borderline - the last of us.

22. safe.

WHEN JOEL GOT BACK TO THE HOUSE, it was silent. He had missed the end of Ellie and Ralph's movie by a narrow fifteen minutes and was now trying to navigate the inside of this unfamiliar house in the darkness, arms waving out in front of him like a zombie.

Aside from those antics, Joel wasn't feeling very good this afternoon. For starters, what Tommy told him about Ralph threw a total curveball at him. And then, right after that, one of those mini heart attack things crept up on him straight afterwards, adding insult to injury. Then, in the workshop, he had finally gotten to the meat and bone of it all and completely broke down and confessed everything to Tommy- About him and Ralph, about Ellie, about why he wanted Tommy to come with them.

Now, he was left with the dull task of telling Ellie what was going to happen next, shuffling up to the door she was sleeping behind and placing his hand over the handle of it, letting the cold metal press against his warm hand.

'Ellie?' He called out softly, twisting the handle and opening the door, happy to see there was a light on inside the room and that he wasn't disturbing anything by being here. He shuffled into the room and found her sitting by the window, a book opened in her lap and her eyes darting across the page from left to right.

'Is this really all they had to worry about?' She asked him, not even looking up from the page and continuing to read. 'Boys. Movies. Deciding which shirt goes with which skirt. It's bizarre.'

Joel stared at her blankly, not able to give her an answer. Not wanting to give her an answer because that would only drag out this detrimental conversation and keep him here, frozen on the spot, for even longer. 'Listen.'

'Why are you here?'

'I came here to talk to you.'

'No, why are you still here?' Ellie looked up at him with a scrunched-up face. 'If you're gonna ditch me, ditch me.'

'What exactly did you hear?' Joel asked, scratching his thumb against his palm.

'Why don't you ask Lou?' Ellie stared out the window at the snowfall behind the glass, giving up reading or looking at Joel for the calmest activity out of the bunch. 'She heard everything, told us everything as well. "I have to leave her, you have to take her. I can't do it, I can't get him hurt. Can't risk it." You know, I should've listened to her. Everything she said about you, I stood up for you, because I thought...'

'...I made this decision for your own good.' Joel had half the mind to go stomping into the room next door and tear Louise Zhenya a new one for being such a goddamn snitch, but every action had a consequence, he supposed. 'You'll be way better off with Tommy. He knows the area better than I do-'

'Do you give a shit about me or not!?' Ellie got to her feet, slamming the diary down on the windowsill and glaring daggers at him. 'Or do you only care about Ralph? Is that why you're doing this? So you can be stuck with someone who fucking worships you?'

'Of course not!' Joel yelled back at her.

'Then what are you so afraid of? Ralph cares about me. You always copy everything he does, so why can't you copy that? Why can't you care about me!?'

'Ellie, I do care about you! I do!' Joel insisted loudly, holding his hands out in front of himself. 'But... These things, they're difficult. This is for your own good, kid. It's best for you to go with Tommy. You and I both know it. I'm old, Ellie, and I-'

'I'm not her, you know.'

Joel's heart dropped, and Ellie noticed it within a second.

'Maria told me about Sarah and-'