How does one celebrate something without the people the holiday it was meant for?
It had been more than a year since Liam had emerged from the Vault into a world that was not her own. Less than two months, counting time in Spirale, since she had lost her son. And sixty years since losing her husband, though that might as well have been a year ago given the nature of cryostasis.
Holidays from the old world weren’t celebrated in the Commonwealth. Or if they were, it was never the same-- only a ghost of the original intent. Hell, people these days didn’t even know what baseball really was. Given that daily life in the Commonwealth was also fraught with peril, Liam hadn’t really been given an opportunity to dwell on frivolous things like holidays. Hell... She’d barely even been given a chance to properly mourn. Day in and day out, it was a fight for survival.
But not here. In Spirale, things were hauntingly similar to life before the War. Peaceful, almost to the point of boredom. It was so mundane, a world that did not know pain the way the Commonwealth did. The people here lived lives that Liam found difficult adjusting to again... And celebrated holidays which she had long forgotten.
The glint of gold upon her palm shone in the sun, the cool winds of the Savior’s Respite caressing her cheeks and the bare skin of her shoulders. She would have been unrecognizable to those who knew her back home, devoid of the usual layers of clothing encasing her body-- Only a tank top and simple pants. Vulnerable, out-of-place, much like how she felt.
Nate would have eaten this holiday up. He had been overjoyed upon hearing the news that he would be a father, sweeping Liam up into his arms with countless kisses to every inch of her face. They had started a family later in life than most others, though their respective career paths were to blame for that. Being a lawyer meant long workdays, and Nate’s military career meant long periods of time for a child to go without a father. It never felt like the right time, though as the years passed and Liam entered her 30′s, time felt like it was running out.
They hadn’t exactly been planning for a child though, as evidenced by the fact that Shaun was conceived at a public park. It was an ‘if it happens, it happens’ sort of deal. The day she learned of her pregnancy had simultaneously been the happiest and most nerve-wracking day of her life.
But Nate... Oh, Nate. He threw himself whole-heartedly into the role of being a father. Telling everyone he knew, even strangers in line at the grocery store. Taking it upon himself to fix up a room for the baby, purchasing parenting books to read during his free time, taking Liam to pick out clothes and toys and to all her prenatal appointments. When Shaun was born, he had cried more than Liam had ever seen in their 14 years of knowing each other. He had promised to be the best father he could to their son.
He wouldn’t get that chance. Not even a month after Shaun was born, the bombs fell. And Liam’s world began to end.
Standing a few feet from the precipice, the Sole Survivor of Vault 111 struggled to hold in her tears. Ring in hand, the woman searched for words that could describe the feelings tearing through her heart and soul. How does one describe living in a world without her husband, the father of her child-- Who, in a separate and strange turn of events, also came to be known as Father? Who grew up far from the safety and warmth of not only her arms, but the arms of his paternal figure? Who became the leader of the very organization she sought to ( and eventually did ) destroy?
“Nate. I wish I could have saved you both... Please forgive me.”
Many things had changed since going into the vault. Liam had never dreamed of becoming childless and a widow at age 34. Pressure built behind her eyes and she could feel warmth spilling down her cheeks, her breaths becoming shorter and heavier in her struggle. She had found purpose in the Commonwealth, but was now lost in yet another new world, once again without a foundation to stand upon. The heaviness of that realization hadn’t hit until word of this holiday had reached her ears... And then?
Sinking to her knees, the Sole Survivor closed her fingers around Nate’s ring, pressing her fist to her forehead. And as her body was wracked by sobs and run through with grief, more isolated than she had ever felt, the only other sound that could be heard was the wind.
