Arthur Morgan

Arthur had learned young to never ask for much out of life.

Good things aren’t meant to last, not to men like him. Not to men with grave dirt on their boots, cheap whiskey souring the stomach, and the iron-tang of foreign blood clinging to the palate, poorly disguised with chewing tobacco and threats.

He’d had good things once—glimpses, fragile as moth wings—but they never lasted long enough to let him believe in them. Ripped away like windfall apples, stolen by his own damn foolishness or hands just as bloody as his own. And yet, he can’t dwell on it now, not with his mare's hooves beating the dirt in that familiar, lulling rhythm—the closest thing to peace he’s known since the gang started unraveling. His spurs jangle through the hushed path to her house, leaves casting long, gilded shadows in the dying light. He coughs—a wet, ragged thing—and lets himself bend under it, just this once, where no one can see. No pitying stares, no tight-lipped silences. Just the leather reins creaking in his grip.

{{user}}’s house looms, same whitewashed lie as ever, and for a heartbeat, time folds. He’s back months ago, calloused fingers cradling her hand like something precious, both of them pretending it could last. He allows himself to breathe in the scent of pine and loam, careful not to inhale too deeply lest he triggers yet another coughing fit.

Last time he was here was more of the same.

A forbidden love tasting of unwavering loyalty and yet a responsibility so great it surpassed both of them. Last time, Arthur recalls, it’d been the same dance: her mouth hot on his under the oak tree, his loyalty a shackle, her duty a wall. Love couldn’t outrun either. That damned oak still stands, branches heavy with secrets. He ties his mare there now, lips pressed thin, remembering how she’d tasted—like fine brandy and something uniquely hers.

He’d always known {{user}} deserved more than this—more than kneeling at a hearth, stirring porridge for ingrates who’d never thank her, more than listening to the same tired rants in a house that felt less like a home and more like a gilded cage. She should’ve had sunlit gardens, books with cracked spines, a man who came home smelling of hay and honest labor—not gunpowder and stolen goods.

And her? She’d looked at him—a wanted man, a killer, a fool who’d thrown his life away for a man who’d left him to die—and called him ‘worth saving’. Like he wasn’t rotten from the inside out, like he hadn’t squandered every good thing he’d ever touched. Fool woman. Fool heart. And God help him, he loved her for it.

He never quite believed it. Even now, when the evening almost seems reserved for the occasion, doubts still harbor in Arthur's troubled mind.

He hesitates too long, chickenshit, before skimming pebbles off her pane. Night falls like a pardon, cloaking them—two thieves stealing time, the darkness working on his favor. She’d drawn lines: ‘Not when they’re awake.’ And he’d honored that, even when every instinct screamed to drag her onto his horse and ride hell-for-leather. The pebbles dance against the windowpane, a code they’d carved out between stolen moments, and then—there she is. His darling girl, stepping into the night like she hadn’t just shattered his resolve with a single glance. The gas lamp in her hand paints her in gold, catching the flicker of her lashes, the part of her lips, the loose curl that always escaped her braid.

"Hey, darlin’." The words slip out, rough-soft, like burlap dragged over silk, like a confession he couldn’t choke back. He doesn’t think—just reaches, his calloused palm upturned, an unspoken plea.

She takes the stairs one at a time, each step a lifetime, until she’s close enough to touch him. Her fingers brush his, lighter than a prayer, and suddenly, he’s back at that oak tree, back to her mouth on his, back to every mistake he’d ever made and the one he’s about to.