A/N: Happy Valentine's day if you celebrate or not.
I'd like to give a great thanks to daisherz365 for helping me through this, besides editing. She will be helping through this very tough time, hah.
I warn you that this is not yet completed, but I am assured by my own 'plotting' that it'll be a monstrosity.
Hopefully you'll leave an encouraging review or a hearty kudos.
From now on, this fic, God willing, will be updated every Wednesday!
- Prologue -
With the still moonlight, sad and beautiful,
That sets the birds dreaming in the trees
1949
She had taken the car, yet, she hadn't gotten far.
It was, perhaps, the furthest she'd ever been in the Ford Anglia.
Molly was standing at the very edge furthest from the village, though she could scarcely see it from the peak which the church stood upon. The lights were all too dim to be seen from such a distance, the village seeming so small and insignificant. It felt too dark and quiet, the church looming overhead, as rain drizzled around her.
She was still clutching the keys in her hand, thinking.
She could still go further, the engine still humming in the background, but she only crushed the keys into the palm of her hand, the pressure somewhat calming as she felt the markings.
Molly had rushed there, barely seeing the muddy slippery road through her windshield, and she hadn't cared, she hadn't cared if she saw no more. Her headlights hadn't lit the ground well enough before her, yet she had sped through it all, using the engine for all its worth, desperate to find somewhere, someplace, and this was where she found herself. It was hardly anywhere at all. She was not far enough, though she did not know if she could have gotten further, even with how hard she pressed the pedals.
Still, the church, of all places.
She was not religious, barely so, but she found the church comforting. It was one of the few places she could find peace, and quiet... Though that was perhaps why many others found solace within its structures as well. The church stood for something - hope. It was one of the few places from which she felt like herself, though there was a reason for that.
Molly slammed the still-open car door, ignoring the slow drum of the engine still running.
There were no lights on in the church as far as she could see from the dark windows, though no one was supposed to be there, yet. The gossip circulating in the village these days had told her enough.
The new vicar hadn't taken his post yet.
When she'd first heard the news she'd been surprised, though even more so when she heard that it wouldn't be a 'worn out old codger' taking the post once more, but an unexpectedly younger man. A man who'd yet to even have had a congregation yet, which for some felt rushed, though she knew those few outspoken were the elders of the village who were the strict religious sort, and went to church at every opportunity, to beg for forgiveness, but would turn a blind eye to any vagrant who had wandered by mistake into the village in hopes of finding work or a warm meal. They lived by the word of God, but they did not breathe it, as they claimed.
Molly closed her eyes, letting the slow drizzle of rain wash upon her, wanting to rest her mind if only a little, to have the thoughts that ran through her quiet down for now. She purposely strode forward with eyes open, once more, happy to see that the key as always fit the lock, though she suspected they wouldn't change the lock any time soon either.
She gently closed the door behind her as she slipped inside, and gingerly walked towards the piano at the front of the pews. She lifted up the lid carefully, letting her hands glide across the keys. This was a piano she knew, she was familiar with its keys - it's every tone - it had once been hers.
She smiled, settling onto the stool with the faded green velvet coverlet, putting aside the keys. It was then she finally realized how very soaked she was. She was only wearing a thin summer dress, the cloth itself clinging to every piece of her, uncomfortably so, but at least she barely noticed that in the dark of the church. Her body ached, and she could almost feel the bruises starting to form. They were just underneath her skin, throbbing through the surface, willing to be visible. She would wear something different tomorrow, she would have to, as she knew Richard could never bear - - - her hands hit the keys with a tremble. Her shoulder ached, her elbow following suit, but her hands, her hands would pull through. She would not fall apart, though, she never had. Her hands began to play. She knew the melody by heart, and her fingers followed suit, carefully.
It was not to be rushed, it was a delicate piece.
It was a piece her father had loved, a piece he had requested more than once, and so, with every stroke of the key, every movement of her hands, she let all of her feelings flow through her very fingers. This was the only way she knew how, anyone would know how she felt, though they never asked. They never questioned any of her performances, never wondered why she always closed her eyes in their company, never wondered why she always looked like on the verge of tears.
They all just knew, they just didn't want to see it.
She almost cried out, then and there, nearing the end of the piece, feeling it lift her, transport her somewhere else entirely - where the sun always shone, where the trees always bloomed, where everything smelled of fresh lavender. She was right back to her childhood, where she ran free amongst the trees, exploring and marveling nature, marveling over the astonishing glory created by -
Her hands paused at the keys, the hairs on the back of her neck standing on end, as she felt someone was there, felt, more than she knew.
She could hear, whoever it was sigh.
She expected to hear a sigh of disappointment or disapproval, but she swore it for one moment sounded like, relief. She got up to her feet, the stool clattering behind her with a sound thud, as her eyes could barely make out the shape of a man.
He was standing at the end of the steps that lead up to the rectory.
She did not know what to with herself, not daring to pick up the stool, fearing this man would tell Richard that she'd been here, of all places, instead of where she belonged.
"You should finish," he said, his voice deep, though she could still not properly make him out in the dark, his features barely visible, though moonlight shone through the large windows.
He had to be the new vicar, and he wouldn't know of her, of her situation, but he would find out soon enough.
She clung onto her bare arms - "I shouldn't," she said - her belief that it was still empty had been wrong.
Molly ran after that, not daring to stay put, hoping he too struggled to see her through the dark, that he wouldn't recognize her if he saw her sat in one of the pews. With that she got back to the car, slamming the door shut behind her, and finding slight anguish in the fact that she had forgotten the keys inside the church.
They were not her keys, after all, yet, she had hoped to have returned them. Looking upwards, she could see the light in the rectory, and in the window, the man. The vicar standing by the window, staring down at her for all she knew, causing her to avert her gaze, and when she dared return it, it was yet again dark. She had disturbed him in his sleep, she thought to herself, ashamed, though not as ashamed as she wished she should have been.
And she could only hope he was a forgiving man.
He had, after all, wanted her to finish.
And it was in his occupation to be forgiving, however, she would soon feel the depth of his compassion in more ways than one.