[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

[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."