#GAHHHHHH I LOVE TAM AMBER SO MUCH I LOVE HIM AND CLERK CARMINE I CAN'T DO THIS

[retrowitchy]

thinking about baby lenore dove and her uncles again goddamnit

if u have ever wanted 9 year old lenore dove and tam amber content then you are in the right place step right up folks

*✴︎+ lost souls on ao3

It was a quiet evening, one of those nice ones where the grass in the Meadow seemed to sway like it was caught up in a waltz, and all heaven and earth seemed in tune with it, even the lightning bugs and the leaves on the oak trees.

They were sat out in the grass, not too far from the house. Tam Amber absentmindedly picked along on his mandolin, one conscientious eye on his nine year old niece, who was hunting for wish-flowers. Her dark hair sprung out every which way, unruly and bouncing as she dove through the grass, reminding him of himself when he was her same age.

Clerk Carmine was off with his sweetheart in town, so Tam Amber was the sole parent for the night. Not that he minded- somehow, when CC left, it felt like there was a little more wiggle room for dreamers. Clerk Carmine kept them sensible, kept them safe. Without him, Tam Amber and Lenore Dove would "roam the impossibilities and daydreams of yesterday, tomorrow, and never" as he liked to say sometimes. He and her both had rovin' minds, wandering all over the place, and there wasn't any shame in it. Besides, he loved hearing the things his niece was thinking about.

Tam Amber started to sing as he plucked the strings, watching Lenore Dove blow dandelion seeds everywhere.

"Can't take my past

Can't take my history,

You can't take my pa, 'cuz his name's a mystery.

Nothin' you can take was ever worth keepin'-"

"Oh nothin' you can take was ever worth keepin!" Lenore Dove finished with him, springing onto the blanket and nearly startling him out of his nice reverie.

"Well, Lenore Dove, what brings you over to this here blanket on this fine evening?" he asked, poking her in the belly.

She giggled. "Play some more, I like that one."

"I know you do. That's a Lucy Gray song, it's in your bones," he said. "Your uncle used to go crazy on the fiddle when we'd play it."

"He's already crazy," Lenore Dove rolled her eyes, wiggling her bare toes out in front of her. Lord, she had sass on her. When she and CC would go at it, Tam Amber could barely keep up. They'd banter for days without even stopping to sleep if they could.

"You make any good wishes out there?" he asked her, continuing to pick out the tune of the song quietly.

"Lots. I wished for a thousand birds to be my friends," Lenore Dove said, flopping back on the blanket.

"Well hey, you know what they say. A well-willin' wish will surely will itself real."

"They don't say that. You just made that up!" Lenore Dove exclaimed. "That's a tongue twister!"

"So what if I did?" he said, smiling at her. "Doesn't make it any less real."

"Oh, quit. Keep playin'," she said.

Tam Amber obliged, feeling no need to continue singing but dutifully playing the song to the best of his recollection. Lenore Dove sat up, turned over, and propped herself up on her arms on her stomach to watch.

"Hey, what's that mean in the song? About havin' your pa's name be a mystery?" she asked.

He set the mandolin down in his lap momentarily. "I reckon it's sayin' they don't know who their pa was. His name's a mystery because they never met him."

"Like me," Lenore Dove said, moving over to lie on her back again and gaze up into the treetops of the oaks. "I never met my pa."

"Yeah, just like that. We never met him either, so it's true, his name's a mystery," Tam Amber conceded thoughtfully. "Sorta true about myself, too."

She looked over at him, eyes big and wide. "What? You didn't know your pa either?"

"Pa or ma," Tam Amber said, shaking his head. "Didn't I ever tell you this story?"

"No," she said softly, fingering the patches on his pants. "Can you tell me?"

"Well sure. Not much to tell, really. Back in the old days, the days you like, all the Covey had at least one relation to each other. Your ma, Lucy Gray, Barb Azure, they were all Bairds. Clerk Carmine, Billy Taupe, they were of Clade kin. When that old man took 'em in, they were all already sort of a family. But I came straight to 'em in a box off the side of the road. My ma left me, I s'pose, or my pa, whoever was in charge of me. I never knew 'em. Your mama used to call me a lost soul," he said, chuckling. Lenore Dove was hanging onto his every word with a rapt attention. "I guess that about sums me up."

"If you're a lost soul, I'm one too," she said determinedly. "We're kin like that."

"Well, you're a Baird, so don't let any of that clan hear you disrespecting them like that. They'll roll in their graves," he laughed, gently pulling one of her curls.

"Okay," said Lenore Dove, yanking one of his curls in return. "But if I never knew my pa, then I'm half Baird, half lost soul. How 'bout that?"

Tam Amber looked at her, her big, earnest green eyes, her dirty overalls, the hopeful twitch of her little nose. It had been hell when Maude Ivory left them. He didn't know if he could stand the loss of one more member of the family, and worse, neither could Clerk Carmine. But they had had no idea how much joy this little kid, full of sweetness and sass and dreams and big ideas, was gonna bring them. How she would carry with her life back into the Covey house, and laughter, and love. Just like her mama did. And maybe her pa was the same way, who knows.

"Sure," he said, eyes crinkling up in a smile. "I think that's a fine idea."