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Peja's Wonderful World of Makebelieve Import
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Published:
2020-11-04
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1,889
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1/1
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16
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1,112

The Importance Of Being Real

Summary:

About loving and being loved.

Notes:

(See the end of the work for notes.)

Work Text:

"The Velveteen Rabbit" is by Margary Williams

 

The Importance of Being Real

by Amethyst

Jim rubbed his thumb over the cool skin on the back of Blair's unnaturally still hand and pulled in a strangled deep breath in an effort to hold back the burning tears that suddenly threatened to break free from his weary red rimmed eyes.

It was now five days since all of Major Crime had watched in horror as the twin towers of the World Trade Center thundered to the ground in New York City. It was four days since Jim had determinedly tracked down the whereabouts of his young roommate, who had disappeared while visiting NYC with his mother. Two days ago, Jim and Simon had managed to arrange for the unconscious young observer to be flown back to Cascade and since then, Jim's sleepless terror had been replaced by a silent vigil at Blair's bedside in the Intensive Care Unit of Cascade General.

Naomi was safe. She had stayed at their hotel to meditate while her energetic son had decided to burn up a few hours by sightseeing. Blair had been caught outside the towers when the disaster unfolded and been hit by the falling debris. Immediately recovered from the street by rescue personnel arriving at the scene, he was one of the fortunate ones, evacuated before the towers came down.

Now Blair's unconscious body lay pale and still in a hospital bed, sheltered by the presence of loved ones, while his mind remained buried within its wounded housing. Jim reminded himself how blessed they were by just having Blair alive and close to home, when so many would never be coming home ever again. So many lives altered by a few short minutes in time. So much death and destruction at the hands of so few.

Running his hand lightly over the bruises and abrasions on Blair's pale face and upper arms, he gently touched the large white dressing covering the left side of the young student's head. Tracing a finger down the gauze and onto the slender, abraded neck he rested the tip over the softly bounding pulse, reassuring himself of the constant flow of life within the damaged, still body.

Brushing a hand over his bleary eyes, he stooped down to retrieve a brown paper bag on the floor by his feet. Hesitantly drawing an old, stuffed animal out of the bag he leaned forward and shakily placed it by the

uninjured side of Blair's face. Tucking the old, worn, stuffed rabbit closer to a hidden ear, Jim settled back in the cushioned lounge chair the staff had found for him and pulled a well worn book from the crumpled bag the rabbit had inhabited.

Firmly taking a small, still hand deep into his own large, warm one, Jim closed his fingers around this small part of his best friend and hung on as if for dear life. Gazing at the nearly translucent closed eyelids, Jim whispered into the deafening quiet of the darkened room.

"I need a sign here, Chief. I need to know you're in there, that you can hear me. I need you to come back to me. You've been out for five days now and even you should be caught up on sleep by now."

Heart wrenching silence greeted his plea. Increasing the pressure on the cool hand in his grasp, Jim opened the storybook in his other hand and flipped to the opening page.

"If you can't hear me just yet, maybe you can hear the rabbit. If you listen really hard you can hear it when he whispers in your ear. He always used to whisper in mine when I felt scared and confused. He'll understand if you are, too."

Adjusting his eyesight for the darkness of the room, Jim slid back in the chair and softly began to read from the well-thumbed book.

"There was once a velveteen rabbit, and in the beginning he was really splendid."

The story continued page after page as the soft voice occasionally broke and stammered over forgotten lines and long buried memories and emotions. Jim was so engrossed with the telling of the story, that he never heard the footsteps behind him until a wrinkled hand landed hesitantly on his shoulder.

Glancing up, expecting to see Joel or Henri or Rafe, he locked surprised gazes with his father.

"Sally said you had stopped by and asked for the book. She told me what happened to the boy. I thought--I thought maybe I could lend a hand, read a little, sit with the boy if you had things to do."

William Ellison softly touched the worn fur of the old rabbit as it lay on the thin pillow by the immobile curly head. Jim blinked back the surprise from his expression and nodded at a chair in the corner of the room.

"I'll just finish up with this story. I'm almost done. I'm trying to get him to wake up. It's been five days now."

William nodded and pulled the straight-backed chair closer to the bedside. Absently he tucked a corner of the blankets more snuggly around Blair's slender shoulders, as he settled into the chair.

Jim remembered the countless times the man before him had read this very same story to him as a child. The memory of rhythmically twisting one of those long cloth ears as he listened intently to the beloved story flooded his memory and forced him to clear his throat of the lump forming there. Jim pushed his uncertainty over his father's arrival to the back of his mind and focused on the page before him.

' "Wasn't I Real before?" asked the little Rabbit.

"You were Real to the Boy," the Fairy said, "because he loved you. Now you shall be Real to every one."

And she held the little Rabbit close in her arms and flew with him into the wood. It was light now, for the moon had risen. All the forest was beautiful, and the fronds of the bracken shone like frosted silver. In the open glade between the tree-trunks the wild rabbits danced with their shadows on the velvet grass, but when they saw the Fairy they all stopped dancing and stood round in a ring to stare at her.

"I've brought you a new playfellow," the Fairy said. "You must be very kind to him and teach him all he needs to know in Rabbit-land, for he is going to live with you for ever and ever!"

And she kissed the little Rabbit again and put him down on the grass.

"Run and play, little Rabbit!" she said.

But the little Rabbit sat quite still for a moment and never moved. For when he saw all the wild rabbits dancing around him he suddenly remembered about his hind legs, and he didn't want them to see that he was made all in one piece. He did not know that when the Fairy kissed him that last time she had changed him altogether. And he might have sat there a long time, too shy to move, if just then something hadn't tickled his nose, and before he thought what he was doing he lifted his hind toe to scratch it.

And he found that he actually had hind legs! Instead of dingy velveteen he had brown fur, soft and shiny, his ears twitched by themselves, and his whiskers were so long that they brushed the grass. He gave one leap and the joy of using those hind legs was so great that he went springing about the turf with them, jumping sideways and whirling round as the other did, and he grew so excited that when at last he did stop to look for the Fairy she had gone.

He was a Real Rabbit at last, at home with the other rabbits.

Autumn passed and Winter, and in the Spring, when the days grew warm and sunny, the Boy went out to play in the wood behind the house. And while he was playing, two rabbits crept out from the bracken and peeped at him. One of them was brown all over, but the other had strange markings under his fur, as though long ago he had been spotted, and the spots still showed through. And about his little soft nose and his round back eyes there was something familiar, so that the Boy thought to himself:

"Why, he looks just like my old Bunny that was lost when I had scarlet fever!" But he never knew that it really was his own Bunny, come back to look at the child who had first helped him to be Real." '

Jim leaned over the still form on the bed and slowly brought the limp hand to rest against his own whiskered cheek.

"Chief, the rabbit became real because he was loved by the boy, just like your friendship and love made me real again. You made my dingy velveteen turn back into skin I could tolerate to have touched and my twitching ears were able to hear again. You made it possible for me to live with the rest of the Real rabbits and have a Real life again. Blair, listen to the rabbit and come back to me. Come home, Blair, people who love you are waiting for you."

Jim bowed his head down and sat absolutely still for so long that his father finally stood to lay a shaky hand on a broad back. Jim slowly raised his head to stare into his father's moist eyes. A raspy, dry voice worked its way out of the elder Ellison's throat.

"I always thought that story had a hidden meaning somewhere in it. I just didn't realize how close to home it would hit."

The younger Ellison fumbled for an answer to the unexpected expression of understanding from his father but the barest hint of movement drew his attention to the bed. Rising from the chair he stepped closer to the bed and dropped down to sit at Blair's right hip. With a light touch to the uncovered side of the young man's forehead, Jim stared hard at the dry, cracked lips.

Moments later, a tiny slice of pink tongue slid between peeling lips then darted back inside the slightly open mouth. Jim sucked in a shuddering breath of his own and waited. Once more the tongue appeared and disappeared, this time with a slight quivering of the lower lip. A soft sigh escaped next and Blair nuzzled his face closer into the worn fur at his cheek. Jim found himself grinning like a idiot as the small figure flopped a hand up to land near the stuffed toy and instinctively drew the rabbit tighter to his neck, burying the rabbit's face in his own curl covered ear.

Bursting with the staggering joy of the realization that Blair was indeed going to recover, Jim impulsively hugged the waist of the tall figure beside him, before burying his face in the worn, blotchy fur next to his young friend's cheek. A whispered litany continued to break the silence of the sick room as relief flooded through both men.

"Thank, God! Thank, God! Thank you, God!"

And the count of long term survivors of a horrific event rose by two.

 

end

Notes:

This orphaned work was originally on Pejas WWOMB posted by author Amethyst.
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