She looks a lot like his wife.
Sometimes, when he looks up at her from across the room – across her desk, the dining table, the drawing room – he sees the ghost of his wife smiling back at him. And then he blinks and instead it's his queen, smiling at him in that utterly artless way of hers. He's sure she has no idea what she's doing to him.
Caroline and Victoria both are – were? Are? He's not sure how to describe them when one is long-dead and the other is so vividly and preciously alive – petite and delicate and fiery. Perhaps Caroline was more of a classical beauty, but he's not twenty-five any more. He knew it then, of course, but the intervening years have only convinced him to his bones that a woman's beauty is little indication of anything of import. A woman's worth is found in her character, in her eyes. And Victoria – no, Her Majesty – has such startling eyes, big and round and the loveliest shade of cornflower blue, and so utterly transparent. Caroline's eyes were rich and dark and sensual, but they hid so much. Victoria is completely artless.
He can find no fault with her. (Like with Caro, there is nothing he cannot forgive.)
Sometimes, late at night, when he's dozing in his chair next to an open bottle of claret (or port, or brandy – it depends how arduous his day was, whether he wishes to indulge his bursting heart or to numb his soul) and his eyes are closed and his mind is heavy, he sees those cornflower-blue eyes just as they were when they smiled at him across a busy room that morning, afternoon, evening. In the absolute privacy of his study, he smiles back, just as he would have done if he were many years younger and of royal blood. He might have eyes for no-one else – any fool can see that – but he rations the smiles he gifts her for her own sake, and goes home to his bottles as soon as he can extricate himself after dinner.
If only her smiles were all he dreamed of.
It always starts innocently enough. He dreams of resting his hand in the small of her back as they walk; it could be hazardous but not necessarily catastrophic. People already talk. He touched her like that once, when they were entirely alone. He can still feel the ghost of her dress under his fingers. Now, as he imagines a reprise, he feels her spine straighten. She stands taller and she lifts her head to beam at him. In his mind, he smiles back again. Here, he can afford to be generous.
If he's up to his third glass of claret, he might imagine stealing a kiss. It would only be a peck on the forehead, or her cheek if he felt daring – and only if he was certain no-one was looking, that they were momentarily alone and free from interruption.
His aching fondness for her is there in his words, he hopes, that he cannot express in any other way. She's desperate for any human warmth after the coldness of Kensington. That much was clear from their very first meeting and in all her choices since. He hopes he does what he can. He is her friend, her confidante, and if the world was not watching them both so very closely he would comfort her in ways beyond measure.
Sometimes, by his fourth or fifth glass, he will have slouched down in his chair, one hand on his glass and the other restless in his lap, and he will think back to their daily meeting in the morning and contemplate the sturdiness of the palace furniture.
Sometimes, if he makes it to a sixth glass or further, it's easier to keep his eyes closed and to let his inhibitions dissipate. He remembers her blue eyes brightened by champagne, her wide guileless smile and the way she once held onto him and declared her wish to dance with him without a second thought. If he were a different man, not so battered by the storms of scandal and public opinion, not so concerned for her position and reputation, then perhaps that evening – and many others – might have unfolded differently. Perhaps he might not be spending another night drunk and alone in his chair.
It's those thoughts – the wish for any happier alternative – that sweep away the last of his restraint.
What if they were able to dance in private? Perhaps they could forget all her servants, the household and court that watch like hawks and circle like vultures. They could pretend they weren't at the centre of that world and enjoy the mutual light-headed delight and the dizziness of a waltz after too much champagne.
Even after six glasses of that night's poison, he cannot imagine going any further in that situation; they only dance. His pleasures are inevitably suspended by some intrusion - the Duchess of Kent, Baroness Lehzen, a footman with a tragically timed missive.
Truthfully, he is only satisfied when he imagines them in her private study, during their morning meetings, disturbing her red dispatch boxes.
He imagines standing over her, of lifting her onto the desk. She is always smiling; it's infectious and he smiles as he thinks of his hands on her waist. He imagines liberating her from her skirt and petticoats – not entirely, never entirely, and that does things to him it's better not to think about – and leaning her back over the wide expanse of table. He imagines the softness of her skin under his hands, and wonders about the way she would move as his hands explore upwards, the sounds she might make. God, how he wonders.
The woman in his mind never speaks to him – he can't imagine what she might say. He loves her voice, clear and pealing. He can – he does – imagine many, many things to the fullest degree, but he can never quite capture the cadence of her voice.
But he talks to her.
He shares every filthy thought that has ever crossed his mind. He asks questions the real woman could not begin to comprehend, let alone answer. He has always enjoyed having the power to shock; the erosion of her innocence would be a gift to treasure. It would be one to savour – something to be taken more slowly in truth than he can manage in his mind. It would be another part of her education. They do both so enjoy it when he plays the mentor, and she is an excellent student.
He also enjoys, when they're alone in his head, speaking to her as an equal. In what world could they ever be equals except this one, except as lovers? Sometimes, when he takes himself in hand, when he takes the woman on her desk in his head, he dares to gasp out her Christian name. Not every night, but sometimes.
She never calls him William.
He wonders what she would look like when her pleasure reaches its zenith. In every fantasy, every flavour of dream, that is the detail he focuses on. His imagination never disappoints, nor does it repeat itself. Her eyes, her mouth, the colour of her cheeks: it is almost a blessing that he will never see the real thing, to displace the countless multitudes of visions he consoles himself with at night.
Her zenith is matched by his nadir. He soils himself in his pleasure and holds the image of her face in his mind as comfort for as long as he can stand. Then, aching, uncomfortable and dishevelled, he sleeps.
Author's Notes
Previously posted on AO3. Written for ars_belli as part of Yuletide 2016.
I would thank Kyrene once Blood Roses and annachibi for their beta work but I procrastinated and whined at them for so long there wasn't time for pre-reading. Instead, I'll just say thanks to them for putting up with me and my nonsense.
Also, any interested reader should check out the other five Victoria works for Yuletide. Our new little fandom had a good year. Any feedback will be greatly appreciated. Come and chat on AO3 or Tumblr if you like; I'm Sobriquett there too.