It's taken me a long time to come back and comment properly - and it's not for a lack of desire on my part, nor a lack of re-reads as I've read this countless times over the past couple of weeks. It's just that the story is so
big. I don't mean in size but in scale and depth of emotion and truth. As the series comes to an end, you're bringing the story strands together so beautifully and the resolutions you are finding are both profound and incredibly moving.
So we pick up where we started off, with Mick driving away from the Fordhams, joyful and desolate as only he can be:
Shadow wrote:But it hurt, it hurt so much, as if Mick had lost his humanity all over again.
Oh, Mick. We saw it. We felt it. We know it. He was SO sure Robert was his son and Jacob his grandson, not just because of circumstance, but because of instinct. I
love the way you found to make that possible again because that always felt like the way it should have been.
The scene in the car, with Mick accepting Beth's comfort when he cannot hold out any longer, is beautiful.
In his reminiscence we see the toll of so many losses over so many years:
Shadow wrote:Mick touched the screen, taking Beth’s words into his heart, letting them fill the empty spaces inside him.
Such a beautiful visual, and such a delicate, truthful way of showing how much Beth means to Mick and how he couldn't bear to add her to his list of losses.
The scenes with Jacob, his fear, his grief and Mick's tender care, just crushed me. Seriously. Weeping. We see, so clearly, that Mick is helpless as far as Jacob is concerned - he will watch over him forever, even if he doesn't think he'll ever truly be in his life:
Shadow wrote:He kissed the top of her head. “It’s part of life for me. That’s just the way it is.”
“I don’t want it to be that way,” she whispered, putting her arms around him. He held her close, for a long time. Mourning with her, for times she’d never known, for something he had somehow lost yet again.
And after all this emotional pain and trial, Mick finds the one person who can genuinely offer him comfort from the point of knowledge and understanding: Esme. I love that she was there just at the moment Mick needed her most.
Everything's connected: Mick, Esme, Tyler, Elaine, past, present and future. No wonder Mick feels his life is ruled by cruel fate.
And just when I think Mick can't possibly take any more, Elaine is in danger. Oh, honey, that whole section had me
praying she was going to be okay but I got even more than that. The most beautiful thing of all - after all Mick has lost, all he's suffered and all he's sacrificed - he can finally give voice to the love he has for her, his daughter. Elaine's story has been so integral to this whole series and to see her get to the point of wanting to go on and being able to accept Mick's love and care was amazing:
Shadow wrote:“When does it stop hurting?”
He glanced up at her. “I don’t know,” he admitted. “Maybe never.”
She nodded sadly. “I wish it had been real for you,” she said. “I don’t know why, but I like the idea that you might have had a kid, back when. You ought to be a dad.”
“I am.”
And so we come full circle. Mick and Beth at the beach with Jacob. Mick's dream come true. The love that shines through every word, every emotion, Mick reconnecting with life, love, the universe and his place in it. He dares to dream; he dares to hope, he even dares to pick up his guitar again:
Shadow wrote:Because I love her.
Red
I'm choked up...after reading this.
and I am so glad that you want to do some re-reading!
but for now I'll just say that you have outdone yourself. 
that you are considering writing another chapter... and I absolutely love LadyA's description. It truly would be In Between the past and the future. In Between what we know and what we can only imagine. 
And it's not even written yet! How I love such confidence . . .. 
