Once Bitten, Twice Shy

18

Parr found herself sat on the floor of the living room one morning, staring blankly at the wall in front of her. She wasn't particularly sure how she had come to be here, but by the time she had gathered her bearings and taken in her surroundings, there she was.

It wasn't as if this hadn't happened before. She had lost so much sleep recently that the only thing keeping her even remotely functioning was the large cup of coffee she discovered in her hand at that moment. She also didn't remember making the coffee but that was besides the point. The point was that the countless nights of restless wondering were never very worthwhile, as even though during the night it felt that she had finally figured out her problems; when it came to the morning the lack of rest for her brain made her forget whatever revelation she may have had, consequently erasing the purpose of her staying up altogether. That being said it wasn't as if she could just switch her mind off and sleep - she had enough trouble with that under normal circumstances - but with the events of however many days ago - She was barely able to grasp the concept of time anymore - playing on her mind, it was impossible for her head to rest. And so the endless cycle of consequences continued.

Anna found her like this at some point - the only indication of any passing of time being the mug that now lay half empty in her lap.

"You know, I think the paint on that wall dried a long time ago." She joked and came to sit beside the girl who she wasn't sure had really clocked her presence. To say she jumped at the disturbance would have been an overstatement, as it was more of a mild startling, signified by the slight widening of her eyes and a small turn of her head in the direction of the noise. Cleves couldn't help the amused look that crossed her face at the underwhelming response. "How many hours have you slept this week?"

"I don't need sleep." Anna was surprised she had managed to form a coherent response. Though it couldn't have been very well reasoned, as the words clearly weren't true from the look of her.

"I beg to differ." She challenged and a serious look replaced the previous cheeky smirk. "Ok this needs to stop. You can barely keep yourself upright. Please just let yourself rest?" When Parr didn't respond, she realised she was going to have to dig deeper than that. It wasn't as simple as the girl not wanting to let herself sleep, but the fact that there was so much going on in her head that it was impossible to get one moment of peace.  

"Look" She tried again. "I may not understand all of it but I can at least try and lift some of your pain. Among everything else you feel guilty that Anne died and you didn't right?" Parr didn't want to nod but her head was already moving before she could stop it. She knew she couldn't control who got to live and who had to die, but even so she felt bad that she had got to raise Anne's daughter when Anne should have been there to do it herself. And she thought that maybe, if Anne hadn't died the way she had, that she herself wouldn't have had the chance to make the mistakes that led to all of this.

"I know how it feels to outlive everyone around you, and as much as I'd like to tell you the guilt will go away, I'm not completely sure it would be true. What you can do is trust that the people around you don't hold any kind of resentment towards you because you got lucky, and I can assure you with certainty that no one in this household will ever hold you accountable for that. It might feel like it now but Anne's not angry with you because raised Elizabeth and she didn't. We have to accept that the world has it's ways, some of them fair, some of them not. But don't beat yourself up over something you couldn't have controlled." Parr had never realised how much she needed to hear those words.

Anna let out a breath and continued. "Now, as for the rest of it. I think the only way you can make this right is if you understand it yourself first. Staying up all night debating what to do isn't gonna solve your problems, there's only one question you need to ask yourself: Were you responsible?" She placed a hand on Parr's shoulder and rose to her feet. "you'll know what to do with the answer." After a reassuring nod, she left, and Parr was back to her own thoughts. She had never thought Cleves would be so wise, but everything she said had made perfect sense.

She stared at the mug in her hands of which the contents was now most likely an unsatisfying temperature, and with a sigh got up, deciding enough was enough and no more would she wallow in self loathing. It was a good thing Anna had come along when she did as it was about time she had a voice of reason and a bit of well needed tough love to get her working again and after some long overdue clear thinking, resulting in a dramatically prolonged pouring of coffee down the sink, she left the kitchen with settled thoughts for the first time that week.