Chapter Text
The door to the attic creaks when JJ pulls it down, and even though Mama is working in the garden and Mom is on patrol he is extra quiet when he climbs the ladder into the dusty room. He shuffles forward on his hands and knees, crawling past boxes upon boxes filled with books, comics, movies and photo albums, until he reaches the other side of the room.
There he finds what he's looking for. A guitar case. He wipes his hand over the top, stirring up a cloud of dust and he can only just stop himself from erupting into a coughing fit. That guitar case hasn't been opened in a long time. JJ feels a bit like this guy in the movie he caught Mom and Mama watching one night, with the hat, leather jacket and a whip at his hip, discovering treasures of the past. This sure feels like finding a treasure. He clicks open the clasps to the case and lifts the lid.
There it is.
Holding his breath, JJ runs a hand over the wood of the guitar, feeling the little dents and cracks that tell a story all of their own - one JJ wishes to know one day. Despite those little flaws the guitar is beautiful, colored a rich red-brown with a moth painted on the neck. Carefully, JJ plucks the thickest string and the deep sound that comes from the body of the guitar runs right through his bones.
"Jesse Joel Williams!"
Oh boy.
"Get down here or so help me!"
JJ snatches his hand back and hastily closes the case.
"Coming!" he calls back and grabs a random comic from one of the boxes on his way back. He climbs down the ladder and comes face to face with Mama who has her hands on her hips, brows furrowed in disapproval.
"Mind telling me what you were doing up there?"
JJ puts his most innocent face on. "I was just looking for a comic to read," he says, holding up the comic in question.
"Oh yeah?" Mama seems sceptical. "What's it about?"
Shit.
"Uh..." JJ stares at the cover in hopes of finding a clue to the plot. Savage Starlight. That's not exactly helpful. "It's about this, uh, guy... who, uhm, does things... in space...?"
"Really. "
"Yeah, sounds pretty cool, right?"
"Absolutely. Very impressive for something you just made up. Why, I'm almost tempted to read it myself."
JJ shrinks a little in size, but Mama has a crinkle in the corner of her eye which means she's at least a little amused.
"What were you really doing up there?"
JJ hesitates, fiddling with the corners of the comic. "Promise me you won't tell Mom?"
The amusement vanishes from Mama's face, replaced by worry. "What's going on?
"I found her guitar."
"Oh, sweetheart…”
"You said she used to play a lot and now she doesn't anymore. I didn't even know she played at all until you told me."
"Honey, come here." Mama takes his hand and sits down with him on the stairs. Her face is sad and JJ's stomach coils in dread. "That guitar was a gift from Joel. With her hand... she can't really play it anymore, and seeing it... it just makes her really sad. That's why it's hidden up there."
JJ breathes a soft oh. "I didn't know that."
Mama runs a hand through his hair and JJ leans into her side. "No, she doesn't really like to talk about it."
"Do you think I'll make her sad if I ask her about it?"
Mama sighs, rubbing her hand up and down his back. "Probably. But remember a few years ago when Buckley died?"
JJ nods. That wasn't a good day
"We were all sad together, we cried and we felt a little better afterwards, yeah?"
"Yeah..."
"Sometimes we need to be sad, so we can feel better again."
"Mom says I'm good at making people feel better. You say so, too, and my friends in school say that."
Mama looks at him with a sad smile and JJ knows she's thinking of his Dad. "Yeah, you are." She drops a kiss into his hair and gets up. "Come on, it's late and you have school tomorrow."
JJ groans. "It's not even dark out."
"Doesn't mean it's not late."
"But Mom is not back from patrol yet."
"And she won't be for at least another hour yet and that's way past your bedtime."
"Oh come on. Pleeease?"
"Bathroom. Toothbrush. Now."
***
An hour later JJ is lying in bed with the Savage Starlight comic on his knees (it's actually not a bad read) when he hears the front door open. Mom is back. He shoves the comic under his pillow and sneaks out of his room to the stairs. Through the bars of the railing he sees Mom and Mama standing in the kitchen. Mama is leaning back against the table with a mug of tea in her hands, Mom is going through the contents of her backpack, her revolver lying next to it on the table.
"Bonnie and I went through that movie store up in Wilson Valley and I think I found something JJ will like." She takes a DVD out of her backpack and gives it to Mama.
"Finding Nemo? Man, I hear that's a classic. Jesse's parents have been scouring the library for it for years."
Mom sets her backpack down and locks her revolver in the drawer of the cabinet. "Yeah, we can watch it and then give it to the library. Maybe. Depends on how much JJ likes it."
Mama throws her a smile. "Depends on how much you like it you mean."
"I don't know what you're talking about."
Mama hums. "He's probably still awake, you know. He doesn't like going to bed when you're not back yet."
"Yeah, I know. I didn't mean to take this long. We ran into some trouble on our way back and it took longer than I thought."
"What kind of trouble?"
"A horde. We had to wait for it to pass by."
"Does Maria know?"
Mom nods. "We'll check again in two weeks. If they haven't moved on, she'll send out a clean up crew."
"Good." Mama pauses, staring down into her mug. "Ellie."
"Hm?"
"JJ has asked me not to tell you, but..."
JJ can't see Mom's face but she sounds worried. "What is it?"
"He went up into the attic today."
"Okay?"
Mama sighs, putting her mug into the sink. "Ellie, he found your guitar."
Mom stands still. Her shoulders rise and fall with every breath she takes and for a long time she says nothing. JJ is holding his breath, he doesn't dare move.
"Did he ask you about it?"
Mama nods.
"What did you tell him?"
"The truth. That you can't play it anymore because of your hand and that it's hidden up there because... Joel gave it to you. "
Mom takes a step back, nods to herself. "Okay."
"Okay?"
"Yeah, it's just... " With a sigh she drops into a chair, holding the stumps of her missing fingers. "He's gonna start asking questions now, isn't he? "
"Probably. But that was bound to happen sooner or later."
JJ can't see much of Mom's face, but what he sees looks very broken.
"How much should I tell him?"
With a heavy sigh Mama sits down next to Mom, shoulder to shoulder. "I don't know," she says, laying a hand on Mom's arm. "What do you want to tell him?"
Mom turns her head to look at her and JJ is shocked to see tears brimming in her eyes. "The good parts," she says so quietly he can barely hear it.
Mama cups Mom's cheek in her hand, gently guiding their heads together. "Then that'll be enough."
JJ sneaks back into his room then. He shouldn't have seen that and he definitely shouldn't have heard that and now he feels bad. He crawls back under the blankets and turns off his night light, but he doesn't sleep. Instead he just lies awake, thinking.
What were they talking about? What is it that Mom doesn't want to tell him? What are the good parts and why was Mom crying? Mom never cries, not when Buckley died, not when they watch a sad movie, not even the few times they went to Joel's grave. What's so horrible that she can't tell him about it?
JJ hugs the blankets a little tighter around his shoulders, curling into a ball. He's worried. Seeing Mom so broken was... scary... and he wants to help. He's good at helping. He'll figure something out.
A while later when he's almost fallen asleep, he feels a hand running through his hair and fingers smoothing over the furrow in his brow. He knows it's Mom by the way she smells; like that old jacket she wears everytime she goes out. It's a bit big on her, but she says it's warm and comfortable and it smells good, and she's definitely right about that last part. It smells like wood and sunlight and evenings spent by the fire, but mostly it smells like home and comfort. It smells like Mom.
She tucks the blanket around his shoulders and plucks a strand of hair from his forehead.
"Goodnight, kiddo."
JJ is asleep before she's even left the room.
***
JJ had asked Mama once what she had liked most about Dad and she had answered with his patience and his good heart. And then she'd looked at him and said you're just like him. JJ's little chest had puffed up with pride at that. Usually he tries to live up to the picture of his Dad and most days it wasn't even hard. But when almost a week later Mom still hasn't said a word about the 'good parts' JJ's patience is on it's very last thread.
"How was school today?" Mom asks him on their way home. "Did you learn something?"
JJ shrugs. "Not really."
Mom's lips are pulled into a half smile when she looks down at him. "What, a whole day spent in school and you learnt nothing at all?"
"Nothing useful." JJ kicks a stone, stuffing his hands into the pocket of his hoodie. "We don't learn how to kill Runners or what to do if we see a Bloater, how to sneak past a Clicker and no one has ever even mentioned Shamblers."
"How do you know about Shamblers?"
Crap. He's not supposed to know about Shamblers.
"Uh, Tommy told me?"
"And did he tell you what to do if you encounter one?"
"Don't attack them at close range, they're faster than bloaters but easier to kill and they explode into clouds of spores when they die, which first of all is fucking gross-"
"Language, JJ."
"- and secondly super dangerous, so don't hang around once you've finished one off."
"Well, there you go. You already know all there is to know about Shamblers, except that they don't exist in these parts because as far as I know they've never made it out of Washington."
"How do you know they're in Washington?”
Mom shoots him a quick nervous glance. "... magic."
"I don't believe in magic."
"That's not my fault. And anyway, how does Tommy know about Shamblers?"
"Because he's Tommy. He knows things."
"Oh, I see. Tommy can just magically know things and I can't?"
"Well. Yeah."
Mom gives him a flat look. "Ouch."
They walk past the workshop and JJ jumps on one of logs that lie on the floor, balancing across it. "When can I start with patrol training?"
"How old are you?"
"Twelve?"
"And how old does Maria say you have to be every time you pester her about it?"
JJ's shoulders deflate as he jumps from the log. "Sixteen."
"There you go. Man, that's another eight years. You've got a long road ahead of you, buddy."
"It's four years!"
"Really? Hang on, let me go through it again." Mom taps her finger against her lips with a hum. "Alright, I was wrong. It's actually nine years."
"Mom!"
Mom playfully nudges his shoulder with his. "Patrols aren't the heroic adventures you think they are. It's a lot of riding and waiting around. Once you've had your first patrol in the cold and the rain you're gonna wish you'd never signed up."
"So why do you always go?"
Mom doesn't react at first. She has that blank expression on her face that she always puts on when she doesn't want people to know what she's feeling.
"Because I need to look after things."
"Lots of other people who can look after things," JJ grumbles. He doesn't like Mom being out there. He's only twelve, but even he knows of cases where not everyone who went on patrol came home again. It's not that he doubts Mom's abilities - he knows she's one of the best shots in town and he's proud of that - it's just that Mom is so determined to protect the people around her that JJ fears she'll forget to protect herself.
"Exactly. And they're all doing their jobs, same as I'm doing mine."
"Mama never goes on patrol."
"Mama almost never goes on patrol. She has other jobs to do. She helps out at the farms and the greenhouses, she teaches the kids to ride and sometimes she goes out to look after the dam. People do what suits them best."
"I guess," JJ says. "I'd rather go on patrols, though. We could be partners, covering each other's backs."
"JJ-"
"When I'm old enough, I mean. That would be cool, right? Like you and Joel were partners?"
Mom is walking faster now, forcing JJ into an almost jog to keep up with her. She doesn't seem all that excited at the idea of them being partners. There's a pained frown on her face and her left hand, the one with the missing fingers is clenched to a fist.
"Mom?"
She throws him a quick look, trying for a smile, but it's more of a grimace. "We'll see, okay?"
And suddenly JJ has had enough. Enough of the secrecy and the half truths and pretending everything is fine. He stops in the road, planting both his feet firmly on the ground.
"Mom."
She turns around, looking him up and down. "What's going on?" she asks when it's clear he's not going to move.
"Why did you never tell me you played the guitar?"
Out of the dozen questions that are swirling in his head, it's that one that bothers him the most.
Mom's shoulders deflate with a sigh. "How did you find out about that?"
"Mama was showing me this photo album 'cause I asked her about Dad and there was a photo of the three of you at a bonfire and you were playing the guitar."
Mom stares off into the distance, eyes softening a fraction. "I remember that evening. It was the first time I played for someone other than Joel. I was so nervous that day that Joel cancelled his shift on watch duty and took me on patrol instead to get my mind off things."
"Mama said it's what made her fall in love with you, hearing you play."
"She said that?"
JJ nods. "And I never even knew you played at all."
"JJ, I'm sorry. I didn't think it mattered so much. I can't play anymore, I can't play anything for you, so telling you wouldn't have made a difference."
"Bullshit." JJ's chest is heaving, hands clenched into fists. "If it didn't matter you wouldn't make such a big deal of hiding it. You wouldn't have kept the guitar all these years and you wouldn't have hidden it from me."
Mom presses her lips together, fiddling with her fingers. "You're right. I'm sorry."
Her words came so unexpectedly that all anger leaves JJ in a rush. He's left staring at Mom. Waiting.
"So tell me."
Mom nods. "I'll show you."
***
JJ knows the roads they're taking well, past the cemetery and the greenhouses. Sometimes after school, when he knows Mama is still working and Mom is still on patrol, he comes and visits Tommy. He's not sure the old man likes him coming over - he always sighs whenever JJ shows up at his doorstep - but he never sends him away and JJ always gets a mug of chocolate.
For as long as he can remember Mama has never liked Tommy and he has no idea why. Sure, he's a bit grumpy and he doesn't smile often. He keeps to himself mostly. The only person who really visits him apart from JJ is Maria. JJ sometimes sees them sitting on his porch and more often than not Maria looks at him like the sight of him is hurting her heart.
And Mom - Mom doesn't really visit him either as far as JJ knows, but he's pretty sure she has a soft spot for him. She asks JJ sometimes, when she knows he's been visiting him, how Tommy's doing. JJ never quite knows how to answer that question. For him Tommy is just Tommy like he's always been: grouchy, seldom in a good mood, alone. But he also stocks up on chocolate for JJ and answers the questions no one else seems to have the patience to, so JJ is pretty sure there's some kindness in him. He and Joel were brothers, that much JJ knows. It's all he knows, in fact, because Tommy is almost as reluctant to talk about Joel as Mom is.
"We're going to Tommy's house?" JJ asks.
"It wasn't always Tommy's," Mom says. They enter the yard through the back gate, heading toward the garage. "It used to be Joel's, a long time ago, and this-" she points at the garage, "-used to be my place."
"You lived in a garage?"
Mom smiles at his skeptical tone. "I did." They stop at the door, Mom looks at him. "Shall we see what's inside?"
JJ stands up straighter and nods eagerly. Mom lifts the doormat and pulls out a key.
Then she opens the door.
Dust is the first thing JJ sees. The light breaking through the window makes every particle stand out, hovering in the air. He steps past Mom, taking a look around. There's a coffee table in the middle of the room and a small kitchen next to a desk at the opposite wall. To his left is a large empty bookcase and a double bed with no sheets. And that's it. All of it is covered in a thick layer of dust - it's been a while since anybody has set foot in this place.
"How long did you live here?"
"Four or five years or something." Mom steps further into the room, taking a careful look at everything. JJ wonders what she sees, what kind of memories come with this place - all JJ sees is a dusty room. He tries to picture Mom as the girl she once was, getting out of that bed, standing at that kitchen range and sitting at that desk. He can't quite manage it. Looking at Mom, at her sad eyes traveling the room, he thinks maybe she's trying to picture the same thing.
"Why didn't you live with Joel in the house?" he asks.
Mom shoots him a quick look. "I don't know, I guess... For as long as we'd known each other we'd always been traveling, always on the road, never staying in one place. I think neither of us quite knew how to have a home together, so we just... figured something out." Mom smiles to herself. "That was Joel's way of doing things. Figuring stuff out, making it work. He was good at that."
Mom's eyes stop at the coffee table, something complicated passing over her face. Hesitantly, she walks toward it and sits down, hands flat on the surface.
"This is where he gave me the guitar," she starts. "He sat right here on the table and I sat at the desk and he played me a song. He gave me the guitar as a gift afterward, taught me to play on it." Mom takes a breath, folding her hands in her lap. "So yeah. You were right. It matters a lot to me and I'm sorry it took me this long to tell you."
JJ nods. He doesn't quite know what to say. It's a strange thing, the ghost of someone he's never met having such a big impact on his life. JJ knows what Joel looked like from the few photos he's in, but he hardly knows anything else about him. He doesn't know what his voice sounded like or the way he smelled, the sound of his footsteps or that of his laugh. What did it feel like standing next to him and what was it like being someone he loved?
Out of all the people that are important to JJ he's the only person he doesn't know these things about. He even knows them about Dad, because Mama answers every single question he has about him.
Joel, though, is a mystery. Mom and Tommy rarely talk about him and the few times he's asked Mama she said it's not her story to tell. JJ gets that, but Joel is part of his story. It's half his name after all, and he thinks it's about time he finds out why.
"What was he like?"
Mom bites her bottom lip in thought. "What was he like..." she repeats, cupping her hand around her missing fingers. "If I had to describe him in a word I'd say he was a protector, often a ruthless one. He was the first to enter a building of Infected and the last to leave it, always one eye on his partner. He was a fixer. To every problem there were two solutions. He was comfort, a steady presence. A quiet refuge if you needed him to be. But he was also stubborn, selfish sometimes, and proud. Didn't know a compliment if it slapped him in the face."
JJ breathes a laugh at that and Mom's lips quirk into a half smile.
"But most of all he was... gentle. Patient. He never made you feel guilty about anything, didn't judge. That's what I loved most about him, that I didn't have to hide or pretend, I could just… be." Mom falls quiet, staring off into space. No doubt losing herself in memories - good ones, JJ hopes, but fears the opposite. The look on Mom's face is not exactly what he would call nostalgic, more like haunted. She snaps out of it, gaze jumping at JJ.
"And that concludes my essay on Joel Miller," she says with a forced lightheartedness. "Comments, opinions...?"
"You didn't tell me how he died."
Evidently the wrong thing to say going by the shadow passing over Mom's face. "A good heart at the wrong time," is all she says, with an air of finality to it, that has JJ feeling she's done talking.
But JJ isn't.
"He sure sounds a lot like you," he points out.
"A good heart at the wrong time?"
"No, that other stuff you said. Protective, gentle and patient."
Mom looks down at her hands, pressing her lips together. "I don't know about that."
" 'cause you're never protective, gentle and patient with yourself."
Mom stills for a moment, eyes widening in surprise or maybe realization. When she looks at him it's with a sense of wonder in her eyes. "You're pretty wise for a kid your age."
JJ shrugs, hiding a proud smile. "Someone has to be. And you sure aren't."
"And now you're being a dick. Time to go home, I think. Mama is probably wondering where we are."
They leave the garage, Mom locking the door behind them while JJ looks around aimlessly. He casts a look at the house and sees Tommy standing at the window of the kitchen. He doesn't smile when he sees them but that's not so unusual. His mouth is set into its usual grim line, brow furrowed. JJ does what he always does when he sees Tommy: He waves. Normally Tommy waves back and on very lucky days he even smiles a little, but today Tommy does none of these things. His face stays in its bitter mask and he turns his head and limps away from the window. Disheartened, JJ lowers his hand. What was that about?
"You coming?" Mom calls, drawing his attention. She's standing at the fence, one hand holding the gate open.
JJ hurries after her, throwing one last look over his shoulder, but Tommy doesn't appear at the window again.
"What's the deal with you and Tommy?" JJ asks while waiting for mom to lock the gate.
"What do you mean?"
"He's Joel's brother, right?"
"Right."
"So that means he's practically your uncle, right?"
"Uhm-"
"So why do you never talk to him?"
Mom steps away from the gate, avoiding JJ's eyes "It's complicated," she says and leads on homeward, JJ right beside her.
"Mama doesn't like him, but you do."
"And you know Mama doesn't like it when you visit him."
"Yeah, but she hasn't told me why and she hasn't exactly forbidden it either."
"If you want to keep it that way, maybe don't tell her he's been teaching you about Shamblers."
"She already knows."
"Does she?"
"Yeah. And you're not answering my question."
Mom sighs. "Can we just... keep that question for another day?"
JJ looks up into her tired face. She looks old somehow. Worn out. "Too much?"
"Too much."
JJ lets it go. They round a corner and Tommy's house disappears from his vision. JJ wonders what Tommy is doing all alone in that big house. It must be sad, the silence and the loneliness. Maybe that's why he's so grumpy all the time.
With a sudden spring in his step. JJ makes a decision. He'll visit Tommy tomorrow, bring his walkman. Music seems to be one of the few things that cheer him up. Yeah, that sounds like a plan.
_________
Ellie
Bringing the guitar to Jackson had been Dina's idea. It was about a year after Ellie had come back from Santa Barbara. A year of trying to rebuild what they once had, a year of trying to make it right, of apologizing and forgiving. A year of grieving. For the first time since his death, Ellie had let herself grieve Joel, without the guilt and regret. Just him.
Joel and those future days she had taken for granted.
When Dina and her went back to the farm house to pick up some of Ellie's stuff, Ellie hadn't been prepared for the punch in the gut she'd gotten from seeing her guitar again. She had just stood there, frozen in place, a noose tightening around her neck. There was no use taking the guitar home, she'd told herself. She wasn't ever going to play it again, so what good would it do? But Dina... Dina had taken one look at her face and whatever she'd seen there had made her put hand on her arm and she'd taken the guitar and put it back in it's case.
She was the one who'd carried it home- just the thought of touching it had made the stumps on Ellie's hand burn, but she told herself that that was okay. She didn't need the guitar to get better, she would be just fine without it. And that's what she kept telling herself over the past decade. The guitar had found its way into the attic and Ellie had never gone up there to look for it.
Until now.
It's well past midnight and Ellie finds herself sitting in the darkened attic nex to the open guitar case. She's hugging her knees to her chest, limbs gone stiff from how long she's been sitting here. Her eyes have gotten used to the darkness and she can make out the shape of the guitar, strings shimmering in the moonlight. Slowly she moves her arm, laying her palm on the strings. With her thumb she plays the lowest note. The sound, somehow deeper than she remembers, sends a shiver down her spine and from some deep corner of her chest, something rises up in her. It's not grief exactly - Ellie knows that feeling well enough. It's not regret or guilt either, but it makes tears rise in her eyes and the corners of her lips tremble into a smile.
And suddenly she knows what that feeling is. It's that of his comforting hand on her shoulder, of his scratchy beard at her temple when he hugged her. Cool evenings spent on the porch, struggling with that C chord. It's the feeling of making that trip to the moon and coming back to a place she can call home.
Ellie closes her eyes, letting a tear run down her cheek. It gets caught in the smiling corner of her mouth.
"Hey Joel," she whispers into the darkness and she can almost hear him whisper back.