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It’s rare to find the type of love that overwhelms you in warmth, the type that little girls dream about having one day. Webb Schroeder and Tate Markham found that love so young that it destroyed them in the end. It draws you in and leaves you wounded.
Long ago, Webb, his younger sister Narnie, and their parents had been making a journey to the ocean. Along the Jellicoe Road, they collided with another car. Webb’s mother was killed on impact, and his father took one hundred and thirty two minutes to die. Narnie counted. There was one survivor from the other car - Tate. She crawled over her own dead to hold Webb, and Narnie’s hands until a boy on a stolen bike rode by and saved them.
Since that day, they had always been romantically involved. Since neither had family who were willing to take them in, the local boarding school became their home. The boy who had saved them, and a cadet who came once a year for summer joined their group, and Webb and Tate took over as the ‘parental figures.’ They were so madly in love, and it never wavered.
Years later, Tate told Webb she was pregnant. Not long after, he disappeared. At the police station, the deputy tried to ask if there was any chance Webb had taken off. Narnie and Tate were adamant that he hadn’t. Jellicoe Road was their home. They had planned to build a house that that could all come back to, or stay in forever. Webb’s love for the four of them, especially Tate, just his love alone, was enough for them to never consider that option, not even for a second. They had been right.
The boy on the stolen bike had shot Webb out of a tree. It was an accident - he was aiming for a tin can. Having the weight of Webb’s death on his hands, the boy went crazy. He lived in the tree he shot Webb out of for years until he couldn’t take the guilt anymore and shot himself. It wasn’t an accident that time. His pain was nothing compared to Tate’s, though. She ran away, never looking back at the home and family she had made for herself.
Tate had the child in Sydney. A girl named Taylor Markham. But she wasn’t the same Tate anymore, the Tate with silky hair, and a belly laugh, who would have made the most amazing mother any child could have asked for. Her skin was so pale that she almost looked dead when she was asleep. Tate lived off of drugs and alcohol, selling her body for money to afford them. In the end, Tate ditched her child in a 7/11 on the Jellicoe Road, leaving her for Narnie to take care of. Through her psychoticness, the only thing Tate knew was that the only piece of Webb she had left deserved better. Tate never found a new love again. She died from cancer 10 years later, wishing for the life she almost had, still despairingly in love.
While they were together, every outsider who was in Webb and Tate’s presence, just for even a second, envied the connection they had. Of course, they admired other aspects of their relationship, but it always came back to how easy it was. They had never needed to try - They were Webb and Tate, had always been, and will always be. There for each other, in tune with each other, encouraging of each other, and all with love sparkling in their eyes. They had what anyone could ever ask for - an effortless love.
They became one, part of a healthy togetherness. Those surrounded by them based what they wanted in a relationship off of Webb and Tate. They radiated love, so strong it was almost blinding, but there was always more to it. They were a family. It was impossible to survive without a strong union. Their legacy is using their love to make a home, and a family. But they also knew that it wouldn’t always be perfect. They planned on the possibility of going away separately, while having a place to come home to, back to each other. Webb and Tate knew to never let their relationship cause harm to their friends, knew where to draw the line.
The thing about Webb and Tate’s relationship was that it was constantly growing. This was because of two things. The first is that they were young and on their own. Adventure and childishness and creativity were still major parts of their lives, so there was never a moment where they were at standstill. The second was the shared traumatic experience. Everyone who’s ever been through one knows that you grow closer to whoever was there with you.
It wasn’t always perfect though. No relationship is, but theirs was pretty close. They had the usual couple fights and annoyances. It never mattered for more than 10 minutes. The problem was that it was too perfect. When Webb died, Tate never recovered. They had been too close, too dependant on eachother. Tate spiraled into one of the deepest depressive states and never returned. They had never thought that they would ever have to live without each other, which left the survivor drowning.
No one had ever thought they would have to plan for that, though. Narnie had always thought their love was eternal. And it would have been. Their relationship just worked. Tate was the mother, she made sure Webb was looking after himself, and that everything was okay. She was the peacekeeper, and she kept her boy peaceful. Webb brought the adventure, the plans. He was the strategist, the person who looked into the future and saw his child, and his beautiful wife, living in the home that they built for themselves on the Jellicoe Road. They evened each other out. Tate was reasonably feminine, and Webb had adapted, had shifted to a safe middle in the gender continuum.
It was a more modern romance. No one even remembers who initiated the relationship, and they never hid the fact that they were sexually involved. While they took on separate responsibilities for their friends, taking on almost the ‘mother and father’ roles, it wasn’t an aspect of their relationship. Tate was never expected to clean, and cook, and Webb was never expected to bring home the money. And if everyone’s being honest? Webb loved it when Tate took charge of everything. Strategic as he was, Webb loved when Tate had the say.
Their relationship was quite unlike any other. Who else had come together the way they had? Not only did how they meet shape them as people and as a couple, but so did their family. Not their blood family [besides Narnie, of course]; they were either all dead or didn’t want them. The family they made for themselves. It consisted of five of them. They called themselves the F-ed Up Five.
These three other people shaped their lives, and were the center of what they became. Fitz, the town boy, who no longer stole bikes, had the mentality of a child. He loved fiercely, and lived ferociously. Jude was a boy from the city who came every summer with the cadets. He was the one who murdered his abusive father, who was hard and tough, who planted poppies to replace the ones the cadets had crushed on their morning run, the poppies Webb, Narnie, and Tate had planted to represent their dead.
And then there was Narnie. She had lost a piece of herself the day of the crash. Depression had become a part of her, and nobody ever thought that would change. Webb said that when you saw Narnie smile, it was like a revelation. Jude loved her, but she didn’t want to be loved. [He needed a Narnie revelation.]
These three broken people are who Webb and Tate looked after. Had they eaten? Gotten out of bed? Been told they were loved? Taken too many pills? Not enough? They took after all of that, while looking after themselves and eachother. They grew up so fast that they hadn’t had a choice on whether or not they wanted to be parental figures. They were the oldest, around the most, and a couple. These three kids looked up to them, and Webb and Tate had had to step up since no one else could.
Growing up so fast while being together is a strong reason on why the love never ended. When Webb died, Tate continued loving him on her deathbed, and when she passed, their daughter, Taylor, carried that love on. Narnie had been right. Their love was eternal. No demise or ending in love, only tragedy in life.
Webb had sat in that tree, thinking about the dream he had had the previous night. His daughter had visited him, and told him that her name was Taylor. He told her about the house he planned to build, ‘a home to come back to every day of their lives. Where they would all belong or long to be. A place on the Jellicoe Road.’ He died thinking of Tate, and Tate died thinking of Webb.
It’s rare to find the type of love that overwhelms you in warmth, the type that little girls dream about having one day. But nobody dreams about it ending. Nobody considers the fire, the sadness, the loneliness when that person leaves. Sometime’s it’s better to just settle.
But you know what? From this distance, everything looks so bloody perfect.