it's funny, isn't it, how intertwined they are with each other. they've all lived in each other's pockets for so long, even when they were leagues away from each other or on opposite sides of oceans, that they know each other, breath and body and soul. but here, in england, that fades, except in all the ways it doesn't.
she knows, and she isn't bitter about it or angry; it is is simply a fact, that it's peter they all revolve around, peter who keeps them together and whole. peter has had his hands on edmund and her hands on him, and now she and edmund are -- together, as if they're trying to fill the hole of peter's absence with their own presence. there are four of them, but lucy has forgotten too much (and susan simultaneously envies and pities her this) and peter is gone with the setting sun and the turning of seasons. summer ended when he left, mouth hard against hers at the train station when their parents weren't looking (or maybe they were; it doesn't matter and she doesn't care), and the irony of it (again; whose joke is it now? their summer, having begun a thousand years ago, is always ending) would make her laugh if she remembered how.
they both have to leave to go to school, and that makes it easier and harder all at once, because most of the other girls know what she means. they have brothers or fathers or sweethearts at war too, and there is an air of waiting. once they're done, they will be part of the war, part of the world.
she comes home for christmas and edmund's there. she kisses his cheek like she would peter's, but edmund turns his face away, expression grim and set. "susan --" he says, and puts the letter in her hand.
it's addressed to him (of course it is; peter doesn't trust their parents and probably never will again. that's gone with their long-ago childhood), and for a moment, looking at it, the letters make no sense. then
your brother is missing as a result of air operations last night
and there's more, but she's too busy screaming to read it.
Re: doesn't take much to light my fire
it's funny, isn't it, how intertwined they are with each other. they've all lived in each other's pockets for so long, even when they were leagues away from each other or on opposite sides of oceans, that they know each other, breath and body and soul. but here, in england, that fades, except in all the ways it doesn't.
she knows, and she isn't bitter about it or angry; it is is simply a fact, that it's peter they all revolve around, peter who keeps them together and whole. peter has had his hands on edmund and her hands on him, and now she and edmund are -- together, as if they're trying to fill the hole of peter's absence with their own presence. there are four of them, but lucy has forgotten too much (and susan simultaneously envies and pities her this) and peter is gone with the setting sun and the turning of seasons. summer ended when he left, mouth hard against hers at the train station when their parents weren't looking (or maybe they were; it doesn't matter and she doesn't care), and the irony of it (again; whose joke is it now? their summer, having begun a thousand years ago, is always ending) would make her laugh if she remembered how.
they both have to leave to go to school, and that makes it easier and harder all at once, because most of the other girls know what she means. they have brothers or fathers or sweethearts at war too, and there is an air of waiting. once they're done, they will be part of the war, part of the world.
she comes home for christmas and edmund's there. she kisses his cheek like she would peter's, but edmund turns his face away, expression grim and set. "susan --" he says, and puts the letter in her hand.
it's addressed to him (of course it is; peter doesn't trust their parents and probably never will again. that's gone with their long-ago childhood), and for a moment, looking at it, the letters make no sense. then
your brother is missing as a result of air operations last night
and there's more, but she's too busy screaming to read it.