A/N: One of my favourite things to write in hopeless wanderer was undoubtedly the bits between Callie and her mother and, because of that, this happened. I actually have had this saved for a good couple of months now, but I never have the guts to post it...
I must admit, I have a bit of a fear of writing one shots at the minute. I've taken it upon myself to get on with it and post this and, if people don't like it, that's their choice.
The only thing she remembers is the sound.
Tires screeching against asphalt, glass and metal crunching too close to her ear for comfort. Yelling.
And then someone saying her name before the silence.
It's all she can remember. Not what she was doing before it, not where she was when it happened or who was with her. She remembers nothing. Nothing but the sound.
She can't seem to open her eyes. It seems an absolutely impossible task, no matter how hard she tries, her eyes stay firmly shut.
She decides that she should move her hand – let someone know that she is here, awake. But her hands do not obey, her body seems to be tied down. Or just paralysed.
"Callie?"
She does not recognise the voice – not at first, anyway. Not through the insistent buzzing in her head and the excruciating pain in her leg. She can't seem to figure out how to respond. She's forgotten how to speak.
"Callie?"
Who are you?
As a child, she suffered from traumatic night terrors. They came about around a month after her mom died, and they stayed for two full years. Most of the time, she'd wake up screaming for help. But there were these times where her mind would be waking up, but her body still asleep. She'd imagine that she was tied down by rope, or sinking under dense liquid, and no matter how hard she tried – she could not sit up. She'd try every which way, but her body would not comply. The doctor said that this was a form of lucid dreaming and that he couldn't really do anything about it other than prescribe some sleeping pills.
They didn't really help.
It's how Callie feels right now. The only thing she can see is the back of her eyelids, but she can feel everything. A hand clinging onto her upper arm, another running through her hair. Someone whispering soothing words in her ear that she can't quite understand.
"You've grown so much."
If she could see, she would reply to the faceless nameless person. She'd assumed that it was coming from outside of her mind, from the world that she wants so badly to step into.
Who are you?
"It's me, baby." The voice replies. "It's mom."
She tries to open up her mouth and respond, but finds that – even in this world – she is unable to do so.
Help me.
"I know it's scary, sweetheart. You'll get used to it."
It hits her suddenly that her mother is replying to her despite her inability to use her voice. She wishes that she could just open up her eyes, just for a moment, and speak.
What happened to me?
"You were in an accident, sweetie. You're in a coma."
I'm...a coma?
"Yeah, baby. A coma."
am I dying?
There is a silence, one that lets Callie really understand her current situation.
"It's hard to say, honey."
She knows that she's hanging on by a thread, she feels it in the back of her mind. It's like a pulling, a constant go to sleep, let go.
Will you stay with me?
It's hard to differentiate between what's happening outside of her body, and what's happening inside of her mind. It's hard to decide if the person who is touching her arm is really touching her arm, or if it's her mind making her feel like it might be her mom.
"Of course, my beautiful girl."
She hates how she can't move her limbs, not even her little finger. She tries and tries and tries, and it just seems to make her more tired, but she just wants to let the people outside know that she's here. That she knows they are here.
"I've missed you so much, Callie."
She doesn't want to reply because she doesn't want to pretend to herself that she is having a conversation with her mother. She knows this is just her mind, her consciousness, her imagination. She knows this isn't real. Ghosts aren't real.
Angels aren't real.
God isn-
"I am here, you know. I've been waiting."
There's no way to prove that.
"No, Baby. I suppose there's not. But does that matter? Wouldn't you rather enjoy this than pretend it doesn't exist? Why push something away just because it doesn't seem logical."
Callie wishes that she could make any sort of facial expression. This thinking of responses isn't how she wants it to be, she wants to open her eyes and see her mother.
Or open her eyes and see her family.
Either will work.
"Remember when we used to go to the funfair?"
yeah.
"We used to pay to go on the ferris wheel over and over again all day. We'd just sit up there, looking down at the world and eat cotton candy till our stomachs were sore."
An image flashes before her mind, just a flash, barely enough to see anything. But it's the view from the top of the Ferris wheel.
I loved that.
"Think about it. Hard. Just think about it. You don't have to be trapped, honey."
And then, suddenly, she is four and she is sitting at the top of a paused ferris wheel next to her mother eating bright pink cotton candy.
The world below isn't moving.
It's jus them, up high, alone.
She looks up at her mother and she is everything she ever remembered her to be. "How did I do that?"
Her mom smiles. "That, my sweet child," She says. "Is your imagination."
For a while, neither of them speak. They just look out at the world. Callie see's a paused still of a woman pulling her excited child along on the ground below her feet. She thinks about herself and her mom at the fair when she was that age.
"Mama I wanna go to the merry go round."
"But we need to eat, honey!"
"but maaamaaaaaa."
"So this family...you like them?"
Callie tears her eyes away from the kid and her mother and looks up, giving her mom a half smile. "They're great."
"I can see you, you know. Up here. I've watched you grow up."
Callie manages a small half-hearted smile and shifts her gaze towards her feet. "I'm sorry, you know."
Her mother reaches out and laces her fingers through Callie's. It feels like a gentle breeze, not like a real hand but the ghost of a hand. She takes a deep breath and remembers that she's still laying in a hospital bed, still in a coma, she still can't really move.
"For what?"
"You know...just everything. Juvie, leaving Jude alone...running away. I didn't turn out the way you wanted me to."
She feels her mother smiling down at her and then, after a moment of silence, she runs her ghost hand along Callies ghost arm. "You turned out perfectly, my girl."
"Really? What about me is perfect?" Callie laughs bitterly and looks down at the ground below, at the still of a mother and daughter fighting.
"I want cotton candy!"
She and her mother don't fight often, but when they do it's always a huge tantrum. Today is no exception, and Callie is wailing in the middle of the fair with her hands flying in the air.
"You need proper food first, Callie."
Callie lets out another wail and sits down on the ground. "But . ."
"But you cant have cotton candy. Not right now, anyway." Her mother is losing her patience, and Callie can tell.
She crosses her arms and stands ground. "Well then i'll sit here all night long."
"Well, your courage for a start." Her mother says, breaking her way from her whisper of a distant memory. Callie looks up, and Colleen is smiling. Proud.
"Courage?"
"Yeah," She says, nodding. "You're such a brave young girl. So much has happened, so much that I wish I could have prevented. But you always tried your hardest for you and Jude, you always pushed through when things got hard. You've always been so brave."
Callie smiles. "And...what else?"
"I admire how you continue to live..." Her mother silences for a moment, realising that maybe, in this exact moment, those weren't the right words. She remembers why it is she's here, what she's here to do. What will happen if callie makes the decision...she shakes her head and continues. "It's like you have this thing inside of you that tells you it'll eventually be okay. Sure, i've seen you struggle, and I've seen you nearly give up. But then you just...you spring right back up. Not once, not ever, have you completely given everything up. Not once have you decided life isn't worth living."
Callie nods, she seems to understand. "I couldn't do that to Jude."
And just like her mother had a few moments before, Callie realises the reality of her current situation. She's not on a Ferris wheel talking to her mother, she's not high up in the sky looking out at the sun and the kids and the balloons. She can't smell popcorn or cotton candy or hear fairground music. She's lying in a bed, completely unable to move, completely unable to break free from her mind. She's dying, no other way to put it.
And she's in between both versions of herself.
"You love them?" Colleen asks again, completely out of the blue. It takes Callie a moment to realise who she is talking about, but she nods without hesitation when she figures it out.
"I love them. A lot."
It used to be scary to admit that, but these days she finds herself saying those words as much as she possibly can. Like if she doesn't say it enough, if she doesn't say it loud enough, she might not be heard...they might not know that she's grateful, that they're her family, and that it's all she's ever been waiting for.
"Stef and Lena are so worried." Callie says quietly. "I don't know how but I can...I can feel it."
"That's normal." Her mother replies. "It's normal to feel the emotions in the room. You can hear them, but it's subconsciously so you don't always notice that you're hearing what you're hearing."
"They want me to wake up."
Colleen nods. "Honey, the thing is...it's not exactly that simple."
But Callie knows that. She can feel it. Like she's three quarters here and only a quarter there, and every moment she spends on this ferris wheel with her mother is making her presence here stronger. But part of her doesn't mind. She loves them, she does. But this is her mother.
And it's peaceful here, calm. Like a perfect little ending, like everything has been tied up and closed and she's okay with being here, on this wheel. With her mother.
Without her other mothers.
She's confused.
"Do you know what's going to happen to me?" She asks, and she's surprised by how little her voice is. "Am I going to be okay?"
"Either way," Her mother says. "You'll be absolutely fine."
.
It's the first time she's had the flu in four years, the first time she's been sick at all in three and so it seems to hit her harder than it should. Her brain wakes her up at 3am, and the thought of something not being right is crushed by the turning of her stomach, the running towards the bathroom with a hand over her mouth, not making it and throwing up on the hall floor.
She's embarrassed, of course, and so she tries to clean it up without anyone finding out. But then the cold shivers come, and every muscle in her body hurts and, so, she's just kneeling on the floor with a wet towel trying her best but not really trying at all.
The light switching on makes her jump, and she looks up to find a disgruntled Stef emerging from her bedroom.
"Cal?"
Callie clears her throat, but her voice still comes out limp and tired. "It's okay, I'm okay. You can go back to bed."
Stef blinks a few times, and Callie thinks that she might turn around to head back to her bedroom, but she suddenly seems to still as she obivously comes to the realisation of what her daughter is doing up at this time of night.
"Oh, Callie. Why didn't you wake me up?"
"I know...sorry, I tried to make i-"
"No! I don't mean...I mean, you shouldn't be trying to clean this up, honey. You look like you're about to pass out." She kneels down beside the girl and places a hand to her head. "You're burning up. Let's get you back to bed."
It's the first time she's been sick in three years, but it's the only time she's realised that she'll be absolutely fine no matter what.
.
"They care about me, mom."
Colleen smiles gently, and Callie knows that she wishes she could take her hand, and callie gives her a look that tells her it's okay.
"They do, I know."
"So do you." Callie adds.
"I always have, always will."
It's calm here. Peaceful. Warm and relaxing and okay.
There is different, it's hard. It's great, but it's hard. All the time. And it's going to be painful, she knows it already, if she wakes up she's going to be in more pain than she's ever been in.
"You can stay here, Callie. With me, and it'll be wonderful." Her mother says, smiling. "Or you can go home, recover, be with your family. Live."
And she knows what her mother wants her to do. She can see it in her eyes, in her gentle smile. She nods, and a ghost tear falls down her ghost cheek and her ghost mother kisses her ghost forehead gently.
"It's okay, darling. My sweet lovely girl, we'll be together again. I'm waiting. Always."
And then she's looking at the back of her eyelids again. Darkness. No mom, no fairground, no light. Nothing.
But she can feel her senses coming back. She feels her fingers, her legs, her head...everything. One by one, with every ounce of energy she has, she manages to move her fingers, and then a hand is clasping around her arm.
"...waking up. Oh thank god, oh thank god. My love, we're all here."
Voices become clear.
And pain does, too.
But then she opens her eyes, and she's looking at a white roof in a white room, and she can feel a hand on both of her arms.
"We're right here, Callie. Love, we're right beside you."
She turns around weakly and smiles at both of her mothers.
"I'm so happy to see those beautiful eyes." Stef mumbles, kissing her forehead.
And then Lena leans in too. "You're gonna be okay, baby."
And she knows she's made the right decision because it's painful here sometimes, it's hard, but it's home and it's okay.
"I love you guys," She rasps. "I love you guys so much."