Author's Note: Do you ever just get the urge to update a fic you abandoned almost ten years ago? Me too. I watched the Artful Dodger and totally blame Thomas Brodie Sangster for this.
The little girl remembers other things that she knows she shouldn't.
It's not just the vague memories of her father that she stopped bringing up after being met with the disapproving silence from her mother.
She's old enough to understand now.
Old enough to know her mother feels attachment will only distract from her work.
Even to her husband.
Even to her daughter.
There are other memories the little girl learns not to bring up.
Like the hazy one from when she had been sick, lungs full of liquid, heaving chest contemplating going still for good, and her mother had told her to get well.
There was something more.
Someone more right at the edge of her memories, a face familiar from her days peering into forbidden classrooms but a stranger nonetheless.
A boy.
A boy with fluffy hair and wide, kind eyes, occupying the bed next to her.
A tube twisting through the space between them, carrying blood from his arm to hers.
His hand stretching towards hers.
Gripping.
Gentle.
Sleep pulling her away before she could do more than squeeze weakly back.
The little girl asked her mother about him later.
Earned herself a frown for her trouble.
"He doesn't matter, Ada."
"Neither do I, not to you," the little girl wanted to reply.
She said nothing.