mary margaret x david; wholly, a coda podfic, ~1400 words (downloadable here)
Mary Margaret feels almost whole when she’s in front of a classroom. Sometimes she just likes to settle in beside her students as they work in groups and watch how magnificently incredible their minds are. They make connections at the speed of light, ones that adults would never consider – and getting it right means so much to them. To watch their eyes light up after a correct answer sends Mary Margaret beaming into the rest of her day.
But it’s not just their intelligence, or their readiness to learn. She loves them even as they struggle. As they stare in sullen silence at a worksheet that they believe is asking too much of them. She loves them even as they talk back or call out – because they are still learning. Because they cannot even fathom holding a grudge against her for longer than a moment and so in turn, she can only respond with patience, calm and strength.
And that’s why, she tells herself, it’s best that she gave up her volunteer job at the hospital. Her kids are clearly the most important thing in her life right now and it’s just not fair to split her attention between them and… something else.
She wants to cry. She wants to toss her damn patience and calm and strength out the window because how dare he. How dare he say those things to her? How dare he- he speak the words that she has been dying to hear since she can remember existing – how dare he choose her when he does not even have a choice. He is married, he cannot be hers and still his words tell her I am for you as you are for me – but she isn’t. She can’t be his. She barely belongs to herself.
No, no – she belongs to her students. And her classroom. She belongs to a job that she can never leave behind because she is constantly thinking what next, what more, how can I – because she feels the weight of responsibility always, the pressure of inputs and outcomes and metacognitive skills and holistic learning and constructivism and so many education buzzwords that her mind wants to melt as she screams but what about my kids?
And now all she can scream is but what about me?
Because she may belong to her students and her job – but she has always, always wanted what David is asking of her. Someone is finally telling her precisely what she wants to hear – that she is right and perfect and good and all they will ever need – and it makes her proud to know that. To know that she is being trusted to be that for someone, to be half of a whole – but it’s not fair because it has been torn away from her before she can even fully comprehend that it has been given.
She may be loved but it’s not actually his to give away.
Which means the next time she sees David is utterly by accident. She has not returned to the hospital since she handed in her letter of resignation and she has avoided all the paths they used to walk together – but that does not prepare her for seeing him on the street outside of Granny’s, crouched beside Henry and smiling widely.
Henry of course spots her first – “Ms. Blanchard!” he calls, rushing over – and David turns, eyes wide with something Mary Margaret cannot and will not identify.
“Hello Henry,” she says warmly, despite the cold, clenched first that has settled in her stomach. “How are you?”
“Good!” he chirps, with his usual good cheer. “Mr. Nolan was just telling me how much better he feels now that he’s out of the hospital.”
Mary Margaret does not have to look up to know that David has joined them – she can feel the warmth of him pull close and smell the perpetual scent of leather and pine that has followed him since she first sat with him one morning many months ago. “I was just telling Henry how glad I was that your class visited with me while I was there,” David says, his voice low and quiet and intimate in a way that Mary Margaret had been studiously trying to forget. “It meant a lot.”
Henry beams up at the both of them before a call from across the street steals his attention. Dr. Hopper waves his umbrella and Henry waves back fervently. “Sorry, I have to go meet with Dr. Hopper now,” Henry says in explanation, even as he starts for the curb to cross the street.
“Look both ways-” David and Mary Margaret begin together, before stopping and glancing at each other. Henry rolls his eyes.
“Duh,” he says with a goodnatured smile. “See you tomorrow Ms. Blanchard!” And with that, he pelts away to Dr. Hopper’s side, leaving Mary Margaret in precisely the position she had been trying to avoid.
“I want to meet them,” David says and Mary Margaret stares at him blankly for a moment. “Your students,” he says, looking less sure now. “Now that I’m awake, I mean.” Because of course he would remember and care that they had visited him while he was still unconscious, because of course it would mean something to David to meet the children who so kindly decorated his room and read him stories while he was asleep.
“Oh! I…” And Mary Margaret wants to say no, because sometimes she thinks she cannot stand another minute in his presence without pressing close – too close – but she makes herself reconsider. It would mean rather a lot to them to know that their volunteering had – in some roundabout way – made a difference. Had meant something. “They would like that,” she allows quietly, hesitantly. “That would mean a lot to them, thank you.” And her gratitude is genuine and David knows this – she can tell because he smiles widely back at her.
“It would mean a lot to me too,” he says honestly and she falls for him all over again. There is a long pause and she waits, weighing the pros and cons between running and saving herself or staying out of some masochistic desire for torture. “You stopped coming,” David ventures quietly, but with confidence. “I never saw you around the hospital.”
“I resigned,” she returns just as quietly, folding her hands for something to do. “To concentrate more on my kids,” she adds hurriedly, clarify. As much as it is all David’s fault, she can’t help but want to keep him from knowing that.
David’s mouth twists into a frown and then quirks up into a smile. “Your kids,” he says, glancing at her briefly. “I like that. That you call them that.”
“They are-” Mary Margaret begins, feeling somewhat on the defensive, but David hurries to explain.
“No, no, I know. It just… It makes me happy to know that you’re teaching them. That you’re the one looking after them, giving them hope. I don’t think there’s anyone better suited in the world to that than you.” He pauses. “Mary Margaret, I still-” And she must make a noise of fear or protest, or something must show on her face because he stops and smiles tiredly, looks resigned. “Let me come say thank you to your kids?” he asks instead and she feels a sudden wave of relief and gratitude.
“That would be wonderful,” she says, smiling up at him, her stomach twisting and her hands trembling. “…Tomorrow?” she ventures and David’s face lights up and she has to look away to keep him from seeing her answering smile – because she knows that her face gives it all away.
He nods in confirmation and she pulls away from where they have been standing under the awning of Granny’s, oblivious to passersby and nosy patrons inside peering out the window. She pushes herself to turn and walk away – but of course he calls her name and she stops, turning.
“See you tomorrow?” he asks, something in his voice determined and sure.
After a long moment, Mary Margaret says what she had wanted to say the last time he had asked this, what she had kept inside by force of will alone. “Tomorrow,” she promises, and they smile at each other gently before she can finally allow herself to walk away.
For a brief moment in time, Mary Margaret belongs to herself first and foremost – she is not whole quite yet, but she is not someone’s half either. And this, she thinks, is progress.
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