Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome to Zaraph's first Pride and Prejudice fanfiction. As you know, no parts of Pride and Prejudice belong to me, they belong to Jane Austen.
Hope you enjoy it, and reviews would be much appreciated
Chapter One: Musicians and Record Stores
There is something about a rich person that makes it that their presence never goes unnoticed, no matter how much they may try to be discrete or otherwise subtle.
Such was the case of Charles Bingley- a tall, blonde, and handsome boy with so much charisma that he almost seemed to be reeking of it. He was incredibly rich, but had so much going for him anyway that there is no doubt that girls would have been hanging over him even if he had been average in a financial sense.
But Elizabeth doubted that his dark-haired friend would be so magnetic without his obvious money. True, the man was incredibly good looking in a dark sort of way, but there was something about his personality that was very off-putting. He seemed to very much wish that he was not in the record store, and would rather be anywhere but the store.
Elizabeth shrugged, and then jumped slightly as the phone next to her began to ring.
"Headspace Records, how may I help you?"
"Elizabeth!" The excited voice coming over the phone was none other than her friend and roommate, Charlotte. "You will NOT believe the news I just heard!"
"Well, I don't know." Elizabeth laughed, and leaned on the counter. "Might it have something to do with a blonde-haired musician moving into the area?"
"HOW did you guess? Wait... no... You haven't seen him already, have you?"
"How very perceptive of you Charlotte. In fact..." Elizabeth glanced to her right. "Our violin virtuoso friend just happens to be checking out the Beatles records right now."
"What? No! Really?" Charlotte's excitement grew tenfold. "Well, Jane and I will definitely be over there in just a minute. Try and keep him there if you can!"
She then hung up, and Elizabeth sighed and shook her head, then resumed watching the violinist and his mysterious friend.
Elizabeth loved classical music, and both her sister, Jane, and good friend Charlotte had become infested with her enthusiasm for it after she had taken them to see Charles Bingley in concert. He played the violin remarkably well, with emotion that quite nearly took your breath away. Both Charlotte and Jane had been awestruck by his ability, and probably also because he was so cute and charming.
Anyway... I wonder who his dark friend is? Elizabeth twisted a strand of her brown and curly hair around a finger absently. I don't recognize him at all... Could he be another musician?
Elizabeth watched as Bingley and his friend seemed to get into an argument about the virtues of some musician or another, and nearly missed Charlotte and Jane entering the store.
She probably would have missed them if Bingley hadn't looked up and suddenly become so captivated with something. As Elizabeth followed his gaze she found Jane at the end of it, and she smiled bemusedly.
Well now... would you look at that!
Elizabeth laughed quietly to herself and began to organize a stack of records.
Charles Bingley took in a sharp breath.
"Darcy, would you look at her?"
Fitzwilliam Darcy frowned as he looked up from the stack of records he was surveying, and then followed Bingley's gaze to the tall, blonde, and lovely girl that was standing in the doorway of the store, staring back at him with equal captivation.
"Oh good God, Charles. You must be the most hopeless romantic I've ever met. Every single city we go to it's another girl."
"No, no no. This girl is the one, I'm sure of it. She's so perfect..."
Darcy snorted. "And need I remind you that you've said the same thing about all the girls you meet?"
"No, but Darcy, I'm serious this time."
Darcy shook his head and turned back to the records, preferring their company to that of his love-sick friend. He soon heard Charles walk away from him, and Darcy snorted again and began to quite stubbornly ignore Charles.
Or try too, at least. Darcy could not help but listen to the conversation that started between his best friend and the beautiful blonde girl. After a while he had to grudgingly admit that she was not as vapid or otherwise stupid as she had seemed upon first glance. That strange expression that had been on her face was probably just because she had been struck speechless (and perhaps thoughtless) by the sight of Charles.
But still, it simply would not do for Charles to fall in love with every single beautiful and blonde girl he met. Half of them knew who he was and were gold-diggers, and the other half; composed of girls who might actually like him but probably only lusted for him, were simply not good enough for Darcy to approve of. He did not want Charles to have an ordinary sort of girl; somebody with as much talent as he must have a girlfriend and eventually a wife that came from good family, and was graceful, witty, and eloquent. And in most ways perfect.
Darcy scowled at the young girl and his friend and wondered if there was any possible way that he could shorten their stay in Minneapolis. It wasn't the most terribly interesting place to begin with, and the sooner he got Charles away from the blonde girl, the better.
Elizabeth, however, was much of a different mind.
The moment she saw how Jane and Charlie were looking at each other, she knew that there was something special developing between them. Jane was not one to imprudently fall in love, especially not at first sight, but the sight of Charlie seemed to have swept that all away. And Charlie looked as much entranced with Jane as she was with him, which boded well.
Elizabeth mentally recorded this moment, snickering to herself as she thought of what a good story it would make to tell their children.
Charlie had walked up to Jane and stood there before her silent for several seconds, seemingly unable to speak; unable to even begin to string together words to explain what was on his mind.
Fortunately, Jane was not struck quite as dumb as Charles was. She shyly inquired as to his name and how he was liking Minneapolis, and a conversation started from there.
Elizabeth was so caught up in watching the couple that she was quite oblivious to the fact that the dark-haired, intense friend of Charles Bingley had walked up to the counter and was obviously waiting for some help. When he had decided that there was no-one behind the counter or in the back room that was behind the counter, he looked around until he had found the nearest salesperson, and walked up to her quite angrily.
Elizabeth smiled at Jane, then set the records she had been organizing back in their slot and looked around the store. She was happy things were going so well with her sister, who had not been in a relationship in a while.
"Excuse me." An icy and imperious voice suddenly appeared behind Elizabeth, and she spun around to find herself face to face with the Unpleasant Man.
Oh, drat.
"Hello. What can I do for you?" Elizabeth said politely and cheerfully, remembering all the customer-service lessons she had been taught by the other employees of the record store.
"I was wondering if you perhaps had any records by Thelonious Monk." The young man's icy tone had not lessened any bit. "I have been looking in this store for nearly half an hour and perhaps would have found them by now if the assistance-"
"WELL, we do happen to have a selection of his work right over here." Elizabeth walked towards the Jazz music section of the store, silently fuming. She had a quick temper that often got the better of her, and though she knew that she should have been paying attention to the customers in the store, she thought that the Unpleasant Man didn't have to get so pissed when he was not waited upon right away.
But hey, there was a reason she was calling him the Unpleasant Man.
"As you can see," Elizabeth said smoothly, "We have a fine selection of Jazz pianists right over here. In the Jazz music section. And Thelonious Monk's records happen to be right over here-"
Elizabeth stopped abruptly. They were supposed to be right over here, but either someone had bought all the records or had decided to move them.
"Well, they were over here, let me see..." Elizabeth began flipping through the records quickly, trying to find out where they had gone.
The Unpleasant Man frowned and watched Elizabeth do this, until he became fed up with her and started sorting through the records himself. Soon he gave a self-satisfied sort of smirk and looked up with several records in his hand.
"Excuse me, but I believe I have found what I wanted." There was a tone in his voice that said No thanks to you, and Elizabeth stiffened.
"Well, excellent. Would you like me to check them out for-"
"No, I believe I shall find a more capable person to do that." The Unpleasant Man smiled sarcastically at Elizabeth, and walked off.
Elizabeth clenched her fists and counted to ten, and then walked past the Unpleasant Man to the back room.
Why do people have to be so rude! It's not like I was being stupid, somebody had moved the records. That self important, egotistical jerk... Elizabeth fumed for quite a while, and then came back into the main area of the store in time to see the Unpleasant Man drag Charles Bingley away from her sister and towards the door of the store.
"What is it, Darcy?" Charles was surprised and rather miffed. "I was in the middle of a conversation, why do we have to leave now?"
"Because I can't stand being in a room with empty-headed and idiotic people." Darcy snapped.
"Oh, do you mean the saleslady who was helping you? She seemed nice, why do you say-"
"Charles, she was vapid and an airhead. I had to talk to her, you didn't. So let's go." With that, Darcy unceremoniously dragged Charles out of the door.
Elizabeth clenched her fists again and counted to thirty this time, then decided it would be a rather good idea to leave work before she started throwing things.
Thelonious Monk is a jazz pianist, as you can probably tell. If you want to know more about him, please google him, 'cause I'm not likely to explain any more.
And yes, the store where Lizzy works is an actual record store. They don't sell CDs, only vinyl.
Thanks much for reading, see you next chapter.
