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Published:
2025-08-21
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2025-11-08
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7/?
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Blackbird (singing in the dead of night)

Chapter 3: Octopus's Garden

Notes:

Thank you so much for 39 Kudos! That's double the amount of people in one of my tutorials at uni so I'm shocked by how many people seem to like this story.

I'm hoping that by Chapter 6 we get caught up to the beginning of season 3 and we can start having fun with all the drama. Thank you all again for reading!

Chapter Text

Conrad had become a master at coming up with excuses to hang out with Jude by the first month of knowing her. By the second, he didn’t need an excuse before she managed to invite herself everywhere.

It didn’t feel like a coincidence that the snow had melted away, the sun shining, and the flowers blooming. They had gone to the library, his house, various bar nights, and even a trip to the aquarium involving gummies, where Jude had to be persuaded not to jump into a large, open tank of stingrays, who she insisted were her soul-friends.

Conrad knew she was his best friend far beyond that point. But he only realized that Jude was the only person he could call family on the second anniversary of Susannah’s death, a year after they had initially met.

By that point, Jude had become more relaxed around him. Not afraid to say whatever was on her mind. And not afraid to sit quietly, saying nothing. He had seen her completely, just as she seemed to see him.

After a day of rain, a layer of dew covered the earth with cars driving by in blurs on the busy road that permeated the stench of gasoline exhaust. Conrad vaguely regretted suggesting a walk after the rain had finally gotten rid of a week’s worth of heat and humidity. But that last walk he had taken on his Mother’s death anniversary had managed to work out well for him after all.

“Do you wonder if there's any point to all of this?” Conrad asked. Jude makes a thoughtful noise, prompting Conrad to continue.

“I feel like I sleep and I wake up exhausted. Like my bones have reached their expiration date and I’m meant to dissolve into the ground.”

Jude laughs at this. “Dissolve!”

Conrad snorts empathetically, “Yes, yes, go ahead and laugh.”

Her laughter falls short, and Jude turns, saying, “I will or I won’t. Maybe there is no point to all this, so laughing won’t make a difference either way.”

“If nothing matters, what is the point of living?” Conrad sighs.

“Maybe the meaning of life is simply to live it — to experience all of its beauty and pain. I don’t think there needs to be a reason to live or a meaning to life. If this life is all we ever get, isn’t it better to live it to the fullest?”

“So what do you think happens after you die?” Conrad asked.

“With the world as big as it is, I really don’t see this life being the only one,” Jude replied.

“So we’ve moved on to reincarnation? Shit, if this isn’t the most random conversation–”

“Do you honestly believe that at the end of this life, you and I can be judged the same as someone living in poverty, or someone at war, or even the same as that son of a bitch King Charles?”

Conrad hums in agreement, “Very true, Jude, team Diana for life. We should make T-shirts. Start a club?” Conrad makes a fake face of contemplation.

“Do this sarcasm business all you want. But it is impossible to take the life of a man who has nothing and judge him the same as a man who has everything. If a poor man steals and lies and does bad things, is he meant to go to hell for it? Punishment for eternity just because he was dealt a bad hand in life?” Jude huffs impatiently.

Conrad furrows his eyebrows in contemplation. “Well, I suppose not. But now what? Are we back to square one and nothing matters?”

“That’s the point, everything matters. I think we come back every time after we die, experiencing life over and over until we become good people.” Jude nudges his shoulder.

Conrad groans loudly. “Damn, I hope not. I’m tired enough of this life, I don’t want to go through more.” Conrad keeps his thoughts of not wanting to live life without her to himself. She’s able to tell anyway, if he’s reading that sly half-smile correctly.

“I think we’ll know each other in every life,” Jude says softly.

“Maybe this isn’t even a life.”

The sombre mood diminishes as Jude sighs in exasperation, “What nonsense are you up to now?”

“Maybe we’re not even real in the first place,” Conrad fakes clutching a string of pearls.

“Enough of your dramatics, we watched Matrix yesterday.”

“Neo is hot.”

“Nemo? The fish?”

“No, Jude. Keanu Reeves,” Conrad sighs when she continues to look at him with a glaze of confusion in her eyes. “The main character of the movie you literally just brought up.”

“Ah yes, Neal.” She nods confidently, having placed him now. Conrad has to press his lips together to bite back a retort, knowing there's absolutely no hope.

“Either way, I was talking about this theory I saw online—” Conrad continues

“It better not have been a random post on Facebook. I just read a research article on the increasing levels of fake news permeating that shithole.” Jude interrupts.

“You’re the one always on Facebook Marketplace! And that’s not the point!” Conrad retorted.

“Yes, the point —”

“Jude,” Conrad stops entirely and turns towards her, interrupting whatever spiel she was going to go down.

“Conrad.”

May I continue?” He asks exasperatedly. At her assenting nod, he bumps their hands together with a soft grin. “I was talking about the theory of Last Thursday.”

“And what’s that?” Jude sighs.

“It’s the idea that the universe was created last Thursday, and our memories and all of history have been pre-programmed into our minds. You can’t submit a memory of something before last Thursday as evidence because the theory itself says that everything has been planted. So, technically, everything that we remember before last Thursday isn’t real and has never happened.”

“You make life complicated. There is no need for all these theories — living is enough.” Jude laughs at him. “And I never want to hear you call me a nerd again after that little spiel.”

“But that’s sort of my point, isn’t it? Maybe it doesn't matter how we came into existence. Just that we are,” Conrad clarifies, “Existing, that is.”

“Then maybe we make the most of the time we do have, despite our beginnings and our end.” She makes a thoughtful sound.

Conrad purses his lips and looks at her, breathing in deeply like he can exhale all his worries into oblivion. More than anything he misses his mother. He feels small again, young. Wondering where his mom had gone and left, and never knowing the answer until she came back with a smile and a kiss. “When that life is over, what do you suppose death feels like?”

Jude brushes a fallen piece of hair off his forehead before she responds, “Death feels like death. Not everything feels like something else.”

The way she smiles up at him silences him, and he knows that nothing could describe the feeling in his chest when she looks up at him like this.