To begin with, let me say that while I write a lot, I never write fanfic. This is my first – and more than likely my last – story in the genre. I hope it came out decently and that it can be at least somewhat enjoyable for you guys. If not, I really am sorry...
I'd been thinking for a while about what Julia would come to mean to Eli as he grew up, and about how it would be possible for him to love Clare profoundly but still treasure Julia's memory … and then the thoughts sort of solidified into this story. I wrote it over the course of what has been one of the craziest months of my life (involving, among other things, an intercontinental move and a tragedy in the life of someone very dear and close to me) … so if parts are a bit disjointed or overemotional, I'd like to think it's because of that. In my defense, I'd also like to say that in the weeks that I wrote this, I was speaking very little English in my daily life. I honestly think that may have made my wording a little less graceful and precise than I would have liked, while writing this. Ah, well.
More importantly than any of that, I'd like to say that this story is dedicated to MusikSnob and ArentYouSophiaLoren-8887 – both of whom are absolutely incredible writers, and both of whom showed amazing patience in their willingness to read this as I worked on it and talk to me about it when I was stuck. You guys are awesome. I know this dragged on forever, and I am so grateful for your support along the way. If anybody isn't reading their stories, you need to get to it. They range from heartrendingly gorgeous and melancholy to side-splittingly funny. And they are truly remarkable. Every single one.
And because this A/N isn't long enough already, I'd like to shout out to a few other people. I realize it's odd to dedicate a story to so many folks at once, but like I said, I probably won't write any others. So it's my only chance. So while we're at it, this story is also for CatrienStardust, who was the first person to show me that fanfic could be beautiful and profound; it's for DevinFabulous, who makes me laugh on a daily basis; and it's for LiteraryLolita and FloorplanHobo, who are my first fanfic loves and whose Clare-and-Eli's have long been more real to me than the ones on the show.
I do not own Degrassi, or Tim O'Brien's astonishing memoir-novel The Things They Carried. I guess I sort of own Addy and Julia Goldsworthy? Well, anyway…
Namesake
"Uncle Adam!" the boy blurted, scrambling up into Adam's lap and taking the man's face in his hands, "Guess what!"
Adam mimicked the toddler's gesture, pressing his own palms against the child's bright cheeks. His eyes widened and his eyebrows shot up. "What?" he whispered conspiratorially.
The intensity of Adam's response seemed to take the boy by surprise. He pulled back and teetered a bit, momentarily sinking into a startled silence.
"Well," he said, regaining his composure, "My name is Addy, right?" he posed the question with an unwarranted solemnity.
Adam stifled a laugh, "Right…."
"Well, but …" resumed Addy, "Did you know that that's not my real name?"
"Oh?" asked Adam.
"No!" the toddler responded. He shifted slightly on Adam's lap and raised himself on to his knees. "No," he repeated, and pressed his nose right up against his "uncle's," "My real name is Adam!"
"No!" Adam exclaimed, playing at shock.
"Adam," Addy reiterated – in case the earth-shattering import of the revelation had been lost on the man before him, "We have the same name."
"Woah," exhaled Adam, "That's crazy. Are you sure?"
Addy let out a gleeful squeal and nodded vigorously.
"I wonder why your parents would give you that name. Maybe your mother forgot that someone else already had it," Adam mused, craning back in his seat to wink at Clare, who had been listening in from the kitchenette.
She shook her head and smiled then set down the last of the dishes she'd been drying and came into the living room to sit beside her son and her friend.
"Well, Addy," she said, stroking the boy's dark hair, "it just so happens that we didn't forget anything – and Uncle Adam knows that perfectly well!"
Addy twisted about to look at her, his soft, round face going blank with puzzlement.
"You have the same name as your uncle because you're named after him."
This did not seem to clear matters up for the child, so Clare continued, "Daddy and I wanted you to have the same name as Uncle Adam. It was on purpose."
"Why?" inquired Addy.
"Because we love Adam and we wanted to do something nice for him," Clare explained.
"But why?" he persisted.
"Because we thought he would be happy to have someone as wonderful and sweet as you share a name with him."
"Yeah," Adam deadpanned, "They were totally wrong, though." Clare shot him an icy look, but he could tell from the twitch in her mouth that she was holding back a giggle. Still, he hastened to repair any potential damage. "Kidding, kidding," he assured, pulling Addy into a tight hug. "It's the greatest! Nothing could make me happier!" Then, over the boy's head he spoke to Clare. "What?" he teased, "The sarcasm receptors don't grow in till age five?"
Clare pursed her lips. Her eyes brightened with amusement, but she refused to crack a smile.
Wriggling out of the hug, Addy slid down onto to the couch and settled between his mother and "uncle." He peered across the room at the spot on the carpet where his older sister was stretched out on her stomach, hard at work on an elaborate drawing that had held her attention for the better part of the evening.
Adam and Clare could feel the question coming before it left the boy's lips. They looked at each other uneasily, each one groping about for a new topic of conversation. But in Addy's head, the gears were already turning.
"What about Julia?" he asked blithely, "Who's she named after?"
His words hung limp in the air between them. No one spoke, and Addy turned his head from one adult to the other.
"Maybe I'm not named for anyone," came a low, placid voice from the floor. Julia had spoken without looking up, without even lifting her pen from the paper. It always amazed Clare how attentive she could be – how nothing in her surroundings went unnoticed, even when she seemed completely immersed in her own separate world. "Maybe my name is all my own."
"Yeah," said Addy, "You weren't important enough to be called Adam!"
Julia huffed, "I'm a girl, Addy. They couldn't have named me Adam. That would just have confused people."
"If they wanted to, they could. They just didn't want to. They were waiting for me!"
"No," Julia insisted. She kept the emotion out of her voice and had yet to look up at her brother, but Clare noticed that her hand had stilled on the page. "They weren't waiting for you. When I was born, Mommy and Daddy had no idea you were ever even going to exit."
"You're just jealous because I'm specialer," gloated Addy, puffing out his chest.
Julia dropped her pen and pushed herself up into a sitting position. Her teeth were clenched and her chin jutted out slightly more than usual. "More special," she corrected in a haughty tone. "And you're wrong, at any rate," she added, experimenting awkwardly with the grown-up turn of phrase. "I'm sure I'm named for someone, too!"
Adam watched Clare from the corner of his eye; her lips were set in a thin, tense line.
"Who?" Addy pressed.
"Someone important – more important than Ad–" the little girl stopped short, flustered. "Someone as important as Adam," she concluded with a timid glance towards her "uncle."
Adam smiled nervously. He cleared his throat and fumbled for his phone. "Gosh," he mumbled, pulling it from his pocket, "It's getting a bit late. I should probably head out."
Clare breathed in sharply. "Right, right," she agreed, "Guys, bedtime. Come on, go get ready." She patted Addy on the back, gently nudging him off the couch. The boy hit the floor faster than he would have liked. He stumbled back a bit and stared at his mother in confusion.
Getting up off the carpet, Julia began to protest, "But Daddy – "
"He can come give you a kiss after he brings the laundry up," Clare told her, still somewhat on edge. "In the meantime, go brush your teeth and get changed."
Julia grimaced but didn't resist. She picked up her drawing and rolled it into a tight scroll, securing it with the clip of her pen cap. Brushing past her brother, she walked up to the couch and kissed Adam on the cheek, before leaving the room without a word.
Addy lingered a moment longer, unsure of what had just transpired. When no explanation seemed forthcoming, he turned around and waddled out after his sister.
"Does she know?" asked Adam as the children traipsed away down the hall. He kept his voice low, aware that sound carried far in the cramped apartment.
Clare shook her head. "She was just trying to save face. She has no idea. Not that it's a secret, really. It just hasn't come up before. Eli's waiting for a good time to tell her, I think. I guess it's a heavy story for such a little girl."
"Yeah, well he may want to get on that," Adam pointed out, "I mean, I know enough not to say anything but if they get hung up on the whole thing now and it comes up in front of someone else … people don't always think things through, you know?"
Clare nodded thoughtfully. "You're right," she answered, "I'll talk to him."
Brisk footsteps reached them from the corridor and they heard the whine of the front door's hinges. "Hey guys," Eli called to them, "Sorry about that; the cycle wasn't quite finished." There was a string of soft thuds as he toed off his shoes and kicked them aside. He came padding into the room, a faded blue laundry hamper braced against his stomach. "What's up?" he asked, leaning down to set the basket on the floor.
Adam and Clare rose from the couch. "Not much," said Adam, "Gotta get home, though."
Eli flicked his sleeve back to check his watch. "Already?" he asked, a bit disappointed.
"Yeah, it's been a long day," Adam excused himself; his eyes met Clare's.
"Alright…" said Eli, not entirely convinced, "Suit yourself, I guess."
"Sorry, dude."
Eli shrugged.
"Lydia's coming back tomorrow?" asked Clare.
Adam shook his head, "Sunday morning. Early."
"Oh. Do you want to come back over tomorrow night, then?"
They had crossed into the dark little foyer at the front of the apartment and Adam was bent over, struggling with his boots. "No, it's okay," he grunted, stomping to jamb his feet in. "If the snow keeps up this way, you won't be able to pay may to leave the house, tomorrow."
"Well, there are leftovers from tonight. I could pack you something," she suggested, already turning to dash back to the kitchen.
"Clare!" Adam half-shouted, "I'm not going to starve. You do realize I know how to cook, right?"
Clare snorted, "In the broadest sense of the term, perhaps."
"Ouch!" snickered Eli.
"Seriously!" Adam brought his hand to his heart with a flourish. "The abuse I put up with from this girl of yours!"
Eli reached out and pulled Clare into the crook of his arm. "Oh, don't worry," he drawled, "She's just feeling a little insecure cause she knows Julia and Addy would take your grilled cheese over hers, any day."
"Excuse me?" Clare intoned, swiveling out of her husband's embrace. "Say that again. I dare you!"
Adam chuckled. He pulled on his coat and rolled his eyes at his friends.
"I speak only the truth," declared Eli, his voiced deepened by mock gravity.
Clare folded her arms over her chest and arched an eyebrow saucily, "You wanna take this outside, Mr. Goldsworthy?" she asked.
Eli pretended to consider her proposal, scrunching his mouth to one side and crinkling his eyes. "Not really," he replied after a pause. His eyebrows darted upwards and he gave her a small smirk, "But we could take it to the bedroom…."
"Aaaaand, that is my cue to exit," Adam cut in.
Clare giggled. Jokes like this had long since ceased to faze her, but her cheeks still glowed a bit at Eli's insinuation. "Don't worry Adam. He's not getting any, tonight – not after this little display of treachery."
"All the same," Adam smiled, "I'll leave you two lovebirds alone, now." He swung the door open and stepped over the threshold. "'Night, guys!"
"'Night, Adam," Clare sing-songed.
"See ya, man. You'll call after the weekend?" Eli asked.
Adam gave a friendly nod. "Yep!" He beamed at them, and pulled the door shut behind him.
Eli slipped one hand around the small of Clare's back and used the other to lock the door. He could hear Adam's footfalls receding into the stairwell and the muffled clank of the apartment's plumbing told him the kids were down the hall washing up for bed. For the first time since that morning, he and Clare were alone with one another.
He drew her towards him and pressed his lips to hers, moving against her at a deliberately lazy pace. Clare lifted her hands to the back of his neck and fiddled affectionately with the hair on his nape. She began to suck on his bottom lip and momentarily allowed the embrace to absorb her.
Somewhere in the house, though, the children were quibbling. She couldn't make out any words, but their voices reached her and the shrill melody of their speech pulled her back into the day's realities. "Eli?" she mumbled into the kiss.
He broke away briefly, but only to dip past her cheek. "Mmmh?" he answered, gingerly taking her left earlobe between his teeth.
Clare rolled her eyes in delighted exasperation. "Look," she said, "As long as Julia is still awake –"
Eli cut her off, "She might find us?" he breathed against her neck, "She might catch us and give us detention for PDA?" Clare could hear the smile in his voice.
"No," she giggled, shoving him gently, "But there's something I wanted to talk to you about before she goes to bed."
Eli straightened up and gave her a concerned pout. "What's that?" he asked.
"So, while you were downstairs, she and Addy had a bit of an argument…."
"Our kids? In a verbal scuffle?" he ribbed, "Never!"
Clare dropped her arms. She took up Eli's hands and braided her fingers together with his. "They were talking about names," she clarified.
"Ah," said Eli with a brief, comprehending nod. He made a move towards the living room and motioned for Clare to follow. "Elaborate?" he requested, gathering up the laundry and heading in the direction of their bedroom.
Clare waited till they were inside, with the door shut, before speaking. Then, in a hushed tone, she began to recount the exchange. Eli fell to sorting the laundry with an uncharacteristic zeal, but his occasional nods told her he was listening.
When she had finished, he let out a low "Hmm." He looked down at the folded sweater in his hands and flipped it back and forth a few times. His forehead furrowed and Clare could hear him softly suck his teeth. "Well," he said, finally, "I guess I should talk to her, then." His voice was calm, if slightly laced with resignation. "Not that I really know what to say," he admitted after a pause.
"I mean, you don't have to tell her right away…" Clare began.
"No, but what Adam said to you – that's true," he told her, "If it comes up again around someone who doesn't know any better, she's going to hear it in some offhand remark."
"Possibly," Clare granted him.
Eli laughed nervously, "I'm not really sure what I've been waiting for, exactly…. I guess for her to be old enough? – Whatever that means. It's just a lot to lay on a child her age."
"It is," Clare agreed, "But then, Julia's always been a bit of an old soul, hasn't she?"
A crooked smile crept across Eli's face. He dropped his gaze and bobbed his head a little. "That she has," he conceded, not bothering to hide the loving pride in his voice.
"So what are you going to tell her?" Clare asked.
"The truth, I suppose."
Clare reached out and gave his arm a gentle squeeze. "Here, give me that," she coaxed, taking the sweater from his hands. "I'll finish this. And I can take care of Addy. You focus on Julia."
"Thank you," he said, simply. He placed a hand on each of Clare's cheeks and rested his forehead against hers, thinking back to a night more than eight years earlier….
It was mid-summer, some time early in Clare's third trimester. The days were blazing hot that year, leaving Clare in a constant state of damp exhaustion. Most nights, she collapsed sprawled across their bed before the sun was even down. Eli would clean up after dinner and then join her, stretching out beside her for a murmured conversation as she meandered towards sleep. They kept the lights off, content to rest in the warm, brassy gloom of the late summer evening. The breeze off the cooling city streets fluttered in through the open windows and Eli was always relieved to see Clare slowly relax under its caress.
That particular night she was already asleep when he came in from the kitchen. Trying not to wake her, he cautiously lowered himself onto the bed and gazed at her in silence. When she didn't stir, he moved closer and leaned in towards the smooth bulge of her stomach. He lifted the hem of her loose tank top and delicately moved it upwards until the pale yellow cotton was bunched up at her chest. Then, pulling a pillow over from the headboard, he settled down on the cool sheets and laid his head alongside Clare's middle. After a moment, he edged closer and planted a gentle kiss against her skin. His hand traveled back down from where he had gathered up the fabric of Clare's shirt and he began to run slow circles along the curve of her abdomen.
The room was quiet except for Clare's soft breathing and the ebbing surf of the traffic outside. He nuzzled in closer to her stomach until he could make out the warm, watery sounds from within. His thoughts drifted towards their daughter, curled up in there, cradled safely in a tender, nurturing darkness… Closing his eyes, he let out a long, blissful sigh.
"Really, Elijah?"
Eli's eyes snapped open and he lifted his head to find his wife giggling at him.
"Again?" she teased, her voice still fuzzy with sleep. It had become something of ritual with him, it was true. Ever since Clare had started to show, he had taken to cuddling up against her this way. There was something vaguely pathetic in it, he knew … but most nights he couldn't help himself.
Shifting to face her fully, he propped himself up on his forearms and began to protest, "Oh come on, Edwards –"
"Don't 'Edwards' me!" Quipped Clare fondly; "I haven't been Edwards in years. Or did you forget?" She cocked her head at him and raised an eyebrow mockingly.
"Details," Eli smirked. He rested the back of one hand against her exposed skin and prodded her impishly with the pad of his thumb, "You get a nine-month head start with her," he remarked after a second, "You're seriously going to begrudge me these few minutes of closeness each night?"
Clare smiled and reached out to stroke his cheek. "No," she whispered, "But. That doesn't mean I'm not going to tease you about them!"
For a moment they were silent. Clare lifted herself off the pillow, sliding her elbows slightly behind her and bracing herself at a shallow angle. She fixed Eli with a pensive stare and cleared her throat to speak. "We keep saying 'she', 'her'," she said at last, "Don't you think we should name her, at some point?"
Eli shrugged good-naturedly, "Yes," he responded, "That would probably be advisable. … Why? Did you have something in mind?"
"Sort of … yeah."
There was something in her tone he couldn't quite place – a kind of nervous timidity – a guilt, almost … "Well?" he prompted.
"Well," she smiled anxiously, "… I was sort of thinking … Julia."
Eli's shoulders went rigid; he could feel the color drain from his face. "Why?" he demanded. The word came shooting out of him, much sharper than he had intended.
Clare's breath hitched. She recoiled with a start, and her eyes glinted in a way that told Eli they were filling with tears.
"Sorry," he whispered, "I'm sorry," he repeated urgently, "I didn't mean to…. That was unfair of me…."
She looked at him and blinked, "It's alright," she answered, her voice slightly strained, "It was a bad idea…"
"No," said Eli, "It's not that. It's just … I don't know," he trailed off and brought a hand to his face. "Why would you want to do that?" he asked, kneading his forehead with the tips of his fingers, "Why would you want to name your firstborn child after …" There was no simple way to finish the question.
"After my husband's first love?" Clare offered.
Eli met her eyes and nodded, "Yeah. That … I guess."
Clare inclined her head and seemed to focus all her attention on a thread that had come loose in the bedsheet beneath her. She plucked it up between her fingertips and began to wind it around her thumb – slowly, purposefully. After a moment, she flicked her wrist up and tugged. The fabric around the base of the thread puckered; Clare arched her hand back a bit further, and the thread came snapping out.
This seemed to release some sort of tension for her and she settled back into the pillows, fixing her eyes on the ceiling. "So, ummm," she began, and paused to swallow, "I think about her a lot, you know? When we were first together, I used to think about her all the time. I felt awful about it, but I was really jealous of her, in the beginning," she confessed, "That's terrible and stupid of me, I know –"
Eli reached out a hand and touched her arm, "No, Clare," he shook his head, "It's natural. And you were always really good about it. You did your best. Even if I never said it back then, it wasn't lost on me. It meant a lot."
"For the longest time, I was sure there'd be a sort of 'nihil nisi bonum' situation with her," Clare continued, almost as though Eli hadn't spoken, "I thought that she'd be this ideal I could never live up to, that no matter how hard I tried at anything … in your heart, you'd always be thinking, 'If only Julia was here, she would have done that so much better, she would have understood, she would have known what to say'…"
Eli tightened his grasp on Clare's arm. He wanted to say something, but it seemed important to let her finish.
"And I don't really know when that changed, but there was some point where I stopped feeling jealous towards her and started feeling kind of …" she chewed on her lip and seemed to search for the right word "… apologetic," she said it almost like a question, as if uncertain if that's what she truly meant, "… Like, I was sure that wherever she was, she must hate me. And I couldn't blame her because –"
"Clare…" began Eli. He wanted to say that Julia wasn't the type to hate anyone, but he knew that wasn't quite true. There was a certain furious intensity to Julia – a ferocity that had utterly captivated him, but that had always scared him a little, too. She was perfectly capable of hatred; he knew that. And yet, he couldn't imagine her hating Clare … "I don't –"
"It's okay, Eli," Clare looked at him for the first time since she had begun her explanation, "I don't think that anymore. I'm just trying to make all this make sense for you."
Eli could feel that his face was still tense. He willed his features to soften and gave Clare a small, encouraging smile.
"I just felt there was something so horribly unfair about me getting you. Because, I mean, by then you'd told me about her – I mean, actual stories about her – not just the fact that she'd existed. So I knew how remarkable she was, and I knew how good she was to you, and how happy she'd made you. I guess I knew that she deserved you every bit as much as I did. And I felt guilty because I was the one that got you, when it should have been her. Or something like that. It's hard to explain. Just … I felt like if she was out there somewhere she must be so angry, so desperately sad. And I thought she would have every right to hate me – which all seems a bit strange to me, now. But it's how I felt, then. And it didn't actually change till we were in college."
Eli narrowed his eyes quizzically.
"Well, sophomore year, when I had my cyst," Clare elaborated, "Back before I knew what it was, when I was just in excruciating pain for months on end, and we thought it might be something really serious. There was this one night when I started wondering what would happen if I died." Eli cringed; the episode had scared him too – more than he'd been willing to admit even to himself, at the time. "It was just one of those stupid spirals you get into sometimes. I didn't really think it was going to happen," she reassured him. "But I couldn't stop thinking about it, just then. And I thought about what would happen to you, what you would do after I was gone – I guess, what I would want you to do after I was gone. And one thing I realized immediately is that of course I would want you to find someone else who you'd love and who'd make you happy. But I'd also want you to keep me with you, somehow…." She was silent for a moment. Without meaning to, Eli held his breath. "I must have just finished reading The Things They Carried, around then. Do you remember that book? I know you read it…"
"Yes," rasped Eli. He was starting to see where this was headed and he could feel his throat gently clench.
"Well, I started thinking about the very end, when he talks about the girl he loved – the one who died when he was ten. And I don't know if you remember" – of course he remembered – "but there's this scene there where he's dreaming about ice skating with her and he asks her what it's like to be dead…" Eli had to look away; his heart had begun to pound painfully, and his arms were starting to tremble. Clare noticed, but continued, "And she tells him it's like being a book on a shelf: you're safe and all, but you're kind of alone, up there – forgotten, unnoticed. Only then, someone will think of you, and suddenly it's like the book has been taken down and dusted off; you get to be part of the world again, for a little while. And I remember thinking that that was somehow perfect. I'd kind of stopped believing in Heaven and Hell, by then. But that seemed exactly right: that we live on in others, we get to keep living through them, as long as they remember us and keep us in their thoughts. And I thought that that's what I'd want if I died and left you behind: I'd want you to go on and love someone else, but just to carry me along with you, in some way…. Well, and then, of course, I thought of Julia … and I sort of figured that to the extent that she was out there still, it was with you – I mean, with other people who loved her, too – but you were the person I was thinking about, obviously. And I sort of felt at peace with her for the first time. – Not that it was 'okay' or something – because it will never be okay that she died so young. But I felt like she was still with you, like I hadn't stolen you away from her entirely, after all. Because some part of her was still alive inside of you." Clare paused and brought her hands to rest on top of her stomach. She ran her palms back and forth over the taut skin a few times before speaking again.
"So, yeah," she concluded, "I was thinking it would be nice for you – that it would mean something to you – to name your child after this person you loved so much… And then, maybe it's silly or sentimental, but I kind of thought it would mean something to her too, in a sense…. Like it would be a way of, well, taking her book down from the shelf…." her voice trailed off.
Eli lowered his head and nestled his face into Clare's stomach. Her scent calmed him, but his breath was still unsteady. He wrapped one arm around her waist and draped his leg over her knees, gripping her so tight he thought that he might melt into her bones. He wanted to speak, but words wouldn't form for him. So he just held her….
He hoped she knew his heart was brimming.
"Take the photo." Clare's voice dented the surface of his thoughts.
"Huh?" he mumbled, still emerging from the memory.
"Take the photo," she repeated, "She's very visual. The story will mean more to her if she has a face to pin it to."
Eli nodded. "Right," he said, and backed away towards his dresser.
Stooping to open the bottom drawer, he retrieved a worn manila envelope from among a neat stack of old journals and correspondence. The photo he produced from within was over twenty years old. But he had kept it safe; it was glossy and clear … completely untarnished.
Of the handful of mementos he still kept of Julia, this was the only one he had brought along with him when he moved out of his parents' house. It was by far his favorite picture of her. He had come across it half way through grade twelve, somewhere in the final stages of his room excavations. By the time he found it, he could no longer recall the occasion on which it had been taken. Even so, it spoke to him.
Julia hadn't noticed she was being photographed, and it made her more herself than she normally knew how to be in front of a camera. She was sitting with Eli on the front steps of his house, her long charcoal skirt swept to one side, a dark brown shawl knotted around her shoulders. The wind was undoing the bun that held her hair, but she appeared not to notice; something else had absorbed her completely. She had her hands thrown up in an explanatory gesture, and her face was radiant. Eli, for his part, wore a look of deep puzzlement. Whatever it was Julia was telling him, he was clearly struggling to keep up. Even two decades later, he could still imagine the tone of voice she must have been using – exuberant and affectionate and incredulous, all at the same time: "But Eee-li, how can you not get it? It makes such perfect sense!"
He didn't notice Clare come up behind him until she was leaning her head on his shoulder. She reached out and tilted the photo gently in his hands, trying to cut the glare from the lamp over the dresser. "It just makes her more real," she told him. She examined the picture intently, though she had seen it more times than she could count. "If you tell her out of the blue, it will just be this vague, abstract concept. At least if she has an image, she can start to build a person in her mind."
Eli turned to press a kiss to the top of Clare's head. "You're right," he whispered. Somehow, she always was.
"You need to hurry up, though, if you want to catch her tonight. It's getting late." She gripped his waist softly and angled him towards the door, as though not quite trusting that he would take the initiative himself.
Eli chuckled, "Someone's eager to get rid of me," he teased. But he knew he needed the encouragement. He took a final look at Clare, then turned and padded out of the room and down the corridor.
His daughter's light was on and he could see her clearly through her open door. She was sitting cross-legged on her bed, bowed over a book in her lap as she absent-mindedly wove her hair into two loose braids. He thought she might be trying to finish the page she was on and not wanting to distract her, he paused for a moment to look on silently.
Julia had inherited Clare's coloring – her caerulean eyes, her silkily pale skin, and the nutmeg hue of her rippling hair. But her build was largely Eli's. Already her limbs were lanky, her fingers spindly and long. She had her father's sharp edges and what Clare referred to as a "decidedly Elijahn jaw-line." She wasn't a beautiful child, exactly, and it was too soon to tell what she would grow into. But she carried herself with a sort of awkward grace, and there was something oddly compelling in her blend of fragile coloring and tough, wiry frame.
She appeared to finish the passage she had been reading because her back straightened slightly and she switched her focus to her hair, pulling a black tie from her wrist and winding it around the base of her second braid. Eli figured it was safe to disturb her, now. "Hey, Julesie," he called out softly from the doorway.
Julia raised her face to him and smiled. "Hey," she said, shutting her book and setting it down on the bed. When he didn't move or answer, she seemed to cast about for a topic of conversation. "Your socks are mismatched," she told him.
Eli glanced down at his feet. Black and maroon. Indeed. He looked back up at his daughter and glared, "Yeah?" he retorted, feigning offense, "Well, your hair is mismatched!"
The girl gave him a bewildered look before reaching up to grope her braids. One was nearly twice as thick as the other. She assessed the situation solemnly then nodded. "True," she conceded, "But I'm too tired to change it."
"Likewise," replied Eli, finally crossing the room to sit down beside her, "So I guess we're even?" he asked.
"No," Julia answered emphatically, "We're uneven – both of us!" She gestured towards her lopsided hairdo and grinned at her own joke.
Eli chuckled and reached out to tuck a loose lock behind her ear. "So, Julia," he said, his voice a bit more somber.
Julia shifted around to face him, and pulled her legs up under herself. "Yes?" she asked.
"Mommy tells me you were saying that you're named after someone very important…"
"Oh," her smile faded, "Yeah…. I just wanted Addy shut up," she offered meekly, "He said he was more important than me because he's named after someone you guys love. He always needs to be the center of everything. And I just wanted him to stop. I didn't mean to lie; it just came out. I'm sorry. I was being unmature."
"Well," Eli fought off the urge to laugh at her contrition, "for the sake of accuracy let's agree that you were being immature. But– "
The eight year-old interrupted him to repeat the word. "Immature," she muttered, committing the term to her rapidly expanding vocabulary.
Eli hesitated. He could tell she had already moved on, that the whole matter of names had ceased to interest her – probably even as soon as she and Addy had left the living room that evening. He looked down at the photo in his hands and ran a finger along the top edge, wondering how to proceed.
"Who's that?" asked Julia. She grabbed one corner of the picture and tugged it towards her.
Instinctively, Eli took hold of her fingers and slid them to the photo's rims. "Careful," he chided, "It's very old."
Julia balanced the photograph delicately in her slender hands. She squinted at it and looked up at her father. "Who are they?" she asked.
Eli leaned over and pointed at himself in the picture. "Well," he answered, "I think you can guess who that is."
She brought the photograph closer to her face and contemplated the matter, sucking on the inside of her cheek as she examined the image. "Oh," she said, the recognition sinking in, "That's you!"
"Yep."
She scowled at the second figure in the photograph. "But … that's not Mommy?" she asked reproachfully.
"No," Eli responded, "This was before I knew Mommy, actually. I don't think I met Mommy till about two years after this picture was taken."
"Then who is it?" There was still a hint of accusation in her tone.
Eli let out a shallow breath and leaned over Julia's shoulder so he could see the photo, too. "That," he told his daughter, "is someone very important. That's the person you were named after."
Julia leaned to one side and turned her face towards him. Her eyes were wide and her lips had frozen somewhere between a smile and an incredulous gape. "Why don't I know her?" she asked.
"That's a long story," Eli warned, "But I can tell you, if you like."
Julia stared at the photograph a moment longer then set it down on the bed. She folded her hands in her lap and nodded. "Yes, please," she answered.
Where to begin? Eli leaned back into her pillows and pulled his legs on to the bed, stretching them out at an angle so that his ankles and feet hung off the edge of the mattress. He pressed his palms together and fixed his eyes on the far wall of the room.
"So…?" prompted Julia, a little awkwardly.
He gave her a sheepish smile, "I don't know where to start with this," he confessed.
"Tell me how you met her," she suggested.
Eli shook his head a little, "I don't actually remember meeting her," he began, the words coming to him slowly. "I mean, I know around when it must have been because I know we were in the same class in kindergarten. But I don't even know if I ever talked to her, then – probably, yes, because it was a very small class… but then again, we were both really shy kids. So maybe not. I can remember that I knew who she was in grade one and two, but we didn't interact because we had different teachers those years. Then in grade three we ended up in the same class again, and that was when I actually got to know her. Neither of us really had any friends at the time. We were sort of the two kids who played alone, off to the side of the playground everyday…"
"Just like me," Julia observed – and Eli was surprised by the note of serene pride in her voice. He knew she was a happy child, but it still perplexed him that she took her solitude so utterly in stride. When she had first started school, he and Clare had worried at her lack of friends. They had sent her on play-dates and invited numerous classmates over to their home. But the encounters always ended in the same way: with the other children playing in one room, and Julia off in another, drawing, or reading, or talking to the adults. It was Adam who finally put an end to their futile efforts. "Look, guys," he told them, "Everyone is worried about Julia not having friends – except Julia! Julia is fine; she's perfectly content. So let her be. When she meets the right kids, she'll make friends. Until then, don't push her. It's not as though any of us were social butterflies at her age, and we all still found each other, eventually." He had a point. And so they backed down – much to their daughter's relief, it appeared.
"Yes," Eli continued, "a lot like you, that's true. Only with you, I think it's more of a choice. With us, it was actually that other kids just didn't want us around. So we were each on our own a lot.
"At that age, I had a kind of fascination with patterns. I used to spend recess collecting pebbles and arranging them in a particular order. I had very elaborate and strict rules about it – based on feel, and color, and size, and stuff I can't even remember now. And I used to get sort of hysterically furious with myself whenever I made a mistake. In retrospect, I'm certain there was something fairly unhealthy about that preoccupation; I grew out of it pretty quickly, which is good. But there was a while there where it really sucked me in.
"So anyway, one day she just walked up and dropped a handful of little stones on the ground beside me. She told me that she found them in her driveway and thought I might like to use them. Only poor girl, she didn't realize that somehow, in my rules, the pebbles had to come from the playground. … I freaked out completely. I called her stupid and threw her stones all over the place. And, well, she got angry at me. So she stepped right into the center of the pattern I'd created that day and kicked in every possible direction, until the pebbles were scattered so far apart that there was no way I'd be able to find them all again before recess ended. I started screaming at her – and probably crying too, to be honest – and she put her hands on her hips, turned around, and just walked away.
"After that she didn't try to talk to me again for a few months. And somewhere during that period this boy Mike took an interest in me – by which I mean he started beating me up. Pretty much every day. It was like a sport to him."
"Why didn't your teacher stop him?" Julia asked indignantly.
"It was always after school," Eli explained, "He would find me somewhere on my way home."
"And nobody helped you?" she asked, a pained look darkening her eyes.
"Well that's what I'm getting to," he told her, "Somebody did. Somebody named Julia. One day, she found us just as he was starting to taunt me and corner me so I couldn't get away. And she walked right up to him and told him to leave me alone. She said it was wrong what he kept doing to me and that he had to stop. And he said, 'Yeah? Make me.' So you know what?"
"What?"
"She did!" the story was coming more easily now; there was even a certain joy in telling it. "She got between him and me and stretched her arms out to make a barrier – and she was a tall girl, so she actually covered me when she stood like that. 'If you want to touch him, you have to beat me up first,' she told him. And I guess Mike had enough decency not to hit a girl – or maybe he was just too stunned to do anything – 'cause he stood there like a complete idiot. Then Julia took my hand and said, 'Come on, Eli, let's go home,' and pulled me along with her back to her house."
"And after that Mike left you alone?" Julia asked.
Eli laughed. "No, not exactly. He never left me alone entirely. I didn't get truly free of him till his family moved away, in grade five. Somehow it didn't matter as much after that, though: I had a friend. After that first day she took me home, we were together almost all the time. I had someone who was by my side and always willing to stand up for me – and that made all the difference. … We got into quite a lot of mischief together, actually. Her older brothers were serious pranksters and she studied their methods pretty carefully. She helped me play some great tricks on Mike and his friends," a wistful smile appeared on Eli's face, "—Ummm, not that that was commendable behavior, on our part," he threw in perfunctorily.
Julia giggled at her father's pedagogical aside.
"Well, anyway," he fumbled to resume, "we were this sort of indestructible duo. By junior high, we both started to make some other friends. But at the end of the day, it always came down to the two of us. We were inseparable…."
"And then what?"
Eli hesitated. "Well, and then we got older and things changed a little. I started to notice how beautiful she was, and I started getting really anxious whenever she talked to other boys. It took me a good long year or so to admit it to myself, but I definitely had feelings for her – only I had no idea what to do with them: I was still pretty shy back then … which Mommy can never believe, actually," he smiled warmly, "Finally, in grade seven, someone else asked her on a date and I knew I had to act fast. She said yes and went with him to a movie one Saturday afternoon. But afterwards, she still came over my house in the evening – because that's what she did every weekend. When she came to my door that day, I thought I was going to tell her how I felt. But instead, I sort of panicked and ended up just kissing her."
Julia gave him a toothy smile and wrung her hands in excitement, briefly forgetting her earlier allegiance to her mother, it seemed.
"And then everything just sort of fell into place: she kissed me back, and we talked, and from then on we were a couple. And … well, a lot of that is that is stuff I'll tell you about when you're older." Julia's face fell, but he held his ground. "It will mean more to you then," he assured her. "But anyway, at the end of grade eight her father got married to a woman Julia really couldn't stand. They fought a lot and the lady was really pretty terrible to her. … So that summer, Grandpa Bullfrog and Grandma Cece told Julia she could live come live with us – which she did."
"Was it fun?" the little girl interrupted him.
Oh, you have no idea, Eli thought to himself. He laughed inwardly, realizing that, liberal parenting notwithstanding, there were certain things about his relationship with Julia – and perhaps even more so, with Clare – that he would never, ever, in a million years be able to share with his daughter. "Yes," he said, "for the most part it was fantastic. We had the greatest time together … but …" …and here comes the hard part, he thought.
"But what?"
"Well," he began, "We were both at a tough age, a lot of things were changing for each of us, and we could both get pretty angry pretty fast. Fundamentally, nothing changed between us. We still cared about each other just as much as ever, and we would still do anything for one another. It's just that now and then we'd get into fights… and sometimes they'd get really bad. Then one of us would storm out and go off alone for a bit. And later we'd sit down and talk it through and make up, and things would be okay again – more than okay, things would be wonderful. It's something we would have gotten past, I think. We just needed to grow up a little. But … well …" he cleared his throat, "One night we had a fight that got particularly bad. I don't know what it was about that one time, but it just got worse and worse … it became this massive blowout … and … I did something really horrible," he paused. Julia sucked in her lips, waiting wordlessly. Eli took a deep breath and continued. "I told her to get out of my house," he admitted, taken aback by the way his voice dropped to nearly a whisper. "I told her I hated her and never wanted to see her again. … So she got on her bike in the middle of the night, took off before I could take any of it back … and she was hit by a car."
"And she got hurt?" Julia's voice was soft and cautious.
Eli shook his head. It no longer pained him to say it. Over the years he had told enough people that the statement itself no longer hurt him, no longer catapulted him back to that night, the way it once had. But Julia – this Julia, this slight, serious child perched before him on the edge of the bed – took things so much to heart. For a moment he questioned the wisdom of telling her so soon. It was a bit late to stop, now, though. He rested his hand on her knee and patted her gently through the flimsy green flannel of her pajama pants. "No," he said, at last, "No, sweetheart. She died."
Julia's forehead creased with concern. "She should have been wearing her helmet," she scolded – then blushed deeply, suddenly abashed at the snippet of grade-school wisdom she had so reflexively regurgitated. "No," she resumed, and lowered her eyes as she struggled to find the proper stance. It dawned on Eli that, in her short life, this was the closest she had ever come to death. "No, well, she…" her voice faltered and Eli stepped in to rescue her.
"You're right," he murmured, and smiled sadly at the look of relief on his daughter's face, "she should have been. And it's very good that you always remember to wear yours. When Addy gets old enough to ride a bike you can teach him to always remember his helmet too, okay?"
The girl nodded tentatively and looked up to meet his gaze. Eli waited. He had braced himself for so many questions, but perhaps this was it. Perhaps she didn't want to hear any more. Or perhaps it didn't even occur to her that there was more to be heard. No matter, he told himself. It was out there now. If and when she wanted to know more, she would come to him.
They were silent, and Eli shifted to lift himself from the bed. But Julia picked the photo up once more and he froze. "How old was she?" she asked abruptly.
"Almost fifteen," he answered. And today, he thought to himself, she would have been thirty-five years, eight months, and – what? ... sixteen days old. It was a little calculation he ran often, almost without noticing – something that surfaced in his thoughts every now and then, whenever his mind had been idle for too long. It occurred to him that off the top of his head, he probably knew her age better than he knew his own.
Julia was pensive, herself absorbed in a calculation of some sort, it seemed. "That's like Madison," she said finally, referring to the eldest of Darcy's children.
"Pretty much," Eli confirmed.
She tilted her head to one side and sighed, still weighing something carefully. "That's…" she began, "That's not really little, anymore…. But it's very young to die. It's not even grown up yet."
Eli nodded.
"That's so unfair," she whispered, her voice quavering a little on the final syllable. She looked down at the photo again, and studied the space between the two teenagers. Eli wondered what she was searching for. "Did you love her?" she asked, at last.
"Yes," said Eli, without hesitation.
Julia launched herself at him, crawling into his lap and throwing her arms around his neck. "Poor Daddy," she whispered, and squeezed with all the strength her small body could muster. "Poor Daddy," she repeated, kissing him over and over again on the temple.
Eli wrapped his arms around her and pulled her close, pressing his face against her neck. Her skin had not quite lost the smell of infancy. He inhaled the scent slowly, basking in its clean, powdery warmth. Julia's arms trembled a bit from exertion, but she held tight. He could feel her heart beating against his chest, and he knew that his own was quickening to match its rapid, earnest pace.
Holding her like that, he thought of his fifteen-year-old-self – stunned, and devastated, and furious at the world. He thought of all the words of comfort he had heard, of all the sympathetic glances directed at him. And he thought of all the countless embraces that had meant nothing at all to him, back then. Sometimes, it felt as though that younger Eli still existed, suspended somewhere in memory and time. The grown man had long ago healed and learned to live again; but in some world, the fifteen-year-old continued to suffer. Eli could no longer quite identify with him; he seemed like something of a separate person. But he could still feel for him, and his heart broke a little when he thought of the anguished teenager trapped in his despair. He wished, now, that somehow, across time, across all the intervening years, he could reach that shattered, raging boy: he wished he could send him this single, simple hug.
"It's okay, Julesie. It's okay," he crooned, "It was a long time ago. I'm alright, now."
"But you lost your friend. You were all alone again," she whispered between ragged breaths, "It's so sad…"
Eli rubbed her back and rocked her a little from side to side. "For a while, yes, I felt very alone," he told her, "And it is very sad, that will always be true. But you know what?"
She pulled back, her hands still resting loosely around his neck. "What?" she asked.
"Well, the first year was terrible, but then I met some incredible people. I met your "uncle" Adam, and I met your mother. And the years right after that were still pretty difficult. I did some extremely stupid things … and I tried to push them away more than once. But, in the end, they always stood by me, no matter what. So I wasn't alone once I found them. I had Adam. And I had Mommy – I've never felt alone since I've had your mother in my life."
Julia nodded and slid her hands off his shoulders. She wriggled around on his lap and settled herself so her back was leaning into his chest. "Was Julia like Mommy?" she asked, pulling Eli's arms snuggly around her.
"Well," he said, resting his chin on Julia's head and pausing to think for a moment, "Not at first glance. Certainly not in the way she dressed or presented herself. Her general style was much more like mine than Mommy's."
Julia bent her head forward and tugged on the cuff of his left sleeve, "Less color? More black?" she inquired.
Her phrasing struck him as strangely familiar. Someone had used those words with him before…. Eli could feel a memory flicker somewhere on the peripheries of his mind. But the spark guttered and blew out before he could bring it forth…. Still, he smiled. "Yes, that's a good way to put it," he told her. He had discarded some of the chains and skull rings, and over the years skinny jeans had largely given way to slacks – but his wardrobe had maintained its decidedly dark palette.
"But what about at second glance?" Julia asked hopefully, "Was she like Mommy, then?"
"Yes and no." he replied, a little more sure of what it was he meant to tell her, now, "She wasn't literarily inclined like Mommy and me," he began.
Julia bumped her head towards one shoulder. It was a gesture he knew well, one he recognized even from behind: I don't understand you, it said, but I'm too proud to admit there are words I haven't learned yet.
Eli muffled a chuckle with a soft kiss to the back of her head. "She didn't read and write as much as we do," he clarified, and felt the child relax in his arms.
"What did she do instead?" Julia asked.
"She was very musical. She knew an astounding amount about every kind of music you can imagine. – So you can guess she fit in well with my parents! – She wrote her own pieces, and picked up instruments almost effortlessly…. Grandma Cece still has her violin, actually…. Next time we go over, I can show it to you, if you like."
Julia nodded. She seemed unsatisfied, though. "But how was she like Mommy?" she pressed.
"It's complicated… Julia wasn't a very nice person. But she was a very good person – "
"What's the difference?"
"Anyone can be nice – smile, and chat, and say cutesy things. Julia wasn't like that. She was quiet, very reserved. People always thought she was cold, but that wasn't it. Really, it's more that she was a bit scared of other kids … and very serious. Until you got to know her, that is. If she felt safe with you, she could be hilarious…. She was never bubbly or outgoing, but she was willing to take a risk and befriend someone if they seemed lost or sad – I wasn't the only person she did that for. Even thought it took a lot of effort for her. She always said she didn't know how to be social. But she would put herself on the line for other people when it counted. And she would stand up for what she thought was right. Especially when it had to do somebody she cared about. She was so loyal. She would do anything for the people that mattered to her…. So in that way – in the important ways – she was exactly like Mommy."
"That's good," Julia muttered. She dropped her head back against his collarbone and continued to mull something over. "You loved her very much," she added, after a few seconds.
"Yes, I did," he said, "very, very much."
Julia stiffened a little and lifted her face towards Eli. She locked eyes with him and turned one corner of her mouth down, grimacing in a perfect imitation of the frown her mother sometimes gave him.
"What's up, Julia?" he asked.
"You loved her very, very much…. But you love Mommy more, right?"
Eli's jaw went slack. It was not the question itself that shocked him. Really, it seemed like a perfectly logical thing to ask. What jarred him was that he had never heard it before: it occurred to him, now, that countless people in his life must have wondered about this at one point or another… and it mystified him that he himself had never once thought to consider the matter in such terms.
"Daddy!" Julia snapped, making him start. She pulled away and glared. "Say 'yes,'" she ordered, "Say 'yes'!"
Yes, Eli: say 'yes'! Don't make this harder than it has to be, he told himself. And yet, he wavered. It wasn't a question that you answered with a 'yes' or a 'no' – not if you wanted to answer honestly.
"Daddy. You have to say 'yes,'" Julia insisted – and this time it was a panicked plea.
"It doesn't work that way, Julia. It's not a competition." He reached for her hand but she jerked it away.
"People only say that when it is a competition but they don't want to admit who lost!" she spat, her face flushing. She glanced down at the photo and Eli had a sudden fear that she might try to destroy it. He snatched it off the bed and slipped it into his breast pocket, eyeing his daughter sternly. Julia gave him a guilty scowl and he knew he had read her thoughts.
"Julia," he said. She looked away, her teeth clenched. "Julia," he repeated, "I'm speaking to you!"
"Rrhm." She made a sound of grudging acknowledgement. It was the best he was going to get out of her, just then.
"You asked me a question," Eli started, "Now, I was under the impression that you are a mature girl who can handle the truth, even when it's complicated." He shrugged and sat up, swinging his feet to the floor. "But I guess I was wrong," he sighed. Low blow, Elijah, he thought to himself; it was bound to get her attention, though.
"No," Julia breathed, her eyes wide and glassy, "No, Daddy, I am. I really am."
Eli put his hand on hers, and she didn't pull away. "Alright, then," he said in a low, steady voice, "Do you want to hear my answer?"
She nodded mutely.
"Okay. Come here, though," he whispered, stretching out his arms. She inched towards him and tucked herself against his side. He smoothed her bangs a few times then stroked her cheek lightly, waiting for the tension to lift from her small frame. He wondered how much she would really be able to grasp – how much it would all mean to her if he told her now. Could he truly make her see how broken he had been at the time that he met Clare? Was it even something he wanted her to know, this early on? He wondered sometimes what would have become of him had Clare not been so persistent, back in those early days. Had she accepted his evasions and retreated in bitterness or pain, had she not shown up on his doorstep demanding answers … would anyone have ever reached him again? Perhaps. But when he imagined the subsequent years playing out without her, he could almost see his heart drying up and shriveling in on itself. Clare had pieced him back together. She had brought him out his tangle of pain and fury and fear, and guided him back into life. And though statistically he know it probably wasn't true, he couldn't help but feel that there was no one else on earth who could have done that. No one else could have been that steady and patient and determined with him. No one could have been that strong and wise. …. Yet, how could his child see all that? How could she fathom the depths from which her mother had brought him back? He would tell her someday, eventually … or gradually, over several years, perhaps. But for now, he would leave her with just most essential part. "The thing you have to realize," he told her, "is that I love your mother as much as it is possible for one human being to love another…. In fact, I know you hate to hear this, but I think in a way you're too young to fully understand how much Mommy and I love one another – " he could hear the intake of breath as Julia opened her mouth to argue, "—No, Julesie," he silenced her, "It's not that you're not intelligent enough or grown up enough. You just haven't lived it yet. Your mother and I have been together so long, we've been through so many things together. When you live so closely with someone and experience so much with them by your side, you don't just love them – there's something deeper than that, more fundamental. You grow into them; they shape you and you shape them. What I have with your mother – what we've created together and what we share – is completely central to who I am. I can't even imagine myself separate from it."
Julia smiled faintly and nodded.
"But," Eli went on, "that doesn't change the fact that I loved Julia profoundly. Nothing can ever change that. She still holds a place in my heart that no one else can ever take. I'm going to carry her with me for the rest of my life."
The girl shifted uncomfortably, a frown returning to her face.
"One thing you have to realize though," Eli said tilting her chin upwards to get a better look at her, "is that if I hadn't loved Julia, I would never have fallen in love with your mother."
"Why?"
"Because I would have been a completely different person. So much of who I was when I met Mommy came from Julia. And all of that is still in me…. You can think of it as the foundation for who I've become in my life with Mommy."
"But if Julia never died, would you still be with her?"
"I don't know, sweetheart," he answered truthfully, "That's something no one can know. I tend to believe she would still be in my life, somehow. But I can't be sure how, anymore."
He could pretty well picture the woman Julia would have become, and it wasn't inconceivable to him that he would have married her, eventually. But there was no guarantee. It could have gone any number of ways, he knew. And at the end of the day, this was the way it had gone. He had grown up, without her; he had reached adulthood … and she had remained, forever, a child. In a few more years he would be old enough to be her father….
"Would you maybe still have met Mommy?" Julia cut into his musings.
Eli sighed. "Probably not, to be honest. I transferred schools because of how people treated me after the accident. So, no, if that hadn't happened, I probably wouldn't have crossed paths with Mommy."
"So then, do you regret that it happened, or not?" she asked softly.
"I regret it for Julia – tremendously. I regret that she never grew up, that there are so many things she was never able to do. She would have led an extraordinary life, I'm certain – she was just that kind of person. So it's … well, tragic – I don't really know how else to put it – that that life never happened. And it all still makes me incredibly sad," He paused, allowing the next sentence to take shape in his mind, "… But do I regret it for myself?" he asked, "At this point, no. I can't. I couldn't possibly regret how my life has turned out. I couldn't possibly regret a life that brought me you and Addy and Mommy…."
Julia was slow to respond. Something about what he had said seemed to rattle her. She burrowed deeper into his arms and hid her face against his chest. When she spoke, he could barely make out her words. "I exist because she died," she mumbled into his shirt. Then, raising her head, she continued more clearly, "And maybe there's a different little girl who never got to exist because I did."
Eli didn't know what to say. It was true and not true, all at once. So many factors had conspired to create the miraculous little person in his lap; the slightest shift in any one of them might have given rise to someone completely different. But there was truth in what she had said. Without the death of the first Julia, the life of the second would not have been possible.
The Julia in his arms lifted a hand to his chest. She rested her palm on the photograph and searched his expression for permission. The malice had left her eyes and Eli nodded as she slowly extracted the picture from his pocket.
She brought it close to her face, and with the tip of one finger, lightly traced the outline of the girl for whom she had been named. "Can I have it?" she asked.
His first instinct was to say 'no', to yank the photo out of her hands and flee to the bedroom, where he could hide it safely among his things... Then came the pang of guilt. It had been so many years since he had learned to control those impulses, so many years since he had overcome those fears and needs. And still, every now and then, something could trigger them. He felt ashamed. Though, really, it made sense: it had all begun with Julia, with the objects that linked him to her. No wonder then, that he should hesitate to give up this picture, this most treasured reminder of her existence.
His daughter gazed up at him expectantly; he had yet to answer. He felt something in his chest constrict and had to breathe deeply to loosen , impossible. He couldn't do it. He couldn't part with this. He moved to take the photo from her. But something stilled his hand. This was his daughter, one of the three people on Earth who mattered to him most. This was not a matter of throwing the picture in the trash, or packing it away into some cardboard box. It wasn't parting with the photograph: it was passing it on.
"Will you take good care of it?" he asked.
"Yes," she assured him, "I promise. We can get a frame to keep it safe."
"Okay," said Eli. He let his hand drop and closed his eyes to steady his nerves.
"And you know what?" Julia asked.
"What?"
"I'll put it on my desk. That way, it's right next to the door and you can come look at it anytime you want."
His heart swelled and words failed him. He drew her in and held her close, planting warm kisses along the crooked part in her hair. Julia hugged back, but her grip was looser now. Eli could sense the fatigue overwhelming her muscles. "Maybe we should get to sleep," he suggested, after a minute.
Julia nodded. She straightened up and looked at the picture one last time, before leaning past him to set it carefully on her nightstand.
Eli stood up to allow her pull back the covers. He watched her settle in among the pillows and blankets, then bent down to kiss her goodnight, before heading towards the door.
"Daddy?" Julia murmured drowsily.
"Yes?" He stopped at the threshold.
"Adam said that having Addy named after him makes him happy. He said it was the greatest; I know he really likes him…. Do you think Julia would like me? Do you think she would be happy that I have the same name as her?"
"I'm certain of it," Eli told her. And he truly was.
He switched off the light and pulled the door shut behind him. In the hallway, it took a moment for his eyes to adjust. The apartment was dark now, but for a band of dull light from under his and Clare's door. He shuffled over to Addy's room and pushed the door open. The curtains on his windows had not been drawn all the way and a pale glow from the street lamps seeped into the room through the gaps between them. By its faint light, Eli could just make out the form of his sleeping son. In the time since Clare had put him to bed, he had already managed to kick his blanket halfway to the floor. His legs were splayed in opposite directions and he had flung his arms up at strange angles on either side of his head. Crossing the room, Eli wondered what he might be dreaming of. He gathered the blanket from the ground and pulled it up around the child's chest. Addy reached for something with his right hand, mouthed a non-existent word, and went on sleeping. As lightly as he could, Eli brushed his lips against each of the toddler's eyelids.
Back in the corridor he groped his way towards his own room, running his hands along the middle shelves of bookcases that lined the wall. When he reached it, the door opened with a raspy sigh. Inside, Clare lay on the bed, curled around one of her numerous notebooks. She had her head propped on one hand and was scribbling away furiously with the other. At the sight of him though, she dropped the pen and shoved the book aside. "How did it go?" she inquired, sitting up against the headboard.
"I don't know…" he heard himself reply, "Good, I think…. I don't know if she understood all of it, though."
"She probably didn't," said Clare, "But that's okay. It will stay with her. It will take root over time." She glanced at his hands, then up to his breast pocket. "Where's the picture?" she asked.
Eli spread his hands and smiled weakly. "She wanted it," he answered, "That girl always gets what she wants with me – the brat," he added, then shrugged at the feebleness of his own humor.
The weight of the evening's exchange settled on him all at once; he felt suddenly frail and drained. Clare opened her arms to him and he sank on to the bed, drooping into her embrace. "Is that okay?" she asked as he nestled down against her.
"Yeah," he said, but immediately shook his head. He drew closer to Clare, intertwining his legs with hers and pressing his cheek to her chest. "Well, not at first," he began to elaborate. He felt her nod and knew she understood completely.
"But now?" she asked, placing a hand on top of his. She wove their fingers together.
"It feels a bit weird," he confessed, "But it feels right. It's not giving her up; it's just letting her live on in one more person."
Clare lifted his hand and turned it towards her. She pressed her lips to the heel of his palm and massaged his thumb with her own. "I'm proud of you, Eli," she murmured. Her words fell hot and damp against his skin. "I mean, not just about the picture, or the conversation. About all of it. About how far you've come." She set his hand down and he slipped his arm around her waist.
He wanted to tell her that it was all her doing, that it was she who had brought him this far. But he knew she would brush it off. "No, Eli," she'd say, "I was only along for the ride." And try as he might, he would not be able to make her see the truth of his words…. So he settled for something else, something true and constant that he had said a million times before – and still never quite enough. "I love you, Clare," he told her.
"I love you, Eli," she responded.
He remembered Julia's question from earlier that night and felt uneasy. "Clare?" he asked, "You know how immensely important you are to me, right? I mean, you know much I love you? … You don't ever doubt that, do you?"
He felt Clare shift beneath him and lifted himself slightly to allow her room to move. She edged down the bed until she was lying by his side, her eyes level with his. Her gaze was steady and sure, the affection in it unfathomably deep. "Never," she told him, "Not for one moment." She brought her face forward and their lips met.
The kiss was slow … velvety, even. They grazed each other's lips with the tips of their tongues, but neither one moved to deepen it. There was a quiet perfection in the moment's utter tranquility. And when they broke apart for air, it was only the tiniest distance. They lay motionless, their faces still touching, their breaths lacing together.
Eli thought of their children – of the spunky, impish boy sleeping fitfully, down the hall; and of the willful, precocious girl dozing off in the next room over. He thought of the people they had been named for: the intense, hilarious young man who had stuck with him through so much; and the long-lost girl, the fiercely loyal childhood friend and first love, whom he carried with him everywhere he went…. And at the center of it all, he thought of Clare – the woman by his side, the person who knew him better than anyone else on Earth, the one who had made him live again when he had thought that nothing ever could.
He marveled that so many remarkable people could fit into a single life.
Explanatory Notes:
1. Lydia is Adam's wife/girlfriend/significant other. I have nothing against Fadam, but I just don't think it's realistic both they and Eclare would make it through to adulthood (by the way, I haven't been able to watch the new episodes yet, so for all I know, there is no Fadam right now. But yeah…)
2. If you happened to notice a certain four-word phrase that struck you as coming straight out of The Things They Carried, then you need to know two things: a. it was meant as an intentional, respectful allusion – not an act of plagiarism; and b. you're really cool for catching that!
3. The pebble thing that Eli talks about is a precursor to his hoarding. I have suffered from numerous compulsive disorders for most of my life, and in my experience, they don't come out of the blue: people are usually predisposed to them and experience them in various forms throughout their lives. So that's what that was about, if anyone was perplexed….
4. It may seem strange that Eli and Clare would name their child after Julia, but I actually don't think it's all that far-fetched. In my own family, my mother was given a feminine version of the name of my grandmother's first love – a boy who died fighting in the Warsaw Uprising of 1944. It was my grandfather's idea. Oddly enough though, although I'd always known about the boy, I didn't make the connection to my mother's name, or ask my grandmother about it, till after I'd already started writing this story.
5. Also, I understand how Punnett Squares work, and appreciate that Julia's appearance is borderline genetically impossible. But, hey, this is fanFICTION.
6. ArentYouSophiaLoren-8887 thinks her A/N's are awkward and verbose. Psssh…. Amateur! :P