WALKING DISASTERS | Jack Thompson

Epilogue.

THE CHILDREN CHASED one another around the garden of their home. They had moved out of the city when she first fell pregnant, deciding that the cleaner air of the city's outskirts would be a lot better for the children than the streets of New York. Their house was beautiful (a wedding gift from her brother, who always liked to go the extra mile), and it was the perfect place to raise their children.

The boy was the eldest, seven years old on the morrow, and his little sister was two years younger. She never pictured herself having children, but as she stood in the kitchen, watching them play from the window, she realised that she was complete now that she had her children.

He came up behind her and wrapped his arms around her waist, leaning down to kiss her cheek as she splashed water from the basin at him teasingly.

"You're home early," she said, smiling as she turned in his arms to face him.

"I promised I'd be home for dinner," he replied, kissing her nose gently. "And I always keeps my promises."

She looked at the ring on her finger, the object he swore upon to always keep his promises. "It appears that this ring has magical powers then."

"Ah, don't be like that," he chuckled. "Where are the kids?"

"Outside," she replied, pointing at the window. "She's becoming just like her aunt, I tell you."

"She takes after her mother as well," he said, kissing her cheek again as she turned so that her back was against his chest.

They swayed there for a while, watching their children play, the boy with hair as dark as midnight and the girl with sunlight shining in hers, and for a moment, time stood still, encasing them in the perfect moment for eternity. The girl waved a wooden sword, an old bedsheet tied around her shoulders like a cape as she battled with her brother, who wielded a sword similar to his sister's.

She could have watched them all day, the perfect combination of her and her husband, brought to life by a love that knew no boundaries. Everything they had faced together had never been enough to topple them, and although they were walking disasters with chaos at every corner they turned, they persevered and always came through.

He hugged her tighter against his chest and she leaned back into his embrace, the safety and security of his arms around her acting as her hideaway from the world. In his arms, in her dreams, everything that happened in the real world didn't matter. Here, in this moment, she was happy.

She never thought she would love again, but she fell in love with the man standing behind her after hating him for so long. One might say it was destined for them to eventually grow to care for one another, but she always believed that he was a miracle sent to her after she had endured so much suffering.

"Should we break that up?" he whispered, pointing at their children.

The girl was sitting on her brother's chest, sword raised high as her little voice carried through the open window on the summer breeze. "I have slain you, o' knight of evil! Now I shall rescue the princess!"

She laughed at the sound of her daughter's voice. "No, I think it's just getting to the good part."

Every dream was like this, watching the children playing in the garden, feeling the safety of his arms around her waist, and every dream ended all too soon, for Sera had endured so much suffering that even her dreams could not keep the grief at bay, and every time she saw her daughter raise her sword to defeat her brother, the evil knight, she woke up in a cold sweat, the bed empty beside her and the reminder that the only time she would ever have that happiness was in her dreams, because the real world was a factory of cruelty and Sera Stark was no exception to its evils...