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Susan Pevensie came back through the wardrobe and into her twelve year body and Nineteen-Forty, In the space of ten seconds, she’s gone from being a revered queen with a respected opinion and leadership skills to rival any King, to a young girl in a time where she may as well be mute. It’ll take her a lifetime to be respected again.
Aslan hath giveth and Aslan hath taketh away.
She’s thirteen when her horn pulls her back and blesses her with that trust again. She has to earn it this time, but she’s used to that now. It’s only been a year since she had a crown on her head and she’s not lost her fight yet. She feels more alive than she has in twelve months. The wind in her hair has never felt so good.
They find their old castle and their old possessions. It’s been hundreds of years but her bow still feels at home in her hand. She looks at the statue of herself and realises that even in Narnia, people always talked of her beauty first. Even in Narnia, Aslan crowned her Queen Susan the Gentle. The boys were Magnificent and Just but her? Gentle. At least Lucy got to be Valiant. Even in Narnia people have such silly expectations of women and by god she’ll prove them all wrong.
In the meantime, there’s adventure and fighting and a solidly good time. She feels a thrill that she’s not felt in years as she beats Trumpkin in the archery contest. It feels good to hold her bow again, but it feels better to prove a man wrong and have him give her respect. Caspian’s a little sceptical at first, but she proves him wrong too. Respect feels exquisite.
She missed the openness of Narnia. She missed the endless forests, the lush green grass and the tall mountains with their glacial blue rivers. London’s nothing but grey – the only colour there comes from the fires still burning from the night before’s bombings. The air in Narnia doesn’t taste like death.
She starts to feel alive for the first time in twelve months and then He takes it all away. Forever.
Susan Pevensie grows up (again) but this time it’s all wrong. Her body’s too pillowy, her fingertips too soft. She’s not sleek muscle and lithe sinew anymore. She looks in the mirror every morning and doesn’t recognise what’s there. It’s a terrible thing to look in the mirror and not see yourself.
She tries to go for a run every morning, but her parents stop her after the first time they spot it. It’s not ladylike. You really shouldn’t exert yourself like that Susan, dear. She wants to go for a ride in the mornings, like she used to in Narnia. She misses the feeling of speed, galloping through a forest with the wind in her hair. It felt like flying. It felt like freedom. It’s too painful by herself though – just her, alone, with a horse who doesn’t talk back. Instead, in the privacy of her room, she punishes herself with rounds of sit-ups, push-ups, stretches. She works until her core is steel and her limbs are flexible. Every time she breathes she feels a slight pain and she smiles. Every day, she takes back a little more control. Every day, she becomes more as she’s meant to be.
She plays the good daughter at her parent’s parties. She simpers and smiles, curtsies and dances with all the eligible bachelors. And all the time, she listens. She keeps her mouth shut and her ears open, and she learns. She learns the politics of this land just as well as she knows Narnia’s. She considers every side and makes her judgement. She starts to insert herself into serious conversations with old men. She states her opinions in her Queen voice – matter of fact and fully confident. They laugh at her. Call her a silly little girl and tell her to stop parroting better men’s opinions and to go back to her tea sets. Her opinions have never been anything but her own.
She finds her nearest archery range and shoots til her fingers bleed. The man behind the counter scoffs at her. It’s almost enough to make her quit. In Narnia, she’d won hundreds of archery contests, had been heralded as the truest shot in all the kingdoms. Here, six (thirty) years later, she’s lucky if she hits the target. The frustration threatens to overwhelm her. She breathes deep and closes her eyes. Focuses. Slows her heart and breathes between the beats. Again, she misses.
But her gift never came from Aslan. Her archery skills did, sure, but her determination was her own. So she shoots and she shoots and she improves.
You miss 100% of the shots you don’t take.
She’s fifteen when she can’t take it anymore. Edmund and Peter don’t understand – how could they? They’re men. They have the capability to become the leaders they once were. If they want to build muscle and become strong again, they’re just boys being boys. They can have fights, if they want to. When they speak, they are listened to. They could even run the country, one day. They’re allowed to do that. They can do whatever they want. When Susan tries to explain they just brush it off – ‘You could do it if you actually tried hard enough, Su’ and ‘Look Su, maybe it’s for the best that you don’t’.
Lucy doesn’t understand either but then again, she was never much one for ruling. Susan was political – a debater, a true leader, always advocating diplomacy over violence. Lucy just liked to have tea with Mr Tumnus and explore the new countries that she went to. Susan almost envies her, really – that she’s managed to keep that child-like wonder and optimism. She hopes that Lucy never gets made to live in the real world.
She’s fifteen when she tries to pretend that it was all just a childhood game, and tries so hard that she almost succeeds. She put on lipstick and nylons and goes dancing with the suitable young boys that her parents find. She learns the skills necessary to be the perfect hostess. Mostly, she learns to be quiet. There’s no point confiding in anyone if no one can understand. If she can’t be the perfect Queen then she’ll try her hardest to be the perfect daughter, She’s fifteen but she feel likes thirty and tries her hardest to act like she’s twenty-one.
Her siblings hate her for it. They mock her dresses and her shoes and her hair, like they hadn’t all been as perfectly put together as royalty in Narnia. Peter’s armour had been golden and shining. Edmund’s helm had been the brightest in the army. Her outfits are her battle armour. It’s not her fault that they can’t see it.
She’s twenty-one when Aslan decides to punish her for trying to move on. He doesn’t move slowly, he never has, and in one swoop her entire family is dead. Her siblings, she understands – he’ll be letting them live in Narnia and they’ll be loving it, but her parents? Was that just to punish her? She’s alone now – but, really, she’s felt alone since the wardrobe spat her back out nine years ago. Edmund, Peter and Lucy has been cold to her for year, feeling that she felt herself above them. She never did – she just didn’t want to sit around and reminisce. The days of her rule were long gone, and they weren’t coming again. She feels enough pain every day without adding to it on purpose.
She’s twenty-one when she packs her bags, quits her respectable and suitable job as a secretary, and leaves for America. She’s heard things about American women – about how they’re brash and loud and uncouth. They sound like just the women she needs.
There’s nothing left for her in England. Aslan saw fit to take her entire family. She’s done being the proper young lady that her parents wanted her to be. She’s a Queen and it’s time to stop pretending.
She’s twenty-five and she’s started to make ripples in the great American ocean. It’s a long, slow process fighting for anything in this country. She learns this new country’s legislative procedures. She learns their legal processes and their constitution. They won’t let her go to school, so she creates her own syllabus and teaches herself a legal degree. She fights for women’s rights, for equal pay and for all women to be treated as equals. She’s seen enough discrimination in the countries that Narnia visited and fought to put up with it here. She knows full well that colour of your skin, the gender you were born, the class that you were born to or the language you speak doesn’t impact the worth that you have. Only you can do that. And then you have to fight old men to help them see it.
She’s twenty-five when she starts teaching women how to defend themselves. She teaches them archery, hand-to-hand-fighting. She teaches them how to draw attention away from themselves. She teaches them how to make themselves invisible when they need to, and bold when they don’t. She’s learnt a lot of skills over the past few (hundred) years, and there’s no point keeping them to herself.
She’s twenty-five when she meets a young man. He’s the first one that she’s met in a while who isn’t immediately put off when she doesn’t simper and smile like’s expected. She tells him about herself, about her fears and her hopes, and he doesn’t laugh at her. She invites him out for a drink because of that. He then invites her for another and before she knows it she’s waking up to a smile that finally makes her feel like maybe this world could be home.
She keeps her name though. Pevensies have marked the history of many countries. She’s the last one left.
She’s thirty when she has a daughter. She’s thirty when she looks into her daughter’s eyes and vows that her child will never, ever, feel inadequate. She looks at her daughter’s sleeping face and vows to make the world a better place, for her. Her daughter will grow up knowing that nothing is given in this world, or any other. You have to fight for what you believe in, but if it’s important then it’s worth fighting for. She calls her Eleanor, Greek for bright, for shining, because this is the future that she will make for her daughter.
She tells Eleanor bedtime stories of Narnia, of strong female role models and a Queen who was revered for her beauty, but known for her backbone of steel. Queen Susan the Gentle indeed. She defeated armies without a drop of blood, and she’ll be damned if her daughter doesn’t know it.
Eleanor takes after her father though. She’s quite content with her life, and Susan still feels that even after all this, no one truly knows her.
Eleanor grows up and marries, has a perfect husband and two picture perfect children. They name their eldest child after her, but it’s the youngest that she sees herself in.
The Bishop household is a lovely one. The house is always spotless, and it’s lovely and big. It so large and grand and familiar that Susan almost expects to find a wardrobe in one of the unused rooms. She’s not sure that she’d step through. Narnia showed her who she was meant to be, but Aslan took it all away with a whip of his whiskers. Everything she’s accomplished here, however, she’s done herself. No one can take that away.
Susan can see that Eleanor hates it though, feels trapped. She tries to help her daughter, but Eleanor won’t admit it – just takes more and more holidays disguised as business trips. She’s good with the children, she clearly loves her daughters more than anything, but she has trouble staying for them. Derek’s just as useless. Little Susan is quite content with the Nanny, but tiny Katie, only a toddler herself, is climbing the walls. She’s constant restless energy, and Susan thinks now here is a girl that I can help
Katie grows into Kate. She’s strong minded and wilful. Susan looks at her and sees Lucy, but there’s a steel in her eyes that’s all Susan.
Susan’s daughter dies and Kate loses her mother. Susan picks Kate up from school early one day. Eleanor’s death has taken a toll on Kate the most – Derek and Eleanor had been separate for a while, and Susan the younger is a grown women who’s gone her own way now. Her mind’s full of wedding venues and white lace, but Susan doesn’t blame her for that. Every woman has her own interests and enjoyments and Susan would never shame a woman for what she chooses to do with her life. Just because she wants to rebel, to make a difference, doesn’t mean every woman has to. Little Kate, on the other hand, is still a child. Susan hesitates to say just a child, because she knows better than anyone that what children can do. Children can change the world when they put their minds to it. Children are a powerforce.
She pulls Kate out of class and into her car. She drives her downtown to the archery range that she set up years ago, where she teaches her classes. She takes Kate into the furthest bay from the end and puts a bow into her hand. ‘It’s time I told you some things’, she says.
Kate flourishes. She’s a wonderful archer. She’s an even better young woman. She never misses a shot because she always tries to take it. Susan’s spent time growing those notions that she planted when Kate was young, and they are blooming. Kate’s confident and strong. Sometimes her decisions leave a little to be desired, but the point is that she makes them.
Susan’s wedding gets invaded by some teenage boys and also some bad guys. Kate comes running to her grandmother later, face flushed with excitement and outrage. ‘They wouldn’t let us join because we were girls!’ she shouts, frustrated tears in her eyes. ’But I did what you always said, and I didn’t take no for an answer.’ Susan hugs her, tells her that she’s proud of her, and somehow, Kate becomes a superhero. She’s the only one in her little group who doesn’t have any super powers but she goes toe to toe like the Pevensie she is. It’s dangerous work but Susan would be a hypocrite if she told her to stop. The girl can protect herself. Susan taught her well.
Kate cultivates a public image to use as her mask, and Susan’s proud of her for that too. It takes a lot of courage to let people think the worst of you, whether they’re your siblings or the tabloid press.
Kate travels the world fighting evil supervillains and the like – to Europe, to Asia, even to space and back. No one ever seems to realise that Kate is not as surprised by these things as she should be. That’s what happens, however, when your grandma is the Queen of a magical land. She always comes home and tells her grandma about her adventures though, no matter the outcome. All Susan asks is that she is truthful and owns her decisions, both bad and good. Every time Kate comes home, covered in blood or beaming in success, Susan has never been prouder.
Kate finds another mentor – a young man named Clint Barton who shuffles his feet and calls her ma’am when Kate introduces them. He has a good heart and a good mentality. He’ll be good for her little Katie, and she’ll be good for him. Susan’s old now, and it’s nice to know that there’s someone that Kate can talk to once she’s gone. She wants the world for Kate, but she never wants her to be alone.
‘I’m sorry about Clint leaving,’ Tommy says, scuffing the floor with a shoe. ‘Like, I know he’s not dead or anything, he’s just retired. He wants out. We won’t be seeing him anymore. And, well, I – I know he taught you everything.’
She remembers the most important lesson her grandmother ever taught her. Susan Pevensie, English and prim and proper, had sat little Katie Bishop down one day and explained to her one very, very important thing.
‘People can help you with skills, they can teach you lessons and languages and love’ she’d said, holding Kate’s hands in her own, ‘but your drive? That’s yours, little bird. That comes from you and don’t you ever let anyone take it away. You will always be strong. You will always be enough.’
Yeah, she’s Hawkeye, but her fire’s all her own.