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It takes them about a year to stop pretending.
It’s a year of denial, of burying heads in too-deep sand. It’s a year where implication rumbles heavily under the surface, where neither can bring themselves to say the words, to break the bubble. They’re finally happy, unbearably so, the sort of happiness that spreads throughout your entire body like a warm, pleasant ache. So for a year, Lucifer hides his worries behind humour and Chloe cloaks hers in stubborn denial.
Until they catch wind of a rebellion brewing in Heaven.
Zadkiel brings the news, his expression grim and sober, and the more he speaks, the clearer it all becomes.
It’s impossible to be God and rule from Earth.
Just as the demons had needed a king to keep them in line, the angels need the heavenly Father. Without their ruler, they’re untethered, disorganised and unpredictable. Lucifer listens to his brother and lets acceptance sink like a heavy stone to the pit of his stomach. He watches the resignation sweep over Chloe’s face too, the realisation that they’re out of time.
He dismisses his brother with a hollow thanks, the cogs in his head turning. He thinks of his own Father and the fall and all the choices that have led him here. He thinks about all the different paths that stretch out before him now, and how it doesn’t really matter, because they all lead to the same destination.
And that night, wrapped up in silk sheets, her touch is laced with a little more desperation.
She clings to him, thighs trembling either side of his hips, nails carving moon-shaped crescents into his back. She’s never been more eager to mark him, to remind herself she was once the only one who could, and emotion swells into a lump in his throat.
He kisses her, mouth moving languidly against hers. He feels her hands move to his hair, carding through the strands. She feels soft and warm and she tastes better than anyone who’s come before and anyone who would come after. Everything about her is better.
Over too many years to count, he’s had rough sex, slow sex, kinky sex. He’s had sex that was a little boring, and sex that was downright daring. But he’s never had sex that meant anything.
Until her.
Now, cradled between her thighs, it feels like when he first opened his eyes on the world—all the cosmic brilliance, the unbearable light. He supposes it makes sense, that he’s experiencing it all over again, that he’s reborn with her. Before her, there was nothing.
The notion of returning to that—a world above, rather than below, but just as empty—has an ache clenching in his chest.
He keeps kissing her until he tastes the salt of tears.
“Chloe…”
Her eyes slide shut and she shakes her head.
“No,” she whispers, holding onto him like an anchor, “not tonight.”
He goes to speak, there’s so much he needs to say, but then she’s begging “please” against his kiss-swollen lips, and all he can do is listen.
She waits for him on the balcony.
“I can’t believe we’re here again…” she murmurs, her back to him.
She doesn’t need to elaborate. He sees the memory as clear as she does, the night he left for Hell, the night he soared down below with the buzz of her “I love you” still sharp in his veins.
But it was different then. They were only starting out; just the promise of something. But now he’s loved her and been loved by her in return. Now he’s held her, and touched her, and tasted her, and he knows how bloody perfect she is—how is he supposed to let her go?
She turns, leaning her back against the railing. The setting Californian sun paints her in soft orange and yellow hues, illuminating her beauty. Even after all these years, she’s still the most beautiful thing he’s ever seen. His eyes flit over her, as though to drink her in, to never forget.
“I won’t beg you to stay,” she says, voice clear and steady, “not this time.”
He nods, grateful that she understands, but while his shoulders itch to unfurl his wings, he just can’t. It’s as though he’s rooted to the floor, shackled to her.
“I wanted to be God to be worthy of you,” he chokes out, “so if I can’t have you, what’s the point?”
Her lips twitch into a melancholy smile. She knows this is just a blip, a desperate lapse in judgement because he loves her so much. He’s never exactly been good at processing his emotions.
“It might have started out that way,” she takes a step towards him, “but it’s not like that anymore. You have a higher purpose. You’re God because you want to do good… and you will.”
“Without you?”
A flicker of sadness passes over her face.
“I can’t go to Heaven, you know that. Trixie’s already lost one parent.”
He does know it, deep down. He knows her place is on Earth and his isn’t, no matter how much he wants it to be. He burns too bright—the lightbringer, uncontainable.
“I don’t know if I can do this without you,” he admits in a painfully honest confession.
She lifts a hand to his cheek.
“You can,” she assures him, “and I’ll still be here, supporting you and believing in you from a distance. I’ll live a long and happy life and when it’s time, I’ll come back to you. What’s forty, fifty years compared to eternity?”
He sighs, a tremulous sound rolling from his throat, and his hand comes up to grip her wrist.
“I love you, Lucifer,” she whispers, “but it’s selfish of me to keep you here.”
“I love you too,” he replies, as easy as breathing. He can’t remember a time when he found it difficult to say, when the words lodged in his throat. In the face of losing everything, it’s so simple now.
“Yeah?”
“I’ve always been in love with you,” he murmurs, turning his face to lay a kiss on her palm, “I will always be in love with you.”
Her bottom lip trembles and she wraps her arms around his neck. He holds her tightly to him and tries not to think about everything he’ll miss—every birthday, every anniversary, the urchin’s graduation and first heartbreak. Inexplicably, his eyes start to burn and he holds her tighter still.
When they slowly break apart, she angles her chin to capture his lips in a kiss. He kisses her back, hands coming up to cup her face.
It’s a soft, gentle kiss—a goodbye.
Not forever, but for now.
He says goodbye to Trixie this time.
“Look after your mother for me,” he asks with a smile that doesn’t quite reach his eyes, “won’t you?”
To his horror, the little urchin’s eyes fill with tears.
“Is it because I kicked you and called your hair stupid?” she asks in a small voice, “because I didn’t mean it.”
He chuckles, a low husky sound.
“No, you were right. Not about the hair, of course,” he can’t help but clarify sourly, “but you had every right to be angry. I should have said goodbye before. I’m saying it now. I wish I didn’t have to go, but I do and… dare I say it, I might even miss you.”
Her lips stretch into a wobbly smile, even as her eyes remain sad. The first tear falls and from where he’s crouched in-front of her, having lowered himself to her level, he wipes it from her cheek.
“Now then, child,” he scolds half-heartedly, “none of that.”
“I’ll definitely miss you,” she whispers resolutely and then throws her arms around his neck. He lets out a little grunt, half surprise, half discomfort, his hands twitching awkwardly. Finally, with a sigh of resignation, he hugs her back.
They stay like that for a moment, the embrace nowhere near as uncomfortable as it used to be. He remembers how tiny she used to be—such a small, irritating little thing—and he feels a stab of pain, of regret, that he’ll only be able to continue watching her grow from afar.
“And I know,” she whispers into his ear after a few silent beats, heavy and significant, “I’ve always known.”
He pulls back, stunned, but if he had any doubt of her meaning, it fades away with the look on her face.
He laughs, a small sound of disbelief, and suddenly, his throat feels too dry.
All those years desperate for acceptance, for belonging, and it had been here the whole time.
He doesn’t plan it this way, not at all, but the last person he sees on Earth is Michael.
It’s once the goodbyes are done. Once Ella has finished hitting him with her shoe, and Amenadiel has clasped his shoulder with a fierce promise to look after things. Once he’s sent Maze off with a kiss on the cheek to collect that crown she covets, and once Linda’s stopped crying long enough to listen to him thank her for everything.
Lucifer’s surprised to see him lurking in the shadows outside Lux, and even more surprised at the words that come out of his mouth.
“I’ll look out for her,” he proposes, that unsettling accent cautious and unsure, “if you want.”
Lucifer raises a brow.
“I know you’re wondering why I’d offer,” Michael shuffles awkwardly on his feet, “because you already have Amenadiel—”
“That’s not why.”
His twin closes his mouth, a muscle in his jaw ticking.
“The truth is…” his eyes slide shut briefly before they open again, “it’s been a year and I still can’t forget that look on your face when I…”
“When you stabbed her?” Lucifer replies dully, “when you killed her?”
Michael swallows heavily.
“Yes,” he whispers, expression regretful, “I didn’t realise how much you cared for these humans. I didn’t know how it would feel to see you so broken. I didn’t… I didn’t know.”
Lucifer slides his hand in his pocket, his eyes flickering over his twin. He searches for any sign of insincerity, even uses his new powers to reach inside his mind, but he finds none. Truth be told, Michael has been a model prisoner the past year, and he knows he still searches for his place in the world.
“This is your redemption then?”
Michael shrugs.
“Maybe,” he tries, “I don’t have wings, you saw to that, but I’m still strong. Can’t hurt to have me on her side, right?”
“From afar, yes,” Lucifer warns, knowing that Chloe still quite rightly struggles to forgive him.
It’s silent for a moment as they process the exchange.
“You love her,” Michael says then, his voice quiet, and it’s not a question.
“Completely,” Lucifer answers, “I love her completely.”
Michael shifts again, shoulders no longer broken, but movements just as awkward.
“I don’t know what that’s like.”
“Maybe one day,” Lucifer says, his tone clipped, because they’ve come a long way, but he still doesn’t envisage them talking about their love life over cool glasses of whiskey and vodka any time soon, “you are immortal, after-all.”
“I don’t know what I am anymore,” shame passes like a shadow over his twin’s scarred face.
Maybe it’s heaven’s light inside him, or maybe he’s just grown as a person, because he places a hand on Michael’s shoulder and gives it a squeeze.
“A fallen angel is still an angel.”
Michael’s mouth twists wryly as the hand drops from his shoulder.
“Goodbye, brother,” he says.
Lucifer’s jaw ticks at the reminder of the familial bond and he can’t quite say it back.
“Goodbye, Michael.”
The months pass by and Chloe tries. She really tries.
She throws herself back into work, because how stupid was she to think she could be God’s consultant? How could she have ever thought this would work? Some days the pain is almost too much to bear, but some days she can muddle through, and eventually the searing agony she feels at Lucifer’s loss turns into more of a dull ache.
It’s like the pain from a phantom limb. She can’t see him, but she knows he’s there.
And that’s enough.
Amenadiel visits him now and then. He tells her about him, how much the angels respect him, how he’s doing so well now people have put their faith in him. He sounds so proud, and he’s only trying to help, but eventually, being so close to Lucifer and not being able to have him hurts too much and she has to ask Amenadiel to stop.
She gets hobbies of her own and actually finds them fun. She spends time with friends, and she raises Trixie, and she tries her best.
Until about a year passes, and on her birthday, a strange feeling sweeps over her. She has to stop what she’s doing to inhale a sharp breath, her hand resting on the counter to steady herself.
“You okay?” Linda asks, her brows knitting in concern.
Chloe shakes her head, placing her hand against her chest as if to soothe the ache.
“I can’t feel him anymore,” she whispers, the words springing tears to her eyes.
Linda’s expression softens, “Oh Chloe…”
The tears she hasn’t let herself cry suddenly fall over, pain twisting like a knife inside her. She feels the rush of loss all at once, and clings to Linda when she folds her arms around her in an embrace.
That night, when she’s opened all her presents and Trixie’s stuffed her full of birthday cake, there’s a knock on the door. She almost doesn’t answer it, but with a sigh she does, and her heart plummets to the pit of her stomach.
There’s a bouquet of flowers on her doorstep, so bright and beautiful it almost hurts to look at them. Tomorrow, Amenadiel will tell her they’re from the Garden of Eden itself, from the banks that grow around stones like the one she wears on her finger. Tonight, she picks them up, her throat dry, and reads the elegant cursive on the message attached:
I’m always here.
Happy birthday, darling.
She smiles a watery smile, and holds the message to her chest.
She goes to church with Ella.
It’s never exactly been her thing. In-fact, she was an atheist before… everything… and the last time she was in a church, it was with Father Kinley by her side. It claws painful memories to the surface, ones she’s tried to suppress. She’s spent so long wallowing in guilt, thinking about all the time she wasted, another year they could have been together.
But now, she’s searching for a reason, and Ella always seems to have one.
So she sits next to her in the pews and tries not to think about how absurd Lucifer would find all this.
She smirks at the sermons the priest gives, about a God he’s never met. She glances around and thinks Lucifer’s surrounded by people who adore him, but she’s the only one who loves him. She’s the only one who knows him, inside and out, better than she knows herself.
She thinks of the nuns she met on that case with Amenadiel and wonders how they would react to Lucifer now. It’s enough to make her face break out into a rare smile, imagining his glee, his charm and wit as he no doubt wrapped them around his finger.
She listens as the speaker talks about God being merciful and kind and good and she crosses her arms over her chest in outrage. Lucifer is all of those things, but she still has her reservations about his Father, and these people have no idea they’re different. They have no idea it’s Lucifer they have to thank for the world being a better place.
Slowly, he’s started to right his Father’s wrongs. The gap between rich and poor has started to close, and there are no more famines or droughts brought on by a dreadful rage. Even global warming has slowed, the Earth healing itself, and while others call it a miracle, Chloe knows it’s him. Even people’s sexual hang-ups seem to have suspiciously calmed, something that makes Chloe roll her eyes as much as it makes her smile.
“Fear thou not,” she dials back into the priest’s speech, “for I am with thee.”
She glances up to the sky and knows he’s right.
“Why do you have faith?” Chloe asks Ella, “in God?”
Ella smiles, as though she’s been expecting the question.
“Because he’s there for me,” she shrugs, as though it’s a fact as simple as breathing, “always, no matter what. I guess it’s just the way he makes me feel. It’s hard to describe.”
Guilt lashes at Chloe like a whip, the fact that they never told her the truth. They should have from day one but they just… didn’t… and now it feels too late, the hole too deep. She would be so devastated if she knew they’d lied to her all these years. Her light has already struggled so much after Pete, a flame flickering and fighting against the wind to stay alight.
Perhaps selfishly, they thought the world needed it. So Chloe lets her have her faith.
“No, I get it,” Chloe says, “I think it’s nice.”
“He loves you, Chlo,” Ella insists cheerfully and Chloe’s eyes widen in surprise before she adds, “and he loves me. No matter what, he carries on loving all of us. I guess that’s why I have faith. Because with all my darkness, and after everything with… you know who… he could turn away from me in disgust, but he doesn’t. He loves me.”
Chloe smiles, reaching over to give her hand a gentle squeeze. She remembers Lucifer’s fondness for her, how fiercely protective he was of her, how his mouth would pinch all primly when she hugged him, but how he still always hugged her back.
“Yes,” she whispers, “he really does.”
Somewhere in that mangled mess of time—less than ten years, more than five—Chloe cracks.
She’s dreaming.
She knows she’s dreaming.
She’s watching her younger self with Lucifer, a memory of one of their many date nights. There’s wine and soft music and he’s holding her hand and it feels so real. She can smell whiskey and his sandalwood cologne. She can feel the bite of his fingers at her waist, and taste the scotch that drenches his kiss. She can hear the husk of his accent, silvery posh and silken smooth, seductive in her ears.
It’s so real, in-fact, that she wakes up in tears.
And just like that, she can’t take it anymore. She can’t handle the way her stomach dips when she opens her eyes and realises it’s not real.
He’s not here.
“Lucifer,” she whispers into the darkness of her bedroom, “please. Please come back to me. Just this once.”
She takes a shaky breath, trying to stop her heart from racing. She can’t seem to calm down, pain and grief clenching in her chest until she feels breathless.
“Just for tonight,” she adds in her mind, her throat too tied up in knots to speak, “please.”
She closes her eyes against a rush of wind, her loose hair billowing until she has to tuck it behind her ear. When she opens her eyes again, he’s there, standing in the shadow of her window like he never left.
She gasps, her breath catching in her throat as she throws the covers off and rushes to him. He catches her easily as her legs wrap around his waist and it’s so different, and yet the same. She buries her nose in his neck and breathes him in and she loves him. She loves him so much—then, now, always. Forever.
He doesn’t say anything as he carries her to the bed and sits down with her in his lap.
She finally pulls back to look at him. It’s expected, but still jarring, how time hasn’t changed him. He’s as beautiful as the day they met, all lean muscle and immaculate lines, a body quite literally sculpted by the divine. It’s been years and she can’t say the same for herself, but she knows he won’t care.
She cups his jaw, feeling the rasp of a neatly tripped beard under her palms.
“I miss you so much,” she admits brokenly.
His answering smile is soft and melancholy.
“I miss you too, every minute of every day,” he replies, “but darling, nothing has changed.”
His tone is gentle but insistent, the sort of level-headed ruler she’d hoped he’d grow into. A leader who is firm but fair.
“I know,” she nods, her thumb swiping over sharp cheekbones, “but can we ignore that, just for tonight? I’m allowed one blip, right?”
She tries a laugh, but there’s little humour in it. If she uses her one blip now, she’s still faced with thirty, forty, fifty years without him. Time stretches out before her like a yawning chasm, something painful and unending, and she needs to learn how to live without him. At the moment, she’s only surviving.
He smiles again, but it doesn’t quite reach his eyes.
As the clock ticks steadily in the corner, she stays in his lap as they count the years and tell stories and laugh. The minutes go by, bleeding into hours, and Chloe starts to relax, the tension unravelling from her body. He’s calmer now, carrying a subtle air of authority, of power. But in other ways, he’s just the same. He still wears a ludicrously expensive three piece suit and a smile like a weapon. He’s still annoyingly charming, tone laced with innuendo, and his mouth still pinches sourly when he talks about kids, detestable little creatures.
She asks about the angels and her Dad. She tells him she’s noticed all the good he’s doing, and so has everyone else, and she smiles at how he preens at the praise. She cries when he tells her Dan’s in Heaven now, having overcome his guilt, and laughs when he admits he still pranks him on a weekly basis. She tells him she’s happy they have each other, even if he grumbles and pretends he doesn’t care.
She tells him about Linda’s new fiancé, and Trixie’s first boyfriend, and how they’re both good guys. She says Michael’s been hanging around and reluctantly admits it’s nice to have an angel looking out for her, even if she still refuses to speak to him. She shows him pictures of Charlie because he’s so big now, and he listens patiently, as though he’s not literally all present and all knowing. As though he doesn't have a front row seat to all of it.
Eventually, once she’s tired of conversation and out of things to say, she registers that she has him, all of him, beneath her. She feels his body, strong and warm, and a latent desire that’s been pushed down for so long suddenly claws to the surface.
She wants him, and judging by the way his eyes darken, pupils blown to black, he wants her too.
But she’s a single Mom with stretch marks and more than a few grey hairs and forty in the rear-view mirror. Who is she, to have a divine being between her legs?
But then he tells her exactly who she is.
“It’s been years,” she whispers cautiously, “not all of us are immortal.”
His mouth curves into that charming grin.
“You’re stunning,” he insists, “up there or down here, you’re still my Goddess.”
It’s depressingly predictable, but the words spread like warm sunlight through her chest. She leans in and kisses him for the first time in years, breathing in everything that makes him him. Wonderful and intense and too bright for this world. As his mouth slants over hers and they fall back onto the sheets, she realises that it’s still his kiss. Everything that’s brave and strong and sexy about him is still in his kiss.
When it’s done, when she’s sated and limbless and happy, he broaches a difficult topic.
“Chloe… don’t be afraid to fall in love again.”
She swallows, knowing she’s not giving life one hundred percent, but unable to promise that either.
“Will you not always be the best friend Linda and Maze have ever had?”
He frowns, confused by the apparent change in topic.
“I like to think so.”
“Will you always be Amenadiel’s brother? And Michael’s and Zadkiel’s and all the others?”
“Of course.”
“Well, you’ll always be the love of my life. That’s just the way it is.”
He blinks, quiet while he processes it.
“Darling, it’s different—”
“Do you want me to date?” she interrupts, frustration licking at her insides, “fine, I will. I’ll try harder to be normal, and I’ll live a long and happy human life. Just don’t ask me to love somebody else, because I can’t.”
He smiles a little sadly at her speech before he leans in and kisses her.
“You have to go,” she says after a while, not an order or a request, but a question, “but one day we’ll be together again.”
Lucifer nods, and even though it must be certain agony to live without her too, he kisses her lips and murmurs, “take your time, my love.”
“I’m sorry,” Trixie says on her wedding day, as Chloe applies the finishing touches to her hair.
“For what?”
She’s shocked to see tears brimming on her daughter’s eyelids.
“We’ve never talked about this, but I know I’m the reason you stayed here. I’m the reason you’re not with Lucifer.”
She places her hands on Trixie’s shoulders and looks at her reflection in the mirror in-front of them.
“No baby,” she says softly, “there were lots of reasons why, and it was my decision. I loved Lucifer. I’ll always love him. But I wouldn’t trade watching you grow up for anything. You are the best thing I’ve ever done in my life.”
Trixie nods, sending her a tearful smile.
“I hope George loves me even half as much as Lucifer loves you,” she references her fiancé.
“He adores you, monkey,” she assures her because it’s so clear he does and Chloe couldn’t be happier for her, “and you’re going to have the best life.”
“I wish Dad was here,” she says in a small voice.
Chloe gently squeezes her shoulders in a move she hopes is reassuring.
“He’s looking down, so proud of you. Trust me.”
Trixie twists in the chair and stands, wrapping her mother up in a hug that hasn’t changed, all these years later.
Over time, Chloe learns to live a happy life.
She had been happy before Lucifer, and she learns how to be happy after him. She loves watching Trixie start her own family, settles into the role of grandmother and godmother to Ella’s first. She visits all the places she insisted she never had time to, and even goes on a few dates along the way.
“Sometimes you look at me, and it’s like you don’t even see me,” a fleeting boyfriend tells her once, and she can’t bring herself to argue.
Boyfriends never last long.
She’s in her sixties when Charlie gets married.
It’s a beautiful ceremony where Amenadiel and Linda beam with pride. Beforehand, while they’re waiting for the cars to arrive to take them to the church, the heavens open and rain pours down, sending everyone scrambling inside.
Chloe closes her eyes and turns her face to the skies.
Amenadiel appears next to her, his expression easy and calm.
“It feels strange, doesn’t it?” he says, “going to church and getting married insight of a God we personally know.”
“And one we know is far more interested in the bachelor party,” Chloe laughs.
He chuckles, crossing his arms over his chest.
“Wish the weather was better,” he says, “Lily’s already freaking out about her hair.”
Chloe smiles at the mention of Charlie’s bride, imagines her fussing over her elaborate up-do, and she glances at the sky again.
Suddenly, the clouds shift and move, and the rain stops as quickly as it started. The sun shines through, bathing her in warm light, and she hears Amenadiel’s laugh of disbelief next to her.
“Thank you, brother,” he murmurs to the sky.
“You must be proud of Charlie,” Chloe says, shaking her hair slightly, uncaring of the droplets clinging to the strands, “and I know you and Linda haven’t been together as a couple for years, but it’s a special thing to share.”
“I’m sorry you weren’t able to share Trixie’s big day with Luci,” he replies solemnly, “I’m sorry you aren’t able to do all the things you wanted to do.”
Chloe shakes her head, melancholy and reflective.
“You don’t understand,” she whispers, “I don’t miss doing things with Lucifer. I miss doing nothing with Lucifer.”
Amenadiel’s mouth twitches into a small smile as she continues.
“I miss just knowing he’s there, you know? Just hanging around in the penthouse and turning my head and oh, there he is. And he doesn’t have to be playing the piano, or drinking whiskey, or doing anything at all really. He’s just there, and we’re together. I miss that.”
Amenadiel doesn’t reply. He just wraps an arm around her shoulder and places a gentle kiss into her hair and that’s answer enough.
She’s in her eighties when it starts.
At first, it’s just innocent things like getting a name wrong, or forgetting where she’s put her keys. Then she starts to forget what day of the week it is, or that she’s not meeting Linda for lunch because Linda passed away last year.
Trixie cries and stops the doctor from saying it, but they all know what it is.
Alzheimer’s.
Advanced and aggressive.
She doesn’t suffer for long, and Trixie doesn’t wait for the white light, or the grim reaper, or the rasp of slowing breaths.
She waits for Lucifer.
She’s a mix of emotions when he turns up at the door.
She’s happy, because she loves him and she’s spent her entire life missing him. But she’s heartbroken too, because she knows this means it’s time.
“Hi Lucifer,” she breathes.
His smile is blinding, as bright as she remembers. It’s been so many years, but he’s unchanged, timeless in his beauty. She wonders what he sees when he looks at her. She’s certainly not a child anymore.
“Beatrice,” he grins, because he can hardly call her a little urchin or parasite now, “look how beautiful you are.”
She beams and throws her arms around him, holding him tighter when he grunts in surprise, just like before.
They talk for a little while, about how ludicrous it is that she has grandchildren of her own now, because she’ll always be a nasty little ankle-biter to him. He says it with fondness in his voice, and he tells her he’s half-joking, because her grandkids seem fine. Nothing to crow about, he says, but fine. She takes it as a compliment.
He tells her he’s proud of her, and with a hand over hers, he says her father’s proud of her too. That earns him another hug.
Eventually, what he came here for hangs heavy in the air between them.
“She’s in here,” she smiles sadly as she takes his head and leads him into the bedroom.
All traces of humour slide from his face when he looks at her mother in the bed, frail and weak and a hundred other things Chloe Decker never was.
It brings tears to her eyes, how her mother lights up the moment she sees him.
“Lucifer…” she breathes.
“You know, most days she doesn’t even remember her own name,” Trixie whispers, “but she always remembers you.”
He gives them privacy while Trixie says goodbye. While she tells her she was the best mother she could have asked for, and thanks her for all the sacrifices she made. While she kisses her forehead and tries to hold back the tears.
She stands by the door as Lucifer sits next to her mother. He takes her hand, thumb running over raised liver spots and the weathered lines of age, of a life well lived.
His throat moves when he notices she’s still wearing his ring, Eden’s white stone shining with his own sacrifice. He lifts it to his mouth and lays a kiss on it.
“Lucifer,” Chloe croaks, voice hoarse, “what are you doing here?”
He smiles that blinding smile and it’s not difficult to see how her mother fell in love with him. And the way he looks at her, Trixie marvels. She’d noticed it when she was a child, how he always looked at her with so much awe, as though she were the one who hung the stars. That look hasn’t changed.
“I’ve come to take you home, darling.”
And when Chloe Decker finally closes her eyes on the world, it’s with a smile on her lips.
Chloe blinks against blinding light, her eyes adjusting to the world beyond Heaven’s gates.
It takes her a moment to realise she’s sitting on what looks like a throne, the arms made of beautiful white marble. She’s in a hall, a building so beautiful it feels like looking into the sun. She blinks again and looks to her right where she sees a matching throne.
Lucifer’s throne.
Because he’s God.
She’s finally the Goddess.
She touches her trembling hand to her mouth and notices unblemished skin. She touches the rest of her face and feels her hair and realises she’s young again. Ageless, frozen. Later, Lucifer will tell her she can pick her appearance, any age she likes. When she asks him if he’s ever changed his, she’ll gift him her quintessential eye roll as he replies “why mess with perfection?”.
She doesn’t realise she’s crying until she feels tears on the pads of her fingers.
A heavy door opens and then he’s there, finally. She stands on shaky legs, like a fawn learning how to walk, and takes his hand when he extends it to her.
“You have no idea,” he starts slowly, quietly, “how I’ve longed for you.”
She exhales shakily, touching her forehead to his.
“I’m here now.”
He kisses her and the world bursts into light. It’s different to every kiss that came before, all those decades ago on an earthly plane. Now, up here beyond the clouds, everything burns, everything blazes brighter than before. Immense power flows from them, electrifying the air around them, as though their love could create a whole new Universe. Maybe it could.
“Are you ready?” he asks, breaking away and giving a gentle tug on her hand, “Linda and Daniel and your parents are waiting for you…”
Her eyes and throat burn and she blinks past her tears to nod.
He lets her hand go and probably expects her to follow him.
She will, but first, she blurts out, “oh, Lucifer?”
He turns around, his brow arched in a silent question.
“I love you,” she chokes out on a delirious laugh, an ache spreading through her chest.
He blinks before a smile splits his face, glimmering bright and beautiful.
“Well, I should hope so. You’re stuck with me now.”
“Forever?”
“Forever,” he promises.