Chapter Text
This week had been hell. Which wasn’t saying much since every week for nearly twenty years had been hell. But Tess getting thrown in FEDRA lockup for six days had given this one an extra layer of hellish torment. And as if that wasn’t bad enough, his only company in her absence was the knowledge that it was his fault she landed there.
While she was tied up, he was left to cover all of their regular smuggling and trade deals solo. A circumstance that went over less than ideally with those she usually took care of on her own. There were more than a handful that preferred - or, were more easily manipulated by - her finesse to his brute force. She could always figure out which method would be more effective. He never cared enough to try.
Outside their business dealings, he never slept well when she was out at night. In fact, it took more self medicating than usual to sleep at all if she was gone. Unfortunately, they were already running low on those particular supplies. He couldn’t afford to overindulge.
He briefly considered making a rare appearance at the Trough. Winning a few fights would restock their supply cache quite nicely. But he was still paying for the chat he had with Robert about how Tess ended up in lockup. And losing a few fights because he was spoiling for punishment might feel like a temporary reprieve but it would hurt more in the long run. Plus there was the fact that he’d agreed not to go back after the last time had nearly killed him.
Faced with the choice of an empty apartment (sans a drug induced blackout) or an empty rooftop, he chose the latter. The silence didn’t weigh the same up here.
He took the last swig of his rationed whiskey, or what passed for whiskey these days, and let his head fall back against the old electrical unit that was propping him up. He was tired - had been tired everyday since this hell began. It was starting to seep into his bones and calcify. A crippling sort of fatigue that he could never sleep off even when he did manage to sleep. Stiff limbs, full of lead. He was getting too tired to carry the weight of it.
He was definitely too goddamn tired for whatever feral raccoon was scampering onto his roof.
He could have just left. He should have just left. But reacting to a threat, finishing a job, moving, doing something - anything - was always better than sitting still. Especially alone. So he slipped around behind the cover of the electrical unit and drew his pistol from his belt instead. The flimsy justification that he couldn’t risk anyone spotting him or following him home kept him moving toward the approaching sound rather than away.
Whoever else picked this particular roof tonight needed a lesson in sneaking around after curfew. Rule number one: don’t make any fucking noise.
Slower than he’d once been but still quick enough, he grabbed the intruder by the wrist and flung them around into the side of an old HVAC unit. The thud of the impact was louder than he wanted and so was the startled grunt of pain. He had his gun trained on them as they went down, alert for any sign of twitching or a gun of their own.
His would-be attacker was small and for a moment he just stared at her - crumpled into a pool of oversized clothes and a sloppy ponytail that missed more than one of her curls. She couldn’t be more than 100 pounds soaking wet. Not a raccoon after all.
She pressed back against the equipment behind her, bare feet sliding as she tried to press herself right into it. Hands up, breathing hard, her eyes went crossed trying to focus on his gun. An old instinct sent a ripple of horror though him at the realization that he had his gun trained on a frightened kid. He moved it a fraction to the right but only a fraction. She tracked the movement and leaned to his left to get a bit more breathing room.
There weren’t a lot of ways a kid that small could be any kind of real threat. But there was at least one.
“You infected?” he asked.
“We’re in a fucking QZ,” she hissed, puffed up like a cornered wildcat and perhaps not as scared as he thought.
He fought the instinct to step back at the non-answer, that familiar thrumming building in his chest. “That ain’t an answer.”
“How many infected do you find on roofs?” she snapped back with venom.
Another non-answer - strike two. “More than zero. Answer the question,” he ordered.
Her dark eyes darted away and back like there might be one lurking nearby. “You think I’d just admit it if I was?” she asked. “Are you really that stupid?”
Strike three. “I think if the answer was no, you would’ve said it already.” His aim hitched.
Her eyes shifted between him and his gun, and he thought he heard her breath catch before she asked, “You gonna believe me if I do?”
“Only one way to find out.”
Her next breath passed over a trembling lip. Enough sense to be scared after all. She cut a sideways glance like she might be looking for another way out of this. And there was only one reason she’d need another way out. Because the answer was-
“ No, ” she hollowed out the word like it was obvious, “I’m not infected.” She pinched up her expression and added, “Happy?”
His eyes narrowed as he considered her and wished, not for the first time tonight, that he hadn’t broken his flashlight on Robert’s face yesterday. Of course she said no. Anyone with an ounce of self preservation would say the same in her position. But the fact that she wasn’t freaking out about impending death was doing a lot to shore up her claim. And it had been several years since they’d had any degree of outbreak within the QZ walls (if public reports were to be believed).
Still, he wished he could see better to be sure.
“You a FEDRA snitch?” he asked instead.
Her eyes narrowed at that and her mouth twitched like she might actually growl at him. “You really think a FEDRA snitch is gonna admit to it with a gun in their face?”
The non-answers were starting to wear through what little patience he had. “If they have any sense.”
They slipped into a momentary stalemate while he waited for what would surely be another snarky retort.
“No,” she finally said again, though not as mockingly defiant as the first time. “Just a regular, boring ass FEDRA orphan.”
Well, some of that defiance lingered.
FEDRA orphans were a dime a dozen in the QZ. It wasn’t an uncommon occurrence for parents to give kids up because at least FEDRA custody guaranteed they’d be housed, clothed, and fed. All for the low price of never seeing the kid again. It also wasn’t uncommon for parents to give them up in exchange for other benefits. Sometimes the sole benefit was just not having the responsibility anymore.
He wondered distantly what happened to her parents. Fools that they were for bringing a kid into this world, they probably wound up dead. They better be dead , he thought with a twist of a knot in his gut that he wouldn’t bother untangling. The only thing worse than having a kid in hell, was abandoning them there.
“Someone else send you up here?” he asked.
“Yeah,” she admitted with a nod.
“Who?” he demanded.
“Your mom.”
He blinked. She delivered the smart ass answer with an impressive level of seriousness that only lasted a beat before her lips tilted into smug amusement. Laughing at her own damn joke. And him, probably, for thinking he was finally getting something out of her.
A notch of tension fell out of his shoulders. He pressed a breath out through his nose and lowered his gun. Not infected. Not a FEDRA rat. Just a particularly annoying pest. It wasn’t the worst stroke of luck he’d had this week.
“Okay, smart ass.” He tucked his gun away and ignored the almost proud lift of her chin. He gestured back the direction she came from. “Go home.”
She scrambled to her feet but no farther. The formless shape that she was didn’t unfold as tall as he’d expected, she couldn’t be more than twelve - maybe thirteen, maybe . Out of the shadow of the equipment, he could see the wear marks of life beginning to show already. Dark circles were forming under her eyes and she was far too skinny for a-
He didn’t care.
“Get lost, kid.”
“I’m not a kid.” It was an attempt at keeping up her wildcat image but the execution looked more akin to a hissing kitten.
He looked pointedly down and back up the short distance of her height. She hadn’t even cleared five feet yet.
“Pretty short for someone who’s not a kid,” he said.
“And you’re pretty fucking old for someone who’s still alive,” she shot back with a degree of confidence she shouldn’t have while faced off against someone who could throw her over his shoulder like a sack of flower.
Running into an infected might have been a better stroke of luck.
He needed to quit while he was ahead. But for some reason cosmic beings probably couldn’t even understand, he said, “Surprised that mouth hasn’t landed you in lockup.”
“Who said it hasn’t?”
He shook his head, more at himself than her, and turned to stalk off without another word. She wasn’t annoying enough to drive him back to the empty apartment. Yet. So he took his usual seat, conveniently located across the other side of the roof from the pest infestation, and left her to do whatever the hell she’d come up here to do.
He closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose. Two fingers slid up his forehead, like he could massage the headache away. The pain throbbed lower in his forehead but the price was a sharp flare at the nape of his neck. He wondered briefly if sticking his head in an ice bucket until it went numb would offer some relief.
His eyes snapped open and he mistakenly checked left first before clocking the movement to his right.
“ Christ , kid, what do you want? ”
She shuffled back a step. Good , he thought, even as it felt like something different. He didn’t want to scare her but he did want to be left alone. If that was what it took then that’s what he’d do.
Arms wrapped around herself, shoulders tensed up, she was a stitch more cautious with her words when she asked, “You’re not a FEDRA snitch, are you?”
He glanced sidelong at her, fully prepared to match her earlier snark. But he rerouted when he saw genuine concern plain on her face. “I look like one to you?”
No quick witted retort this time. Instead she seemed to give his question serious consideration as her head tipped sideways a bit. Her gaze swept over him like she might find some evidence either way. She exhaled a breath that deflated her shoulders and her answer slipped out in the wake of it, “No.”
He didn’t respond, only silently willed her to leave.
“So… You’re not gonna tell anyone you saw me up here?” she asked. Then added hastily as if he might not understand, “after curfew?”
He didn’t look over when he answered this time, hoping it emphasized his point. “You never saw me. I never saw you.”
“Cool,” she said, her ponytail bouncing with a nod. “So-”
“Go away.”
“I was just gonna say-”
“I don’t care.”
“-that it’s a big roof-”
“Leave. Now.”
“-so we could share it-”
“ No. ”
“C’mon, man.” Her arms fell to her sides in exasperation. “You won’t even know I’m here.”
Current evidence to the contrary.
“Find a different roof,” he said through a tightly clenched jaw.
“ You find a different roof,” she challenged.
“Don’t need to,” he said. “I already found this one.”
“Well, so did I,” she said, drawing her arms across her chest like it might be something intimidating. “You leave if you don’t wanna share.”
“I was here first,” he said. “It’s my roof.”
“Really? This roof belongs to you?” she said with a mock impressed look around. Then added in a flatter tone, “I don’t see your name on it.”
“I’m using it,” he said.
“The whole roof?” she asked, head tipped to a skeptical slant.
“Yep.”
“Wow, what are you gonna do with all this space?”
He pinched the bridge of his nose again and debated whether it was worth a few nights in FEDRA lockup to turn her in for breaking curfew.
“Find,” he started slowly, to emphasize the repeated order, “a different. Roof.”
“Or what?”
His brow scrunched. “What do you mean ‘or what?’”
She fidgeted in place, twisting one shoulder forward and then the other. “You said you’re not a FEDRA rat. Not gonna tell anyone you saw me. So if I just… don’t leave. What are you gonna do?”
“Throw you over the edge,” he said flatly.
She stopped fidgeting but didn’t flinch away. Those big eyes narrowed again. “No you won’t.”
She called his bluff with more certainty than he liked for a slip of a girl who didn’t even know him. Successfully backing him into a corner of conceding one way or another.
“What are you even doing up here?” he asked, less curious and more hoping it would somehow give him a leg up on getting rid of her.
“What are you doing here?” She parroted the question.
“I asked you first,” he said with more petulance than was probably wise.
“Heard it was the best rooftop bar in town,” she said with an exaggerated look around.
He sighed. Walked right into that one. Silence. That was the best way to deal with an obnoxious pre-teen. It should have been his first move instead of engaging at all.
“What are you doing here?” she asked again.
He didn’t respond. She would get bored and bugger off. Eventually.
“Meeting someone for a drug deal?” she asked.
As far as guesses went, it wasn’t a terrible place to start. On another night, hell earlier tonight even, she would have been right. But he wasn’t going to admit that.
“Meeting someone for not a drug deal?” was her next guess.
In another life he might have been affronted by the implication behind that question. But in this one he just stared ahead, committed to outlasting her bothersome curiosity.
“Are you stargazing? ‘Cause you don’t really seem like the type,” she said.
He still didn’t respond, just stared at the roof across the alley - blissfully free of chattering pests - and wondered if it was too far to jump.
“You just really like roofs, or something?” she asked.
Five , he mentally tallied, wondering if she’d get bored before or after making it to twenty.
“I got it,” she said like she solved a puzzle. “You’re scoping this place out to open a rooftop bar?”
Now she wasn’t even trying. It was a distraction at least. As little interest as he had in answering her questions or asking any of his own, it was something else for his mind to circle around beside the too vivid image of Tess in lockup. He hadn’t forgotten what she looked like after the last time she’d been thrown in, and that was just two days.
“Got a nagging wife at home you’re avoiding?”
An amused scoff slipped out at the mental image that comment evoked and he wished Tess was here so he could see the look on her face. It was a toss up whether she would be more annoyed by the ‘nagging’ part or the ‘wife’ part.
“I’m taking that as a yes,” she said.
He almost fell for the bait of denying it but caught himself and shook his head instead.
“Fine. I didn’t come up here for company anyway.” She walked off but didn’t go too far before she slid down to a seat against the parapet wall, head tipped back against it to look up at the sky.
Fine. They could share the space if all she really wanted to do was stargaze. As long as she kept an acceptable distance and silence between them.
He noticed her bare feet again, toes poking out of pants that were too long for her. It was warm enough for a late spring night to be comfortable without a jacket but no shoes? He almost asked but then remembered he didn’t care.
With twenty questions over, his thoughts were left to slip around from one dark corner to the next. Tess had four more days in lockup. Getting thrown in wasn’t anything new, they’d both done one or two days multiple times over the years. But this was the longest she’d be stuck there. Alone.
He’d circled the idea of intentionally getting thrown in with her. The presence of the threat he posed would certainly be more of a deterrent than just the vague idea of it. But there was no guarantee that they would throw him in the same block as her. And she would be pissed if he sacrificed a week’s worth of work just to play at being her bodyguard.
He knew she could take care of herself, she made that clear the day they met. In addition to carrying her weight in a physical fight, she could talk her way out of almost anything. But being in lockup was different. She was penned in with desperate people, no resources, and no back up. And desperate people were the most dangerous. It was difficult to broker a deal with people who had nothing to lose or escape a sticky situation with nowhere to escape to. If she got cornered by the wrong person…
All he could do was hope the threat of his reputation for violence was enough to protect her.
To his intruder’s credit, he hardly noticed her for the rest of the night. Lost in his own thoughts as he was. She was almost suspiciously quiet and at one point he was pretty sure she’d dozed off for a bit. He didn’t know how much longer they stayed there in silence, maybe a few hours based on the stiffness settling into his joints.
Eventually the string bean hopped up, stretched, and walked slowly across the roof, aiming for where she’d appeared from earlier.
The words were coming out before he decided against it. “Don’t make a habit out of this,” he said.
She paused and looked back over her shoulder, hackles rising. “Is that a threat?”
He shook his head. “It’s a warning. Maybe you’re lucky a few times but eventually you’ll get caught and then…” He let her imagination fill in the rest.
She waited, like she expected him to finish, and then nodded once when he didn’t. “I never saw you,” she said with the inflection of a question.
He nodded and mirrored, “And I never saw you.”
She hovered a moment longer before disappearing behind the wall.
With any luck, he’d never see her again.
~~~
Evidently, Joel was shit out of luck.
“I told you not to come back here,” he said, hand leaving his gun tucked into his belt.
“Technically, you only warned me not to,” she said.
His gaze dropped to her feet as she approached, absently noting that they were bare again tonight. Stupid kid was going to cut her foot open traipsing around like that. Or lose a toe come winter. He pushed the thought away with practiced indifference and moved back to his usual spot. Her trailing footsteps set his jaw clenching.
“Do you come up here every night?” she asked.
He rubbed his left temple against the headache that was already forming. “No.”
“Kinda weird that we ran into each other twice then,” she said.
He hummed an unimpressed response and sank back into his seat against the protest of his knees. He reached for his flask before he remembered he’d already drained it.
At least Tess got out of lockup tomorrow. That would give him a break from pulling double smuggling duty and the latitude to find a new roof (ideally one that wasn’t infested with a ninety pound parasite). Assuming Tess was in good shape when she got home. If she wasn’t, well… He’d have a few other things at the top of his priority list.
“I’m Ellie, by the way,” she said, leaning her back against the parapet to face him.
“I don’t care.”
“That’s pretty fucking rude,” she said.
He didn’t respond, verbally or otherwise. Arms drawn across his chest, he started counting the bricks instead. Ignoring her had worked last time. Sort of.
Her patience only lasted to the eleventh brick before she said in a low voice that must have been an attempt at imitating him, “ ‘Hi, Ellie, I’m-’ ” and gestured for him to fill in the blank.
“Not interested,” he said.
“That’s not a name.”
“Never said it was.”
Her eyes rolled to the side. “You’re so lame.” Her hands fidgeted absently, left hand trailing up her right sleeve and pausing on her bicep, almost like she was tracing a pattern. “Have you always lived in the QZ?”
“No.”
Maybe indulging her questions with the shortest and least interesting answers possible would bore her quicker than silence. Show her that even if she won the silent treatment, she was still losing in the end.
“Where did you live Before?”
“Pass,” he said.
Her head tipped. “Pass?”
“Yeah, pass ,” he leaned on the word and hoped a bit of bite would slow her down.
“Where do you live now?” she asked, undeterred.
He sighed. “Here.”
“Here, like, on this roof? Are you a pigeon?” she asked.
He didn’t comment. She damn well knew what ‘here’ meant.
She rolled her eyes. “That really narrows it down,” she said. “What area? ”
He leveled what should have been an intimidating glare at her but for some reason she found it amusing instead.
“I swear I won’t show up on your doorstep,” she said.
He hadn’t actually been worried about that but now he was picturing this slip of a kid knocking on their door in the morning like a goddamn girl scout. Still, it was a big area and he doubted she would stoop to going door to door just to harass him in daylight hours. And if she did, it might be amusing to watch Tess deal with her.
“Three.”
She looked around, brow furrowing. “Why are you all the way in Twelve?”
“None of your business.”
“C’mon,” she groaned, “who am I gonna tell?”
He held firm. “Pass.”
She stooped to pick up a piece of scrap metal before continuing with her next question. “How long have you lived here?”
“Longer than you,” he said.
She tested the end of the metal rod against the brick wall, scoring a few jagged lines. “You got any family?”
“You got a quota to fill?”
Her ponytail whipped with the sharp turn of her head. “The fuck is a quota?”
“Means you ask too many questions.”
She shot him a snarky expression before turning back to her vandalism. “Just making conversation, dude, you should try it sometime.”
“Pass.”
“That wasn’t even a question. You can’t pass if it’s not a question.”
He looked at her and said pointedly, “Pass.” Then added, “No more personal questions.”
“Anybody ever tell you you’re a dick?” she said with a hint of amusement.
“Never.”
She shot him another look that made it clear she knew that was bullshit. Then she shrugged and said, “I’ve dealt with worse.”
“I don’t care.”
“You’re terrible company,” she said plainly.
“Thought you didn’t come up here for company?” he said.
“I didn’t. But you seem like you need some.”
“I really don’t,” he said.
“So… What are you doing up here?” she asked.
He leveled a glare, wishing he’d scared her a little more that first night. The ‘pass’ was on the tip of his tongue but he detoured. “What are you?”
She just smirked and looked up at the sky. He glanced up too, it was mostly cloudy tonight, not ideal stargazing weather. He shook his head. Smart ass.
“Your turn,” she prompted.
“You always this nosy?” he said instead.
“Are you always this friendly ?” she said with a mocking lilt. “C’mon, I told you why I’m here.”
“Don’t care,” he repeated.
“Then why’d you even ask?” The amusement finally faltered.
“To show you how annoying it is.”
“That doesn’t make sense. I answered your question.”
“I don’t care,” he snapped sharper than he meant.
Her lips twitched. “Your watch is broken.”
The nonchalance of that comment was more effective than any self flagellation he could hope to inflict.
Before he could recover from the sharp jab she started coming closer. Not directly, she was walking along the wall, running her hand over the uneven surface and dragging her scrap metal. But even if she stayed plastered against it, crossing in front of him would be closer than he cared to get.
“Ten feet,” he grunted.
She stopped in her tracks. Her own voice was sharper now, “What?”
“Ten feet between me and roof pests at all times,” he gestured between them.
She scoffed. “What are you afraid I’ll get the jump on you, old man?”
He didn’t answer. Answering was what got him into this mess in the first place.
“How old are you, like, one hundred?”
He refused. He shored up his resolve to remain silent, fighting the temptation to give her a snarky response.
“Ten feet isn’t even that far,” she said, taking a few steps backward. “I can still see you and talk to you. You should have said fifty feet if you didn’t wanna talk to me-”
“Fine, fifty feet,” he said.
She hesitated, not backing off but not coming closer either. Gaze cast out into the relative darkness of the rest of the roof.
“Is there anything bad up here?” she asked.
“Just you,” he said.
“Oh ha ha,” she said humorlessly. “You’re up here too, asshole.”
Well, she wasn’t wrong about that.
“How far is fifty feet?”
“Farther than that.”
She took a few more steps backward. “This far?”
“Farther,” he said. Then amended, “Much farther.”
She took more steps backward. “How’s this?”
“Farther,” he repeated.
“You’re not even looking.”
“Don’t have to. If I can hear you, you’re too close,” he said.
He waited, fully expecting another interval distance check but the silence stretched on. Some long buried timer went off in the back of his mind and had him glancing over to see what she was up to. But she was gone.
He was perched at the edge of his seat to stand when he stopped short. There was nothing bad up here apart from himself, he knew that. But with her out of sight, the certainty of it began to erode.
Not his responsibility, he reminded himself. It was the motto he and Tess had adopted to survive. It worked, so far - staying detached, unseeing, and numb. It might have cost him Tommy in some way but they were all still alive. The kid disappearing was exactly what he wanted, he didn’t need to go looking around and risk bringing her back. He didn’t need to get caught up in whatever trouble she was sure to find herself in. He didn’t need to know that she was okay, he needed to never see her again. Not his responsibility.
Tess would be back tomorrow, that’s what mattered.
~~~
The odds of running into the same random kid on the same random rooftop a second time were probably higher than he wanted them to be. Certainly higher than running into the same kid on a different random rooftop. But three times? Part of him suspected the kid had been coming up here every night for the past week just hoping to run into him again.
It shouldn’t have happened. Mainly because he should have known better and found a different fucking roof by now.
Tess had been out of lockup for almost a week, which should have been plenty of time to find a new roof to occupy. But he’d been too busy and at the last minute, opted to gamble on the impossibly low odds of running into her a third time. The gangly thing meandering around the perimeter was evidence of the result of that gamble.
The kid turned the silent treatment around tonight, not saying a word to him since she’d shown up over an hour ago. He was fine with that. But a fly buzzing around was still a nuisance even if it didn’t speak. He watched her investigating the HVAC unit that he threw her into the first night she’d appeared. The door she was testing popped open easier than she expected and she startled herself. He suppressed an involuntary chuckle and turned away.
Despite the six days spent worrying over worst case scenarios, Tess returned relatively unscathed. Relatively being her choice of word. If it was entirely up to him, he would have repaid even the minor to mild injuries that peppered her. But she talked him down, insisting it wasn’t worth the risk. And in true Tess fashion, she insisted that leaving them on edge to wonder when he might come for them was more tortuous than actually doing it. He disagreed but he left it for a shift in the burn pits anyway.
She jumped back into her routine as soon as she’d washed off what she could of those six days. After looking forward to the reprieve from the busier schedule, Joel had found himself with too much idle time. So he picked up extra shifts wherever he could get them. The pits, the sewers, the stockyard, even FEDRA’s inventory yard. Anything that kept him physically occupied and bone-tired.
Tess didn’t comment when he came home so late it could be considered early every night so far that week. She could probably tell where he’d been based on the extra ration cards that were piling up and the exhaustion that felled him into bed. But she was out tonight and he hadn’t been able to find another empty shift to fill the void.
Which was how he found himself circling back to the same rooftop. There was a difference between being alone on a roof and being alone at the apartment.
A sharp clang far too loud had him up and turned back around.
The kid was frozen in place, half of a rusted unit panel had snapped off in her hands. Her wide eyes were trained on the break. Just when he didn’t think she could be more annoying.
“Knock it off,” he ordered.
It was hard to tell in the low light of the cloudy night but he swore she scowled as she set the chunk of panel down. She squared off against him with a withering glare. He shifted his expression, one hand resting at his belt. Being bothersome was one thing but pulling shit like that might actually draw some attention if the wrong patroller was in the right place at the wrong time. And considering how low he’d been running in the luck department lately, he didn’t want to push the odds.
Whether she got the silent message or not, she moved over to an old equipment curb and dropped to a seat, back toward him and arms wrapped around herself. Irritation settled between his shoulders at the continued silent treatment. But he rolled it away and made another silent vow to find a new roof before Tess’ next evening appointment.
~~~
“Hey, asshole?”
His mouth fell into a thin unamused line as he slid his gaze over to where she was playing balance beam on one of the old equipment curbs. He couldn’t actually be upset with the nickname she’d given him since he’d refused to give her his name. He was still trying to decide if he regretted it.
“Have you ever been outside the QZ?” she asked.
He kept a critical gaze on her and contemplated whether or not he wanted to field the follow up questions.
After running into her for the third time he vowed he would find a new roof. But then after she disappeared, he convinced himself he’d seen the last of her - that she wouldn’t possibly show up again. Then he thought the same after she showed up again. And again. Wishful thinking. He’d find a new roof eventually, when he had the time to scope one out.
In the meantime, her questions weren’t the worst thing about Boston this week.
Close to the top of the list of shitty things was Tess resuming her regular standing appointment with Monty. Even when he didn’t have anything to trade - a weekly meeting just to stay on his good side.
An after curfew meeting to maintain a contact wasn’t his favorite risk, especially when she insisted on doing it without him. But Monty was one of their more lucrative connections. How he managed to continue to get ahold of so much shit was part of the reason Tess kept up with him. The long game of cutting out the middleman.
It didn’t escape his notice that the kid was wearing the same clothes every time she appeared. And never shoes. The curiosity nagged at him whenever he saw her bare feet poking out of those too long pants but he didn’t ask. She looked worse tonight than she had the past few weeks. There were darker circles under her eyes and he would have sworn she was a bit thinner in the face too. He didn’t ask about that either. Probably just FEDRA running her ragged with not enough food. Just like everyone else in the QZ.
She glanced over her shoulder when he took too long to answer. “I’m not gonna tell anyone,” she said with a note of exasperation.
“Yeah,” he said.
“What’s it like?”
“What’s FEDRA tell you?”
Her brow scrunched. “That it’s a desolate wasteland full of infected and raiders. Anything outside the QZ’s from Before is basically dust. And anyone who tries to make it out on their own either ends up dead. Killed by infected or raiders or they just starve. Basically it’s one big mass grave because the only place people can survive now is inside a QZ.”
He looked over slowly. It wasn’t anything he hadn’t heard, witnessed, or experienced first hand. But there was something about it all just coming out of her mouth in that nonchalant tone that struck him a little different.
“Yeah,” he said. “That’s about right.”
He expected a follow up question, something about how he managed to survive all that when he was as old as a dinosaur. He was prepared to pass. The line for what he was willing to do and what he was willing to talk about were offset a fair amount. Especially in front of a kid that was essentially still a stranger.
“Does that mean you’ve seen the ocean? And, like, mountains and stuff?” she asked.
He wasn’t prepared for that to be the follow up question. Something so… innocuous.
“Yeah,” he said when he couldn’t find a reason to pass.
She hopped off the corner with a flourish and ended up facing him. “Are they all gone now?”
“Where would they’ve gone?” he asked.
She shrugged before stepping up onto the adjacent curb for another round. “Just covered with infected, I guess? The way FEDRA tells it there’s basically nothing out there between here and the other QZs. Have you ever been to another one?”
He adjusted in his seat, back starting to protest the discomfort of the hard seat early this evening.
Usually he wouldn’t even entertain answering that kind of question. No history was more ominous in the intimidation department and the less knowledge other people had, the less they could use against him. But she was just a kid and even if he didn't completely buy her ‘stargazing’ excuse, he knew she wasn’t up to anything more nefarious than that.
“No,” he said absently, part of him still hung up on the idea that hordes of infected could level mountains or destroy the ocean.
“Does anybody besides FEDRA?” she asked. “Move to other QZs, I mean.”
“You looking to relocate?” he asked.
“No,” she said, too quickly. “Just curious. How would it even work? If there’s infected and, like, raiders everywhere?”
“They’re not everywhere,” he said. “You can get around pretty well if you know what you’re doing. And if you’re lucky, you might even survive.”
She turned the corner of her makeshift balance beam. “I bet you’re pretty lucky, huh?”
He leveled a pointed look at her. “Sometimes.”
“Is that how you got that scar on your head? Luck?”
He reached for it but bailed out halfway there and crossed his arms instead. “Yeah. The guy flinched.”
Not technically a lie.
“You shoot him back?”
“I missed.”
Also not technically a lie. Somehow it was easier than passing altogether.
“‘Cause you’re a terrible shot?”
“‘Cause it ain’t as easy as FEDRA target practice,” he said.
He caught her making a face in the corner of his eye but by the time he looked it was gone. She hopped off her current balance beam and opted to lay along the length of it instead.
“You know, sometimes I stay up all night,” she said, “wondering where the sun went.”
He cut her a look, a quip about how shitty FEDRA’s education was loosely formed.
Before he could get it out, she continued, “Then it dawned on me.”
He clocked the wordplay immediately and wondered if it had been intentional-
A stifled giggle slipped out. “Get it?”
Yeah, it was definitely on purpose.
“No,” he said. Lest she get the wrong idea and try to keep going.
“Hold on, I’ve got a better one,” she said.
“No,” he repeated.
“Did you hear about what happened to the guy who invented paper?” she asked anyway.
“He died,” he said, silently hoping it would kill her stupid joke somehow.
“No,” she brushed him off. “He invented a few other things but nothing as note-worthy.”
He took a long blink and shook his head. “Terrible.”
She lifted her head and said indignantly, “That was a good one.”
“If that was a good one, I’d hate to hear a bad one,” he said.
She pulled herself up to a seat, looking far too much like she’d just been issued a challenge. “What did the mermaid wear to her math class?” A beat later she finished, “An algae-bra.”
It wasn’t funny. It definitely wasn’t as funny as she thought it was. Not only was he stuck with the chattiest kid in the QZ, she also happened to have the worst sense of humor.
“Please stop.”
Her head tipped sideways and her brow furrowed. “Did you suck on a lemon today?”
“What?” he said, searching for the potential pun.
She shrugged. “You seem kinda bitter.”
He rolled his eyes while she laughed at her own damn joke. Again.
“Won’t be so funny when I drown you in a tub of lemonade,” he said.
“Can’t do that without violating the ten foot rule,” she said.
“My rule, I can break it to exterminate pests if I feel like it,” he said.
“You’re such a dick,” she said, but there wasn’t much bite behind it.
“You’re welcome to find another roof,” he said, but there wasn’t much bite behind that either.
~~~
“Your minder know you’re sneaking out in the middle of the night?” he asked when curiosity got the better of him one night (curiosity wasn’t the same as caring).
“Probably not,” she said.
He didn’t ask any of the follow up questions that drifted through his mind and she didn’t offer up anything more. She was quieter than normal tonight and he hated himself for even noticing. When she’d shown up, a bit later than usual, she skipped her usual balance beam routine and sunk straight to the ground against the parapet with a half hearted greeting. She’d barely said a dozen words since and now she was laying on her side.
“You sick or something?” he asked.
She swiveled her head to look at him, dark eyes narrowing like he was the one under suspicion. He couldn’t read her very well with the distance between them, she wasn’t quite fifty feet away but she usually kept at least the original ten.
“Thought you didn’t care?” she said.
“I don’t.” It was still true. He didn’t and he never would. “But I don’t want to wake up sick tomorrow.”
“I’m not sick,” she said.
“You look sick.”
“ You look sick.”
“I’m not the one curled up on the ground,” he said.
She rolled her eyes. “I’m not fucking contagious, if that’s all you’re worried about,” she snapped.
The shorter temper wasn’t doing anything to alleviate his suspicions.
She pushed herself up to a sitting position and dropped her head back against the wall, eyes falling closed. “Just new FEDRA meds,” she said with a dismissive wave.
“Meds for what?”
She was hugging her knees to her chest, arms draped loosely around them. Head turned to rest her temple on her knee. Her eyes were blinking a little slower each time. “Just meds,” she said. Her arms twitched tighter around her legs as a shiver went through her. “What’s it matter to you?”
It was on the cooler side for an early summer night but it still wasn’t cold enough to prompt the shivering she was doing. Then again, she was wearing the same paper thin long sleeve tee and-
“Where are your shoes?” he asked.
“Don’t have any,” she said.
“FEDRA doesn’t give you shoes?”
“They do but they also take them away if you get in too much trouble,” she said. Her voice dropped the way it did when she was mocking him, “Every step serves as a reminder.”
He snorted. “That really taught you a lesson. They take all your other clothes too?”
“Something like that,” she said.
He had to appreciate the irony of the role reversal, usually she was the one asking all the questions and he was the one giving the short answers. Except her short answers were ticking up his ire.
“That ain’t right,” he said.
“You know what isn’t right?” she asked flatly.
“Hm?”
“Left.”
Her laugh came a beat later like an aftershock. And then it built far more than the simple pun warranted.
“Get it? ‘Cause left-” she was interrupted by her own giggle “-isn’t right .”
“It’s not that funny,” he said.
It was a little funny. But the fact that she was losing it over her own dumb joke was funnier than the joke itself. Whatever new meds they gave her were making her extra silly, which might have been cute if there was room in hell for things like that.
What wasn’t funny was the whole body shiver that shook her after the laughing finally subsided. To her credit, she wasn’t complaining about it. But he couldn’t just let her freeze, even if it wasn’t his responsibility.
“Hey, kid.”
He moved before she turned and tossed the flannel.
His gut twinged at the way she flinched back from the projectile.
“What the fuck, man?” Her indignant exclamation was muffled by the fabric. She struggled briefly and then her head popped out from under it like she was surfacing for air. She leveled a glare his way and waited for his explanation.
“Tired of hearing your teeth chattering,” he said.
Her gaze moved between him and the flannel once and then twice. A furrow in her brow while she decided what she thought of it. She came down on the side of not a threat or scam or trap and opted to drape it over herself like a blanket. It was large enough to cover her curled up against the wall.
“You shouldn’t run around without shoes,” he added. “You’ll cut your foot open.”
“Without shoes is my only option,” she said, head tipped again onto her knee.
“You could stay in bed,” he said.
Her head rocked across her knees and back in a horizontal shake. “ You could stay in bed.”
“I’ve got shoes,” he said.
She didn’t respond. Her eyes were closed again. So he left her to snooze, mildly jealous that she even could while sitting in that position.
A few hours and sleep positions later, she pushed up to her feet and started dragging toward him. Looked more like sleepwalking.
“Ten feet,” he reminded her. He still wasn’t convinced that whatever bug she had wasn’t contagious and he’d rather not explain to Tess how he came down with something.
“Thought it was fifty?” she said around a yawn. Then she held the flannel out as far as she could.
He waved her off. “Keep it. Too much trouble to wash your germs off it.”
She made a face at him. “I told you I’m not sick.”
“Wasn’t talking about those germs,” he said.
She made the same offended face again and then looked almost fondly at the flannel in her hand. She extended her arm a little farther. “I’ll lose it.”
His brow furrowed. She had the same clothes on every time she showed up, one more piece of clothing didn’t seem like it would get lost in her extensive closet. He scratched his jaw.
“You mean FEDRA will take it?” he said.
Her hesitation was enough of an answer.
“Alright, how about this-”
He tipped his head for her to follow and he led her across the roof to an old, dented electrical box in the opposite corner. He knelt to open the box with a mild huff and more than one cracking joint.
“How do you even get up here with those knees?” she asked.
He leveled a glare at her and then did a double take when he noticed the sweat beaded on her temple. The wispy baby curls that refused to stay in her ponytail were slicked to her head. Her face was wan. He’d been too far away to notice before but he knew if he reached out to check her forehead it would be warm.
Fever.
Would FEDRA even care? Did he?
“What?” she asked, leaning back a little.
“Nothing,” he muttered and turned back to the cabinet. He popped the cover off, revealing the small cache spot inside.
“What the fuck?” She stepped closer again and leaned in to get a better look.
“Told you it was my roof,” he said. “You can leave it here. Won’t get lost.”
She wadded the flannel up into a sloppy ball and dropped it in next to the small stash of weapons and drugs. “What’s it for?”
“Emergencies,” he said. “Don’t get any ideas about taking anything.”
She shook her head and then switched to a nod. “I won’t,” she clarified.
He closed the cache box back up and pushed up to his feet. She was already shivering again.
“You have a long trip back?” he asked.
Her hand found its way to her arm, a nervous tick he’d seen her do more than a few times now.
“Not too far,” she said.
Part of him was reaching, wanting to make sure she made it back and into an actual bed when she did. Someone should be there for her, to make sure she stayed in that bed until she was well enough to be up and about again. It would be harder without a 24 hour pharmacy down the street, no children’s Tylenol, no easy comfort snacks. But someone should be there with a gentle hand and reassuring words.
He pulled back and smothered it under layers and layers of ash from the burn pits, under bodies and rubble, under six feet of dirt in a Texas field. This kid was not his responsibility.
“Good,” he said. “Don’t slice your foot open on the way.”
She rolled her eyes and turned to meander back to wherever she called home. “Don’t break a hip.”