It was too painful sometimes to watch the world go on without her â the world outside the land of wolves where she used to live, where they all used to live together. It was rarely peaceful, but it was real ⊠or was it? It was difficult to tell sometimes. It felt like it could have been a dream, that sheâd never lived that lonely childhood without her parents. How could she when she looked across a bonfire every night and saw her mother smile at her, heard her father call her Andrea with such fondness. The name almost felt natural now when it came from his lips, like it was hers. Like she belonged. And then she remembered, abruptly, wrenchingly, when she caught sight of Klaus still hesitant among the kind he was born but never lived with.Â
She would never be able to look at Klaus and not remember.
So she snuck looks in here and there, saw her daughter ( older and more beautiful every day ) thrive and fall, make friends and make enemies, laugh and cry, and Hayley laughed and cried with her. She wanted so badly to take Hope into her arms and tell her how proud she was of her, then tell Hope how obnoxiously stubborn she was, and then tell her again how proud it made her. There were moments, of course, when she wanted to hold her daughter by the shoulders and shake her â but everything seemed so simple on this side in a way Hayley knew it wasnât.
So I think youâre already better than all of us. Freya was telling Hope everything that Hayley wanted to, everything that ⊠she might even be able to ⊠if her daughter went through with this as Hayley knew she would. And your father and mother would say the same.Â
She hadnât often imagined how Hope would die. She hadnât ever wanted to imagine it. But seeing her daughter die in Freyaâs arms â Freya, who had been her partner for seven years in raising Hope, had been Hopeâs second mother in all the ways that matter â was both a hand twisting her heart and softly soothing down her back. Hope didnât die bloody or violent or unwilling. She died of her own choice, however much Hayley wished she never had to make it, and she died in the arms of someone she loved and who loved her almost as much as Hayley did. That was better than almost anybody ever got.Â
The woods were dark, though the moonlight shone though the trees to make it a little brighter than it was the last time she had stood among them with Hope. Perhaps that was fitting since the situation seemed a little brighter than it had been then too. A chance to talk to her daughter, to see her ( really see her and be seen in return ) and hold her for the first time in years. She was prepared this time, had rehearsed a hundred speeches over the years watching Hope.Â
â There are different kinds of peace. â Her voice was soft as she walked up behind Hope at the dock. â Iâd been hoping youâd finally started to find some of that back there. â
      Dying was far more peaceful than Hope had ever believed it could be, one final blessing for her before she began her life as one of the damned. She wanted to laugh at her own dramatics, half-wondering whether that was something also triggered by transition. But Hope paused then, confused. She couldnât feel Freyaâs arms around her anymore, couldnât feel anything. Her brain wanted to panic but another part of her consciousness understood it wasnât necessary. Transition.Â
It wasnât quite like what Elijah described it as, but who was to say that dying felt the same to everyone? Consciousness simply appeared for Hope, in bits and pieces yet in such a seamless manner that she questioned whether it had ever been gone in the first place. Her senses felt exactly the same, hearing the crackle of fire and the quiet lap of water. Water...?
Her eyes opened and Hope sat up, but things still felt the same. A small pinch of fear hit her. Did something go wrong? Or... right? Standing on the dock, the tribrid glanced out over the water, not quite afraid of what was on the other side, but not entirely sure that she was ready for it either. And all thoughts in her mind stuttered to a stop when she heard voice sheâd dreamt about every night for the past several years. âMom?âÂ
Her voice was scratchy, but Hope didnât care because she threw herself into her motherâs arms anyways. She had hoped and prayed and dreamed that she would get to see her mother during the transition, to be able to hug her one more time before she endured a hundred lifetimes without? It was a wish that Hope had never dared to speak aloud, to protect it from anything that might wish to steal it away from her.Â
"Is it really you?â Would she get to spend more time with them this time? Or would she need to be rushed back to her body. Too many questions circled in her head and Hope didnât know which was the most important to share with her mom right now. âI donât know if anyone finds peace in high school,â she joked softly. Seeing Hayley in front of her like this was jarring. She hadnât aged a single day, still looking every bit as young as all of the photos and portraits that Hope kept nearby. And the last time she was here, she hadnât had the time to process her guilt. Sheâs honestly not sure whether she would ever fully relieve herself of it, but at least it was tucked away in a healthier place after years of therapy.Â
âI hoped I would but I wasnât sure... Is it just you again?â