29 March 1959

All sense of propriety had deserted her, every promise she'd made to herself, to her king - to her priest - vanished from her mind in an instant. The man who stood before her was a king no longer, it seemed to her; he was only Lucien, the same man who had spoken to her so gently, who had danced her round the kitchen, kissed her hand so tenderly, kissed her lips so passionately, his shoulders bowed by grief. It would have taken a heart of stone, to turn aside from him in that moment, and Jean's heart was made of softer stuff. Though she did not allow herself to reach for his hand once more, to smooth his rumpled hair as she so longed to do, to cradle his cheek and brush the line of his beard with the pad of her thumb, still she lingered there with him amidst the golden blooms, a strange, not altogether unpleasant silence falling over them in the wake of his declaration.

I fell in love with the wrong girl, and I lost her.

Before now Jean had thought it no more than a wartime dalliance, the occupation of a man who knew he could not wed without his father's consent and yet thumbed his nose at tradition and took the girl he'd fancied to bed anyway. But oh, now she knew it was so much more than that; he'd married that girl, his girl, and she'd borne him a child, the heir to the throne and Lucien's own flesh and blood lost somewhere in the world. The ravages of grief had shown upon his face, and Jean knew as she looked at him that his heart ached for his child, just as her own would have done had one of her boys been taken from her. Time did not heal a wound of that magnitude; how could it? To lose a child would be to lose one's own self, she thought.

What was she like? Jean wanted to ask. This woman you married, this woman you loved so fiercely? Tell me about her, and I will tell you of my Christopher, and we can both of us drift into the past together.

That was a dangerous road to travel, though. Their lives had charted such very different courses, and the past was full of ghosts; moreso for him than for her, she thought, for he had been held prisoner by the Japanese, and what Jean knew of those horrors she had learned from secondhand accounts, not from lived experience. What has he seen? She wondered as she looked at him. It's no wonder he can't sleep, and drinks enough to keep a ship afloat. Some sorrows could only be drowned in drink or in love, and without the latter it seemed he'd fallen upon the former with a will.

"How old is she now?" Jean asked him, somewhat timidly. She did not want to upset him, but she wanted to know, tried to imagine what a child of Lucien's would like, what sort of person such a child might be.

His smile was soft, and terribly sad. "She'd be twenty-one," he said. "If she's still living."

"Twenty-one?" Jean repeatedly, utterly stunned by the very thought. "My Jack is twenty-one. He will be, come June." And how strange that was, to think her baby boy a man grown; no doubt Lucien felt the same way about his daughter.

"Is he your oldest?"

"No," she answered. "Young Christopher is twenty-three."

"How about that," the king mused, resting his hands on one of the long benches before them, his eyes distant and unseeing. There was no need for him to finish his thought; she had told him once, long before, of how she'd married young, started a family when she was barely twenty. And though he was years older than she, they'd had their children at the same time, had been living on opposite sides of the globe, utterly unaware of one another's existence, their lives so very different and yet they reached that milestone together. Yes, it was a strange thought indeed.

"Where are they now? Your boys."

"Young Christopher is a soldier," Jean answered. Like his father, she thought. "He's in Korea, just now. And Jack is...well. Jack is Jack."

"Is he your troublemaker?"

The king's smile was gentle, almost playful, and Jean's heart ached at the sight of it. She did not want to tell him yes, did not want to tell him exactly what sort of trouble Jack had gotten into, how many sleepless nights she'd spent worrying for him, how at that moment she did not know, not for certain, where he was living, what he was doing. Jack was her greatest regret, she thought, for surely any of his personal failures were hers as well. It had been her responsibility to raise him up to be a good man, a strong man, a man of his word, a man like his father, and yet he remained wild, impulsive, selfish, restless. Every good quality young Christopher possessed was lacking in his younger brother, and Jean could not help but feel as if somewhere along the way she had let him down, somehow. Why else, she wondered, should he be so angry, so convinced that the world was against him, if he had not learned it at her feet?

"Yes," she said softly.

"I suppose there's always one. My parents only had the one child, but I'm I caused them trouble enough."

He straightened then, smoothed his hand over the back of his hair and smiled at her ruefully. What a strange evening it had been; Jean had not thought to meet him here, but he had found her just as he so often did at home, as surely as if they were two magnets drawn together, or perhaps two planets circling one another. He was the sun, she thought, and they were pulled towards one another by forces they could neither understand nor overcome. And the conversation had been strange, but not unwelcome; she had not expected his outpouring of emotion, the truth of him spilled at her feet, had not expected to stand quietly in this place with her king, discussing their children, and yet somehow, here they were.

"Jean," he said then, and it seemed that stranger things were yet in store, for there was a softness, a hesitancy about him that alarmed her, for it seemed as if he were just on the cusp of asking her something he ought to keep to himself. Part of her wished he wouldn't, wished he would hold his tongue and only bid her goodnight, but her heart cried out to him, knowing that whatever he asked of her in this moment her answer would surely be yes.

"Dance with me," he said.

She smiled; she could not have stopped it if she tried. They were alone in the glasshouse, surrounded by flowers, the sky pitch black overhead. She was wearing trousers, purchased especially for this occasion, for the more casual surroundings of the country estate, not some beautiful, flowing gown. And he wore a neat black suit, in place of his usual blue, his tie balled up in his trouser pocket. Now hardly seemed a moment ripe for dancing, and yet he had asked, and she wanted to say yes.

"There's no music," she said, still smiling.

"I can remedy that easily enough." He was so certain in his answer, holding out his hand to her, that she accepted his offer before she had the chance to think better of it. She slipped her hand into his own, and he pulled her close, and then, to her very great surprise, he began to sing.

"When I fall in love, it will be forever," he sang as they swayed softly together, dirt beneath their feet and stars twinkling overhead, "or I'll never fall in love," oh, Nat King Cole he wasn't, but still his voice was rich and warm, and Jean lifted her chin, and joined her voice to his, "in a restless world like this, love is ended before it's begun," and his eyes widened as he heard her sing, and she felt the thrill of pride that always crept up her spine each time someone praised her for her beautiful voice, and his own voice faded, and he held her only humming now as she picked up the familiar tune, "and too many moonlight kisses seem to cool in the warmth of the sun. When I give my heart," he spun her loosely and then drew her back against his chest and the breath almost left her completely, but still she sang, for if she stopped they would have no reason to keep dancing, "it will be completely, or I'll never give my heart. And the moment I can feel that you feel that way too, is when I fall in love with you-"

She had to stop singing, then, because they'd swayed to a stop, and he ducked his head, and brushed a gentle kiss against her lips. It surprised her; she'd closed her eyes as she sang, savoring the words, the swell of the melody, the warmth of him wrapped around her, and had not known what he meant to do until the thing was done. It was just one kiss, soft and sweet, and then he pulled away, smiling at her sheepishly in the dim light.

You shouldn't have done that, she thought, but she did not speak the words; she could not bear to hear them leave her lips, for she was grateful, so grateful, to know that the feelings she carried in her heart were returned, even if there could never be anything more between them. It was enough now, in this moment, to know that he cared for her, here in this place so far from prying eyes, alone and free from the world beyond. Even if it wasn't meant to last, it was a memory she could cling to, and she knew she would, for all the rest of her days.

"We should be getting back," she said instead, reaching out to smooth his jacket fussily. He smiled, but did not protest, only turned, and offered her his arm. She took it, and he led her silently out of the glasshouse.

Matthew was waiting by the door, and if he thought it strange, the picture they presented, he said not a word, only fell into step beside them as they walked along the lantern-lit path through the gardens toward the manor. They parted on the doorstep, Jean to seek her bed, the king to seek his own, and though they did not speak the words of the song echoed between them, the thinnest thread of hope in a world that was set against them.