Fic for ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
violeteves
Oct. 12th, 2004 05:48 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
cygna_himeSpecial delivery: One Meiling fic, just for you. Happy Birthday!
She used to care. The pain used to be at the back of her mind, almost forgotten but never quiescent. She had gotten so used to ignoring it she sometimes could forget it was there. Sometimes. There had never been whole weeks, or even days, when she would go free of reminder. Until…
Until she went away to somewhere she couldn’t hear her mother anymore, and it was too expensive to call. Letters were easily burned unread, and they came only once a week at the most. She was free. For the first time, she was free. And there were other people like her. She had never been quite sure they existed before. Suddenly they were all around her.
She dreamed, even then, of running away from them all, making herself famous and wealthy beyond their wildest dreams. She dreamed of coming back, smiling condescendingly at the mother who had despised her, the father who had forgotten her, and making them see that she didn’t need them, had never needed them, that she was better than they could ever hope to be. But she never did. There was always someone to stay for; first him, and then the growing circle of people who really would miss her if she left.
She hated to come back to her house, and found the best excuse she could to leave again and go back to the place she almost called home. She grew up there, burning letters until she could swallow her pride and ask a friend to read them first. Her friend had understood. It was, she slowly began to realize, not a unique problem to be unwanted.
When at last she did come back, it was as herself. Not as a rich celebrity, but as herself, someone who was going places of her own choosing. She had to stay there a few months, perhaps a year, but somehow it didn’t touch her anymore. None of her mother’s barbs hurt her. All she did was shut herself out of their reach, and live in letters and phone calls to home. Home, where she would return. Home, where she could be herself no matter what that meant. Even if it meant not a magician or a martial artist. Even if, as she suspected, it meant something within the bounds of the mundane.
That was her home; not the land where she had been born, but the land where she had lived. Her family; not the people she shared blood with, but the people who shared her love. Her self; not who she was expected to be, but who she really was.
And nothing could hurt her anymore.
She used to care. The pain used to be at the back of her mind, almost forgotten but never quiescent. She had gotten so used to ignoring it she sometimes could forget it was there. Sometimes. There had never been whole weeks, or even days, when she would go free of reminder. Until…
Until she went away to somewhere she couldn’t hear her mother anymore, and it was too expensive to call. Letters were easily burned unread, and they came only once a week at the most. She was free. For the first time, she was free. And there were other people like her. She had never been quite sure they existed before. Suddenly they were all around her.
She dreamed, even then, of running away from them all, making herself famous and wealthy beyond their wildest dreams. She dreamed of coming back, smiling condescendingly at the mother who had despised her, the father who had forgotten her, and making them see that she didn’t need them, had never needed them, that she was better than they could ever hope to be. But she never did. There was always someone to stay for; first him, and then the growing circle of people who really would miss her if she left.
She hated to come back to her house, and found the best excuse she could to leave again and go back to the place she almost called home. She grew up there, burning letters until she could swallow her pride and ask a friend to read them first. Her friend had understood. It was, she slowly began to realize, not a unique problem to be unwanted.
When at last she did come back, it was as herself. Not as a rich celebrity, but as herself, someone who was going places of her own choosing. She had to stay there a few months, perhaps a year, but somehow it didn’t touch her anymore. None of her mother’s barbs hurt her. All she did was shut herself out of their reach, and live in letters and phone calls to home. Home, where she would return. Home, where she could be herself no matter what that meant. Even if it meant not a magician or a martial artist. Even if, as she suspected, it meant something within the bounds of the mundane.
That was her home; not the land where she had been born, but the land where she had lived. Her family; not the people she shared blood with, but the people who shared her love. Her self; not who she was expected to be, but who she really was.
And nothing could hurt her anymore.
