Susan Pevensie (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
quote_gentle_unquote) wrote2024-04-16 08:37 pm
quote_gentle_unquote) wrote2024-04-16 08:37 pm
Entry tags:
. [interlude]
A letter, carefully and neatly written on a clean sheet of paper, left out on her desk in case Lancelot should like to read it, too.
Dear Peter,
I've started a hundred different letters to you over the past few weeks. I haven't finished a single one. I've not been able to sort out my angle, you see. I've wanted to find the perfect combination of words to prove to you that I was never the enemy and it was wrong of you to treat your little sister as such. To force you to stop and really look at me while I say, Peter, you were wrong about me... and get you, despite that queer disconnect Lucy spoke of as being central to Aslan's country, to care.
I don't believe that's the way to do it, though.
Instead: Allow me to introduce you to Susan Pevensie.
I am your little sister, though I am very nearly the same age you were when you died. It's queer to think about. I took care of the littler ones - oh, don't look at me like that, you know I played a bigger role than you even if you were unable to ever admit it. You always did struggle to accept that women's work is as meaningful as men's, but your position in caring for Ed and Lu was always the same as Father's: setting rules, speaking sternly about your concerns, and the like. I was the one who would tuck them in with bed-time stories, who would bandage and kiss their scrapes and scratches, who would cajole them into eating their vegetables with supper. - but despite all that, you were always the eldest and the one we would look to for guidance and direction. Now you are dead, and soon I shall be older than the eldest ever was. Eventually I will be older than you ever got in Narnia, too. I've already surpassed Lucy on that front; soon I shall catch up to Edmund. I rather hate it.
But that isn't Susan Pevensie, is it? Or perhaps it is. I have always worried about things like that. You know how I worry. A fearful woman turning to the wrong things for comfort, isn't that how you put it before you died, when you thought I ought to spend more time behaving in ways you approved of? But I don't think it's wrong to make friends and dress nicely and try and capture the attention of others. Certainly I don't think it's as wrong as you did. Sometimes I think you might have been frightened, too, to see me grow and change. Other times I think that I'm being too generous with you in my grief.
I'm a worrier. It clouds my faith - you were right about that. I envision the worst-case scenario and then I can't stop thinking about it. Sometimes it captures me so fiercely I worry it gets in the way of my ability to form solid friendships with people here, since I'm so busy reacting to the nightmare I've constructed in my head that I barely have time to process what's actually laid out before me. But I would argue I'm occasionally justified in doing so. Perhaps you, like Lucy, are glad to be dead and in Aslan's country. But think, for a moment, what it's like to be me. You were all so angry that I forgot Narnia and Aslan. Perhaps (if I'm interpreting your actions generously) you were worried you might lose me. I was worried I was losing you, too, to madness and childish obsession. And then I did lose you. Every last one of you, save Uncle Harold and Aunt Alberta. My worst fear, realized: for my family to go where I could not follow; to move beyond all my capacity to protect and comfort.
I survived that. I'm in another world now. Perhaps Lucy thought to tell you after she visited. A world without rationing, where one cannot help but remember truths they long-ago suppressed. Here I grew fearful that things might change. That there might be some catch to the abundant supplies and comfortable accommodations. Again, my worst fear was realized. It wasn't nearly as bad as the last time, of course; a return to rationing pales in comparison to losing everyone you've ever loved. But I suppose nothing could ever be as bad as the first time. I can't bring myself to be grateful that you all died, though, even if it means that it's given proportionality to any other fear of loss I might experience.
Which I suppose evokes yet another fear. Susan Pevensie can't help but worry, and she has fallen in love. Naturally, more worry follows. I do wish you could meet him, Peter. Even though we fought so dreadfully so often - even though I hated your opinions on so many things - I still do value it, still do crave it. You're my big brother, you see, and my high king. He's sleeping right now, my Lancelot. He was injured. Mildly, in service of saving someone hurt more grievously, and that was days ago. He's since completely healed. But still I fuss. You know how I've always fussed. I don't expect that shall ever change, even if I am a creature of change these days.
My feelings about you are all so complicated. I can't separate out where the anger ends and the sadness begins. Lucy always had the greatest, purest faith, but you were always like a dog with a bone about yours. Jot that down, too. Susan Pevensie: fearful woman, can't help but worry, complicated feelings. Perhaps that's why I'm so drawn to science, where if you ask questions in the correct way, you can arrive at a clear answer. I like when things are plain. I like relying on my senses: what I can see, what I can touch, what I can taste and smell and hear. I don't like conflict unless it is a distraction from my worry. I do suppose that's why we always fought.
I've been reading for you all, since you died. Stories of heroic young girls for Lucy; political science for Edmund. I haven't the faintest idea where to start with you. I don't believe you truly knew me, but I suspect it's possible I don't know you, either. We grew up together. We ruled together. We raised our little siblings together. We're strangers. Your opinions were always so stridently expressed, but still when I sit to think about you, all I can picture is a blaze of glory, a bright light, and an emptiness behind it. Men remind me of you when they anger me, or when they shine brightly, or when they shut down in the face of my obstinance, or when they rush off into battle without thought of practicalities, or when they look young and wield swords with improbable grace. In a way, even though Lucy always loved Aslan best of all of us, I think you must have loved Narnia the most. Perhaps it came from being High King. Perhaps that gave you a greater sense of burden. I think you would have done anything to protect it - I wonder how you feel now that it's gone, and I worry about that too, even though Lucy says you haven't got any cares or concerns in Aslan's country. I believe you would have protected Narnia against your own little sister, if need be. (Me, obviously. Never Lucy, who personified it.) Perhaps I ought to forgive that, but to me Narnia, though I loved it, always came second to you three. If Lucy loved God over country, and you loved country over all, I loved family the most.
(I believe Edmund might have been focusing on loving himself. Don't be hard on him for it. I know how sore you can get. That sort of thing was important for Edmund, after everything with the White Witch, and reasonably so. He deserved it, you know.)
Perhaps Susan Pevensie is as shallow as you accused her of being. Sometimes I feel like little more than the fragments I've described on this page. Perhaps you'd be surprised, though. Your vain little sister in mourning black for ten months! Even though the color does wash me out so. Or perhaps you wouldn't be surprised at all. After all, I do wear nylons still, and lipstick. But Peter, my interest in looking good hasn't replaced my practicality. I have always been practical to a fault. I am precise. I take things literally. I am prone to flights of panic. I care deeply for some, and little for many. I like ethology and psychoanalysis. Believing in Aslan again doesn't mean I like him. I still don't know what to say to you. I never know what to say to you. I don't know where we stand, beyond the fact that our relationship hadn't been good in years.
The worst thing I've been able to imagine in a given moment has happened twice, now, and I've overcome both occurrences. I miss you every day. I trust you won't mind if I admit I miss Edmund and Lucy more - my missing you is so caught up in wishing we'd had a chance to resolve our differences that I barely think I miss you (as an individual man independent of being my big brother) at all compared to them. You were my big brother; you were my guiding light. I know everything about you. I don't know who you are. It's all ever so clouded by anger, by regret, by sorrow. But even though I miss you - or the idea of you - or what we might have become, if Aslan had allowed you to grow old - I have weathered the storm. Grief still takes me like a jagged wound when I least expect it to, but every time, it's a little less intense. Every time, I recover more quickly. Perhaps one day it will be more of an ache than an acute shock that threatens to unmoor me.
This month, too, is nearly over. Though the supplies stopped coming, we have weathered this storm, and now we know to anticipate such things in the future. I suppose sometimes there must be a forest fire to scour the land and make way for new growth. I suppose, if nothing else, realizing my fears and experiencing my losses has done the same for me. I'm your little sister Susan. I am exactly as you remember. I am a completely different person. I don't know where to even start, with explaining myself to you. Part of it is because I don't know who you are outside of my complicated feelings and inconsistent memories, but the rest of it is that I suppose I'm getting to know Susan Pevensie (as she is now) too.
I love you, Peter. I have always loved you. I will always love you. I hope one day I will remember how to like you.
Your sister,
Susan
Dear Peter,
I've started a hundred different letters to you over the past few weeks. I haven't finished a single one. I've not been able to sort out my angle, you see. I've wanted to find the perfect combination of words to prove to you that I was never the enemy and it was wrong of you to treat your little sister as such. To force you to stop and really look at me while I say, Peter, you were wrong about me... and get you, despite that queer disconnect Lucy spoke of as being central to Aslan's country, to care.
I don't believe that's the way to do it, though.
Instead: Allow me to introduce you to Susan Pevensie.
I am your little sister, though I am very nearly the same age you were when you died. It's queer to think about. I took care of the littler ones - oh, don't look at me like that, you know I played a bigger role than you even if you were unable to ever admit it. You always did struggle to accept that women's work is as meaningful as men's, but your position in caring for Ed and Lu was always the same as Father's: setting rules, speaking sternly about your concerns, and the like. I was the one who would tuck them in with bed-time stories, who would bandage and kiss their scrapes and scratches, who would cajole them into eating their vegetables with supper. - but despite all that, you were always the eldest and the one we would look to for guidance and direction. Now you are dead, and soon I shall be older than the eldest ever was. Eventually I will be older than you ever got in Narnia, too. I've already surpassed Lucy on that front; soon I shall catch up to Edmund. I rather hate it.
But that isn't Susan Pevensie, is it? Or perhaps it is. I have always worried about things like that. You know how I worry. A fearful woman turning to the wrong things for comfort, isn't that how you put it before you died, when you thought I ought to spend more time behaving in ways you approved of? But I don't think it's wrong to make friends and dress nicely and try and capture the attention of others. Certainly I don't think it's as wrong as you did. Sometimes I think you might have been frightened, too, to see me grow and change. Other times I think that I'm being too generous with you in my grief.
I'm a worrier. It clouds my faith - you were right about that. I envision the worst-case scenario and then I can't stop thinking about it. Sometimes it captures me so fiercely I worry it gets in the way of my ability to form solid friendships with people here, since I'm so busy reacting to the nightmare I've constructed in my head that I barely have time to process what's actually laid out before me. But I would argue I'm occasionally justified in doing so. Perhaps you, like Lucy, are glad to be dead and in Aslan's country. But think, for a moment, what it's like to be me. You were all so angry that I forgot Narnia and Aslan. Perhaps (if I'm interpreting your actions generously) you were worried you might lose me. I was worried I was losing you, too, to madness and childish obsession. And then I did lose you. Every last one of you, save Uncle Harold and Aunt Alberta. My worst fear, realized: for my family to go where I could not follow; to move beyond all my capacity to protect and comfort.
I survived that. I'm in another world now. Perhaps Lucy thought to tell you after she visited. A world without rationing, where one cannot help but remember truths they long-ago suppressed. Here I grew fearful that things might change. That there might be some catch to the abundant supplies and comfortable accommodations. Again, my worst fear was realized. It wasn't nearly as bad as the last time, of course; a return to rationing pales in comparison to losing everyone you've ever loved. But I suppose nothing could ever be as bad as the first time. I can't bring myself to be grateful that you all died, though, even if it means that it's given proportionality to any other fear of loss I might experience.
Which I suppose evokes yet another fear. Susan Pevensie can't help but worry, and she has fallen in love. Naturally, more worry follows. I do wish you could meet him, Peter. Even though we fought so dreadfully so often - even though I hated your opinions on so many things - I still do value it, still do crave it. You're my big brother, you see, and my high king. He's sleeping right now, my Lancelot. He was injured. Mildly, in service of saving someone hurt more grievously, and that was days ago. He's since completely healed. But still I fuss. You know how I've always fussed. I don't expect that shall ever change, even if I am a creature of change these days.
My feelings about you are all so complicated. I can't separate out where the anger ends and the sadness begins. Lucy always had the greatest, purest faith, but you were always like a dog with a bone about yours. Jot that down, too. Susan Pevensie: fearful woman, can't help but worry, complicated feelings. Perhaps that's why I'm so drawn to science, where if you ask questions in the correct way, you can arrive at a clear answer. I like when things are plain. I like relying on my senses: what I can see, what I can touch, what I can taste and smell and hear. I don't like conflict unless it is a distraction from my worry. I do suppose that's why we always fought.
I've been reading for you all, since you died. Stories of heroic young girls for Lucy; political science for Edmund. I haven't the faintest idea where to start with you. I don't believe you truly knew me, but I suspect it's possible I don't know you, either. We grew up together. We ruled together. We raised our little siblings together. We're strangers. Your opinions were always so stridently expressed, but still when I sit to think about you, all I can picture is a blaze of glory, a bright light, and an emptiness behind it. Men remind me of you when they anger me, or when they shine brightly, or when they shut down in the face of my obstinance, or when they rush off into battle without thought of practicalities, or when they look young and wield swords with improbable grace. In a way, even though Lucy always loved Aslan best of all of us, I think you must have loved Narnia the most. Perhaps it came from being High King. Perhaps that gave you a greater sense of burden. I think you would have done anything to protect it - I wonder how you feel now that it's gone, and I worry about that too, even though Lucy says you haven't got any cares or concerns in Aslan's country. I believe you would have protected Narnia against your own little sister, if need be. (Me, obviously. Never Lucy, who personified it.) Perhaps I ought to forgive that, but to me Narnia, though I loved it, always came second to you three. If Lucy loved God over country, and you loved country over all, I loved family the most.
(I believe Edmund might have been focusing on loving himself. Don't be hard on him for it. I know how sore you can get. That sort of thing was important for Edmund, after everything with the White Witch, and reasonably so. He deserved it, you know.)
Perhaps Susan Pevensie is as shallow as you accused her of being. Sometimes I feel like little more than the fragments I've described on this page. Perhaps you'd be surprised, though. Your vain little sister in mourning black for ten months! Even though the color does wash me out so. Or perhaps you wouldn't be surprised at all. After all, I do wear nylons still, and lipstick. But Peter, my interest in looking good hasn't replaced my practicality. I have always been practical to a fault. I am precise. I take things literally. I am prone to flights of panic. I care deeply for some, and little for many. I like ethology and psychoanalysis. Believing in Aslan again doesn't mean I like him. I still don't know what to say to you. I never know what to say to you. I don't know where we stand, beyond the fact that our relationship hadn't been good in years.
The worst thing I've been able to imagine in a given moment has happened twice, now, and I've overcome both occurrences. I miss you every day. I trust you won't mind if I admit I miss Edmund and Lucy more - my missing you is so caught up in wishing we'd had a chance to resolve our differences that I barely think I miss you (as an individual man independent of being my big brother) at all compared to them. You were my big brother; you were my guiding light. I know everything about you. I don't know who you are. It's all ever so clouded by anger, by regret, by sorrow. But even though I miss you - or the idea of you - or what we might have become, if Aslan had allowed you to grow old - I have weathered the storm. Grief still takes me like a jagged wound when I least expect it to, but every time, it's a little less intense. Every time, I recover more quickly. Perhaps one day it will be more of an ache than an acute shock that threatens to unmoor me.
This month, too, is nearly over. Though the supplies stopped coming, we have weathered this storm, and now we know to anticipate such things in the future. I suppose sometimes there must be a forest fire to scour the land and make way for new growth. I suppose, if nothing else, realizing my fears and experiencing my losses has done the same for me. I'm your little sister Susan. I am exactly as you remember. I am a completely different person. I don't know where to even start, with explaining myself to you. Part of it is because I don't know who you are outside of my complicated feelings and inconsistent memories, but the rest of it is that I suppose I'm getting to know Susan Pevensie (as she is now) too.
I love you, Peter. I have always loved you. I will always love you. I hope one day I will remember how to like you.
Your sister,
Susan