'She just wants to make a good impression,' Jane said kindly.

Indeed she said everything kindly, whereas Elizabeth had a more cynical streak.

'I know Jane, I'm just worried mum will leave more of a crater than an impression - you have fore-warned him haven't you?' she asked nervously.

'He has met mum before, Lizzie.'

'He's talked to her on Skype not met her in person, it's a very different experience.'

Fran had taken to regularly interrupting her daughter's Skype calls to Chand, loudly doting on him and making in-depth enquires into his life. Still Lizzie felt that left him ill prepared for their mother in her current state of excitableness.

The two sisters were in Jane's car on their way to see his new house at number five Netherfield Street, a full three hours earlier than they had originally intended. Behind them were the rest of the Bennets, including Lydia's best friend Kitty Goulding who seemed to spend more time at their house than her own. Elizabeth could just see their car through the small slice of the back window still visible over the mountain of bags in the boot. Fran had made true her plans to get him 'all the essentials', regardless of her daughters pointing out that he'd already been living in his own flat for some years. Elizabeth was already mortified and they hadn't even arrived yet, she didn't know how Jane was so calm.

The two cars pulled up nearby and everyone piled out, after being handed a bag each to carry, they all made their way up to the house hidden behind a removals van.

'Oh look there he is,' Fran cried trying to wave to him despite the heavy bags weighing her arms down, 'it's lovely to see you dear.'

'Hello everyone,' Chand beamed though his eyes fixed on to Jane.

Elizabeth quickly guided her mum through the door letting Jane and Chand greet each other in peace. At once Fran started to arrange everything. Standing in the middle of the lounge she assigned all her daughters tasks.

'Mary put the cool box over here in the kitchen, and Lizzie, if you could just move that box over,' Fran said pointing to one of Chand's delivery items, 'we can put the cleaning stuff down. Lydia would you pop up and find the bathroom to put these toiletries away?'

Lydia and Kitty soon disappeared and Mary clamped on her headphones as she usually did. Elizabeth suspected this had the double advantage of letting her listen to her favourite music in peace - the rest of the family had very different tastes – as well as blocking out their mum's voice. This left Elizabeth alone to cope with Fran. She was of course used to her mum's mood swings by now, but she couldn't remember seeing her this eager, at least not since Lydia had been given the starring role of Angel in the Christmas school play.

Fran was blustering around the house taking note of every detail as if it was her daughter moving in when a stranger appeared.

'Oh, that'd be a lovely spot for Jane's photo collection,' Fran enthused completely oblivious to her daughters embarrassment as the unknown man stood in the doorway, staring. It didn't help that he was unfairly attractive, the embodiment of the classic tall, dark and handsome.

At last Fran noticed him. 'Hello, I'm Francesca, Jane's mum. You must be one of Chand's friends,' she said, it wasn't a question.

'Hello,' he replied, but it sounded more like a knee jerk reaction than a greeting, leaving them all to stare awkwardly at each other.

Suddenly in the next room there was a loud shriek, that special kind of shriek that only teenage girls seem to be able to produce, followed by a chorus of giggles.

'Oh God!' Lydia cried as she burst into the room and barged past Chand's friend, 'I thought Kitty had broke it -'

'Me? It wasn't my fault,' Kitty bleated.

'But it's a good picture, what do you think?' Lydia said as she flashed her phone under Lizzie's nose, but before she could make anything out it had already been whipped away.

Lydia and Kitty stood hunched over their phones tapping away with practiced efficiency. At fifteen they were seven years younger than Elizabeth but she often felt it was more like a different species classification. Not that it stopped her from loving them, so she wasn't at all impressed with the judgemental look the man directed at them.

'Oh there you are Darcy,' Chand smiled as he popped his head round the door, 'could you just help with the armchair?'

The stranger, Darcy, quickly made his exit looking very glad to have an excuse to get away, and Elizabeth was just as glad to see him go.

'Oh Chand, mum said to give you this,' Kitty said, as she dug around in one of the shopping bags before eventually producing a bottle of wine.

'Thank you very much, I do have a weak spot for red,' Chand smiled.

'A man after my own heart,' Ian said from a comfortable chair in the corner where he'd settled himself out the way.

'Well, I'll show you everything we've brought,' Fran said eagerly.

Her daughters rolled their eyes as she grabbed Chand's elbow and steered him around his own house. Chand seemed to take Fran's eager interest in arranging everything in his stride, Elizabeth was very impressed. Jane was very happy too, but unlike her sister she wasn't surprised. Though whether that was due to her good opinion of Chand, or her good opinion of people in general was hard to tell.

The rest of the morning past in a flurry of activity, except for Ian who had discovered some instructions for putting together a flat-pack table – he wasn't actually building it, just reading the instructions. Innumerable boxes and furnishings were brought in and moved around from room to room as Fran deliberated over where to put them. At last the pass the parcel was brought to an end by Lydia declaring herself to be starved, and in a rare moment of unity of thought between the sisters, Mary agreed and went in search of the food.

Everyone was too hungry and tired to talk much over lunch, though they did all make sure to thank Fran for preparing it. She could cook well when she wanted to, and this momentous occasion had prompted her to make an effort. So they dined on homemade cold pasta salad and a vast array of fancy sandwiches, filled with smoked salmon, egg and cress, and, tuna with peeled cucumber.

When everyone was full conversation started up.

Fran, a usual, led the way, 'have you seen much of Meryton yet?'

'Just a brief look and everything Jane's told me of course,' Chand said with a rather syrupy glance to Jane.

'Well it's a very nice looking town, especially since they got the flower baskets up, and there's plenty to do, there's that lovely little café in town - you know the one I mean Jane you'll have to show him, and the park by the river is worth a visit,' Fran babbled seemingly without the need to breathe.

Chand looked genuinely interested and Jane promised to show him around her favourite spots.

Bored of this topic, Lydia and Kitty started gossiping and giggling amongst themselves about the other kids at their school before disappearing off all together, while Mary was slumped in her chair unused to the exertion of the morning.

Her hometown was a subject that Fran did not quickly tire of, the advantages of different shops were weighed up, the Green was praised and the roads and traffic lamented over. Thankfully Chand's interest did not seem to dim, however such interest was clearly not shared by his friend. Elizabeth was called upon to describe the country walks and Ian to describe the best pups. Chand asked questions and Darcy was silent, Chand laughed and Darcy was glum.

Eventually Fran's effusions came to an end and Chand took the opportunity to address them all.

'Well, everyone, thank you very much for helping me,' Chand beamed, 'it's been a success all round, just aching muscles and a scratched table -'

'Not the oak dining table!' Fran exclaimed, 'I'm sure I would have noticed, what with the flowers I arranged there.'

'Chand,' Darcy said, as soon as Fran paused to draw breath, 'if it was damaged in transit you need to take it up with the company.'

'It's not actually oak,' Chand said reassuringly, 'besides it's just a scratch.'

'Really? That's such a shame, the clumsy clots could have ruined it!' Fran lamented, 'it looked so lovely with light coming through the window, and you know the light will make any scratches stand out. I'll just go and have a look at it, you know, it depends where the scratch is and where the light hits it -'

Ian's eyes crinkled with amusement as his wife hurried out the room, and they could all hear her loudly abusing the delivery men all the way up the stairs, in fact, the delivery men outside could probably hear her too.

'You do need to talk to them before they go,' Darcy insisted.

'I guess you're right,' Chand sighed and with a smile he pulled himself out of his chair and disappeared to talk to the delivery men.

Now it was just the eldest sisters and Darcy, Jane gave her a look which clearly meant she'd like to talk to Chand's friend but didn't know where to start.

'So, Darcy, what do you do?' Elizabeth asked, silently thinking that with her mum and the younger girls' preoccupation now might be the best time to attempt conversation.

'I'm doing my Doctorate,' he answered briefly.

Maybe not then. 'Medical?' She prompted.

'No, history.'

The air began to feel heavy. Christ, this was like pulling teeth, but just as that uncharitable thought formed he deigned to ask a question.

'What about you?'

'I'm doing my Masters. One year down, one more year to go and decades of debt for all my hard work,' she added lightly.

His face remained blank, 'what about you Jane, what are you studying?'

'I'm not, I never went to uni. I work as a carer,' Jane said brightly.

Lizzie smiled, she knew how much her sister enjoyed her job which was so well suited to her patience and compassion.

'Oh, right,' he nodded, his eyes drifted off out the window.

Elizabeth frowned and followed his gaze. Outside Lydia and Kitty were giggling over the delivery men while Chand was looking over some paperwork.

'I should go give him a hand,' Darcy told them and promptly left.

'Give him a hand? He couldn't come up with a better excuse to go?' Lizzie scoffed, 'Chand's what? Twenty six, twenty seven?'

'Twenty seven on fourteenth of September,' Jane said at once.

Elizabeth laughed, making Jane blush.

'Well you have some catching up to do, by the time mum was twenty seven she was already expecting me,' Lizzie joked, 'the small bedroom would be perfect for a cot -'

'Lizzie,' Jane said shaking her head in embarrassment.

'Alright,' Lizzie smiled, 'you can have a short reprieve while I go to the loo.'

On her way back from the toilet Elizabeth spotted Chand and Darcy talking together, she stopped outside the door when she heard Jane's name mentioned. Smiling to herself she listened in, expecting to gain more evidence with which to tease Jane.

'Jane's wonderful, isn't she?' Chand said warmly, making Elizabeth's smile widen.

'She's seems nice enough, but her family's a nightmare,' was Darcy's curt reply, her smile faltered.

'Really? I thought you'd get on with Elizabeth?'

'Well, comparatively,' Darcy conceded before adding, 'I don't have anything in common with them, you know I get on better with other academics, and Elizabeth is hardly an engaging student.'

Elizabeth moved away from the door, scowling now, and went back down muttering as she went, 'pretensions prat.'

Authors note: Thank you so much for all the lovely reviews, hopefully you all liked this instalment, I certainly enjoyed writing more Fran Bennet!

To clear a few things up,

Characters ages and jobs should be clearer now, except Mary, I have ideas but nothing definite about her yet.

Chand Bansal is the very same Charles Bingley, I wanted him to be outside of the typical white rich boy club.

I don't plan for it to be a blow by blow retelling, but (hopefully!) it should still have that P&P essence.