The Tale of Susan Pevensie- part 2

First, I want to apologize, as this and another post were mixed up and this post should have been published on Wednesday. But I hope that you will appreciate it anyway and also check out the other post. Maybe the mix-up will serve a bigger purpose, as God’s plans are better than ours.

Susan spent several months in a haze of grief and regret. She hardly noticed anything but the constant ache of missing her brothers, her parents, and her sister Lucy. Lucy, the bright spot that had given them all hope. And now, even she was gone. 

She had no one to give her hope now. 

But there was Michael. Peter’s steady, reliable best friend. He didn’t understand what she had shut out of her life, what she had refused to acknowledge, but he was there. Always there. 

He took her to the market, practically made her go with him, and then walked her home to her flat again. 

When she didn’t have the strength or will power to cook, which was often, he would come over and bumble his way through a meal preparation. It was usually pretty tasteless -he wasn’t great at picking seasonings and such- but Susan could hardly notice the flavors in any case, the guilt and depression was so overwhelming at first. 

Then it was April, and flowers began to come up in her window boxes, and she realized it was spring. Lucy had always loved spring. So had her mother. 

Susan resolved to plant some flowers for them. What fun they had had as children before the war, making gardens and watching the little seedlings come up. 

She didn’t know which ones to get, so she asked Michael the next day. He was fortunately more experienced with flowers than he was with cooking, so he helped her select some seeds and even a few seedlings from a local farmer he knew, an old family friend. They planted them on the weekend, and Susan felt better immediately.

“Thank you for helping me, Michael. You’ve been my rock these last several months.” she said afterwards. 

“Of course…anything for Pete’s sister.” he said in his easygoing way, but she sensed something more underlying his words. As though it was more than her just being the sister of brave, protective Peter, who would do anything he could to protect his family. Maybe this time, someone was helping her for herself. Maybe Michael saw who she really was and didn’t hate her for the way she had pushed them all away, even if he didn’t know, couldn’t understand the reason why. 

If she was too old…Michael surely was too. There was no way she could explain the memories she had of that place. No way he could ever have the experiences she had, what she remembered no matter how hard she tried to bury them. 

But somehow, in that moment, none of that seemed to matter. Michael was there for her, and it was enough. 

“Really. I mean it. If you hadn’t been here, I might as well have died too.” she shuddered. “Your being here means more than I could ever explain. Thank you.”