Elizabeth Samson, youngest daughter of a rigidly strict mother and industriously absent father, had been raised to be meek and accommodating all her life. It couldn't be denied that she had always talked just a bit too much. But something had happened when the young Samson met Audrey Alexandra Kai, Elizabeth had discovered there was a different way to be a young lady. She discovered there might even be an entirely different way to live.
Everything Audrey Kai was, she was bluntly and blatantly - be it bold, or wild, or sad or angry. Everything Audrey felt or thought was undeniable. And suddenly Elizabeth had realized she had been muted, like a winter morning on the coast shrouded in a heavy fog. Elizabeth couldn't be sure if it had been meeting Audrey or her finally coming of age that began her change. But change she did. She found her own boldness. She discovered confidence. She made a decision to live a life of her own.
She didn't so much model her life or alter her personality to mimic Audrey, but she became a student of her friend's comfort in her own skin. And through the study, Elizabeth became an expert in understanding when something had shifted within her friend.
"It's always strange," Elizabeth murmured as the hack swung around a corner, sharply enough to jolt Audrey from her fixated stare out the window.
"What's strange?" Audrey mumbled back politely, even as her eyes drifted back to the dark street. Elizabeth spotted a couple of freckles on Audrey's nose and bite back a remark on taking care not to idle so much in the sun. From experience, she knew it would not be welcomed.
"How it seems you know the newsboys." Elizabeth laughed at the absurdity of the thought. She had noticed the familiarity before, many times, but she also knew that it always seemed as if Audrey knew everyone. Audrey had the gift of fast friendship, her grandmother would call it, effortlessly making any stranger feel at ease.
"We've been part of the Children's Aid Society for months now Elizabeth, I do know some of the newsboys. As do you." Audrey dismissed the idea easily with a bounce of her chin as she sighed heavily and rested her head back. Elizabeth winced as her friend's curls were crushed, again swallowing a remark on keeping up a lady's appearance. The thoughts bubbled so automatically; it was a testament to her manners she caught the remarks before they escaped her.
"Yes, but the two that walked us to the hack…" Elizabeth began.
"Slingshot and Bottle Cap." Audrey provided.
"Yes, we've never seen them before. And you've already learned their names." Elizabeth pressed.
"They introduced themselves when Slingshot caught me before I fell at the bottom of the steps." Audrey smiled, waving her hands impatiently at her feet.
"They did both seem very polite, respectful sorts." Elizabeth mused.
"You know it's not just rich dandies that are polite, heavens sometimes those dandies are the rudest sort." Audrey snorted before settling back to her silent observations outside the window.
Elizabeth followed her friend's gaze, trying to decipher what might be of interest to her. The real strangeness she felt was at how unsettlingly quiet Audrey had become. Not just this evening but since she had attended Grace Vanderbilt's Fete de Roses, since Jacob had set sail for Europe. Audrey had never been the quiet sort, at least never around Elizabeth. The sudden shift was like standing too quickly after working on needlepoint for hours. But even more unsettling was in all their months at the Children's Aid Society, Audrey had never once remained quiet on their return home and that stirred Elizabeth.
Elizabeth had always found it curious the way Audrey seemed to distract the very night air with her boisterous ways after evenings in the school rooms, forever directing their conversation and managing away from the oddities. The strangeness of how comfortable the young Longfellow ward always seemed around the poor boys, or how she always knew just where things might be stored.
After a full city block, Elizabeth took a deep breath. Deciding in a breath to be blunt.
"Do you miss him?" She whispered a tentative shy prodding.
Audrey jumped, so startled by the question Elizabeth worried the other girl would tumble out of her seat. Audrey's brown eyes widen slightly before beginning to blink, slowly but repeatedly as if adjusting to a new light. Then she tilted her head up as if trying to recall something.
"Jacob," Elizabeth held her voice at a whisper. She didn't pretend there might not be others Audrey missed, but Elizabeth wouldn't know their names. Audrey was tightly shrouded in the mysteries of her past, she existed only in the present for Elizabeth Samson.
Audrey let out a long breath of air. Almost a sigh.
"I do not know." She replied a bit helplessly.
Elizabeth nodded into the silence.
Audrey had taken note of the driver before climbing into the hack. The face was unfamiliar but definitely too inattentive to be a bird at least. She had been watching their progress through the city for blocks and knew no one was following them, at least not closely. Like a bird she was comforted in their privacy enough to make her own decision.
Audrey leaned forward, her curls springing back into an enviable state, she clasps onto Elizabeth's hands to pull the other young lady forward as well. Nestling their heads together. A portrait of girlhood friends.
"He proposed." She rushed over the words, eager to finally say them out loud and have another soul know. Her voice was soft, tentative, surprised even.
Elizabeth jerked, trying to pull back but Audrey held her strongly in place.
"Did you…" Elizabeth began.
"No. I refused him."
Elizabeth used her thumbs to rub comforting circles onto the back of Audrey's hands, as mindlessly as Audrey might on baby William's back.
"No one knows. You can't, I shouldn't have…" The words still frantically climbing over each other. The fear was apparent, though towards what was unclear.
"Was he angry?" Elizabeth interrupted.
Audrey shook her head, a tiny laugh escaping her.
"Bit of hurt pride, I suppose, but no. We are still friends, dear Elizabeth, fear not."
The hack shuttered to a stop and Audrey released Elizabeth from her grasp. They had arrived at the Samson home.
"Come inside for tea," Elizabeth begged as the door of the hack opened. Audrey shook her head, having finally spoken the words out loud she suddenly wanted nothing to do with the conversation.
"Please? My sisters and mother had evening engagements; they will not be home." Elizabeth pressed. She caught Audrey's hand again as she stepped out of the carriage.
Before either young lady even understood their own movements, they were both swept inside and seated in the family parlor. The coolness of the basement a welcomed relief from the pressing heat of the summer night.
"Must we have tea? I'd rather have a bit of something cool, a lemonade perhaps? This wretched coat is boiling me alive." Audrey muttered mutinously as she shifted uncomfortably. She itched to remove her boots, to find a glass of whisky, to be anywhere but here. For two weeks she had been the only one who had known, and it had been years since Audrey had been the sole keeper of any secret.
Elizabeth was now being unusually quiet, as one of the maids fluttered in with a pitcher of lemonade and tray of cookies. Elizabeth's eyes followed the maid as she scurried back out, the young lady of the house pulled the door to the hall shut. Audrey found herself curiously trying to remember when Elizabeth had become secretive if the behavior was more for her and less about her friend.
"Did you not love him?" Elizabeth asked without turning around from the closed door.
"I love Jacob for himself, just not for me." Audrey replied truthfully. Unable or unwilling to give her friend the same truth she had given Jacob.
"I thought you must, you had to know he loves you." Elizabeth turned now to settle her accusatory glare. Audrey let the denial die on her lips because she had known.
"You were well matched," Elizabeth murmured walking towards the refreshments. Audrey was watching carefully as her friend mindlessly started pouring out glasses of lemonade. And then Audrey understood.
"Oh, Lizzy." Audrey jumped to her feet. She remembered the day on the shore last summer when she had first met the talkative youngest Samson daughter.
Though Jacob, he seems interesting. Is he?
The words had been in passing, youthful curiosity barely registering to the preoccupied Audrey. But she remembered them now. She remembered how Elizabeth Samson had always seemed unusually shy or quieter around Jacob, subdued. They were friends now, companions against the world with Audrey herself, but the undercurrent was there.
"You have feelings for Jacob?" Audrey clasped her hands over Elizabeth's.
"He loves you. I thought you loved him." Elizabeth shook her head as she replied weakly.
"Jacob loved me like a boy loves a shiny new bauble, for being new and different," Audrey argued.
"You haven't been just a bauble."
"We are great friends," Audrey pressed agreeing and dismissing in one. "I think we might always be, but he knew I didn't love him, like that."
"Is that why he never properly courted you?" Elizabeth wondered.
"I'm not one for properly courting." Audrey laughed.
"Are you not broken-hearted?" Elizabeth searched her friend's face.
"No, no. I was burdened with the secret, worried it was not a secret at all. I do not want him to be harmed by the gossips." Audrey explained.
"And what of you?" Elizabeth frowned.
"I could withstand it, but not if we might not be friends anymore. You should have told me, about Jacob."
"I thought you would be happy."
"Never at your expense, dear one." Audrey pressed her forehead to Elizabeth's.
"You won't tell anyone?" Elizabeth whispered.
"Just as you won't tell anyone." Audrey smiled.
