Disclaimer: I don't own any Downton Abbey characters, I'm only borrowing them for a little while
They had had ample opportunities to stop. For months, even years afterwards, Bates would think back to that fateful night, simultaneously one of the best and worst nights of his life, and curse himself for not stopping before things went too far.
He should have stopped, should have had more self-control than to give in to his impulses. With Anna snuggled at his side in the solitude of the courtyard, he should have remained strong, as he had countless other times before.
That day, he had received another letter from Vera, tantalisingly holding the prospect of a divorce just out of his reach yet again.
I'm not really sure I'm ready to be alone again, she had written, claiming that being married, although only in name, was a comfort of sorts to her.
"She'll come around in time," Anna had said hopefully, turning her head to look at him while keeping her body pressed close to his to share his warmth.
"You know I'd marry you tomorrow morning if I could," he said, dipping his head to kiss her neck.
"I know," she said, shuddering as his lips grazed the hollow of her collarbone. "And I know someday we will be married. Until then, we'll just have to manage as we have been so far."
"Like this?" he asked, his emotions starting to get the better of him. "To be so close to you, and all I can do is kiss you? And I shouldn't be doing even that," he went on. "To be caught kissing a married man would ruin you."
"Being left without you would ruin me," she corrected him, turning her face back up to his. "Nothing else can."
Anger at Vera and desire for Anna bubbled up simultaneously in him, and he kissed Anna more forcefully than he would normally have, taking her by surprise and drawing a moan from her throat. Growing bolder, his hand dipped and began exploring her body through the thick fabric of her dress, fully expecting Anna to draw back in horror at any second. Instead, suprising him, her hands came up slowly, one encircling his waist and drawing herself closer to him, the other running through his hair and holding his head in place.
"You'll be my undoing, you little minx," he said in a husky voice, knowing how close he was to giving in, knowing he should draw back now, before it was too late.
"Mr. Bates –" Anna began –try as he might, he could never prevail upon her to call him "John" –and he loved her pronunciation of his surname too much to insist too hard that she use his given name –"I've told you before, and I'll tell you again, this is killing me just as much as it's killing you."
"Anna," he gasped, pulling away from her with difficulty, "I could never compromise you in that way."
"No one has to know," she said softly. She knew how forward and wanton she was being, but at that point she didn't care. The sensations rising in the pit of her belly were too much to ignore, and she knew, somehow, that she needed more than these snatched moments in the courtyard to satisfy her.
"Wait," she whispered as his hand strayed to the hem of her dress. "Not here."
His brain was telling him one thing, his heart and body quite another as he practically pulled Anna indoors, intending to make a beeline for the nearest room with a door, but found Anna tugging him instead through another door and a staircase he'd never before used. Realising quickly that she was showing him the way to the maids' corridor, he tried, albeit unsuccessfully to quiet his breathing, which was coming in quick, audible pants.
"Anna, are you quite sure you want this?" he asked as she softly closed the door of her room behind them, knowing that if she said she wasn't, he would have to do the honourable thing and leave –and hoping, in his heart of hearts, that she did want to continue.
"I am," she breathed next to his ear, knowing they had to be quiet –Mrs. Hughes was asleep only two rooms along, and Miss O'Brien on the other side. "I love you and you love me... and we're getting married someday... that makes this all right."
Ashamed as he was to admit it, he barely heard anything beyond her first two words. And with those words, their fate was sealed.
Lying in his bed, alone, a few hours later, guilt began to creep over him. Anna had deserved something much more special, not a hurried fumble in the dark... and he'd had to hurry out and back down the stairs almost immediately afterwards, not wanting to risk discovery. He should have stayed there with her, held her in his arms as she drifted off to sleep. By the time the hall boy thumped on the door to wake him at six, he had convinced himself that after his ungallant behaviour, Anna would not even want to speak to him again.
He walked downstairs almost dreading the moment when he would run into Anna.
There she was, already sitting in her usual place, one hand holding a cup of tea while the other rubbed at her eyes. He couldn't speak to her, not with Mrs. Hughes sitting across from her. Hoping that their faces weren't giving anything away, he cautiously tried to meet her gaze, steeling himself to see distaste, regret, even revulsion, cross her face. Instead he was rewarded with a half smile as she wished him a good morning in a perfectly demure tone.
"Anna," he called when he came across her making up Lady Sybil's room a couple of hours later. "Let me help you." It was an excuse, they both knew that, but it was the only opportunity he would have to speak to her privately before tonight.
"About last night," he began, but she shook her head slightly as she met his gaze.
"Mr. Bates, I know that tone," she said firmly. "You're about to apologise, but let me tell you, you have nothing to apologise for. Nothing, do you understand?"
"I shouldn't have let myself get carried away," he acknowledged, determined to say his part.
"Mr. Bates, if I didn't want you to get "carried away," as you call it, don't you think I would have stopped you?" Anna asked, a cheeky smile on her face. "I have no regrets, and you shouldn't either. We haven't hurt anyone by it, so no harm's been done."
Be that as it may, he forced himself to exercise great self-restraint when he and Anna found themselves alone once again the next evening once Mrs. Hughes had retired to bed, leaving them both ostensibly bent over their mending at the table in the servants' hall.
"No," he murmured as he felt Anna's hands begin running over his chest through his shirt. She pulled back immediately, hurt, and he hurried to reassure her.
"You've done nothing wrong, love," he said, framing her face with his hands to emphasize it. "It's just that we can't risk losing control like we did last night... we can't keep taking chances."
"What if I told you I wanted to take that chance?" she whispered softly.
"We can't, Anna. Last night should never even have happened, much less be repeated. I shouldn't have taken such a risk, and I won't again –not until we're free to be together. I'll say no more about it."
Although they never spoke of that night again, it was never far from either of their minds. Bates continually thought of it during their snatched moments together, musing that self-control was far harder to exercise now that he had already lost it once. Anna, although she saw the sense in his words and never tried to push things further, found herself thinking more and more about it as the weeks passed, fretting and wishing she had a mother or older sister to confide in.
He was perplexed when she first started withdrawing from him, worrying that he had pushed her too far, that she was getting impatient as the weeks passed with no sign that Vera was close to thawing, eventually he began to dread that Anna had realised just how old and unsuitable he was.
"Are you alright?" he asked when she pulled away as he tried to kiss her during one rare evening alone in the courtyard.
"Of course," she shrugged. "I'm fine." She fled indoors soon afterwards, claiming she was too tired to stay up much longer.
He wouldn't have though much more of it –the life of a housemaid was tiring, after all –if he hadn't watched her, two mornings later, turn white as breakfast was brought in to the servants' hall. She shook her head quickly as Daisy went to place a bowl of porridge in front of her.
"Not for me, thanks, Daisy," she said. "I'm really not hungry this morning."
He watched her carefully as he ate his own breakfast, worrying that she might be sickening for something. Her breathing was quick and measured, her jaw clenched, and before long, she pushed back her chair, excusing herself to Mr. Carson and claiming that she needed some air.
Before going up to dress His Lordship, he went out into the courtyard to see how she was feeling –everyone else seemed to have forgotten she was outside, and Mrs. Hughes, who would normally have followed Anna out, hadn't yet made an appearance at the table that morning.
She was sitting on a crate, head bent and breathing slowly, though her head shot up as soon as she heard the door open.
"I'm fine, Mr. Bates," she said before he had a chance to say anything. "Just got a bit dizzy inside –all that noise and bustle, I suppose."
Not convinced, he went inside to tend to His Lordship, wondering whether he should tell Mrs. Hughes that Anna appeared to be ill. Later that morning, however, he was walking back from the stables, where he'd gone in search of Lord Grantham's misplaced riding hat, when he heard a gasping cough coming from not far away. Worried, he looked round, immediately assuming the sound was coming from the garage –had Branson been taken ill in there? The garage was empty, but as he walked round its perimeter, the sound came closer, until, crouched outside the building, on the side furthest from the house, he found Anna, retching over a bucket.
"Anna!" he gasped, immediately striding towards her. She stood up shakily as he approached, wiping her eyes with a handkerchief she fished from her apron pocket.
"You're ill," he said, putting an arm carefully round her shoulders. "Do you feel well enough to walk back to the house with me? Or I could fetch Mrs. Hughes here –"
"No," Anna begged, startling him. "Not Mrs. Hughes, please... you can't!"
"But you should be in bed," he protested, until he noticed the tears streaming down her face. "Anna, what's wrong?"
Unable to maintain eye contact with him, Anna leaned against the garage wall as more sobs overtook her. Not sure what to do, John rubbed her shoulders awkwardly, wondering what else he could do. Finally, when Anna's sobs had died down, he tried again.
"Anna, what's the matter? Why won't you let me call Mrs. Hughes?"
"She can't know," Anna said. "Please, don't tell anyone about this... I'll be dismissed if anyone finds out."
"Finds out what?" Bates asked, a cold feeling of dread beginning to creep over him.
"I think," Anna began, taking a deep breath, "I think I might be..."
Bates' ears began to ring and the world seemed to freeze around him. He didn't need to hear what Anna was saying: it was as clear as day to him as he watched one of Anna's hands curl protectively around her abdomen, as if trying to hide it from his view.