Empty Moments
By Misha
Disclaimer- I don t own any of the characters of the Chronicles of Narnia, though I wish I did. I m not making any money off this story, so please don t sue.
Author s Notes- I ve been on a Narnia kick lately, not sure why. This is my first Narnia fiction, but likely not my last. Its Lucy-centric. I ve always been fascinated by the fact that they grew to adulthood and then had to become children again and that s what this story is about. I make up a lot, I pair Lucy with Corin, and make up histories, but that s what fanfic is about right? Also, my timeline is this, Lucy was 8 when she went into the wardrobe, they stayed there 20 years (I wasn t sure of the length, so I made up a number), and thus she was 28 when they came home. This takes place 5 years later, 3 years after she d last been in Narnia. I hope you enjoy!
Summery- She suffers through the moments of her normal life, but can t help remember the life she already lived...
Rating- PG-13
It's her 13th birthday. Mother and Father have planned a party, there will be cake and presents and friends, but...
Lucy wants to shout to the world that she turned 13 long ago. She remembers it, that 13th birthday that took place in a far away land...
They had been on the thrones at Cair Paravel almost five years then and birthdays had been a big thing, though the calendar had run differently. Still, with birthdays evenly divided between the seasons, it was easy to pick approximate dates. Peter was Summer, Susan Winter, Edmund Fall, and Lucy' s the first day of Spring.
Lucy closed her eyes and pictured herself at Cair Paravel, remembering the grand gala and how lovely it had been. All their parties had been lovely. Oh it was so long ago now.
It was funny, today was her 13th birthday, but she was remembering what had felt like her real 13th birthday as if it had happened long ago...
Of course, she 'd been 28 when the'y d left Narnia, sh'e d had so very many birthdays. It might seem strange, but deep inside, that woman still lived inside the little girl.
She wondered if the same was true for her siblings. Surely not Susan. Susan who was 17 now and so very frivolous. Susan who had seemed to forget that she was ever a queen.
Maybe it was easier for her that way, easier than to remember the life she' d left behind. Of the husband and child sh'e d abandoned one fanciful day. Of course, the'y d all been married then, but only Susan had had a child...
Lucy often wondered what had happened to Susan' s daughter... None of them had dared mention in when they 'd come back to Narnia a thousand years after they left and Lucy couldn' t bring herself to ask when she and Edmund returned a year later.
It was easier just to forget that they'd been grown, that they' d ever married, that Susan had ever had a child... So, perhaps Susan had the right of it after all.
Susan forced herself to forget, while Lucy couldn 't bring herself too. As for the boys, Lucy thought they fell somewhere in the middle. They didn' t block the memories like Susan, but they didn' t dwell on them on like Lucy.
Maybe because she was the youngest... She was the one who had been forced back into the body of a little girl, despite the fact that in her heart, she was still a woman grown, while Peter and Susan at least had been at the cusp of adolescence.
Lucy knows she ll have to go down soon and fake the joy of a girl on her 13th birthday, her entrance into the threshold of adulthood, but she needs a few more minutes to fortify herself, because in her heart she reached it long ago.
This morning, the morning of her 13th birthday, she finds herself remembering other birthdays. 13, 16, 19, 21, 25... She remembers the day she married Corin.
She' d been 24, he was 21. He d grown from impulsive child to a brave, fierce man and she' d loved him dearly. She wonders what happened to him, her brave Corin. He 'd been off in Archland the day they had gone to hunt for the stag, so it would have only been afterwards that he would have learnt of her disappearance. Poor Corin. It seems weird to be remembering a husband, she' d left behind so long ago.
After all, she is but a thirteen year-old girl, to young yet to even date, and once she 'd once been married. Oh, so long ago now... In her life it was five years she d seen him, in that world, well millennia had passed.
Lucy stands then and walks to her mirror. She looks into it and sees her face, the face of 13 year-old Lucy Pensive, pretty and becoming less childish with each passing day, but the face of a girl, nonetheless.
Yet, for a second, she swears she sees the face of Queen Lucy look back at her. The beautiful gold-haired woman, with all the traces of childhood vanquished from her face.
Lucy stares at the mirror long and hard, but that fleeting image of the queen she once was has vanished and all that is left is the girl that she still is. Finally, she realizes she 's put it off long enough, she must go down and celebrate a birthday that really she celebrated long ago.
In her heart, she is 33 today, not 13, but it doesn t like work that. For her, the clock moves backwards, not forwards. Today is her 13th birthday and she must pretend that she never had another.
But then, that shouldn t be hard, by now, pretending is second nature.
Lucy forces a smile as she makes her way down the stairs. After all, today is her 13th birthday.
- The End