by -=/\=- Zanh Liis
90302.03
A week after Going Home
Soundtrack: Stars and Midnight Blue by Enya
-=/\=-
-=The O'Sullivan Residence, County Cork=-
90302.03
A week after Going Home
Soundtrack: Stars and Midnight Blue by Enya
-=/\=-
-=The O'Sullivan Residence, County Cork=-
For days she had been comforted, simply by the fact that he was near. The smallest things, it seemed, brought her the greatest joy.
The sound of his voice as he contentedly hummed familiar songs, traveling from room to room to bring her another blanket, or a cup of coffee.
The gentle feeling of him draping his jacket over her shoulders as she rocked in the swing on the front porch, breathing deeply the fresh air of the countryside as she recuperated from recent adventures, as she preferred to call them.
Each day was a gift, and each hour brought along with it a feeling of grace and gratitude that defied description.
Even when he was busying himself with something in another room, she could feel his presence in the house like the warming glow of a fireplace.
In sharp contrast, the moment he left, she found that it felt intolerably empty.
Without his presence within the house it turned cold; and she grew colder inside of it by the minute. She grew anxious for escape from the feeling, if not the structure itself.
She was dying to get some air, anyway. She'd been under something akin to house arrest since the second they'd arrived, not that she cared, until now.
All she had wanted was the chance to just be here, with him, alone, and that was what she'd had. With the distinct exception of Dr. McKay's daily intrusions, or visits, as he preferred to call them, the rest of her honeymoon had played out just as she'd hoped.
Peacefully, without crisis or interruption.
Still, at times when she'd be half awake or, more correctly mostly asleep, her mind would wander and she'd begin to worry.
She worried for Salvek and his family. She worried for the crew of her ship. She worried for William Lindsay and she worried, most of all, for her husband.
Keiran was so happy when they were here. It seemed as though as long as the rest of the world was locked safely outside the confines of these walls that he was able to forget for spans of time the memories that haunted him, waking and sleeping.
She wondered at times if true healing would ever be possible for him. If that healing was something that she herself could help him find, or if he'd need to put himself into the hands of professionals again to try to overcome the waves of panic that intermittently jarred him from his rest.
She wondered honestly, if they would both have to consider that idea, as much as they mutually despised it.
She knew the power of such nightmares, and she hated having to bear witness to his more than she hated experiencing them herself. She wished she could take them for him- every one- to spare him ever suffering another moment of pain in this life because he loved her.
Harder than hearing him cry out her name in desperation was hearing the gratitude in his voice when he thanked her, every time, for waking him.
He always thanked her for waking him.
It cut deeper each time, feeling him tremble as she gathered him near into her arms and kept him there until he was asleep once again.
Some nights there would be no returning to sleep, and all she could do then was stay awake with him. Letting him talk if it helped, and holding him in silence if it did not.
Last night had been one of those nights. This time, however, she found that after waking him from his internal torment, all he wanted was hear the sound of her voice.
-=Flashback=-
"What shall we talk about then?" She asked, as the moon, long since past the midnight position above in the night sky, began to drop down beyond the skylights in the ceiling over their bed.
"Tell me," Keiran asked gently, "If ya can," he paused, thinking better suddenly of what he was about to ask her.
"Tell you what?"
"No, bad idea."
"Keiran," Liis sat up in bed, turning to face him in the moonlight. "What do you need to know?"
"Tell me...when did you, I mean." The starlight caught and reflected in his eyes, and Liis' heart nearly stopped.
*This is it.* She thought. *The sight I knew I'd die without, if I could never see it again.*
"When did'ya know that ya loved me in this timeline? Enough to wish I'd...come back to you?"
"Before you even left the ship, Keiran, I, I swear I never wanted you to leave to begin with." Liis confessed, "I didn't want you to...but I think," she stumbled over the words as she propped herself up on one elbow, tilting her head to the side.
Her rings glistened, catching Keiran's eye as she gazed at him and he closed his eyes, committing the vision to memory.
"Please tell me, Liis."
"It really hit me hard when I read the letter you left for me. The one that you gave to Thomas, in case I remembered you." Liis answered, fighting to get the words out.
"I knew, the moment that you said that you didn't want me to suffer over the loss of what we'd had, that you wanted me to be happy and live the life of my dreams," she sighed. "I knew that the one you meant wasn't the one I wanted, or needed, at all. The life I needed was one with you, and I didn't think I'd ever," she was unable to continue, but she didn't need to.
Keiran traced his hand up and down her arm, and even as she shivered at the sensation a question formed in her mind.
"If you were writing that letter now, knowing what you know and knowing how much I," she let her sentence go unfinished, seeing that he was already shaking his head.
"I wanted to free you, Liis. I didn't want you to feel torn, or guilty, for loving someone else and not me. But by God," his voice grew hoarse, each word more ragged than the last as he remembered the desperation he'd felt when writing that letter. "If I had to do it over, don' think I could've written it the way tha' I did."
"It would've said something different?"
"Different?" He laughed once. "Could say that. Somethin' a hell of a lot more selfish. Somethin' like, forget ev'ra'thin' else, ev'ra'one else, and marry me, Liis. That was all I ever wanted to say, from the moment I started to remember. The only thing that stopped me was bein' told if I acted upon my feelings then, that you could get hurt, and I..." he glanced away, up at the stars. "I couldn't have survived losin' ya that way again."
"Then regardless what you wrote, in the end you got what you wished for?" She asked hopefully, wondering if all they'd been through since the wedding was giving him second thoughts on the whole 'in sickness and in health' deal that came with marriage.
A deal in which he had certainly gotten the worse end of the bargain.
He answered her by kissing her and drawing her closer to him, and there was no other answer she needed.
-=End Flashback=-
She moved along slowly, legs feeling numb beneath her, from room to room of the home he'd built for her. She was trying so hard to feel at peace in it without him near, but still found it impossible.
Everything was too new; the emotional wounds, too deep and fresh.
Will's words about the compasses true readings and the knowledge of how close she'd come to losing Keiran again reverberated in her mind with increasingly amplified volume until finally, she simply had to get out.
She threw on her leather jacket, pulled on her boots and headed off down the lane into the whispering winds and sterling gray of the afternoon's soft, steady rain.
She didn't stop walking until she came upon a place she had only ever seen up close once before; in a nightmare that at the time had been impossible to wake from.
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-=/\=- Zanh Liis O'Sullivan
Currently on Earth
-=/\=- Zanh Liis O'Sullivan
Currently on Earth