bigapplesauce | Children Aren't as Simple as We'd Like to Think [Closed]

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Children Aren't as Simple as We'd Like to Think [Closed]

The practical, sensible part of her knows this might not be a good idea. It's too sudden, too quick, too much responsibility striking like a bolt of lightning out of a clear blue sky. Greta's still raw and aching, the Witch's blunt exposition and the Balladeer's more gentle but no less horrible refrain replaying themselves in her mind with exhausting regularity. She shouldn't even be alive; what business does she have taking in a child? Especially one who, from the sounds of things, might as well have been raised by wolves?

Well. She doesn't have any business, full stop. That's rather been the problem, these past few days. Waiting to go home had been her chief occupation, and there's no point in that, anymore. If she doesn't find some way to fill the hours, all the loving support her friends can offer won't be enough to keep her from going mad. She needs to do something.

She can do this.

Her apartment was already neat as a pin, and it's been livened up with some art supplies and a few toys. It's not enough for the long term - the child will need far more if Greta's going to care for her indefinitely - but she thought it best not to jar the girl with an overwhelming display. Aziraphale only asked for help, after all; it would be rash of her to act as if it was a given that Lilly would be staying here forever. Maybe she'll only end up watching the child for a few days. Maybe Lilly won't even like it here.

Greta really hopes she does, though. Now that a potential purpose has been dangled in front of her nose, she can't help but grasp at it. And if she's a little too eager, well, that's better than the numbing fog she's been drifting through of late.

How refreshing, to want something she can actually have.

She looks around the apartment, as if to give the furniture an opportunity to object to the impending visitor. Then she picks up her phone and texts Aziraphale one last time.

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He gathers Lilly's things together, leaving the actual explanation of what's happening to Melanie. If Greta is able to handle Lilly, then this will be better for her in the end, and he and Melanie will be able to go back to isolating in their typical fashion.

Lilly, he suspects, will not be pleased about the development. She likes being with Melanie, and she's grown used to being here. But she is too young to know what's best. And honestly, what does he know about child-rearing? Melanie doesn't count at all. She's a small, preternaturally sweet adult.

"All right," he says, holding out a hand to the girl. "Shall we?"

Lilly understands enough to know that she's leaving. Melanie's said it's for the best but she isn't sure how that's right. She likes it here, with Melanie and Aziraphale. Well, mostly Melanie. It's almost like having Victoria around again, in a way. Aziraphale is nice enough but she just isn't as close with him.

She does, however, like him well enough to offer a small, mournful type of smile as she places her smaller hand in his. "Lilly go," she mumbles as her gaze flickers first to Melanie then to the ground. Her mind is racing, wondering if she'll like who she's going to stay with or if she'll wind up biting her. She doesn't think Melanie would like that.

She knows Aziraphale wouldn't.

Her lips curve into a fleeting bemused look before her expression falls into a somewhat sad one again. She absently curls her toes against the ground, waiting for the scenery to change into something unfamiliar and wishing Melanie could come with her even though she knows it's not safe. Just like Mama. Mama's house is in the woods. She's safe there. Melanie is safe with Aziraphale. It isn't what Lilly wants but fussing won't change it.

She's tried to explain things to Lilly, and she knows it hasn't really worked. Maybe she couldn't find the right words. That's hard, sometimes. Or maybe it's just not something Lilly could understand, even with all the right words.

No matter how much like a hungry child Lilly might be, she isn't one. Not really. She's human, and that means she could be normal. Maybe she's not normal yet, but she's learning quickly. Melanie's been able to teach her how to write a little, and her manners are improving (or occasionally appearing, at least). But you can only learn so much when you're cooped up all the time - Melanie knows that lesson well. And the only thing stopping Lilly from going out and learning more things and meeting more people is Melanie, herself. It's not fair. Lilly can bite just about whoever she wants without the world ending; she shouldn't have to live under the same strict rules Melanie imposes on herself.

If nothing else, she should at least get to try being a normal little girl, with something like a normal mother. If she doesn't like it... well, the choice to stay with her and Aziraphale would mean more if Lilly knew what she was choosing from.

"You'll be okay," Melanie promises, taking the angel's other hand. "We'll all go together, and we'll make sure Greta's nice." She sounds nice, from what Aziraphale's said about her. Hopefully she'll be good for Lilly, the way Miss Justineau was good for her.

Their surroundings change in an eye-blink, Aziraphale's flat replaced by a hallway. It's not as shabby as the hall in the old Rebel building, and Melanie shifts her feet on the thicker carpeting as the angel knocks on what must be Greta's door. It opens a moment later, and a woman peers out at them, her gaze dropping down to Melanie and Lilly straightaway. She seems surprised to see two children, but she recovers quickly and steps back to let them in, a little smile tugging at her lips.

"Hello," the woman says, and Melanie notes the familiar accent with a little pulse of pleasure. Greta looks kind, and--Melanie has to mentally dig for a moment before coming up with wholesome. And she has a nice voice. Melanie leans forward to give Lilly an encouraging smile as Greta adds, "Please, come in."

"Hullo," says Aziraphale pleasantly as he leads the girls into Greta's apartment. "Thank you so much for making yourself available on such short notice. I do appreciate it." He looks down at Lilly and, after a moment's hesitation, lowers himself into a crouch. "Lilly, this is Greta. She'll be taking care of you for a while, all right? I know she'll be very good to you."

He reaches out and rests a hand gingerly on Lilly's tiny shoulder, giving her what he hopes is an encouraging little smile. "It'll be all right. And you can visit us whenever you like."

Good to add that, surely. It's not like he wants to cut Lilly off from them entirely, and he knows Melanie's grown to care for the little one, just as Lilly's grown used to being with them. But this will be better, undoubtedly. Greta knows what she's doing better than either of them could.

Lilly meets Melanie's gaze seconds before their surroundings change. She does her best not to scurry completely behind Aziraphale at the sight of Greta but instead allows herself to be led into the apartment. Once inside, she practically freezes in place. She can feel the reactions she normally has that cause her to want to hide: increased heart-rate, a hard time swallowing, and an overwhelming apprehension at someone new... someone possibly a threat to her.

To Lilly's credit, however, she doesn't try to hide. She knows the part of her that is screaming she's in danger is wrong. This isn't the woods. Not everything and everyone besides Mama and Victoria are threats. She's fine. She's safe.

She doesn't feel very safe, though. Not when Aziraphale introduces her to the woman, not when he places a hand on her shoulder and tries to be encouraging, not even when she seeks out Melanie's gaze for reassurance. However, she stays where she is and ignores her instincts to fight or flee, instead slowly turning to peer at the woman with whom she'll be staying.

"'lo G'eta," she says quietly. Her annunciation has gotten better - eventually, it's only a matter of time before she'll likely start speaking with the same British accent as those she's surrounded by, although she doesn't realize it - but she isn't really putting forth the effort to speak clearly just yet. It's all too much, too quickly, and she desperately wants to simply go back with Aziraphale and Melanie where she can keep practicing her alphabet and play with dolls and try to drink tea without lapping at it like a dog.

Her lower lip quivers slightly and she glances back to the Principality, blinking the wetness from her eyes before looking to Melanie again. "No go," she finally sobs, dropping instantly into a crouch and darting with surprising speed and agility around Aziraphale, coming to a stop mere inches from the other girl. Her tone is beseeching but her voice is soft as she sniffles once. "Lilly be good. No go."

"It's no trouble," Greta assures the angel. Whether that holds true remains to be seen, but caring for even a difficult child would be better than nothing.

Lilly does seem to be veering more towards that end of the spectrum. Greta can see the way she tenses upon entering, the way her eyes dart around the little apartment as if expecting a bear to come roaring out of any given doorway. Her greeting, when it comes, is an almost unintelligible mumble. But at least it's there - it had belatedly occurred to Greta to wonder whether the girl would be able to talk at all - and she drops down to the girl's level with a kind smile. "Hello, Lilly. Would you--"

That's as far as she gets before Lilly abruptly bursts into tears and scurries around Aziraphale to hide behind the other girl. Greta stiffens, more stricken than she has any right to be. Any child would be thrown by a sudden change of scenery. No child would understand their guardian's motivations well enough to not blame themselves or see it all as some sort of punishment. That doesn't make it any easier to watch the poor child flee from her.

The other girl seems only a little less taken aback by the outburst. She shoots Greta an apologetic look, then turns back to Lilly and runs a pale little hand over her hair. "You are good," the girl says softly. "But Greta could teach you how to be better."

Greta straightens out of her crouch and smooths her palms over her skirt. The other girl's implicit vote of confidence is encouraging, and also a kick in the seat. She was thrown, but she's going to salvage this. "Why don't you both have a look round," she suggests, canting her head towards the rest of the apartment. It's clear both that Lilly's attached to the girl and that the girl has a working understanding of what's going on, here. This will give them time to talk more without the grown-ups hovering over their heads. Plus, Lilly might find the place less intimidating if she can explore it with someone she trusts. "Take as much time as you want," she adds, because she won't have any of them thinking she's going to hold a sobbing little girl back while her new family abandons her. There's no need to make this harder for her than it has to be.

Once the older girl's coaxed Lilly a little ways toward the living room, Greta turns back to Aziraphale. "What can you tell me about her?" she asks quietly. 'She grew up in the woods' doesn't even begin to cover it, she's guessing.

Aziraphale watches the exchange between Lilly and Melanie with growing concern. He knows that human children are... fragile, and they become quite dependent on those around them, but she'd had the same feeling about Gabriel and Johnny, hadn't she? She'd grown to love Melanie, so why can't she see she'll feel the same way about Greta? Children are so unreasonable.

This, he thinks, is precisely why he can't continue as her caregiver.

"Well," he says softly, looking from the girls to Greta. "She can't explain much herself. She was found here by a boy, Johnny, er, I don't know his last name. He lives with Gabriel - your landlord - who passed her to me, apparently operating under the massive misapprehension that I'd have any idea what to do with her. Melanie isn't... like other children, she's different, easier to manage - all she needs is to be kept safe. But Lilly..." He flaps a hand. "She can barely speak for herself. We've been teaching her language, and she's learning, but... I haven't any idea how the process is supposed to be."

He sighs and pinches the bridge of his nose briefly, more of an affectation than a response to a brimming headache or anything like that. "I don't know why she grew up in the woods, only that she did, apparently without care apart from someone called Victoria, who I believe was her sister, also just a child. She does reference her mother quite often, but we can't really get much out of her about it. She knows her mother is gone, but frankly I don't know how much she understands beyond that."

He shrugs haplessly. "I know this is a lot to take on," he says, "and we can take her back if it's too much, I mean, this doesn't have to be anything more than a trial run, but... I do think it would be better, I mean, really, I'm not... parent material."

Lilly likes exploring and, out of everything that's being said, that's the one word that actually perks her up a little. Of course, the first few steps she spends with her gaze on Melanie as though she might disappear at any given second. However, by the time Lilly's far enough away that the conversation between Greta and Aziraphale is little more than background noise, her attention turns to the apartment itself.

She has no opinion about how a house should look or what decorations are nice and which ones aren't. The only place she's lived that she considers a true home was filthy, run-down, and lacked even the most basic of luxuries. However, she supposes Greta's is nice enough. The walls are definitely begging to be drawn on, at any rate.

Then Lilly notices the art supplies and, slowly, a smile begins to appear. "Lah-ook, Mel'nie!" she exclaims, even making a point to enunciate the L in front of words other than her name, just like she's been taught. Running it into the rest of the word, clearly, is going to take more practice. Her gaze goes from the supplies, back to the girl beside her, and her smile falters as reality once again begins to seep in.

"Lilly miss Mel'nie," she says softly, her smile falling a bit as she peers up at the girl. She knows she has no say-so, just like when the strangers took her from Mama and the woods, and she does understand this is going to happen, but she's still not terribly pleased about leaving the girl she's begun to consider a sister.

Melanie's ears are sharp enough - and the flat is small enough - that she has little trouble listening in on Aziraphale's and Greta's conversation, even though she doesn't entirely mean to. She hears Greta's quiet, "Truant. Yes, I know him," and she hears the faint undercurrent of something like exasperation or reproach in the woman's tone, as if she's disappointed Johnny didn't call her, first. Melanie's gut gives a guilty twist when Aziraphale pronounces her different. It's not hard to put the pieces together: everyone thought Aziraphale would be good with Lilly because he's good with her, and that might be part of the reason why Lilly didn't go to Greta right away. Melanie isn't sorry they ended up with Lilly - far from it - but she's sorry they can't keep her, and she can't help but wonder if it would've been more fair to Lilly to not keep passing her from caretaker to caretaker like this.

She suppresses a sigh and shifts her focus to the art supplies. It's good to see Lilly looking excited about something, and she returns the girl's smile. "Greta got these just for you," Melanie says, bending to flip open a large pad of blank, white paper. "She knew you'd like them." Maybe it will help a little, knowing right away that Greta wants her to like being here. She only had a little time to prepare, and she could have used it to buy clothes or extra food or other practical supplies. Instead, she used it to get things that would just make Lilly happy.

"I'll miss you, too," Melanie says, her own smile exchanged for a more solemn expression. "But we'll still see each other. We're not even that far away, just on the other side of the park. You can come see us, or we could visit you here. I'm sure Greta wouldn't mind." Melanie's never entirely at ease outside the safety of Aziraphale's flat, but Greta's flat is pleasant - neat and uncluttered, and smelling powerfully of bread and sweet things - scents that are interesting, but unappealing to the hungry part of her. She thinks she could visit here safely enough, even if the angel left them for a bit.

But they can work that out later. It's more important that Lilly learn to be comfortable here now. "Let's try these," Melanie says with a recovered smile as she pries open a cardboard package of brightly colored markers and spills them out beside the paper. Back at the base with the other hungry children, their hands were freed more for writing than art, so drawing is somewhat new to her. She starts to squiggle away with a purple marker, attempting to recreate a magnified image of Ophiocordyceps that she saw in Dr. Caldwell's paper on the subject.

After a few minutes, Greta sets down a plate of biscuits within easy reach, her smile both anxious and hopeful. "Thank you," Melanie says, for all that the food holds no appeal to her. She takes a biscuit anyway, and offers it to Lilly. "It's good," she says, because it smells as if it would be to someone all human, and she suspects Lilly will like it.

Aziraphale excuses himself to the kitchen along with Greta, taking it open himself to prepare a bit of tea to go with the biscuits, or to settle his nerves. Either way. He feels anxious and he's not entirely certain why, whether it's eagerness to return home or concern about how Lilly is going to adapt - perhaps a bit of both.

As Greta brings the children some biscuits, Aziraphale pours them each a cup, and carries one out to her, hovering nearby, keeping a close eye on the girls. And maybe on the biscuits.

It isn't the biscuits that cause Lilly to smile again, although the expression does coincide with the arrival of the snack. It isn't even Melanie drawing with her, even though that's easily one of her most favorite things to do. No, Lilly's smile is born solely from one thing and one thing only.

She's figured out where she needs to go in order to visit her friend whenever she wants.

Of course, she doesn't say as much. She lacks the words and, well, the biscuit is good. The latter is a fact made obvious when she all but inhales the first one... although she does do her best to at least attempt to keep her mouth shut while chewing. It's a fairly new practice for her but she's slowly - very, very slowly - but surely getting there.

Peering up at Greta through her lashes, she offers a hesitant smile. "T'anku," she mumbles, doing her best to imitate Melanie's manners. Then she quickly snatches another biscuit in one hand, a black marker in the other, and returns her attention to her drawing: a picture of her, Victoria, and Mama, standing on the cliff near the house where she grew up.

It doesn't look as good to her on paper as it does on the wall but it'll have to do for now.

There, now, this is much better. And how fitting, she thinks a bit wryly, that the way to this little girl's heart would be through her stomach, too. But unlike the last one, she expects Lilly isn't used to eating well. Goodness knows how they got by when they were living in the woods, but no one accustomed to plenty would bolt down food like that. It's not as if Aziraphale's been starving her, after all; it must be an old habit. The poor thing.

"You're welcome," she says, smiling warmly down at the girls. "And there's plenty more where that came from."

Now that Lilly seems a bit more at ease, Greta risks dropping into a crouch beside the girl. "Can you tell me what you're drawing?" she asks. Then, pointing at the smallest of the vaguely person-shaped scrawls, she hazards, "Is that you?"

Lilly's body tenses when Greta drops into a crouch next to her but, before she can decide whether to react or not, she's being asked about her drawing. Immediately she relaxes and she gives a sharp, jerking nod of her head. Setting down the marker, she points to the others she's drawn.

"Victoria. Mama," she states. She presses her fingertip against the cliff. "Mama 'ump. Lilly 'ump. Victoria stay." Her lower lip juts out slightly, trembles for a moment, before she bites down on it. She misses her sister, far more than she can truly express, but pushes the feeling aside in lieu of eating the biscuit she's holding.

Once it's gone, and quickly so, she reaches for another marker - this one yellow - and, humming the song she learned from Mama, begins to do her best to draw the crowns made of flowers that she and her sister were wearing that night. Although a few strokes of the marker against the page and she pauses, glancing briefly to the woman who is now responsible for her.

"G'eta draw too," she says matter-of-factly, tipping her head toward the art supplies before returning her attention to her own drawing and continuing where she's left off.

Her sister, then, and her mother. There's something a bit unsettling about the latter figure, but then again, Lilly's only a child. Whatever she's drawing is bound to look a bit off, at the very least.

Far more unsettling is her matter-of-fact description of jumping. Is she referring to the Rift taking her? Does that mean her mother is somewhere in the city, as well? She suspects that's wishful thinking; surely they would have found one another by now if that were the case. Which means... what, that her mother and Lilly jumped from somewhere, leaving her sister behind? Ugh, it hardly bears considering.

Greta takes a blue marker, as ordered. She hasn't drawn anything in ages, but she's not about to refuse the invitation. Melanie glances up from her abstract creation with a faint, encouraging smile - a rather precocious child, isn't she? No wonder Aziraphale finds her easier to manage.

She tells herself she's not even a little bit envious.

Greta carefully sets down a few neat, simple flowers, listening to the fey little tune Lilly's humming. Then, she taps the blunt end of her marker next to the cliff's impression. "What's that?" she asks, keeping her tone light and curious.

Although she doesn't glance up from her best attempt at drawing very tiny flowers surrounding the heads of very tiny stick figures, Lilly answers Greta almost instantly. "Hill," she says simply, uncertain how else to explain it. She points to the blue scribbles along the bottom half of the page. "Wa-wer," she continues, glancing briefly sideways at the woman with haunted eyes of a child who has seen far too much.

"Mama sad. No more baby." Then she smiles suddenly and the sorrow vanishes. "Mama 'ump. Lilly 'ump. Mama no more sad."

Her gaze cuts to the flowers Greta is drawing and her bright smile turns almost shy. "P'itty," she murmurs before reaching for another biscuit then returning her attention to her drawing. Reaching for the black marker once again, she begins working on another stick figure, this one a few feet away from the rest, kneeling, and reaching for Lilly and her sister.

This is hitting altogether too close to home, and Greta pauses midway through exchanging the blue marker for a green one. It's a struggle not to let her face betray how gutted she feels at Lilly's forthright 'no more baby,' or the larger, awful picture she's painting with a few simple words and some childish scrawls.

She knows, far too intimately, the pain of losing an infant (though at least she can convince herself her son is still alive, if beyond her reach). It might be enough to drive someone over a cliff's edge. But with another child in her arms... no. That is unfathomable.

Does this mean there can be no homecoming for Lilly, either?

Greta glances up at Aziraphale, wondering if Lilly had conveyed this much to him already - if he chose not to divulge it, or if he just couldn't decipher it, or if he'd hoped it was all some sort of fiction and brushed it aside. Lilly's quiet admiration of her work draws Greta's eyes back down to the girl, and she offers a faint, distracted smile that doesn't reach her eyes. "Thank you," she says quietly.

What can she say to the rest of it?

Well, she knows exactly what she could say - if she presumes that forging a connection with Lilly is more important than maintaining privacy around the other two people in the room. The girl isn't likely to find Greta's situation all that horrifying if she can speak of her own in such straightforward terms. What's an accidental tumble compared to a deliberate leap?

She doesn't trust her voice to explain that she lost her baby, too, and that it also makes her sad.

Greta clears her throat, steeling herself. Then, she reaches out to press her own fingertips to Lilly's rough approximation of a cliff. "Greta fell," she explains, tapping the picture once for emphasis. Her voice is steadier than she'd thought it would be. Tell it like a story, like a thing that happened to someone else. "And then I was here. Just like you."

Oh, good heavens.

Lilly's not been here thirty minutes and Greta's already drawn more vital information than he'd ever been able to - and what's more, she relates to it in a rather unnerving way. He suddenly feels very much that he's intruding.

Still, though, it wouldn't do to back out at this crucial juncture. He inches forward and rests a hand lightly on Greta's shoulder, hoping that it isn't too much.

Empathy is a fairly new concept for Lilly and not an easy one for her to grasp. There are moments, however, when the feeling is strong enough that she can't help but react. This is precisely one of those moments.

Her gaze slides slowly from her drawing of the cliff, to Greta's hand, up her arm, and finally to the woman's face. With a furrowed brow and eyebrows knit together slightly, it's clear she's struggling to say something. Finally, after a few seconds, she manages to get it out.

"G'eta sad." It isn't a question. To Lilly, it's obvious. Being raised by a spectre of a woman whose sole reason for still existing is the heartache of losing a child, the girl knows what to look for without even realizing it. "No more G'eta baby." Another statement of fact, but this one comes with something more.

Moving slowly, almost hesitantly, she places her hand over Greta's and squeezes gently. Then she offers a small smile and inches a little bit closer. Finally tearing her gaze from the woman, although not releasing her contact, she looks first up at Aziraphale, then to Melanie and gives an almost imperceivable nod.

"Mel'nie go," she says plainly. "Lilly stay."

The angel's hand on her shoulder is a surprise, but not an unwelcome one. Greta sets down the marker so she lift her hand, intending to give his a reassuring pat - she's fine, she doesn't need him troubling himself over her emotional state when she's trying to prove herself a worthy caretaker. Her gaze stays on Lilly as the girl fixes her with an intense, searching look.

And then - oh, god, she knows. It's not even a guess. Greta forgets to breathe for a moment, her hand slipping off of Aziraphale's as she stares at Lilly, her astonishment failing to mask her grief. No use in attempting to deny it. Nor can she confirm it without more tears, and she won't have that. This isn't about her own losses. This is about Lilly.

Lilly, who draws more comfort from the parallels than Greta had thought she might. The little hand on hers is too mature an offering from someone so young, and it jolts her lungs back to work. Greta pulls in a breath as the girl smiles at her and scoots a bit closer, a far more childish seal of approval. She's staying. She's choosing to stay.

Well. This has gone far better and far worse than Greta ever could have anticipated.

The temptation to just haul the child into her lap is almost overwhelming, but she knows better. Greta settles for resting her free hand atop Lilly's as she waits for her heart to stop hammering and the ache in her throat to ease. She sees Melanie get to her feet, though she can't bring herself to look at the child directly (goodness knows what she's making of all this). Once she trusts her voice, she turns to look up at Aziraphale.

"I think we'll be all right," she says quietly.

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Children Aren't as Simple as We'd Like to Think [Closed]

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