Archive of Our Own

 - Brand New City, Mitski

Tess was humming. It was a habit she had, when she was nervous or pensive or both. Odds were it was about the job they’d just run, but she’d come around to saying so in her own time. He nudged her hip with his and felt her bump him gently back. Upstairs, the neighbors were having another screaming match that echoed down through the vents. 

He and Tess had cleared out the last of the big pot of soup she’d made the night before and now were contending with the stack of dishes they’d let build up in an uncharacteristic episode of avoidance. He scrubbed each bowl carefully before handing them over to her towelling, relying more on their rough sponge than the meager supply of watered-down soap to get the job done. Another shout echoed from above them and he sighed, mentally grabbing for the first potential topic of conversation.

“Still thinkin’ about what Max said ‘fore you shot him?”

She squinted at him for a second before replying. It wasn’t all that unfair, given she usually initiated the talking. But he’d really rather eat dirt than have to hear more shrieked cheating accusations at the moment. “No, not that,” she finally relented. “I know sure as shit he was lying. He’s too coward to snitch – on us or anyone else.” They’d already agreed on that, so he just nodded. “But Ariana, she looked scared. Can’t have a scared supplier, Joel. Now we’re doing this for real, we need people around us who trust that we have that kind of shit handled. Or they’ll start turning somewhere else.”

“The ones who don’t trust us will learn to. It’ll take time, Tess.” She hummed noncommittally.

“I did lean into Max’s dog on a leash comment,” she flashed him the ghost of a smirk, steering the topic away from her own worries. He wasn’t concerned – she knew how to pack her shit away and get things done when they needed to be. “Think it actually relieved her to hear you’re not a loose cannon.”

He raised an eyebrow. “Woof,” he said, deadpan. She snickered and put the bowl she was holding into the cabinet. 

It was still strange, for both of them, having a settled-down place. Having items they could put on shelves and trust they’d still be there when they got back instead of lugging them around all the time. The first time they’d washed dishes in the QZ, in a proper sink with running water, they’d looked at each other and burst into perplexed laughter that hadn’t abated for a long time. 

Even now, almost two years later, there was a sort of perverse joy in the act. “Performing normal” Tess called it, and it did feel like a performance. It itched at him sometimes, made him angry and restless when his bad dreams - bad memories - ran up too hard against reality. But today’d been a good day for them. It felt almost disconcertingly good to get his knuckles bloody again, besides being able to stretch his legs outside the wall.

“Figured she wasn’t gonna show in the first place,” he admitted, working at the pot lid. 

“Where else is she gonna offload that shit?” 

He snorted. “You underestimate the stupidity of these QZ drugrunners. Brains’re half-fried from their own stock. But,” he conceded before she could say something cutting, “guess you were right, weren't you?”

She smiles in a way that’s only a little smug, and takes the last plate from him while he starts in on fishing the utensils out of the bottom of the basin. 

“It’s a good thing I didn’t get blood on these clothes, anyway. Don’t have a better shirt and tomorrow’s when they’re needin’ people at the school.” It was a well-paying job, he’d heard. FEDRA were usually smart enough not to underpay the civilians who were being given a free pass to FEDRA facilities, even if only for the day. He’d been lucky to bribe news of it out of an official so they could be first in line. But Tess’s brow creased, and she shook her head.

“Don't worry about it, I told Georgie you’re already signed up for wall repairs that day.”

“I’m not,” he said, then eyed her. “Somewhere else we s’posed to be?”

“No,” she said, far too nonchalant for all that she hadn’t missed a beat. He didn’t know people as well as Tommy did, but he had gotten a pretty good sense of when she was lying. “Just figured you wouldn’t want to. It’s not like wall repair won’t have a slot open this early, though. I’ll take the school instead and tomorrow you—”

“Why wouldn’t I want to?” He interrupted.

“Because you don’t like kids, Tex,” she admitted bluntly, and Joel pulled up short. 

“I don’t-- yes I do.” 

“No…” she said slowly, like he was being dense. “You don’t. It’s fine, I was planning to take it myself.” The uncomfortable feeling in his stomach was growing teeth. If she was trying to dance around— if she was assuming— 

“Think I’m too fucking fragile to be around some children?” He tried to say evenly, and only managed to snarl. It was ridiculous. It was stupid that he was having such a visible reaction. He was dangerous , if anything, not somebody anyone should be trusting around their kids with all the blood on his hands. He knew that. But her tone grated at him for reasons he couldn’t articulate. He shoved the last of the utensils at her like a threat. She narrowed her eyes. 

“Joel. Stop it.” 

“It’s not like I blame you, but you might as well say it—“

“Joel, you don’t like interacting with kids.” She plowed onward before he could draw breath to respond. “Every time Lily or Ham ever asked you to take on babysitting duty in Illinois you ran for the hills. The little girl who lives downstairs says hi every time she sees us and you won’t even look at her. You never even take work around the school. You’ve got an understandable aversion.” His fingers clenched on the sink. “You want the job? Take it, I don’t care. I was trying to do you a favor.”

“Don’t!” He snapped. 

“Fine. Okay.”

“Okay.”

Tess helped him put away the last of the dinnerware in angry silence before she fucked off to the bedroom for unknown reasons. It was still early, so he consigned himself to the couch with a scrappy mending kit and a sweater he needed fixed before winter properly set in. 

After a little while, he went back to the kitchen to retrieve a chipped cup and a bottle of half-decent moonshine. They couldn’t afford to trade for the real good stuff yet— whiskey, vodka. But as long as they were careful to buy from illicit stills who actually knew how to make moonshine proper, it was alcohol and it’d do the job. 

He finished the sweater around an hour later, now at least half-drunk. He’d intended to retrieve a battered pair of Tess’s jeans that needed mending next, but no longer felt like making himself get off the couch and broaching the possibly-still-forbidden landscape of their bedroom. So he stayed put, staring at the grimy wall and rolling the cup between his hands. 

It was no wonder Tess had thought that, if he was being honest. She knew a decent amount about Sarah, even if she never brought it up. Just like he knew about her family from Before. It still managed to catch him off-balance sometimes, though, hearing how other people saw him. Seeing his own warped reflection in the mirror of the end of the world and knowing it was what had made Tommy finally turn his back on him. 

He had been the kids guy most of his life Before. Need somebody to babysit? See if Joel’s available. Trying to wrangle the children during the holiday get-together? Go get Uncle Joel. Baby won’t stop crying? Hand her over to Joel and see if he can’t calm her down.

When he’d started his own construction business with Tommy after his brother graduated, he’d been available less and less to take on those responsibilities, but he’d had his own kid to dote on at that point. Doing it without her mother around had been hard but, Sarah’s grandfather had quipped, if any man could swing it as a single father, it was Joel Miller. 

Well, they knew how well that’d worked out. 

“Hey,” Tess said. He looked up. She’d come to hover next to the couch while he was staring off into space wallowing in angry self-pity, and now she made her way around, holding a mug. 

“Pour me one?” 

He looked at her for a second, then nodded at the couch seat next to him. She sank down gratefully while he filled her cup, wincing as her knees popped. It earned a familiar look of wry commiseration between them, and he could feel the tension already dissipating, the dark cloud in his mind clearing a little. They didn’t really do apologies, him and Tess. But sharing a drink was as universal a peace offering as any, and neither of them knew how to stay mad at each other for long.  

She took a long pull from the glass and then set it on her lap, leaning against his side a little. The temperature had dropped precipitously with the light - the drafts were stuffed with all manner of rags and taped over with newspaper, but hell if it seemed to do any good. He pressed back, recognizing the value of the shared warmth, and they both settled into the couch. 

At some point, the couple upstairs had finally wound down for the night. Wind howled and whistled, the lights of FEDRA trucks occasionally slipping their way across the wall. Somewhere nearby, a dog was barking. He felt Tess’s breathing even out against his shoulder and knew he’d have to wake her up soon enough. They were too old to sleep like this unless they had to. 

But when– if– he slept, the nightmares would come, harassing him with a vengeance that he’d been barely able to outrun before this QZ. Even his subconscious recognized that he didn’t deserve the peace safety ought to bring. Sometimes he was grateful for that. Nightmares meant he couldn’t forget her. Couldn’t run from his failure or stick his head in the sand. But it pissed Tess off to deal with him like that, and he probably owed her uninterrupted sleep, at the very least.

If this business worked out with Ariana, he might be able to get a steady supply of sleeping pills. Might be able to pack it away, shove it down, forget just long enough that it wouldn’t be noticeable anymore. 

For now, he watched the reflections of light on the wallpaper, and tried not to think about whether he’d take the fucking school shift after all.