Warning: this one's REALLY sad!


"Darling, are you really going to follow me around for the rest of the day?"

Richard rolled his eyes. "I am not following you."

"I have gone from the kitchens to the parlour to the library and back up here again, and you have been everywhere I go," said Diana bluntly. She looked up from the paper she was sketching on, giving him a pointed look. "Is there something on your mind?"

"No," said Richard, rather peevishly. Diana rolled her eyes, but did not speak. She returned to her drawing, and he resisted the urge to snatch it out of her hands. But then, what would be do once he had done that? It was easier to stare at her when she was occupied, and he loved the soft crease between her eyebrows that developed when she was concentrating. He was simply in a terrible mood – the Boxing Day hunt had been cancelled due to poor weather, and while the rest of the men had been only too happy to spend some extra time with their wives, he was trying hard not to take out his bad temper on his own. However, it was proving difficult since she seemed to find her current activity far more interesting than him.

A sharp knock at the door interrupted his sulk, and Diana did not look up from her drawing. Rolling his eyes, he got up from his seat opposite her to open the door. It was Sarah.

"Morning, sir," she curtseyed hastily, scurrying past him in her usual, meek way towards her mistress. Richard frowned when he saw her bend down to whisper something into her ear, and was surprised to see Diana's eyes light up with excitement at her words.

"What is it?" he asked curiously.

"Nothing to worry about," Diana positively beamed as she stood up, putting away her tools and nodding to Sarah, who scampered from the room quickly. As the door shut behind her, Diana followed, stopping only long enough to touch his arm. "Can I trust you not to follow me this time?"

"Why?" asked Richard, his hand closing around her wrist as she made to leave.

Diana looked pointedly at his hold on her, and he let her go with a rather sheepish look. "Because I want it to be a surprise," she confessed, her eyes sparkling.

"What kind of a –"

"Silly, it's a surprise for you! Promise me you won't follow?"

Richard groaned. "Fine. Go."

Diana grinned, kissed his cheek again and darted out of the room. Richard huffed in annoyance, his eyes drifting towards the desk in the corner, where Diana had hastily put her charcoal and paper. She had been working on the same drawing for a few days now, but he had never seen it – she had always stuffed it out of sight when he came near, and he had never thought anything of it because she usually preferred to show him her work when it was complete. Curiosity ignited, however, he turned over a few pages idly. What he saw made him frown in confusion.

At first glance, it looked like a drawing of little Henry, seated outside in Pemberley's gardens. Richard could tell it had started out as a simple sketch of some of the flowers in the courtyard that the ladies frequently had tea in – the plants were decidedly more detailed than the face of the little boy gazing out of the page. Despite the fact that he was inclined to believe it was Henry, something about the picture made Richard frown. The nose was too small and the hair was too curly, shaded to a midnight hue much like Diana's own. Furthermore, the child was too young to be his nephew – the little boy in the drawing barely looked four years old. Diana's skill was extraordinary, however, so he could not understand how she could have made such glaringly obvious mistakes. It could almost be a different child altogether…

But who could it be? Talented as she was, and though he would be the first to admit his wife was incredibly eccentric, he doubted she spent her free time looking at random children to draw, or even daydreaming of them. The features worked together too perfectly – it had to be a real person. Perhaps one of the Herbert children? Richard remembered his mother telling him that the new heir to the earldom had twin sons that Diana had spent some time with. But why draw them? Shrugging, he put the paper back onto her desk, only to see that he had been covering a bit of writing at the corner of the drawing with his hand. It was a single word, and it only served to confuse Richard even more.

James

It was Diana's handwriting – he had seen enough examples to know it was no one else's. James had been her father's name, and he was sure none of Pemberley's staff had children by that name. He could be a tenant, but Diana had not been out to visit the estate-dwellers since they had arrived.

Richard could not understand why it was bothering him so much, this harmless picture of a child. Surely, she was allowed to draw from her imagination as well? Perhaps it was the fact that it was a drawing of a little boy, something that he knew she could never have of her own. They had discussed it once, fleetingly, but had never gone into detail. Diana was heartbroken over her inability to have children, and Richard was heartbroken for her. As for himself…

"Are you snooping?" Diana's amused voice by the door jerked him out of his thoughts, and he dropped the paper back onto the desk. Something told him he would be better off discussing this with her another time, but it was too late. She was already standing next to him, depositing a wrapped package onto the desk and catching him looking at her drawing.

Diana turned red, whether from embarrassment or anger, he could not tell. Richard grimaced. "Do you mind my snooping?"

Her reaction was the opposite of what he expected. "I don't see why you need to snoop," Diana practically snarled, snatching the page off the desk and crumpling it up into a ball. Richard raised his eyebrows. Though he knew it was simply his ill-humour from his inactive day, he could feel his own annoyance grow due to her anger. "Honestly, can you not keep yourself occupied for a few moments without being a pest?"

Richard snorted. "A pest? If that's your idea of an insult, love, you've lost your touch."

Diana's eyes glinted. "I am holding back, I assure you."

"Why? By all means, let loose," he gestured towards himself mockingly. "I am at your service."

Diana glared at him. For a moment, Richard felt remorse – this was his own temper and her annoyance at his behaviour, nothing more. Though, why she would react in such an odd way to his discovery of a picture was simply ridiculous and, as much as he admitted he was led by his wife's whims, he saw no need to facilitate her current one.

"I would rather not waste my time ranting to you about your shortcomings, all of which we are both already aware of," said Diana icily.

"I seem to recall being called perfect by you more often than not," shot back Richard, his own temper getting the best of him at her cold behaviour.

"Then I will be the first to admit I can be wrong," snapped Diana. As she spoke, she grabbed other drawings off the desk, and for the first time Richard noticed how at home she was in his bedroom at Pemberley – her papers were everywhere, easily mixing with his own, as if sharing a space did not bother her in the slightest, even though he knew she had never done so before.

The domesticity soothed his anger, and he sighed quietly. "If you are upset I looked at your drawing, I apologize," he said, his tone weary. It was impossible for him to fight with someone who had as much fire as Diana did – she burned everyone except herself. "I did not think it was such a sensitive subject."

"It isn't," she was still snappish. "It is just a stupid drawing, it means nothing."

Her tone was not angry anymore – it was bitter. Richard frowned, watching as she slammed drawers and shuffled papers that belonged to them both with no particular care for order. Her movements were harsh and erratic, and her face was still crimson. As she slammed the drawer shut, the tremble in her hands became obvious.

"Diana?" Richard touched her back, at a loss as to what had upset her so much. "It really is only a drawing, isn't it?"

She sounded like she was choking when she spoke. "Yes."

"And yet you are shaking," Richard frowned, shifting his hand from her back to her arm. Diana leaned against him heavily, and he felt worry grip his chest at the thought of pushing her too far. "Is this another panic attack?" Diana shook her head, and already the colour was receding from her cheeks. However, she retained her grip on his arm, and would not meet his eyes. "Then tell me what is the matter," he was practically begging, images of her clutching at him at the Christmas Ball flashing through his mind. "You aren't this upset over just a drawing, darling."

Diana let out a dry sob that tore at Richard's heart, and he tried to catch her in his arms, but she resisted. She held a trembling hand up to his chest, gently forcing him to keep his distance as she removed the crumpled pages from the drawer. Richard saw that the drawing he had seen was not the only one of the little boy – there were more, always seemingly added as afterthoughts onto others. He even saw what looked like a sketch of his own face that was half-finished, with a complete drawing of the child in a corner. It was always the little boy's laughing face, with the same features and the same careful details. At the bottom of each sketch, the same name was scrawled: James.

"I never wanted you to see these," Richard had never heard her sound so heartbroken. "I thought if you happened to glance at them you could never tell, but you could, couldn't you?" she looked at him with shining eyes, a single tear already sliding down her cheek. She sniffed, and Richard finally pushed her hand away and took her into his arms, pressing her back against his chest and nuzzling her neck. She closed her eyes and breathed in deeply, her shoulders slumping against him.

"It hurts you to speak of it," though he was still confused, he could not stand to hear the pain in her voice, nor see the defeated look in her eyes. "We do not have to –"

"I'm tired of being sad alone," whispered Diana. "Please?" the fact that she felt like she had to ask, hurt him even more. Wordlessly, he kissed her temple, allowing her to continue speaking. She wiped at her eyes, and with a trembling finger pointed to the largest sketch. "I wanted him to have your eyes," her voice was a quiet murmur, barely a sigh in the stillness of their room. "I don't like mine, they're too cold. Yours are always happy – I used to love dancing with you as a girl, because you seemed like the only man who was genuinely pleased to see me smile. But I know you like my hair," her finger drifted towards the midnight curls of the little boy almost as if she was caressing a living thing, and Richard closed his eyes, letting out a ragged breath when he realized what she meant. "So, I thought he should have my hair. The rest just came naturally. A curly haired little boy with your eyes, named for my father. It was my dream."

"Diana, stop," his voice was hoarse.

"It started out as a joke, you know," he did not know if she had even heard him. Her tone had become absent – her hand dropped from the page, hanging limply by her side. Richard cradled it carefully in his own. "My drawing master always said I had a knack for faces, and I used to treat all my girlfriend to sketches of what their children might look like, provided they could show me the man they wanted to marry. I even made one for Emily, and I am sure Charlotte will look exactly like how I pictured her when she is older. They always asked me why I never made one for myself."

"Why not?" murmured Richard. His heart was aching with every word she spoke, but her voice was growing stronger – she needed to talk, and so he would listen.

"Because there was only man I wanted to marry, and if I was lucky enough to have his children I wanted to be surprised," she turned her head to look at him with a sad smile. "I suppose, if you've ever doubted my love for you, those doubts are gone now?"

"Darling, I never have," he assured her immediately, holding her closer and wishing that the blank look would face from her eyes.

"But I married someone else."

"We do not always marry whom we love, Diana," sighed Richard. "I never doubted how much you loved me. I only wanted you to be happy. I thought you'd be happy without me. You know all this."

"I do," she squeezed his hand, the first movement of affection towards him she'd made since she had started speaking. "But we are happy now, as well."

"Of course, my love."

"But we would have been happier with him," she touched the drawing with their linked hands.

Richard did not speak, merely kissed the side of her head again and closed his eyes. What could he say? A little boy with his wife's hair and his own eyes; upon reflection, what he suspected was his mouth and Diana's nose, perhaps even her laugh and his mischievous smile… it was a beautiful dream, but it was a dream nonetheless.

"It would have been wonderful," he agreed quietly. Diana nodded in agreement. Richard turned her around in his arms, catching her eye. Her eyes were cold and bleak, but behind the pain he knew his wife was still there, and he would be damned if she thought for even a moment his love for her could change. "But you are enough for me. You will always be enough for me, Diana, I promise."

"I believe you. I want nothing more than to be enough," the catch in her voice was difficult to ignore. She cleared her throat. "But I like to draw him. I know we will never have him, since it is not right for one person to get everything they've ever wanted in life," her free hand touched his face, and Richard was surprised when he felt her wipe away the wetness on his cheeks – when had he started to cry? "You are enough for me too," she whispered. "But I wish we had him as well."

Richard closed the distance between their mouths, holding her tight against him. The kiss was hard and passionate, full of love and longing, but not for each other. It was longing for a child they knew they would never have, and love they could give to no one except each other. And for now, that would suffice.

Richard pulled back softly, pressing short, sweet kisses to her wet cheeks and her closed eyelids. Diana's lips twitched at the gesture and she returned it, nibbling his jaw softly and letting out a breathless laugh when he growled playfully at her actions.

It was not until they were laying together in bed a few hours later, Diana's head tucked under his chin as they both looked at her drawing, that Richard spoke the words they both knew he had been thinking. He pressed a kiss to the top of her head. "I wish we had him too."


Is anyone else crying...?

I can't talk about this chapter, it's too emotional. I hope I did their feelings justice.

Some wonderful reviews for the last chapter, thank you all for your kind words and well-wishes for my personal issues: moving is awful, but I think I MIGHT just get the hang of it. Thank you again, wonderful people:

Anglocelt

Gaskellian

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Deanna227

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I will see you soon, let me know how you're feeling. Let's all cry together?

Much love xxx