always astounds me when adults hate kids cause like. did you just Forget about how unfair the world seemed when YOU were a child?? do you not remember being upset about how no adult ever seemed to respect you or listen to you at all? and now youre gonna just go on and treat kids like the way you hated being treated when you were one. ok
thinking abt her immediately parenting ellie, even when she can't be sure it's real, and even when joel is still ready to shoot her. thinking abt her knowing joel well enough to tell him to put his gun down from the other room, because she just knows he's raised it. thinking abt her treating joel so gently and calmly, even when his pessimism and anger is driving her mad, right up until the end. thinking abt how she was ready to get joel and ellie to the fireflies even knowing she couldn't continue on with them. thinking abt the pure panic when she realises they've gone, the way joel immediately knows something's wrong because tess has always been the calm one, tess is always keeping him from freaking out, what else could be wrong but the worst possible scenario? thinking abt "i never asked you for anything. not to feel the way i felt," right after joel refused to define their relationship to ellie, and right after slipping into bed at night to hold him but still getting up before him so he doesn't have to acknowledge it in the light of day - thinking of the way joel jolts to say something, to reassure her, and she immediately begs him not to. thinking about the terrible, longing look in joel's eyes before he leaves. thinking about "save who you can save", and joel accepting that tess will have to be another person he loved and watched this wasteland tear apart. thinking about the infection kissing her before joel ever did.