Chapter 1: Forget-Me-Not

Elizabeth stared out into the gardens unseeing, her mind on a thousand other things. She watched the gardeners at work, shaping the flora into a natural-looking oasis of respite. The irony of creating a wild paradise forced a half-smile on her face, and the movement caught her eye in the slight reflection of the window pane. At one time, she might have thought that the reason for her husband's penchant for staring out windows – to see his own reflection.

"And what amuses my wife today?"

Elizabeth turned around quickly to see her husband of five years in the door frame. Her amusement settled into a smile, a familiar smile, one reserved for the only man who could put it on her face. The years had added many aspects to the smile, some only he could read like the sadness that shrouded much of her being lately.

"It's good to see you smile again." Darcy crossed the room to stand before his wife, one hand reaching up to caress her face. Elizabeth leaned into his palm, so intricately familiar with his touch, and closed her eyes for a moment to release a breath she didn't know she was holding.

Darcy leaned down to gently kiss her forehead before pulling her into his embrace.

"It feels good to smile again," Elizabeth admitted into his dark waistcoat before asking, "Is this new?"

Darcy pulled away to look down at what his wife was touching. He caught the shine of the new charm on his pocket watch chain. "Yes."

Elizabeth turned it over in her hand, feeling the gold filigree in the shape of five-pointed flower. "A forget-me-not."

"Yes."

Elizabeth slowly nodded. She touched her fingers to her lips before transferring the kiss to the charm. She tucked the watch deeper into his pocket and smoothed the chain, making sure the charm hung just so. "I don't think that's possible."

"It's not. He will always be part of us, part of our story."

"Yes, she will." Her eyes twinkled up at him.

He lifted his chin slightly with purpose. "There you are, love."

"I wouldn't be anywhere else."

Darcy pulled back slightly, sliding his hands over her arms slowly before taking her hand and guiding her to the nearby sofa. "What got you staring out at the gardens rather than wandering through them?"

Elizabeth reached across him to the nearby table to grab the waiting folded paper. "Jane," she said as she handed him the letter.

He looked at her as if asking for permission. Upon receiving a slight shrug of her shoulders, he read through his sister-in-law's words. The answer to his question easily found in the words expressing her joy over her third child's toddling antics and news of Mary's first child on the way within the first three paragraphs. Reading on, Jane wrote news of Lydia's latest delivery and Kitty's engagement to a widower with two young children.

Baby, baby, baby, baby. Child, child, child, child. Darcy lost count at fourteen mentions of the next generation of Bennets in a single letter. He tried his best to keep the "Darcy mask" in place as he read further into Jane's unintentionally insensitive letter.

Elizabeth noticed the mask fall into place and sighed. "She doesn't mean anything."

"Maybe that's the problem."

"Don't," Elizabeth warned as she took the letter from his hands and folded it up, placing it on the other table.

"Don't?" Darcy asked incredulously. "My wife is hurting because her 'dearest sister' is being cruel."

"She's not being cruel."

Darcy gave her a pointed look. "Cruel can be the result even of the best intentions." He found a spot on the far wall. "I should know better than anyone."

Elizabeth reached to turn his face back toward her. "I'll have none of that now, Fitzwilliam."

He held her eyes for but a moment before she was able to bring him back from memories both would prefer forgotten. He melted into her gaze, his face now leaning into her palm, intricately familiar with his wife's touch.

Elizabeth's thumb slid down slightly to touch his lips, silencing his protests preemptively. "I cannot hold her in judgment and unforgiveness. She is just sharing her life with me as we've always done. Her life is just now filled with an excess of progeny. Had my life taken that direction, I would have…" Elizabeth trailed off as her head slowly fell.

She didn't even realize she was crying until she felt the soft linen on her cheek. Tears came so often these days that she knew more moments with them than without. There were times it felt like there could possibly be no more tears to shed, but there always seemed to be plenty.

"I keep telling myself that it gets easier," Elizabeth said through her shaky exhaling, trying desperately to pull herself together. "We waited so long for just one. I hoped…"

"I know." He really did. Elizabeth knew just how lucky she was to have a partner in her grief. Losing a child is not something anyone plans for, and she was far enough along in her pregnancy to start making plans, sewing clothes, and sharing the news with her family. But for whatever reason, she miscarried her child. Instead of feeling the quickening, she felt pains.

Once it was over, there was no one to tell as they had yet to share their news. No one mourned, no one wrote to console, no one questioned their absence this season. It was just Elizabeth and Fitzwilliam, with some hushed tones and sympathetic looks from their trusted servants. No one is allowed to properly mourn such a loss. You are told to move on, make up for it with the next child, forget the trouble and pain along with the previous hopes and dreams.

It's why Darcy's forget-me-not charm would always mean more than any other piece of jewelry their family could possess, perhaps even more than her wedding ring. It was his promise that their family was remembered, all of its pieces and moments, pain and loss right alongside joy and hope.

"I know."