Passages

Author’s Notes:

This fic takes place after two other brief fanfics I wrote, “Anniversary” and “Rich and Full-Bodied”. However, you do not need to have read the other two in order to make sense of this one.

Thank you to my beta testers, Thegranddewru and Invisibleshrew.

***

“I’m so sorry, mother,” Zoe murmurs, mournfully. “Sorry we weren’t here earlier for you.” A cool wind moves through the evening, rustling the trees in the cemetery. Zoe knows she will regret missing her father’s passing and funeral all the way to her own grave.

Zoe’s mother, Saikara, returns the hug fiercely and Zoe is not surprised at the strength in Saikara’s grasp. “I understand, dear. You got a tough line of work.”

When the hug is finished, Zoe returns her grim gaze to the tombstone. She reads her father’s name – Arthur Johnston Alleyne – and the years of his birth and death, checking to ensure that all the information is accurate and correctly spelled. The tombstone is small and sparse, and Zoe is glad that there had been money to pay for it. There was not, however, room on the marker to mention that he had been a husband, father, and one-time space captain before the illness struck him down.

Wash gingerly approaches his mother-in-law and hugs her. “My condolences, ma’am,” he says quietly as he shivers in the cool wind.

A bit of life returns to Saikara’s face, if not an actual smile. “I told you last time you were here, young man, not to call me ‘ma’am’! Saikara is my name.”

Wash whispers a sincere apology. Zoe had received the wave that her father had passed unexpectedly, and it took over three weeks for a trip to this planet to fit into Serenity’s itinerary. Her father had been ill for years with the slowly degenerative Milner’s disease. Everyone had known that he would not live a long life, but Zoe still had been shocked at his death; last time they had talked he had seemed well.

The sun is starting to set and Wash picks up the lantern, bugs swirling around the light. The trio slowly plods back the gravel road to Saikara’s house. Zoe and Wash have one night to spend with her. Zoe knows that Wash is angry that she didn’t stand up to Mal and demand more than 24 hours of shore leave, but Zoe won’t deal with that right now.

She has other things on her mind, like the trip to the local orphanage they have planned for tomorrow.

*** Zoe and Wash are sleeping in what was her parents’ bedroom, and the only room of the house with a door that closes. Saikara doesn’t sleep there anymore. The room is cold and drafty and Zoe makes a mental note to look for any plastic or other materials that could be used to reinforce the window and keep the room warmer.

Wash shifts closer to her on the soft, sagging bed. One of the planet’s moons is full and its light filters in through the shabby curtains.

He starts to caress her. Zoe is distracted and grieving but she doesn’t halt Wash’s actions. He always knows exactly what buttons to push, whether he’s piloting a ship or touching his wife. She finds that her body has automatically responded and she shifts position so that they can more easily join. For a few moments all the regret and foreboding are forgotten and all Zoe experiences is pleasure. Afterwards, Wash holds and kisses her more before soon drifting off into a deep sleep. Zoe’s thoughts return to their somber path.

She no longer needs to take periodic birth control injections, not since they learned that Wash is incapable of fathering a child -- his sterility due to growing up surrounded by intense concentrations of pollutants and toxins. If nothing else, at least not having to buy the injections has saved the couple some money. She wonders how much of a donation the orphanage will ask for and worries whether or not they have brought enough. That fear is nothing, however, compared with Zoe’s anxiety over the reaction from Mal that they are sure to face if they do indeed bring a baby or child on board Serenity.

*** In the morning, Wash is still sound asleep as Zoe and Saikara prepare oatmeal. “I really wish we had some bacon left to serve you with this breakfast,” Saikara frets as she places napkins on the table. The cloth of the napkins is faded and worn. “My supply ran out last week and there wasn’t any at the market yesterday.”

“Mother, please,” Zoe says, as she stirs the pot. “Half the time on Serenity we eat nothin’ but protein bars. Real oatmeal like this is a treat.”

When her mother doesn’t respond, Zoe glances up from the oatmeal. Saikara is not one to be silent too often. Zoe can make out wetness in the corners of her mother’s eyes.

Zoe hugs Saikara again. She briefly wonders how she and her mother can be so different. Saikara so loquacious and so free with her emotions. Saikara having married a solider though she’d never conceive of becoming one herself. Even their skin color is different, with Saikara’s skin tone and eye color matching that of Wash’s. The differences never have bothered Zoe at all and she’s always loved her mother deeply. The guilt of not being present for her father’s death and funeral will always nip at Zoe’s insides. Her mother had loved Arthur so much, had married him despite her previous vow never to remarry after her first husband’s early death.

“What would I do without you and your brother?” Saikara murmurs, referring to Zoe’s older half-brother Parker, the product of Saikara’s first marriage.

“Mom, I ain’t hardly been here for you. I ain’t been any help to you.”

“Of course you have!” Saikara insists. “Just knowing that you’re grown and you’re doing well helps me. You married, which I’d hoped you would. Maybe someday you’ll be a mother yourself, which I promise you will make you happier than you ever dreamed. It did for me.”

Zoe hasn’t yet told her mother that she and Wash can’t have children. She can’t find words to respond to Saikara right now.

She knows that telling neither her mother nor Mal of their plans to visit an orphanage has been foolish and cowardly on her part. Regarding the captain, Zoe is hoping that he will cut them some slack, given her father’s recent death and his inability to reroute Serenity earlier.

Zoe’s angst is lost on her mother. Saikara continues, “Of course I wish I could see Henry more often.” Henry is the son of Parker and his former wife Abby. They have divorced, as Zoe knew they would, and Abby left this colony with the boy in search of better work. Being apart from her only grandchild is another loss, another pain Saikara manages to live with.

“So do you think,” Saikara begins again tentatively, “that maybe someday you will have one? I know it’s none of my business, Zoe. But it is – I am your mother, after all. I know I wouldn’t get to see your child that often with you and Wash in space so much. It would be so nice to have one though.”

Zoe can’t explain why she can’t, won’t, open up to her mother. “Maybe someday, Mom,” she says quietly.

She sees her mother register the distant look in her daughter’s eye. Perhaps she accepts it, Zoe muses.

*** After breakfast has been eaten and Saikara is bathing, Zoe and Wash sit down and review the last wave they received from the orphanage in the nearest city. They scroll through the information. The place is small, though apparently the largest on this colony, and is run by a church. They usually find homes for most of the newborns quickly and don’t have a large “supply” of children, but encourage prospective parents to visit them anyway.

As she looks at the images, Zoe is ashamed to admit that she is not sold on adoption. She wants to carry a baby inside of her own body, feel it kick, struggle through the pains of giving birth, breastfeed it. She doesn’t want “a three year old with severe emotional problems” (one of the only children currently “available” at the orphanage) but she hasn’t told Wash this.

‘It’s selfish of me,’ Zoe says to herself, ‘That’s why I ain’t told him. Shame on me for wanting my own baby and not openin’ my heart up to raisin’ someone else’s child.’

Wash sets the communication device down. “Zoe, you’ve been really quiet this trip. Now I *am* used to you being the strong and silent type and I’d be pretty surprised if you started talking as much as your mother does. But you’re even more quiet than usual and I can tell from the look on your face that you’re upset. And you didn’t sleep well last night, which has me seriously worried given how you usually fall asleep and wake up right on schedule.”

Zoe meets his eyes briefly and then looks down.

“Something other than your father’s death is bothering you,” Wash says. He quickly adds, “I mean, not that that’s not depressing enough!” He pauses and asks, “Is it the trip to the orphanage?”

Zoe takes a deep breath and looks at her husband. “Let’s not do this. Not adopt.”

“I thought this is what you wanted, since we can’t have a baby of our own,” Wash says, somewhere between a surprised question and a statement.

“But it ain’t what you want,” Zoe says, with a note of finality in her voice. As far as she’s concerned, the decision has been made now.

“That’s not true,” Wash protests, though without much fervor in his voice. “I thought we’d decided that adoption would be good since we live with a crazy group of people who aren’t related to each other and we’ve become this…this family of sorts, though there are some members who…” his voice trails off as he can see his words have no impact. And Zoe can see the relief – hidden but present -- on his face.

She debates telling him all of her reasons for not wanting to adopt. The desire to bear a child herself, impossible as that would be for as long as she is wed to Wash. Zoe’s knowledge that Wash doesn’t really want to be a parent. Mal’s reaction to the notion of any children on Serenity. The two men most important to her life would certainly prefer that Zoe remain childless.

Zoe decides instead to reassure. “Husband, I know you get worried over this. I ain’t gonna ever leave you,” she grasps his hand tightly. Her hands are strong. “Bein’ parents just ain’t in the cards for us and I’m okay with that.”

*** Zoe understands that she is saying farewell to one of her dreams. She will not experience motherhood and she accepts that fact. She has her husband and her makeshift family aboard Serenity. Wash is probably right that a child doesn’t fit into their lifestyle and never will – unless they retire wealthy someday, a prospect that grows ever more dim with each disappointing heist in the depleted ‘verse.

That evening, Zoe hugs her mother goodbye.

“There are worse things that could happen,” Saikara says, referring to her husband’s death. “I’ll survive. I have you and Wash and the rest of our family. And with family and friends you can get through anything.”

Zoe nods, agreeing.

THE END

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