It hadn't been easy to recover since the Blackwater failure. They had lost people, good people, the kind that could not easily be replaced.
He missed the Callander boys, no matter if they were as prickly as a pair of cactus and would cheat on poker more times than he could count using his fingers — then again, Arthur had always been terrible at counting.
Then, there was poor Jenny. The girl was so young, pretty too, full of life. Lenny liked her a lot, and Arthur had his suspicions as to why.
Time passed, the wounds healed, but the gang only got more unstable. Dutch was no longer the same since the attempted robbery, and not even Hosea trusted the man as much as he used to do. Things had changed, for the worse or the better.
Amidst it all, through thick and thin, however, Arthur had you.
Curious little thing you were, always walking around with a camera. You were a traveler, didn't stick around most of the time, always busy doing other things. Some questioned if you were truly loyal to the gang, but then came the question of Trelawney's own loyalty, and any and all arguments fell.
Documenting the fall of the Old West, you said once, and Arthur had since been wondering if the future was really biting at them as much as it did. They had ran so much, and for what? Tahiti was just another excuse that he couldn't bear to hear coming from Dutch's lips once more.
It was one of those nights at camp where Bill was so drunk he'd pick a fight with anyone in front of him, Javier was playing a slow tune, and mostly everyone had gone to sleep or was too out of it to think properly.
Arthur had watched it all unfold before his eyes, arms crossed over his chest in a nonchalant manner before he spotted you, sitting by the fire fiddling with your camera. Of course, curiosity got the best of him, as it often did when it came down to you, and he approached you silently.
He didn't ask for permission, but he sat down next to you, tilting his head.
"Show me some of the photos you took of us."