This update comes on a kinda special day for me. Today, I saw a real live production of Les Miserables for the first time! It was performed by a local theater company, and it was a very good show. I enjoyed it all so much (and I cried).
Anyway, back to this story. Eagle-eyed readers (like adaon45) have already noticed a few historical inaccuracies; in this chapter, there's one that I want to warn you about beforehand. The church hymn in this chapter was first written (as a poem) in 1872, and first set to music and sung in 1884. So it really makes no sense to have Valjean and Cosette listening to this English-language hymn in France in 1829... but I love the song so much – especially since I heard it covered by Alfie Boe, my all-time favorite Valjean – that I couldn't resist including it. I think it's also very fitting for the two of them.
November 22, 1829
Feast Day of St. Cecilia, patron saint of musicians
Today is a Sunday, so of course, Papa and I went to church this morning. The choir sang a hymn that really made me think, especially the first two verses, which went like this:
Dear Lord and Father of mankind
Forgive our foolish ways
Reclothe us in our rightful mind
In purer lives Thy service find
In deeper reverence, praise
In simple trust, like those who heard
Beside the Syrian sea
The gracious calling of the Lord
Let us, like them, without a word
Rise up and follow Thee
It made me think about myself and Papa. I still do trust him, but I think my trust used to be so much simpler when I was younger. When he first found me in the woods, I'd never seen him before, but I trusted him, held his hand, and went right along with him, never asking him any questions. I couldn't do that now. The Bible says to have childlike faith... but is there any way to get that back, after you've lost it?
The next verses made me think, too. I felt as if the choir were singing directly to me.
With that deep hush subduing all
Our words and works that drown
The tender whisper of Thy call
As noiseless let Thy blessings fall
As fell thy manna down
Drop Thy still dews of quietness
Till all our strivings cease
Take from our souls the strain and stress
And let our ordered lives confess
The beauty of Thy peace
Papa says that God is always speaking to us, sending us messages, if we learn how to listen to Him. Listening to those words in church, I felt certain that God was sending me a message. Our words and works that drown — that part made me think of this journal. I started writing it because I hoped to learn more, and I have learned some very important things. I've learned that there are some things I don't want to know, like how Papa got so many scars, or anything about my blood father. The explanations could be too terrible. I don't want to know. I've been striving to know, but I have to make those strivings cease. I think that's what God wants me to do.
The Bible says, "Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make ye free." Not long ago, I thought something could only be either true or false, not both. But now, it doesn't seem so simple. Now, I wonder — can a thing be both true and false? Or could the same thing be true to one person and a lie to someone else? And what if the truth is harsh and disturbing? How could that set you free?
The Bible says too, "Now these three things abide, faith, hope, and love, but the greatest of these is love." The greatest of these is love. I think it means that love is even greater than truth. Perhaps love is so great that it can create its own truths.
Perhaps the one thing — the only thing — I know about Papa for certain is that he loves me. He loves me just as if I were his own flesh-and-blood daughter. I know that, and recently, I think I've lost sight of how important that is. Instead I've been striving to know things that aren't as important.
The truth is that Papa isn't my father by blood. But the truth is also that I love him as if he were, and he loves me like his own daughter and has raised me as such. So I don't think I'm lying to call him Papa. I'm creating my own truth. And I know that it must be true, because when I think about it, I feel free.
::
November 25, 1829
Feast Day of St. Catherine of Alexandria, patron saint of unmarried maidens
I can't remember the last time I slept in Papa's bed, before last night. I suppose it must've been years ago, when we still lived in the boarding house. I used to sleep in his bed often then, and when I was awake, Papa was always holding me in arms or on his lap. I needed to be close to him so desperately when I was younger. It's hard to explain why. I remember feeling so... hungry. But instead of being hungry for food, I think I was hungry for love. The inn-keepers had starved me for so long, for both food and affection, and I was making up for it with Papa. There were some days when I clung to him the whole day through, and looking back now, I wonder that he never got impatient with me. But he never did. He would hold me for as long as I needed him to.
I laid down in my own bed last night and tried to sleep, but whenever I closed my eyes, I kept seeing Papa's bare back, and those terrible long scars. How could he have gotten so many of them? I wondered again if he could've been a prisoner at some point in his life, but... the man who used to give me baths every evening, and still kissed me goodnight every night, and had never been anything but tender to me? How could he have ever been in prison? It seemed impossible.
At last, I got up and crept down the hall to his room. I thought he might be asleep, but he was still awake and sitting up in bed, reading his Bible. He had lit his two silver candlesticks that he keeps on a shelf in his room, which surprised me because he doesn't light them often. I once asked him why, and he said something about special occasions.
He's always had those candlesticks, and I'm curious about why they mean so much to him, but I'm not going to make any guesses – not anymore. Lately I've spent too much time trying to guess at Papa's past, and I think it's brought us both nothing but unhappiness.
So I just said, feeling rather babyish and silly, "Papa, can I... sleep with you, please? Just for tonight?"
He smiled and said I could, and he moved over to make room for me. His bed is narrower than mine — he always puts his own comfort last — and I was a bit pressed between him and the wall, but I didn't mind. I felt safe there. "Are you warm enough? Are you comfortable?" he asked, as I hunkered down beneath the blankets, and I nodded.
What I said next wasn't an easy thing to say. "Papa? I... I'm sorry I've been so wicked lately."
He was still sitting up in bed next to me, and at that, he looked down at me, surprised. "Why, Cosette," he said reproachfully, running one hand over my hair, "you haven't been wicked, child. You couldn't be wicked if you tried. You hardly even know the meaning of the word."
I pursed my lips and sat up, too. "But... I feel like... I don't know, like I've been so..." But I couldn't finish. I don't think I really knew what I was trying to say.
Papa put one hand on my shoulder. "You know, darling, it's been a long time since your old papa was thirteen, but I know it's a difficult age to be. And I know I can be a difficult person to live with sometimes."
I suddenly threw my arms around him. "But you're not difficult to live with, Papa," I insisted. "I'm the one who's been difficult. I'm sorry I—"
But he didn't let me finish. He wrapped one arm around me and said firmly, "Cosette, listen to me. You've done nothing to be sorry for, all right? Nothing." He kissed my cheek. "Lie down, now," he said, and I did.
Papa didn't put out his candlesticks right away; he sat up a little longer, reading. I asked him what part of the Bible he was reading from, and he said it was the Book of Isaiah. "Will you read a little to me?" I asked sleepily.
"All right," Papa said, "but you must close your eyes and try to sleep." I obeyed, and I felt Papa rest his free hand on my head. He read slowly to me in his deep, familiar voice, and at first, it startled me, because I thought that instead of reading, he was speaking directly to me. I looked the verses up and copied them down as soon as I woke up this morning. I don't believe it was a coincidence. I believe Papa wanted me to hear those specific verses.
He read, "Remember not the things of old. Dwell not on the past. For behold, I am doing a new thing. Now it springs up before you — do you not see it? I am He who blots out your sins and remembers them no more."
He read some more, but I fell asleep and only remember those verses.
I don't remember my dream, but perhaps I had some brief, unpleasant dream, because I was aware of shifting around in Papa's bed. It must have woken him up; as I said, his bed is rather narrow. I was sleeping lightly, somewhere between dreaming and half-waking, and I felt him lay one arm over me. "Child," he said, "peace, be still."
I slept soundly after that, and when I awoke in the morning, Papa still had his arm across me. I woke up before he did, and for a long time, I just lay there beneath his arm – his strong, scarred arm. It was quite heavy, but I didn't feel restrained. I felt safe and grounded, as if without Papa's arm there, I would drift away like a balloon. I felt all my strivings cease, just like in the words of the hymn.
I lay there beneath his arm, listening to him breathe, and I thought about a lot of things. I thought about when Papa found me in the forest, and about when we first came to Paris and he sat me on his lap in the horse-carriage and told me that I belonged to him now. I thought about when that man on the horse chased after us – how frightened I was, and how tightly I held onto Papa, because he was all I had, even though I barely knew him then. Perhaps it was strange, the way God had brought the two of us together, but I do truly believe that it was God's will.
I lay there beneath his arm, and I remember thinking, "This is my father. This is our house. This is my life. This is my father, and I love him." No, I don't understand everything that's happened in my life, but all of us have some cross to bear in this world, and perhaps that's the cross that God has chosen for me. Yes, I do wish I knew more about myself, about Papa and my mother, but waking up with his arm over me, somehow it didn't seem like such a burden. It seems like something I can live with.
It's only now, as I'm writing this, that I recognize his words. "Peace, be still." They were the same words that Christ said to calm the storm on the Sea of Galilee. Perhaps that's why, when I woke up under his arm, my stormy, too-curious, tempest-tossed mind felt calm at last. I felt calm at last.
FIN
And that's the end. I hope you all enjoyed it! I'm so grateful to everyone who's taken the time to review the story, but especially to adaon45, BrandonMichelle, CaptainHooksGirl, Darkover, and Deep Forest Green. Thanks for coming along on the ride.