I blame my bestie Kristin over at hartnellss on Tumblr for giving me the idea for this story and for being SUPER patient with me on this since it's been months since she first brought it up. This is for her!
I don't own Persuasion or any of Jane Austen's characters, but I love the story and I hope everyone will enjoy this modern re-telling of it as well. Direct quotes from the text are italicized in normal time.
Enjoy!
Chapter One
"Coffee?"
Anne Elliot shrugged as she slung the strap of her bag over her shoulder.
"I think a nap would be better," she replied, stifling a yawn.
Charlotte Russell raised her eyebrows pointedly, although Anne hadn't meant her comment to be negative. She knew her friend had taken an entire day off work to show her around the city where Anne would be spending the next year working towards a Master's in English, but she'd hardly felt sillier than when she watched Charlotte get the two of them lost using a visitors center map and an out-of-date GPS. They'd spent an hour getting turned around before they found campus, another hour wandering about, looking at buildings that were foreign and passing few people who could tell them where they were. Anne would be grateful for the English department orientation on Monday and its included campus tour, although she dreaded the prospect of meeting new people and the mixer the same evening at one of the professor's homes.
"Coffee sounds nice," Anne agreed, following Charlotte into the nearby cafe, a bit surprised to see a line for the front of the counter.
"I'll stand in line and you have a seat," Charlotte suggested.
"You don't have to-" Anne began, but was quickly silenced by another look from her older friend. "Cream and sugar, please."
Her friend nodded and Anne gave her a smile before finding a table by the window. She looked out on the street, thoughtful as she remembered a particularly funny instance earlier that day when some bird droppings had landed on Charlotte's map and she had sworn so loudly that a mother hurried away with her small child.
Charlotte had been a friend of Anne's family for years, her mother's best friend before she died while Anne was in high school, and was practically like a mother to her. With a rather careless father and two sisters who thought more of themselves than anyone else, Anne had relied on Charlotte for everything until she went off to college, full of dreams and on her own for the first time.
Until she met a graduate student named Frederick Wentworth.
Anne's jaw clenched, as it always did when she thought about Fred, so she usually tried not to. Instead she focused on a bed of flowers outside the cafe window, surprised to see so many buds still in bloom with autumn so near. She forced thoughts of him from her mind, attempting to be grateful about the lovely day outside, the sun bright and warm while a gentle breeze whipped the air about.
Better, she thought to herself.
With a sigh, she glanced over to check Charlotte's place in the line. Her friend had moved up a few places, so Anne turned her attention away, meeting the eyes of someone she never thought she would see again.
Her jaw clenched.
A few tables away he sat, his brown eyes fixed on her, the only perceptible emotion on his face mild surprise. And perhaps a bit of confusion.
Anne's pulse sped up despite her immobile state. Her cheeks burned with heat, vision blurring for a moment until she glanced away, unable to hold the gaze of Frederick Wentworth any longer.
Instead, she stared out the window, pretended to be interested by the outside but really seeing nothing before her as her thoughts raced. What was he doing here?
She remembered clearly that day they'd first met. Her first day of chem lab, confusion on her face as they were told to balance equations, something Anne had all but forgotten from her high school career.
"Did you need help?"
Anne nodded, lowering her hand as the graduate assistant sat in the chair beside her and she noticed how cute his smile was as she shoved her paper at him, thoroughly defeated by the equations on the page.
"I'm sure you have better things to do," Anne told him, "but I just can't figure it out."
"It's actually not so bad," he said gently, scrawling the formula on a scratch piece of paper. "See, here, if you add two to this one, you would've had it."
"God, you must think I'm pretty stupid," she said sheepishly, blushing as he smiled at her again.
"Not at all-" he began.
"Anne," she finished for him. "Anne Elliot."
"Fred Wentworth. Well, chemistry isn't for everyone," he said. "At least, not scientifically."
Anne felt herself blush at his gentle teasing.
"Is that a line all the science nerds use to pick up girls?" she questioned, returning his smile.
"Obviously not very effectively," Fred replied.
"Oh, I don't know," Anne told him and he grinned back at her.
"Do you need help with any of the other equations?" he asked, his voice hopeful. Anne couldn't help but feel lighter at his question, as though the dread she had been feeling over this class had been lifted off her.
"If you wouldn't mind," she said slowly. "I'm afraid I'll be rather hopeless with chemistry."
"I wouldn't say that," Fred replied.
"As an English major, I feel thoroughly like a fish out of water. Near death," Anne joked.
"Well, allow me to rescue you," he offered.
Nearby movement caused her to come back to reality, her pulse pounding unsteadily she she looked for its source.
It was only Charlotte, her bag bumping against a chair as she passed it, a coffee mug in each hand. She hadn't noticed Frederick, although Anne wondered if her friend would even remember him. At least his appearance. There's no doubt Charlotte would remember the young man who had proposed to Anne when she was only nineteen after three months of dating. A graduate student with no money, off to medical school in a matter of weeks.
Anne's father, with the support of Charlotte, had forbidden the match almost immediately.
"Anne, you look out of sorts," Charlotte said, taking the empty seat at the table, her back to the place where he sat. Anne tried not to look at him, but his face was just over Charlotte's shoulder. He looked frozen, eyes fixed on his laptop screen, as though he was contemplating whether to move. Or perhaps he didn't even recognize her, was searching the back of his mind to remember.
"Anne?" Charlotte repeated.
At the sound of her name, Frederick's eyes flicked back to hers.
"Fine," she managed, dropping his gaze as she took her coffee. She wished Charlotte would have asked for take away cups so they could leave, although part of her wished she could be brave and say something to him. If only a simple 'hello'. She knew he deserved much more from her than that. Much more from someone who had allowed herself to be persuaded from a decision she should have made herself.
"Are you sure?" Charlotte breached again, but Anne lifted her eyes only as she saw Frederick stand, gather his things and head for the door. He noticed Anne's eyes on him, finally glimpsing Charlotte across from her and his expression darkened.
Anne felt her heart constrict as he looked at her once again, giving only a curt nod before heading out the door, the heavy sound of it closing behind him ringing hollow in Anne's ears.
"Whoever was that?" Charlotte asked. "Who would you know here? For I barely know anyone yet and I've been here for over two months."
Anne hoped her voice would not shake as she spoke.
"That was...Frederick Wentworth."
She could hardly say his name, the final syllable coming out in a whisper.
"Wentworth? Why do I know that name?" Charlotte mused.
"I...knew him at school," Anne managed, the heat rising in her cheeks as Charlotte's memories were cleared very suddenly.
"The boy who-?" she began, but Anne interrupted.
"Yes," she confirmed as tears stung her eyes.
Charlotte sucked in a quick breath before taking Anne's hand.
"Oh, my dear," she said gently. "Are you alright?"
"I-I hardly know," Anne managed shakily.
Her friend was silent for a long while as Anne sat, staring blankly at her coffee.
"Have you any idea what he's doing here?" Charlotte asked finally as Anne's pulse steadied, although she felt tears burn the backs of her eyes.
"None," Anne replied, finding one-word answers to be a struggle after the surprise of seeing Fred.
"You know what I think of him," she began slowly, her eyes trained on Anne for a reaction. "But I hardly know what you think."
Feeling steadier, Anne looked up.
"I know you thought him rather sure of himself," she said, squeezing Charlotte's hand in friendship. "I understand, have always understood, why you disapproved of our engagement. As the closest person I have to a mother, you must know how highly I think of you. How much I value your opinion and always have."
"I do," Charlotte replied gently. "I have not your sentiment for wit. And his showed a kind of insolence you know I dislike. And besides, a poor medical student and a college freshman? Marrying? You would have been giving up your entire future, Anne, for something that could have ended in unhappiness for both of you."
"Please, I don't blame you for persuading me. I understand your concern at the time, and am even partly grateful for it," Anne said carefully.
"But?" Charlotte prompted.
"But I...I now think very differently from what I had been made to think at nineteen," Anne said, her heart thudding anxiously as she looked up at Charlotte.
"What do you think?" Charlotte asked.
Anne took a deep breath before replying, "I think I've never seen a man who was his equal."
Charlotte looked rather surprised, but only asked, "Do you still love him?"
She swallowed, her voice a whisper as she replied.
"I don't know how I could have stopped."
Anne was anxious as she got dressed.
"Don't you need to leave soon?" Charlotte questioned through Anne's bedroom door.
"I'm just getting my shoes," Anne replied, taking a seat on the bed.
She didn't know why she should be so anxious. After all, it was just a dinner party with the English department and its graduate students. Less than twenty people would be there and she'd met everyone the day before at orientation.
But still, there was a tingle of anxiety in her as she thought about spending the evening with other academics. Especially ones she'd only just met. Anne had only recently changed her ambitions from primary school teacher, for she'd had so few hopes that she would be accepted into a program. How surprised she was when she received her letter of admission along with an offer of an assistantship and stipend.
"You look lovely," Charlotte said with a smile once Anne emerged from her room.
Anne gave her friend a grimace. She knew Charlotte was only being kind, that she was no more skilled at applying makeup or styling her hair than she could fly a plane. And her fashion sense was practically zero.
"I don't know if I should go," Anne said, looking down at her plain gray dress and simple shoes. She smoothed her hand over her low ponytail.
"It'll be fine," Charlotte said, herding Anne down the stairs before she could object. She helped Anne into her jacket, as though she had no choice. "I thought you liked some of the other students you met yesterday. What were their names? Louisa and...and what was the other one's name-"
"Henrietta," Anne finished as Charlotte shoved her purse into her hands.
"Such old-fashioned names," her friend said, steering Anne out the front door and over to the car. "Any handsome men in the group?"
Anne's stomach turned over as her mind drifted to Frederick.
"Not really," she said with a shrug as Charlotte peeled away from the curb. "Thanks for the ride, again. I could have taken the bus."
"Nonsense," Charlotte replied, following the navigation on her GPS, which she had thankfully updated after the failed tour incident. "Who's hosting this party anyway?"
"Professor Croft," Anne told her. "She was really nice, but pretty intimidating. She knows a lot."
"You do too and you'll learn even more this year," Charlotte reminded her. "You said her husband works at the university, too?"
"Mm, he's in the biology department." Of course this reminded her of Frederick and, again, Anne pushed thoughts of him away.
"Well, I'm sure you'll have a very nice time," her friend told her, the drive through town going faster than Anne wanted. According to the GPS they would be there in less than a minute. Oh, God.
Before she knew it, the car stopped in front of the Crofts' apartment, a quaint little brownstone with a bright light illuminating the front steps.
"Make friends," Charlotte instructed her. In spite of her dread, Anne laughed. She was grateful for such a caring friend.
"I'll see you at eleven," Anne said as she slipped out of the car. Charlotte gave a small wave and Anne headed for the house.
The car disappeared around the corner and Anne made her way up the front steps and pressed the doorbell without hesitation. She waited for a moment, hearing shuffling on the other side before the door opened suddenly, relaxed classical music drifting out into the open air.
And Fredrick Wentworth stood on the threshold, his dark eyes unblinking as he stared back at her.
Anne felt faint.
Thoughts?