The light poured in through the thin, cream curtains that covered the windows. Dust danced in each sunbeam. In the warmth of new dawn, cream walls were painted in vivid oranges and pinks. As the sun rose, the colours faded until they were gone completely and everything was plain and ordinary in the young woman's life once again.
As she dressed in black tights, she looked over to her closet where the rest of her outfit hung on a hanger. Her eyes scanned over the black blouse with long sleeves that had puffed gathers and tight cuffs at the wrists. Next came an A-line skirt, also in black, that on any other day would appear fashionable with the pleating. Today, it would just appear dreary. Finally, she had a black suit jacket with three large buttons down the front; the seams made her waist look quite trim. When her tights were on, she put on the rest of her outfit and slipped on some kitten heels. She then left her childhood bedroom and went down the hall to where her mother's room was. She did not look to the left or right of her as she passed through the corridor.
When she reached her mother door's, she lifted her right hand to knock but stopped short when she heard a noise coming from inside. She paused and placed her hand on the door knob. The young woman turned it slowly and opened the door a crack. The sight that she saw nearly broke her heart.
Her mother sat upon the bedroom floor. Her gaze was fixed upon the photographs that were strewn across the floor, littered like rubbish. She picked one up and scanned it, her eyes seemed to be searching for an answer to something. The young woman cleared her throat. She knew what her mother's question was and knew it could not be answered. It never could. Her mother's head whipped round.
"Oh, Susan, darling! How long have you been standing there?"
"Long enough," Susan Pevensie replied as she stepped into the room. "I didn't mean to spy."
Mrs. Pevensie got up slowly from the bedroom floor. "I had almost forgotten you were here," she admitted without a glance in her daughter's direction.
"Yes, the house is quiet, isn't it?"
"Too quiet. I hate it," her mother replied, her tone bitter. Then her hands flew up to cup her own mouth and her wrinkled eyes closed tightly as she choked out her first sob of the day. The first of many. Susan stepped forward, careful to mind the photographs, and wrapped her arms around her mother.
"We have to get going. The service is in an hour. Everyone will be waiting," she murmured in her mother's ear.
"But I have to choose a photo for the service. I can't choose one. And they all hurt to look at," Mrs. Pevensie explained through her tears. Susan rubbed her mother's back and looked down at the photographs that laid upon the carpeted floor. She realized that out of the more recent photographs, she wasn't in any of them. Susan didn't come home the past two Christmases or the past Easter. She hadn't even sent Lucy a birthday card this year. Susan bit her lip. She had been in her own little world and now she would pay the price for it.
"What about this one?" Susan offered. She knelt down and picked up a photograph of she, her sister and two brothers in front of the wardrobe. The Professor had taken it and had sent it to their mother whilst they were living with him out in the country. After they had found Narnia. Narnia. The word stung in Susan's mind. That was something else she had chosen to ignore for the past several years. Now, it rushed back into her mind and memory like a flood. When had Susan the Gentle become so cold?
Mrs. Pevensie wouldn't turn her head to look at the photograph. "It's fine," she whispered. "Oh, how could anything be fine on a day like today? I've lost my husband and my babies."
Susan stood back up and wrapped her mother in another hug. "Mum, you still have me."
For the first time in three years, Susan felt her mother's arms wrap around her like they used to. She relaxed.
"For how long, Susan?" Mrs. Pevensie asked, still in a whisper. "Until the empty coffins are buried?"
Susan tensed and pulled away from her mother. "Excuse me?" To her surprise, her mother looked angry now, almost defiant.
"You haven't been back in three years, Susan! You've ignored my letters, you don't even write to your little sister on her birthday. You had nothing to do with Peter's university graduation last week and as for Edmund's girlfriend, I bet you don't even know her name!"
Susan said nothing, she was absolutely shellshocked.
"Well, Sarah is her name and she is coming to the service. I won't be surprised if I have to introduce you even though she's been with Edmund for the past year!" Mrs. Pevensie snatched the photograph out of Susan's hand and marched downstairs. Her daughter quickly followed after; together, they descended the stairs and Susan tried to get her mother to face her on the landing.
"I had to build my own life, Mum. Peter, Edmund and Lucy, they were all stuck being children."
"As opposed to you? Running away from your family like a child, running away from school like a child, running into the arms of men who treat you poorly like a child. You act so mature, Susan, but you're still a child in so many ways. Adults deal with their problems." Mrs. Pevensie then went into the kitchen and opened one of the drawers. She fetched a pair of scissors and before Susan's eyes, Mrs. Pevensie did her best to cut Susan out of the photograph while keeping her other children in it. She then turned around and faced Susan, who tried her hardest not to cry.
"When this service is done, I want you to disappear again. Like you have for the past three years."
"How can you say that?" Susan asked as tears stung in her eyes. "I'm your daughter."
"You're my daughter only when you want to be. You're so far removed from the family, Susan, I was almost afraid when you wrote me you were coming. I was afraid I wouldn't recognize you."
With that, Mrs. Pevensie stormed out the front door and got into the family car. Susan furiously wiped at her eyes and followed her mother out. She locked the door behind her and when she got into the car, she was greeted with silence.
"I assume you're just saying this out of anger over what's happened. I'll make you some tea when we get home, Mum."
"I mean it, Susan," Mrs. Pevensie whispered fiercely. "You've done such a good job at staying away. So stay away. Because when I look at you, I see your father and your siblings reflected in your face. And I'm disgusted that you care little about any of them."
"I do care!" Susan retorted as they drove out onto the street and began to drive to the church. Mrs. Pevensie said nothing in response and merely turned on the radio; the music was loud to stop Susan from talking. When they got to the church, they went inside first and then the crowd of mourners that had come to pay their respects followed suit. Susan heard whispers of her name as she followed her mother inside and tried not to feel guilty as she sat in the pew and stared up at the Mother Mary holding Baby Jesus. The three empty coffins that were presented, side by side, at the front of the church, each bore something that resembled one of the Pevensie siblings that had died in the train station derailment.
As the reverend spoke of Peter, Susan looked to the textbook that was on top of his coffin. She realized with a lump in a throat that she didn't even know what university Peter had attended or what program he had graduated from.
Edmund's coffin bore two brass scales. At least that was similar to how he had been in Narnia; Edmund the Just had gone on to be interested in law in the real world.
And Lucy's coffin, the smallest of the three, was still quite big. Much bigger than Susan had thought Lucy was. But then again, she hadn't seen her sister much over the past few years. Lucy looked like she would have been as tall as Susan, if not taller.
The Pevensie coffins were empty because their bodies hadn't been found at the train station. Witnesses that had escaped the derailment crash had said they had seen them. But no one had managed to find the three bodies and theirs were the only bodies unaccounted for. It was as if they had vanished.
At first, Susan had hoped that her siblings had escaped the derailment somehow. But she knew in her heart that their vanishing had probably been Aslan's doing. From what she remembered, he had been smart and crafty that way.
Aslan, I know you brought them to your world since they died in mine, Susan prayed. I would do anything to see them again.
For the rest of her life, Susan repented and mourned the loss of her siblings. She met a handsome man that reminded her of Peter's kindness. They had a son and daughter, who bore Edmund's intelligence and Lucy's courage. Grandchildren came, each as sweet and loving as the last. Susan buried her husband at the age of ninety.
Now, she was ninety-four and visiting with one of her grandchildren. A granddaughter, Helen, named after Susan's mother. Susan held Helen's hand as she leaned back in the plump chair before the fireplace. "Helen, I want to tell you about an extraordinary place," she murmured, her voice gravelled and hardened by time. But Helen's eyes lit up when her grandmother spoke.
"What is it, Granny? Where is it?" Helen moved closer to her grandmother's feet and set her chin on her grandmother's lap. Susan ran a hand through her granddaughter's hair that so mirrored the thick darkness that her own had once been.
"It is a place called Narnia. It's very far away and very far to get to. It's not on any map-"
And Susan told Helen of all of her adventures with her siblings from the White Witch on to when they left the Golden Age to when they helped Caspian regain his throne…. and why Susan believe she could never go back. Helen was riveted the entire time.
"Do you want to go back, Granny?"
"More than anything," Susan replied. "More than anything."
A few days later, Susan passed away in her own bed. A photo of her husband was clutched to her chest when her daughter had found her body.
At Susan's burial, her spirit gazed down on the scene. Her children and grandchildren were there. Many of the friends she had made throughout her life were there as well, with walkers and wheelchairs amongst them. As the reverend said his peace about raising her spirit up to God, Susan looked up to the sky and saw that the face of a lion stared down at her from the clouds. Susan smiled. She looked down at her hands and saw that they were no longer wrinkled but thin and youthful. She looked down at the nearby pond in the cemetery and saw that she had returned to the age of twenty. She had been restored.
"Aslan, may I go with you?" she asked into the wind. As she peered at the Great Lion's face, he smiled and a warm chuckle reverberated in his throat.
"Once a King or Queen of Narnia, always a King or Queen," Aslan replied. Susan felt herself being pulled upward and higher still until, at last, she was at peace.