A/N: This is based on a few seconds' shot from the trailer. And…tomorrow, Happy Downton Day!
He closed the door behind him and set the suitcase down, promptly forgetting about it when he saw the bed.
The bed.
He sank onto it with an ungainly plop, feeling it give beneath him. He wondered if it would do that tomorrow, when…
Reflexively, he shut the thought off before it went too far. He would not disgrace her, not even in his thoughts.
But surely it would be fine to think of her like that. After all, beginning tomorrow, everything is allowed.
Running his hand over the soft comforter, he marveled at its texture. His old bed, now abandoned in the attic, held functional sheets and a thicker blanket to keep out the chill. He had never slept with anything so soft covering him. Not as soft as her skin will be.
The light of the lamps glowed as his mind drifted to the next day, to tomorrow. Shakespeare had written of it as a horror, an unexceptional marker of a meaningless life. So once his own life may have been, but for her. He gulped thinking of his questions that would soon be answered.
The feel of her long hair in his hands.
The way the bed would move with two in it, rather than one.
Whether or not her feet would be cold.
How it would feel waking up with her in his arms.
Tomorrow they would arrive at the church separately. They would hold hands in front of others. They would repeat vows said by everyone, in every language, from kings to paupers. Tomorrow they would be the center of the occasion, rather than the center of the organization behind the occasion. They would leave the ceremony together.
Tomorrow, they would be husband and wife.
Tomorrow would be the end of one chapter.
Tomorrow would be the beginning of their life together.
Tomorrow. Tomorrow. Tomorrow.