Over the next few weeks Charles Bingley became something of a fixture at the apartment. If Jane was home, he was probably there with her. It took five days to convince Lizzie that his smile wasn't a 'just got laid' smile; apparently it was just his face. The roast chicken she made on Monday was the best chicken he'd ever had. The movie he and Jane saw on Wednesday was his new favourite. Thursday had the most beautiful sunset he'd ever seen, and Friday saw a new new favourite movie.
It took ten to convince her that he genuinely just thought the best of everything.
And so when Lizzie came home after a shift at Barnes and Noble to find Jane alone on the couch with Beatrix on her lap and a smudge of pastel on her cheekbone, she was more than a little surprised.
"No Mr. Perfect tonight?" she asked lightly, curling up next to her sister.
Jane hummed the affirmative. "He has a gallery opening this weekend, so he needs to work late. Speaking of, we were invited."
"Ohhh, gallery opening. So we'll need to pretend to be creatures of culture?"
Jane huffed lightly. "You might need to pretend. I went to art school."
Lizzie feigned affront. "Jane Bennett. I think you have been spending all-together too much time with me. You bring a guy home on the first date. You make a joke at someone else's expense. What would Aunt Phil say?"
Aunt Philomena— their mother's sister, who hated being called Aunt Phil— was convinced that Elizabeth was a terrible influence on 'dear, sweet Jane' and had done everything in her very limited power to keep the two separate, even going so far as to offer to send Jane to summer camp sans Lizzie.
"Lizzie, I'm sorry. I wasn't trying to be mean."
"Christ's sake, that wasn't a criticism. There's no need to apologise! I like it when you're snarky."
"Are you sure? I'm always afraid I'll take a joke too far and offend someone."
"Yes I'm sure. I don't think you could offend me if you tried. Anyway, tell me about this gallery opening. Do you know who the artist is?"
Jane nodded, still looking like she didn't quite believe that everything was fine. "You remember my friend Mary from school?"
"Red head, freckles, kind of cute, but looked like she huffed turpentine?"
"Yes. But she didn't huff turpentine. I don't think she did, anyway. But she was the one who set me up with Charlie."
"Well, in that case, we'll have to go."
"When you said he ran an art gallery, I assumed you meant a converted warehouse or garage or something, not this," Elizabeth finished a bit lamely, gesturing up at the imposing brick edifice of Newbury street. She was suddenly twice as glad she had gotten her roots touched up the day before.
"What difference does it make?" Jane asked, pulling Elizabeth in with her.
"Do you know how much real estate costs here? Just renting this place probably costs more than we'll make in our lives combined."
Jane hummed noncommittally, and Elizabeth stopped suddenly, narrowing her eyes.
"Did you get yourself a sugar daddy?"
Jane pulled Elizabeth to the side as a tall woman with an impossibly chic auburn bob glared out of the corner of her eye as she mounted the steps past them into the gallery. "It's really not like that. I didn't know right away and I really do like him. He just happens to have family money. But please don't treat him any differently because of it."
Lizzie laughed and poked her sister in the ribs. "I was only teasing and you know it. Besides, I think I've proven that it takes more than money to turn me into a sycophant."
Jane's shoulders dropped as she let out a relieved breath and followed her sister up the gallery steps.
Charlie spotted them almost as soon as they walked through the door; Jane was always hard to miss. But it was hard for Lizzie not to smile when she saw his face light up at the sight of her sister.
He quickly excused himself from a conversation, and hurried over to them, giving Jane a quick kiss on the cheek. "I'm so glad you guys could make it!" As he spoke, the words seemed to race each other out of his mouth. "You've met Mary, right Lizzie?" He wrapped an arm around Jane's waist and ushered her further into the gallery.
"We've met, but I'm not particularly familiar with her work," Lizzie broadened her steps to catch up with them. "Last I heard she was working with hair."
For half a step, Charlie's grin seemed to falter, but it was back almost before Lizzie noticed it had gone. "She still does work with it on occasion, but we're not showing any of it tonight. It's a little, uhh…" he struggled to find a word.
"Polarising?" Lizzie suggested.
Charlie nodded emphatically. "That's a very, uh… nice, way of putting it."
"Jane!" a new voice called out over the low babble of the gallery, as the artist in question pushed herself into sight. Mary looked the same as Elizabeth remembered. Her frizzed, red hair was maybe a little longer and wilder, but she was wearing the same combat boots as when they'd first met. "How are you doing babe?" she asked, linking arms with Jane familiarly.
"I'm doing well. It's nice to see that you're doing well enough for a gallery show."
"Yeah, I do what I can. You still doing kid's stuff?"
"Yes, I am."
Lizzie could tell from the way Jane's eyes suddenly started flitting between Mary and the floor that she was looking for a change in subject, and so quickly interjected, "I think Charlie was just about to give us a tour of the show."
Charlie nodded emphatically, but Mary just laughed. "I'll show them around. You go do your job and schmooze the saps who are going to buy my shit."
For a second Charlie looked like he was about to protest, but Mary had already begun dragging Jane off. Lizzie shrugged and shot him a crooked grin.
They didn't see much of Charlie after that. Jane and Mary seemed busy chatting with mutual acquaintances, and Lizzie meandered from piece to piece.
It wasn't quite to her taste; it was too aggressive, seemed to be trying to get a reaction for no reason but to get a reaction. She much preferred Jane's dreamy watercolors.
What she did enjoy was hearing other people's reactions. Some old woman said the use of color reminder her of Miró (whoever that was); her companion said it looked like hotel art. Auburn bob liked it.
She glanced around the space looking for Charlie. Jane was deep in conversation about some art thing Lizzie wouldn't have the first clue about contributing to, and she didn't know anyone else. She spotted his mess of gingery hair across the room. She was about the make her way towards him when she noticed the direction he was heading. Or to be more precise, the person he was heading to.
Tall enough to stand out in the crowded space, dark hair cut and styled into something that wasn't trendy, but which accentuated the angles of a face that looked like it had been made by a renaissance sculptor. Christ he was good looking.
Lizzie hurried back to Jane, blessedly finished with her last conversation. "Jane, Jane!" she whispered, swatting her sister's arm. "Don't look, but there's a guy who just came in who looks exactly like Gregory Peck."
Of course, Jane looked. "Charlie's talking to him now. I bet he'd introduce us if we went over there."
"Jane, we can't do that. I'd look needy and desperate."
"Lizzie, you are needy and desperate. You haven't gone on a date in months, and that's including the tinder disaster."
"I know I am. That doesn't mean I want anyone else…" She suddenly cut herself off as auburn bob attached herself to his arm with a wide, white toothed smile that he returned, albeit somewhat less enthusiastically. "Oh, shit. He's already taken."
Jane hummed. "You don't know if he's taken for sure. They might just be friends."
"Honestly Jane, men aren't friends with women like that. I guarantee he is intimately familiar with whatever couture, designer lingerie she's wearing."
Jane wrinkled her nose. "Do couturiers even make lingerie?"
"They must. There's clearly a market."
For all that, Lizzie couldn't quite stop herself from meandering closer, hoping to catch a strain of conversation. And she may have meandered slightly more quickly when she spotted the elegant redhead making her way (sans gentleman) in the direction of the bathrooms.
She felt a small thrill of victory when she caught Charlie's voice over the dull hum of conversation.
"Will, I don't know why you even bother coming to these things. You never like the art and you just stand there glowering at everything that moves."
"You know I've been busy with work. I only came tonight because you said you'd introduce Jane."
Out of the corner of her eye, Elizabeth saw Charlie grab his friend's arm. "She's perfect. I don't know how it's possible for a woman to be that perfect."
Elizabeth felt a flush of secondhand pride. It was nice to know that Charlie recognised it.
Will gave a brusque, noncommittal, 'Hm.'
"She's the tall brunette, the one by that green, vagina-looking painting."
Elizabeth glanced over; it did look like a green vagina.
"Isn't she beautiful?"
"She is," Will said plainly. A statement of fact.
"You know, she has a sister," Charlie said suddenly, and Lizzie's stomach did a sickly little flip flop.
"Charlie," came the tired sounding reply, "I'm really not…"
But his friend carried on with hardly a break.
"She's the blonde over there. I could introduce you if you wanted."
Lizzie risked a glance in their direction; he was looking at her. Two pairs of true blue eyes met for a fraction of a second before his darted away.
"The last thing I need right now is you throwing another bleach blonde at me. And at least the last few were pretty."
She should have been more offended, she thought briefly. But all she could feel was a welling bubble of absurdity. If she'd been anywhere else it would have burst into a laugh, but here Elizabeth satisfied herself with a quirk of an eyebrow and a quick rush of air through her nose. Better to know a man was shit before any feelings were involved, especially if he was friends with her sister's boyfriend. And at least she would have a good story to tell Charlotte over a glass of wine.