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Hosea looks over his gang, his family, at all the forlorn faces, eyes sunken in fear and exhaustion. In his mind he sees all they’ve lost along the way, sees Seán laying against a barrel grinning up at him as he did when Hosea would tell him to work, Kieran is stood with the horses petting a hand through Branwen’s main as the mare pushes into his hand, Jenny spinning as she dances to an unheard tune, Mac and Davey bickering as they once did.
He sees all of them yet to leave this plain on the long haul down to where they will no doubt reside. He sees the grasp of death clawing at their clothes, like starving desperate coyotes.
Karen sits slumped over on a barrel, an ever-present bottle in her loose grasp, face rosy with the stain of her sorrows. Watching her break down, finding comfort in the bottle over time was a heavy burden.
At a choked cough, Hosea casts his glance over to Arthur sees the way the boy is bent over a cloth held to his mouth, sees the nervous desperate way he stuffs the blood mottled rag into his pocket as he glances around to see if anyone noticed.
Hosea noticed, he always noticed. He wished he didn’t sometimes, wished that he was ignorant to the fact that the family he had curated over thirty long years wasn’t falling apart at the seams, that members weren’t being picked off one by one.
It was a curse. He had said once so many years ago and Dutch had laughed, bumping shoulders with him as they huddled close around a fire. Hosea had laughed too then.
Dutch…
The man was all Hosea had known for the past thirty years; their lives were entwined in a complicated ball of yarn with no discernible end. Wound so tight around each other that they had once joked about how they existed in each other’s minds, body, and soul. A preposterous notion but Hosea feels it all the same, even now. His Dutch sits content in the depths of Hosea’s mind. Dutch was everything Hosea needed and all he ever wanted, His Moon, His Stars, His Everything. He had promised that they would face the world together, was this what he meant?
He sighs, his heart heavy and he pulls his coat closer over his shoulders. Despite the cloying Lemoyne heat, he’s cold, he’s cold a lot in the recent weeks. It’s a chill that runs bone deep and attacks his every cell leaving them frozen.
Watching as Dutch changed was possibly what hurt the most, and he is certain that it was Dutch who changed. No matter what story Hosea wants to spin for himself, he can no longer try to convince himself overwise.
He’s running out of excuses to make it hurt less. Hosea misses him, he can admit that. He misses the man who used to run with him hand in hand, misses the man who read out loud in the quiet of the night to distract Hosea from the storm that was raging outside the tent.
He misses a man who is not dead. Hosea smiles to himself, it’s a sad smile that will never reach his eyes.
Silly old fool. He thinks to himself, the voice, however, is not his. It’s Dutch’s, his Dutch, and suddenly the man is with him. But not really, it’s an image of the man, just like all those ghosts Hosea sees, and his Dutch grins that marvellous grin that Hosea fell in love with.
‘Silly old fool’, he says again, and it takes all Hosea has got to not crumble then and there.
‘You’ve gotten old, friend.’ His Dutch says his grin falling into a soft private smile, his hand reaches out to cup Hosea’s cheek and Hosea can feel it. The warm pressure that he craves from the Dutch that stand mere feet away.
“So have you.” He whispers and his Dutch smiles.
‘That ain’t me’ Dutch says, glaring at his counterpart, and Hosea shakes his head.
It isn’t. His Dutch would never be this. Never want to be this. But he is.
“Hosea.” Said man blinks, his Dutch is gone, his cheek cold.
Dutch stands in front of him, a confused furrow in his brow and Hosea wants to hide. From the stranger with his friend’s face and from the world.
“You’re crying?” The stranger says and Hosea raises a shaky hand to his cheek to find it wet. And so he is.
“It’s nothing my love.” He forces himself to say, as he stands on unsteady feet, the ground feeling as if it pulsates in beat with his heart. The remains of the once familiar pet name sits unfamiliar on his tongue, gone so long without use.
“This ain’t nothing, ‘sea” Dutch says, his voice small and he’s so similar to his Dutch, it hurts. It always hurts when his Dutch shines through the cracks.
Hosea can’t contain the sob that claws his way out of his throat. He raises his sleeve covered hands to scrub at his eyes, angry miserable tears falling.
Dutch frets, ushering him inside and away from prying eyes and Hosea goes easily as he always does.
When they’re inside the empty house, Hosea can’t stop the sobbing that shakes his slim frame as if it housed a thunderstorm.
“What is the matter, my darling?” Dutch asks, and he sounds like he used to, sounds like Hosea’s Dutch with all his charm and his ever-giving heart.
“I hate you.” Hosea says.
“I hate you so much.” He says again, punching Dutch in the chest and the man lets him. So, he does it again and again and again. Each hit lands against the man’s chest with a dull thud. ‘It must hurt; a voice says in the back of his mind. ‘Good’ another replies.
“I hate you, but I can’t stop loving you.” He says, new tears streaming down his cheeks. The confusion that comes with loving this man leaves Hosea stuck in place, unable to ever leave unless it is by death and he feels that it will be.
“I hate you.” He says, breath shuddering as his arms fall to his side, limp. He’s strength has depleted, a bone deep exhaustion takes it’s place and he can’t do anything but just stand there choking on his cries.
Dutch pulls him to his chest, wrapping the shorter man in a tight hug one hand on his back as the other holds the man’s head to his collarbone. And Hosea just slumps against him his tears soaking into the man’s shirt, the perverted, twisted feeling of comfort settling as a sick feeling in his stomach.
“I hate you.” He says again, he can’t stop repeating it.
“I know.” Dutch says simply, stroking his hand up and down Hosea’s back.
“I know my darling.”