so i live. i don't get on very often, and i don't really read so much anymore, but writing still has a thing for me. i got the idea of this fic from various books, picking up ideas and twisting them to make them my unique sort of thing. i might start reading again, though i doubt it; i'm so busy nowadays, with high school just around the corner. I promise, i've been working on my ed/oc story, and the phillip story, and i'll be updating as soon as i can.

After my first few days in that new place, I always thought nothing could be harder than going from a mere, common boy to being a King with the responsibility of leadership for his country. Ultimately, I was wrong.

It took a few weeks of denial in England to finally face the truth that we weren't going back. At least not in the near future, anyways. Maybe sometime—like the professor said—when we're not looking for it. But at the moment our hearts were set on it, and it wasn't coming. We had another life in front of us, and it was our duty to live it as we had before.

It had always been so easy, looking back, to live a normal life, but now it was proving rather difficult for all of us to adjust back into our old lifestyle. We found the most normal objects incredibly peculiar, simply staring in wonder as a cart passed by, incredulous at the fact that the horses drawing it were not protesting at having to haul such a thing. We would often find ourselves talking to the animals, taking a full minute to realize that we were babbling and weren't going to get a response. The clothing was scratchy and odd, and we had all stared at each other when we'd first fallen out of the wardrobe, wondering what on earth we were wearing. Nothing was close to our home in the least.

Luckily for us, we had a few more weeks to adjust to this mirthless land, better our surprise at stupid animals and control our snorts of laughter at the clothing so we could better fit in. Being a Monarch, you received plenty of attention, respect and scorn alike, but you had the power to do something if it wasn't likeable. Here, we doubted such actions would be allowed; we were no longer above others, but below nearly everyone, all of which were adults. We were slightly miffed at such prejudice, having been crowned at such young ages, but that was how things were here, and we were in no mood to make a scene. Besides, I hadn't seen a sword since we left Narnia, and I doubted the adults here would approve of sword fights to settle a quarrel.

The lack of a sword by my side was the hardest thing to get accustomed to. I hated it. I felt defenseless and stupid without it, which was odd, but I knew Peter felt the same way, too. It was the same with Susan and her bow, and Lucy with her dagger and cordial. We knew we didn't much have to worry about an entire army showing up and being expected to fight them—I mean, we did have an army on our doorstep, but to everyone around us, we were mere children and weren't expected to fight.

It was nice though, really. The professor never once told us we were lying, believed every word we said.. We knew he was probably the only one we ever could tell, unless we ran across someone else who had happened to have gone to Narnia as well, but I doubted it. We all did. We had been the Four, the only Four, and it was good enough that we had gone to it at all. We tried to tell ourselves this, but our hearts all ached equally for all we had left behind. What I had once been afraid of had become my life, and I suddenly felt empty without it all, without the thrill, life, love, joy.. Everything here just seemed.. dead. It was awful.

But we pretended. We must have pretended well, too, because no one gave us a second glance when we boarded the train back home and left behind the only house with any ounce of magic. Parting with the wardrobe was like tearing away the last hopes we had, even though the professor had said we probably wouldn't get back that way. Nonetheless, all of us had retired into it our last few hours there. We felt it was a more formal goodbye to our country, even if we were so far from it. I had stared at the back of the furniture, wondering if the few inches of wood was all that separated us from our home. I had tried to doubt it, but I couldn't be certain. Nothing was certain, anymore. We needed to let things come as they could, as hard as it might be.

We remembered. We talked amongst ourselves, because we were the only company we had. No one knew. No one would ever know. It was our secret, and no one could, or would, believe in it.

Ha, if only I knew how naïve we were to think that.