This is a short series of drabbles (not over 500 words each) based around colour and what those colours mean to Charles and Elsie. Some people see in colour, meaning that certain words have colours associated with them; for many of us colours are associated with feelings or even people. This brief series will take on five or six colours. Note: The first in the series is "Black" and there are references to Series 4 and Anna's situation. There are no descriptions of said incident, but concentrates more on how Elsie is affected. Not all drabbles will be angsty, but there will be a combination of fluff, angst, and romance.
Black
She always heard anger described as white hot. Thought of it as a burning flame of blue-white heat licking up around one's consciousness until you're enraged, seething, and acting in retribution. Yet Elsie Hughes feels nothing of that full white hotness, because if she did that would mean some kind of light was present and at the thought of him she feels nothing but blackness.
And it frightens her.
The darkness she feels inside frightens her to her core but no matter how much she tries she cannot vanquish it; she cannot banish the feelings of vengeance.
She feels powerless and where happiness and contentment once filled her, she's now filled with malice and the need for justice.
She's long been away from Argyll, but there's enough of the Highlands, enough of the Highlands inherent sense of retribution that still beats in her breast, to demand payment for this wrong.
Evil only preys on the innocent; tries to take their light and snuff it out. Mr. Green is an evil man, preying on innocent women like Anna. Anna, who is kind and friendly and who's only extended him, as she has everyone who's darkened Downton's doors, courtesy and a welcoming smile. But now that Elsie thinks on it, that vile man marked Anna out from the beginning. From the moment Mr. Gillingham's valet saw her, he marked her out; the most innocent among them; the one who tries to see a flicker of good in everyone. The one who couldn't afford to tell a soul - except she told one soul; the one she trusts with this horrible secret.
And now as she sits in the very room where she found Anna, the housemaid she's allowed to become too close, the one who owns a corner of her heart despite how unprofessional it is to have favorites, Elsie contemplates the hurt the young woman feels. In the next flash, in her mind's eye, she sees Mr. Green's face, smiling and sinister. In that moment, wiping a hot tear from her eye, she knows what she'd do if she were Anna's mother. She'd visit a bit of Highlands vengeance on the man who'd hurt Anna and destroyed their idyllic little life downstairs. But she won't. Because she isn't Anna's mother and they live in a day and age of modern justice, of laws, and courts.
So silence and restraint bind her up in chains. Anna has sworn her to silence and even if she wanted, she cannot tell a soul, cannot whisper the slightest word to the only one to whom she can usually unburden herself. If only she could seek the solace he would so willingly give.
All she can do is cherish those in her charge, above stairs and below.
She knows the light will return. Because darkness doesn't last forever.
A/N: We often don't explore the fact that Elsie might possibly have a bit of a side that wanted retribution for what happened to Anna. It would, I suppose, seem as if this would go against Elsie being the moral compass of downstairs. But clearly she thought Mr. Green should have been punished and if Bates had killed him, then Bates was only acting in his wife's defense, a sentiment she clearly understood. So, I don't think that this flies in the face of Elsie as the moral compass of downstairs at all. Elsie had an inherent sense of justice and was fiercely protective of those she "valued" (loved) hence, the boot room scene. Elsie is a complex character and one I hope to never tire of exploring.