She blamed herself for it, naturally. She always would, for the rest of her days. She'd said something witty, enough to earn a hearty laugh from him as they descended the winding staircase from the servants' quarters that morning. She couldn't remember what it was, only that she thought in that moment that her words bringing such a smile to his face and a twinkle to his eye was worth it.

Until he stumbled.

Mr. Bates was so caught up in his unexpected mirth that he lost his footing and slipped slightly at the top of the landing of the third floor, and his knee, his wretched knee that caused him no end of misery, gave out on him. As he tumbled forward, Anna gasped and tried to reach for him, but it was too late. He fell downward like a rag doll, his body flipping once near the bottom and coming to a stop in an unnatural position.

Anna screamed in horror and was at his side within seconds, but she was too late to help him. His neck was bent at an obscene angle, his eyes open and glassy, the breath already gone from his lungs. She shouted desperately for help as she sank to the floor and gathered him into her arms. She wept hysterically and rocked him back and forth, the seconds turning into what felt like hours until she heard loud footsteps and shouts on the stairs above and below them.

No one knew what to do, what to say. Even Thomas and O'Brien were in shock, with the former touching her shoulder gently in an attempt at comfort. It was some time later, supervised by Lord Grantham and Mr. Carson, that Mr. Bates's body was lifted onto a stretcher to be carried down the stairs. Before they could pull the sheet over his pale face, Anna risked a final goodbye. She ran the back of one hand over his cheek, feeling the dampness from her earlier tears, and whispered the words she'd been wanting to say for some time, but never had the courage to do so.

"I love you, Mr. Bates," she breathed in a trembling voice before Mrs. Hughes pulled her into her arms.

In an instant, he felt nothing. Then a gentle pulling upward as he rose to his feet. He looked upward to see a light at the top of the staircase, then back down as Anna held his body close to her, his head resting against her bosom as his eyes stared off, unable to focus. He didn't feel the gentle kisses she peppered against his hair, nor the tears that she shed that ran in rivulets down his already sallow skin. He watched from two steps above his own body as she mourned him, his heart twisting and clenching. The light shining from above him grew brighter and brighter in his peripheral vision, but he ignored it.

When Anna whispered her love into his unhearing ear, her words reaching his ethereal ones, he made his decision to stay.

The light went out.

Gwen was sympathetic, of course. She had some idea that her friend had become completely besotted with the quiet, older valet within a few days of his arrival. Where Gwen and Anna used to sneak off to tell stories and share laughs, those little breaks had been recently taken in the company of Mr. Bates. It took some time for her to see exactly what it was that Anna saw in him, but eventually, she understood. When his life was cut short by a ridiculous fall down the stairs, from the exact same step she'd stumbled on herself once or twice, Anna was utterly destroyed. She held her friend long into the night, rubbing her shoulders and stroking her hair, until they both fell asleep. In the morning, Mrs. Hughes took one look at Anna and forbade her from working for the next two days. Gwen came up to check on her several times throughout the day, bringing her food that stayed untouched, warm milk that just soured in the cup, and friendly words that went unacknowledged. All life, all of the spark from Anna's eyes was gone.

Gwen came and went and left her with her grief every time. Mrs. Hughes did the same, and even Daisy and Mrs. Patmore appeared once or twice with tea and biscuits. While they were sympathetic, like sisters and mothers to her, they could not understand the depth of her grief. They were being as kind and gentle as they could be, she knew that, but she still could not get over the agony of losing the only man she'd ever truly loved, nor the bitterness of never having told him as much when he was alive.

Sometime on the night, before bed, she pleaded for something, anything, a sign from God or anyone else who would hear her prayers that he was at peace.

He knew he shouldn't be here. Not in the Abbey, not even in this world, and certainly not in her room. But here he was, standing before her as he'd longed to do so many times before. He wore his best suit and she her black maid's dress, only with no collar or apron to brighten the darkness she shrouded herself in. Her eyes were puffy and red, her nose worn from the rub of overused flannel, but she never looked more beautiful to him. If only he hadn't waited, if only he'd acted on his feelings, damn the consequences.

But perhaps she'd be mourning him even more deeply, and it made him feel sick at the thought. She should, she would move on with her life without him. She must.

Feeling opposing tugs at his soul, one toward her as she kneeled beside her bed, mumbling her nightly prayers, the other upward to the unknown. He knew the path he should choose.

With a heavy heart, and a knee free from pain, he knelt beside her and sighed, clasping his hands in a mirror of hers.

Her prayers were answered.

The first thing she noticed was his smell. There was no reason for the faint hint of peppermint, polish, and smoke to drift her way that evening, but there it was. Her breath hitched and she inhaled deeply, trying to catch another whiff, but it was gone. She tried to think of anything in her room that could smell like him, but she was at a loss. She'd wanted to ask some token from his belongings, but Mr. Carson insisted on sending them all to his poor mother in London. She had nothing to remember him by, until that faint trace of his scent danced on the air and filled her lungs again with both grief and hope.

She immediately stood, her eyes searching the room, but finding nothing. But she knew he was there, just as much as she knew the sun would rise tomorrow.

"Mr. Bates?" she whispered into the night.

The candle on her bedside table flickered, though there was no draft in the room. And then, she saw just a haze, a shadow across her vision, and she smiled. It was enough.

On the second day, when Gwen came upstairs to go to bed, she opened the door to see Anna standing in the middle of the room, a tiny smile playing on her lips.

"You look better?" Gwen said a little cheerfully, hoping that her friend was coming back out of the darkness.

Anna only nodded, the barest of movements, and sat down on her bed, staring at the strangely flickering light from the candle on her bedside table for a few moments before laying down her side. An hour or so later, Gwen remembered rolling over and adjusting her blankets and by the light of the still burning candle. She heard Anna distinctly whisper "Goodnight, Mr. Bates" before she leaned over and blew the candle out.

Gwen closed her sleepy eyes before she saw Anna's hand curl upward, like she was caressing a lover.

It was quite some time before she felt his presence again, after swearing he held her hand all night, and she had begun to wonder if it had simply been grief and exhaustion that had overtaken her.

As she walked toward the flower show, lingering back a bit away from the other girls, she swore she heard a tiny crunch of gravel beside her. She stopped and looked back, but saw no one else. She waited a moment before moving on again, and stopped dead in her tracks when the same crunch of gravel was accompanied by the distinct tap of wood on the ground.

She smiled.

Anna reached out her hand and felt the smallest graze of something against her gloved fingertips. The wind sighed around her, the air filled with his scent again, stronger and more definite, and again, without reason. And without a care whether anyone else heard her, she spoke out.

"I loved you, Mr. Bates," she said, her throat clenching with her words. "I always will. I know it's not ladylike to say it, and I'm probably a little mad, but I'm not a lady, and I don't pretend to be."

The leaves on the distant trees shifted just a little, forming a familiar outline in her vision. Tall and broad and welcome...but not actually there.

"You're a lady to me," the trees whispered back, only for her. "And I never knew a finer one in my life."

Anna wrung her hands together in anguish. "Why didn't I tell you before…" She stopped as a sob choked her.

A soft breeze caressed her cheek. "I am no more free now than I was before. You mustn't linger over me."

"Anna!" Gwen called from up the road, startling her and making her look away. "Stop dawdling and come on!"

When she looked back at the trees, the leaves had changed and the breeze was gone.

She pined and searched and wished for him to appear to her again, but to no avail. He was lost to her. She cried every night and mourned every day. Mrs. Hughes had long given up being sympathetic and had begun gently chastising her for her constant state of grief. Eventually, she realized she had to stifle her emotions in the face of others or risk losing her position. So she bottled herself up. But every night, she wept, and she included him in her prayers. And every morning she greeted him with the sun just as if he was there beside her.

For months, then years this went on. She had fellows who tried to make her more than an acquaintance, but she would hear none of it. Even Mr. Crawley's well-meaning and kind valet, Mr. Molesley, made fumbled attempts at gaining her affections. She was polite as ever as she declined him. For her, there would be no other.

"I'll wait for you," she said one evening before bed, after she'd packed for her trip. The candle flickered once before she blew it out.

It was on the return trip from London to Ripon, as she gazed out the window with a dozing Mrs. Patmore at her side, that everything changed again. There was a lurching, then a horrible squeal of brakes, then…

Nothing.

He'd never left the house, never left her, but he'd lurked out of sight and out of senses, in an attempt to spare her. He couldn't leave anyway. No, he'd lost that chance years before. The light never returned to the upstairs corridor to beckon him to leave.

The main hall was in a great ruckus as he followed Lord Grantham down the stairs. His former friend and employer rushed to the telephone and spoke in hushed tones, his face growing more ashen by the moment. Bates lingered back, his sense of propriety still strong even now.

Mr. Carson stood off to one side, his own face a cloud of sadness and confusion. Lord Grantham thanked whomever had called on the telephone and hung up, then turned to the somber butler.

"There was...an accident," Lord Grantham said in a shaky voice. "The train from York to Ripon derailed. Mrs. Patmore is injured, but able to recover at the hospital. She was one of the few lucky ones in third class."

Bates barely heard the gasp of grief from Mrs. Hughes as she joined in the conversation. All he could see was the front door of the stately manor swinging wide open, the sunlight nearly blinding in its intensity. And there, in the center of the light, was a familiar form, clad not in a dark shapeless dress, but in a shimmering gown of ivory and seafoam.

"Anna?" he said in a pained voice.

She said nothing, only glided toward him as gracefully as ever, her eyes locking with his in a way that left no doubt as to whether she saw him or not. He reached out his hand without thinking and was shocked when she did the same. Their fingers entwined and she felt so real to him that he forgot for just a moment what it all implied.

Without a care for their surroundings, Bates reached up to stroke her cheek. Anna smiled and leaned into his touch, her skin soft and velvety under his palm. As the rest of the household gathered in the grand hall and swirled around them in grief and disbelief, they leaned in toward each other to share one simple kiss. Her lips were as soft as he'd imagined, their taste as sweet as the honey-drenched tea she loved, as responsive as his wildest dreams.

When they broke apart, they leaned into each other, feeling the solidity of their bodies that had been denied far too long.

"Was it fast?" Bates had to ask, closing his eyes and praying that it was.

He felt her nod against him as she buried her face into his chest. He sighed loudly and kissed the top of her hair. Beyond her, the wide doors of the house still stood open, the outside world glowing with an unnatural light.

"You should go," he said gently, his voice cracking with the pain he knew was coming.

She surprised him by taking his hand and pulling him along with her toward the light. "I said I'd wait for you, and you did the same," she said with a little smile. "Come on now, Mr. Bates. Let's go together."

They stepped through the doorway and out of the world of the living. The light consumed them and in an instant, they were nowhere and everywhere at once. In a posh bedroom together, limbs entwined. At a small cottage. An unknown beach. An inn on a hillside overlooking the town below, their children chasing after a pair of puppies.

Together at last.