Work Text:
“ Who said life was easy?
The job is never through
It'll run us till we're ragged
It'll harden our hearts
And love could use a day of rest
Before we both start falling apart” ©
Keith Urban – Raining On Sunday
It’s his first day back to Earth and he feels hesitant and insecure. He’d dreamt of this day so much during the last two and a half years, he dreamt days and nights, not that there were day’s divisions, of course, or he had much time for dreaming. Nevertheless, Lucifer tried. He tried to keep himself sane. Even if that meant dreaming and feeling pathetic.
Hell was as dull and boring as Hell could be, there never has been an entertainment and he hasn’t been hoping to find some, but, at least, he was able to cope with everything in the past and he had Maze for company. This time his loneliness was his only friend.
This time Lucifer didn’t mess with miserable sinners, letting their guilt and Hellish loops do the job. Thanks to the doors for keeping their screams away from him. He focused his attention on the rebels instead. He still had the power. He would manage!
And then, when the rebels were licking their wounds or scattered away, tail drawn in fear, he came to the very edge of the universe and sat down upon ashes, falling from the sky. Lucifer spent long hours just sitting there, looking into nothingness and watching the dance of broken dreams descending from the sky. He was not sure, that it was the sky he was staring at, but there was a tiny glimpse of light and it reminded him of hope.
He had time for thinking but he refused to – false hope never did any good to anybody, especially in a broken place like this, he refused to remember and he refused to forget, so he ended up in his own Hellish loop created by the life he left behind.
Sometimes the faint roar of thunder could be heard from a faraway distance, so Lucifer closed his eyes at that, and let his thoughts wander millennia and eons away from here. Up to the Silver City and up to the times of his childhood.
When he got bored to death from Amenadiel’s mentoring tone and his words of wisdom, when Azrael was hiding from everyone and everything, probably planning some very cruel prank on one of older siblings, might be on Lucifer himself, when his parents disappeared somewhere, too busy to notice their own children, he came to the edge of the City and sat down, looking at the clouds flowing beneath his dangling bare feet.
Clouds never ceased to amaze him. He admired the play of light and darkness on them. He watched the sun's rise and set, coloring the edge of a cloud in purple and pink. He wondered why sometimes pearly whiteness of a cloud turned grey, then the roaring of thunder could be heard and then cold drops of water fell from the sky. He wondered to himself, why he felt the presence on his father at that time, more than ever. So, he ran to his mother for answers.
“Your father is busy with his new project, Sammy, you know about it, and this thing keeps him away from us”, The Goddess answered after some discontented grumbling.
“But why water is falling from the sky, Mother?” Lucifer or Samuel that was his name at that time, asked curiously.
The Goddess touched her son’s cheek and smiled almost tenderly, before answering:
“This watery thing is called rain, Sammy, your father created it to show you that he is never far from you. When raindrops fall from clouds and touch the Earth, he is thinking of you. And I created sunlight to dry your tears when you are sad and lonely. Many millennia would pass, Sammy, but I want you to remember that there is always thunder before the rain and there is always a rainbow after the storm. And we are always in your heart, no matter how far. For rain and rainbow mean "love”
Lucifer heard his mother’s words echoing in the distance of the faraway sky, and therefore he shamefully waited for the rain to start. He didn’t know if he learned to believe in love and but he knew about hope now. And that hope had Detective Decker’s blue eyes and bore her name.
When it started raining in Hell, Lucifer took a deep breath, spread his wings and flew up. He flew back home where his life was waiting for him.
He is hesitant now. Two years and six months have passed, life has changed, and everyone chooses to move on while Lucifer has been struggling with his personal void where no light ever shone. He doesn’t know what their life has been like, which makes him being afraid.
At first, it seems to Lucifer that everything stays the same. At least, Penthouse and Lux look the same as before. Everything is clean and tidy, booze lined up at the bar, his suits hang neatly in the closet, his Corvette probably waits for him in the underground garage, and his piano calls him back. Still, he is afraid. What if none of his friends want him anymore? What if she…?
He pours some whiskey into the tumbler and sits by the piano.
Of course, Lucifer doesn’t hear the elevator’s door open with a soft tingle, and he is not aware of Chloe’s careful footsteps and her suppressed gasp. He is too absorbed in his music and shameful insecurities, but she doesn’t care.
Chloe runs to him in an instant, her arms envelop him in a tight hug, and her sobs break the silence of a summer evening.
“You are back, you are back, you are back”, she repeats like a mantra, her personal mantra that kept her sane all these long and lonely years.
And then there are kisses and whispered confessions, hugs and tender caresses, touches and tears. There is a distant roaring of thunder and first raindrops falling on their heads. There are sunset and rainbow. There is hope gifted to him by his parents.
There is rain.
There is love.
The End.
7.04.2020