Muse Requested: Alex Drake

Fandom of Muse: Ashes to Ashes

Other Muses You Already Have in Theatrical Muse (muse name, fandom, and journal name). If none, say N/A: Gwen Cooper, Torchwood, alien_catcher

Whether the muse is canon or an original character: Canon

Include a response to the most current TM ficlette challenge for your proposed muse. The response must be at least 150 words.

Current Topic: Write about something you've outlived.

When I was young, I often fantasized that my parents had survived the explosion.

It made things a bit easier, to lie in bed and pretend that they weren't home not because they were dead, but because they were both safely tucked away in hospital. They couldn't call because they were both in a coma, but they would eventually wake up. And then one day they would come home and life would be the way it was before I saw them die.

I could have never dreamt that one day, my fantasy, my small tendril of hope that I clung to so tightly, would be my own daughter's reality. And I doubt that it gives her any of the same comfort that it once gave me.

The idea that I could have wished such a fate as my own on my parents in daunting. I fear, at times, that I have outlived my own body. Somewhere, in 2008, I'm wasting away in a hospital bed, as Molly watches. And here, in 1981, I live every day as if I have a chance of seeing her again.

I can't expect to know what will happen, if my body dies. Will my existence in 1981 simply cease? Or will I be trapped here forever? Will I grow, age, start to forget, and eventually die, like Sam? Have I died already, and I just will never know?

I'm trapped in my mind, I feel alive as I have ever been, even as my physical body fights and fades and slips steadily from my grip.

It's far to common to outlive others.

No one ever talks about what a curse it must be to outlive yourself.