I would have died for you, but I never had the luck.
( - The Invention of Love, Tom Stoppard)
It's a crisp autumn's dusk, and the sky is clear. With any luck, a good night for the stars.
Younger, they used to spend hours our here counting them, or at least, that's how Victoria remembers it. They probably talked too, although not as much as you'd think. There seemed to be more stars back then, when they used to try numbering each one... (That's probably just the nostalgia that they're not supposed to feel at their age. Victoria feels it intensely now, intensely, every single missing star like they all fell and died somewhere inside her.)
In particular, Victoria remembers one beautiful night of shooting stars. The night when Jemima had cried from the beauty and then they'd both laughed about that, and kissed and giggled and never mentioned any of it ever again.
She picks her way over sundry bits of rubbish to their old place. One more step and she moves into the dizzying presence of Jemima, who is in a deep poetic despair.
The despair would be because Jemima has just obtained some sort of Relationship with dear dashing Alonzo: handsome and winsome and perfect, it would seem, in every way but some single, desperately important one. And it has to be poetic, Victoria thinks, because that is how Jemima is; those pretty phrases of hers are her deepest sincerity.
"What're you doing, Jem?"
"Thinking."
"About...-?"
Jemima affects to roll her eyes up to the sky and sigh disdainfully. "Ohh no, not about him; I'm sick of him."
Disdain, Victoria thinks, does not suit her. It begins to sound a little like desperation, now and then.
"I don't mean like that," she continues, although Victoria hasn't said anything. "Not necessarily. Just that it's all anyone ever seems to want to talk to me about and I'm sick to death of thinking of it."
"Well, why don't you want to talk about it?"
Which is such a stupid question. Jemima looks down from the sky and Victoria feels shot through the heart with the intensity of her gaze. They can still talk without the words.
"I'm sorry."
She shakes her head. "Is there something wrong with me, Vicky?"
"...Don't ask me." Of all people.
"Hm." Jemima graciously lowers her blazing eyes and smiles. "Well. Come on in, then."
"I thought it was girls who fell in love," says Jemima after a while.
"Yes?"
"Alonzo acts like…" It's a thought she can't quite get hold of. She frowns and starts again. "I think he has this idea… of me… of us.
So… dedicated, and sensible, and I could never… - I don't like it one bit." (It would be disgusting to waste pretty words on something as sordid as this, so she doesn't bother.)
"Mm…"
"Anyway. How's dear Plato these days?"
"Dear Plato! – you needn't say it like that."
"I'll say it however I want to." But she sounds tired, and Vicky lets it pass.
The truth is – the actual truth is – that dear Plato and dear Alonzo will probably never understand. Not in a million lightyears.
We used to play the most fantastic games, remember? Down in the parks. Anywhere. All the time. Adventures and quests, fighting princesses and tragic romance. And, after all… why did all that have to stop?
We swore heart, spirit and soul bonded to each other for all eternity, and whether that was in a game or not, it was as real as anything. Well, we're best friends. Best friends forever, and that's all there is to it. Why won't they just let us be?
"Vick, can I ramble at you for a bit?"
"Go ahead."
"It won't make any sense."
"That's fine, Jem."
"It's only you I do this in front, you know… I'm sorry."
"I'm flattered, seriously."
"Yeah, right."
"Go on. Go on; I'll do your fur while you talk."
"OK. Jem ramble beginning. To begin all dramatically, I… I don't feel like I'm myself anymore – I mean, whatever that was supposed to mean…"
"Go on…"
"You remember at the ball?"
"Yeah…"
"Well – well first of all, I mean it was great. It was so so wonderful and – I just know what I'm about to say will sound so totally selfish I don't even want - But anyway. Something happened to me when I got up to say what I thought – about Grizabella… I just – I just did it. I felt like… like I can't feel anymore. I can't get that back… Something stops me, it's like I think so hard, thinking around in circles and before I know what's happened I've met me again coming the other way, and it's all stupid and - don't pull, Vicky -"
"Sorry."
"And then… there's so much I think I want to say sometimes, I literally fall over my words in the effort to get it all out, but once I do – once I do, half the time I may as well not have bothered, because it's all.. well, sound, and fury, Gus would say, only not even loud enough to make that sort of an impact, not even random enough or stupid enough… And – that's not what I mean, it's – not what I mean to do. I don't dare, is that it? It didn't used to be this way. I didn't mean – do you know what I mean?"
"Mm? No. Sorry."
And that was cold. Very cold. Victoria wonders quite why she said it.
Perhaps it had been an attempt, as happened every now and again, to cut away, a little, at the bonds between them. But such attempts are necessarily futile because why on earth should they be anything so impermanent as tied together? They are kindred spirits, born from the same star, fed by the same flame and dreams of lovers and suicide... A split soul.
Victoria didn't work it out like this until long after she'd sworn her heart away that day in the parks.
...it would explain the pain, maybe.
Jemima - oh it's ever-so-complicated, Jem...
Jemima, you're half my heart.
But she doesn't say any of this.
Then Jem says, It doesn't matter.
But that isn't the point.
Victoria is aware she is setting herself up for the conventional life. She is aware of this, and it is a choice she makes, albeit not entirely freely, every day. Dimly, she is aware that she could have chosen otherwise.
Jemima sees no such choice offered her. For Jemima, it is all too simple and terrible. This is the way the world works, it seems, and she stands utterly alone against it. Yes or no possible or impossible - the situation is impossible, incomprehensible, and it seems there is no escape.
This does not, incidentally, mean she will stop fighting, or rattling the bars of the cage, or generally making a nuisance of herself. There is at least something tragically bright burning in futility.
"I'm... oh, I just feel very tired lately, Jem."
"I know. I'm sorry. Here."
There is something else -
The simple fact that, without Jem, how different life would have been!
Without Jem, she would be settling down without misgivings to something normal, something altogether less heroic and less selfish… Less selfless too… just – less, without you.
"…I know what you mean though," (she doesn't). "It seems like Plato's changed too, a bit..." Victoria sighs deeply and adds: "Well, I suppose all boys are like that, aren't they?"
"Like what? "
"Like - " Victoria nods grimly. "Alright. Sorry, I'm doing it again; I can't help it."
"We're talking like grown-ups," Jemima says flatly, and so they are.
It's all suddenly sad and awkward, and Jemima is inarticulate in despair, and inconsolable, even and especially by her best friend. It all feels wrong - little girls playing dress up - the sort of thing they never wasted time on anyway, they were too busy questing and fighting Macavity and dying beautifully in each others' arms -
Victoria feels her thoughts pressing in.
Thinks: Well, it'll all be alright tomorrow, objectively speaking... Thinks: things will be different, at any rate. Some things. It's the same sky. But a few more stars will have died.
Grown-ups don't seem to have friends, she thinks, disconnected - not in my sense. They - associate, they converse. Cold words. If they're lucky there might be a sordid affair or two to alleviate the hideous ennui of their existence. They have lovers. (Jemima still treats the word as either repulsive or hilarious.) And families, which almost seems worse...
Such a poor exchange.
None of their heroes had children, grew old and stupid and ugly. Young and beautiful and selfless (selfish?), off to save the world and throw your life away at first opportunity...
...You're growing up, Victoria. So you lose a few things along the way, oh well, you're a beautiful young lady now, a lady of the house and don't you look lovely with dear Plato, what a pair you make. What a lovely -
The world tilts, and Vicky holds on grimly.
They still have their Truths. Romantic heroes don't grow old and boring and settle down, they die rather, and so would Jemima. Stars are prettiest when they're falling. And -
Vicky looks at Jem. And -
And yes, oh yes, girls fall in love.
A/N: Another oldie that I just found on a journal, but it was something rather close to my heart and, yes, I still get it. Anyone else?