Light of Day
A/N: This is really rather short, more of a drabble than a fic. It's something I originally wrote and posted on tumblr, but I thought I'd post it here too, just for fun. Anyway – here we go!
His eyes flutter open in the early hours of that young April morning; slowly, softly surfacing from sleep. The sheets are rumpled and tangled around him; shielding him from the slight chill that penetrates the room. His heart pumps with rapidity as the thought strikes his consciousness – in only a few hours, he is going to marry her. His Mary. The woman he loves with every fibre of his being – she will be his wife.
It is the last night, he reflects, chuckling to himself, that he'll ever sleep at Crawley House; for one chapter in his life has terminated, and another one is only a few tantalising hours from beginning; for from this night on he will share his bed with her – how many times has he imagined cradling her slender body in his arms; how it would feel to fall asleep with her, kiss her awake the next morning …
How long he has waited for this.
His darling Mary … what he wouldn't do for her. His stomach churns unpleasantly as he thinks of their argument only the day before – the possible, even imminent, loss of Downton making his heart ache; but how, how could he profit from a dead girl's death whose broken heart he had caused; to be living in luxury, surrounded by grandeur? The guilt would crush him – how would he live with himself accepting Reggie Swire's money, knowing it had been given to him by a man who trusted him with his daughter's love?
He hushes these thoughts; as sure as he is that he could not accept the Swire inheritance if indeed he is the heir; equally, fiercely strong is his conviction that he and Mary will see this hurdle through together. Nothing else in the world matters to him, except that he will walk through life with her hand in his. He feels eight long years' worth of love and longing surge in his breast; the woman who holds his heart will be his to love and cherish for the rest of his life in only a little while, and he cannot adore her any more than he does at that fleeting instant. God, how deeply, madly he is in love with her - her passion, her strength, her intelligence, her beauty …
To him, she's a woman in a million.
He thinks of their loving, reassuring reconciliation the night before; the way he had walked into her (their) bedroom with eyes sealed shut by his promise to her; his lips curled into an anticipative, shy smile, the sensation of her hands on his chest, her thumb tenderly tracing the contours of his face before finally locating his lips; the feel of her silken lips on his that sealed their love with the promise of their marriage, the rest of his life being spent by her side, having children with her, growing old in her arms …
He glances up at the lightening sky; paling indigo streaked with vermillion fire, painting his wedding morn with the fresh, cold light of day. He had prayed that all the best and brightest that nature had to offer might blossom into being just for this one day; he'd wanted his darling to have the wedding day of her dreams. The pearly dawn is steadily swirling more brightly outside his partly curtained windows, colours blending together as effortlessly as ink and water. The breaking dawn, the promise of a new journey, the start of their adventure together, hand in hand …
He hears the house stirring to life downstairs … dear Molesley must be in quite the fluster, he imagines fondly, preparing his morning suit and tie and making sure every little thing was just right, for the wedding day of Mr Matthew Crawley to Lady Mary Josephine Crawley …
Giddy anticipation pools in his belly, a helpless smile breaking across his face. All at once, he wants her desperately – to see her, to speak to her, to take her in his arms and kiss her – tell her how much he loves her. He wonders what she's doing now – whether she's asleep or awake already, being elegantly clad in silk and lace in the finest wedding dress on earth …
Quite suddenly, he wishes his father were here. He wishes he could show him what a wonderful, wonderful woman he's chosen to spend his life with; wishes he could ask him about things he's unsure of, where marriage is concerned … he has not the slightest doubt that Reginald Crawley would have loved his Mary as a daughter, had he known her … his spirited, brave, beautiful Mary.
He awakens and begins to dress, carefully, his movements almost dreamlike … all he can think of is his love, his heart, only minutes away from Crawley House, who at this very moment must be readying herself for fifty years' worth of being ensconced in his adoring devotion … and oh God, that night she'd be – in her truest, rawest, most vulnerable form with him – and they'd at last be connected on that impossibly, indescribably deep level, in soul and body, his love for her forever sealed in that intimate bond, with her body entwined with his … she was going to fall asleep in his arms that night, propriety no longer constraining them with its stifling restrictions, and he, Matthew, was going to be her husband, and Mary his wife – his best friend, his confidant, his partner, his everything … he was going to love her until the day he died and beyond.
Yes, in increasingly shortening time, she was going to be his wife forever and always …
His Mary.
A/N: Hope you liked it! Please do leave reviews, I look forward to them enormously! :)