Letting Go
Summary: AU/Future fic (not related to The Telling). Sydney and Vaughn's sister meet on Vaughn's grave. Angsty thing.
Spoilers: The Confession; Phase One
Disclaimer: No Vaughns were harmed during the writing of that fic. The characters and situation belong to JJA, and those you don't recognize belong to me =)
A/N: Though this fic is part of a series, you do not need to have read the previous installments to understand it. You only need to know that Emilie is Vaughn's older sister. If you ever feel like reading the two previous works, the links are in my profile =)
A big hug to AME, Jen, charmedgal005, purpleblue, aaa and Nattie700 for your kind words and your support. Thanks a lot! This fic here is dedicated to you guys.
Thanks again.
She had bought white roses. She didn't really know why she had chosen those, and did not want to think about it. She only knew the bunch of flowers had made her think of Michael. Probably something to do with some long forgotten childhood memory.
There was already someone kneeling by his grave. A woman with long brown hair and dark clothes. Something in her posture stiffened when she heard Emilie's footsteps.
"You are Sydney, aren't you?"
"And you are Michael's sister."
Emilie took a tentative step forward, and Sydney made some room for her. But she did not stand up, she did not look up. Her eyes where fixed on the white wooden cross.
Emilie put the flowers on Michael's grave, but she did not kneel down. She stood praying silently, next to the woman she knew nothing about.
'Je vous salue Marie, pleine de grâce…'
Madame Gérard's garden, in Normandy. That was what the roses had reminded her of. One summer, when Michael was nine, he and his friends had gone and thrown eggs at the house of their old school teacher. Because the old hag had no right to make Paul repeat his year, they had said. The boys had had to clean up the whole mess they had made in the garden, and Emilie had stayed there to keep an eye on their progress. A few years later, Michael had admitted that they had also opened several eggs into Mme Gérard's mail-box. She was almost certain that they had never cleaned up the mailbox.
'… Le Seigneur est avec vous. Vous êtes bénie entre toutes les femmes…'She stole a glance at the woman. Sydney. Wondering what Michael had meant to her. If it had been love, or a crush, or merely a sex thing.
'… et Jésus, le fruit de vos entrailles, est béni.'
She remembered seeing another stranger on this grave. You should have made a baby with her, Michael. It was probably more than just sex.
'Sainte Marie, mère de Dieu, priez pour nous, pauvres pécheurs, maintenant, et à l'heure de notre mort, Amen.'
"He never mentioned he had met someone, you know?" Emilie said eventually.
Sydney chuckled sadly and looked away. "No, he didn't." Emilie observed her openly for a while, and the woman elaborated. "He wasn't supposed to when we met."
"And after that?"
A long silence. "It's complicated." Sydney wouldn't meet her eyes.
"I would tell you that I understand, but the truth is, I don't." Emilie took a deep, shaky breath. "I hate the CIA," she whispered.
Sydney put her face between her hands. Emilie saw her breathe in deeply a few times, then raise her head and stare at the cross again. "What was he like, as a child?"
Emilie sat down cross-legged on the grass, and stared off into the distance. A mischievous grin appeared on her face. "He was a pain. Too full of life for the people around him. He was always active, you know? Running everywhere, playing tricks on everyone, and he always said what was on his mind." Emilie's face sobered. "Then, my father died."
She saw Sydney flinch from the corner of her eye. She sent her an interrogative look, but received no answer. She decided to let go and talk again. But his time, she kept her eyes on Sydney.
"After that, he was… different. More silent, more reserved. And he only played tricks on the people he didn't like, 'when they deserved it'." She thought about Madame Gérard's garden again. "Of course, his notions of what was good and what was bad were not always very accurate at the time…"
Sydney smiled. "And you were the evil, unfair big sister, weren't you?"
Emilie grinned. "I was his sitter when our mother was working, so obviously, I was the enemy. Do you have any siblings?"
Sydney's eyes went from the cross to her hands. She shook her head slowly.
A silence.
"Do you know how he died?"
For a long while, Emilie thought Sydney would leave without answering. The woman slowly put her hands over her mouth and started rocking back and forth slightly. "You don't want me to answer that question."
Emilie put her hand on Sydney's shoulder, trying to make her brother's lover look up at her. "Sydney, please. I need to know." She unconsciously tightened her grip on the other woman's shoulder. "Please."
"You don't need to hear that. I'm sorry."
Emilie released her abruptly and stood up. "That's what they said when my father died, you know? And they justified the closed casket by saying we didn't need to see." She started pacing behind Sydney. She felt it again –- this strange impulse she had had ever since she had been told the details of her brother's death were classified. This desperate need to know –- granted, she had no idea whether hearing what had happened would really soothe her mind, but it was worth a try. She needed something that would make her feel close to Michael again. She needed something that would prove her he was not completely a stranger to her.
That was the feeling she wished she could convey to Sydney –- her brother's lover. Another part of his life he had not bothered to share with her. There was a time when she knew everything about him. His brutal death had made her realize just how much she missed those days.
"Do you know what it feels like, when you lose someone you've loved with all your heart, and suddenly you realize you didn't know them at all?" She paused in front of the cross. "I spent so much time looking after him, and when Dad died, it was as if I had to be his second parent now. But he's gone away from me. From Maman, from…" She breathed in deeply. "I feel like I didn't know him anymore. I went to his apartment, and it was the place of a stranger. I didn't even recognize the people on his pictures…" Her voice broke. She stopped pacing and went to kneel down right in front of Sydney. "I need to feel close to him again. I need to know him again. Please…" She tried to catch Sydney's eyes, but found she was once more avoiding her gaze. She looked away to the sun.
Then Sydney started talking.
"He was… one of the kindest people I have ever known. Forgiving. Brave. Understanding. Loyal."
Emilie held back a choke.
"He could be quite stubborn and arrogant too…" Sydney paused and glanced at Emilie. "But you knew all that already, didn't you?"
Michael's sister blinked and tears rolled down her cheeks.
"You did know him. What he did for a living, the details of his job… It didn't matter." She took a deep breath. "And the way he died is irrelevant."
Emilie shook her head sadly. "My little brother was all that. The man with the gun in his night stand drawer…" She saw Sydney move from the corner of her eye.
"I have been a spy for almost ten years. When I come back home, I don't want to talk about what I've done or who was killed. So I don't. It doesn't mean I am less myself at home than at work. I'd even say it's the other way around."
Emilie felt a surge of anger go through her. "And it is those ten years as a spy that taught you how to stay cool-headed and composed in front of your boyfriend's grave?"
Sydney froze. Emilie would feel sorry for her and apologize, but she needed to let out her anger on someone. Her gaze caught once again the white roses, their significance suddenly obvious to her.
The story of the eggs in the mailbox was the first thing Michael had ever hidden from her.
"He lived a life of lies," she said in a hoarse voice.
"Not all the time," Sydney answered in a weak, hesitant voice.
"He lied to his family all the time," was the flat answer.
Sydney closed her eyes. "He wanted to protect you…"
"From what?"
Silence.
"And what would he want to protect us from by not telling us he had a girlfriend, exactly? Your clothes were at his place! You can't tell me you'd just started dating!" The despair was back. She didn't know how to deal with despair. After a moment, Sydney started talking slowly.
"You asked me if I knew what it felt like to lose someone you've loved and then realize you didn't know a true thing about them. I do." She paused. "I thought my mother died when I was six. I loved her so much, and I kept loving her. I wanted to become a literature teacher, just because she had been one." Sydney looked at Emilie for the first time. "It was all a lie. All a part of her cover. My mother was a spy for the KGB. She came to the United States during the Cold War to spy on my father and murder CIA agents."
Emilie's eyes widened in shock and suspicion.
"And about two years ago, we found out she was still alive."
Emilie tried to read the brown eyes in front of her, but found she was too shocked to do so. "Did she… Did your mother kill Michael?"
Sydney bit her lip. "No. Not Michael."
Not Michael?
The Cold War.
Emilie closed her eyes. "She killed my father, then."
"Yes."
Emilie remained silent for a long time. "It makes sense." It explained Sydney's hesitation to talk about her family. But above all, it explained why Michael had not said anything about her. "Did he forgive you?"
Sydney looked surprised. "We already knew each other when… we found out. He said it was not my fault. I wasn't her."
"You 'knew' each other?"
Sydney smiled sadly. "As co-workers. We worked together. We were just friends then."
Emilie's emotions were an angry whirl she did not want to explore. She wasn't sure she wanted to be angry anymore, anyway. "Okay," she said instead.
"Okay?" Sydney looked confused.
"Okay."
The two women stared into each other's eyes, making a connection of some sort.
This connection with Sydney made her feel like Michael was not a stranger anymore. She understood a new piece of him now.
Sydney smiled slowly, and Emilie answered. They both stood up.
"If you want… some of the things at his place…"
Sydney sighed and closed her eyes. "I can't. Not yet." She opened her eyes. "Thank you."
Emilie observed her for a while and nodded. She sent one last glance to the grave, touched the wooden cross briefly in farewell, and walked away.
FIN-