30. Time Shall Grant Your Longing #3
All lies, Luna thought distantly. Well-meaning lies, but lies nonetheless.
Louise Demain was a walking cosmic event. You didn’t reason with the concept of time. You just survived it. Or not.
The screen door creaked open and she felt her mother’s presence behind her. “Mind if I sit?”
Luna shrugged. She didn’t mind, but of course, she didn’t particularly care about anything. “It’s your porch.”
Mama settled onto the step beside her, close enough that their shoulders touched. Uncharacteristically, she didn’t speak. Didn’t try to offer a lecture or try to explain anything away. She sat beside her daughter in the summer darkness, listening to the cicadas sing.
“I tried to talk to her,” Luna said finally. Her voice was hoarse from crying. “Louise, I mean. After everyone left. I went to the clock shop. She wouldn’t even open the door.”
“I assumed as much.”
“I offered her anything. I told her she could have whatever she wanted. Years of servitude, years off my life . . . I didn’t care. Just bring him back to me. Or send me to him, that would be okay. Let me go to the 1920s. Let me—” Her voice broke.
Mama’s arm came around her shoulders, solid and warm. “I know, sweetie. I know it hurts.”
“She said no.” The words spilled out now, like a toxin she needed to purge.
“She said Shaw belongs in the 1920s, I belong in the 2020s, and that’s how time works.
She said I was being ‘tediously dramatic.’ I may have called her a heartless bitch.
Or maybe that was just in my head. I can’t remember.
But it’s just not fair.” Luna knew she sounded like a child, but she didn’t care.
“He was right here. We were making plans. We were going to—” She couldn’t finish.
They sat like that for a while, Luna crying into her mother’s shoulder while Mama held her and, blessedly, didn’t try to fix it or make it better or tell her it would be okay.
Finally, when Luna had cried herself out, Mama said softly, “You love him.”
It wasn’t a question, but Luna answered anyway. “Yes.”
“First time?”
Luna nodded against her mother’s shoulder. “I thought I knew what it felt like before. There were other guys, but it was never—” She took a shaky breath. “It was never like this.”
“No,” Mama said. “I’m sure not.”
“How did you know? With Dad. How did you know it was special with him?”
Mama was quiet for a long moment, her eyes distant.
“He made me laugh,” she said finally. “And he listened when I spoke. Not that thing people do when they’re just waiting for their turn to speak.
Actually listened. He remembered things.
Some trifle I’d mentioned weeks before, he’d suddenly recall for no real reason.
” She smiled, sad and fond. “And when he looked at me, I was the only person in the entire world who mattered.”
“Elias does that,” Luna whispered. “The looking thing. Like I’m . . . like I’m everything.”
“I know, darling. I’ve seen him do it.”
“And now he’s gone.” Her voice broke again. “And I don’t know how to . . . Mama, I don’t know how to do this. How to wake up tomorrow and the day after and keep pretending the world makes sense when he’s not in it.”
Mama took both of Luna’s hands in hers, holding them tight. “When I lost your father, I thought the same thing. I was sure I’d never survive it. Couldn’t raise three little girls alone. Couldn’t keep getting up every morning when the person I loved most was gone.”
Luna had heard this story before, of course, but never quite in this way. Not with Mama’s voice raw with old grief, her careful composure stripped away.
“But, my darling, I did survive. I felt entirely broken but I kept on anyway. Because your father would have wanted me to. Because you and your sisters needed me to. Because life kept going whether I was ready or not.”
“I don’t want to get over him,” Luna said fiercely. “I don’t want to move on or heal or any of those things people say.”
“I know.” Mama squeezed her hands. “But, Luna . . . Look at me.” She waited until Luna met her eyes. “I need you to hear me. You’re going to get through this.”
Luna shook her head. “I can’t—”
“Yes, you can. Because you’re a Melrose.
Because Shaw didn’t give up on you when you were in danger, and you’re not going to give up on yourself now.
And because—” Mama’s voice softened “—because the fact that it hurts this much means you loved him. Really loved him. And that’s worth something, even if it ends in heartbreak. ”
“It doesn’t feel worth it right now.”
“No. It won’t for a long time.” Mama brushed Luna’s hair back from her face, the way she’d done when Luna was small and had nightmares.
“But someday you’ll be able to think about him without feeling like you’re drowning.
You’ll remember the good parts. The way he made you laugh.
The way he looked at you. The morning you woke up with him beside you.
You’ll remember these things, and it won’t hurt quite so much. ”
Her throat tightened. “What if someday never comes?”
Mama was quiet for a moment, and then said, “I suppose if I said this was all actually good for you . . . you might be annoyed?”
Luna grunted. “If you say this is all good for me, I will start screaming and never stop.”
“Fair enough. I didn’t say it.” She kissed her instead. Then she stood, pulling Luna up with her. “For now, you need some sleep. Real sleep, not the shenanigans you got up to last night.”
“No way I can sleep.”
“Try anyway.” Mama guided her toward the door, one arm still around her shoulders. “And tomorrow, we’ll start figuring out what comes next.”
Luna stopped at the door, looking back at the empty porch, the dark street beyond. “Do you think there might be a way? To get him back?”
“I think,” Mama said carefully, “that you need to take care of yourself, no matter what happens. Can you do that for me?”
Luna took in a shaky breath. “I can try.”
“That’s all I’m asking. Just have a little faith. Not in me, not in Louise, but in yourself. You’re stronger than you think you are. You always have been.”
She nodded, not trusting her voice, and let her mother guide her inside. But before the door closed, she looked back one more time at the night sky.
I’m not giving up on you, she thought. Wherever you are, whatever year it is . . . I’m not giving up.
She didn’t know if Elias could hear her across time and space and Louise Demain’s cosmic indifference.
But she meant it anyway.