Chapter Three

The guestroom had one large bed in it, and this was the very problem sending Mrs. Pevensie into a stressful tizzy. Susan and Lucy could share the bed, and then Lydia and Charlotte could have Susan and Lucy's room, but that would mean the Pevensie girls would have to constantly be in and out of the guests' room to get their clothing and things. Edmund had snorted that Peter and Lydia could share the guest room and he wouldn't mind sharing with any of the girls; he would prefer that to a lovestruck Peter. Fortunately for him, only Charlotte and Susan heard; the latter glared, the former bit her lip to keep from laughing outright, which Edmund noticed and it made him like her quite a lot. Clearly Susan's friend was much more exciting than ishe/i was.

Charlotte had appeased Mrs. Pevensie by suggesting, "Honestly, I don't mind sharing a bed with Lydia if she doesn't. I'm quite clean," she promised the French girl. She of course would rather have a room to herself or share with Susan, but she hated to see kind Mrs. Pevensie ready to rip her hair out like this.

Poor Lydia was pretty but she wasn't completely stupid, and she was at least partially aware of the stress that her presence had brought with it. After so many weeks of Peter assuring her his family would love her, she hadn't realized he hadn't told them of her. That alone would upset her later on once she got a chance to think about it, but for now she felt out of place and embarrassed. Even Peter suddenly felt like a stranger to her because he was a Pevensie and she wasn't. This was his family, but so far the only person that had seemed genuinely kind to her was this American girl.

With a firm nod, Lydia agreed, "I would not mind this arrangement at all." Secretly, she was glad for it. Perhaps she and this Charlotte could be friends because Peter's sisters didn't seem like they were much looking for a new friend.

There was no arrangement that would make Mrs. Pevensie totally happy, and she bemoaned the size of their house but agreed to Charlotte's suggestion. So the boys carried the things upstairs while Susan and Lucy prepared tea, ordering Mrs. Pevensie and Charlotte to sit and relax. Lydia followed awkwardly, perching on the edge of an armchair with her hands clasped delicately in her lap. She looked like a little doll, and Charlie wondered if it would be too obvious if she copied the pose. But she wasn't a little blond baby doll in any way, and so contented herself with asking Mrs. Pevensie questions about plans she had mentioned earlier to try and calm her.

Tea was progressing rather uncomfortably, and Charlie felt like she and Edmund were doing most of the talking. She made a face at Susan to try and get a laugh, but Susan just smiled and Charlie sighed. This was exhausting and she was beginning to have less fun. She sipped her tea and looked to Lucy, who was twisting her lips trying to think of a thread of conversation everyone could appreciate.

"So . . . how did you meet?" Susan suddenly thought of, directing this towards Peter and Lydia. Peter was leaning against the arm of the chair in which Lydia sat because they were out of seats, and Mrs. Pevensie was trying to decide if she should send her husband out to buy more seating when he got home . . .

At the question, Lydia looked up at Peter with an adoration clear on her face that made Edmund cough and fake vomiting sounds under his breath. Charlotte, who sat between him and Mrs. Pevensie on the sofa, heard and elbowed him in the ribs, painfully missing her own brother. Edmund reminded her very much of him. They would have gotten along beautifully if her brother hadn't gone and died.

Peter beamed as well and explained to his family, "Well, Lydia's father was my professor last spring – my history professor. She came to visit him a few times and I met her when I ran in to him at lunch one afternoon. I mean that I was there with some friends and Professor was there with Lydia, and he introduced us all to her."

"And Peter offered to show me around London. It was quite charming!" Lydia interjected, appearing to swoon. This time Charlie glanced down at her lap to hide her laugh and Edmund nudged her in the ribs.

"Yes, well, Professor turned the offer down," Peter laughed. "But Lydia and I kept in touch – we started writing, you know. Anyways, this fall she decided to come live with her father and we began seeing each other."

"It sounds lovely," Susan offered, trying hard to be supportive. Really, it didn't sound very romantic at all.

"Yes, well . . . it is," Peter returned, and for a moment the two locked eyes in a rather challenging way. Susan looked away, angry, and glanced instead to her friend who seemed simply confused. Poor Charlie, being tossed right into the middle of family drama like this!

Lucy, having remained uncharacteristically quiet, asked, "What about you, Susan? How did you and Charlotte meet?" Charlotte laughed that Lucy would draw a parallel between she and Susan and Peter and Lydia.

Susan seemed delighted at the opportunity to out-romance Peter, though, and explained, "Well, the very first day after I had arrived in Paris, I went walking in Montmartre and got hopelessly lost and then it began to rain. I had an umbrella but there was this poor girl who was caught without anything in the downpour. She had been painting looking down in the cemetery – which is mordibly romantic, I think," and she tossed a quick look to Peter to make sure he caught that this was a romantic story. "She was scrambling to get all her things together so I helped her and shared my umbrella. We were both soaked, though, so she took me back to the place she was staying at the time, which was this awful little place in someone's attic."

Here Charlie laughed and interrupted, "It wasn't so bad. I've stayed in far worse before."

"Well, at any rate, we got to be fast friends, and a week later her building burned to the ground."

"It didn't!" Lucy gasped.

Charlie nodded, "It did. But few of my things were lost because the fire didn't reach the attic. Only I had to send the landlord to retrieve my things for me because they closed the house. The stairs collapsed just after they got my trunk down."

"Yes, and she came to me. I didn't have a roommate so I just invited her in."

"You are an artist?" Lydia asked Charlotte.

"She's an actress!" Lucy anwered excitedly.

"I was an actress . . . I suppose," Charlotte admitted. "And now I don't know that I'm much of an artist, but I'm working on it. I'm in art school right now."

"It sounds lovely," Peter offered, looking at Susan instead of Charlotte.

Susan answered coldly, "Oh, it is."

Lucy sighed and popped her chin in her hands.

Dinner wasn't much better, though Mr. Pevensie's inability to understand his wife's distress did help a bit. He greeted both Lydia and Charlotte with firm handshakes that hurt Lydia's fingers but made Charlotte laugh when he noted she had a good, strong grip. It was something she was told was very American about her, that she shook hands like a man. Mrs. Pevensie had pulled her husband into another room to explain to him how much stress she was now under, and why hadn't Peter told her about this girl and that she would be coming home with him.

"For the same reason I haven't the faintest idea when your birthday is, my love," Mr. Pevensie had laughed loudly enough to be heard in the dining room, where Susan and Charlotte were setting the table. "Because we're men!" This had not been the answer Mrs. Pevensie wanted and she had pouted all through dinner.

He was certainly right in his declaration, though, that Peter had meant no harm in bringing Lydia home. He was simply a lovestruck young man eager to introduce his family to this beautiful girl that loved him back, and it had never occurred to him that he hadn't told his mother about her, or that arrangements would need to be made. He had at least considered that it would be a big deal because it was a big deal, and that was why he had been so willing to help Susan bring her friend home. Having two guests would take some of the pressure off of Lydia, because he knew she was easily overwhelmed, and his family was quite overwhelming as it was. It had just been dumb luck that Susan's guest was as helpful and easy-going as she was, because Peter certainly hadn't missed how quickly Lydia had latched on to her, nor that it had been she that kept his mother from blowing a gasket in front of them all. He sincerely appreciated it and would need to thank her later. However, in his devotion to Lydia, Peter quite forgot about the rest of his siblings. He was angry with Susan for being angry at him, but Edmund and Lucy . . . why, he had hardly said two words to the pair of them.

And though Charlotte hadn't realized this, she did notice that Lucy seemed to grow quieter and quieter as the evening wore on. She even forgot to ask Charlotte about the movies, which Charlotte granted had been sort of dreading all night any ways. Mrs. Pevensie and Susan noticed the mood, but took it to be overwhelmed exhaustion, and Mrs. Pevensie herself retired alarmingly early, her nerves frazzled. The children were left to entertain themselves since Mr. Pevensie quickly followed his wife, winking at the kids and assuring them that the excitement of having everyone come home at once was simply too much.

To pass the evening, Charlie suggested a game of blow-ball, which Edmund readily agreed to because he was bored out of his mind by all the drama. To everyone's surprise, Susan agreed to play as well, and this finally brought a smile to Lucy's face as she pointed out,

"But Su, I thought you were too serious for games like this."

"Yes, well living with Charlotte has dumbed me down a bit," Susan laughed, earning a playful shove from her roommate. Lucy's smiled only last until Peter declined to play, instead settling down near the fire to talk quietly with Lydia.

"Ugh, better off without the lovebirds anyways," Edmund insisted and took his position beside Susan on one end of the table after retrieving a table tennis ball from his room. Lucy and Charlie were the other team, the point of the game being to blow the ball over the other team's edge. The difficulty was that the ball kept wanting to go sideways, and that all the blowing eventually left them light-headed. They collapsed after playing for quite a while in the den only to find that Peter and Lydia had both already retired, not even bothering to say good-night.

"Well I sure hope they are both in their own rooms," Susan huffed, leading the way upstairs for bed. She was very relieved when, hugging Charlie at the door of the guest room, she saw Lydia sleeping peacefully inside, alone. "I'm sorry you have to share with her."

"Oh, I'm not. It's not a big deal, really. Good night!" Susan disappeared into her own room, and Charlie changed into her nightgown before realizing she had left her necklace downstairs, having taken it off for the sake of the game. It was difficult to play with her pearls swinging back and forth against her throat.

Throwing on a robe, she ventured back down in the dark and found not only her necklace, but the youngest Pevensie child, sitting on the carpet before the dying fire and clutching her knees to her chest. She glanced quickly over her shoulder at the footsteps, but seemed relieved to see Charlotte, and the older girl took this as an invitation to join her.

"Everything all right?" she asked, plopping down onto the carpet and stretching her feet nearer the glowing embers.

Lucy nodded, but then sighed, "I miss my brother."

"What?"

"Peter. I miss him." Despite her vagueness, Charlie understood the point, and that made Lucy relax even more. She felt comfortable because here was someone who understood her.

"I know. It's not fun when your brothers and sisters start growing up and you're still a kid. Trust me, I know."

"It's not just that, though, it's Peter especially. He's the oldest, but until today he was still . . . I mean, Susan was a grown up by the time she was my age," Lucy admitted with a laugh. "But Peter, even when he's being all responsible and adult-like, he was still my best friend. He would still play."

Charlie nodded, "Yes, well the difference now is that he was just a grown up kid, but now he's an adult."

"But why?"

"That's the route some people choose to go."

"It's because of her, isn't it," Lucy sighed, stretching her legs alongside Charlotte's.

"Maybe partially. Maybe to impress her, or as a result of being in a serious relationship, or maybe from being about ready to graduate uni, or maybe just because he's getting older."

"But it's not fair."

"I know."

"He wouldn't even play with us. He just wanted to talk to her."

"Well give them some time. Maybe once she's more comfortable around us, they'll both want to play. Or maybe not. But either way, you don't have to lose your brother, just get used to a change in him. It's your only choice, really."

"But we didn't have to wait for you to get used to us," Lucy pointed out.

Charlie laughed, "That's because I'm an odd turkey."

"And you're Susan's age but you don't act like an adult."

"Gee, thanks."

"It's a good thing!"

"Yes, well, I had a taste of being an adult for a while, and I didn't really like it. I'd much rather be a grown up kid."

Lucy grinned and nodded, "Me too!"

"And I believe Edmund is like us in that," Charlie mused which made Lucy laugh and nod.

"Yeah, he still is pretty stupid sometimes. Well, Peter and Susan are too, but in an iadult/i way."

"Yes. And I know it's awful. I remember when my brother and sisters started growing up, I was miserable. I'm the youngest of six, you know."

"You are?"

"I am," Charlie repeated. "And I promise, there are worse things that could happen than Peter growing up. Just be happy that he seems pretty happy."

"He does, doesn't he?" Lucy sighed, letting her head fall onto Charlie's shoulder. "It is good to see him so happy . . . well, I guess we're all just lucky to have you here, then. Susan seems happier, too, and . . . and between you, me, Ed, and Susan, we can have a great holiday!"

"We sure can," Charlotte agreed. Lucy was excited, and though both knew it was only partially genuine – because the loss of Peter to the adult world did hurt a lot – she did honestly feel a little bit better. After a while, Lucy yawned and sighed that she should get to bed. Charlie agreed and pulled Lucy to her feet, then felt her insides warm considerably when Lucy gave her a tight hug. So this was what it felt like to have a younger sister, perhaps. Charlotte liked the feeling and wondered why her siblings had always complained so much. But then, she probably hadn't been as sweet as Lucy.

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