Title: That Which Shapes A Man

Chapter Ten: Resolution

Author: hisgoodgirl

Rating: PG-15 for strong language, angst. Kleenex alert. Characters: Jayne, ofc, omc Pairing: Jayne/Kaylee some chapters Timeline: About the time of “Those Left Behind” Disclaimer: All belongs to Joss. Word Count: 3,742; chapter ten of thirteen

A/N:: From the first time I watched Firefly, I wondered what circumstances might have shaped the character of Jayne Cobb, an exceptionally complex man. This story emerged from the questions I asked.

Thanks to my excellent beta, ArtemisPrime. To read previous chapters, click on my name, above. Your comments are sincerely appreciated. Thanks!

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Chapter Ten: Revelation

All day long, the little house on Weaver Street bustles with people coming and going, bringing food and paying their respects. Jayne hasn’t anticipated all the fuss, but it pleases him to see the affection and respect that people in the community have for Mattie and his Ma. There are a few folks he remembers from his early years, mostly family friends and relatives, but the majority of the visitors are strangers to him. Mostly he feels awkward and in the way.

Over and over, his mother calls him to her and introduces him, “...and this is my eldest son, Jayne. He’s the Head of Security for a starship!” So he’d led her to believe when he signed on to Serenity. Sounded just so much better than “mercenary” or “hired gun.” Still, her obvious pride only serves to make him feel guilty for misleading his family about so much of his life.

In an effort to find a corner where he doesn’t feel stifled by the crowd, he wanders back into Mattie’s room and sits down at the small, overflowing desk. It’s there that Liza eventually finds him, thumbing through Mattie’s journal.

“We missed you and wondered where you were.” She carefully lowers her bulk onto the edge of Mattie’s bed, looking at him uncertainly. There seems to be little of the big brother she remembers in the hulking man across from her.

“I ain’t used to bein’ amidst so many people an’ folks kept trippin’ over me. Thought I’d find someplace a little quieter, stay out from under foot.” Jayne thumbs through the leather-bound journal, then glances around the small room they’d all once shared. He nods at Liza’s belly and grins. “When’r ya due? Must be soon, from the look of things.”

There, that helped. She smiles back, cradling her child-to-be, “I’ve got about three more weeks to go. We was just plannin’ on havin’ the two, but you know how it goes.”

He shakes his head, just to be sociable-like, but the uncertain expression on his face makes clear he really has no clue. Not that I ever had a kid, leastwise that I know of. He contemplates the possibility of Cobb offspring scattered about the ‘verse and decides the idea gives him the willies. Then he imagines Kaylee and envisions her with a belly like Liza’s, carrying his child. Wonder if I ever will?

“Readin’ this, bein’ in here – well, it make’s me feel like I knew Mattie a little better.” His face is wistful as he looks at her. “What was he like, Lizzy, as a man, I mean?”

“You’d know, yourself, if you’d ever bothered to come home,” she snaps at him, shifting her heavy body and trying to get more comfortable. “Mattie was pretty lost when you left, Jayne. We all were, especially with Pa stayin’ drunk all the time and then him getting’ fired and movin’ out…” her voice trails off as the memories of those difficult times overwhelm her.

She sighs and looks up at her brother, seeing the sadness and regret clearly stamped on his features. “I’m sorry.” Her hand plucks and smoothes at her skirt. “This has been a very difficult week.”

“Yeah, I can imagine.”

“And please stop calling me Lizzy. I’m not nine years old anymore.” She speaks softly, hoping to placate him.

The merc stares down at the journal in his hand, nearly filled with his brother’s small, neat script, then closes the book and places it back on top of the stack of ledgers. ”Looks like he was smart.”

“He was. And funny, and sweet. Even when he was sickly, he appreciated whatever anyone did for him. Learned to play that old guitar of yours right well.” Liza’s eyes tear up and she takes a lace handkerchief from her pocket. “Did you know he had a sweetheart he was plannin’ to marry?”

“That gray-eyed gal?” Jayne thumbs toward the capture on Mattie’s dresser.

Liza sniffles and wipes tears from her cheeks. “You’ll likely meet her at the funeral. Her name is Maggie Holmes.”

A quick double knock and Rachel leans in the doorway. “There you two are. Just wanted to let you know, lunch is in ten minutes.”

“Lord knows, there’s enough food.” Jayne marvels. “Plenty a times, out in the Black, I sure wouldda been happy for a tenth of the spread that’s out there.”

“Don’t they feed you on that ship you work on?” Liza wonders.

“Well, there’s times we’re out for a stretch and supplies runs short. There’s only so many things ya can do with powdered protein, ya know.”

Liza grimaces. “Powdered protein? You actually have to eat that?”

“Ya do if’n it’s all you got.” He thinks of Shepherd Book’s cooking and smiles.

“Everyone takes turns cookin’,” he explains, “which makes for a right uneven sorta fare. Now our pilot and the ship’s doc can’t neither one boil water, but we got a preacher on board who’s one helluva cook. Seems to be able to make most anything tasty.”

“To tell the truth, I didn’t even figure on such fine vittles or all the folks that have come by. I seen folks I ain’t seen since I was a kid. Well, some a that’s ‘cause I been gone, but anyhow…” The merc realizes he’s rattling on and leans back in his chair. “So, whattaya hear from Jared these days?”

Liza’s noticeably perplexed by his question. “I thought you knew, Jayne.” She studies her brother. “Jared’s dead.”

Another long, awkward silence. The merc struggles to keep his face neutral, although the news is like a punch to the gut. His jaw tightens, and his heart begins to race.

“What the hell happened?”

“Him and some buddies robbed a bank in Hamilton and killed the guard. Didn’t take long for the Law to catch up with ‘em, and they was all hung. Come to think of it, musta happened about the time you left Sunderland.”

Wuh de tyen, ah! I figured that gorram guard was dead, but I sure as hell didn’t know about Jared and Les and Amos. Damn! I guess I musta made it off world just in time.

Liza shifts to ease her aching back again and her eyes zero in on the butt of Jayne’s revolver sticking out from his bag where it lays on the floor near the headboard of the bed. She glances up at Jayne, watches her brother’s face blanch, his hands tensed on the chair arms and suddenly, it all comes together.

“That was why you left, wasn’t it?” she accuses, her voice rising. “That was why you took off like your tail was on fire, why you never came back, not once ‘til now. You were in on that robbery!”

Her brother pushes his bag up under the bed with the toe of his boot and shushes her. “Gorrammit, Liza, keep yer voice down. Even if what yer sayin’s true, Ma sure as hell don’t need to know nothin’ about it.”

Girl always did have a big mouth.

He stands, towering over her. “Please, Liza, fer Ma’s sake, let bygones be.”

*** The womenfolk clean up after lunch, washing dishes and putting away the remains of more food than Jayne has seen in a long, long time. He’d loaded his plate with ham and turkey, large servings of half a dozen casseroles and a couple of his Aunt Florence’s famed dinner rolls, oblivious to the stares and murmurs around him.

The lesson was one of the first he’d learned out on his own, “Eat when you can, ‘cause you never know when the next meal’s coming”. There were others, but the toughest had been, “Don’t count on anybody but yourself.” Kaylee is changing that one. Workin’ for Mal on Serenity is changing it, too.

After he’s eaten, he lets Rachel know he’s going out for a walk and a smoke. He needs to clear his head, needs to digest the news Liza has shared. For once, the sky is clear and the air warmed by Sunderland’s big red sun. The merc digs the stub of his cigar from a coat pocket along with his matches and cups the flame, puffing to ignite the stogie. The smoke spirals out from his mouth as he stares out over the town toward the ironworks.

Wonder if I still got a warrant out on me? Guess there ain’t no safe way to find out…

He turns, jammed his hands into his coat pockets and begins to walk, his long legs carrying him quickly up the street. Sure feels good to get outside, away from all that hullabaloo. The confinement and constant turmoil are really getting to him and he wishes he had access to his weights or, failing that, a good bar fight somewheres.

Don’t know what I was expectin’ back here, but I fit in ’bout like a turd in a punch bowl. It’s good to see Ma and th’ girls again, but I ain’t got nothin’ in common with ‘em anymore. Worst of all is the way they keep lookin’ at me like they’re expectin’ me to put down roots and stay, take Mattie’s place. No ruttin’ way that’s gonna happen.

He thinks about the girl he left back on Serenity. Kaylee, honey, I’m sure wishin’ I brung ya, if for no other reason than yer sweet company about now. You let me be, ain’t always havin’ to explain myself to ya. The life we live, these folk got no way a understandin’.

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Jayne returns to the house several hours later and things are just as chaotic as before. He grits his teeth and tries be polite and stay out of the way, all the while wishing he had thought to bring along a bottle of booze. Several times he catches Liza giving him the stink eye, and he hopes like hell she’ll have the good sense to keep her realization to herself.

At 4:00 PM, the mortician stops by to sort out the final details for Mattie’s funeral, to be held at Annalee’s church the following afternoon, and there is a new round of lamentation and religifyin’. It’s all just too much, and Jayne goes into the kitchen for a cup of coffee.

It isn’t that he doesn’t grieve his brother’s passing, or doesn’t believe in God or an afterlife, although he figures his own will be pretty toasty. The ponderous conventionality is so tedious, the need for ritual and order and structure is oppressive. He’s once again reminded of how different his life is from the lives of the other folk present, of how they'd scorn him if they knew who and what he is: a mercenary, a hired gun, a thief, a killer.

Jayne can’t remember the last time he’s been in a church – probably not since he’d moved in with Jared. Poor ol’ Jared. To be honest, he’s looking forward to the whole business being over and being back on Serenity.

***

Supper’s been cleared away, and one by one, the guests have taken their leave, until only Jayne and Annalee remain in the suddenly quiet house. With the dimming of the day, the big man lights several oil lamps and sits down with his mother. They sit together in the kitchen at the same table where Jayne had eaten meals throughout his childhood. Annalee is knitting a mint green baby sweater for Liza’s child-to-be, and the click of the knitting needles and the ticking of the old wall clock in the parlor are the only sounds apart from their occasional conversation.

In the stillness, Jayne feels awkward, wishes he had a gun to clean. “The girls look good, huh? Seem happy enough. Rachel, especially.”

Click, click. “They’re well settled, and Tommie and Wallace are good men. When ya git to be my age, son, you want to see yer children happy.” Annalee peers intently over her knitting at Jayne. “T’ain’t natural to lead such an unsettled life, son. I know you ain’t married, but at least get yerself a sweetheart, not them loose women you like to go with.” Click, click.

Jayne reels back, then recalls Kaylee’s accusation: “You ain’t never even told yer Ma about us, have ya?”

Well, that’s about to change. Jayne gathers his courage.

Click, click.

“Actually, Ma, I got me a girl. Remember me writin’ you about Kaylee, the little gal from Harvest who’s our mechanic? It’s taken awhile to get the sticks and stones sorted out betwixt us, but she’s good fer me, Ma, and as sweet as you’d ever wanna meet. Don’t know why she puts up with me but she does. At least, mostly.”

Click, click.

“Didn’t you write me that she was sweet on the ship’s doctor, the fella with the little sister who ain’t right?” Click, click.

“Used ta be,“ he puffs out his chest and preens, “but I convinced her I was the better man.” His big grin is smug.

The old woman sets down her knitting and taps her finger on the table. “So how come you didn’t bring her home with you, son? You know if’n yer serious about her, I want to meet her.”

Oh boy… here comes the interrogation…

“Well, Ma, I wanted to – You gorram liar – an’ she wanted to come, but our Cap’n had a transport job to Newhall and needed her on-board.”

Annalee raises a skeptical eyebrow and takes up her knitting again. “Does she come from a good Christian family?” Click, click.

“Yes, Ma.” Change the subject… "Her Pa runs a machine shop.” Click, click. “That’s where she learned so much about engines an’ such. I ain’t met her kin yet, myself, but they sound like good people.”

Click, click.

Annalee gazes over her bifocals at her remaining son and asks, “Do you love her, boy?”

“Yes, Ma, I surely do.”

Click, click. “Plannin’ to marry her, Jayne?” Click, click.

He takes a deep breath and forges ahead. “I plan to, if she’ll have me.”

“That’s good.”

Click, click. Annalee smiles and begins to count the stitches in the row she’s just finished.

Marry Kaylee. There, he’s said it out loud. Some part of him knew he’d been thinking about the possibility for weeks, but he’d never come right out and admitted it to himself. And what about her? Maybe she didn’t want him like that, didn’t want to make it serious, make it permanent. He’s 41, she’s just 23. He has so little to offer her - no future, no security. And yet, there it is. For the first time in his life, he’s ready to commit to something, to someone.

Click, click.

“Given any thought to where you’re gonna settle? A starship ain’t no place to be havin’ a family, son. Jared’s daddy, yer Uncle Graham? He left his place to me when he passed on last year. It’s rented out right now, but you could have it. Got three bedrooms, even got an indoor bath. They got openings down at the plant for welders and security both, Jayne, and you wouldn’t have no trouble findin’ work, just…”

“Whoa, Ma! You’re way ahead a me!” He throws up his hands to slow her headlong plans. “I ain’t even asked her yet; and we surely ain’t neither one reckoning on leaving Serenity.”

His mother looks hurt. “I just thought… you been away so long, Jayne.” She lays down her knitting and looks at him, long and silently, then speaks her mind. “I figured, things as they are, you might finally be tired of runnin’.”

“Runnin’ from what?” Jayne jerks back, crossing his arms over his broad chest defensively.

Annalee gets up. She comes and stands right beside her son and places her wrinkled, bony old hand on his shoulder. She stands eye to eye with her big, seated son and she speaks from her heart.

“Runnin’ from the robbery you and Jared done, when that bank guard got killed. I knew when Mattie finally gave me that envelope full of money why you’d shipped out all of a sudden. I know why you ain’t never been back, Jayne.”

His jaw drops open and he stares at her, trying to think of what to say, of how to respond. At first the words just won’t come, then he stammers out, “You… ya knowed all this time?”

She nods, a faint, sad smile on her worn old face.

“You knowed and ya ain’t said nothin’ about it?”

“What was I to say, son? You know you done wrong. You was already gone. I figured the best I could do fer you by then was just to love ya and keep prayin’ fer ya, so that’s what I did.”

“Well, I’ll be a gorrammed fool.” He shoves up out of his chair and starts to pace the small kitchen. “All this time you knowed an’ ya never said a word. Never wrote me when they took Jared an’ Les an’ Amos an’ hung ‘em.” He glares at her. “I never even knew they was dead ‘til Lizzy told me about what happened this afternoon.”

“Ma, I ain’t never known you to tell a lie. Why lie about this?” His face is the bewildered visage of a lost child.

Annalee holds out her hand to him. “I understand why you’re angry, son. And it’s reasonable you’d be wantin’ an explanation. Truth is, there are probably a lot of things you need to know. Please, Jayne, come sit back down with me. Ask what you will an’ I’ll do my best to answer you truly.”

Kneading his aching forehead for a minute, the big man returns to his chair, speaks in a voice that is heavy with regret, urgent. “We never planned on killin’ that guard, Ma. As God is my witness. Hell, we didn’t have no business robbin’ the bank, but at the time, it made sense. I knew you were strugglin’ and I just wanted to help, somehow.” He shakes his head from side to side, battered hands grasping the edge of the table, the corner of his mouth tucked in dismay.

His mother’s voice is soft and hesitant. “I knew you boys were getting’ into trouble and did my best to persuade you to come home, but you’d gotten a taste of runnin’ wild, done got it in your blood. Mattie didn’t tell me for several days that you’d left the world. He was acting all tore up and I finally worried it out of ‘im. That was when he handed me the envelope of money.”

“I figured out what had happened when news of the robbery and killin’ got around. The posse didn’t have much trouble findin’ Jared and yer friends and the manager at the bank gave witness, so they was all bound by law to be hung. Yer Uncle Graham took it real hard. He bore a lot of anger, son, that you’d got away and Jared didn’t.”

Jayne gnaws his lower lip. “Don’t explain why you never said nothin’.”

“Son, there was “Wanted” posters out for ya all over the prefecture. What you done was wrong and part of me wanted you to come home, accept responsibility. But when they hung Jared, all I could think was that I couldn’t bear to see the same fate befall ya.” Annalee begins to weep and Jayne feels sick. He reaches out and rests his huge hand over his mother’s small one.

“I never urged you to come home," she sniffles, “because I knew there was a warrant on ya. Finally ran out after twenty years, so there’s no issue with you bein’ home now. Maybe I shouldn’t have accepted the money you brought me, and that’s somethin’ between me an’ the Lord, but times was so hard, I somehow justified it to myself.”

Her streaming sapphire eyes meet his. “The children and I wouldda never made it without yer help, Jayne. Right or wrong, you helped keep us alive.” She dabs her nose and eyes with a handkerchief from her skirt pocket. “Every one of us as walk’s God’s earth can look back on things we done, on the choices we made, and wish we’d done things different. But we cain’t change things no how. Best we can do is learn and grow and keep on tryin’ to be the best man or woman we can be.”

Jayne digests what she’s just told him, decides it’s time for more answers. “Since we’re bein’ truthsome, there’s some other things I want to know.”

“Such as?”

“Is Pa still alive?” Now I’m into the thick of it…

The old woman sighs heavily. “Far as I know, he is, although ain’t none of us heard from him in years. Such a waste when a good man falls in a bottle and cain’t climb out.” She picks up her knitting, then sets it back down, her hands expressing her agitation. “T’was a time Jeddadiah was a good man, skilled at his trade, a tender husband and lovin’ father.”

“What happened to him, Ma?”

“One day, when you were about eight or nine, he was up on a scaffold at the plant, welding. The foreman claimed a bolt sheered off. I don’t know. But the scaffolding collapsed and yer pa injured his head in the fall. From then on, he couldn’t hold the torch steady an’ his eye was off. At first, they gave him extra time, hopin’ he’d get his skill back, but after six weeks, weren’t no choice but to demote him to scrap work, ‘cause it was all he could do.”

“He was proud of his skill, son, and that fall took it all away. It took away his ability to provide comfortably for us and it took away his self-respect. He started drinking and his temper got worse an’ worse. I got no idea why he began taking his rage out on you, but it like to broke my heart.”

She looks back up at him. “Jayne, you never saw a man so proud of a son as yer Pa was when you come along. And to go from that to what he done to ya…"

"I done all I could to keep him happy, did my best to keep him from hurtin’ ya the way he did. Still, weren’t none of it enough. Now he’s gone, an’ Mattie’s gone and soon enough, you’ll be gone, too.” Overwhelmed by loss, she buries her face in her hands and her bony shoulders shake with sobs.

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Chapter ten of thirteen