TITLE: When the clouds are in your shoes [Halfamoon 2026] AUTHOR: kerk hiraeth
FANDOM: Firefly {post- Serenity the Movie};
LENGTH: 425;
CHARACTER(s): Zoë Alleyne; River Tam; Jayne Cobb; Oc (Saisyu Washburne);
SUMMARY: allpoetry.com/Here-Is-A-Wound-That-Never-Will-Heal,-I-Know by Edna St. Vincent Millay {No words that I can find would summarise this story better}
A/N: This was inspired by ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
halfamoon's Big Damn Admin ![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
cmk418's Day 5 Firefly fic halfamoon.dreamwidth.org/567034.html ; mind was too busy writing stories in my head, including this one.
It's also inspired by the idea that when the show ended Zoë was unknowingly waiting to meet that beautiful baby she was talking to Wash about. This idea seemed to fit the post-movie Firefly better so there we are.
The title was inspired by the poem linked above and two songs Abba's 'Hole in your Soul' genius.com/Abba-hole-in-your-soul-lyrics and Nat King Cole's Smile genius.com/Nat-king-cole-smile-lyrics; all three came to mind while I was seeking a new opening line.
He'd never done it, but she imagined knocking the Shepherd to the floor for saying it.
Zoë watched River and Jayne; like co-parenting siblings, playing with 'lil Wash as she happily escaped one or the other's grasp.
A walking and talking knife in her soul.
Reminder of what her life had stolen from her.
A life she had chosen.
Until she had first held that child to her chest she had never truly known pain; not through the war; not when Tracey had died from the bullets they had carried; not even when the battle fever had finally ebbed away and she'd put on that gorram dress.
She had finally understood the pain her Captain; her Sergeant; her comrade; her friend had felt losing his faith. The moment the door had closed on the quarters she now shared with their baby she felt a pain she had foolishly imagined she was prepared for.
“Mā mī!”
Knife twisting in gaping hole where her heart had been, she hunkered down and gathered the waddling, giggling, chubby bundle of laughter in her arms.
She buried the pain deep; 'lil Wash would never know his face; never see her smile reflected in his eyes; never feel his warmth; never groan at his humor; never hear his voice.
She'd never know how much he could annoy her; nor understand her love for him every time she so riled at him she'd yell to bust her lungs.
Zoë could almost see him snickering the first time this tiny creature broke her calm and got herself yelled at the way she'd yell at him.
She could almost hear him too; thoughts interrupted, she looked up as Jayne lay a hand on her shoulder and she returned the invisible smile he had on his face that made him look so much like the preacher.
Her eyes closed before her gaze fell on River's expression but she knew it was telling her she would heal one day.
As much as she imagined River lying on the floor next to Shepherd Book, she knew she didn't want to heal.
She didn't want his memory ever to fade to where she didn't feel that pain.
That pain kept her man alive.
She found herself anticipating the day this child got her so riled up she wanted to shout at her just as she would her father.
She wanted to see him smiling at their child the way he smiled at her after a fight.
She wanted to see him in their child; their little girl; their Saisyu.
Goddess be with you,
天下無不散之筵席 { There is no such thing as a feast that never ends }
kerk
"Saisyu" most commonly refers to the Japanese word 最終 (saishū), meaning "last," "final," or "closing". In this case it is a compound name, 'Sai' being Cantonese for 'Wash' and Syu the Cantonese for 'Book'.
Here is a wound that never will heal, I know,
Being wrought not of a dearness and a death,
But of a love turned ashes and the breath
Gone out of beauty; never again will grow
The grass on that scarred acre, though I sow
Young seed there yearly and the sky bequeath
Its friendly weathers down, far Underneath
Shall be such bitterness of an old woe.
That April should be shattered by a gust,
That August should be levelled by a rain,
I can endure, and that the lifted dust
Of man should settle to the earth again;
But that a dream can die, will be a thrust
Between my ribs forever of hot pain.
{Edna St. Vincent Millay}
