A Sister's Share in the Conversation
First impressions are not necessarily made with a physical meeting. Gigi stumbles on a Youtube video on her brother's laptop.
This is a fanfiction of The Lizzie Bennet Diaries, which is a modern-day adaptation of Pride and Prejudice in video blog form. You can find it on Youtube by searching Lizzie Bennet/Lizzie Bennet Diaries. It is a beautifully written and wonderfully acted series that I would recommend to all P&P fans. If you haven't seen it, go check it out!
Gigi was glad to be back home with William on Thanksgiving. She missed her brother during school time. He was often traveling, so they didn't get to see each other as frequently as they liked. Usually he would take her on a vacation during the summer, but that summer he had stayed with Bing while she was with friends. Fitz had told them it was better for both of them to be apart for a little while after that incident earlier in the year with George, because apparently they were making each other feel guilty when they were together.
For Gigi, time away spent with her friends did help her forget the sting of what happened with George. She might have given up swimming for now because it brought too many painful reminders of him, but tennis was an effective outlet for her pent up energy and made her feel strangely liberated after each practice. It would take longer for the whole incident to fade from her memories, but for now there were some days when she could manage to not think of it. That was a start.
But apparently for William, time away with Bing didn't seem so relaxing. Most likely, without Gigi there for him to practice his art of over-protectiveness on, he just threw himself into work and forgot that he was supposed to be on vacation. In any case, in the couple of weeks that William and Gigi spent together before the new school year start, she felt her brother was strangely distracted. There seemed to be even more on his mind than usual, though he brushed it off as nothing when she asked. It didn't seem like it was anything to do with her though, because there wasn't that little flash of guilt in his eyes that often appeared when he thought he wasn't being a good brother to her. After George, Gigi got to be very good at picking up the expression of guilt from him.
He didn't betray anything during the time she was at school, but her brother was nothing if not discrete. There wasn't much Gigi could gather if he didn't volunteer the information through phone calls, text messages, emails and tweets. Now back home for a few days for Thanksgiving, Gigi could see clearly whatever distracted him was bearing on him still. No matter how normal he tried acting, how he seemed determined to make the weekend a cheerful one for her, there was a sadness about him that she was sure wasn't there before, that slipped through when he thought she wasn't watching. But no matter how she tried to hint at it, or even when she asked outright, he refused to tell her what was wrong. He only assured her that it would past. Bing didn't seem to know what was making him so sad either. Fitz apparently had got into his head that it wasn't his place to gossip about William, though he had never showed that particular philosophy before.
The answer didn't come to her until Sunday morning, right before she went back to school. Her laptop had chosen earlier in the week to break down and she had taken it to be fixed, which left her computer-less the whole weekend. It was fine; she was strangely glad to be without it. But now she needed to check her email to see if there was anything that she needed to do before returning to school. Her brother was on the phone when she asked to borrow his laptop, and his reply was distracted, as he was talking to Catherine and probably had to keep track of about three different topics that their aunt was firing at him at the same time.
She walked into his office and found that his laptop was already open on the desk. Before she could open up her email, she was distracted by the internet browser already opened on the computer, show a Youtube video paused in the middle…and her brother's face was staring out at her.
The video was titled Are You Kidding Me! and posted by someone named Lizzie Bennet…Wait a second, she had heard of Lizzie Bennet. Actually she had heard a lot about Lizzie Bennet. William had spoken of Lizzie when he was at Netherfield with Bing and both Bing and Caroline had talked about a Bennet family. Even Fitz once mentioned meeting Lizzie when he was at Collins & Collins. But then a few week back, somehow they all stopped any mention of anyone with the name Bennet. Gigi couldn't help her curiosity. Not wishing to disturb William's place in the video, she copied the link to a new tab and slipped the headphones on.
Gigi wasn't sure exactly what she expected to see in the video, but it was certainly wasn't this. She wasn't sure whether 'mortified' or 'horrified' was a better word to describe what she was feeling throughout the whole ordeal. Why would anyone put a video like this on the internet? The date showed the video was posted at the beginning of the month. Why would her brother even watch this now? In fact, why was her brother even subscribed to this channel and apparently have it on his bookmark bar?
To be rejected, to have your heart broken was horrible enough – and Gigi would know – but to have it put on Youtube for…was that really over two hundred thousand views? Gigi felt somewhat nauseous just looking at the number. Either her brother was somehow secretly a masochist and she never knew, or there was something more to this video that apparently she wasn't seeing to explain why he would have the video open on his computer then.
Though, she supposed this might be the reason for his moods. The beginning of the month. Yes, it fit with Fitz's sudden silence too, despite the fact that Fitz had even called her on Halloween and among other things, told her she'd probably like to meet Lizzie Bennet.
There has to be something about this Lizzie Bennet that Gigi must be missing, because nowhere in this video did the girl on the screen seem like someone Gigi would get on with. For one thing, she apparently disliked William and she advertised his pain on the internet.
But then…Lizzie Bennet mentioned George Wickham. Something icy settled somewhere at the pit of her stomach as she wondered what exactly Lizzie meant when she said William had destroyed his life. The video gave no further explanation.
Before Gigi could ponder further, however, the door opened and William walked in with something like a resigned expression on his face. She hastened to close the tab and slid the headphones off, but her brother just said, "Don't bother, Gigi. I know you saw it."
"Sorry," she said, flustered. "I didn't mean to snoop – "
"No, it's not your fault," her brother replied, sounding so tired and sad that Gigi felt her heart quench. "I left the tab open, you couldn't have avoided it."
There was a long silence that Gigi didn't know how to break as her brother sat down on a chair on the other side of the desk. She knew it was an invitation to stay, to talk, or as much of an invitation as William was capable giving then. But as concerned as she was, as morbidly curious as she was, she had no idea where to start and what to say.
Finally, she blurted out, "Why are you even watching this?"
"That's a loaded question."
"It is?"
"To answer your question, simply, I would say I need to remind myself of how very wrong I was and endeavour to be a better person."
Gigi wanted to wrinkle her nose. He was talking in riddles. He only talked like that about his feelings when they were too complicated for words.
"I don't understand."
He stood up and turned around, his hands clapsed behind his back. Gigi suppressed the urge to sigh at more signs that this would be a Deeply Emotional conversation, no matter how much she'd gathered already from the video.
"I've mentioned Lizzie Bennet to you before?"
"Yes, and so did Fitz and Bing and Caroline, until you all suddenly stop mentioning her again."
"Caroline mentioned her to you?" William asked, turning suddenly around, looking surprised.
"Just once," she answered, not adding that what Caroline had to say wasn't particularly flattering.
"Don't listen to anything Caroline has to say about Lizzie," William said harshly.
Normally, Gigi never really found herself agreeing with Caroline on many subjects, but right then, she felt rather inclined to sympathise with Caroline's views of Lizzie Bennet. Still, Gigi also knew that her brother also didn't give his heart easily, there must be more to this Lizzie Bennet than what she had seen and heard.
"Then tell me about her. Tell me how it is that after she rejected you like this and put it on the internet to humiliate you, you still feel like you need to defend her."
"Oh, I doubt she put this up on Youtube to humiliate me. I'm not that important to her," he replied; the bitterness was unmistakable.
"William…"
He shook his head, and she stopped mid-sentence.
"We met when I was staying with Bing at Netherfield," William said. "To me, she seemed ordinary at first, and I didn't pay too much attention. But then the more I got to know her, the more I saw how intelligent and witty she was, the more I was drawn to her. Before I knew it, I was in love with her. I tried to fight the feelings, because…well, the reasons aren't important now. They were stupid reasons, anyway, as she had made me realise since. When she came to Collins & Collins for her graduate project, I couldn't hide my feelings for her anymore and told her – you've just watched the video for that. She keeps a vlog of her life, and my…confession was just something that happened in her life. In that video you saw, she was wrong about some things, but I know Lizzie Bennet isn't mean-spirited enough to publish that just to spite me."
"I'll take your word for it," Gigi said, though she knew he could clearly see that she wasn't convinced. "She still published it though, for whatever reason, and you can't call it nice."
She didn't say it, but she couldn't understand either, why anyone would reject William, not if they really knew how good, how kind and loving he was. And Lizzie Bennet had not only rejected him, but cruelly; Gigi couldn't see why he still spoke of her so softly, even if that in itself showed how loyal he was. If only Lizzie Bennet knew.
Whatever she didn't say, William seemed to understand, though, because he gave her something like an indulgent smile.
"You are sweet to think that she was wrong to reject me. But you've seen the video. You have to see that there was more than one thing I shouldn't have said, or should have phrased differently."
Gigi forced herself to think about the specific words that she heard in the video and had to grudgingly agree. "I guess you shouldn't tell a girl that you're surprised to find yourself in love with her in a way that implied it wasn't a pleasant surprise."
"She told me after she turned the camera off, that she would have let me down more gently if I had behaved in a more 'gentleman-like' way."
"That's what you mean, when you said you need to remind yourself of how wrong you've been to become a better person? So you can prove to her that you can be that gentleman?"
"Yes to the first part, no to the part about proving anything to her. I probably won't see her again but she taught me more about myself than anyone else ever did. Her words about me, though harsh, they were still true, at least true to the way I acted when I was around her and her family. I don't want to be that proud and selfish person she thinks I am, even though she might never change her mind about me."
That William would do this for someone he loved, Gigi wasn't surprised about. She was just surprised that apparently this Lizzie Bennet managed to make her brother feel so strongly. Regardless whatever good things William, Fitz and Bing had said about her before, Lizzie still didn't exactly endear herself to Gigi in the five-minute video she just watched. Still, she was more surprised to find that despite of this, instead of instinctive dislike, she was just feeling more curious to get to know Lizzie Bennet.
"You shouldn't judge her based on that video, you know. I found out later that I came in when she was in the worst possible mood to have this talk," William continued.
"I suppose I could give her the benefit of the doubts on that. But she mentioned something about Bing…and George Wickham."
"Bing was dating Lizzie's sister, Jane, and I – probably mistakenly – thought that she wasn't sincere and persuaded Bing to take a break."
"You seemed quite sure that you were right in the video."
"But after that I watched the rest of her vlog and there might be reasons to think that I was wrong. Either way, she thinks I shouldn't have interfered at all."
Gigi wasn't sure she agreed with that logic from Lizzie at all, and shuddered to think what would have happened if William hadn't interfered with her and George. But then, who could be up to George's 'standards'? So maybe her brother did get a bit carried away there.
"And George?" she asked, instantly fearing the worst.
"He just happened to be in town the same time I was and I guess he found out about how Lizzie didn't like me and told her a few more lies to feed her dislike. I've told her the truth about him now, so no real harm was done."
A cold shiver passed through Gigi as she considered what the truth consisted of. "You have? Even about – "
"Yes." There was a pause, where he gazed intensely at her. "You are upset – "
"No," she hastened to add, before her brother got himself too worked up over the idea that somehow he had mortally wounded her. She was just unprepared for what he had to say, but wasn't exactly against what he did. "No, it's fine. It's good. I'll get over it, and it's best that no one else is fooled by him."
As she said this, Gigi realised this wasn't just something she was saying to just assure her brother. She really meant this. Perhaps the knowledge that it wasn't only she who fell for George's charms and believed his lies comforted her. Perhaps she was making more progress in leaving George behind than she previously thought. Which ever it was, the sudden relief washed over her like a balm.
"You would have liked her, I think," William said.
"Lizzie Bennet? Yeah, Fitz said so too. I guess I would have to get over that very strong first impression first."
William smiled somewhat ironically. "Well, it doesn't matter now."
There was such sadness in the way he said this that Gigi crossed the room to where he was, slipped her arms around him and rested her head against his shoulder.
"Maybe you could still see her again. You have ways to contact her, right?"
"Yes, but no. I can't force my presence on her when she'd made it clear she doesn't want anything to do with me anymore. Don't worry about me, Gigi. I know I haven't exactly been myself lately, but it will pass."
He said 'it will pass' the way she might say George would pass for her. But it was hardly the same. It wasn't the same at all. But she didn't think he needed her to call him out on it so specifically, so she just nodded.
The truth was, Gigi did want to meet Lizzie Bennet in person. It was too big a mistake to let a certain impression of a person to form your whole view of them. She had learnt that lesson with George and would not make the same mistake with Lizzie. Anyone who could draw such deep feelings of love from her brother must certainly have her merits. For William to love her so spoke much of the depth of her character. Then there was Fitz, too. While it could be said that love was clouding William's judgement, surely Fitz was in no danger of that, and he had liked Lizzie enormously as well.
Gigi thought back to the disjointed information she received from Fitz. She knew that Lizzie's best friend/practically sister was a partner at Collins & Collins, financed by her aunt, and Lizzie was likely to want to work in the same industry. So maybe with luck and probably a fair bit of help from Fitz, in the future, she could still be able to put together a convoluted plan to get her brother and Lizzie Bennet to cross paths again. When that happened, William's misplaced noble tendencies of keeping away from her would no longer be an issue.
This is supposed to set before what would be the Pemberley arc. I'm being a bit vague regarding the whole Wickham debacle here but still, I wanted to post this before episode 61 come out because I have a feeling it will contradict a lot of this, depending on how they're dealing with Gigi's whole story.
The funny thing is, I love Georgiana, but my vision of her Regency incarnation is nothing like this. Somehow putting her in the modern day, able to watch the 'proposal' first hand sort of changed her more than I realised at the beginning of writing this.