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Shauna knew that she had what could be called a soft spot for Javi Martinez.
She didn't know him beyond a few brief encounters related to the team, but after the crash, they bonded on the first night. Shauna was overcome by a protective instinct that was unknown to her until then. Her father's presence in her life amounted to a few visits during the year, and even so, she knew that seeing what Javi saw would have devastated her. After that, she just wanted to make things a little easier for him.
Over time, Shauna came to regard it as a strange kind of pack behavior. Javi was the runt of the litter — as tall as she was, true, but skinny — and he had that strange aura of sadness and weirdness that reminded her too much of herself.
Javi also reminded her of her younger brother. Shauna believed it was mainly because of his huge brown eyes and his habit of following her everywhere like a lost puppy.
As the months passed, every little thing in Shauna's life seemed to pile up into a pile of regrets. She hated herself for getting so angry with the boy, bitterly regretting the times she had avoided going to her father's house or that one time he had asked to spend a holiday at her house and she had refused. Out there, the resentment she felt toward her father, and by extension her brother, seemed irrelevant. She would never see her family again, and her last memory of him was of a phone call she couldn't wait to hang up.
The main difference between Javi and her Isaac was that her brother was loud by nature, always talking too much without needing encouragement to continue. His presence filled the room and both exhausted and charmed Shauna in equal measure.
Javi was more comfortable with silence. He could spend hours sitting still, carving wood or drawing, and Shauna appreciated the peace she got even with him always around. But she also enjoyed talking to the boy, discovering common interests she never imagined she would have. Comic books were one of them: Shauna was more of an X-Men girl, while Javi seemed obsessed with everything related to Batman. One of their last conversations had been entirely motivated by that.
Javi kept glancing at Shauna's belly. The boy didn't seem upset that he had found out about the pregnancy along with everyone else – when Jackie so graciously told the whole cabin, he just seemed curious, which was certainly better than the other reactions Shauna had received.
They were on the fallen log over the river that Shauna had found months earlier, the place she always went when she wanted peace away from the others. Shauna had her journal on her lap, but she wasn't really writing, too distracted to do anything but draw spirals and cubes.
Javi was carving another one of his figures. Shauna didn't really like letting anyone else use her knife, but over time she had gotten used to it. And unlike the first time she caught Javi going through her things, now she preferred to stay close by. A small part of it was to ensure the integrity of the tool, but most of it was to make sure Javi was being careful. She had already had her fair share of accidents at the meatshed. Her hand was often covered in cuts, and once, shortly after the first deer, Shauna almost lost a finger and was at the mercy of Misty's frantic care. And she definitely didn't want that for Javi.
Unlike other times, the boy wasn't fully focused on what would probably soon become some kind of animal. Shauna knew he would lose the war against curiosity sooner or later, and sure enough, he abandoned the knife and looked at her properly, and Shauna stopped scribbling to finally finally give him some attention.
“The baby,” he began slowly, clearly knowing that this was not a subject that either of the girls saw as particularly happy, “have you thought about the name yet?”
Shauna gripped the pen she was holding tightly, looking away and trying to keep a neutral expression. She didn't want to talk about it, not now, probably never, but she didn't want to take it out on him.
“No,” she finally replied after a moment of discomfort. “Why? Do you have any suggestions?”
It was a ironic question, but Javi's gaze remained focused, as he clearly took it seriously.
“You could name him after a robin.”
Shauna was confused for a second, thinking of the jv girl who is always crying, then she finally realized and almost smiled.
“Should i name my... kid... Dick?”
“What? No!” Javi wrinkled his nose in exaggerated disgust, as Shauna knew he would. “I'm obviously talking about Jason.”
Shauna froze for a moment. She could ruin the whole conversation now by reminding Javi the reason why Jason is the second robin, but not the current one.
Istead, she rolled her eyes playfully. “Why would I name my kid after that brat?”
Javi looked at Shauna as if she had kicked his dog. “He's not even that, he just has some problems.”
Shauna scoffed. "Nice try, but it's never going to happen, buddy."
Javi seemed disappointed, but brightened up soon after. “I can think of other names, I mean, if you want help.”
Shauna looked away toward the line of trees, her stomach twisting. She should end this now. Feeding his hopes was just cruel to both of them. Yet she chose not to, opting instead to offer him a broken smile that would never have convinced anyone else. “You can keep trying if you want, I just expect you to come up with a better idea.”
Van's bloody bandages and the emptiness that used to be filled by Laura Lee's presence taught Shauna that she should not have any hope of leaving that place. She hadn't said it out loud and wouldn't do so, but she knew she would be the next one, either from a miscarriage caused by malnourishment or from the inevitable birth. One of the two would kill her, and there was nothing she or anyone else trapped in that hell could do about it.
The prey was becoming increasingly rare, the moral among the girls had never been so low, and every single day was a different kind of hell. Even so, Shauna had a duty to fulfill, and that duty could not be left vacant when her stupidity finally got the better of her.
Natalie had managed to catch a hare. It wasn't much, the brown animal would barely last two days with so many people, but it was still meat, it was still something, and it would serve the lesson Shauna had planned.
Nat handed her the animal and Shauna looked around, most of the girls were already outside, looking at the hare with the kind of disappointment that seemed to accompany the whole group like a black cloud.
Shauna's eyes went to her usual place, Jackie, the girl was poking the ground with a stick, her forehead furrowed, clearly unhappy about something. Shauna misses her best friend so much, it's a thorn in her side that never goes away, but their strained relationship has gotten even worse since she told her about the pregnancy. The few conversations they had were fraught with tension and discomfort, and Shauna is getting more and more angry. Jackie doesn't even know who the baby's father is, so what gives her the right to avoid her like this? Shauna has a fucking time bomb in her uterus and Jackie is too busy holding a grudge for whatever justification she has found to not talk to her.
She looked away from the girl, doing her best to hide the resentment and sadness on her face, completely unaware that Jackie's eyes were fixed on her the moment she looked away, searching for Javi.
It was better that she was the one to teach her successor, she had become somewhat attached to the task and didn't want Ben to do it, she bet he wouldn't teach Javi as well as she could.
She offered a small smile to the boy who was sitting by the fire away from the conversations around him, "Hey, Javi, I thought you could come with me, if you still want to learn."
Javi nodded immediately, already getting up and putting the wooden figurine he was rolling between his fingers in his shorts pocket.
Javi had been helping her with small things for a long time, so he had a little idea of what to do, but this was the first time Shauna would do it as a lesson.
She placed the hare on the table, then gave the boy a serious look, knife already in hand. “If you throw up, I'll kick you away from my table immediately.”
Javi snorted indignantly. “I'm not going to throw up over a rabbit, I'm not a kid,” he replied stubbornly.
Shauna raised an eyebrow. He was definitely the only kid within miles.
"Some people older than you almost did it." She replied. Jackie almost did it, but she kept the second part to herself. Shauna had been trying to avoid mentioning Jackie to other people as much as possible, slowly curing her habit of making random conversations about her.
Javi shrugged, unperturbed. "I can take it."
Shauna just nodded, believing the boy, but she knew she would pay attention to signs of nausea, not wanting to make him sick.
"Now, just pay attention to what I do." She ordered, unsure if that was a good way to teach him, but she preferred that to a long lecture about cutting.
She went through the steps more slowly than she would have alone, always watching Javi to see if he was paying attention.
"First you bleed, then you skin, then you gut it," she explained to him. Soon after, she separated the kidneys, heart, and liver, explaining that Mari could also use those parts.
She stopped when it was finally clean and ready to be divided. From that point on, there was no longer any risk of the meat spoiling, so Javi could do something other than just watch. She cleaned up and handed him the knife.
Shauna gave him instructions on where to cut, she surpassed Ben's lessons and learned how to do it in her own way, and she knew that Javi would also be able to do the same. At least he had more experience handling the knife than Shauna had when she started, so she wasn't as worried about him hurting himself as she did.
Javi was definitely using too much force to separate the pieces, the makeshift table shaking beneath him, but Shauna didn't say anything. He would eventually learn his way of cutting, and she would have to remember to also teach him how to sharpen and maintain the knife so it would always be in good condition. That really mattered to her, she wanted to make sure it would continue to be well cared for.
“Mari may cook, but the meat is entirely our responsibility. We decide each person's portion, and that means we have to do it right. Everyone gets an equal amount, and we need to try to make sure there's enough left over for the next meal.”
Javi nodded, concentrating on the cuts. “Is that enough to last until tomorrow?” he asked, a little uncertain. Shauna looked at the hare, which wasn't much even for one meal.
“We need it to last,” she said, trying to keep her voice light. "It's much easier to do that with larger animal. I'm sure your brother or Nat will be able to catch at least one deer again soon."
Javi looked at her intently, absorbing every word. Shauna could see that he was taking it seriously and was a little proud of that. She knew she had made the right choice.
The cuts were more uneven than hers, but he hadn't faltered or hurt himself. Shauna considered it a great victory for her teaching method.
That night, even though most of the girls didn't seem to care, Shauna made a point of mentioning that Javi had been responsible for the butchering. Her quick remark was rewarded with an almost positive look from Travis, an angry stare from Jackie, and a half-smile from Javi, the only one who really mattered.
Shauna didn't think much about Javi during the months that followed, just another thing in that big pile of reasons to hate herself.
After the first snowfall, there was very little room left in Shauna to care about anything other than what had been lost. She knew she should have done more, she should have helped look for him, or she should at least have kept him in mind as Lottie seemed to have done all these months.
But Shauna, who had failed him irreparably that night, managed to make everything even worse with her inability to think about anything other than Jackie Taylor.
Taissa brought him back, and for a moment Shauna was genuinely thinking that he was a product of her imagination, just an illusion like the ones that had been happening at the meatshed for months.
Snow doesn't give back what it takes, that was the lesson she had learned.
She gradually convinced herself that this was really happening, and then it became clear how different Javi had become.
Shauna continued not daring to get close to him. Travis had been watching his brother like a hawk, and she had been keeping her distance from Travis for a long time, after that night, after what he had taken from her and after the horrible things she had done, she couldn't even bring herself to look at him often.
Travis definitely remembers Shauna's knife at his throat, but he doesn't know that Shauna told Javi to run, he doesn't know that she is responsible for him almost losing his only family out there.
Shauna should have apologized months ago, but the words would never leave her throat, she wasn't able to say it to Jackie, she wasn't able to say it to him.
She kept a close watch, noticing Travis and the girls attempts to get him to talk, and above all the fear that often appeared on Javi's face. The girls were clearly bothering him, and Shauna was probably included in that since his eyes always looked away very quickly on the few occasions Shauna caught him looking at her.
As time passed, things in the cabin continued to go to hell, and Shauna continued to watch the boy from a distance.
He was her friend, the first one Shauna had made on her own out there. Of course, she had Tai, and she really cared about her, and sometimes she had Lottie, when the girl was able to act like her old teammate and not some cult leader.
But she still felt lonely all the time, and Javi may be safe, but Shauna still knows that she is not and that time is running out faster and faster.
The closed door might as well be a brick wall.
Shauna had made sure that Javi was the only one there. Travis was outside helping with the firewood while the coach was doing whatever the coach does. She couldn't care less about him.
She took a deep breath, shame running through her, she could just give up, go back to her corner on the floor, or even to the empty meatshedt, it would probably be better for him.
Trying to dispel these thoughts, Shauna knocked slowly three times on the door, then waited for a response before remembering that Javi probably wouldn't tell anyone to come in or leave.
She opened the door and entered slowly, giving him more than enough time to do something that would indicate he wanted her out of the room. She left the door open, showing that he could simply walk out if he wanted to.
Javi did neither.
He was sitting on the small bed in the corner of the room, knees tucked up to his chest. Shauna cleared her throat, hating how her eyes stung.
“Hi,” she said uncomfortably, making a conscious effort not to grip the things she was holding too tightly.
Javi just stared at her. Shauna knew he was analyzing her cautiously, but at least she didn't see that fear yet. That was a good thing, right?
Shauna looked around the room, avoiding the boy for a moment. It was as decrepit, cold, and ugly as the rest of the cabin.
"Are you cold?" she asked, even though he clearly had blankets on the bed and warm clothes.
Javi shook his head in response.
"Hungry?" she asked, this problem would not have such an easy solution as just taking someone's extra blanket, but at least, she could get a cup of the horrible pine tea the girls were drinking.
Javi shook his head again.
"Now you're just lying to me", Shauna replied, an attempt at humor in her words.
The slightest of smiles tilted the corners of Javi's lips as he shrugged.
Shauna looked at the things she was holding, another excuse to avoid the boy's gaze.
When her first pens started to fail, she did a pretty good job of looking for others among the team stuff. Most of them didn't care about things like that anymore, so she managed to get a decent little stock of pens, pencils, and a few extra notebooks just to be safe.
She held two pencils, a black pen, and a red pen she had never used, as well as a small notebook she couldn't remember who it belonged to. Shauna tore out the few used pages, so it was practically new.
Back home, she wouldn't even bother to think too much about the value of what she had gotten, but in that cabin, it meant something, it had to mean something.
She placed the gifts on the bed, near Javi, who looked at them curiously.
“I got this for you,” she said. “I know it's not much... but you've always liked to draw, so I thought it might be nice.”
This time Javi really smiled, opening the notebook and slowly flipping through the empty pages. Shauna felt a tight knot slowly loosening in her chest.
She looked at the door. She should probably leave, but she also wanted so much to stay.
“Can I stay?” she finally asked. “Just a little longer.”
Javi nodded.
Shauna sat down on the opposite corner of the bed, watching him start to scribble something.
She observed the boy, cataloging the small differences, she had already noticed how much he had grown, his face had lost some of its childish features, it was thinner and more angular, maybe it was the growth spurt, most likely it was hunger, his hair was a little shorter than she remembered.
Javi had no frostbite, Shauna noticed with some surprise. The girls had been talking nonstop about their theories of where he had been or who was helping him, but Shauna had dismissed it all, uninterested in their endless gossip.
But something about the way Javi seemed to have been spared the effects of cold was disturbing Shauna, frustration beginning to build.
When the snow fell, Javi was somewhere protected enough, warm enough that he wasn't hurt.
Javi and Jackie were outside on the same night, and yet Travis was able to get him back while Shauna had Jackie taken from her twice.
It was not fair, it was not right.
Shauna made one mistake, she looked away for one night and lost everything, how could Travis do the same thing and escape the consequences?
Shauna physically winced as the anger and resentment became suffocating, she turned her face away, her hair covering it like a shield, Javi shouldn't see this, he had no idea how broken and rotten everything was inside her, and he didn't deserve to find out about anything that had happened since he disappeared.
Shauna clenched her fists, feeling the distant pain of her nails tearing into her palms. For the first time, she remembered to try one of Lottie's stupid breathing exercises, and tried her best to bury it, to turn the anger and envy into just sadness, as it was safer for everyone.
Shauna finally snapped out of it, and she felt Javi's gaze on her.
The boy's pen had stopped moving and he looked tense, waiting for an explosion that didn't come.
The silence was exhausting, Shauna just wished she could end it once and for all, maybe that wasn't such a good idea after all, she got up slowly, her pregnancy always getting in the way, always holding her back.
She walked to the door as quickly as she could without looking ridiculous. Before leaving, she turned to the boy still in bed, avoiding his eyes.
“I'm really sorry, Javi,” she murmured. The words didn't burn as Shauna thought they would, but they still left a bitter taste. “I'm just happy that you're here again.”