His shyness was adorable the first time he asked.
"Lizzy, may I paint you?" His words were hushed to the point of a whisper. Their solitude, soon to be interrupted by a dutiful Mary or a flippant Kitty (she sorely hoped for the latter), was fleeting at best. She had little time to think.
"Paint me?"
"Your image against the forest - my wood nymph and friend." His smile grew handsomer by the hour. Engagements seemed to bring with them magic spells of increased attractiveness. He had always struck a pleasant sight - even from that first fateful night at the assembly. It was his ever-increasing charm that surprised and amazed her.
"I hardly make a good subject." She smiled back, aching with the knowledge that their solitude would cease the moment Papa realized her sister tarried. "Artists tend towards the properly sedentary, I believe - thus the still life. Portrait sittings do not suit me, nor I them."
"But you suit me, Elizabeth." His fingers grazed her shoulder, their tips dancing by the base of her neck. The summer morning chilled. "Could I not have one sketch? I shall add subsequent colors on my own. You need not stay still overly long."
"And, pray, tell, where would such a sketch occur?" Her heart danced. Her soul tingled with the memories of kisses stolen a mere few feet away from this spot last week.
Engagements were not to be toyed with.
Darcy, her Darcy, smiled widely. "Not far nor for long, I promise. Merely stand here, or there - and commune with the trees as you often do."
"You portray me to be mad, sir!"
"On the contrary." His entire countenance trapped her, heart and soul. "You render me mad, Elizabeth. I shall never find peace until you are mine. I shall need a token until then."
Kitty's loud footsteps drew closer. Elizabeth worried for insufficient time to catch her breath.
"Very well, Fitzwilliam." She smiled timidly. "If paint me you must."
"Dawn," he had said, when asked what he named the portrait. Her figure, in profile, gazed upon the forest with awe. The paleness of her gown weaved seamlessly with the earthy strokes around her. He was a man of talent, a man of love.
"May I paint you, Elizabeth?" He asked against her ear again a few weeks later, his arms wound nightly around her waist.
She faced the window and its Venetian view - but her smile was for him. "Once more?"
"I believe I have only had the honor once." He kissed her shoulder, its naked expanse heartily ready for his adoration. The thin sheets could not shelter her beauty. "'Tis hardly sufficient practice for a subject so enchanting."
She laughed, flattered, blithesome. "Must you spend our honeymoon with your brushes and easel?"
"I did not bring an easel," he stated, hands diverting her beneath her makeshift covers.
Her breathlessness was rising by the second. Her voice was dazed, distracted. "Then what shall you use, sir?"
"This might suffice." His hands roamed her back, skin against skin, in large, caressing strokes.
She shuddered, eyes closed.
One month of marital bliss, it seemed, drove her only to be more hopelessly in love wth him.
Those who tired of love had not loved at all.
"And what shall you name it?" Sighs interspersed with her words as she fell backwards, draping her body against his. "Shall you call it 'Bed' or 'View' as I look out the window?"
He laughed, hugging her. "I think I shall prefer 'Hope.'"
He did not think when he would paint her again. As Pemberley's master, he found the many demands of estate, tenants, horses, crops, and staff occupying him left and right, day after day. Whatever little respite he could muster was spent in quiet comfort within their master suite. His easel lay neglected, dusty at its hinges. His brushes remained stiff, untouched.
He was completely surprised, therefore, to find them in his room.
"My brushes?" He frowned, tired after a long day's work. Each instrument was displayed intentionally, aligned perfectly with all the others. The scent of fresh paint nearly prevented his discovery of the coaxing figure on his bed.
"Happy birthday, husband." She was stretched generously on his mattress - arms bare, hair untied. The sheet's unforgiving weight exposed her every curve. He doubted she ever meant to cover them. Her smile turned nearly wicked before she lifted her arm and, in one motion, hauled her sole covering and flung it to the floor. He swallowed painfully, for his throat was entirely dry, at the naked vision. Her eyes glinted. Her body beckoned. "Shall you paint me?"
The coarse laugh escaping him was half parts frustration and half parts glee. His eyes feasted on her form. She smiled at his inspection, shifting only slightly.
"I think," he said, pausing only to tug off his coat, "I shall do so shortly - thought not too shortly, madame."
Her giggles, smiles, and moans when he assailed her served as affirmation that their subsequent activity had been her object all along.
"Eros" was the title he'd scribbled on his sketchbook when he'd completed his birthday sketch at last, for a polite English word simply would not do. The image was never painted, for each attempt served only to distract him.
His sketchbook remained locked in his topmost drawer - a private item for private times. It proved rather useful during his wife's visits to her sisters without him, first for Mary's confinement, then for Lydia's. There was no equal, of course, to her touch and her fire. No image - however well-drawn - could be more than a reminder of the feeling of her in his arms.
It was their joyous reunion after her return from her first visit, he believed, that sowed the seeds for the portrait he painted today.
The unceasing movement that made his Elizabeth who she was had now been tempered by her growing belly. Her eyes danced still, as did her movements. It was simply her preference for smoother ground that altered noticeably.
The light behind her, streaming softly from the window, framed her in an angelic glow. Her hand on her protruding navel carried a tenderness and intimacy he could only hope to capture under his brush strokes.
He did not think long for a title. The scene before him whispered, "Bliss." There was no other word equal to what he felt in his heart.
She smiled when he unveiled his next work to her. True to changing trends, the painting conveyed more feeling than precision. Her likeness was discernible in the forefront, her seated figure flanked by their two sons and one daughter. Behind the chair she occupied, her aging father and mother smiled. He painted himself into the image, eyes watching her a few seats away. Bingley, Jane, Georgiana, and her husband all smiled and conversed in the background.
"What do you call it?" Elizabeth ran her fingers up and down the sides of the mahogany frame.
"Warmth," Darcy said simply, before enveloping her in his embrace.
"Elizabeth." He pulled her close, his heart aching as he knew hers did. The hope of one more child - of one more friend for Bennet, George, and Annie - was a cruel hope to take away. He knew they could make more children, but no child could replace this one that they lost. "Elizabeth."
"I loved it - I loved it so much." She sobbed into his chest. Her room, crowded in recent years by stray items of child and home, felt vast and empty tonight.
"So did I." He kissed her crown. Her shaking figure grew cold against his own crying heart. He tightened his grip until he could not do so more without crushing her. "We both loved him, or her, very much."
She nodded, crying hoarsely, into his arms.
His faith, tested like it had never been tested before, hung limply upon a spider's thread.
"Loss," he whispered into her hair, "shall only bring us closer."
She nodded in agreement, to his heartfelt relief.
"Loss," she echoed, lifting her face until their teary eyes met, "shall not conquer us."
He nodded too, desperate to concur.
He knew then that he had to relate this moment to his canvas. It was too painful to remember - too painful to forget.
The seventh time he painted her, he called the picture "Glimpse."
She didn't know he sketched her then - eyes crinkled, lips smiling, bare face and shoulders glowing above the bubbles in her bath. Summer and its baths were welcome, he was sure, after their arduous winter. The intimacy of the image did not escape him, and he shared his sketch with her first before he painted it in full.
She sat beside him often when he painted, their children running free. Pemberley proved a hearty playing ground.
He felt his age in his bones, hers in her greying hair. Still, his blood warmed at the sight of her naked skin; and his heart raced at the comfort of her touches.
Glimpses of her playfulness occurred often still, as did his smiles at her beauty and charm.
"Shall you paint us now?" She looked up towards him, feeling particularly old and eternally young. The swing no longer flew with the wind as it used to. Its creaking tuned itself to her own aching back. "I dare say we strike a pretty picture."
He smiled, his appeal never fading to her. "I fear my fingers shake too harshly to paint well again."
"Pish posh, the impressionists do it well enough." She reveled in the subtle breeze. "Thirty years of marriage is very much worth painting - don't you agree?"
The warmth of his body was welcome as he squeezed on to the wooden plank beside her. The kiss he pressed to her lips was as exciting as it was familiar. Their arms slid around each other as they always did, her head finding its place on his shoulder right after.
Yards and miles away, their eldest courted his lady, their youngest his books. The simple solitude of early marriage had run its course and returned to its first masters.
"And if I were to create this painting." His hand played with hers, fingers threading and soothing and dancing. "What ought I to name it?"
"Forever," she said happily, knowing full well he would agree.
A/N: I hope you enjoyed this! Please leave a review if you did :) I promise I'm still working on Switched, the Oh Brother epilogue, the superhero story, and another Christmas-themed story. These shorter works are just interludes in the grand scheme of things :)
In addition, I am incredibly blessed and grateful to share with you that an updated version of Mothers Know Best is now available for pre-order on Amazon, starting today! I am both nervous and excited about my first foray into formal publication and would much appreciate your support. Thank you for allowing me to be part of such a diverse and exciting JAFF community. Your readership means the world to me. -Iris