Hey everyone. I'm back for the second chapter.

First: Thank you all so much for your feedback! I really loved reading each review and getting follower/favourite-alerts. Thank you. =)

Second: A HUGE thank you to batwings79 for offering to beta this story. It's great to have someone look throught the thing before I post it and to have her question my ideas and thoughts. Thanks a lot.

Without futher ado: Have a good read.

Disclaimer: Not my characters. I'm only borrowing them.

It was a lovely day! I had hoped it would be and it turned out to be even lovelier than I could have imagined. Getting married in winter had seemed rather daring to anyone. They were probably right. But I had always wanted to get married in the winter with snow covering the grounds and, as it was this day, the sun shining. Dickie hated the idea.

When I first mentioned it, I saw him scrunch up his forehead and lift one eyebrow, before he collected himself and schooled his face back into a nice smile that didn't quite reach his eyes. "Whatever you want, Isobel.", he said and I felt wonderful knowing that I had finally found someone who not only accepted my ideas, my ways, me … but who also went along with what I wanted to do. So we set the date. Five weeks later, on the second day of the new year we got married.

It was a lovely little ceremony. Well, "little"… It was after all a Lord's wedding. It couldn't be all that little. But we didn't have to invite all the Lords of the House of Lords… only a few. And of course, there were Mary and George, Cora and Robert, Cousin Violet – my family.

During the whole ceremony I smiled. My face felt as though it had frozen. Maybe that was why I wanted to marry in the winter? So my smile wouldn't falter? Before I stepped into the church - unescorted, for who was there to give me away? - I took a deep breath and reminded myself that this was what I wanted.

"I want to get married today.", I said to myself.

Stepping inside, I couldn't see mucht. It was so bright outside, that the church seemed pitch black at first. And just for a small part of a second, I thought I saw him standing at the front, waiting together with the vicar. I wished it was him, but then my eyes adjusted and I saw that it was indeed Dickie, my dear Dickie. I commanded my thoughts to stay in the moment. They strayed nonetheless.

Don't go down that road, Izzie. You're happy. You want to get married today. My smile returned even wider than it had been before and I started my slow walk up to the altar.

The church looked neat and … lovely. Everything was lovely it seems. There were flowers along the pews, lilies, as I had requested. Dickie didn't want lilies. He said they belonged to funerals. "But my darling, I love lilies. They will look lovely." So lilies I got. They did look just as I had imagined. They took the white of the snow into the church. And they contrasted perfectly with the black suits of the men. Just as I had planned.

While I walked, I couldn't stop my eyes from roaming the people. Where was he? I had invited him, had written the invitation myself and even wrote something on the envelope. Could it have not reached him? But that was impossible. I had slipped it under his door. He must have decided not to come. 'Can you blame him?' A voice asked in my head. I probably couldn't. 'Would you have gone to his wedding?' I stopped for a second. His wedding? No! Never! He wouldn't make me attend. He wouldn't marry … would he? I shook my head a little to get rid of the thought.

And when I focused on the front of the church again, my smile slid back into place.

My soon to be husband smiled as well. Not the whole time as I did, but he smiled and most of all, he looked at me so lovingly that I felt tears welling in my eyes. He would never see the same love in my eyes.

When it was time for the vows, I started fidgeting .

"I, Richard Grey, Baron Merton, take thee, Isobel Crawley, to be my wedded Wife, to have and to hold from this day forward, for better for worse, for richer for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish, till death us do part, according to God's holy ordinance; and thereto I plight thee my troth." He looked so relieved when he had finished the sentence and so happy. I nearly forgot I had to say the same.

"I, Isobel Crawley, take thee, Richard - " my throat constricted. 'Clarkson!' A voice screamed in my head. "- take thee, Richard G-Grey, Baron Merton, to be my wedded Husband, to have and to hold from this day forward, for better for worse, for richer for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish, till death us do part, according to God's holy ordinance; and thereto I give thee my troth."

My cadence became faster with every word I said. I just wanted to get it over with all the while ordering the voice in my head to stop saying the doctor's name. I'm not marrying him! I'm not marrying him!

I jumped slightly when someone, my husband, grabbed my hand to slide a ring on it. I didn't register his words. I was his wife now. His wife. And he was my husband. Richard Grey, Baron Merton, my husband. Till death do us part…

The guests slowly left the church when the bells started chiming. My husband and I came last. The sun was still shining as brightly as before. Again my eyes roamed. He hadn't come. He wasn't there. Just when I had decided to give him a good telling off the next day at the hospital, I saw him. He was standing partially behind a tree wrapped in the arms of a woman! A woman! How dare he come to my wedding with another woman!? When they turned a little, I could make out her face. Elsie Hughes, no – Carson. Elsie Carson. She had gotten her fairytale ending. Or so I had thought.

Why was she here, clinging to my – what was he? Your husband? He's standing next to you. Richard Clarkson isn't committed to you in any way. I started hating that voice. Of course he wasn't committed to me. But Elsie Carson was damn well committed to her husband! When they parted, she took him by the arm and led him away. For the shortest moment I saw his face and it looked as though there were tears on his cheek. That couldn't be.

They walked slowly and the longer I watched them, the more obvious it became, that Mrs. Carson wasn't holding his arm only in a friendly manner, but rather that she was steadying him and giving him something to lean on. I wanted to go to them, take over, care for Richard as I had done before, when he had the flu, or when he had hurt his foot during a cricket game. Just as I nearly forgot where I was, when I was ready to go and look after my friend, find out what was wrong, a hand encircled my waist.

"To my beautiful wife!", Dickie said to our guests - his friends, my acquaintances - cheered as my new husband bent down to give me a kiss.

It was a lovely day.

A/N: Please leave me a review if you can find the time. I