out of the mouths of babes
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Listing Series
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in sickness and in health by marchflower
Fandoms: The Last of Us (Video Games), The Last of Us (TV)
02 Jul 2023
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Summary
“I hope she knows,” Maria says quietly, “how loved she is.”
The words hang ghostlike in the air between them. Joel nods, stiffly, presses his mouth against the crown of Ellie’s damp hair, tastes lavender and bergamot in the back of his throat.
“I think she’s comin’ around to it,” he says.
*
Ellie is sick, Joel is worried, and Tommy and Maria step up.
Series
- Part 1 of out of the mouths of babes
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suffer not the little children by marchflower
Fandoms: The Last of Us (Video Games), The Last of Us (TV)
29 May 2023
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Summary
So far he’s known Ellie at fourteen and Ellie at fifteen, and the gaps in his knowledge of her are so vast they seem to fill every spare inch of conscience he has. There’s so much unaccounted for time, times where people did things to her he couldn’t protect her from, times where people hurt her or bullied her or made her feel small, undeserving, useless, unloved.
**
Ellie grows up, a little. It sort of breaks Joel’s heart, a lot.
Series
- Part 2 of out of the mouths of babes
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i forget the rest by marchflower for two_birds_alone_together
Fandoms: The Last of Us (Video Games), The Last of Us (TV)
07 Jan 2024
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Summary
Joel carries him into the living room, where the Legos are back in their bins and there’s a little block of a room with no roof and Shimmer wedged in it on the coffee table. Joel doesn’t put JJ down; he thinks about those words he told Rafa, about how much harder they cling to their babies because of the ones they’ve already lost, and he sinks down into the couch with JJ still pressed against him. He sits there in the silence of the storm, with the wind banging a little on the shutters and the fire crackling in the hearth and the bubble of the soup a muted hum at the back of his mind. He closes his eyes and remembers to breathe- remembers that he’s sixty seven years old and that there’s little else in this world he finds more comforting than having his babies close and safe and warm.
*
Joel and JJ spend the day together.
Series
- Part 3 of out of the mouths of babes
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swing low, sweet chariot by marchflower
Fandoms: The Last of Us (TV), The Last of Us (Video Games)
01 Sep 2024
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Summary
“How do you feel?”
Ellie thinks, sucks on her lower lip. “I guess- mostly just really sad.”
It’s an understatement if there ever was one. Sometimes the sadness feels so big that she’s not sure how she’d ever manage to escape it, to exist outside of it. It feels like a balloon, constantly growing bigger and bigger and never once popping. Ellie’s terrified of what it’s going to feel like when it finally breaks.
“Sometimes,” Maria says, “Sometimes, sad and stuck are the same thing. And that’s okay. You can be sad every day for the rest of your life, Ellie, and you can still live a rich, full, exciting life. Okay?”
*
Ellie Williams at the intersection of grief, faith, and love.
Series
- Part 4 of out of the mouths of babes