Firstly a HUGE apology for the delay in writing this epilogue. I've been putting it off for a bit because I wanted it to be absolutely perfect. And I think I've done it justice here, anyway. This is an absolute beast of a chapter, pushing 7000 words so it's essentially double my usual word limit. But I thought you guys wouldn't mind? Anyway, I hope it lives up to expectations and you think it was worth the wait. Please feel free to drop me a line and tell me what you thought of the chapter/story.
Another reminder, if you guys wanna read awesome action!Bubbline go check out DiddlyPanda's story The Ties That Bind Us. It has everything, go read it!
Massive hugs, love and kisses to the eternally wonderful radcoolbro7 without whom this fic would not exist. Seriously, send them so much love for being a constant inspiration
Content Warning: Extreme fluffiness, some medical sadness/potentially implied sad endings for one character, feels, smooches.
Another beautiful day in the garden was drawing to its close and two girls were basking together in the golden glow before sunset after another day of planting, weeding and tending to their work. It was hard not to feel relaxed by the atmosphere of absolute calm around the girl with very long dark hair and dusky skin reclining peacefully in the lap of a fair skinned girl with light red waves tumbling past her shoulders. One pale hand was wound protectively into dark hair and the other was holding a book out for both of them to look at, though the darker girl was spending more time being enthralled by the tiny expressions that flitted across her girlfriend's face as she read.
"Do you think bees fall in love?" she sighed into the silence that rolled deep around them.
"No? I mean, they have a completely different social structure than people do. They live in a hive, they only have one queen who produces offspring and all the workers are her sisters or daughters. And I don't think they have the kind of higher-processing abilities required to establish or maintain a complex pair-bond. They do have fascinating chemical memory though and did you know they communicate the location of food resources to the rest of the hive by dancing? It's so... who'd have ever imagined that bees could dance? But they do, they vibrate their bodies and sorta twitch in different directions and the amount of time they vibrate for and other subtle things about the dance tell the other bees exactly how far away the food is and loads of other information too. Bees are so amazing. But no, I don't think they fall in love. Unless perhaps they find the perfect flower? But that'd be like a person falling in love with the perfect sandwich. So probably not."
"Awesome. But why is the sky blue?"
"Rayleigh scattering. It's the way the particles of air in the atmosphere separate out visible light by different wavelengths and scatter them across the sky. Blue is scattered and refracted more strongly because it's a shorter wavelength than reds and yellows. Because the sun's at a different angle in the sky and the light hits the atmosphere differently it looks red and orange at sunset."
The dark haired girl paused, hazel-green eyes meeting warm blue ones and a teasing smile playing around full lips. Nothing in the world was as good as listening to the girl she loved to absolute distraction talk about her passion for science and knowledge.
"Ok? And why is water a liquid at room temperature even though H2O is an absolutely tiny compound?"
"Because of Van Der Waals forces of weak attraction between the slight positive and negative charge at different ends of the water molecules in a large group. Honestly, Marcy, you know this stuff. Our exam is next week, I know you know about Van Der Waals forces because I sit next to you in chemistry and I make you take notes."
Marceline propped herself up on her elbows and grinned at her girlfriend, squinting past the late-afternoon sun that was slanting into her eyes through the screens of honeysuckle they'd put up around the seating area. For a moment she was distracted by watching the progress of one of their honeybees bumbling along on its way back to the hive.
"I just like hearing you talk. I don't think I'll ever get sick of it, I could listen to you talking for hours." Marcy replied quietly after a long moment of very comfortable silence.
Bubblegum smiled down at her and placed her book to one side, carefully sliding a marker in so she didn't lose her place. It was hard to concentrate when Marcy was sprawled across her lap being utterly adorable anyway and after a second's hesitation she gave in and let her hand cup the other girl's cheek, feeling the smooth warm curve of her face like a delicate velvet against her palm. Sometimes she was still amazed that she could reach out and touch the other girl like that whenever she wanted, it felt like reaching into a beautiful painting to touch an otherworldly beauty like an angel or something.
"I actually like talking now when it's with you. And you know it's your fault, right? If you hadn't turned up at the hospital looking equal parts lost and beautiful and so broken I would never have spoken a word to anyone. I'd probably still be there." Bubblegum replied fondly as she slid a hand through Marcy's sleek, heavy hair again in the exact same way she'd done thousands of times over the last twelve months.
Her girlfriend sighed happily and rested her head back down in Bubblegum's lap, staring up at nothing in particular in the cloudless blue sky above them for a moment before letting her eyes slide closed.
"This is the nicest anniversary I've ever had." she murmured happily.
"It's our only anniversary so far." the redhead pointed out.
"So? It's still the very best. Although you can try to beat it next year if you want." Marcy replied with a shrug.
She grinned in the direction of Bubblegum's voice but didn't open her eyes again, too relaxed and happy in the evening sunshine with one of the people she loved most in the whole world. That's why she missed the arrival of one of the other people she loved most in the whole world until his voice drifted into her ears.
"Well don't you two just make the most adorable picture sitting like that? You look just like a couple of flower fairies surrounded by your beautiful garden. But I'm afraid your dinner's ready and as loath as I am to drag you both indoors if you don't come down to eat it then Gunther and GJ will happily take your places at the table."
Marcy opened her eyes and smiled up at Simon.
"Sorry, Dad. We were talking about science and bees."
Too busy being amazed by the unbelievable human who wanted to share her life, too busy feeling like love was invented just for the two of them, Marcy thought to herself. Perhaps Bubblegum could read those thoughts from the tenderness of her smile when she swung herself up and pressed a surprise kiss against the redhead's lips. Bubblegum blushed adorably but smiled shyly nonetheless and followed her girlfriend and Simon out of the garden, hand sliding into Marcy's by long habit and pressing their palms together.
It was weird, Marcy thought as she trailed Simon back to the stairs leading down to their apartment, what a difference twelve months could make. She was happier being alive than she could ever remember being. She had the most amazing girlfriend and adoptive father, she was doing well at college and she was actually looking forward to the future. And their garden was going from strength to strength, they'd won more funding to extend the project for the next year too and maybe open up a second garden if they could find a suitable site for it. Life was finally as good as everyone had always promised her it could be. She was still taking a pretty heavy dose of medication and receiving weekly therapy but she was finally stable and that alone felt like a complete miracle.
They took their seats at the table and Simon brought three plates of pasta from the kitchen, almost tripping on his way back to the table because his legs were wrapped in a writhing mass of excited cats.
One day a few months earlier Gunther had come home with a tiny white kitten in tow that someone cruel bastard had half-starved and for whatever perverse reason spray painted pink before presumably abandoning her in the street. Bubblegum had found them both on the fire escape that morning, alerted by Gunther's panicked yowls when the tiny kitten was too weak with hunger and dehydration to push open the cat-flap in their back door and enter the apartment. She'd immediately woken Simon and Marcy and they'd rushed Gunther Junior to the vets, it had been touch and go for a few days. But the tiny kitten pulled through and came home with them a couple of weeks later clean and well fed again. GJ had thrived since, never leaving Gunther's side for more than a few minutes. Of course Gunts made an awesome adoptive father, Marcy thought fondly. He had Simon as an example.
He was being his usual embarrassing father self during dinner, telling some long fanciful story about Marcy when she was eight and how she'd tried to lay a trap for the tooth fairy but fallen asleep long before Simon that night anyway. His daughter listened with half an ear and rolled her eyes where appropriate, much more interested in the stealthy way Bubblegum slid the disgusting green things off Marcy's plate whenever Simon wasn't looking. She shot a subtle smile at Bubblegum who quirked the side of her mouth upwards in reply and delicately nibbled a piece of stolen broccoli before nodding to something Simon had said like she'd been paying attention the whole time. Marcy felt her heart warm a little at just how wonderful her life had turned out these days and wordlessly slid the pepper down the table to her girlfriend without needing to be asked; she was an expert at anticipating her girlfriend's needs.
...
Her mobile rang just as they were finishing dinner and Marcy answered it with a grin when she saw the name on the screen.
"Finn Man!"
"Suicide Squad! How's it going?"
"Can't complain. How's life on the outside treating you these days?"
"Alright. It's sort fun, being out of hospital. I can do stuff with Jake again and I get to sleep in his bedroom if I have a rough night. I still gotta see a ton of head doctors but I'm back in school and I wanna be a social worker when I'm old enough. I'm gonna save everyone."
She could hear the pride in his voice and felt a pang of answering pride for him too; they'd gone back to visit Finn and the other kids as often as possible and having friends outside the hospital who wanted him to get better had really helped the blonde boy accept the help that was offered to him. He'd been improving in leaps and bounds until he'd finally been discharged two weeks earlier.
"So are you just calling for a chat or..?"
"Nah, I'm standing outside your apartment block! Surprise! Let me innnnnnn!" Finn said with a laugh.
Marcy hung up the line and stood from the table.
"Dad? Finn's here, I'm gonna show him the roof!" she yelled in the direction of the kitchen where Simon and Bubblegum were loading the dishwasher.
"Ok! Have fun, darling!" Simon called back.
Bubblegum met her in the hall and wordlessly slid out of the door behind her; the redhead still didn't like to talk in front of other people so much but she was beginning to be better with it. And she could talk if she needed to, it didn't cause the paroxysms of anxiety and terror that speaking had triggered for her when she was in the hospital. Finn was waiting for them with a huge grin plastered across his round face; he was bouncing on the balls of his feet in excitement.
As he grabbed Marceline for a tight hug she glanced over his shoulder and made eye contact with an older blonde woman in a car on the other side of the road. The woman nodded to her and a brief smile flitted across her slightly familiar features as she pulled away from the pavement and drove off down the street. Marcy frowned a little, thoughtful. The blonde woman looked kinda like-
"Finn! I'm so glad you're out of hospital!" Bubblegum was saying loudly.
And that in itself was a miracle; Finn was gaping at her with a face that radiated surprise. He did look a lot like his mother, Marcy thought. She had the same hair and eyes as him. It was nice that she'd stayed on the other side of the street to check he met them ok instead of waiting with him and embarrassing him in front of his friends. Mums were the best, Marcy thought distantly as Bubblegum grinned at Finn.
"Uhh, Bubs, that was mega loud!" he gasped in shock.
"I've been practicing talking to people." she replied at a more appropriate volume. A cute pink blush was spreading across her freckled cheeks and just for a second Marcy felt like she falling in love with her all over again; she was sometimes struck at the oddest moments by how lovely her girlfriend was. She shook her head to clear it. There'd be plenty of time to show Bubblegum how much she loved her later once they were alone, they were spending their anniversary night in their bedroom watching whatever Bubblegum wanted on the TV.
"Come on, Finn. We're gonna go up to the garden." she told him instead.
It wasn't a terribly tall building, just three storeys high, and it didn't take long before they'd trudged up the narrow external stairs to the charity roof garden they'd worked so hard to establish over the past year. The aim had been to create a space for other kids who suffered from depression or mental health problems to come and relax, feel at peace. Marcy had always felt happiest when she'd been in the middle of the wilderness with her mother, she'd figured perhaps other kids in the city might feel better in themselves if they could connect with nature a little. Seemed like for a lot of people she'd been right; the project had grown beyond her wildest dreams and now it was a massive success. It was like stepping through the door to Narnia, Bubblegum always said. Out on the street there was litter and graffiti and everything was made from grey concrete. Nobody smiled or made eye contact. It was a bleak, bittersweet world full of uncaring strangers and noise, deadlines and pressures and expectations. But up the stairs and out onto the roof of their unassuming building was The Oasis Garden and that was the exact opposite of the street below.
The first thing that Finn noticed was simply how green everything was. And after that it was the perfume of a hundred different kinds of fragrance flowers combined to overload his senses with sweetness. Then the hum of bees and trickle of water features slid into his awareness over the distant traffic noise below and Finn understood why it was called The Oasis; it was like a tiny little Garden of Eden right there in the middle of the anonymous urban sprawl.
"This is amazing." he gasped, staring around himself.
"This is just the outside. You wanna come into the Inner Sanctum to get the full effect." Bubblegum told him with a proud grin.
She motioned towards his arm and pointed him forwards through a woven willow archway hung with sweet-scented honeysuckle in vivid pinks and creams that stood out spectacularly from the verdant green foliage. Finn sucked in an impressed breath. Marcy was pretty happy to let her girlfriend handle the tour; she was still enthralled every time Bubblegum opened her mouth and spoke to someone so she was left with plenty of time to reminisce over their many happy hours building everything from scratch together.
"The roof was pretty big when we looked it up so Marcy redesigned it all into concentric Zen boxes. This is the honeysuckle room." Bubblegum continued proudly.
That was something of an understatement, Marcy thought, but she didn't expect Finn would understand anyway if she'd explained that it was planted in memory of her mother. That midsummer they would wear honeysuckle crowns together and sing the old songs to the earliest sunrise; Marcy knew without a shadow of a doubt that before the end of it she would be sobbing into her girlfriend's lap but she was equally certain that Bubblegum would comfort her, gently wipe the tears from her cheeks and remind her of all the wonderful things in her life now. It wouldn't help to focus on things that she knew would upset her, Marcy's many therapists all agreed on that. Come what may she'd have Bubblegum by her side. So instead she turned her attention back to the garden and the tour, grinning widely at the amazement on the younger boy's face as he stared at the sweet screens of lush blooms.
It was a large long corridor like the inside of a living maze; the walls of honeysuckle towered above their heads and in one corner a traditional large wooden beehive was alive with activity. Bubblegum nodded at it proudly. "I make the honey, I'm learning to be a beekeeper as well as all my other school stuff. I sell it online and at local markets. It's Oasis Garden Honey, it's really good. I'm going to be in a competition with it this year. We have it on toast for breakfast." she told him, practically glowing with pride. Marcy felt her ruby-heart give an extra strong pulse of love; she didn't have words for how wonderful it was to see Bubblegum so happy.
"I bet any honey you make is extra sweet." Finn breathed in reply.
Marcy narrowed her eyes a little; maybe she wasn't the only one who'd noticed that a healthy, happy, talkative Bubblegum who looked after her hair and glowed with pride was a very attractive Bubblegum. If Finn had wanted to get to know her and try to help her he'd had plenty of opportunities during the whole year before Marcy had arrived at St Luke's. She slid a little closer and put a protective arm around Bubblegum's shoulder, staring hard at the younger blonde boy who looked back at her innocently like he didn't understand why she was frowning at him.
Of course the redhead noticed the slight tension between her friend and her girlfriend and leaned into Marcy's embrace lovingly, giving her a look of pure adoration that somewhat made the taller girl forgive Finn. Of course he couldn't help noticing she was beautiful, Marcy though. Bubblegum was the most beautiful person she'd ever seen.
"When it's a whole separate area that's distinct in its design and structure like this then gardeners call it a 'room'. This bit of the garden is our honeysuckle room." Bubblegum continued proudly. "It smells best. I made the benches out of reclaimed wood and this is my favourite place to sit when it's sunny because the sun makes the honeysuckle release more essential oils into the air and that makes the whole place hum with fragrance. The smell comes from a complex mix of organic chemicals that are unique to each variety and in some cases each individual plant, like a scent thumb print. You can smell the garden from down the street when it's really warm. There are nineteen different types of honeysuckle in this room, I picked them all for their scent."
"You know a lot about honeysuckle." Finn commented, still wide eyed. Bubblegum grinned a little self-consciously.
"I read a really good book about it! Marcy got me some books about flowers and they were fascinating. She's the best." she told him happily. Marcy grinned in reply and pressed a quick kiss against the tip of her girlfriend's nose, making her blush and giggle a little again. Then she was motioning him forwards again into the next 'room' in the garden. "
Roses!" Finn yelled, excited. "I know what these ones are! I got some for my Mum on mother's day! She was so happy."
"This is the rose room. It's based on both traditional European rose gardens and on Japanese rock gardens. This is where Marcy meditates." Bubblegum informed him. "I like to sit with her and read or just watch her, she's very relaxing to watch. She's kinda Zen too, like, she's so still and tranquil. Meditating with her is the best."
"Adorable creep." Marcy grinned back. "The hardest part is not collapsing in giggles and losing my concentration when I can feel her staring at me."
"Uh, you meditate?" Finn asked her, confused.
"Yeah, I do. It helps me relax and find my inner tranquillity. It also helps me focus my energy to thump annoying little dudes with absolute precision if they try to say that meditation is lame. Just so you know." she told him a little defensively.
"Nah, I think it's cool! Show me how some time?" Finn asked. Marcy sighed.
"Sure, man. I show a lot of people how, actually. I'm thinking of opening up a Tai Chi and meditation group cause it's so popular. Dunno though, I might not have time."
"I'd come! It'd be awesome!" the blonde boy enthused. "I'd Tai Chi the crap outta my stress!"
"Don't think it works like that but, whatever." Marcy shrugged. "We'll see, I dunno if I'm good enough to lead a class in it yet anyway."
In truth she wasn't sure she wanted to share her early morning serenity with anyone but Bubblegum. The rose garden had been a real labour of love for the both of them, she felt like it had cemented them as a couple to build something so beautiful together. Marcy had such fond memories of lugging huge bags of compost up the stairs and raking bark chips over endless flower beds while the scent of fresh green rose leaves and warm earth filled her with a kind of quiet serenity. It had just felt to natural and right to kiss Bubblegum there in the rose garden, hands sliding through her hair and lips pressed her sweet skin. It was their place, other people could come here but nobody got to enjoy it quite the way they did, nobody else had those private memories of stolen kisses brightening up dull spring days. Perhaps letting Finn and whoever else come and barge into that serenity would ruin her memories, or maybe it would simply make her cherish them more. She hadn't made her mind up yet.
"There are fourteen types of rose in this room as well as nine types of stone in the gravel garden. There's another beehive on the other side too, we keep them apart a little so they don't compete too much." Bubblegum cut in, still in garden-tour mode.
"You're good at remembering how many of each type you've got." Finn told her in surprise.
"I know. I like making lists of thing." Bubblegum replied.
"How many rooms are there in the garden?" Finn asked interestedly. "It doesn't look so big from the outside."
"Yeah, it's a like tardis. There are four, including the Inner Sanctum. The next one is the cut flower cottage garden room." Marcy told him.
She reached out and slapped his hand before it could touch one of Bubblegum's precious Osiria roses. They were a rare and hard to grow variety that Marcy had found at a garden show the summer before, one of the first garden shows they'd gone to together after being discharged from the hospital and still a little shy of showing too much affection in public. They'd spent the whole day sending each other covert smiles that had boiled over into a long and heated kissing session once they got home to make up for the trial of not being able to hold hands all day. The base of each individual petal on he Osiria rose was a pure snowy white and slowly faded into a deep blood red at the tip. Marcy thought they looked like someone had sucked all the colour out of the bottom of the petals, they were her favourites too.
"And this," Bubblegum announced in the proudest voice of all, "is the cut flower cottage garden."
"Woah." Finn breathed as he stepped through the rose-arch into the third room.
'Woah' was a pretty accurate description, Marcy thought. Cut flowers were varieties grown to look good in floral displays and they'd have the most glorious bouquets of flowers this year. It was a riot of colour and scent; there were more varieties of flower there than Marcy could name spilling from every possible square inch of the room. Containers overflowed and vertical grow stands groaned under the sheer volume of luscious blooms, climbers and creepers overhung dozens of overhead pergolas and draped heavy scent over them like the whole room was a single huge organism breathing green life onto its human guests.
She'd built this one mostly with Simon, watching in fascination as he reeled off more and more information about each seed packet and fresh shoot that appeared while Bubblegum tended the bees and smiled at her like the sunrise. Marcy was quite certain that between them her father and her girlfriend they could answer every question in the known universe.
"If you're really careful with my good secateurs you can put together your own bouquet and take it home for your mother." Bubblegum added to Finn. "I give one to my Mum every week when they're in bloom. I think it makes her a bit happier that I live here now. And then you can get some herbs out of the Inner Sanctum to make it unique."
"It looks like you grow the whole world here. It's like, a Garden Kingdom and you're the Queens. This place is amazing, no wonder you win awards!" Finn told her breathlessly.
It was true; they'd won a few gardening awards that summer and a few charity awards too. The local papers have been to take photos and Simon was negotiating with a TV crew from a gardening show to come and film a small feature about the Oasis Garden for one of their upcoming programmes. He'd almost fallen over with shock and pride when he'd picked up the phone and been greeted by the voice of the nice man from TV with all the dogs and the big, famous garden asking if they could come and film on his roof.
"Inner Sanctum?" Finn prompted after a second.
"Right through here." Marcy told him, pointing through the final archway.
The Inner Sanctum was the last and biggest room. After the riot of greenery and blooms in the other rooms Finn had been expecting it would overwhelm him with flowers. But the Inner Sanctum was almost Spartan in its design, Zen-like in its simplicity. There were low stone benches and a sunken fire pit right in the middle surrounded by a mosaic floor made of polished recycled glass of every possible colour set into the concrete walkways. Around the edges of the room stands at hip height held all manner of herbs and green shrubbery that Finn couldn't have even begun to name. It was accented by several minimalist water fountains that trickled down over smooth blue-grey pebbles and added an almost musical note to the air, blending the traffic noise from the streets below them away to almost nothing. Finn could feel the tension draining out of his shoulders just by stepping into the room, it was the very definition of peaceful.
This was where they help group therapy for their small crowd of local teens, it was where Marcy was learning not just to share her story but to hear others' too. Sometimes she brought her guitar out there and they just sat together talking and singing, sometimes they'd have an intense one-to-one with a kid who needed to get it all off their chest. Whatever was happening it usually happened in the Inner Sanctum.
"This place is magical." he breathed, awestruck.
"It's pretty cool." Marcy agreed happily. "Bubblegum designed it. She's so awesome at this sorta thing."
They sat together in the Inner Sanctum until the sun finally began to set, catching up with Finn and telling him about their bees and their flowers and the army of volunteers who came every day to help keep the Oasis Garden beautiful. Most of them were local kids who had problems with mental health, there were a few adults and even one or two retired volunteers. The Oasis Garden was so popular that despite being Bubblegum and Marcy's idea they didn't really need to do so much work on it unless they wanted to, the volunteers and Simon kept it in perfect condition for them most of the time. Finn was as enthusiastic as Marcy had suspected he would be when she asked if he wanted to come volunteer with them too.
"How are Lydia and Phoebe doing?" she asked after a while. Finn's face fell.
"Lyds got really sick again. She was doing so well but something must have happened because she was moved onto a new unit. I dunno, her skin went all weird and lumpy." Finn replied quietly. "I wanted to help but I've been working on accepting that there are things I can't fix. Because I'm not a super hero. I wanted to make it all better for her but, um, I can't. Because if I try to help and she doesn't get better anyway I can't blame it all on my nemesis, sometimes people get sick and die and it's nobody's fault. I can't be a super hero because they're just a metaphor."
Finn said that last part like he was chanting a mantra; Bubblegum looked at him curiously. Those were the exact same words she'd said to him the year before so perhaps some people were a bit like a super hero, Marcy though. Bubblegum had been able to help save Finn, at least. Marcy nodded, also sad for their friend. Lumpy skin was a symptom of liver failure that Marcy recognised too well from her previous overdoses when she'd been suicidal from emotional pain. And in someone with anorexia that usually meant total organ failure, it was unlikely that it was just Lydia's liver that has been damaged. Marcy hoped for her friend that she'd make it out of hospital without it having to be in a coffin.
"Phoebe's doing a lot better now though. Her new meds are really helping and she said the voices only whisper sometimes, she can ignore them a lot and she doesn't want to burn herself anymore. She gave me a goodbye kiss when I was discharged." Finn added shyly, cheeks flushing from happy embarrassment.
"That's so cute, you can have weird psycho babies together." Marcy grinned back at him. "Hey, you wanna get a bouquet for your Mum? It's getting late, you should call her to come pick you up and you can surprise her with flowers."
She helped him cut some magnificent dahlias, lavender and lilies and added a sprig of leafy peppermint to give the whole bouquet a fresh, unique scent. Just as they were finishing tying some gardening twine around the stems to hold the whole arrangement together two voices approached from the rooms outside.
"..can't tell you how much it meant to Finn that your girls came to visit even after they were discharged, Simon. I know it must have been hard for them to go back in that place. And I must say I'm very impressed with this garden, no wonder it's in all the local papers. Of course if Finn and Jake wanted to help out I'd be happy for them to come over so long as they're no trouble for you."
"Well I'm very glad you approve, Margaret. Marcy's barely stopped talking about Finn all year, seems like the two of them have become fast friends. Ah, there they are now."
Simon and the same older blonde woman who'd been watching Finn from across the street stepped around the screen of foliage together and into the Inner Sanctum and Finn bounded over, presenting the bouquet to his mother almost shyly.
"Marcy and Bubblegum helped me make this for you, Mum. They're gonna show me how to grow stuff." Finn told her proudly.
"Your father will be thrilled, you can help him with his vegetables." the woman replied with a smile. "These are lovely, thank you so much. And these girls must be your friends. Hello, I'm Margaret, Finn's mother. So lovely to meet you finally, my son's told me all about you both."
She held out her hand and Marcy shook it. "Pleased to meet you, I'm Marceline." she said carefully. She'd met a few important people over the last year so it wasn't too daunting to make a good impression on her friend's mother. "And this is my girlfriend, Bubblegum."
Margaret looked a little surprised when the redhead ignored her hand and instead dropped into a perfect little curtsy; it was something Simon had suggested she try because making skin contact with strangers was still supremely uncomfortable for her but through her work on the garden a lot of people wanted to shake her hand.
"Well girls, this is an absolutely beautiful garden you've made here. I can see why Finn's so impressed with you both. And I wanted to thank you for coming to see him so often and helping him while he was in the hospital." Margaret continued.
"Muuuum, you're so embarrassing!" Finn wailed, mortified that she'd mentioned he'd been sick even if every single person there knew about it.
"I can hardly embarrass you by telling people what good friends you have, Finn. Come on sweetheart, let's get home and put these gorgeous flowers in water. I'll see you all soon, I'm sure." Margaret told them all with a smile.
She guided Finn back out of the garden and down the stairs while he waved over his shoulder at Bubblegum and Marcy.
"I've said it before but I'm sure you can stand to hear it again. I am so very, very proud of you both." Simon told them with a fond smile as they all trooped back inside the building and down to their apartment.
Marcy and Bubblegum followed him hand in hand, already discussing which documentaries they'd watch while snuggling up together that night. Nothing in the world felt safer to Marcy than lying with her girlfriend's arms around her hearing Bubblegum's heartbeat against her ear while the TV filled the room with a blue glow and background noise. It was the perfect end to her first anniversary, she couldn't wait to see how all the others would end too.
...
By the time Marcy fell asleep that night she was the best kind of exhausted; tired from a day's honest work and content with how everything was. Bubblegum was fast asleep next to her and Simon was snoring away in his bedroom next door; everything was as it should be. Her ruby-heart felt whole again, maybe a little scarred and scuffed but solid and healthy. It was full of love and that was the only thing that mattered at the end of everything. She knew because someone really wise had told her so a year earlier. Perhaps one day she might still want to die, she had no idea what the future would bring. But it wouldn't be that day, or even the next day or the next week or month. It would be another day, a day very far away and maybe it would never even come.
One thing Marcy had learned more than anything else was that no matter how sad she felt, it never lasted forever. That she was the person with the power to make her future whatever she wanted it to be and it didn't have to be a choice between dying or living in constant pain.
"I know you're asleep, babe, but I just wanted to tell you that I love you more than anything in the world." Marcy breathed into Bubblegum's sleeping ear. "Without you I'd probably be dead, or still locked in the crazy hospital. I might never have managed to heal my ruby-heart and then Simon would be sad too that I'd killed myself. You're an angel, you can't fool me. I know, cause you came and saved me when I needed you most. And you're too beautiful to be a regular person, you gotta be some kinda angel. And I just love you, I adore you. I don't know how else to tell you but I feel like I wanna keep saying it over and over until you know just how much I love you."
"Marcy." Bubblegum murmured, stirring and smiling in her sleep but not waking.
Marcy took a long moment to examine every line and curve of her girlfriend's wonderful face before carefully lowering herself down next to her. Bubblegum's arms immediately slid further around her, holding her securely so there was no chance she might disappear in the night.
She closed her eyes and dreamed of her mother, of her beautiful singing and their adventures together, of the magnificent fairy tales she'd recited from memory. Dreamed of the midsummer flower crowns they'd made together in the secluded forest meadows they'd spent the warm weather in when she'd been small. In her dreams they were in the Oasis Garden together and Bubblegum and Simon were there too. All the people she loved best in the whole world, filling her ruby-heart with so much love that it glowed like a bonfire in her chest. Perhaps heaven looked like a garden; perhaps whatever unity her mother had become with the Infinite beyond the living world she was enjoying the scent of the summer blooms too. She dreamed of Bubblegum and her softness and warmth, of the hours and hours they'd spent together in the garden just exploring what it was to be in love. And then her dreams shifted a little; Marceline dreamed of the lullaby her mother had sung to her when she was very small. The words came back to her unconscious memory so much more easily than during the waking hours, words that were more powerful now than they'd ever been before. Perhaps she understood them better now since she'd allowed love to heal her shattered heart.
"Let's go in the garden
You'll find something waiting
Right there where you left it
Lying upside down..."