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And the Heart is Brave
Chapter 11
"Rosemary, I don't want to talk about it anymore!" Elizabeth said the words sharply, setting her teacup down with force, regretting her sharp words to her dear friend almost immediately. "I'm sorry," she apologized, as the pair sat on the settee inside her rowhouse. "I didn't mean to..." she trailed off.
"I know," Rosemary said soothingly, patting Elizabeth's hand. "You're just upset. You're upset Nathan didn't tell you he knew Jack. But..."
"But what?"
Rosemary tried to be delicate. "But aren't you being a little stubborn about it?"
"Rosemary!" Elizabeth exclaimed in objection.
"It's just...it's just we've known Nathan for over a year now. He seems like a good man. I'm sure there must be some reason for his not telling you," she tried to gently coax some reasoning into her friend.
"I can't believe you're siding with him!" Elizabeth exclaimed.
"I'm not siding with him! I just don't like seeing you this upset," Rosemary said.
But Elizabeth was upset. She was upset at what seemed like a deception on Nathan's part just when she'd...she'd...Elizabeth hesitated over the thought before finishing it...just when she'd begun to open her heart to him. Just when she'd begun to allow her feelings for him to flower. And then this.
Nathan had made a few attempts since their blowout in the schoolhouse that day, a few attempts to talk to her but she had rebuffed him each time. If he wasn't offering an explanation then she wasn't listening to anything else he had to say either, resisting all his attempts at peacemaking. It was her way or no way, and in that sense she supposed Rosemary was right and she was displaying a streak of stubbornness. But it was entirely based on her own righteousness, that he had no right to withhold something like this from her. But it had become awkward in such a small town to avoid him entirely. Especially since that meant avoiding Allie too, if she was with Nathan.
"Listen, Rosemary, let's change the topic. How are the new designs coming?" she asked her friend, watching Rosemary's face light up as she began to describe the new fashion designs she was working on at the dress shop.
But Elizabeth was only half-listening, her mind elsewhere. Her mind was on a certain frustrating, taciturn, confounding man whose mysterious ways had suddenly turned her world upside-down.