Being Human: there was a whisper [George/Nina]
Title: “there was a whisper”
Author: Shaitanah
Rating: PG
Timeline: series 1-4, indefinite future
Summary: Nina, before and after her death. [George/Nina]
Disclaimer: Being Human belongs to Toby Whithouse and the BBC. Title from the eponymous song by Bang Gang.
A/N: Weird, non-linear structure, choppy writing, basic plotlessness, inspired by Peter Gabriel’s "Mercy Street", the song used in the epigraph.
THERE WAS A WHISPER
all of the buildings, all of those cars
were once just a dream
in somebody's head
she pictures the broken glass, she pictures the steam
she pictures a soul
with no leak at the seam
Peter Gabriel. “Mercy Street”
Nina shows him the scars so that he knows how ugly love can be, and they don’t talk about it later, and he promises he will never hurt her in the same way.
He keeps that promise but gives her a much more damaging scar.
--
I thought she’d, you know, grow up, Nina says, cradling her baby daughter in her arms.
Give her time, Annie says.
I don’t have to. Time is all she has.
--
They are wearing visors and seem to be dead set on not letting her blood touch their skin. She thinks as she dies: well, that would have been nice to know… before. Like when Herrick stabbed her.
--
What she knows about George after the first few meetings is that he is a crass, arrogant fuckhead.
What she knows, and dislikes acknowledging, about herself is how easily she sometimes misjudges people.
--
She stands by the door and watches the vampires as they continue showering her now dead body with hard blows of baseball bats. She is glad George isn’t here to see it but she wishes she could say goodbye. It’s not enough to keep her for long. She opens the door and steps into the bluish light and keeps herself from thinking: thank God it’s over.
--
Maybe there is a parallel world where she gets to have a happy ending.
But maybe there’s a parallel world when she lives and gets to watch everyone else die.
That’s food for thought.
--
By the way, George tells her, I named her Eve.
Nina keeps quiet. He touches her hand, worried that she doesn’t like the name.
Biblical, she says.
Still better than Sapphire.
--
She tries to make the telly work but there’s too much interference. She is secretly glad: she remembers what Annie looked like when she sent her messages from the other side. She wouldn’t want George to go through that again, even if it’s her door, even if everything’s fine, even if fine is relative.
--
Be back in ten minutes, she tells him.
Ten minutes can be a very long time.
--
He surprises her when he walks through the door. She is caught between what took you so long and who the hell allowed you to die.
I got lost, he says, sounding sheepish. So many corridors. There should be a map of this place.
Nina is terrified that he’ll ask about Mitchell - because in all her time here, she hasn’t caught even a glimpse of him. She isn’t sure vampires even get doors or end up in the same place.
But he doesn’t ask. Not yet. That will come later. Right now he’s just kissing her. Happiness has a taste here. It’s nothing like raw meat.
--
You happy? he asks.
I’m waiting, she tells him.
When Annie walks through the door, carrying the baby in her arms, things seem to be getting better.
--
Noises come from the ceiling sometimes, ghostly and barely there, and she remembers the attic that housed an amnesiac vampire. She wonders what kind of a bizarre dream it is.
She remembers the street and the house and the attic and the basement and the space in between and a sandwich stuck in a laptop and a murderer hiding newspaper clippings detailing the horrors of his crime. All of that seems a bit meaningless as she sits alone in the room behind the door, waiting for someone to come.
--
When George calls her my Nina, it’s very hard for her to ignore the butterflies in her stomach. A huge monstrous swarm of them.
--
Nina has precious few good memories of her childhood.
Eve has none.
It’s just one of those unfair things.
--
Eve catches sight of her mother once. It’s an old memory of a corridor in St. Jude’s. Nina’s hair is up in a bun and she’s wearing her nurse uniform. She looks irritated with something, but not unhappy.
Eve takes a step towards her, then turns around and leaves the memory.
--
Nina catches sight of the woman in a yellow shawl once. The woman has got braided blond hair and is wearing a pair of cross-shaped earrings. She looks familiar and sad. Sad in a familiar way.
Nina doesn’t approach her because some boxes are better left unopened.
--
Sometimes she expects to open her eyes and find out that werewolves don’t exist.
But that would mean she had made George up.
--
A hundred, maybe a thousand years later, people still drop by for tea. Annie’s friends mostly, ghosts she’d helped to pass over.
The baby is still a baby. Nina still feels like she’s waiting for something.
--
I’m trying to wake up, she says.
You’re pretty when you sleep, George whispers.
--
The last time George sees her, the mortuary notwithstanding, she is framed by the doorway and she has never looked more beautiful.
The phone call comes too soon. The pain of the full moon has got nothing on this.
--
She wants to remember them in front of the gaudy Hawaii poster in the house in Barry, dancing, laughing, feeling alive.
It turns out death isn’t really that big an adventure after you’ve died. It’s actually rather dull.
--
The wait is very long, like a sentence devoid of all punctuation marks including the full stop.
What are you waiting for? Annie asks.
Nina doesn’t have a proper answer to that. Death is a snowfall of memories, suspension marks and splinters of the past rising like jagged rocks around the corner.
She is waiting for the future to begin again.
She is waiting for Eve to grow up.
--
She is looking for that dunce of a hospital porter she was rude to because she wants to apologise.
In one world, she finds him.
In another world, she doesn’t.
Sometimes Purgatory gets it at all wrong.
--
I love you, George says.
They are on a boat for some reason, Eve snoring quietly astern. Nina bends over the board and dips her fingers into the water. It feels cool. The river is dead calm. Nothing to be surprised about. She isn’t sure if it’s her memory or his.
We are going to be happy, she decides. Even if she has to jump into the water and push the bloody boat into the future herself.
--
I love you too.
August 4, 2012
Author: Shaitanah
Rating: PG
Timeline: series 1-4, indefinite future
Summary: Nina, before and after her death. [George/Nina]
Disclaimer: Being Human belongs to Toby Whithouse and the BBC. Title from the eponymous song by Bang Gang.
A/N: Weird, non-linear structure, choppy writing, basic plotlessness, inspired by Peter Gabriel’s "Mercy Street", the song used in the epigraph.
THERE WAS A WHISPER
all of the buildings, all of those cars
were once just a dream
in somebody's head
she pictures the broken glass, she pictures the steam
she pictures a soul
with no leak at the seam
Peter Gabriel. “Mercy Street”
Nina shows him the scars so that he knows how ugly love can be, and they don’t talk about it later, and he promises he will never hurt her in the same way.
He keeps that promise but gives her a much more damaging scar.
--
I thought she’d, you know, grow up, Nina says, cradling her baby daughter in her arms.
Give her time, Annie says.
I don’t have to. Time is all she has.
--
They are wearing visors and seem to be dead set on not letting her blood touch their skin. She thinks as she dies: well, that would have been nice to know… before. Like when Herrick stabbed her.
--
What she knows about George after the first few meetings is that he is a crass, arrogant fuckhead.
What she knows, and dislikes acknowledging, about herself is how easily she sometimes misjudges people.
--
She stands by the door and watches the vampires as they continue showering her now dead body with hard blows of baseball bats. She is glad George isn’t here to see it but she wishes she could say goodbye. It’s not enough to keep her for long. She opens the door and steps into the bluish light and keeps herself from thinking: thank God it’s over.
--
Maybe there is a parallel world where she gets to have a happy ending.
But maybe there’s a parallel world when she lives and gets to watch everyone else die.
That’s food for thought.
--
By the way, George tells her, I named her Eve.
Nina keeps quiet. He touches her hand, worried that she doesn’t like the name.
Biblical, she says.
Still better than Sapphire.
--
She tries to make the telly work but there’s too much interference. She is secretly glad: she remembers what Annie looked like when she sent her messages from the other side. She wouldn’t want George to go through that again, even if it’s her door, even if everything’s fine, even if fine is relative.
--
Be back in ten minutes, she tells him.
Ten minutes can be a very long time.
--
He surprises her when he walks through the door. She is caught between what took you so long and who the hell allowed you to die.
I got lost, he says, sounding sheepish. So many corridors. There should be a map of this place.
Nina is terrified that he’ll ask about Mitchell - because in all her time here, she hasn’t caught even a glimpse of him. She isn’t sure vampires even get doors or end up in the same place.
But he doesn’t ask. Not yet. That will come later. Right now he’s just kissing her. Happiness has a taste here. It’s nothing like raw meat.
--
You happy? he asks.
I’m waiting, she tells him.
When Annie walks through the door, carrying the baby in her arms, things seem to be getting better.
--
Noises come from the ceiling sometimes, ghostly and barely there, and she remembers the attic that housed an amnesiac vampire. She wonders what kind of a bizarre dream it is.
She remembers the street and the house and the attic and the basement and the space in between and a sandwich stuck in a laptop and a murderer hiding newspaper clippings detailing the horrors of his crime. All of that seems a bit meaningless as she sits alone in the room behind the door, waiting for someone to come.
--
When George calls her my Nina, it’s very hard for her to ignore the butterflies in her stomach. A huge monstrous swarm of them.
--
Nina has precious few good memories of her childhood.
Eve has none.
It’s just one of those unfair things.
--
Eve catches sight of her mother once. It’s an old memory of a corridor in St. Jude’s. Nina’s hair is up in a bun and she’s wearing her nurse uniform. She looks irritated with something, but not unhappy.
Eve takes a step towards her, then turns around and leaves the memory.
--
Nina catches sight of the woman in a yellow shawl once. The woman has got braided blond hair and is wearing a pair of cross-shaped earrings. She looks familiar and sad. Sad in a familiar way.
Nina doesn’t approach her because some boxes are better left unopened.
--
Sometimes she expects to open her eyes and find out that werewolves don’t exist.
But that would mean she had made George up.
--
A hundred, maybe a thousand years later, people still drop by for tea. Annie’s friends mostly, ghosts she’d helped to pass over.
The baby is still a baby. Nina still feels like she’s waiting for something.
--
I’m trying to wake up, she says.
You’re pretty when you sleep, George whispers.
--
The last time George sees her, the mortuary notwithstanding, she is framed by the doorway and she has never looked more beautiful.
The phone call comes too soon. The pain of the full moon has got nothing on this.
--
She wants to remember them in front of the gaudy Hawaii poster in the house in Barry, dancing, laughing, feeling alive.
It turns out death isn’t really that big an adventure after you’ve died. It’s actually rather dull.
--
The wait is very long, like a sentence devoid of all punctuation marks including the full stop.
What are you waiting for? Annie asks.
Nina doesn’t have a proper answer to that. Death is a snowfall of memories, suspension marks and splinters of the past rising like jagged rocks around the corner.
She is waiting for the future to begin again.
She is waiting for Eve to grow up.
--
She is looking for that dunce of a hospital porter she was rude to because she wants to apologise.
In one world, she finds him.
In another world, she doesn’t.
Sometimes Purgatory gets it at all wrong.
--
I love you, George says.
They are on a boat for some reason, Eve snoring quietly astern. Nina bends over the board and dips her fingers into the water. It feels cool. The river is dead calm. Nothing to be surprised about. She isn’t sure if it’s her memory or his.
We are going to be happy, she decides. Even if she has to jump into the water and push the bloody boat into the future herself.
--
I love you too.
August 4, 2012