A/N: As one might surmise, I am not psyched about the Downton film. I won't rain on the parade for those of you who are, but in return I ask that you be gentle with me. I'm struggling with whether to write at all anymore and find that I get antsy when I don't and there's an idea burning me up inside. So.

I haven't written a period piece for Richobel in a couple of years, because the modern iteration of them is just so natural to me. But then this idea was born, and it is a living, breathing, very organic thing. At least for now. I can't be certain of the timeline for the film yet, but everyone seems to be talking like it's about five years post-S6. So that's where we begin. Consider this how I would have the film go. Sorry this first bit is short. Be well, and please let me know what you think!

xx,
~ejb~

He is positively struck dumb when it finally happens, even though he's looked over his shoulder every day for the last five years, certain their paths would cross sooner or later. As much as York has grown since the War, it is no London, after all. And since the merger went forward, it really is quite remarkable that he has neither seen nor heard anything of her or from her in all this time.

Of course, that's mainly down to his choices: having left Downton before the ink was dry on the merger agreement, for starters, and then taking a lucrative position at a teaching hospital in Leeds for three years. It had been a wise move for him; far enough away that he was guaranteed neither to be preceded by his reputation nor to come into contact with his betrayers.

Indeed, that is precisely how he had thought of her in the wake of Downton Cottage Hospital's acquisition by the Royal Yorkshire. Her poncey wet blanket of a husband and Lady Grantham hadn't escaped this low valuation either, but it cut to the core of his being because it was she who had led the charge. Accordingly, Leeds had been a bid for self-preservation, and it had worked a trick. He'd found himself so preoccupied, between teaching seminars on infectious disease, seeing patients at his private surgery, and giving at least twenty hours a week to the hospital, that, over time, the bitterness of losing his career post of forty years and the torment of knowing he'd lost her to that pompous dullard had receded into the background. Days became weeks that stretched into months with hardly a thought of his former life.

And so, when he was asked to consider the position of chief of surgery at the Royal Yorkshire Hospital, he'd had no reservations about saying yes. He was working well, and he was happy. The days of hearkening to the whims of the Crawley family under the auspices of deference were well over.

Suddenly, with a wayward glance, it is thrust upon him once again.

oOo

It is that part of spring that dawns cold and glistening but warms by noon, teasing the summer that is to come. He doffs his white coat whilst walking through the courtyard on his way from the surgical wing back to his personal office. It's almost time to dust off the rod and reel and try his luck with the trout, he thinks. Perhaps he'll tie some flies at the weekend.

It's her laugh that grabs his attention. He'd know that sound anywhere. He ducks behind a column and turns in the direction from which the cachinnation came. Indeed, it is she, chatting to the chairman of the hospital's board of directors. She; cool and elegant in that plummy shade of merlot that was always so becoming on her, despite it being the uniform of half-mourning.

Who has died? he wonders, then swiftly chides himself. What does he care? Clearly it's one of the family. The family; the Brutus to his Caesar. Keep walking, man. There is no good that can come of this. None whatever. None.

She is moving closer now; his best chance at avoiding being seen is to double back, and he does. But it's too late. He hears her take her leave of the chairman, and then, behind him:

"Dr. Clarkson? Is it you?"

Caught. Like a rabbit in a snare. There is nothing for it but to concede defeat. He turns, steels himself. Aims for a smile, managing at least (he hopes) a visage of neutrality.

His first glimpse of her, close enough to count the lines around her eyes, knocks the breath from his lungs. She is a stunner, as ever; the years have been kind. She is …

Poison. The cruellest kind of heartless b—

"Lady Merton," he manages, and it's all he can say. He chokes on the words. He'd nearly slipped and called her Mrs. Crawley, and it takes him back to their first meeting.

"Well, Mrs. Crawley, I have a feeling we will sink or swim together." She hadn't been his then; she never was. Never would have been even if they had ever got together. No, indeed; she was something far superior in those halcyon days. She was Isobel. Her own woman. Obstinate; impassioned. A visionary. He had held onto so many fond memories of the way she used to be, but they'd long since become raw wounds.

As she stands before him now, he finishes the thought:

And she is the salt.