Disclaimer: I do not own Pride & Prejudice, the plot is of my own imaginings, and any characters that are unfamiliar.
21 December, 1811
Elizabeth woke to someone poking her cheek, and then there was laughter, and bouncing. Cracking one eye open, Elizabeth glanced at the figure hovering half over her.
"Kitty," Elizabeth sighed, "what exactly are you doing?"
"Waking you up," Kitty grinned, flopping down on top of Lizzy, forcing the breath out of her.
"And why are you waking me up," Lizzy wheezed, trying to shift Kitty's weight just slightly.
Kitty rolled slightly so Lizzy could sit up, "Come on Lizzy, you have to tell me everything!"
"Everything," Lizzy asked, wiping the sleep from her eyes.
"Yes," Kitty pushed, "everything! Where were you yesterday, did you see a certain someone?"
Elizabeth coughed as her breath got caught in her throat in surprise. "Yesterday," it was a faint question.
"Yes," Kitty sighed in exasperation, "yesterday. You disappeared after luncheon and didn't return for hours! I was beginning to wonder if you had run away!"
"I, I went for a walk," Elizabeth muttered, sitting up further and pulling the blankets closer.
"A walk with whom," Kitty giggled.
"No one," Elizabeth spoke.
"Oh," Kitty pouted. "I would have thought Mr. Darcy would have met you, or come to sweep you away."
Elizabeth swallowed heavily, "And why would Mr. Darcy do such a thing."
"Because he loves you," Kitty groaned, "I know it, can't you tell!"
Elizabeth shifted, sliding out from underneath the covers, "Kitty, that is not funny or clever."
"Lizzy," Kitty growled, "Would you stop being so…so stubborn! Can't you tell Mr. Darcy cares for you?"
"We are friends, Kitty, and nothing more," Lizzy denied.
"You are lying to yourself then," Kitty huffed and headed to the door, "He loves you, Lizzy, I wish you would let him."
Elizabeth was shaken. Now more than ever Elizabeth needed an escape. She was anxious and frazzled, she needed desperately to run, to move, to not be anywhere around people. Frantically, Elizabeth shoved clothing on, she didn't bother matching her socks, or tying back her hair, she honestly couldn't afford to waste time like that.
Plato was still half asleep when Lizzy dodged past him. Lizzy didn't wait for the dog, she was out of the house in record time. She didn't bother stopping for her extra scarf, or her knitting, or a snack, or anything. Elizabeth was just gone.
Darcy sat across from Charles in Netherfield's library. Both men were sipping on port and skimming through business papers, Charles slightly less focused than usual. Darcy on the other hand wasn't actually reading the papers in front of him. He was more absorbed in the real task at hand. Darcy had spent much of his morning plotting and planning, and Darcy was half certain he had come up with the best way to keep Elizabeth by his side, at least, for Christmas.
The problem Darcy faced now, was convincing Charles to believe that the whole thing was his idea, and not Darcy's. "Only a few more days," Darcy mused, flipping the piece of paper he held over.
Charles looked up and smiled, "Isn't it wonderful, all the snow."
"Yes," Darcy agreed, "the snow is very beautiful, however makes the holiday season a little less joyful."
"What can you mean by that," Charles snorted. "Snow is very in the spirit, it is very joyful!"
"There have been no carolers, no Christmas balls, no children playing in the snow," Darcy sighed, "As joyful as the snow is, it has limited the sense of community."
"I hadn't thought about that," Charles scowled. "I suppose that is true."
"Miss Elizabeth was just telling me how she and Miss Jane always looked forward to spending time with other families in the neighborhood."
"Miss Jane never mentioned it," Charles' face fell. "Do you think she is sad about not going to a Christmas ball?"
Darcy ran a hand over his face, covering the slight tick in his cheek. "I do not think the lack of a Christmas ball is really any call for sadness?"
"Well, I suppose not," Charles admitted sheepishly. "But a ball would allow for meeting friends once again."
"Yes," Darcy agreed. "But there will be no balls this Christmas."
"No." Charles suddenly leaped to his feet, "Do you think, maybe this is mad, but, what if we invited the Bennet's for Christmas?"
Darcy smirked, "Do you mean a small get together, Christmas day?"
"No," Charles exclaimed, "Much bigger, better! Two or three days!"
Darcy's brow quirked, convincing Charles to host the Bennet clan was quite a bit easier than he had suspected. "That will take a lot of work, a lot of planning."
"Just think of it though," Charles grinned, "we could have Christmas dinner, and exchange gifts, and be merry together!"
"And Miss Jane," Darcy prompted.
"I could propose," Charles sighed happily, flopping down into his chair.
"Then I suppose you should set to work planning this, and then you must extend the invitation, personally, I should think," Darcy advised.
"Right you are," Charles leaped up once more, "things to do, people to see!"
Darcy rose from his own seat and retreated from the room and the increasingly frantic man. He had things of his own to attend to while Charles made arrangements.
Her teeth clenched, and her breath only came in short sharp pants. Elizabeth was lost in her thoughts as her feet took her exactly where she wanted to go. If Elizabeth had been more aware of her surroundings, perhaps her breathing would have been labored, or if the jolting anger hadn't spurred her on. She had walked nearly four miles when she finally stopped, finally looked up from her thoughts.
"Ridiculous," Elizabeth breathed as she kicked at the mounds of snow. "Entirely ridiculous, that girl…"
Shaking herself, Elizabeth started walking again, this time well aware of exactly where she was walking too. Not so far from Longbourn there was a small outcropping of trees. As a child it had been a veritable forest to Lizzy. Now it was just a small sanctuary, it was well enough out of the way that no one ever thought to look there for her. It was Elizabeth's own personal hideaway from the world.
Setting down on the natural bench made of a tree that had grown right back into the ground, Lizzy wiped away tears that were born of the cold wind. Tipping her head back, Elizabeth stared up at the canopy of her little forest. The sun filtered through the leaves and snowy branches, birds twittered as they swooped between trees, singing joyfully despite the barren snow-filled landscape.
Franticness bled to peace as Elizabeth let her thoughts drift away and her mind became blissfully blank.
Almost as soon as Darcy and Charles entered Longbourn, they were set upon by the lady of the house. Charles was escorted to sit, and Darcy was studiously forgotten in the hall, only he had hoped for such an opportunity and was hardly put off. When the hallway was clear, Darcy stepped forward, not to follow Charles, but to another door, a door he knew quite well to be Mr. Bennet's hideaway.
Steeling himself, Darcy knocked on the half-open door. The older gentleman looked up and frowned.
"Sir," Darcy inhaled, "I was wondering if I may have a moment of your time."
Mr. Bennet's frown deepened, "I suppose you should, close the door."
Darcy didn't speak immediately, he chose instead to pace for a moment before his previously thought out words seemed to come more easily. "Mr. Bennet, it is my greatest desire to marry your daughter."
Mr. Bennet's brow quirked upward, "It may have escaped your notice, Mr. Darcy, but I have five daughters, perhaps you should be a little more specific."
"Elizabeth," Darcy slipped, "Miss Elizabeth, that is."
"My Lizzy," Mr. Bennet frowned once more, laughing in spite of the situation. "it is my Lizzy that you wish to marry?"
"Yes," Darcy responded vehemently.
"And what makes you believe I would allow this," Mr. Bennet scowled.
Darcy faltered, "Nothing."
Silence fell, and Darcy began to pace again, his heart racing frantically in his chest.
The older man's smooth, wry voice interrupted the younger man, "Lizzy is of the opinion that you could not possibly love her. Is she right?"
"No," Darcy spun quickly and spoke even more quickly. "I love your daughter with every fiber of my being. When I look to the future I cannot imagine it without her beside me, and when I think of the past I cannot fathom how I have existed without her for so long."
The impassioned plea, seemed to shock Mr. Bennet, he sighed and sat back in his chair. "She has no money, no real standing in society, and as her mother will tell you she is not the prettiest of the girls."
Darcy stalked forward, "I have money enough, she is gently born, and I have long considered Elizabeth the handsomest woman of my acquaintance."
"And your family, they cannot possibly be accepting of such a woman, as my Lizzy," Mr. Bennet pushed.
"It doesn't matter," Darcy exclaimed. "I love Elizabeth, and I would gladly forsake everything I have, everything I am to spend one day as her husband!"
"I see," Mr. Bennet breathed. "And how do you intend to convince my stubborn Lizzy to marry you?"
Darcy's speech had quickly gone out the window, this however, this he had no answer to, planned or otherwise. "I have no idea."
Mr. Bennet chuckled and rose from his desk, "Lizzy thinks a little too much sometimes, if you want her to marry you, you had better keep her from thinking too hard or she may think herself out of being in love with you."
Darcy froze, his frantic mind stilling. "Are you, do you mean…"
A hand waved dismissively through the air, "You have my blessing, that is not the challenge here."
"Do you mean that Elizabeth loves me," Darcy asked softly, almost afraid of the answer he would get.
Mr. Bennet snorted, "From all that I have heard from Lizzy, I was convinced you were very sharp, perhaps Lizzy is more in love with you than I believed to exaggerate so."
Darcy took a step back. His body on fire, Elizabeth loved him, surely, or as sure as he could be without hearing it from her lips. The sigh of relief was all it took for the tension to drain from Darcy's body.
The door to the library slamming open forced the tension right back into Darcy's spine. Mrs. Bennet rushed in, laughing and sighing and squealing. She completely ignored Mr. Darcy and could only rush over to her husband.
"Oh Mr. Bennet," she sighed, "Mr. Bingley has invited us to stay and celebrate Christmas with him and his family!"
Mr. Bennet sighed, "And I suppose I have no choice in the matter, we are to spend Christmas with the Bingley clan, then?"
"Oh, Mr. Bennet," Mrs. Bennet exclaimed before stomping out of the room.
"Well," Mr. Bennet sighed, "I have a slight suspicion that you have a hand in this, Mr. Darcy."
Darcy coughed lightly before excusing himself from the library not wanting to be the subject of the man's ire, not when he had yet to secure Elizabeth's hand.
Stepping into the sitting room, Darcy searched for Elizabeth. She was conspicuously absent, Plato laying forlornly before the fire. Frowning, Darcy swallowed back his anxiety. Stepping over to Miss Kitty he sat down beside her and pretended to listen to the conversation.
As soon as the conversation became loud enough, Darcy turned to Kitty, "Where is you sister?"
Kitty shrugged, "I don't know, she left early this morning and hasn't come back yet. She's probably off walking."
Darcy blinked, his heart thumping heavily. Darcy had been almost certain that Elizabeth would be at home, especially as she hadn't been resting beneath the oak tree. "Where does your sister walk to?"
"As if you don't know," Kitty snickered.
"The only places I have met her are around Oakham Mount," Darcy admitted.
Kitty frowned, "Well Lizzy has always wandered all around Longbourn, I don't know all of the places she goes."
Nerves had Darcy fidgeting, wanting to race out of Longbourn and find Elizabeth. He knew that she had wandered most of her life, but Darcy worried, worried about Elizabeth being alone out there, in the cold, without even Plato for protection.
"Confront a child, a puppy, and a kitten with a sudden danger; the child will turn instinctively for assistance, the puppy will grovel in abject submission, the kitten will brace its tiny body for a frantic resistance"
-H.H. Munro
A/N: 21/25. For some reason I keep picturing Darcy playing Who Wants to be a Millionaire, desperately using his lifelines just to get to Lizzy. Ah well, life… Love you all, see you tomorrow!