Be Who God Meant You To Be

The coffee pot is almost empty when Meg reaches the kitchen.

Which means that not only has her definitely-not-a-morning-person fiance woken up earlier than her definitely-a-morning-person self, he's been awake for a while.

Meg pours the not quite a cup that's left into a mug. She's not much of a coffee drinker (at all), and Alain brews coffee that's very strong and fairly bitter, but some times just seem to call for it, and this is one of them.

Alain is sitting in the floor of the living room, his back against the couch. Meg sits down next to him, so that their knees rest against each other. Alain's eyebrows go up for a second at the sight of her mug, but neither of them speaks.

They sit like that for several minutes.

"I didn't think it bothered me this much," Alain says, finally, his eyes on the window across the room.

Meg nods, even though he's not looking at her. "I know."

"I don't like it."

"I know that, too."

"I don't like it, I don't understand it, I don't trust it, and I don't really want you going there. And I'm sorry."

"You don't have to apologize for any of that, Alain."

Alain turns to look at her. "Not even the last?"

"No. You might have to apologize if you were trying to forbid me from doing something, but you don't have to apologize for not liking it or wanting it to happen."

Alain's smile is faint and very wry. "I don't think it would do me any good to try to forbid you to do something."

"Well, no. Probably not."

"And I know it's important to you, and I wouldn't even ask you not to go there, but I just . . . "

"You don't like it."

Alain shakes his head. "It's not that simple, Meg. It's . . . my fiancee is friends with an angel. How long can I possibly compete with that before you -- "

"Alain, you're not competing with that. You're not competing with any of it. There's no contest here. I don't see my life as some zero-sum game, where you can't win unless someone else loses."

"But you stayed there. When something was wrong and you needed help, you stayed there. You didn't come home to me."

"That's true. And I'd do it that way again. Because it's not that simple, either. It wasn't a question of 'something was wrong and I needed help.' It was 'I was ill and I needed medical attention.' And I had very good medical attention there, and I was safely quarantined so I couldn't make other people sick, which would have been much harder to manage here."

"But I wasn't there."

"No, you weren't. Look, Alain, I can't promise you that you will always be the single most important thing at any given moment of my life or the single deciding factor in every decision. You can't be. There will always be circumstances that affect that."

"That's not exactly encouraging, ma belle."

"But," Meg continues, "when you take all the decisions and all the moments and average them together . . . it's you. It's us. And no one and nothing matters more. Here or there."

Alain opens his mouth and then closes it again, shaking his head a little. But he's properly smiling for the first time since the evening before. "I hate it when you say things like that."

"No, you don't," Me says, with a smile of her own. "Even though you can't argue with them."

A moment passes before Alain speaks again. "Your friend Edward said I was 'very accommodating of all this.'" Meg winces a little. "What, you don't think I'm 'accommodating'?"

"It's not the word I would use. It makes you sound like . . . like a hotel. Or like you're just indulging some whim of mine or something. I don't know. I would say that you're amazingly accepting, and terribly supportive, and generally remarkable, but not 'accomodating.'"

"The current conversation wouldn't seem to support the theory that I'm accepting or supportive, Meg."

"Of course you are. You don't like this or understand it or want it to be happening, and you're still here, and we're talking about it. If you weren't accepting or supportive, we'd have been done a year and a half ago, when I first told you."

"Maybe," Alain allows. And then, in a bit of a rush, "I didn't like him. Edward."

"I know you didn't."

Alain looks just a little taken aback. "How? I didn't say anything or . . . "

"No, you've been very tactful on the subject of Edward Cullen. But I'm your fiancee. I know you, and I know when you're being tactful."

"He's your friend."

"Yes, he is. But you don't have to like all my friends."

And Edward told her that he hadn't been entirely kind to Alain.

"He made me feel like he didn't expect me to be good enough for you. And he talks like he thinks he knows you incredibly well. Maybe even better than I do."

"Well, he doesn't get a vote on whether or not you're good enough for me, and he doesn't know me better than you do."

Even without mind-reading, Alain knows her better than Edward does.

"I don't like him. And I can't say I really like this, either," Alain says, reaching out and touching the gold bracelet from Edward, where it rests on her right wrist between the silver one from Alain and the steel one from Laura.

Meg waits until he has moved his hand away, then turns the bracelet on her wrist until she can reach the clasp.

"No, I didn't mean . . . You don't have to take it off," Alain says.

"I know. But I don't have to wear it every day, either," she says, setting it carefully on the table beside her.

"Thank you."

Meg nods. "I know I'm not the easiest person you could have chosen."

"You're really and truly not," Alain says. "But you're the only one I've ever wanted to choose. And I won't stop trying to understand things, even if I don't like them. So here we are."

"Here we are. And of all the places I have been or will go, this is my favorite. Even though our coffee's gone cold."

Alain leans over and kisses her. "I'll make us more."

Meg has been back in Montreal for seven hours and nineteen minutes when she hears the key turn in the lock on the front door.

"Meg? Are you -- ?" Alain breaks off as Meg kisses him, dropping his suitcase and kicking the front door closed with one foot, his arms going around her. "Ma belle," he says, several moments later, "not that I am complaining, but . . . what brought that on?"

"Tu m'as manqué," Meg says.

"I missed you, too," Alain says.

"How do you feel?" Meg asks.

"Good," Alain says, with a smile. "Better by the second," he adds, bending to kiss her again.

"You don't feel feverish? Or have a headache?"

Alain laughs. "No, of course not. I'm fine. Maybe a little tired, but fine."

"Tired? Why are you tired?" Meg asks, reaching up to place the back of her hand against his forehead. He doesn't feel warm.

"Ah, because I spent the weekend moving furniture," Alain says, ducking away from her hand. "Meg, what's wrong? You're acting very strangely."

"Have you had the chickenpox?" Meg asks.

"I don't know what that is," Alain says.

"La varicelle."

"Oui, quand j'avais quatre ans. Luc et moi ensemble. Pourquoi?

"Oh, thank God," Meg says, resting her cheek against his chest. "Then you're probably immune and I didn't make you sick."

Alain steps back so he can look at her. "Ma belle, you're not making any sense. And that is not like you."

"I had the chickenpox while you were gone. And I was already contagious when you left, and I didn't know if you'd had them before or if I'd made you sick."

"Meg," Alain says slowly, "you can't have had the -- what did you call it, chickenpox? -- while I was gone. You would have . . . " he taps one index finger across her cheeks and the tip of her nose " . . . spots."

"I did," Meg says. "They're gone."

"That takes days, ma belle. Weeks maybe. You cannot have had spots for weeks. I saw you yesterday. You can't have been sick for weeks since yesterday."

"Well, most people can't," Meg says. "I can."

"Comment?" Alain demands, and then, before she can answer, "Oh. Milliways?"

Meg nods.

Alain takes another step back, dropping his hands to his sides. "You had the chickenpox. Which is a ridiculous name."

"Yes. And I went to lie down, and instead of going into the bedroom, the door took me to Milliways."

"And you stayed there."

Meg nods. "Dr. Cullen found me there."

"Edward?"

"Carlisle. His father."

"Right. Baseball."

Meg nods again. "Yes. And I was running a high fever, and -- "

"How high?"

"Dangerously high," Meg admits. "Around forty."

Alain draws a sharp, almost hiss-like breath. "Quarante?"

"Oui."

"Why didn't you come home?"

"I needed a doctor. And one was there. And, yes, I guess I could have come back here, but . . . you weren't here, Alain."

"I wasn't here because you told me you were fine. Yesterday morning. I asked you twice. You know I wouldn't have left if I'd known."

"I know. And when I told you that, I believed it. And I'm not blaming you, not at all. That's not what I meant. But if I'd come back, I would either have had to get myself to a doctor or hope I didn't get any sicker before you got home. And I didn't know if you'd had chickenpox before, or if I'd already made you sick, of if I could still make you sick. Either way, the most sensible thing for me to do was -- "

"I don't give a damn about sensible right now, Meg."

"Alain, I--"

"You were sick, you were very sick, and you were there. You were in a place I can't be, or even get to, to help you or protect you or take care of you when you need me. And that's just going to keep happening, isn't it?"

"Probably, yes," Meg says. "I'm sorry, Alain. I -- "

Alain holds one hand up, shaking his head. "Non. Pas maintenant." He sighs, and shoves one hand through his hair. "Je vais faire une promenade," he says, finally.

"And . . . do you want me to be here when you get back?" It's his apartment, after all. If he wants space, she'll go.

Alain very gently kisses her forehead. "Pour toujours."

He pauses at the door. "But don't wait up."

Meg is working very hard at not scratching her chicken pox. Because scratching is bad. Infections. Scars. General unpleasantness.

She will just have to find something else to focus on.

Other than worrying about things at home.

She really should have asked Edward for some books she hasn't already read.

Or crossword puzzles.

Meg surveys her choices again and finally picks Jane of Lantern Hill, then settles back into bed to read.

It's amazing what a difference a shower can make.

Oh, she's still very much got the chickenpox. She's still running a low-grade fever (but that is, at least, preferable to the dangerously high one she had when are arrived), she's still vaguely tired, she's still contagious, and she is thoroughly itchy.

But she's clean, her hair is combed out and neatly braided, her nails have been cut as short as she could manage, and she's dressed in real (if very loose) clothes instead of pajamas. She's starting to feel properly human again.

She's even actually hungry for the first time in about four days.

"Chaussettes," Meg says, sitting on Alain's bed and watching her fiance throw (almost literally) clothes into the bag he's packing.

It's not the way Meg packs -- she has lists and there's careful folding to maximize space and so on -- but it's not her bag. Alain tends to pack at the last minute and on whims. Which means he occasionally forgets things like socks or his toothbrush or, on one memorable occasion, any shirt but the one he wore out of the apartment.

"Oui. Chaussettes. Merci," Alain says, pulling two pairs of socks from a drawer and adding them to the top of the bag. He looks down into the bag, reaches in to move things around, and then looks back to Meg. "Je pense que c'est tout."

Meg nods, her own eyes still on the bag. "Meg?" Alain says, and she blinks and looks up at him. He frowns at her a little. "Ma belle, are you sure you'll be all right?"

"Of course," Meg says. "You'll only be gone two days." Alain and his brother have been drafted to help with the move of a cousin who lives in a town whose name Meg cannot quite remember. "Why wouldn't I be all right?"

"I don't know. You just look tired," Alain says, reaching one hand out and letting it rest against her cheek.

"Well, I did get up at 5 a.m. to help my fiance pack," Meg says. Luc is due at 5:30.

"Yes," Alain says, "but you look more tired than that would explain."

"Maybe a little," Meg allows. "It's been a busy semester. But I'm fine."

"I can tell them I can't come," Alain says.

"I'm fine," Meg repeats. "Go help your cousin. Don't worry about me."

Alain hesitates for a moment, his hand still resting against her cheek, and then nods. "Get some rest this weekend. Don't just study the whole time I'm gone. You can stay here, if you want some quiet."

"I probably will."

"Good," Alain says.

There's a knock at the front door.

"That'll be Luc," Meg says.

"Oui." Alain leans down and kisses her. "I'll call you. I love you."

"Je t'aime, aussi, Alain. Have fun," Meg says. "And don't worry about me. I really am fine."

"Go back to bed," Alain tells her, kisses her once more, and leaves.

Meg doesn't go back to bed, though. She likes mornings, even ones that start very early. They're quiet and still and generally speaking she can get a lot done. She fixes toast and tea and settles in to study at the table in the apartment she doesn't officially in just yet.

It's surprisingly hard to focus.

Maybe she is more tired than she realized.

She fixes soup, when it's lunch time, but finds the idea of actually eating it to be incredibly unappealing.

Meg revises her earlier theory. Maybe she's coming down with something.

She spends Saturday afternoon dozing on Alain's sofa and drinking most of the apple juice in the refrigerator. Alain calls in the evening, but they're both too tired for a proper conversation. He thinks he'll he home by tomorrow afternoon, though possibly not till the evening.

Meg wakes up Sunday morning with a sore throat and a dreadful headache and suspects she might be running a low fever. She decides against going to church, and instead curls back up on the couch with a book she can't seem to pay any attention to.

Finally, just before noon, she gives up on reading and the couch, and decides she's going back to bed.