Remember
Disclaimer: I own nothing
Ms. Ivinia Pearen requested a sequel and for once inspiration struck and so here you have a sequel where Susan finally reunites with her siblings. However, this can be read without having read 'Forget' but I would appreciate it if you would read it.
"These are beautiful Susan." Her friend complimented leaning over her shoulder as Susan's pencil flew across the page detailing every inch of the stone table. Her sketch book was full of drawings of Narnia, of the forests, rivers, flowers, animals, people, Aslan, Caspian but most of all her siblings.
Of them from when they were small children, and then as they grew up, to them as Kings and Queens, until finally there was a sketch on the very middle page of the scene when she had last seen them.
Drawing was now the sole thing keeping her balanced. She could live in her world, mingle with friends and work colleagues but still remember her days as a Queen in Narnia.
She smiled at Elizabeth as she moved to start the outline of Aslan's body closing her eyes to remember every detail of the lion she loved so much.
"How do you think of these things to draw?" Elizabeth continued tucking her legs up under her as she returned to her seat in the busy London café where they had met to get away from everything for the morning.
Susan and Elizabeth had met a few years earlier when Susan had started work in the bookstore replacing Elizabeth's former colleague. They had been drawn together when it had been revealed that Elizabeth too had lost her brother through illness around the same time of the train crash which had taken Peter, Edmund and Lucy.
"It's easy really." Susan shrugged changing her pencil for one that was more suited for shading. "If you can remember your childhood." Images flooded her brain of the fateful evacuation which had led to so much more.
Elizabeth grinned as she thought of her own spent in the tall town house in the capital city where despite the misery of the greyness and for some time blitz she had many a happy memories of playing in both the garden and the house with her brother Luke.
The sound of someone dropping a plate behind the counter and startled them both out of the reminiscing and they both smiled sadly at each other both blinking back tears. "I miss him." Elizabeth murmured biting her lip.
Susan reached for her hand and squeezed it tightly before letting go. "I miss them." she nodded before quickly picking up her pencil and finishing the sketch of Aslan. Elizabeth studied for a moment and then opened her book to the page where she had last shoved her bookmark in and continued to read.
Susan unlocked her front door stepping into the dark, cold hallway and fumbling for the light switch. As the light flicked on she caught sight of a mouse scampering into a small hole in the wall. Reepicheep.
Smiling softly to herself she disappeared through to her kitchen where she flicked the radio, slung her bag onto the table and dropping into a chair pulling out her sketchbook and pencils. Once she had found an empty page she paused her pencil hovering over the page as she closed her eyes and thought back to the day where she had first met the noble Knight.
As the radio played through several songs of the time Susan drew and by the time the six o'clock news started she had detailed the scene in the woods. Narnians in the background, Peter facing Caspian, both with stubborn scowls on their faces, herself standing between her two younger siblings with Trumpkin standing next to Lucy and the small mouse in the centre addressing her little sister.
Sighing she allowed herself a few more moments as a Queen before shoving her chair back and rooting through her kitchen cupboards to cook something up for her dinner. She found some potatoes and some leftover chicken in the fridge from her meal with friends at the weekend and started making something of it.
As she worked her thoughts floated back to the Saturday evening. There had been five of them, six including herself, and for once her flat had been filled with laughter and teasing compared to its usual silence save from the radio and occasional outburst of tears.
And then she slipped back into her royal title and thought of the grand dinner parties they had thrown where intermingled with the political debates there was laughing and joking and the evening had always ended with dancing.
The first few notes of the next tune on the radio reminded her of one of the Narnian folk songs and she started humming along until she realised that the song playing was one of the latest from Elizabeth's favourite singer and not the familiar and comforting tunes of her royal life.
The months passed and Susan had soon almost filled her second sketchbook her drawings becoming more frequent as the two year anniversary of their deaths approached.
It passed. The day spent by the only Pevensie alive was seen through a haze of tears as she sat curled up on her sofa a pencil in her hand and both sketchbooks closed at her side. Elizabeth dropped by that evening with a casserole in one hand and a box of tissues in the other.
The casserole remained uneaten. The box of tissues ended the evening empty.
A week later with a chicken pie and another box of tissues Susan rang the doorbell of Elizabeth's place. Again the pie was left and the tissues disappeared.
And one day the two friends left work and crossed the road laughing at the strange old woman who had been into the shop that day. But neither made it to the other side. Neither had seen the speeding car. Both felt the impact and both saw darkness.
Susan lifted her arm slowly and reached across to find Elizabeth's hand. She gave it a gentle squeeze before she saw a spot of golden light to her right and then her hand slipped from Elizabeth's and she drifted towards it.
She tried to scream as her body passed through the beam and she felt intense physical pain before for the first time since her return from Narnia she felt normal again and with a thud she landed on the ground.
She heaved a sigh and rolled onto her side before her eyes fluttered open and she saw a greenness of the grass which she had never seen before in England. "Susan!" She lifted herself into a sitting position at the sound of her name and shielded her eyes against the glare of the sun with her hand to find Lucy running at her.
"Lucy!" She grinned and in one fluid motion was on her feet and bounding towards Lucy.
"You're here!" Lucy squealed flinging her arms around Susan who staggered backwards at the force of the hug.
"Well of course I'm here." She rolled her eyes. "You don't honestly think that I really forgot Narnia did you?"
Lucy drew away from her sister with a sheepish look on her face and Susan found herself swallowing a lump in her throat. "It was just my way of coping knowing I wouldn't be coming back." She explained gripping Lucy's hand tightly.
"Wouldn't be coming back?" Lucy questioned spinning Susan around in a full circle. "Where do you think we are now?"
Susan grinned down at her but words weren't needed between them. "Hey!" A shout from behind them made them both turn sharply on their heel. Edmund was leaping towards them a wide grin on his face.
He was in front of them before Susan had really registered it and she was in his arms a second later being lifted off the ground and spun round in a circle. "You made it then."
"Well duh?" Susan laughed before she was set down on the ground. "Where's Peter?"
"Behind you." A familiar voice made her jump before she threw herself into her older brother's arms. The next few moments were spent tangled in each other's arms all laughing and the two sisters crying before a cough broke the reunion.
Caspian was standing near the end of the line which included both Beavers, Mr Tumnus, Trumpkin and Trufflehunter. On Caspian's other side stood one whom Susan had drawn so often that she could do it with her eyes closed, Aslan.
"Welcome Daughter of Eve." His voice was the same as it had been in her dreams and she dropped into a curtsey before rushing forward and flinging her arms around the great Lion her tears soaking into him.
The sadness of leaving her life in England was present but small. The relief of being back in Narnia and the happiness of being with her siblings was almost too much for her.
All she had wanted was to be with siblings and now here she was, with her siblings. Forever.
Thanks for reading; I like the start of this but am not sure about then end so your thoughts would be much appreciated!
Tacxxx