Separation

Your absence has gone through me

Like thread through a needle.

Everything I do is stitched with its color.

- W.S. Merwin

River leaned heavily on the shovel at her side, arms sore, hands calloused and cramping after digging for so long. But it didn't feel right to leave the task to anyone else, no matter how exhausted she was. Nate was the father of her son, the love of her life. She fully expected to be eighty-sixed any day now, from some raider's shitty pipe pistol or a mine she discovered too late or some other wasteland horror she hadn't even heard of yet, and hopefully find herself in some life after death where he would be waiting for her. She wanted his body resting somewhere peaceful before that happened, so his bones could finally have some form of respite. Her brilliant, beautiful, hard-working man.

She was scared, and weary, and so very, very alone. She needed Nate now more than ever, and that was the worst part of losing a spouse, that they were the one you would've gone to for comfort, and now without Shaun, she had nothing. She had no one.

"You gonna be all right?" It was the first time Preston had spoken up since he'd helped her carry Nate's body out here.

River nodded absently, without looking up. "Thanks, Preston. I'll take it from here." She'd have to thank him again properly later, when her head was clearer. It was a hell of a thing to ask someone to do, but he'd jumped at the chance to repay her the favor of escorting them safely to Sanctuary.

The Minuteman lingered a moment longer, obviously wanting to comfort her somehow but not knowing how. Eventually he turned back for town. "You know where to find me."

She cleared her throat once he was out of earshot, staring down at the freshly disturbed dirt over what was now Nate's final resting place. "I'm sorry about the grave," she began, testing the sound of her voice in the quiet evening air. "You should be buried in a military graveyard somewhere, dressed up all nice in that gray suit. You know the one. Looked so damn good on you." She eased herself onto the ground, crossing her legs in front of her. Speaking to him like this tore the wounds right back open, still fresh and raw like it had been only yesterday that she'd watched him die, instead of god only knows how long ago. "I'm sorry I couldn't stop them," she whispered, tears wavering in her voice. Her hands curled into fists. "I don't know what the hell I'm doing, Nate. I wish you were here to help. Or that they would've killed me instead. You'd know how to get Shaun back." But this pain. . . . She wouldn't have wished it on him for the world.

"Then again, maybe it's for the best. You'd lose it if you saw what they did to Fenway." River slumped forward onto the dirt, ignoring the way it clung to her skin and hair. "God. Who else is gonna laugh at my horrible jokes? How am I gonna find Shaun on my own? We were supposed to raise him together. He's . . . he's gonna be all temper and a bad sense of humor if it's just me." She closed her eyes. "I'm sorry, this isn't much of a eulogy. I'll try and think of a better one sometime. Come back later when I don't look a complete mess."

River got shakily to her feet, picking the shovel up where she'd dropped it. "I'm gonna find him, all right? Kid's got the best damn genes in this whole fucked-up world. Humanity can't afford to lose him now." She paused, blinking past the tears that were flowing steadily now down her cheeks. "I love you. Okay? I love you." Another pause. "And I'm not gonna move on, by the way, so don't even bring it up. I know we talked about it, but you're wrong. You're it for me, and I'm gonna be a lonely spinster for the rest of my days." Now things are just getting sadder. She smoothed out one last lump in the dirt of Nate's grave with her shoe and left, before she ended up staying there all night.

She made it until about three in the morning before she couldn't take it anymore and dragged her sleeping bag all the way back up the hill so she could fall asleep with her husband one last time. For the first time since stumbling out of the vault, she slept dark, dreamless sleep. For the first time, she didn't watch him die all over again in her dreams.

Let this be a lesson to you, Proud Mary, her mother had advised her once, cold and emotionless even as she stood crying over her father's deathbed. Death is easy. Life is hard.

She fucking hated it when her mother was right.

"The fuck you lookin' at, MacCready?"

"None of your damn business." He dropped the object back into his bag and kicked it swiftly under his bed, fixing the other Gunner with a glare. Jansen or Thompson or something like that, MacCready couldn't remember; he'd been calling him Fat Lip in his head. Easier to remember and it made him smile every now and then. But he certainly wasn't smiling now as Fat Lip closed in on him, making to reach for his bag.

"Looked like a toy. You playin' with toys over here?"

MacCready reacted too quickly to control himself - surprise, surprise, everybody: MacCready loses his temper once again! - grabbed Fat Lip by the arm and flipped him over hard, face down on the cold concrete. He had his boot between the man's shoulder blades and his arm yanked back on the cusp of dislocation, the barrel of his pistol at the back of Fat Lip's neck. "How many times I gotta tell you not to fuck with me?!" Aaand there's another broken promise. Why can't I get my life in order?

"MacCready!"

He growled, tracking Winlock's approach out of the corner of his eye. He stepped off of Fat Lip, who got to his feet and came immediately for him again.

"That's enough, Johnson!"

Johnson spat onto MacCready's boot, the last-ditch effort of a man who'd gotten his ass kicked.

"All right, ladies, nothin' to see here," Winlock dismissed the gathering crowd before leaning over MacCready. He had a good six inches or so on his height and the shoulders of a damn mutant. If MacCready wasn't so stupid or so stubborn, he might've let such a thing intimidate him. "If I see you causin' trouble one more time, MacCready, I'm gonna take care of you myself. Got it?"

MacCready bit back a thousand different retorts that would probably end up with him being thrown off the highway overpass. Eventually showed a little wisdom and nodded, once, reluctantly.

I need to get the fuck out of here.