missed it.
They would sit around their small fire which he obviously had to build and look up from their books occasionally, smile at each other and Dutch would just start talking and Hosea wasn't always listening but he’d give anything to his rambling again. Dutch would also try to get as close to him without him noticing and would just fall asleep on his shoulder. Hosea rubbed his shoulder getting a phantom feeling of the ache he would wake up with, yet he never complained. He mourned the people they were before. He was now stuck with watching him read the same book over and over on the other side of camp as he avoided him like a disease.
Yesterday, he had heard him yelling at Arthur again for leaving camp for a couple days more than he was supposed to. Hosea couldn’t blame him, if he could stay away he would, yet he couldn’t, he saw pieces of the person Dutch was and he holds on to the hope he would come back, he knew it was stupid but if he went it would be admitting he gave up on him which he couldn’t and if he left the boys would be left her and he wouldn’t leave his sons he’d give his life for with a man on the edge of a breakdown. He'd tried to get them to leave and take Jack and Abigail with them but they were as stubborn as he was. Arthur had gotten close but Dutch had had one of his good days which had brought everything back, almost as if he knew what they were doing. The good days were worse than the bad because they were always waiting for the shoe to drop and they knew it wouldn’t last, yet every time they looked like kids on Christmas.
His last good day was a couple weeks ago, Dutch had asked him to go fishing which caused his face to fill with joy and a pit of dread into his stomach. They go to the spot, Hosea hadn’t been fishing since they had moved camps but he’d been meaning to and he wasn’t expecting to have Dutch ask him. He’d ask how he had been and he had to lie, he needed him to stay for as long as he could.
“Fine. How have you been?” he had said.
“Good. I’ve missed this” Dutch had replied while admiring the emptiness in front of them.
They had stayed silent while they fished. Everything was peaceful yet Hosea was still too distracted to catch anything but Dutch had caught more than enough. They hadn’t gone back straight away instead Dutch had grabbed his hand and stared at him not saying anything for what felt like hours until something snapped and the look of love and remembrance that he had thought he had seen was gone and replaced with a cold yet familiar glare as he snatched his hand back with disgust and threw him the ores and he had quickly rowed back wanting to forget what he had been so close to and bury it in another bottle. Which he did.