I bring you a tiny chapter that I felt needed to go in, kind of as a filler. Sorry it's taken so long, life has been mad! Though I am horribly unsatisfied with the ending, I do enjoy the scenario of this chapter. Next one should be up quicker!
As always, find the ficmix here:
8tracks sadie-reay / hold-me-till-it-sleeps-a-fanmix
And in a burst of light that blinded every angel
As if the sky had blown the heavens into stars
You felt the gravity of tempered grace
Falling into empty space
No one there to catch you in their arms
Tia's death brings some odd clarity to the house.
They attend her funeral.
It's nothing like she would have wanted. Tia comes from old money, though Eliza had never known. Her family insists on a traditional ceremony.
The ceremony is stifled, quiet, somber, everything Tia wasn't. Tia was wild, bold, joyful.
She would have hated this, Eliza knows, as she grips Alex's hand and tries to come to terms with the very odd feeling she has about being here.
It's a little that she is just realizing how quickly life can change, how instantaneously it can be ripped a way. And, if she's honest, a bit about how this is how it might end, for her family.
A sea of people dressed in black surround the wooden casket.
Tia would have wanted bright colors and laughter, Eliza thinks.
She shifts her gaze to Theo the younger. The young woman looks absolutely miserable. Tears track down her cheeks as she slides an arm through her father's.
And her father…Aaron Burr is a different person than either of them remember.
Oh, he was always a master of the noncommittal, but this is different. He carried poise with him before, a quiet grace.
It's as if that has been ripped from him and he just simply doesn't have the strength to fight anymore.
His posture slumps, his eyes trained on the ground.
Eliza has never seen anyone who looks more like they have simply given up.
And she knew Tia, and that is the last thing Tia would want.
Alexander squeezes her hand, shaking her out of her thoughts. She squeezes back and gives him a halfhearted smile.
They've been doing much better since they heard the news about Tia.
Eliza doesn't really know why, but maybe she's learned to accept his help. Maybe he's learned how to be there for her like she needs him to. Maybe both, maybe neither.
The point is that they're in this together, and they both know that now.
If Eliza wakes up in the middle of the night vomiting, she doesn't try to hide it from him.
If Alexander is angry, or sad, or anything else, he tries to tell her.
(He still hasn't cried in front of her since she was diagnosed, though).
Her health isn't what she'd call steady, but she's hit somewhat of an even keel in managing the side effects.
They have each other. For better or worse, they are each other's someone.
But Aaron Burr? He has lost that someone, and if there's one thing about death that's so impossible to grasp, it's the permanence.
It's been a week, and the only time Eliza has seen Aaron Burr with an expression of anything other than heartbreak or misery was once, when they were visiting the house and the door swung open without a knock, followed by the sound of keys dropping and a coat being sloughed off.
Burr's face had lit, his eyes had widened, and he strained to see who was coming in.
It was Tia's sister.
And the expression on his face was one Eliza would never forget.
He thought it was her.
Because some part of this is not real to him. He hasn't let her go, Eliza knows. A piece of him still thinks she will walk through that door.
The funeral does not help matters, so Eliza searches her brain for something that will.
It actually comes to her on the car ride home.
Alexander takes no convincing to agree.
They pick Burr and Theo up the next day.
"Get in the car," she tells him gently.
And thanks to that absolute brokenness that pervades him, he doesn't object.
They take him to the beach.
Eliza has Alex stop twice so that she can vomit on the side of the road.
Burr looks like he's in physical pain as he watches.
It's a cold but sunny day as they approach Brighton beach. It's nearly empty, thanks to the time of year.
Tia always loved this place. She talked about it so often, with a longing in her voice.
She loved looking at it, but she hadn't been there since she got sick.
It's the perfect spot, Eliza thinks.
As soon as she gets out of the car, the wind whips around her, as if pulling her into a dance.
Aaron and Theo get out of the car slowly, hesitantly.
She knows they are confused as she leads them to the side of the pier, stopping once so Alexander could loop a steadying arm through hers.
They stop at the edge, so Eliza can draw something out of her pocket.
With care, she hands Burr Tia's favorite scarf, which she had found stuffed into a box of items brought home from the hospital on a visit to the Burr's home.
Burr stretches out a hand and takes the scarf.
"What is this?" he asks, lovingly passing his hands over the fabric.
Eliza smiles.
"We're going to let her go. But we're going to do it right. You know she would have hated that funeral. But this….she would have loved it here. So here, we let her go. Let the scarf go, let her fly."
Burr laces the scarf through his fingers.
"But I…"
"It's just a scarf, Aaron. Tia will never leave you," she smiles. "I promise."
"Then, why…"
"Because we have to let her go. She's free now. We need to let her be free."
After a moment, Burr gives a stiff nod.
Alexander steps up from behind her to lay a hand on Burr's arm and whisper words she can't hear into the other man's ear.
He must be of some comfort, because the man's posture relaxes just a bit.
Aaron Burr stands facing the breeze, as it picks up with a singing howl. His jacket whips in the wind.
His eyes shut, but Eliza knows it's not because of the breeze.
He's talking to her.
He feels her here.
She is here, Eliza knows. She was never gone, she will always be here.
Burr raises the scarf above his head.
Slowly, his fingers release.
The breeze curls around the scarf and soars it into the sky. Up, up, higher and higher, until it dances into the blue sky above them.
And Aaron Burr laughs.
He laughs and wraps an arm around his daughter as tears spill down his cheeks.
Burr watches the representation of his beloved wife be taken away, knowing now that she is free.
There will be no more pain for her, no more cancer, no more relapses.
Tia is gone now, forever, but the love they shared, that's still there.
The world will keep turning, without Tia. Most people will have never met her, never known her or her importance in their narrative. But they did.
Tia exists in all of them now. Cancer could never take that.
And if it takes her the same way, Eliza feels a strange comfort in knowing how life will continue around her.
The dead are never forgotten by those who love them.
Aaron Burr will love Tia till the day he dies, and is reunited with her.
Theo will remember her mother, love her mother, for the rest of her life.
She'll have her own children, maybe, and raise them as her mother raised her.
And Tia won't exist, but she'll always exist.
And that will be enough.
We can sail away tonight
On a sea of pure moonlight
We can navigate the stars
To bring us back home
In a place so far away
We'll be young
That's how we'll stay