Our Handshake (Arthur Morgan X Reader)

III: Secret Spot

Blackwater
1877

I begin walking in the direction of my spot. It's the spot I always go to when I need to be alone for a bit. When it's sunny, you're hidden in the shade where no one can see you. At night, obviously it's dark so you still can't be seen unless you have a fire going or a torch. It has the perfect view of the sunrise, when you look straight ahead. And you can see camp when you look to your left. No one has come up here since we've been here and no one has followed me up here when I do. For that I consider it my secret spot, momma is the only one that knows about it. I told her where it was one day after her and Ms.Grimshaw were freaking out one day, after I had "disappeared out of thin air" as Ms.Grimshaw put it. I put up a lantern, so that momma knows I'm up here when she can't find me in my tent. We arrived at the spot. I turned around to see that Arthur was a foot maybe two away from me. "This is what I wanted to show you. It's my spot. It's where I come to think, draw or just be alone. I figured you'd want a spot you'd like to come to so I'm sharing my secret with you and only you." I said looking at him very seriously. "If you're up here though, you have to light the lantern so that I know that you're up here and you want to be alone for a bit. Okay?" Arthur nodded his head at me looking around the spot. "I'll leave you be for a bit. Let everything soak in. I'll come and get you when your tent and the stew are ready." I say and I turned to walk down the hill. "Thank you." I heard, I turned back around. The look of shock on my face. Arthur hasn't said much since we've been up here. I smiled and said "Anytime." I walked up to him and held out my hand. He took it and gave it a squeeze. I squeezed back and we let go. "Oh by the way, there's some matches up on that branch there. Light that lantern so momma knows where you are." I turned and walked away as Arthur sat down against one of the trees after lighting the lantern.

~Time Skip to camp~

I got back down to camp and saw that Ms.Grimshaw was nearly done with Arthur's set up. "Thank you Ms.Grimshaw" I said while I walked over to her. She turned and looked at me in shock. I rarely said thank you to her, this made me feel kinda bad. I've never been appreciative of her and after all she's done for me. "What are you thanking me for?" She asked all confused. "Today I realized that without you I'd be in jail or worse. You've always looked after me and I realized that I have never thanked you for all that you've done for me. I'm also sorry for being bad and not listening to you. So thank you for everything you've done for me and will do in the future." I said with my head down, kicking around a pebble on the ground. She laughed a little and came over and gave me a hug. "Thank you, I know you're a growing girl and that you're going to rebel a little bit. You do cause a little trouble but you make up for it by helping me around camp. Don't change, don't know what I'd do if you weren't causing a little mischief around here." She laughed again and I did too. "I promise to cause less trouble, but I'm not gonna stop." I laughed and she smiled. I ran off to mom as Ms.Grimshaw went back to work. "Hi momma, what are you doing?" I said as she was sewing a pretty black and blue fabric. "Making you a new dress, the one you have is getting all worn, the ends are beginning to fray. Where's Arthur?" She asked while looking up from her current task. I just smiled and said "It's a secret." And looked up to the hill were the lantern was lit. She looked back at me and smiled. "That was very nice of you to show him your secret spot dear. You should go get him though Mr.Pearson was saying a few minutes ago that dinner would be done shortly." She said as she went back to sewing. I walked back over to Ms. Grimshaw and saw that was just finishing up Arthur's tent. So instead of waiting for her to tell me to go get him like momma just told me to I started my journey back up the hill.

~Time Skip to the top of the hill~

As I made it to the top I noticed that Arthur had a book and a pencil in his hand so instead of interrupting him I say down next to him. I was about to look at what he was doing but before I could see, he closed the book and looked at me. "Can I help you?" He said squinting his eyes at me. " I just wanted to see what you were doing..." I said with an innocent smile. "Well that's none of your business, now is it?" He said with a stern voice, well as stern as a fourteen year old boy could get. "It looked like you were drawing something. Can I see it, please?" I asked politely not trying to pry but I was at the same time. "Why do you want or need to know if I was drawin anything?" Wow this is the most I've heard him talk all day this must be very private to him. "Well ya see, I like drawing too. That's what I do when I come up here sometimes. So I want to know if what you're drawing is similar to what I was drawing when I came up here for the first time." I said with a smile but he wasn't budging. "Arthur if you show me what you were drawing I'll show you all of mine, after dinner, please show me." I said with pleading eyes. "Ugh, fine but I'm only showing you one! That's it!" He said with some attitude. "Close your eyes." He said before he even opened the book back up. "Why?" "Because I don't want you seein my other stuff, now close 'em." He said, I rolled my eyes but I did close them. I heard pages turning for a few seconds before they stopped. "Okay, you can open them now." He said still with an attitude. When I opened my eyes I saw a beautiful drawing of the horizon in front of us. Arthur didn't need any colors to draw how beautiful the setting sky was. His shading was perfect. I stared in awe for a bit, but Arthur slammed the book closed. "Alright that's enough." He said looking away from me and getting up. "Arthur that was the most beautiful drawing I have ever seen! You have to show me more!" I pleaded loudly. "No, I told you that was it. No more!" He said holding his book and pencil closely to his side. I got up from the ground. "Alright, fine. Just don't expect me not to ask to see more. That was amazing! Anyways I came up here to tell you that Ms.Grimshaw finished your tent and that dinner should be done now. Mr.Pearson makes a great stew if you ask me!" I said dusting myself off a little bit, and beginning to start the walk back down. "Thank you."

~Another time skip~

After dinner I guided Arthur over to my tent to show him my drawings. As we walked in a voice was heard, "You open one of those tent folds young lady! Don't need any funny business!" Arthur and I looked at each other wide-eyed and blushing. I turned and opened the folds to my tent. "Yes poppa..." I could hear Hosea chuckling a few feet from my father about the entire situation. I turned back to Arthur, still blushing. I cleared my throat, "Anyway... Here's my sketch book." I said pulling it out from under my bed and handing it to him. He looked at me confused. "What? You can look at all of them. Unlike you, I don't care if people look at my artwork even if it's bad. The only opinion that matters to me about it is mine." I said opening the book for him. There were drawings of poppa, the camp, the secret spot, horses, the night sky, and my most priced drawing, momma picking flowers. "Is that your mom?" He asked, looking deeply at the drawing. "Yeah, I was sitting in my tent one day when I looked up and saw her picking some lilacs over there. They're her favorite. She doesn't even know about it, only you." I said smiling at my work. "Wow, you're good. I think I could do better though." He said while looking at me with a smirk. " You think you could draw my momma better than I can? Is that a challenge Arthur Morgan?" I said while raising an eyebrow. "I think I can draw anyone in this camp better than you. And yes I am challengin you, Y/N Van Der Linde." Oh so that's how we're gonna be, okay I'll play. "Alright, even though I said I don't care what others think of my art, I'll take the challenge. We each pick one person from camp to draw, and put them out for show, have everyone take a vote and we'll see who wins. Oh and just because you don't like people looking at your book I won't look at yours and you can't look at mine." I said putting out my hand. "It's on." Arthur said with a smile, taking my hand and squeezing. We let go. Arthur went back to his tent and the challenge began.

~Time Skip... again~

Arthur and I finished at the same time. I'm not sure who he drew but because we shook on it I wasn't going to look. Everyone looked at our papers and took a vote. "We just can't decide! They are both beautiful drawings. They both have an amazing amount of detail." Arthur and I looked at each other. I decided to be nice and say "Arthur even though they say they can't choose, and I can't even see yours, I'll give you this one but only this once." Arthur smiled as I closed my book and put it back in its place. Arthur did the same with his book, he came over to my tent and put out his hand. "Thank you." I took his hand and squeezed and he did it back. "Goodnight Y/n" he said letting go. "Goodnight Arthur." And we went off to bed.

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This chapter is maybe a little longer than the first few. I hope you guys enjoyed. It took me a little while to write and find an okay ending to the chapter. I'm thinking about maybe making Y/N and Arthur older in the next one so we can bring in more characters and more drama!!!

With love
Shannon 🦇