Chapter four: Who can hold a memory?

Wednesday, January 23

Darcy watched Lizzie round the corner, then closed and locked his office door. He leaned back against it for long moments, staring at the envelope in his hand, nervous and speculating what it might contain. Then, sinking down on a nearby couch, he opened it and began to read.

Darcy —

I didn't have good answers for the questions you asked this afternoon. I was upset and nervous and probably didn't make any sense. I'm not sure I'll do any better now, but you deserve a better explanation and apology, so I'm going to try.

First, about your friends. Maybe you've already asked them by now, but I'll tell you just in case. At Netherfield, Bing came in while Jane was filming a video letter for Charlotte, and I posted the footage. He was in few more videos after that and always thought I was filming a letter for Charlotte. Recently, he found me filming at Pemberley and figured out it wasn't really for Charlotte. I don't know if he has found my videos yet.

Fitz found me filming at Collins & Collins and impulsively asked to be in my videos. I made him promise not to watch my earlier videos or tell you about them, and he obviously kept his word.

Neither of them knew what I was doing. Please believe that! You can see for yourself: Bing was in #28, 29, 31, 34, and 79, and Fitz was in #56 and 58. You can watch them if you want. That goes for any of my videos. I am ashamed that you respected my privacy enough to not watch them, when I showed no respect for your privacy.

After writing that, I rewatched my videos, trying to imagine what you would think. They made me cringe. Ranting about you made me feel so freaking clever, and my videos made it easy to insult you as much as I wanted. Actually, it was more than insults. I defamed you, eagerly and repeatedly.

I also posted video of you. That was partly because I couldn't process what had happened and partly for my viewers. They always liked you, no matter how many awful things I said, and I knew they'd never forgive me if I didn't let them see you. I'm not blaming them, though. Marathoning my videos helped me see what I did. I got obsessed with telling my story. I tried to put people in neat little boxes, painting pictures of them that showed only my limited perspective. Telling my story became more important than Bing's privacy or your privacy or any of the other ethical lines I crossed. I didn't care how you would feel about everyone seeing that video, or how you might find out about it. That was incredibly selfish of me.

I just reread this and am ashamed again. Last fall, I rejected you without showing you any consideration or understanding, and you wrote a letter that made me see how I had misjudged you. Now I've hurt you again, but I can't write you a letter like that. I know that apologies after getting caught seem insincere and can't fix anything, but…I am deeply sorry, Darcy. For everything.

Sincerely,

Lizzie Bennet

Darcy's eyes flew over her words at first, eager to take in everything at once. Her defense of his friends he quickly accepted. Bing's easy credulity and Fitz's friendly impulsiveness were too much in character to be doubted. It was his first moment of relief since this nightmare had begun, and he regretted having doubted them at all.

Lizzie did not, he noticed, offer any defense of Caroline.

The rest of the letter he read repeatedly, examining each word, ready at one moment to accept her confessions but sickened by them again in the next moment. The defamation he knew about already. Wickham had described it vividly yesterday, complete with painful quotes. It still boggled his mind that her loathing for him could have carried her so far. And her reason for posting footage of him without his knowledge or consent? She had determined that her viewers should despise him as she did, and when they hesitated to think as she dictated, she seized the opportunity to show him at his arrogant, insulting worst, thus neatly proving her point. That, in any case, was how he interpreted her explanation, and it was intolerable.

Outrageous.

Unjust.

It was "incredibly selfish." Darcy read her words again and softened despite himself.

Lizzie regretted what she had done. She had twice tried to apologize yesterday, but he had cut her off. Now she had written him this letter. Her purpose in writing was, it seemed, to ensure the preservation of his two closest friendships. Nearly half the letter was dedicated to explaining and pleading on behalf of others, but she made no attempt to justify herself. Instead, she wrote with…well, he could not say honesty, because there was much he could not verify, but at least with ruthless transparency.

And with shame. Shame that struck him more forcefully with each reading. He knew well the gnawing helplessness of shame, having suffered it every time he recalled his behavior toward her that day at Collins & Collins. Now it seemed she suffered the same, regarding him. The thought sat ill with him.

Her tone had changed since they spoke yesterday. Then she had been strained and distressed; now she was simply, wretchedly defeated. He could read between the lines of her last paragraph. His letter had, remarkably, improved her opinion and helped her understand him, but she did not expect her letter to do the same. She apologized, but without hope that he would believe or forgive her.

Could he forgive her?

The thought emptied the air from Darcy's lungs. He rose, agitated, and began to pace the floor.

How could he answer such a question? In practice, clearly, he could forgive her. The last twenty-four hours had shown that however justified his anger toward her, he was incapable of sustaining it. He was confident he could conceal his turmoil and treat her with professional goodwill during the remainder of her visit.

But to truly, fully forgive her? That meant more than merely the absence of ill-treatment, more than an impulse, however strong, to know her. True forgiveness would require the unity and commitment of his heart, will, and mind. Could he interact with her without dwelling internally on the record of wrongs she had committed against him? Could he see her as something more than the woman who had deceived him? For that matter, could he be certain that she did not deceive him still, that she was not faking her contrition in order to get his guard down and exploit him further? Thinking such a thing about her made him recoil instinctively, but he would be foolish to ignore such a possibility.

He was still mulling those questions some time later when his phone beeped. It was a reminder of his meeting in ten minutes with the Domino launch team. He looked through the rest of the day's schedule and groaned. It would be hours before he had an opportunity to think of Lizzie without distraction, or to take a desperately needed nap.

Nevertheless, he had responsibilities to fulfill, and he would not shirk them. Darcy shrugged on his suit jacket, folded Lizzie's letter and tucked it into his inner pocket, and faced the day.

%%%

It had been unwise, Darcy came to realize, to keep Lizzie's letter in his suit pocket. He would have thought of her frequently in any case, but the presence of that paper against his chest made it nigh impossible to concentrate on anything else. By mid-morning, he was running behind schedule, and his last meeting finally ended an hour and a half after he had anticipated. After that, thirty minutes in one of Pemberley's napping pods was absolutely necessary to avoid endangering himself and others on the road.

Finally, he was in his car, fighting traffic. Normally, he would use that time to make phone calls or listen to industry-related podcasts, but today his thoughts gravitated to Lizzie and her letter.

He was no nearer a resolution now than he had been earlier. It had all broken upon him so suddenly, so recently, that he was still processing the magnitude of what she had done. In fact, when he had awakened from his nap, he had felt an overwhelming relief at first, thinking it had all been a horrendous dream. Then he had reached for his jacket, and the crackle of paper in its pocket had brought a more profound misery than ever. He had read her letter again as he lay there, and now as he drove, he thought of the offer she had made.

Lizzie had given him permission to watch her videos. It was a completely unexpected gesture, and a meaningful one. Oh, he saw it for what it was. Her letter made it clear that she was driven by guilt and a sense of fairness. He knew very well that she was not intentionally inviting him into her world. Still, though, she would allow him to watch—even appeared to expect him to watch, to the point of imagining his reactions.

That being the case, why did he hesitate? Mere hours ago, he had looked at her playlist with acute curiosity…even yearning. Now that he had permission to watch, however, he could not bring himself to begin.

Was it wise to watch her videos now, when he was still reeling from the knowledge of their very existence? Her words—"I defamed you, eagerly and repeatedly"—were blunt and unsparing. Last fall, he had faced her anger for only a few minutes, but it had upended his world and created wounds that, while ultimately beneficial, had not yet fully healed. What would it do to him to hear her enumerate, in video after video, her reasons for hating him? Could any good possibly come from subjecting himself to such pain?

For that matter, could any good whatsoever come from watching? If he watched, he would do so to learn about and better understand Lizzie, but to what end? He could not know if other nasty surprises awaited him. And even if she had come to like him—and he was very far from thinking that, now—he would not enter into a relationship with a woman he could not trust. Nothing was worth that pain.

And yet…and yet he wanted to watch. It was as simple and illogical as that.

Darcy reached home at last, energy completely spent and irritation rising at his state of indecision. Supper forgotten, he completed the minimum of preparations before collapsing into his bed. He needed sleep. He needed peace.

%%%

Thursday, January 24

Sleep came at last that night; peace did not. There was no disorientation when he woke this time. Consciousness brought with it the same turmoil that had dogged him the day before.

What should he do about Lizzie's letter?

Darcy groaned and rolled over, scrubbing his hands over his face. A glance told him his alarm would not sound for a couple hours. He turned on the lamp, slipped on his glasses, and leaned against the headboard, phone in hand, to peruse her playlist once more.

In the end, it was bleak practicality that decided him. He was already tormented over this, with little prospect of relief. The possibility of incurring more pain hardly mattered at this point. He would watch one or two of her videos and then decide about the others.

"Yeah, I Know." That was the title she had given to the video in which he brought his letter. After Wickham's departure two days ago, Darcy had watched part of that video, enough at the beginning to see that Lizzie was conscious of her audience and enough in the middle to see that she had included the footage of him.

He watched it in full now.

Charlotte came to tease her for missing the signs of his interest. His efforts to seek her out, to dance or discuss her favorite Russian novel with her—Charlotte taxed her with all of them, and Lizzie alternated between downplaying the meaning of his actions and shooting defensive glances at the camera.

"The virtues of reading Russian literature are far outweighed by the fact that he disinherited George. Oh yeah—and he broke up Bing and Jane!"

"You don't even like George anymore."

Darcy's eyebrows flew upward when she didn't contradict Charlotte's assertion. Lizzie had only ever liked George Wickham, and even that had ended before he saw her at Collins & Collins? That was less fearful than any of the possibilities that had haunted him these past months.

"I have a hundred more reasons to dislike Darcy than he has to like me."

"Well, I don't think you have to worry about him liking you much longer after that. You weren't exactly easy on him."

"Yeah…and you heard him list all the reasons he shouldn't be in a relationship with someone like me. It won't take long for those feelings to drive away anything he actually felt for me."

"And if not, you could always tell him to watch the videos." Charlotte tilted her head teasingly, but Lizzie was in no mood for it.

"Are you kidding? He could sue me for some of the stuff I've said about him—not that it's untrue!" Lizzie eyed the camera uncertainly. "He's a really successful businessman. Really successful businessmen sue people a lot, or so I'm told. G-, I am so screwed if he ever finds these!"

"Yeah…too bad we don't know any lawyers."

He entered then, having heard only Charlotte's last words and not suspecting they related to him. Charlotte left them, and he gingerly seated himself beside Lizzie. Then he noticed the camera.

"You're filming again. I apologize—I hope I have not interrupted anything important?"

Lizzie bit her lip, her gaze darting from him to the camera…and stammered out a lie.

Darcy replayed the scene, then pressed pause as she began to speak. His breathing became labored as he took in her expression, which he had missed at the time in his preoccupation with the camera. Now he could see her uneasiness and guilt. They were written all over her face, even as she lied. So was her fear.

That was why she'd lied to him. She feared his revenge. Worse yet, her fear was appallingly reasonable from her perspective. If, as she thought then, he had destroyed her sister's happiness and Wickham's future without cause, why would he hesitate to destroy hers?

Lizzie had believed he would hurt her in retaliation. The thought tore at his heart.

Was she afraid of him now? His eyes slid shut as he recalled her agitation when he confronted her over her videos, how she had flinched away from his anger. His accusations must have been her nightmare come to life. Thank goodness he had given in to his impulse to allow her to stay at Pemberley! The thought of her fleeing from him, fearing his reaction, waiting at home in dread of a career-wrecking lawsuit…

He shook himself. It did not bear imagining. Lizzie had agreed to stay, so she must have realized she had nothing to fear from him. He did wonder that she had come to Pemberley at all, even going so far as to film him again. She must have known that made it more likely he would discover her videos.

Darcy frowned thoughtfully. Clearly, there was much he did not understand about Lizzie Bennet. Which returned him to his earlier question: should he take advantage of her invitation to watch her videos?

This time, there was no indecision or hesitation. Darcy looked through his schedule for the day and promptly sent emails arranging to remotely attend two essential meetings that morning and postponing the rest.

His afternoon and evening were now free. He had eighty more videos to watch.

%%%

Thanks for reading—please do leave a comment! I'd love to hear your thoughts as we transition to the next phase of the story.