70. Bertram #2
“He mentioned medical school a few times over the years as a possibility for me. That he would be very proud of me if I were to become a doctor. He didn’t start pushing hard until I was in undergrad.
He said . . . I had started my work with animals so young, and I was already coauthor on all these papers and had gotten to be a part of more otherfolk studies than some People did their whole lives .
. . So he thought, maybe I . . . ‘got it out of my system’ sounds too harsh, and he never quite used those words, but . . .”
“But?”
Helena didn’t respond.
“Gerard was an amazing man,” Bertram said. “Nothing you say is going to make me think that he didn’t love you with every fiber of his being. Or you him.”
Helena swallowed and nodded. “He never explicitly said that he didn’t want me to continue my magizoology studies.
He just, he kept saying more and more how much amazing work I could do as a doctor, how many lives I could save.
All the things he never got to do. It really got in my head.
That’s why I didn’t start my PhD right away.
But I also . . . I didn’t fucking want to be a doctor, so I couldn’t commit to that, either. That’s why I took that gap year.”
Bertram squeezed her tightly.
He could hear the pain and conflict in Helena’s voice.
The fear she once had of disappointing her father, the fear she had now that voicing this was betraying his memory.
She had lived for so long worrying about making Gerard proud, but Bertram was certain that Gerard would have been proud of her no matter what.
He had heard the joy with which Gerard spoke of his daughter.
Helena had felt this pressure for so many years and never once mentioned it. Not even when Bertram and Helena were in the throes of their romance. It hurt to know that she had been so deeply anguished, and he never knew that a war was raging within her for her future.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” Bertram asked, as he held her as tightly as he could.
“You knew better than anyone else how badly I wanted to be a magizoologist. I knew you’d think my dad was in the wrong. And he loved you, Bertram, he really did. I didn’t want you to think badly of him.”
“Oh, Helena.” Bertram softly stroked her hair.
“And then, of course, there was the matter of us. I wanted to go where you went. I wanted to be with you. So, I told my father I was sorry, but I couldn’t go to medical school.
That that was his dream, not mine.” Helena took another deep breath.
“I also told him that I knew Dr. J offered to pay for medical school for him, and that now that I was an adult, he should do it. And he said . . . he said he wasn’t brilliant like I am.
That I’d do more good as a doctor than he ever could.
But he told me that if I became a doctor .
. . he would let Dr. J pay for his med school.
That was the deal he made me. So, I said I would do it.
I would go to med school if he would. By the time I finished residency, he wouldn’t have even been fifty yet.
He absolutely could have gone back to school.
” Helena swallowed. “But he died when he was forty-four.”
“Helena. I’m so, so sorry,” Bertram murmured, leaning his head against hers.
It was all starting to make sense now. Bertram had never understood why Helena would give up her lifelong dreams, seemingly out of the blue. Her love for magical creatures had seemed infinite. Her love for her father was even greater.
“I thought becoming a doctor was the one thing I could do to give him the life he deserved.” Tears flooded down Helena’s face, and Bertram brushed them gently away with his thumb.
“After everything he gave up for me, he could finally have his turn. And then he was just . . . gone. And part of me thought, ‘well, now I have to become a doctor in his memory.’ But I just, I just didn’t fucking want to do it, Bertram.
I hated it. So, I gave up. Maybe that means I’m not a very good Person, if saving lives isn’t as important to me as looking at otherfolk—”
“You weren’t giving up,” Bertram said, at once.
“You were choosing your own path in life, one that makes you happy. And you’re still contributing good to the world, Helena—not just for otherfolk and mundane animals.
This otherfolk crossing alone will save People’s lives—People are also killed in vehicular collisions with otherfolk.
You’re still saving lives, and you’re doing it in a way that’s meaningful to you. ”
“Thank you for saying that,” Helena said softly.
“I’m saying it because it’s true. You’re going to do amazing things in this world, Helena—you already have, and you’ll do more.
Gerard was wrong to try to push his dream on you, but no, I don’t think less of him for it.
Parents aren’t flawless beings. Look at my mom—she’s an amazing woman, but our relationship isn’t perfect.
You know that, but you still love Jennie.
There is no doubt in my mind that Gerard was wrong for making that deal with you.
I still love Gerard. You didn’t change that by telling me this. I promise.”
Helena flung her arms around Bertram and held him tightly.
“And I know Gerard would be proud of what you’re doing now.”
Helena nodded into Bertram’s chest. He stroked her hair. After a while, she took a deep breath and pulled back, sitting beside Bertram once more, leaning her head against his shoulder.
“I really needed to hear that,” Helena said. “Thank you.”
“I wish I had known at the time. It all makes more sense now. Well.” Bertram hesitated. “Most of it.”
They had come this far. They had broached the topic, and Bertram hadn’t fallen to pieces.
The floor hadn’t given out from beneath him nor did the ceiling cave in.
He had spent so long running away from this moment that now that he was tiptoeing closer and closer to the line, it seemed like the only logical thing to do was cross it.
Maybe it would hurt. But maybe it would heal.
Either way, there was nothing left to do but ask directly. Ask the question that had plagued him for years, that had haunted him at night, that even now he was both dying to know the answer to and afraid that hearing it would break him wide open all over again.
Bertram’s heart raced as he gathered all his strength to ask: “What about everything else you said that night? Were you just trying to drive me away, because you thought it would be easier for me to hate you?”
Helena furrowed her brow. “Bertram, what are you talking about?”
“What you said. About our work not mattering—”
Helena shook her head. “That wasn’t me trying to make you hate me. I was just trying to convince myself that that was true, not insult you—”
“And about—about human lives being the most important thing.” Bertram swallowed.
Helena’s mouth fell open slightly.
Bertram shrugged, feigning nonchalance, as if the words didn’t still sting five years on.
But they did. The realization that Helena did not accept him the way he thought she had had never stopped stinging.
“I never said that,” Helena said. “I would have said ‘humanoid’ if anything.”
Bertram scoffed humorlessly. “I remember pretty clearly what you said. Until my dad’s death, it was the worst moment of my life.”
Helena looked like he had slapped her.
“Bertram, I was a wreck at that point,” Helena said.
“I may well have said ‘humanoid’ and didn’t say it clearly because I was sobbing.
But if I did say ‘human,’ it was a slip of the tongue.
My father wanted me to work in medicine, healing People, of any species, as opposed to hanging upside down with flying foxes or doing little math equations to analyze Queen Alexandra’s birdweasel poop.
Are you telling me—did you think I meant that human lives, like human lives, like Homo sapiens specifically were most important?
Over pixies, like my grandmother? Over . . . vampires? Over orcs?”