sloanesomething:

Sloane (

sloanesomething) wrote,
2005-12-01 23:57:00

For

bantha_fodder, for Christmas.

"Boys and Lipsticks." Narnia. Susan.

She sleeps soundly. Why shouldn’t she? She’s young, and the war is over.

*

A boy sits on the stool beside her, towheaded, his eyes bright. He hasn’t asked permission, and she has to remember that here, no one has to ask.

“My mates,” he says, “want me to say that I think you’re the loveliest girl in the world.”

When she licks her lips, she tastes the wax from her lipstick, and the boy’s eyes go bright as a faun’s.

*

Mr. Tumnus was always her favorite, because he loved Lucy best, and it befit the Gentle Queen to give up what she held dear.

*

The boy walks her home, tries to take her arm. The centaurs had more grace.

“When I was a lad,” he says, “I used to make believe that the streets were filled with monsters at night. I think my mum told us that to keep us in our beds.”

She says, “You believe a lot of stupid things when you’re young.”

*

Susan wakes up gasping for air, throws open her bedroom window.

She sleeps in the same room, never in the master suite. The professor left the house to all of them. Just because she survived doesn’t mean it’s hers.

*

The boy likes the house. He kisses her in the kitchen until the kettle screams.

He smiles like a faun, just like.

*

The worst of the supplicants came to her, their clothes crusted with blood, their teeth broken on the bones of their victims.

They came to her because she was The Gentle; for all Edmund was the Just King, his grudge ran deep, and they knew better than to expect mercy from a consort of the White Witch.

*

“That’s lovely,” says the shopgirl at her shoulder, nodding. “Very becoming. Suits your skin.”

Susan thinks it makes her look sallow and puts it back, over the girl’s protests.

She doesn’t believe anyone when it comes to this sort of thing.

*

She misses Peter most. She should say Lucy, because of course Lucy was youngest and perfect, but Susan knows that Lucy was so perfect she’ll come out all right in the end.

She worries for Peter, who she knows is missing her, too.

On the way to her room she passes the locked door.

Spare Oom, she thinks, and hates herself.

*

The boy tries the door, frowns.

“You got some other lads in here?” he asks with a grin.

She takes his hand, pulls him down the hall. “There’s nothing in there for us,” she says around the lump in her throat.

*

The boy’s name is Peter.

She doesn’t think about it.

*

She doesn’t touch the door as she passes. It would be childish.

*

“London, please.”

The cab driver blinks. “That’s quite a ways.”

“I know,” she says, sits back.

The cab ride is long, but she can hardly complain; she doesn’t take trains.

*

The flat in London is just as they left it. Lucy left a jumper on the sofa, and it’s covered in a layer of dust.

She’s exhausted, falls asleep on a bed with the coverlet still tucked.

It must have been her bed, she thinks; Lucy wasn’t so tidy. She wonders how there was a doubt, how she could have forgotten which bed was hers.

When she gets up, later, in the dark, the mark of her body is outlined in dust on the bed.

*

She folds the sweaters, washes the dishes, takes a broom to the floor.

Someone has to look after things, she thinks. Who else will?

When the thought hurts, she sleeps again.

*

In her dreams, she hears the echo of a horn.

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bantha_fodder

December 2 2005, 05:02:08 UTC 6 years ago

I love you because you are awesome.

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