A/Ns: So if anyone read Stargazing ages ago, you might remember that I said Lucy would get a chapter too. Well, this is that chapter. Like Stargazing is, this is set within the Souls & Spirits storyline. If you haven't read that, it's not a big deal, since this takes a very, very different route, even though this was more or less how the story was supposed to end as a whole when I first started writing it. But no, I can promise you, S&S will have a very, very happy ending, and no one will die. I promise.
Scenes in italics are 'flashbacks'. Normal text is present day. Hopefully that makes sense.
Anyway. More notes at the end!
"Sometimes I forget that it's been ten years, Cosplayer. It still feels like you were here just yesterday, and we were happy together," he whispered to the slab of stone in front of him. Bickslow could feel his legs beginning to go numb from the cold ground, but he didn't care. He'd been sitting there at her grave for that many years that the cold of the snow-covered ground didn't bother him in the slightest.
Ten years. That was how long he'd been doing that – coming to her grave and remembering that she was really gone, and she had been for ten years.
Ten horrible, miserable, lonely years.
He hadn't been able to completely move on, and he knew that he never would be able to. Everyone else knew that, too. They knew not to see him ever fall in love with anyone else or marry them; he wasn't even going to date anyone, either. He just couldn't. The one person in the entire world that he had loved – and still loved, even to that day – more than anything in the entire universe had died, and when she had, she had taken a part of him with her.
Bickslow just hadn't been the same after Lucy had died, and ten years on, he still wasn't. He was better, happier, but he wasn't the same. He would never be the same man that everyone had known for years, and everyone knew that. Things change when you lose someone you care about so deeply, and that was what had happened to Bickslow ten years earlier, but not a single day had gone by where he hadn't missed her and thought about just how much he wished he could hold her again and tell her how much he loved her.
Ten years without her – his friend. Partner. Wife. Soul mate.
Mother of his child.
Ten years without her, but ten years with his son. Their son.
He could still remember the day that they'd found out they were having him. It had been one of the happiest days of his life, right next to the day they'd finally gotten married. But they'd both been so incredibly happy when they'd found out she was finally pregnant, because they'd stopped trying to make it actually happen.
Before that though, things had been hard. They'd waited until they'd been married a year before trying to start their family, and even when the months went on and it didn't happen, they kept trying. They'd known it would take time, and even when it had started taking longer than they'd thought and expected, they hadn't let it stop them. They'd told themselves that they'd have their chance, they just had to be patient.
But then the months turned into a year, and the year turned into two. Their friends had all tried and succeeded in starting their own families, but they still hadn't.
Bickslow could still remember the day that they'd been told they wouldn't have kids, too. Just sitting in that bland office at the hospital, Lucy beside him in on one of the most uncomfortable chairs in the entire world, and hearing the words that neither had wanted to hear. It had been one of the worst days of Bickslow's life, hearing that it would be a wiser decision to look into other options, but it had been the absolute worst of Lucy's.
All thoughts of having their own family had been put to the back of their minds and sealed away after that. They hadn't wanted to look at other options. They'd talked about it a few times in the months that followed, but they hadn't done anything else other than talk. They'd known that it just wouldn't have been the same unless it was their own child – their flesh and blood – so they'd stopped trying. They'd accepted that they wouldn't have their own family, not for a good while, at least, and that had been it.
But then, it had been nearing their six-year anniversary that it did happen; nearly three years after they'd found out that they wouldn't have kids. They'd known it hadn't actually been impossible to conceive and get Lucy pregnant, just incredibly unlikely and it was just something that might or might not ever happened.
But it did happen, eventually, and it had surprised them both, but they'd been over the moon. They had both been so excited and overjoyed to be finally getting the chance they thought they'd never have to start their own family.
And then things went perfectly, even when the doctor had been worried that it wouldn't go to term and they'd been worried about the same thing, considering everything that they'd been dealing with over the last few years. But things had gone great with Lucy's pregnancy the entire way through, and not once had they taken that for granted.
And then what Bickslow thought would be the best day of his life had finally came, and he'd been so, so happy. But it hadn't been the best day of his life.
It had been the worst day of his entire life, and even then, ten years later, he still remembered that day like it was just the day before, and not three thousand six hundred and fifty.
Bickslow looked down to the newborn in his arms, and all he could do right then was smile. Not a single word came to his mind as he stared down at his just-born son, but he didn't even care. He was just in a perpetual state of bliss and complete happiness, because for so long, he had thought that he wouldn't be able to live through that moment. He would never be able to hold his son – their son – and be so, so proud to be able to call himself a father.
Bickslow had never thought the day would come where he'd be able to hold his own flesh and blood in his arms, but it had, and he was happier than he had ever been in his entire life. Nothing would ever top that day, and he knew that Lucy felt the same way.
Gently, he was passing their newborn baby back to Lucy, and carefully sitting himself down on the edge of the bed to wrap his arms around her. "I love you. So much," he said tenderly, and he softly pressed a kiss to her temple before smiling down at his family with nothing but complete love and adoration. "I'm so proud of you, Lucy. You did great."
"I love you too, Bicks," Lucy whispered. "What do you think we should name him though?"
That was a question Bickslow could answer easily. "What about Jude?"
Lucy felt tears well in her eyes, and she nodded while turning to look up to her husband, and softly pressed her lips to his before whispering, "Jude sounds perfect."
But then all of a sudden, everything was changing, and their perfect, happy moment was ending. Bickslow could hear the alarms sounding from the monitors connected to Lucy going off, and then he could see how panicked and frightened Lucy looked. He didn't want to believe that something was wrong, but when a nurse was pulling him up and away from his wife, and another was taking Jude from Lucy's arms, that was all Bickslow thought.
Something was wrong, and it terrified him because he didn't know what was happening.
"Sir, you need to go and wait back in the waiting room."
"What? No, damn it, I…" Bickslow didn't want to be out in the waiting room. He wanted to be with Lucy, and Jude – his family. He tried to get himself free of one of the nurse's hands and get back to his family, but he couldn't. He just kept getting pushed back towards the door, and all he could do was stare at his terrified wife and watch her get pushed down on the bed. "It's… It's okay, Lucy," he quickly said, doing his best to assure her, and himself, really. "E-Everything will be alright. I p-promise."
But Lucy had a sinking feeling that things wouldn't be okay. Everything had been too good to true, and now, it was all coming crashing down, and she had never been more scared in her entire life. Neither had Bickslow, and she could see that as the nurse pushed him out of the room and the other medical staff in the room, still there being just minutes after Jude was finally born, rushed around her. Nodding quickly before her husband was finally on the opposite side of the door, Lucy tried her best to look to him again, and she stammered, "I-I love you, Bickslow."
Bickslow hadn't the chance to say it back before he was being escorted down the long corridor in the maternity ward and back towards the waiting room where he knew most of the guild had piled in, hearing that Lucy had been going into labour that morning.
He kept telling himself, over and over again that things would be okay; that it was maybe just a common complication that occurred during birth and they were sorting it out. Everything would be fine.
It had to be.
And everyone just watched him pace the waiting room floor, constantly looking towards the doors that remained closed. They knew that something was wrong, and as worried as they were, they knew Bickslow was in far worse a state. He couldn't keep still, constantly running his hands through his hair that still hadn't changed from the way it had been nearly nine years earlier when he'd first started dating Lucy, or nervously picking at the black polish on his nails. But no one could blame him for being that way. If any of them had been forcibly removed from their partners just moments after their child was welcomed into the world and had no idea why they were being told to leave, they'd be the same.
But the time went on, and the more terrified Bickslow became. He wanted the doors to open and he wanted someone to come and give him some form of news, but he was so scared of getting the wrong news. The nurses at the reception didn't know anything, and even if they did, they certainly weren't going to tell the frantic Seith mage, so it left Bickslow desperately hoping that the doors stayed closed. If they opened too soon, then it meant something had gone terribly wrong, and that was the last thing he wanted. If they opened after a while, then maybe they were dealing with whatever it was that was happening to Lucy. They were taking care of things and everything would still be okay.
But the longer he paced, the more he began to realise that it didn't matter whether the doors opened right then or in five hours. The moment his chest began to hurt was when he finally stopped moving, and it was then that he sat on one of the vinyl chairs on the opposite side of the room, away from everyone.
He had never felt something so painful in his entire life, and he'd felt immense pain before. But what Bickslow was feeling then hurt in a different way, and deep down, he seemed to know what it was, but he wasn't ready to accept it. It was a fate he would never be ready to accept. Not then. Definitely not then.
He felt as if a piece of him – his soul – was being ripped away from him. Like he was being torn in two, and like his heart was going to be breaking into a million tiny shards any second now. It was almost as if he could feel each fissure being made, and it scared him when he thought of why.
But even in the waiting room with the overly bright lights and the heating going in every room of the hospital, he was cold, and it was dark. So very, very dark.
He knew. But he wasn't ready to accept it. He wanted to be proved wrong.
When the doors finally opened, he didn't look up from where he had his face in his hands. Not even when he heard his name being called by the doctor standing in front of him. He knew, and everyone else knew.
They'd known when it had happened. But Bickslow had known before anyone, because he'd felt it, just like everyone else had to an extent. He'd felt his heart begin to break and his very soul do the same, and nothing was okay anymore. Nothing would ever be okay, and nothing would ever be the same with the brightest light the world had ever known fading away.
When he finally heard the words that he'd never wanted to hear, the day that he'd thought would be the best of his entire life, became his worst. And nothing, nothing, would ever change that.
If Bickslow had been able to avoid Lucy's funeral, he would have. Oh, he would have. But he hadn't been able to, even if he'd planned on staying away from Magnolia for a few more days…
Or weeks.
Or months.
But ever since that day, Bickslow had felt terrible. Not just because the love of his life and the only woman he would ever love had died far too early, but because he hadn't seen his son since then. He just hadn't been able to stay. He had needed to get away from everything.
He hadn't been able to go home, where things had still been a mess because they'd been rushing about and trying to get everything to get Lucy to the hospital, because he wasn't ready to face anything there. Not all of her things – her books, clothes, favourite blanket, her keys – or the photos they had, and not the way that he knew her pillow would still smell exactly as she did.
But worst of all, Bickslow wasn't ready to be near Jude yet. He had her eyes, and her goddamn nose, and sitting in that hospital, the same one that his wife had died in just hours earlier at the time, and looking down at him had been as painful as knowing that Lucy was gone. And he truly hated himself for it, because he was all that Jude had left, aside from the guild, and he hadn't been anywhere near him. He'd just left. Disappeared to a place where nothing would remind him of Lucy apart from the constant pain.
The day of her funeral though, he came back. Loke had told him when it was, along with letting him know that Jude was okay with Laxus and Mira and that even though they didn't understand what he was going through, it was okay that he wasn't there. But it still hurt, and everything still sucked. And when he actually turned up to her funeral that day, everything just became all the more real.
And Bickslow knew that it was real. That Lucy was gone and it was just him and Jude now, even though he hadn't been anywhere near him and felt like the worst father in the world – something that he felt he didn't even deserve to be called.
But the funeral… Seeing everyone there…
That hurt. A lot. And Bickslow had almost turned around and left, hoping that no one had noticed his presence there, standing at the back and in the shadows, listening to almost everyone in the guild say something about her, because Bickslow hadn't been the only one to lose her that day. He'd lost his wife and soul mate, Jude had lost his mother, but everyone else had lost an incredibly dear friend.
But after a while of listening to so many people talk about her, cherishing the moments they'd shared in all the years Lucy had been a part of Fairy Tail, Bickslow found himself needing to do the same. Before he knew it, he was standing up in front of everyone, and trying to think of what to say.
He just stood there for a little while, staring down at the wooden podium he was leaning on, but no one questioned him for doing that. They all knew that he was going through a lot, losing Lucy, and it didn't surprise any of them to see that he looked like he hadn't even slept for a week. He had tried to clean himself up, and he'd done a reasonable job, wearing the appropriate attire and making it appear like he'd been awake for a week, but there were some things that not even a hot shower could fix.
"I… Don't even know what to say right now," Bickslow finally began with a shaky breath, looking up to everyone standing before him. It was like the entire guild was there, and that didn't surprise him in the slightest. His sisters and their families had turned up, and were standing at the front along with the former Team Natsu, and next to Laxus and Mira who had been unofficially tasked with taking care of Jude until Bickslow was able to. "And truthfully, I don't even want to be here."
If Bickslow could be anywhere else in the world, he would have. It was so hard being there right then and standing in front of everyone that he wouldn't blame if they were judging him for just getting up and leaving so suddenly. But somewhere, Bickslow knew that being there at Lucy's funeral was the right thing. He needed to be there. He needed to be saying goodbye to Lucy, even though it was the one thing he never wanted to be doing. Not again, and not after leaving her all those years ago.
"A-And I… And I keep hoping that I'm going to wake up and none of this is real; that it's all just one horrible nightmare," he continued, and already, his voice was beginning to waver. "But I know it isn't. I know I'm not going to be able to wake up next to h-her again and I know that I'm never going to be able to see her smile, o-or tell her that I love her."
None of it he'd be able to do again. And oh, was that just sinking in. All of those simple, seemingly meaningless things, would never happen again. Her cold feet against his back in the morning, shoving each other out of the way in the bathroom while getting ready together, or even getting to laugh at the way she danced around in a towel or in her underwear after a shower or bath. Each and every little thing that she'd done – or they'd done together – that had made him smile, he wouldn't get to see again. Even the way she always scrunched her nose up when her characters and plots were giving her trouble and things weren't going like she'd thought them to in her head, or hearing her laugh, too. All of it was gone with Lucy, and Bickslow would miss each and every single little thing.
"The last thing I actually told Lucy was that… Was that e-everything would be alright. I-I told her that everything would b-be fine, a-and I…" He stopped himself then and dropped himself to lean on one elbow on the podium, and let the tears falling from his eyes stain the paper that was on there. "S-Shit, sorry, I just…" Bickslow muttered, but even that sentence he couldn't finish.
He couldn't what, though? Right then, there were lots of things he felt like he couldn't do or be.
He felt like he couldn't breathe, almost.
He felt like he couldn't be there, saying goodbye to his love.
He felt like he couldn't do anything anymore. Not without her by his side. He'd barely functioned at all for the past week. He'd sat in a hotel room in a town he'd never once visited with Lucy over all the years they'd been together, having taken countless jobs across Fiore, and done nothing. He'd barely eaten a single thing, instead just drank far too much and enough that he was sure his liver hated him as much as he hated himself. He hadn't changed, or even showered or shaved, or ran a comb through his hair. The last time he'd even slept had been the night before she'd died.
Even the simple things, he couldn't do anymore, and none of that was including his son, either. Bickslow couldn't be a parent without her by his side. He just didn't know how to, because it had been something they were supposed to have figured out together. He was never supposed to be doing it alone, and he wasn't even doing that. He wasn't being a parent at all.
But why was Bickslow apologising? Deep down, he seemed to know that he had no reason to apologise. His wife had just died, moments after bringing their son into the world, and of course he was a fucking wreck. But he still felt guilty as all hell, because he was neglecting his new responsibility.
Straightening back up eventually and bringing his hand across his cheek to wipe his tears away, he took a pained breath and glanced to Mira holding Jude. "When Lucy u-um… When she found out she was having Jude, that was the happiest I'd ever seen her," he said quietly. Bickslow was sure his voice would break if he was any louder, and he was trying his hardest right then to talk about all the best things that had happened in her life. Things that only he really knew about. "A-And she was so excited, too. I still don't even know how she managed to have so much energy the entire time she was pregnant with him."
A quiet chuckled moved across the large group clad in back as they all thought back to the time the thirty-four weeks pregnant blonde had run around the guild, chasing Natsu while threatening to set him on fire and trying to grab Happy's tail, and even Bickslow smiled for the shortest of seconds. But it was mostly just because he was remembering just how happy she really was the entire time. Not a single day had gone by over those nine months where he hadn't seen a smile on her face.
"But we never thought we'd have Jude," Bickslow went on, and the sombre mood was quickly returning. "It was never about us just waiting to have kids. It was that we couldn't, b-because Lucy wouldn't be able to get pregnant, but then she did, and i-it totally surprised us. But I… But I know that that day was one of Lucy's favourites, and it's one of mine, too."
And Bickslow did his best not to break down after that, because he knew he would pretty shortly. He didn't know what he was supposed to be saying, because he'd never been expected to say anything at a funeral before. But for Lucy's, he was. So he just told them about the best moments, because that was the way he was supposed to be remembering her. It was supposed to be a farewell, and each time he relived each silly moment they'd had together that would always be in their list of favourites, he found himself smiling for just a little bit, and that was something Bickslow had never thought he would do again.
Remembering each moment had him smiling, because their years together had been full of those moments, and Bickslow's only wish was that there'd been more.
But then Bickslow couldn't do it anymore. He couldn't keep talking about all of the cherished memories, knowing that they were all he had left with Lucy really being gone. He didn't even care how he looked to anyone else there, because Bickslow knew that he felt a whole lot worse than he actually looked. Bickslow was sure he was supposed to say some sort of closing statement about how she was gone but she'd never be forgotten, but he hadn't been able to. Not when the only thing that came to mind was how the last thing she did was bring the most precious person to him on the planet into the world – one that reminded Bickslow so much of Lucy.
All he'd been able to do was choke out a few words about how he missed her more than anything and how he wished that she was still there, and then he was leaving. He couldn't stay. He hadn't wanted to be there in the first place, because it was still too soon to be back for him. So when he was walking away, shoulders shaking as his body became overcome with his sobs right before he was stepping up onto the five totems and disappearing somewhere far away, no one questioned it.
No one questioned how Bickslow spent most of his time sitting up in the rafters of the guild later that afternoon and night either. Everyone – both Fairy Tail members and those of other guilds – had gathered in the guild after the funeral, and for the first time since Master Makarov's death just a few years earlier, it was quiet. That was the way it had been once the news of Lucy's death had spread to those that hadn't been at the hospital that day, because everyone seemed to still be trying to cope with the loss.
But when Bickslow had eventually shown up, surprising everyone, they'd all done their best to welcome him, because even without Lucy, Fairy Tail was still his home and his other family, and they were all there for him. He'd been quieter then, only thanking each person who offered him their condolences. After that, he'd sat himself up in the rafters and just watched everyone from afar. Mostly, he just watched Jude, because even if he wasn't quite ready to be the person he needed to be, Jude was still his son and the only other person he really had left of his family.
From his sisters who had come back to the guild with everyone else, getting to know the nephew that they'd been so excited to meet, to Layla, Damian, and Jasper admiring their new baby cousin. From Natsu, Gray, and Erza trying not to hold him for too long, lest they be reminded of Lucy, just like Bickslow was, to Laxus, Freed, and Evergreen constantly looking up to Bickslow and no doubt wondering just when he was going to be coming down.
It even hurt being the guild, because so many of his fondest memories had been in that same building, and part of him was having a hard time trying to accept that he would never be able to walk in and see that blonde hair anywhere, or hear her bubbly laugh over everything. That was gone, just like she was.
When it was getting late, and when he hadn't moved from his spot, Bickslow vaguely registered one of the babies mentioning something about Mira and Laxus getting ready to leave to take Jude back to their home since they'd been out all afternoon, after all, and a newborn needed to be kept inside and taken proper care of. Hearing that though, Bickslow found himself moving and stepping back down on the totems as they lined up, and flying back down to the floor of the guild. He wasn't really quite sure what he was doing as he walked up to Laxus and Mira, with Mira gently taking Jude from Saskia, and Laxus helping his four-year-old daughter put on her coat.
Bickslow knew he wasn't ready to look after Jude like he was supposed to be doing, but he wanted to be. Soon, hopefully, but eventually at the very least. His closest friends had been the ones looking after his one-week-old son, and watching them from up in the rafters, Bickslow had only found himself almost wishing that he'd been down there and holding him.
So when he looked down to Jude in Mira's arms, that was what Bickslow wanted to do. It hurt like hell seeing him, but he was his son for crying out loud, and he wasn't going to get anywhere if he kept avoiding the reality that Jude would always be his son, and Lucy would always be his mother.
Even without saying anything, Mira seemed to know what Bickslow wanted. Or was it what he needed? Bickslow didn't know himself, but he became just that little bit more sure of himself when he was holding his newborn son again. And it did hurt, like he'd expected, and he didn't even care about the tear that slid down his cheek from the corner of one eye. He needed to take a step forward, because as long as he had Jude, he wasn't able to just spend his time alone. He had his son to take care of, and Bickslow knew he was just going to have to find a way to deal with all of the pain and hurt that would come from raising him alone.
But with the guild, he'd be able to. He knew that, even right then.
"Can I… Can I take him?" he whispered, and he didn't look up to see Mira nod with a soft smile on her lips. All he felt was a hand on his shoulder and the sound of footsteps behind him, and then he was walking home with two of his closest friends and their two children, and his newborn son in his arms.
He wasn't quite ready to go home, but that was where he needed to be. It was where Jude needed to be.
It had taken Bickslow a long time to be able to be the person he needed to be to Jude after he'd returned to Magnolia. For months, Bickslow had visited Lucy's grave every single day. The first few weeks alone had been more or less like the first week after her death. He hadn't done much of anything, and if it hadn't been for his friends and his family coming to visit him each and every single day, or Lucy's still master-less spirits coming every now and then, Bickslow wouldn't have been where he was now, ten years later.
For the first few weeks after her death, Bickslow still hadn't really looked after Jude himself. Mira and Laxus had done a lot of it still, along with Freed and Evergreen too. And if Bickslow wasn't moping around the house that felt too empty and too cold, he was at her grave. Just sitting on the cold ground and staring at the stone in front of him. Day in and day out, that's where Bickslow had been.
For the first few months, Bickslow barely slept. He'd never been very good at sleeping without Lucy beside him, and if he'd thought the year away from her had been hard, that had been so much harder. If he was up in the middle of the night, which he was every night, he was most likely sitting in front of her tombstone, and more often than not, he'd had Jude with him. Everyone who had been helping him since he'd started to try his best to be the father he needed to be to his son had only been there during the day. Nights, Bickslow was mostly alone, but after a while, that was okay. He had begun to slowly move on. It still hurt though, because even to that day, every time he looked down to Jude, he saw Lucy.
Eventually though, as time went on, Bickslow had gotten used to the way life had become. He still had his moments, even then, where he'd go to say something to Lucy next to him, and realise that she wasn't there. But what could he say? Old habits just die hard. He'd adapted and adjusted to everything though, and with each day, the pain faded.
By the time Jude was a year old, Bickslow wasn't visiting her grave every day, or multiple times a day as he had done for a long time. By that time, it was a few times a week, but when Jude's first birthday did finally come around, Bickslow was there at Lucy's grave. He'd felt like he'd been at war with himself then, because he'd been so happy and almost proud of himself, because he'd gotten the chance to watch and help his son grow that year. But he'd been miserable, too, because it had been a year without Lucy, and he'd been supposed to be celebrating that day with her, not doing so alone and crying at her grave.
But it had been just the first year of so many more to come, and Bickslow had accepted that by then. That hadn't made it any easier though.
The weeks turned to months though, and the months turned to years. As time went on, things got easier, and Bickslow became happier, and he wasn't visiting her every few days. Once a day turned to once a week, and once a week turned to once a fortnight, and then it was once a month, and it was always the same date.
And so there he was, ten years later, sitting on the cold snow-covered ground on the day that marked ten years without her.
Ten horrible, miserable, lonely years.
Ten years that Bickslow had thought he would never smile again in, or find some semblance of happiness in, either. But he had. Ten years where he'd gotten the chance to raise the child that they had both thought they'd never have. Where he'd gotten the chance to see him smile, hear him laugh, and watch him play. He'd gotten the chance to watch their son already grow into an amazingly perfect, gifted young boy.
And he still saw Lucy whenever he looked at Jude, but it didn't make Bickslow cry anymore. He smiled whenever he looked at Jude, and he knew that Lucy would've been too, if she'd been there. She'd be as proud of him as he was, and she'd love him as much as he did.
But ten years on, it still felt like it was just yesterday to Bickslow, and Bickslow was still coming to terms with the fact that maybe it would always feel like that. Maybe it would still always feel like a bit of a dream and that none of it was real; that he'd open his eyes and see Lucy right there next to him and smiling at him.
But Bickslow knew it wasn't. She was gone, but not forgotten. She may have died that day, ten years earlier, and a part of Bickslow had died with her, but part of her would live on for a long time. As long as Jude was living, a part of Lucy would be, too, and that was what made Bickslow happy that day, considering all things.
He missed Lucy more than he could put into words, and he told her that each time he visited her, along with all the crazy and the mundane things that had happened in their lives that month, and he still loved her as much as he had the last time he'd seen her, but he was happy. He was happy when ten years earlier, he hadn't thought he ever would be again, and it was all because of Jude, and the guild and everyone else they loved.
Looking up to the snow that was slowly and delicately falling to ground, Bickslow sighed and watched as his breath turned to fog in the cold air. "I still wish you were here though," Bickslow said softly. "That we were an actual family and we were all together. Things would be so much better if you were here with us, Lucy. Did I tell you before that Jude has a crush though?"
"Daaad!"
He turned to the ten-year-old boy beside him on the snow-covered ground and stuck his tongue at him, and tried his best not to laugh too hard at the way his nose scrunched up just like Lucy's had. "What? You do. Everyone knows you have a crush on her, kid. It's adorable though, don't worry," Bickslow said, and he lifted a hand to ruffle up his dark blue hair. "I'm sure your mother wouldn't tease you like I do though. She'd just get mad at me for teasing you about it, actually."
"Good," Jude muttered.
"Oh, come 'ere," Bickslow laughed quickly, and quickly, he was pulling the boy into his side to tightly hug him. "I'll quit teasing you about her. I'll even teach you how to ask her out when we go to the guild."
Jude looked up with hopeful eyes and bright smile then. "Really?" he asked excitedly, and Bickslow nodded. "Oh! Can we go to the guild now? Please, Dad!"
"I suppose so," Bickslow sighed with a roll of his eyes. Jude picked himself up off the ground quickly and began dusting the snow from the bottom of his jacket and his pants, and Bickslow slowly followed suit.
Before turning and leaving his father to say goodbye, Jude smiled and looked down to the tombstone in front of him with the fresh bouquet of fairy primrose flowers. "Bye, Mum," he whispered, and Bickslow closed his eyes as one single tear rolled down. Though he didn't know her, he wished he did. He had heard so many things about her and learned what she was like over the years that he almost felt like he did know her. It wasn't the same as actually knowing her though, and that was what Jude wished he knew what was like.
But he'd gone his entire life without her, and even if he'd imagined what things would be like with the blonde in their house, he knew he didn't need it. He had Bickslow, his father, and the guild, too. Bickslow was always there for him, and ever since Jude could remember, that was how it had always been for him.
Bickslow still wished Jude had been able to know Lucy like he had, too, but even though his son knew exactly what had happened and how his mother had died, he was still the bright young boy he loved that reminded him so much of Lucy. He has happy, and that made Bickslow damn happy too. But he could be happier. If Lucy was there, he would be happier, and he had a feeling Jude would be, too.
But she wasn't, and it had been ten years. Three thousand six hundred and fifty days had gone by, and he'd survived each and every single one of them. "Well, I guess I better go take Jude to the guild and teach him how to pick up girls… God, I am such a great parent. He probably would've ended up slightly better if you'd been here to steer him straight," Bickslow chuckled as he looked down to her tombstone with a sad smile. "He's still great though, and I really hope that wherever you are now, you can see that. I know you'd be proud of him if you could see him now. He's not as tiny as he was when he was born. He's ten. Ten! Can you believe it? I sure can't."
With a glance over his shoulder and to the boy standing by a garden covered in snowflakes, Bickslow smiled again. Ten years. He still really couldn't believe it sometimes, and for so many reasons. But even if that day was still the worst of his life, it was also still one of his happiest.
Because on that same day, someone who had become his reason to smile and even live had been born, and that same boy had become the light that shone in the darkness. Jude was the reason Bickslow was smiling that day, because even when Lucy was gone, a part of her was still there within him, and that, Bickslow loved.
A/Ns: The ending didn't quite end up like I'd originally planned for this story, but... I think it's okay. I wanted a bit of a happy ending (I needed one, too) since I had my ass in tears when writing most of this.
For the most part though, this story didn't turn out like I was expecting, either. I honestly thought it would be shorter, but, that didn't happen. I also don't think it was quite as emotional in afterthought as I wanted it to be, but then again, I guess that's a good thing. But if it makes any of you depressed, then my job here is done!
For the record though, Bix and Lucy will not be having a kid called Jude in the actual S&S storyline. That doesn't really count as a spoiler, I don't think, so whatever. Also, she never miscarried in this version of the story either. They still broke up, but she was never pregnant before then.
And again, if you haven't read S&S, it doesn't matter. This works as a standalone story.
I do hope you liked it (sort of) though! I'd love to see what you guys thought of this one.
Until next time.
- April