Chapter 2 – Chances

A/N: It's swell to be back, everyone. Thanks for reading and reviewing. This is most definitely an ensemble piece, so rotating POV will be on throughout!

~CeeCee

Richard Clarkson knew he should be exhausted, body and mind, but he couldn't quite feel it, at least not yet, as he left Downton Cottage Hospital. He adjusted the tweed cap he was wearing to better protect the tips of ears, which were chilled by the night air, and glanced up at the star-scattered sky above. The evening was crisp but still, the perfect early winter night.

He hurried along the mostly empty village streets, turning towards the modest brick house he had called "home" for nearly two decades, his breath preceding him in thick plumes. The place truly had been home, just as this village had been, but what a different home it had been the past few months!

He laughed aloud, an unselfconscious, joyful sound, as he reached his front door. A quiet, sleeping household would certainly greet him, so he did his best to enter soundlessly.

Then chuckled as he shut the door behind him.

He could hear humming, a slightly off-key alto, coming from the study towards the end of the hall, then pages rustling, the same voice muttering something under her breath. He rid himself of his outerwear and headed towards the sound with the giddiness of a green lad at the doorstep of his sweetheart's house.

Isobel was sitting at the desk, her dressing gown-clad figure illuminated by the golden halo of light coming from the small lamp thereupon. Her bronze-colored hair was half undone, tumbling about her shoulders, her face creased in concentration, bent over one of the large medical folios that lined the shelves of the cozy room. Her finger traced along a particularly detailed diagram, and then she sighed with satisfaction.

"Aha!" She poked the illustration for good measure, then began writing in earnest again.

"Ye've solved it all, have you?" He questioned from the doorway.

"Richard! Goodness! You scared the wits out of me!" She gasped, dropping her pencil. Her face crunched in consternation for a moment, then broke into a sunny grin. "Hello. How are you? It's terribly late, is it not?"

She stood and glanced over at the wall clock, her forehead furrowing again. And she looked so lovely, so very dear to him, he couldn't help himself; he crossed the room in three great strides and wrapped his arms around her, pressing his cold lips against her warm ones.

She yelped. "You're so cold!"

"And you're so warm," he retorted, kissing her again. "What on earth are you still doing awake?"

He brushed his hand across her cheek, tucking a stray wave behind her ear. He looked at her for a long moment, the reality of his new life washing over him, as it did, often, in the past few weeks and months. Sometimes, it was impossible to believe this was all real.

She was here, his wife, in his house, their house. She'd surprised him, yes, really surprised him, when she told him she wanted it this way. She was ready to leave Crawley House and seemed willing to shed much of what connected her to the big house above and beyond. And she'd not changed it much once she arrived, this house of his. Oh, there were newer curtains at the windows, slightly lusher bedding in their shared room upstairs, more vases of flowers scattered about the place. But in essentials, save one, she'd not interfered with the place he'd called home all these years.

His maid-of-all-work was here more often, as was Mariah, her maid from Crawley House, but neither of them lived in. She still used young Jack Davis, her driver, regularly, but Richard suspected it was more because she liked the lad rather than out of perceived necessity. They had a cook in several times a week to prepare teas and suppers, but usually, it was him steeping the tea and her boiling the eggs each morning, the pair of them moving around his modest, bright kitchen with the ease of a couple who had dwelt together far, far longer than three scant months.

"I've decided, I think," her face had that look. The one that both irritated and inspired him.

"Do tell, then, Mrs. Clarkson," he answered, his mouth twitching. Oh, how he loved calling her that!

"Well, that's just it. I've decided it should be Dr. Clarkson, going forward," she grinned up at him, and kissed him again.

oooOOOooo

"Richard?"

"Isobel?"

She tucked her head in the crook where his arm and shoulder met, breathing in the smell of him, relishing the feeling of his skin against her cheek. She tried to ignore the little voice deep at the center of her, the one that often wanted to be heard, the one that sounded like a harsher, younger version of herself, trying to remind her of how many mistakes she'd made, how much time she'd wasted, in getting here, this warm bed with this Scottish doctor she'd known for nearly two decades.

I am here now, so quiet, you, she thought, and laughed.

"What is it?" She could hear the smile in his voice, but kept her face pressed against his shoulder.

"I mean it, you know. I want to go all the way, not just the nursing certificate," she started.

"Believe me, Isobel, no one understands your decisiveness the way I do," he replied, and now his hand alit on her hair. "As I've said before, I think this town could handle two Dr. Clarksons just fine."

"As will the Crawleys, I believe," she pondered. It wasn't her family at Downton that was preoccupying her.

"If you were going to scandalize them, I believe you'd have already, don't you?" Now he was laughing.

"Enough of that," she answered. "I…I…actually wasn't thinking about the town or my family, I'm ashamed to say."

"Shame isn't your style."

"No, it's not, you're right," she propped herself on one arm so she could look at him. "Probably to a fault, most likely. I want to do this, for myself, Richard, and because I know I can."

"There's nothing to prove, you know," he answered, and she could see both amusement and warmth in his eyes. "Neither in your desire to do the thing, or in actually doing it, Izzy."

The pet name, very sparingly used, flooded her eyes with unwanted tears. There were many, many things she wanted to say to this man, who had been such a steady friend to her for so long, who was now her husband and her lover, facts that were both startling and fundamental to her.

What came out of her mouth, however, was: "Reg would be so proud of me. Matthew, too, I know, but I keep thinking about Reg, and that's terribly wrong of me."

"Is that what the fuss is about?" His hand, which has been resting in her hair, cupped her cheek. "You do realize, Mrs. Clarkson, I am aware you've been married a time or two before."

She laughed, tears still spilling down her cheeks, and pushed at him. "That's not very gentlemanly, Richard, teasing a lady when she's in tears." She swiped the offending things away.

"Ah, but you forget, I am no gentlemen…nor, my dear, are you any longer a lady," he was chuckling, but then grew serious. "Isobel, I shouldn't tease, I agree. I hope you understand me when I say I am glad for Reginald Crawley's existence in your life, for the son you had together. You deserved a love like that, a marriage like that, a child…"

He drifted off. She thought of Matthew, and she knew he was thinking of Sorcha, his first wife, and the baby that had taken both of their lives whilst being born, all those years ago.

"I don't know if I deserve this, however," she whispered, pressing her fingers against the tickly wires of his mustache. His breath was warm on the palm of her hand. "This chance, these chances."

"Maybe you don't," he answered, and she could feel his lips curling under her hand, his tone teasing. "But I certainly do, after all this time."

And they were both laughing when he pulled her down towards him.