[For Elvis]

[intheruins]

Grief, as always, comes in waves. Not long after Edith's funeral, the newspapers stop talking about the Purge on the front page and slowly life seeps back into something like normality. At least, as close as anything can get to normality in a place like Darrow.

Serena settles back into her routine of working on bringing the house up to modern standards and teaching lessons at the stable, marvelling every day at the progress George is making. Before long, she's sure he'll be walking and talking, and all at once she fears the change and is desperate for it to happen. She doesn't know if she'll ever have a child again and lives with an awareness everything might be the first time for the last time, but she also wants to see everything the child she and Pemberton created is capable of.

Today, though, he's been with a sitter while Serena's been at the stables showing a young girl the basics of dressage. She picks him up afterward, still wearing her jodhpurs and a sweaty complexion despite the growing cold. Balancing a job and parenthood is more difficult than she ever imagined but also deeply gratifying, a reminder that she is more than one thing and always has been.

There aren't often visitors by the house nearby theirs so Serena's surprised to see a young man when she gets off the bus with George in her arms. Curiosity gets the better of her and she lifts her hand into a wordless wave. 

Comments

[wasblindbefore]

Though he much prefers it to the city itself, Elvis doesn't typically spend a lot of time out in the country. There's no real reason for him to, nor is there time; though things have slowed down over the past few weeks, following the influx of business after the Purge, he still keeps busy, too much so to drive out here with no reason. As he sometimes does, though, today, he's stopped by to see Effy, and is in the process of pausing to light a cigarette, seeing no reason not to take his time on his way back to where he's parked his hearse, when a woman gets off the bus and waves.

He waves back, thinking that he might as well. As quiet as it is out here, he wouldn't have expected to run into anyone else, and he can't help but wonder if the same is true for her, too.

"Afternoon."

[intheruins]

"Hello," Serena responds, stepping a little closer. Her eyes widen a little when she sees a hearse not too far off in the distance. The way that the dead are treated here seems to be far more dignified than on the timber camp, but it also seems to cost an awful lot more. With the amount of fatalities on a weekly basis from rattlesnake bites and falling trees, there was no way the business could afford such transport – and neither could the fallen's families. "Is that yours?"

[wasblindbefore]

"Uh, yeah," Elvis says with a nod and a glance back in the direction of the hearse. It's a strange sight, he knows — has been told as much before — but with as normal as that and everything about death has always been for him, he's never really thought twice about it. Certainly he doesn't see any reason to get another car when this one functions perfectly well. "Or, well, I guess it's technically work's, but I get to use it for whatever, 'long as I bring it back with the gas tank filled up."

[intheruins]

"Are you an undertaker, then?" Serena asks without flinching. The practicalities of death don't really bother her even if she'd been shocked to see a hearse this far out in the country. She'd thought maybe someone had died, and around this area if they had she might very well have known them. She's curious to know more even if it isn't her right, death having been a part of her life since she was terribly small and following her wherever she goes.

[wasblindbefore]

"I am, yeah," Elvis says, a little relieved that she at least doesn't seem to be too put off by the prospect. Most people are. "Never saw much point in gettin' another car when I can just use this." It's all he's ever driven anyway, the only vehicle they had at home. Sure, maybe it gets him odd looks on occasion, but since when has that ever not been the case in his life. "There's no one in there now, though. I was just visitin' a friend."

[intheruins]

"Sounds like the practical choice," Serena says. She's never driven cars much herself, in part because of the traditions of her times and in part because she simply preferred horseback riding when it came to transport. Trains, too, had a sort of nostalgic quality to her. She has vivid memories of gathering up her siblings and going to the train station to collect her father after he'd been to visit another city. "I've met the young man who lives over that way. Harley, I think it was."

[wasblindbefore]

"Yeah, I know him, sort of," Elvis says, nodding. "I'm friends with his girlfriend, s'why I came out here." It's a bit of a drive, but it's worth it to be able to spend time with an old friend, one he once thought he would never see again. He's still not entirely sure how that happened, Effy remembering everything, when he's never heard of that being the case in any other instance, but he's damn pleased for it. Friends aren't something he's ever had a lot of in the first place. Getting one of the few he has back, that's a pretty big deal.

[intheruins]

"I'm not sure I've met her," Serena says. She hasn't made much of an effort to socialize around here but when she's in the city and when she's got George with her, she knows she needs to go the extra mile. She might be content in her not-quite-loneliness but she doesn't wish that on or for him. She loves him too much for that. "I hope you don't mind my asking," she continues, although she's ever been one to bite back curiosity: "But do you like what you do for a living?"

[wasblindbefore]

"No, I don't mind at all," Elvis says, shaking his head. He's used to fielding comments about it, uncommon — and off-putting — a line of work as it is. People are usually either curious, morbidly curious, or they don't want to know anything about it. Often, he has a hard time putting himself in their position, with as accustomed to it as he is. "I do, yeah. I was kind of... born into it, so I grew up around it. Got used to it pretty quickly that way."

[intheruins]

"I can understand that, somewhat," Serena nods. She'd been born on a timber camp and hadn't known any differently until it all fell apart. Her life had been learning about the economics of timber and riding about the mountains of Colorado before she could walk. Family businesses just make sense to her. If they'd stayed in North Carolina, George surely would have inherited their empire. "I'd imagine you would have been more busy than usual, lately."

[wasblindbefore]

"Yeah, it's been..." Elvis trails off, not sure of the most tactful way to put it. Normally, he doesn't really give a damn about such things, but the Purge is still something different, and so fresh in most people's memories, that it's worth treading cautiously. Besides, just because he's used to death doesn't mean he'll ever be insensitive about it. "Well, there's been a lot happening lately."

[intheruins]

It's hard not to think of Edith and want to ask after her, but Serena stops herself. It's none of her business and even if it was, she's sure there are rules and regulations about what information can be shared. And anyway, she can't imagine what he could say that would make her feel better about her friend's passing. "Well, thank you," she offers as a compromise. "For what you do."

[wasblindbefore]

It's not the sort of response he usually gets, more thoughtful than that, and Elvis smiles faintly for it. Though he's never really stopped to consider any other line of work, he's also always thought that someone has to do it. It may as well be someone like him, who knows the trade, who isn't bothered by it. "I like to think maybe it helps people," he says, shrugging maybe a bit more easily than the subject should call for. "At least a little."

[intheruins]

"I think it helps more than a little," Serena says, thinking beyond the immediacy of Edith's passing and back to her parents and siblings. The sole survivor of the tragedy, she'd been the only one to stand at the funeral and represent a world of grief. Her memories are faint but she's certain that the undertaker had offered a kind word or two at a time when nobody had known what to say. When she hadn't known what to say. "The funeral... business was very different where I'm from, though."