By his thinking, it all started that day. Not the one with the bathroom sink, or the one after when she left a plate of butterscotch biscuits on his step, but the one four days later when he came home to find Edith Crawley smashed up against the front door of Ros' brownstone, as if the three or four inches of molding around it might protect her from the elements. Though their stoops shared a common cast iron railing, Anthony had to shout over the rain so she could hear him.
"Are you alright?" he felt compelled to ask.
Edith jumped and turned at the sound of his voice. "The cleaning ladies have locked me out by mistake. It's fine, I called a locksmith," Edith assured. She smiled at him from beneath the hood of the raincoat she wore, and even then he could see her teeth chattering.
"When is the locksmith due?"
"A few hours," the young thing answered. At three on a November afternoon, that meant after dark. And even though it was practically balmy for the autumn, it wouldn't stay that way for long if one was soaked through.
Still, he was reluctant to bring a young girl into his home. It seemed a little untoward. "And you don't have a spare key?"
Edith arched a brow. "If I did would I be standing here in the rain?"
Anthony smiled, hopeful she wouldn't notice him turn scarlet at the blunder. "I suppose if you were an eccentric."
"I assure you I'm not," she laughed. "Anyway, no use in both of us getting drenched. Best you get inside, Anthony. I'll be in soon enough."
He thought of offering his umbrella and having done with it, and then felt like a terrible wretch. "Get in here before you freeze to death, or get washed away. Come on," he said, fumbling with his own keys. He couldn't remember the last time anyone else stepped foot in his place, but he was committed now.
"I really don't wish to be a bother," Edith tried. It was Anthony's turn to raise a brow.
"You won't be a bother, but I will think you very ridiculous if you insist on standing in this downpour."
Edith ducked her head and hurried over, shoulders hunched and hands stuffed in the pockets of her jacket. She wore tight-cut trousers that showed how skinny her legs were and little leather loafers that surely couldn't keep her toes warm.
Anthony ushered her inside and shut the door against the rising wind. "Weather's getting worse by the minute. You might have blown away," Anthony muttered, noting how small she seemed shivering beside him.
"I would have been fine, don't exaggerate," she scoffed, pulling her hood back. In the dim light of his foyer, she looked all bright and colorful. He wasn't used to such glittering things in his home.
Her hair was neither blonde nor red, but somewhere between the two depending on the lighting, and her skin, her skin was pale and delicate. She had a bit of a glow beneath her flesh, coloring from the cold or from emotion he couldn't tell, and her eyes were fiery and rich and part of him wished she would stop turning them to her feet out of shyness.
Anthony wordlessly took her coat and draped it over the large, ornamental globe to dry. He turned, confused, when he heard Edith giggle.
"Something funny?" he asked lightly.
She pointed at his work. "Unusual coat rack. Is that a matter of routine for you?"
"Better than letting it drip all over my floors. Anyway, that's the first practical use that thing has seen in its entire sodded existence." He sounded gruff, and defensive. He knew he did. He could be a real ass at times.
But she was laughing again. He noticed then that she was wearing a bit of makeup, a cream blouse and gray cardigan to compliment her navy pants. A bit more put together than last time he saw her, and perhaps not quite as young as he'd originally thought either.
"I seem to be rather wet every time we meet," Edith said, immediately followed by a hiss of embarrassment. She closed her eyes and shook her head, blushing all the way down to her clavicle. It took him a moment to understand, and he eagerly changed the subject.
"Care for a cuppa while you wait?"
Anthony led her to the lounge, urging her to sit close to the fire he had started, before fetching tea.
"Milk and sugar?" he asked, taking up the sofa across from her. Edith shook her head and thanked him when she took the mug from his hands.
"You have a lovely home," she offered, and he realized she would have had plenty of time to notice all the dust built up and the rubbish on his desk and the dated furnishings. She was being polite.
"Yes, well, it gets the job done I suppose." He took his own tea, wondering how to entertain her. "How did you find yourself locked out, by the way? If you don't mind my asking."
"Of course not. I left my bag on the entry table when I went out for a walk, which was my mistake. The cleaning ladies come twice a week, arrived while I was out, and they lock up after, thus leading to your second heroic rescue of me since I moved here." She smiled sheepishly and Anthony felt a bit squeamish at the image of her sweet dimples and downturned eyes.
"I, um, I'm no hero I assure you."
"Well seeing as you've saved me on more than one occasion I beg to differ," she said quickly, and before he could protest she added, "I'm really not helpless, I swear to you. I'm not a complete moron."
"I never would have imagined you were."
"Well you'd be in the minority. My parents," but then she stopped and shook her head. "Never mind." Again, before Anthony could get a word in, she changed the subject. "So what do you do, Anthony?"
He huffed once, breathless from trying to keep up with her. "I, um, I'm a surgeon."
"Oh that's impressive! So you really are a hero," she replied, and he turned red despite himself. A grown man getting sheepish at some teenager's unqualified praise.
"Are you here for school?" he returned, moving the focus away from him as she had done earlier.
To his further bewilderment she scoffed again. "How old do you think I am?"
Anthony stammered, truly panicked now. "I, I don't know. Seventeen, eighteen?"
Edith nodded and sighed. "I usually get sixteen. Makeup helps, I suppose. Anyway, I'm twenty. Hardly a child."
"Hardly an adult either," he snorted, and she had the nerve to look affronted.
"Well how old are you?" she asked.
"Old."
"No doubt," she said sarcastically. "But how old?"
"Old enough to keep a spare key," he teased, and he couldn't decide if he was genuinely irritated or enjoying her company.
Ignoring his dig she said, "You're awfully coy about your age for a man. You're worse than my Aunt Ros."
"How old is your Aunt Ros?"
"Somewhere between thirty-six and forty if you ask her many suitors. According to family record she's forty-seven."
"Well then she's got six on me," he ceded softly, looking down at his tea.
"I'm not here for school. I finished my degree a year ago, in fact, because when you're socially dysfunctional it's rather easy to bury your head in the books. Anyway, I got a job and was rather desperate to leave my parents' home in Yorkshire so I moved here."
"My mistake," he said, and he didn't realize he was grinning at her until she dropped her head to her shoulder and bit her lip.
Anthony cleared his throat, feeling unease bubble up from the pit of his stomach. This young thing made him nervous, and he was never nervous.
"What's your specialty?"
"Beg your pardon?" he asked, feeling clammy and disoriented.
"Sorry, I meant in surgery."
"Oh, um, cardiovascular."
"A heart surgeon," Edith muttered. She looked rather contemplative, then cleared her throat and shifted on the couch. "Your wife must be very proud. What's her name?" Edith pointed limply to a picture on the mantle of Anthony and his bride some twenty years earlier.
"Maude," Anthony answered automatically. He wondered if perhaps… but then Edith sighed. "I haven't met her yet, she must be very busy."
"She's away, in Cornwall," Anthony answered.
"You couldn't join?"
"Work," Anthony said, feeling exceptionally loutish.
Edith smiled. "Busy saving hearts," she joked softly. "And daft neighbors too." She blushed deeply, though Anthony couldn't be sure whether it was from her comment about hearts or a renewed embarrassment about being locked out.
Anthony was aware she was doing all the polite chatter such a situation required, but the more he tried to think of something to say, the more jammed the majority of his thoughts became. He couldn't process beyond the fact that a strange young woman was in his home, asking him questions which he had no desire to answer. Was he really so out of practice socially?
Yes, yes he was.
"Anthony?" Edith said, and he had a sinking feeling she had asked him another question and he hadn't heard.
Say something you git, he told himself. But when his mouth opened words failed to produce themselves. He was a surgeon for christ's sake. He could map the complexities of the cardiovascular system on the back of a napkin, and had done once while hiding at a hospital gala. Speaking to anyone other than patients and staff shouldn't be so very difficult.
"I feel kind of impetuous calling you Anthony. Do you mind? Only I don't know your last name or I would call you Doctor," Edith rambled. She was uncomfortable now, it was clear in the way she held herself in, bare feet tucked over each other, elbows in her lap. As if she were trying to make as small a footprint as possible in his natural habitat.
"It's Strallan, my last name," he said, "But I don't mind if you call me Anthony. If you must call me at all."
Ass! Anthony regretted the comment as soon as he'd made it, the words giving a message he hadn't intended at all. And the wound was visible in Edith's small, apologetic grin and eyes that were slightly sadder than they had been a moment before.
"Edith, that's not—"
"I know I'm a nuisance—"
"I'm sorry—"
"I'm sorry—"
They talked over each other for half a second before the most dreadful silence fell between them. Anthony felt flustered and frustrated. He likened the sensation to a toddler learning to communicate and the mouth refusing to cooperate with the brain.
"I'm not a very… likeable man," Anthony tried, then closed his eyes for a minute. His tea had long gone cold and he set it on the table with a loud thump. "What is this new job you got?" he asked, trying desperately to sound less like a complete prick.
Edith looked almost thankful he had changed the subject, and had opened her mouth to answer when her mobile went off. Slipping it from her back pocket, Anthony got a nice view of the soft curve of her rear, and looked away in a huff.
A few one word answers and she hung up. "That's the locksmith, he's outside."
They said nothing else as she all but ran to gather her coat and the loafers she had removed. The little thing was practically frantic, sharpening the guilt creeping up Anthony's spine. She was already halfway out the door and struggling with one arm of her coat when she gave a hurried thanks.
"Edith, don't think," Anthony began as she rushed down the steps. He caught a glimpse of the impatient locksmith, a large young man who looked entirely normal and who Anthony had a sudden and deep distrust of.
She was at the bottom step, waiting for him to finish, blinking up into the rain. When he failed to finish his thought, Edith shrugged. "Good night, Anthony, thank you."
Anthony watched Edith explain the problem to the locksmith, swearing it was her home. He had half a mind to accompany her, a young woman dealing with a stranger who could easily overpower her.
But then Anthony wondered if anyone could overpower that girl if they dared try. Unsure, and ever the coward, Anthony ducked back into his house and shut the door. That he found himself dragging one of the dining room chairs to the front window, surreptitiously listening for any trouble and waiting for the locksmith's van to leave, Anthony decided not to overanalyze.
His surveillance proved silly in time. In a matter of twenty minutes, Anthony would see the van go, and would still feel compelled to go check on her. The awkward, stilted conversation they would have led to mutual apologies, a blushing silence, and the dawning of something new and unexpected and as wholly unwelcome as it was unavoidable.
A/N: Thank you for your reviews and follows! This one is a little different for our pair. I'm thinking of Anthony in the first season, when he was a bit awkward and dumbstruck (and frankly idiotic about our poor Edith and her attentions.) He let Mary sway his attention at the first dinner, he asked her awkwardly for the first ride and Edith had to take the initiative to say she would go, he literally ran from the garden party. Anthony is a dear, but a touch bumbling I'd say.
And Maude remains a mystery for now. :) Bear with me, and thanks for reading and reviewing! Also, I'm out of the country for three weeks starting Thursday, so if I don't post, not to worry-I haven't abandoned the story.
Always,
Eleanor