Notes:
Warning Tags: Child's loss, miscarriage
Edited... We all know my bad habit of posting first and edit later... It's the stress I guess...
This was written in about an hour.
I was working on chapter 11 for AGN and suddenly I had this idea. Against my better judgment, I decided to write a short drabble and this came out.
It's not perfect, far from it, but it worked for me. It satiated my wild thoughts.
By the way, chapter 11 of AGN will probably be split into chapters 11-13. It just happened...
Who is Afraid of Charlotte Richards?
It had been almost two months since Lucifer's disappearance and Linda's contact with the celestial community of L.A. had been minimal. Rephrasing that, it was nearly non-existent. Maze was dropping far and in between for a drink but Lucifer's absence had taken a vital something out of everyone who truly cared for him.
The only upside was the undisturbed lunches she now had. Which in turn had proved to be a downside as she always expected Lucifer to barge right in with his latest existential crisis or Maze trying to reaffirm her worth.
"I will only take five minutes of your time." Linda heard a female voice from the now opened door. She should have expected her to drop by at one point. Thankfully, she had an inkling on how to approach this if her sessions with her sons and Maze were anything to go by.
"What do you want to talk about? Lucifer leaving? The rocky relationship with your ex?" She questioned grabbing her notebook and sitting on her armchair.
"No, I want to talk about something more... human," Charlotte admitted with eyes darting outside the window to the ever, sunny L.A.
"Sex." Linda deadpanned.
"Uriel" Charlotte tentatively replied clearly uncomfortable discussing that topic.
"Oh…"
"Humans say that there is a physical order. Parents are not supposed to experience their children leaving before them." Charlotte began deep in thinking.
"That is true the loss of a child here is considered one of the greatest losses a human can go through. Even animals are known to grieve their young." She could feel the stir deep within her but ignored it. This was her patient and she had the responsibility to carry on, not to refer her to another therapist.
"Well, then, the Goddess of all creation has found a connection with this part of Creation." A humourless laugh had Charlotte rubbing her eyes smearing her obviously non-waterproof mascara.
"You seem to dislike it. I mean Creation or at least this part. Us." She said carefully. Linda had heard quite the terrors from Lucifer regarding his Mother's perception of humanity.
"Doctor. I have not come to talk about my ex's infuriating neglect over his knick knacks. I'm here for my baby boy." She pressed and palmed her cheeks in agitation
"Yes, of course, I'm just still new into this." New was a relative term. To celestial beings seeking therapy? Not really. This kind of conversations? Absolutely yes.
"So am I." She said ruthfully and gave Linda a small smile.
"Talk to me." Linda finally prompted her.
"Uriel… He was a lovely boy. He was a lot like Lucifer but for so many different reasons."
The spark every mother had when talking about her children was there. If Linda didn't know how manipulative she could be, she would have honestly have been fooled into thinking she had been a dedicated mother.
"What is your first memory of Uriel?" She always wondered how the litter of children Lucifer had told her about had come to be, but in this case, that first memory was the source of all sorrow. It was labelled as the beginning. A beginning that should have never had an end.
"He was one of the first. At the very beginning, we had Michael, Samael or Lucifer as you know him and Gabriel. They were all born from me. After Gabriel, though He said that we could create children out of love without them taking a toll on my existence." She rushed with names and situations and her insistence of calling Lucifer, Samael spoke of a belief that her child was not so changed as he claimed to be after all.
"You had a difficult gestation?" Linda asked carefully.
"No… What came from me was too powerful. Perhaps in His mind dangerous as well but he loved them so much. Samael was so tiny at the beginning, the smallest of them all." She smiled to a memory long lost in time but always close in her heart, something that Linda could not relate to.
"I have to be honest, I cannot imagine Lucifer as tiny." He would have huffed and demanded to know what was so little of himself. Always clueless and insecure.
"Oh but he was. The smallest for a long time. At least until the rest were created. Amenadiel was created full grown as were Camael, Raphael, Jophiel and Zadkiel. I loved them all dearly but I craved for a baby." She admitted not caring about how that would sound. There were no social pressures to dictate her after all.
"Uriel?" Linda guessed.
"Uriel. One day He came with the smallest baby I had ever seen in His hands and gave him to me. He had a gift as they all did. But his gift never made his life easy." She sighed and reached the fresh water Linda had laid out for her next session.
"Lucifer was the Lightbringer." Linda at least knew that much.
"Not until he had grown a bit but Uriel could always work with patterns. He only had the gift of omniscience."
"As did you." Gods were supposed to be omniscience otherwise what was the point?
"As did His father. He always knew that the older boys would not play with him. He was always the runt of the litter just as was Lucifer for the most part of his life before Uriel came along." That had probably been a good time for Charlotte as her eyes had a far away look which Linda always identified as a time of true happiness and tranquillity in a patience's life.
"But something made them different." She noted. Linda knew that at least Lucifer had been different enough to Fall.
"Lucifer dealt with things differently. He questioned things while Uriel worked with the answers. Both of them though entertained themselves separately yet always near me." They were both momma's boys. That didn't surprise Linda.
"They were your favourite." Lucifer had always insisted he was Father's favourite but was terrified of his mother. That alone spoke volumes to whom he looked up while growing up.
"They were my babies. They still are." Charlotte insisted but she could not hide the affirmation. They had been indeed her favourites.
"Do you blame Lucifer for Uriel's death?" She wondered. A loss was always clouded by who was to blame. Even Lucifer had taken that path a long time ago.
"I blame many. Myself for starters but most of all Him. He knew and He stayed up there watching as my boys fought over something He could resolve easily." Divinity was a funny thing for Linda lately. Powerful beings with human traits.
Betrayal was not exclusively a human characteristic. Negligence was not escapable even for Gods. That perhaps offered Linda some comfort while feeling a lot like relating this to the Olympian Gods. They had faults and consequences always followed.
"You believe Uriel was killed because his father neglected him." She was guiding Charlotte but she felt there was no alternative. Charlotte had to face all her guilt over Uriel's loss obvious or not.
"And because I abandoned him. When He threw me to Hell, Uriel must have felt so betrayed. So lost. My son was forced to seek me out because he wanted to make sure I would be forever gone." Covering her eyes she relished the torturous yet exhilarating minutes in Hell where her boy was alive. Where he begged her not to be abandoned again. Heaven was unhelpful as sometimes wished, she had stayed in that disillusion of reality. At least her boy would have been alive.
"Gone in order to not abandon him anymore?" No one had ever explained what exactly had happened during Lucifer's return to Hell but Charlotte's revival had been accompanied by a short-lived breakdown. One word had been clear enough for Maze to hear. Uriel.
"He was never a bad boy. Neither was Samael, no… Lucifer. I'm just so scared…" Charlotte confessed while watching her hands starting to tremble.
"What are you afraid of?" Linda finally asked. What could a Goddess be afraid of after all?
"That... My son is really and truly broken. I did this…" She finished with a broken wheezing sound.
"Lucifer has left and is probably trying to find answers. He is coping and thus he will return." Linda reasoned the best she could but she knew it was true. Lucifer was broken for a long time and something must have gone terribly wrong for him to flee like that. Especially when he had declared that he didn't want to stay away from his Detective.
"You miss my point Doctor. I lost a child, my sweet little Uriel. How long will it be until I lose Lucifer? How long until He decides to take a second son away from me?" Charlotte had started to hyperventilate, a notion and sense so foreign for her newly acquired body.
Linda had no answers this time. She had the same questions. Her marriage had ended two decades ago when she had lost two boys. They never had the privilege to draw a first breath despite being perfectly formed. For half a year she had carried them and they never made it to this world. Somewhere out there, was a Father who had looked the other way when His son had been killed. When His son had mourned himself to the edge of madness. How could she offer comfort when even the higher power did not make sense anymore?
She uncrossed her legs and stepped towards the woman on the couch. Charlotte was blinking the tears away uncertainty for the future filling her eyes. Linda took her hands in hers and traced the soft flesh of Charlotte's palm.
"It is widely believed He has a plan. Lucifer claims that does not mean it's a good one. But that does not constrict you from having one yourself." Linda told her offering her a tissue box from behind the couch.
"You lost a son and you should grieve but without guilt, without anger. Let go of these but never let go of your love for him. As for Lucifer, he will come back. He cannot stay away, I should know." Both women chuckled at this. Lucifer was always a petulant child and unfinished business had been left behind. He just didn't have the patience to leave them behind unresolved. Whatever that meant.
"Then when he returns just make sure to love him. No matter what happens make sure he knows he is loved. I believe he may have missed out of what being loved is all about. Or perhaps he has forgotten while lost in his self-doubt."
"He doesn't believe me anymore." She smiled sadly and opened the office's door.
"Then you live for the day he will." Linda told her and watched the fallen Goddess with new resolve making her way to the elevator.
"Otherwise, you live for the day you will." She whispered and closed the door behind her.
The End
Ending Notes:
1) The title Who is Afraid of Charlotte Richards? comes obviously from Who is Afraid of Virginia Wolf?
Why? If you have seen the movie you will know why I pick this title. If you do not well let me explain you.
A couple makes up a fictional son who the husband "kills" when the wife tells others about her child. It is a story of grievance of infertility, of make-believe and of a loss that is equally real and unreal. How does that relate to this fic's title?
I gave Linda an unbearable burden. I made Charlotte wonder when the loss is going to come when she has already experienced one. I also conclude with what I believe it's the reason of why Father sent Mother away. In the play/movie the husband plays the song Who is Afraid of Virginia Wolf? and the wife replies that she does. She is afraid of her own self. So perhaps Father was afraid of what He could not control, what had more power than him. Perhaps it's too much. Perhaps too feminist. But it matches God in the comics somehow.
Thank you for reading.