My siblings watched me worriedly, angrily, sadly when they thought I wasn't looking. When our eyes met, they tried to keep up the same fake front of love. I saw right through it; what did they think I was? A little child? That I couldn't see past this juvenile game of hide and seek?

Lucy would look at me worriedly, searching me for any signs that I actually remembered, since I never discussed Narnia with my siblings. Edmund was sad, for he remembered a time he could tease me and have fun and not deal with this hard, cold, brittle version of his warm sister. Peter was mad. Darling Peter, High King, was mad, after all this time; he accused me of being "childish''. No matter what, I would always be a childish adult in Peter's eyes.

I never told them I never talked about Narnia because it hurt. It hurt to remember a time when I was High Queen, when I rode and romped and danced and everything was simple and good and beautiful.

They only noticed a different boy on my arm every week. They did not notice what to me were glaring similarities: brown hair highlighted with blonde, just like Caspian's, or brown eyes flecked with gray. My last attempts to keep in touch with Narnia.

The parties provided an easy way to forget. The dances were different and the atmosphere was different, but here I reigned as queen once again. Little by little, I started to enjoy the parties for their own sake, not because of Narnia. I had ''suitors'' again, who made me feel desirable, wanted. I could have my pick of men, choosing to reject and favour.

I flirted, and I romped. I shopped and painted my face. I disappointed my siblings but satisfied myself. And I was happy.

Brushing my hair one day, I suddenly put down my brush and looked hard at the mirror. Something indefinable had changed. I felt my features. No, my face was just the same. I looked carefully. Was it the paint? No, that was no it either. Then I looked at my eyes. It was then I realized it.

The yearning, the longing, was gone. The loneliness and fear were gone as well. I was finally whole.

I had finally moved on.

Fin

AN : Please remember that when Susan is banned from Narnia, she is only thirteen years of age. When everyone talks about her in the last book, she is 21. It is very easy to put everything down as a child's game.