A/N: Hey everyone, I know it's been a hot minute since I last updated this story. Hehe. Sorry bout that. Anyway, I know this chapter is short, but I have big plans for the next one, so make sure to stick around! Please leave a review- I appreciate both your enjoyment and constructive criticism!
Chapter 3: Escape
Wisps of gentle snow had already begun to fall in late November, fluttering down, down, down to the ground like mild thoughts that come and go. Susan watched as the white glimmers oscillated gently to the ground, her breath staining the frosty window of her chilly attic room. She marvelled as the curious white powder dusted spires and pillars of London's skyline like icing sugar, kissing the large, dark, magnificent shape of St. Paul's that nestled amongst cluttered roofs and blackened chimney pots. The fading sunlight caused the sky to darken to an impressive dark ultramarine, framing the stark brightness of the snow against the dreary background. The stillness of the scene compared to the frenzied motion of the snowfall had put her in an odd sort of mood.
She glanced down at the arithmetic book settled between her knees. Her child-abiding maths professor had decided to set them a thirty-page homework assignment, and while Susan was usually efficient when it came to the scientific studies- her irrationally logical brain wasn't completely useless- there was something about the atmosphere that felt… a little wrong. A little out of place.
Maybe it was the cold draft of air that was sneaking through the gap in her window. Maybe it was the odd combination of half-light and half-dark that seemed to suspend the sky in eternal sunset. Maybe it was the quietness downstairs, or the silence and stillness of the house.
The house felt empty without her siblings. Lucy and Edmund were at their cousin's, and Peter was at his Scout's camp down on Brownsea Island, so she had been enjoying- or trying to enjoy- the rare tranquillity of the house's hushed ambience. But it was rather lonely, and although she loved Nonna dearly, the poor woman was half-deaf with age and thus provided little conversation.
Anyway, whatever it was, it was beginning to make her spine shiver, and she pulled the warm patchwork quilt her Nonna had knitted for her closer around her shoulders.
"Susan?" a familiar voice called up the stairs suddenly, brisk and assertive.
"Yes, mama?" she sighed back, snapping the arithmetic book closed with a resounding thud.
"Darling, come downstairs and help prepare supper please, your father and I need to pack."
"Ugh," Susan grumbled to herself, throwing the quilt off and exposing her legs to the cold air. "Coming."
Her parents were taking a celebratory 'yay-you-didn't-die-in-the-war' vacation to America, even though the war had ended two years ago. Or, at least, that's what Susan called it. Her father claimed it was a 'well-deserved break' and a 'time for them to cherish each other and be grateful that they could be together, when others sadly could not'.
Except, none of the children were invited.
So… that was that.
It felt a bit rushed, Susan thought. A bit jarring and odd and… sudden. And she couldn't really quite believe her parents were going away on vacation without them- their children. As if- as if they perhaps had another reason for making such a rushed and hasty excursion.
As she chopped the vegetables, her mind wandered to places she tried to forbid it from going. Pictures of a familiar station, with rolling green fields that seemed to blur into the next, then an old house that belonged to a wise old man, and a dusty room with an even dustier cupboard… and then a cold, snow-filled forest with a stark black lampole lighting the way, or a fawn with red scarf, or a dark night sky that sparkled like a black, velvety abyss, sprinkled with splashes of stars, or a magical cove with water so smooth it appeared to be glass…
A sharp, hot slice of pain seared her middle finger. She looked down hastily to see blood oozing out of the cut in her finger, both the carrots and the knife stained with the scarlet fluid.
Cursing, she down the chopping board and stuck her finger in her mouth, storming out of the room to the medical cabinet in the hall. To her surprise, her mother was there also, rifling through what looked like several plastic jars of pills.
"Mama?" Susan asked, raising an eyebrow. Her mother slammed the door to the cabinet shut, before turning around hastily. "What are you doing?"
"Nothing, darling, nothing," her mother muttered, seeming not to notice Susan's bloody finger. Just then, her father coughed upstairs, and they both turned their heads towards the weak sound.
"Helen?" he called, before another bout of frame-shaking coughs seized his voice.
"Coming, Chris," her mother replied, tucking the pills into her apron so that she could carry a sweating water jug in one hand.
"What's going on?" Susan demanded, "Is Dad okay?"
"Yes, he's fine," her mother replied, "pass me those towels."
But as she wrapped the bandage around her cut finger, Susan heard her father's coughs and her mother's gentle soothings, and she knew that he wasn't.
Supper was a miserable affair.
Her father had not been able to come down, so Nonna had sent him up a bowl of the vegetable broth they had broiled earlier. Her mother's face was pale, sallow and anxious as the three women sat around the table, eating in silence, pushing her food around the dish nervously as if she was ready to jump out of her seat to rush to her husband's aid.
"Mama," Susan rallied herself, unable to bear the silence. "Why are you really going to America?"
Her mother's face finally flickered to her in surprise, setting her spoon down carefully.
"We told you, Sue, my darling- we need to get away from all the… from everything. Just for a while. A little break, a time to rest after the hard work-"
"No, mama," Susan's face was sad. "You can tell me, really. I know papa's not well. I know- I know he's worse than you're telling me. You wouldn't go away for fun if he were that ill."
Her mother was quiet for a long, long moment. Nonna, oblivious to the conversation around her, stared blankly at the wall, humming a small tune to herself. At least, Susan thought, the silence was filled with the murmuring sound.
"There's a specialist," her mother spoke at last, her knuckles white as she clutched her utensil, "in America. A clinic. We don't know- I don't know- what's wrong with your father. We have tried all the doctors in this town, GPs, family practitioners… we must now try elsewhere."
Susan's heart sank. How bad was it if her parents were paying all the war to go to America?
As if reading her face, Helen took her daughter's hand gently. "Forgive me, my love, for not telling you. I didn't want to worry you all, because… because it is bad. And everyone in the medical industry has been so busy after the war…"
"It's…" It's alright, she had been about to say. But it wasn't. It wasn't alright. Her mother, sensing her hesitation, withdrew her hand from Susan's and stroked her cheek tenderly.
"I know," Helen murmured, "I know. It's not okay. But you know what… I've a feeling we are going to make it. We are going to be perfectly fine. Yes?"
Susan nodded mutely. She could still feel waves of horror pounding down her spine, and she shuddered in dread.
"Can I ask something of you?" her mother said, brushing back a lock of dark hair from her daughter's face.
"What is it?" Susan asked, suddenly losing her appetite.
"Please… please don't tell the others about this," Helen blurted, breathlessly. "Don't tell your siblings. I don't… we don't want to spoil their holiday with worry. Papa and I will be fine- just, you won't tell them, darling? Promise me?"
"I…" Susan held her breath. It was hard not to confide in her siblings. They had grown so much closer since… since Narnia.
"Okay," she sighed at last, "I won't. Promise."
Her mother smiled sadly at her. "I know it's hard, my love. But it's best for everyone."
As Susan opened her mouth to reply, her father's coughs disrupted the brief pause of peace, followed by a creak of the bed as the ceiling shook slightly above them. Her mother bolted out of her chair, out the room, and disappeared upstairs.
Outside, the street lights lit up the cobblestones, letting golden light bleed through the cracks of water-logged grout, like golden rivulets of blood. The curled shadow of the ash tree at the end of their garden cast a peculiar shaped shadow across the lawn.
She needed to relieve something. Some emotion. Anxiety, for her father. Reproach at her mother, from not telling her. For asking her to keep it a secret from the others. Loneliness, from being away from her siblings for too long. Anger, at the whole situation.
She needed to shoot.
Thwack. The sound of the arrow burying its head into the gnarled tree trunk usually satisfied Susan, its red fletchings stark and bright against the wintery coolness of the air.
Whenever she was lonely, or worried, or bored, she found that practising her aim on the gnarled ash tree at the end of their garden always helped to relieve stress. She was all three of those emotions currently, and yet, none of the fourteen arrows buried deep into the bark's marred surface- all expertly placed within inches of each other- had offered any sort of emotional release.
She growled, strolling to the end of the garden and yanking them out viciously. Enough.
Striding back into the house, she flinched as her father coughed, heaving and hurling upstairs. She couldn't bear to be in this house a moment longer, listening to her father cough and cough and cough, a constant reminder of the price all soldiers had paid in that bloody war.
She needed to get out.
Not bothering calling her mother and informing her she was going out- Susan snatched up her purse, threw on a thick jersey and over jacket, and stormed out the house, out into the night.
Her footprints were covered by the swiftly falling snow, and the lampoles burnt brightly in the distance, towards the bubble and chatter of the market square.
Perhaps there she might find some relief.