I Am a Sinner Chapter 7: Part 7: Susan, a chronicles of narnia fanfic

I AM A SINNER

Well, I'm excited and sad to admit it, but we are now to the very, very end of my story. I present to you the seventh and final chapter. (Interestingly, there are seven chapters in this, and seven volumes in the Narnia series. How about that?) Since I first began this, people have been asking and begging me, again and again, to make the last chapter about Susan. For those of you who made such a request, your wish has been granted! I intended to focus the last chapter on Susan anyway, even when I started out with just five chapters, so I'm one step ahead of you!

Out of all the seven chapters, out of all the seven stories, this one's got to be the most powerful.

Arm yourselves with plenty of tissues; if any of the previous chapters made you cry, this one is sure to bring on the waterworks!

Characters © C.S. Lewis and Disney/Walden Media

Story © unicorn-skydancer08

Lyrics © Josh Groban

"But Zion said, 'The Lord has forsaken me, the Lord has forgotten me.' Can a mother forget the baby at her breast and have no compassion on the child she has borne? Though she may forget, I will not forget you!"

~ Isaiah 49:14—15 (NIV)

Part 7: Susan

This could not possibly be happening to her. Susan Pevensie longed to wake from this dreadful nightmare. She even pinched herself twice, hard both times, just to be sure she was awake.

But this was no dream.

Her whole family…her parents…her brothers…her sister…her cousin…even the old Professor…they were all gone. Gone. Just that word alone tasted bitter on her tongue, and she hated it.

How could this have happened, she couldn't stop asking herself? How was it that God could have allowed this horrible tragedy to come about?

From what Susan understood, there had been a dreadful railway accident that day—a passenger train, bound for Bristol, somehow derailed while approaching a station, going around a curve at excessive speed. Though Susan had not been present at the event, in her mind, she could picture the train coming off the tracks. She could almost hear the awful, sickening, ear-splitting screech and clang and crunch of metal, see the surprised and aghast looks of the people as the uncontrolled train headed straight for them.

There were quite a few fatalities…and Susan's loved ones were among the victims. As far as Susan knew, not one in her entire family had made it.

At first Susan adamantly refused to believe it when the police arrived at her front door and told her the news.

But when reality finally sank in, she became almost physically sick with grief.

Alone in her room, the night of the tragedy, Susan kept pacing from end to end, sobbing incessantly, wringing her hands like wet sponges, her lovely face ashen and void of makeup, her dark hair unkempt and disheveled, her eyes so red and so swollen from so much crying that she looked quite sickly. The house seemed eerily empty, ominously silent without her family. She wanted to scream. It just wasn't fair! Why did they all have to go, every last one of them? Now, she would never get to see them, speak to them, or hear their voices again, ever. No longer would she be able to touch them with her own hands, to embrace them, to come to them whenever she had a problem. She never even got to say goodbye.

In the days that followed, Susan could not eat or sleep. Though her friends, her current beau, and a remaining aunt and uncle all did their very best to care for her, to comfort her, Susan refused to be comforted. She thought there would be no end to her grief. For her, it was the end of a world of light and color, of beauty and happiness.

Everything in her life that had seemed so important at one time was now completely useless.

In addition to her grief and heartache, Susan also harbored potent feelings of anger at herself. The last time she had seen her siblings, just two days before the accident, she had behaved very badly toward them—especially to Lucy. Susan remembered, in lurid detail, how her brothers sat with her in her room and expressed how concerned they were about her.

Susan wasn't eating properly, she wasn't getting enough sleep, she kept coming home later and later every night, she was attending too many parties, going out with too many unsavory men…the list went on practically forever. Lately, it seemed to Peter and Edmund that all their sister cared about anymore was lipstick and nylons, attending as many parties and cotillions, and flirting with as many boys as possible. These days, they hardly knew Susan at all.

Deep down in her heart, Susan knew her brothers were right; she just wasn't ready to admit it, wasn't about to admit just how wrong a turn her life had taken over the years.

After listening to Peter for a few minutes, Susan finally lost patience and jumped up, shouting at him and Edmund that she was sick to death of their constant worrying and nagging, and thoroughly fed up with their so-called "talks". "I'm fine!" she'd yelled, while Edmund shrank back slightly, as if fearing she would slap him, and even Peter recoiled. "In case it hasn't occurred to either of you, I am no longer a child! I'm twenty-one years old; I am perfectly capable of looking after myself!"

Then Peter made the mistake of mentioning how the old Susan, the Gentle Queen of Narnia, would never have behaved like this.

How was it, Susan wondered incredulously, that her siblings still believed in this Narnia nonsense, after all this time? "For the last time, Peter," she said sharply, "would you give it a rest with Narnia? Honestly, I have just about had it with the way you all keep carrying on about it, how you all so pigheadedly believe in something that isn't even real!"

"But Narnia is real," a timid voice spoke from behind.

Susan turned around and saw Lucy standing forlornly by the door, which had conveniently been left wide open.

"You've been there yourself, Susan," Lucy protested. "Narnia is a beautiful, magical place, where everything is green and bright, where we met some of the most wonderful people we could have ever met. It's where we came to know Aslan. We were even once Kings and Queens over Narnia; surely, you remember that."

"Oh, grow up, Lucy!" Susan rebuked her sister. "It was all a mere child's game! It's high time you opened your eyes, and faced reality! Narnia doesn't exist! It never has, and it never will! Sure, it was a lovely enough game we played when we were younger, but that's all behind us, now! You simply must stop with this claptrap about Narnia and Aslan, whatever his name was, and get a life!"

Lucy merely took one look at Susan before bursting into tears and running away, without once stopping or looking back.

Immediately Susan regretted having shouted at her. She began to call after her sister, but Lucy had already gone before she could even open her mouth.

"Susan!" Peter had said, when Lucy was out of sight and her heartbreaking sobs faded into silence. "How can you treat your sister that way? You should be ashamed of yourself!"

Indeed, Susan was ashamed of herself—not for what she had said, but for the way she'd said it, for making Lucy cry.

By that time, Peter decided he'd had enough, that it just wasn't worth the argument, and he rose to leave the room.

Just before he stepped out the door, he shot one final cold look at Susan, and told her bluntly, "You may think you're so mature and grown-up, Miss Susan…but you still have a great deal to learn." With that, he turned his back on her and strode off without another word.

Susan watched him walk away, then she turned to Edmund, who had also risen to his feet.

Edmund said nothing at all, but just looked at Susan, and Susan could see incredible sadness, disappointment, and heartfelt pity in the depths of her brother's eyes.

After a minute of willful silence, Edmund quietly sauntered out after Peter, with his shoulders drooped and his head bowed to his chest.

Once they had all gone, Susan furiously slammed the door shut, bolting the lock for good measure, and then she'd thrown herself across her bed and cried for an hour.

That was the last she ever saw of her brothers and her sister…ever.

She refused to join the family that night for supper, and came out of her room the next day only to attend her date with William, the young and extremely handsome if somewhat arrogant man who currently maintained possession of her heart.

On the morning of the railway catastrophe, Susan only spoke briefly with her parents before they left, anxious to get ready to meet with William again. William was intending to take her out to dinner at a fancy restaurant, where they served sparkling wine in pure crystal goblets and serenaded you with amorous music while you ate; then they would go dancing afterwards. Susan had been making sure her elegantly styled hair was perfect, smoothing out wrinkles in her sleek new gown that weren't even there, and putting on a final touch of lipstick when the fateful knock sounded on her front door. When William showed up later to take Susan away, the young man had been stunned to find Susan with the police in her living room. Susan said nothing to her beau when she saw him, only rushed up to him and threw herself into his arms, almost knocking him off balance in the process.

When it was confirmed that Susan was the only one in her immediate family left, Susan pushed herself away from William, and fled to her room in a blinding agony of tears.

After the loss of her family, as hard as Susan tried, the girl could find no peace, no relief, no answers in a world that had suddenly been turned completely upside-down. Three straight weeks went by in which she didn't wear one dollop of makeup, and her gaudy dresses were stashed away in the very back of her closet.

Once, William invited her to go out for an evening with him, to help take her mind off things, and Susan lost it and went into a heated tirade about how she couldn't possibly think about going out and having a grand time when her whole family was gone forever.

At first, Susan blamed everyone and everything for the terrible disaster that seemed to shake the entire world.

She even thought for a time that her family's accident was somehow her fault; after all, she had been perfectly dreadful to them, and the next thing, they were gone.

One morning, unable to bear being in her house for one more minute, Susan was out alone in the garden, thinking to herself.

The thought of Aslan came to mind.

Despite her initial rebellion, her adamant refusal to believe in the Great Lion, Susan ultimately found herself saying out loud, "Oh, who am I trying to fool?"

Was she really that stupid? How could she not believe the truest thing in her life? How could she even pretend that Aslan, Narnia, and all the like were but a mere figment of the imagination? It was about as ridiculous as saying there was no sun or moon, or even standing right in front of the ocean and claiming there was no ocean.

Susan had never felt such guilt. She didn't believe it was possible to feel this horrible, yet she couldn't deny the pain that twisted her insides and numbed her soul.

In addition to the agony, her sense of utter shame, Susan came to realize that even though she had turned her back on Aslan, and all she had known to be true, she couldn't erase the memory of Aslan's love, of his interminable mercy. More than anything else in the world, Susan wanted that love and that mercy, that comfort and guidance that only Aslan could provide.

She needed all that; without it, without Aslan, her life was meaningless.

But was it too late? Susan knew she couldn't turn back the clock and change what was already past.

She knew she could never change what she had done—but could she be forgiven for it?

Overwhelmed by emotion, Susan buried her face in her hands and quietly wept, and as she wept she kept whispering fervently to the flower-laced air enfolding her, "Aslan…oh, Aslan…Aslan…"

Not so very long afterwards—or it could well have been ages, or even an eternity afterwards—Susan found herself in the New Narnia, kneeling at the feet of none other than Aslan, the Great King himself, as real as anything. Racked with remorse and guilt for her past sins, for her doubts and her rebellion, Susan bowed herself at the omnipresent Lion's feet and wept over his paws, her tears soaking the luxurious fur in no time. Aslan stood in silence and allowed the Daughter of Eve to do this, making no objection to having his feet wet.

As always, Aslan was full of love and compassion for the girl, quick to hear her cries and willing to stay with her, even though Susan felt totally undeserving of him.

She could sob to him the way she used to cry on her mother's shoulder, knowing her mother could somehow make it all better.

"Oh, Aslan, I'm such a fool," Susan wept. "I lost my faith in you! I have denied you, I have sinned against you, in just about the worst way imaginable. But I do so wish to come back, if you'll have me. You have lost nothing without me, but I have lost everything without you! I'm so sorry; I am so very sorry, for everything! Forgive me, Aslan—oh, forgive me!"

"Daughter," Aslan spoke up, his voice soft, his golden eyes emanating nothing but kindness, "be at peace. The past is gone, and you are here now. That is all that truly matters."

"Forgive me, Aslan."

"I forgive you, my child," Aslan never hesitated to say. He lowered his head and nuzzled her hair, and Susan could hear him purring gently. "I forgive you," Aslan crooned again, "and I love you. I have missed you, daughter. My heart has truly been sore without you. Now that you are here, now that you have been restored to me once more, my grief has turned into joy."

"I—I missed you, too, Aslan," Susan had to admit. "Even when I refused to believe in you, even at my darkest and lowest points in life, there was always some part of me that yearned for you."

"Love," Aslan told her, "true, pure love, is something that can weather even the longest and harshest of storms. Though it may be frail and flimsy, it can never be truly destroyed." When Susan lifted her face to him at some point, thoroughly wet and shining with the tears that had fallen, the Lion licked her tears and kissed her forehead, and said, "You are most welcome here, my beloved one. This is now your true home, just as it is mine. Think no more about what is already past. And rejoice, because your pain and your trials have ended."

Oh, yes, now Susan could indeed rejoice. Never had she experienced such joy, such sweetness, to which nothing could compare.

It was like standing before the Son of God, in all His glory.

There was so much Susan wanted to say to Aslan. Yet she could find no words with which to properly express what she was feeling, and all she could do was embrace Him and cover Him with kisses. When she later regained the strength in her legs and arose to walk, Aslan walked right beside her.

All of Susan's bad times, all of her pains and sorrows, now seemed nothing more than a bad dream.

And Narnia, the one true Narnia, was everything she could dream of, and more. Nothing withered or died, and everything was full of life and light.

Everything looked just like the Narnia Susan once knew, yet somehow more glorious and wonderful, by at least a hundredfold.

But what made this heaven truly heaven were the figures standing in the not so far distance. There, garbed in the most stunning finery, alive and strong and youthful and beautiful as they had ever been, were Lucy, Edmund, and Peter. Susan knew them instantly, and she couldn't repress a gasp at the sight of them.

They in turn saw her, and clearly recognized her also, for they became very still, their eyes wide with astonishment and wonder.

At first, all they could do was stand there on the spot and stare. No one could speak.

Then Lucy's face broke into a radiant smile, even as tears flooded her lovely brown eyes and spilled freely down her cheeks, and she was the first to dart forward. Susan didn't hesitate to run to her also. In no time the two sisters were caught up in each other's arms. Lucy's body felt warm and undoubtedly solid, and all Susan could do was hug her and cry hysterically. Lucy was weeping every bit as hysterically, her tears gushing out of her as if through a faucet. Peter and Edmund soon joined them, their eyes and faces wet long before joining with their sisters. Susan clung fiercely to them too, one after the other. Not one thing had to be said; words were completely unnecessary. Susan knew she was forgiven, and that her siblings, whom she'd never thought to see again, were just happy to have her back, that they were all together again as a family, never to be separated.

To further add on to Susan's joy, if such a thing were even possible, she looked up at length to see her whole Narnian family coming for her.

Aside from Eustace, Jill Pole, the dear old Professor, and even her own mother and father, she saw Tumnus, the faun who was Lucy's husband and eternal companion, accompanied by his two precious children, Puck and Selena; she also saw the centaurs Oreius and Glenstorm, the Beavers, the human kings Caspian and Tirian, Trumpkin the dwarf, Trufflehunter the badger, Reepicheep the mouse, Jewel the unicorn, and even Puzzle the donkey—along with all the others who had been saved through the redeeming grace of Aslan.

Everyone appeared genuinely glad to see Susan. They all took turns greeting her when they reached her: holding her in their arms, rocking her, nuzzling her, bathing her face with tears and endless kisses, and saying a thousand endearing things to her. Susan did likewise with each and every one of them, her heart brimming over with sheer love for them all.

Every time someone told her "welcome home", Susan knew it beyond a grain of doubt to be true. She was home.

This was where she belonged, and she would not belong anywhere else.

When I am down
And oh, my soul so weary
When troubles come
And my heart burdened be

Then I am still and wait here
In the silence
Until you come
And sit a while with me

You raise me up
So I can stand on mountains
You raise me up
To walk on stormy seas
I am strong when I am on your shoulders
You raise me up
To more than I can be

You raise me up
So I can stand on mountains (stand on mountains)
You raise me up
To walk on stormy seas (stormy seas)
I am strong when I am on your shoulders
You raise me up
To more than I can be

You raise me up
To more than I can be

"You Raise Me Up" ~ as sung by Josh Groban