AN: Thank you all for the lovely reviews :) This took a bit, as I asked my husband to beta it, just in case I managed to mess it up.
The target chapter count is now 19.
####
Any moment now Mrs Reynolds would be calling them for dinner.
Their seventh evening together.
She took another turn and passed under a small vine-covered gate.
The gardens were almost the same as she remembered them. Of course, the last time she had seen them in fall was when she was so depressed she could barely recognise colours. In fact, the girls' first birthday had surprised her a bit, and only with its sudden nearness she had noted she had been steadily isolating herself from anything but the children and her dissertation, down to the point when e-mail became a more frequent mode of communication than speaking for her.
Stop it, Lizzy.
She was much better now. Not good, but way better than she used to be. She had gone through enough therapy to last her a lifetime. Counselling. Yoga. Meditation. Medication. Guided imagery (which was one that she actually found useful later on, too). Breathing techniques. She drew a line at alternative medicine, but had tried everything else she had been able to cram into her already rather full schedule.
####
Mary had been godsend, both taking care of Mina when Elizabeth attended her sessions and finding, through her uni society friends, various options of therapy for Elizabeth to follow.
Finding themselves in a sudden role reversal - with eleven months between them, it had usually been Elizabeth who played the guiding role for Mary - they settled into a new dynamics rather neatly. Elizabeth worked on her dissertation and it was kind of miraculous how it suddenly progressed once she accepted the inevitable and introduced the correct drugs, added a regular routine of mental self-care and agreed to be a subject of some experimental relaxation sessions by Mary's friends. Mary was preparing data for her own thesis, and for that Elizabeth had provided some helpful tools, including an easy to use database of objects Mary was analysing. Mina was reasonably achieving her expected milestones of the second year.
Elizabeth tried very hard not to think about Rose too much. Or about William. Not thinking about William was particularly challenging whenever she was required to discuss her interpersonal relations with her therapist. She tried to isolate thoughts about him and Rose from her everyday life, and despite the nice psychologist's entreaties to the contrary, she managed to keep it so for two months. She had a job to do - the dissertation to finish, all the university formalities to be closed and viva to be prepared for, so she couldn't afford to get sidetracked. Still, the holiday season was stronger than her. She broke down just before Christmas.
She wrote a letter.
Before writing, she had considered several options. After all, there was more than one way to communicate.
Considering how her throat just closed up every time she had to talk about William, she could not really imagine talking to him. On the phone, or, even worse, face to face.
Text message felt much too direct.
E-mail slightly less so, but still, it was something that would produce a nearly instant reaction. Or was supposed to. And the last thing she wanted was an instant reaction. She very much preferred a nice, reasonable delay
Her hands shook as she folded together the printout of the confirmation of the date of her viva and the page hastily scrawled with apologies and a declaration.
If you come, I promise, we will work on this.
He never did.
When she had confessed to the therapist that she had written the letter, the woman had cautiously lauded her for the step. The fact that no answer ever came, and that in four weeks time she was a newly minted MSc and engineer, and no closer to reconciliation... Well, even the most optimistic psychologist couldn't dispute the outcome. He was not willing to reconnect. She could only try to restructure herself around that fact.
So she slipped into a routine of very carefully not thinking about William and Rose, which held firm until the next time Mina did something milestone-worthy, which made Lizzy curl up on her bed and cry herself to sleep.
####
And now, she was here. All four of them back together, almost exactly thirteen years, in a few days. Pure heaven mixed equally with pure hell.
Wednesday had been hell. Hell of indecision. She couldn't think, she couldn't write, she couldn't bloody focus. Only when William came back from the office - and the police station - had she managed to sit down to her computer and work on the code she needed to finish correcting. Before Rose came to fetch her for their agreed walk in the flower garden she had managed to correct and submit all but two points raised by the client. She logged the hours spent in the client's system, checked the total count, multiplied it by the hourly rate and felt a wave of vague discomfort. It summed up to a lot, with the express rate they had accepted, together with the new features they requested and various modifications. She really hoped they wouldn't suddenly decide to reduce the rate for some reason. Yes, she had a contract with them, and a written agreement for the special rate, but she had one just like that the year earlier, and what came out of it? It was a different company, of course, but it wasn't that uncommon a practice, unfortunately.
Damn it, she couldn't afford another dispute. If they decided to retract the promised express rate, she would take what they'd pay. She couldn't responsibly risk not getting paid at all. And with the lack of solution to the issue of storage they had raised she had a feeling they could try to reduce the payment somehow.
But if they did pay as they had promised, she would be able to finally add to her savings. She had to use up part of the money the year before - three months of work with nought to show for it - and was rebuilding it slowly now.
Still, the risk was there, always, with the way she worked. There was only one solution - she had to find a position in a company that would at the same time offer stability and accept the need for flexibility of working hours. It would require polishing up her CV, going through a few courses to re-establish her skills and produce appropriate certificates and, what she hated the most, interviews. This would affect her working time, but she could do this, if she made appropriate preparations. That meant making sure Mina was secure, taken care of and happy. And there was only one way to do that.
#
"Kitten?"
Mina looked up from over her tablet, where she was looking for some Italian vocabulary, so Elizabeth closed the door behind her and crossed the room to sit on the bed.
"Kitten... I need you to now be very, very honest with me."
"What's wrong?"
"Nothing, not... well, except for the whole mess that we've all made" she smirked and Mina joined her. "But we can work it out. And I have an idea, but I need to discuss it with you first."
"Fire away. Because I've been stuck in this bed for the last week and I'm dying for some usable solutions! I..."
"Mina, I've got one. I just need you to consider and, you know. Just tell me what you think."
"Sure. So? What is it?"
"I still need to talk to your father about it, but I think it would be better if you stayed with him and Rose, here."
Mina fiddled with the tablet for a moment.
"And?"
"And I would..." Elizabeth sighed. "I would find a new, smaller place. Something I can afford without depending on your grandparents. And I'd start looking for a normal, regular job."
Her daughter frowned.
"But what about us? When would you visit us?"
"Every weekend even. Wherever I find the job, I can be here Friday evening. And then we can do whatever you two wish for two days."
Mina nodded slowly, but bit her lip.
Uh-oh.
"Mom, am I that much trouble?"
Oh, kitten.
"No, no way" Elizabeth pulled her closer. "No. It's just me. I'm... I'm not as well organised as I should be. I should have done something about our situation earlier, but there never seemed to be time. And now, this week kind of gave me a... not a break. But it's not the same as it used to be, right?"
"No" Mina burrowed into her a bit. "So... it's not my fault?"
"No, darling. Never your fault. Now, I have to discuss this with your father, which will be of course a bit of..." she sighed. "A challenge. But I will. And you know he loves you, right?"
"I suppose so."
"And I love you, ducky. And remember, it's not your fault."
"Mhm."
#
And it was a brilliant solution for several issues at the same time.
One, the girls would stay together, which was the priority anyway.
Two, they needed their father and William more than deserved more time with them.
Three, he was much better qualified to provide for them materially than she was at the moment.
She only had to keep her temperament in check and discuss it with him calmly, without giving in to the pride and stubbornness. Oh, she was no little submissive woman to go and beg the big, strong man to help her. She had to put it in terms of making it right for the girls. Their children's wellbeing was paramount, and Pemberley was the place where they would be much more comfortable than anywhere else.
She swallowed, hard. It would hurt to be parted from them, but she would make do. With Mina in a better school - anything was better than her current one, rather obviously, but Rose's school sounded quite acceptable - and under her father's care, Elizabeth could take a moment and regroup. Rethink. Rebuild. Once she managed to find a stable situation, she could safely reclaim her place in their life. And then, maybe, they could consider something more. Moving to Lambton would be easy as long as she worked freelance, but if she found a job, she would be stuck wherever the job was located, at least at the beginning.
But that would be fine. They would be fine, at some point. It could take a few months, but she could do it, as long as she knew that the girls were fine. And even if the new job kept her in one place for some time, still, she'd have weekends. There was no place in the country from which she couldn't get to Derbyshire in a reasonable time. Manchester was a bit over an hour away, York just under two hours. There were IT centres in York, various companies. London, obviously, would take longer, but was still a viable option. Everything was a viable option as long as she was allowed to visit them.
When she managed to convince the two little horrors to put off watching the end of "The Last Crusade" and could finally lie down in "her" room, it was so late she could barely keep awake long enough to make notes of the most important points to be completed.
#
Thursday was so much easier. Having made the decision, she felt as if a weight was lifted from her shoulders. She found herself overseeing Mina's Italian essay and, in the other room, Rose was going over chemistry exercises, calling for her assistance from time to time.
It was strangely relaxing. Liberating even.
Taking a few passes on her tiptoes, she carefully made a proper pirouette in the middle of the stone corridor. Looking down at her fourth position feet, Elizabeth made a plie and switched to a waltz.
Herrgott, was ist denn heut los?
Herrgott, was hab ich denn blos?
A few more steps of Viennese took her to the window at the end of the corridor and she opened it, letting in a gust of fresh air, smelling faintly of wood smoke and moisture.
Dass heut mein Blut so pulsiert,
dass heut mein Blut so moussiert,
Herrgott, ach Herrgott, was kann das nur sein?
Ach jetzt fällt mir's ein.
One-two-three-one-two-three. To the other end of the corridor. The impulse to let the air in, to cleanse the stuffiness of the ages. To air away the last remnants of Catherine and Anne, too. If she was leaving Mina here, the least she could do was to make sure the house was free of any traces of these two, including even dust. She would ask Mrs Reynolds for contact to some cleaning crew in the area and book them to come and deal with the two closed rooms. But there was time. There was absolutely no hurry.
Mina was much better already - her cough coming only when she overtaxed herself trying to argue with her or Rose over something. The doctor had declared her ready to go back to school on Tuesday or Wednesday the latest and Lizzy tried to suppress the thrill she felt as she imagined Rose's face at the news that they'd be going there together.
#
On Friday, William went to the office rather late. He looked a bit peaky, but when she asked, he just shrugged and waved it away, saying something vague about too much happening in too little time. She could only agree with that sentiment.
She pulled a chair out to the back stairs and sat there, legs on the stone bannister, laptop comfortably perched on a cushion. It took her two hours to close the last two issues, get them tested by the customer's testers, receive final confirmation and a signoff on the invoice.
In full amount.
She was done. It hadn't been the most irritating project, barring the idiocy of the storage problem - which she just couldn't solve, however much she turned it around in her head. She smiled at the memory of William serving as her rubber duck. It hadn't been the first time, but his volunteering for the role meant a lot for her. The fact that he remembered the idea at all felt heartening.
####
"Will, I need to talk something through with you" she looked up from her screen to find him watching her in slight surprise.
"You do remember I have an MBA and not an engineering degree?" he folded his newspaper slowly.
"That's the idea" she shrugged. "I have a problem that I need to take apart. I need to reduce it to points that will be so simple that everyone could understand them."
"No matter how dense" he quipped, making her snort into her cup, just a bit.
"Yeah, no matter how dense, Colonel. Do you have fifteen minutes to play rubber ducky?"
"Is this some kind of weird insult, or do you actually need my help with... a bathroom accessory?"
"I need to talk to you for a moment as if you didn't understand at all what I'm doing."
"That should be easy. I usually don't get most of what you're doing on that black monster."
"OK. Now. Imagine you're a big, yellow duck..."
"Elizabeth" he growled and she felt a small flush of warmth somewhere inside.
"Fine, fine. The idea is that if I talk about a problem step by step, making it simple enough for a rubber duck to understand, I will at some point spot the problem. I always feel weird talking to inanimate objects, so I need to voice a few points and I need your confirmation that you follow and understand my reasoning..."
####
"Elizabeth? Aren't you getting chilled out here?"
She blinked and looked down at her hibernated laptop - luckily quite secure for the time being, but it was a good thing she was awoken.
"No, Mrs Reynolds, but thank you. I'm quite fine."
She picked up her things anyway. The job was done, she deserved an early break, after the week of express work and last minute corrections. She would be notified the moment the money transfer was on her account, but for the time being it seemed like there should be no obstacles to her getting the full sum.
"I've just made some tea" the older woman called her as Elizabeth dragged the chair back to the dining room. "If you have a moment, darling, come to the kitchen. I need your advice on something."
"Just let me put the laptop away safely" she placed it on the sideboard and followed the housekeeper down to her domain.
The main table was covered with what seemed to be at least two layers of interior design magazines, catalogues and colour samples.
"What is this all about, Mrs Reynolds?"
"You see, darling, William tells me nothing" the older woman started slowly. "But he has some plans. He's been asking questions about the kitchens and finally he brought all... this. And I'm not sure what to choose!"
Elizabeth rounded the table, looking at the amassed reading material.
"And what did he ask you to choose? Colours? Specific items?"
"'Anything you would need in your kitchen' he said. It seems much too general for me, so..." the older woman shrugged and gestured towards the table. "This."
Elizabeth picked up one of the magazines and flipped through it.
"We could bring some semblance of order to this" she said. "Let's divide them. One heap, only kitchen magazines. Second heap, kitchen catalogues. Third heap, general magazines and the fourth, general catalogues. This way we'll have different categories to work with."
They slowly divided the glossies into types and stacked them neatly on a side table.
"Now, William asked what you want in the kitchen? Not what do you want it to look like?"
"That, too. But first what I want."
"Ah. So, first, you can make a list, without looking at the magazines. You want a range, an oven, a vent...?"
Mrs Reynolds smiled and pulled a thick pad of paper from a drawer.
"You were always a smart one, Elizabeth. I knew you could help me with this. Will just... left these and almost ran away, I don't know what this boy is about these days."
They made a list of things that already were in the Pemberley kitchen, making notes on every item that they could think could be replaced or improved. They drank the tea, brought a lunch up to the girls (Mina: English essay, Rose: French vocabulary) and continued with the list.
"Maybe a bigger fridge?" Elizabeth prodded the catalogue towards the housekeeper. "May be useful before bigger events."
"Well, the biggest 'event' in this decade is the two of you coming back home" Mrs Reynolds remarked sourly. "Not like I have a lot of occasions to show off my skills, apart from a birthday cake now and then. Not even a proper Christmas - not that I'd ever wanted to celebrate with these two. You know what I mean."
Elizabeth's stomach felt suddenly heavy and cold.
Back home.
"Ah, Mrs R" she said softly. "I'm not staying. I... I came because the girls switched, and I have to go back to London. I do all of my work remotely, but sometimes - I have a meeting on Monday I have to attend personally" she stumbled on her on words, trying to justify something that didn't really need justification.
The housekeeper's face fell.
"If you think it's the best..." she paused. "Well, I remember how it'd been, before. But William changed. A lot. It was... incredible to watch it, you know."
"It had been bad" Elizabeth confirmed, not looking up from the magazine she was holding. "And I see he changed. I just... I can't just..."
"I know, lassie, I know. And the house is still the same awful pile of stone and mortar it used to be, and it's still as ancient - or, rather, a decade older than it was!"
"Maybe William wants to do something about it? Updating the kitchens won't affect the status of the house too much - they were done just after the war anyway, so no historical society will try to intervene if he wants to make it more... modern" she gestured to the fifties-style fridge that looked, frankly, as if it should have a label "lead-lined" attached somewhere.
"Well, fixing up my kitchen won't make the whole house easier to manage. It's still a pain to heat and clean. Everything is too high, too leaky or too old to be scrubbed properly . At least I don't have to do the cleaning itself - Will hires a group of youngsters from the area to do that."
"Hmm?" she opened a catalogue and left only half of her attention to Mrs Reynolds.
"He had hired a team of students... oh, I don't know. When Rosie was three, maybe? Whole summer, they went through the house, cellar to attic - boxing everything, cleaning, securing, archiving. Then during the school year he got them to come back every first weekend of the month to do a thorough cleaning, windows and all. The kids organise in a kind of group and they even set up an actual company that runs this kind of service, all proper and legal. They don't touch the really antique stuff downstairs, this is done by a specialist, but upstairs and the halls and so on, yes. And they help the estate crew during summer and in early fall, fruit collection and so on. Two years ago we got so many apples William actually paid them for additional two weekends and they sat and peeled the whole crop. We still have jars of apple pie stuffing in the storage, we made so much. I gave them a lot, too. Students are always hungry and homemade food is in demand" she winked at Elizabeth.
"I remember. We were always better off, with Jane - we can both cook and we had a kitchen, unlike these poor souls who lived in dorms. Sometimes I wondered how they survive on instant noodles and fastfood."
"Well, that's why I gave them part of whatever we made. Cherries, blackberries, bilberries. Pears, plums, even walnuts. We made wonderful pickled walnuts that year. And the locals had honey, so we also made some jars of nuts in honey, too. Well, anyway, William has been hiring the same group ever since - the kids change, of course, because it's only students, so once they graduate, they go and find a real proper job - but he says he'd rather support students who get honestly paid than some big cleaning company that takes most of the money and leaves people with just pennies. And he pays way more than waitressing jobs, and much more steadily. They get a set hourly rate at the beginning of summer and then only count hours in and out. Some are even sleeping in the free rooms in the admin building, if they say they want to start earlier or can't drive here."
Elizabeth nodded, hiding a smile.
"Very... socially conscious of him."
"That it is, that it is. I suppose this weekend the team would be able to deal with the... leftovers."
"I was actually planning to ask you just that. I'm not very keen on touching anything they might have left behind, and I'm guessing neither is William. I know -" she breathed deeply "I'm not staying. But that doesn't mean I'm not coming back, and if there is one thing I can do - after William had so kindly removed them from the house - is to make sure their presence is properly erased from these rooms, once and for all."
"They will be here early in the morning. I wake up at six anyway, so I can get them started on the fruit collection, as it's better to do this as long as there is good light, and then they can start inside the house."
"Do you have enough boxes? Or should we call them to bring some?"
"Ah! Lassie, you are the smart one. Not sure what they left, but I'll take a peek and call the nice woman who manages the bookings and ask her to make sure they have the boxes."
Elizabeth nodded and flipped another catalogue open.
"Oooh" she sighed. "That looks sleek."
"Elizabeth! This is not a sound appropriate for kitch... Oh."
"Wow."
"Don't be juvenile, lassie."
"Oh, Mrs R, it is definitively a 'wow'. Look at this."
"Too red. And... It looks somewhat improper."
"OK, there is a version in... No, black doesn't help much."
"I'd have to cook with me poor eyes closed!"
"Silver?"
"Silver... much better. Buy why don't people just stick with good old white?"
"Some people like fun, Mrs R. So, should we put it on the list?"
"Just make sure it's silver or white, or I will die of embarrassment."
Elizabeth added the sleek, handy little hand blender to the list and smiled at the housekeeper, who was looking at her with a mixture of exasperation and sorrow.
"I missed you, lassie. They missed you, too. He was absolute rubbish when you left."
She sighed.
"Mrs Reynolds -"
"I don't mean you were wrong to do it. Well, it wasn't good, but I was here, and that boy escaped a well-tanned hiney only because he had been balancing the company and these two... well. At the same time. But he did neglect you rather awfully, and there was no excusing that."
"You helped" Elizabeth said shortly.
"Well, but he was the one who should have been helping! He definitely got a crash course in being a father in the weeks after you left, I can tell you that. I'd never seen him that shaken before. Well, little Rosie kicked up a fuss when he didn't put the jacket on her correctly or tried to convince her to eat something but oatmeal for breakfast... Oh, Lord, lassie, don't cry! I didn't mean to... oh, Elizabeth, I'm so sorry..."
#
She couldn't just leave them like this.
She had to. It would be better for all of them.
William would have both girls.
Girls would have each other.
She would have a chance to fix her situation.
She had to go inside and have dinner with the others.
She considered the red blouse still waiting in her suitcase. Because why not. Once she had finally embraced something more advanced in the colour palette than simple creams, it had still taken her a long time to open herself to vividness.
She could do vivid now. Orange red was vivid.
Not that it helped her all that much. Playing with colours can't really make it better if inside one is feeling grey.
####
He sat up.
Very stereotypically, he was drenched in sweat.
There was a fleeting thought there that thankfully he had been sleeping under a thin fleece blanket instead of his duvet - because it was Elizabeth who was using it. He knew as much because he had moved it himself from the cot in the, well, what he now labelled "girls' room". It gave him a certain level of satisfaction, knowing that she was safely, warmly ensconced in it, just down the corridor. She needed it more than he did, anyway, with her petite built and permanent overusage of stored energy.
Now, there was no other way to look at that mess.
He pressed the heel of his hand to his heart, trying to make it slow down.
One. The girls should not be separated again.
Two. They needed Elizabeth's presence, and quite obviously Elizabeth needed them.
Three. He had more than sufficient resources to ensure their comfort.
He sighed. Progress to point the fourth was much more of a challenge. How to ensure Elizabeth's and girls' comfort without it seeming like she owed him now, instead of her parents.
He rubbed his eyes, trying to wake up.
One thing was certain. Whatever the outcome of the whole mess, Mina and Lizzy would not be staying in that flat any longer than necessary. He would phrase it as the long overdue child support or, basically, whatever else he could think of. And Mina wouldn't be going back to that institution that called itself a school. He would ask Jane and Charles for help if needed. Georgiana would definitely be supportive, if not with finding better explanations for the money, then with convincing Lizzy to take it. He was ready to rope in Kitty Bennet (or whatever she called herself now) - there was no love lost between them two, but she had always seemed like a very down to earth person and she did care for Elizabeth. After all, she had cornered him during the wedding and interrogated him about his plans regarding Elizabeth. She had been rather frightening as a barely eighteen, acting on her fresh status as an adult and threatening a man she thought undeserving of her sister.
Maybe if he presented it is as his contribution to Mina's wellbeing, she should take it. If he didn't overdo it and make her feel it was him pointing out she is unable to provide for Mina properly.
Maybe if Rose... he paused here, thoughtfully. Yes, Rose.
He shied away from the idea of point the fifth - making sure they all stay.
Elizabeth was an independent professional. The "independent" part was a very strong factor. She would not accept handouts. She would also not take well to anyone trying to control her decisions. Manipulation was out of question - even if he had an idea how - and even considering it made him feel dirty.
They could try talking plainly and honestly, probably. If they ever managed to be in the same room and able to speak without saying complete rubbish. He cringed a bit as he recalled the way he had told her about his twisted knee.
But she did seem to be engaged and empathic. She seemed interested. In a totally random - and not very important - fact from his life. Well, maybe it was only due to its relation to Rose's illness.
He wanted to know as much as possible about her life, and Charles' stories were definitely not enough to satisfy his curiosity, especially considering that there was exactly one - no, two - persons who could tell him in detail, fully and truly, what was the everyday life of Elizabeth Bennet, except for the woman herself. Because she would definitely never do so of her own volition and he would not be one to pressure her into anything.
That was why, having taken a quick shower and after informing the office he'd be in "at an unspecified time, unless there's something major happening" he went in search of Rose.
When he checked the girls' room, Mina was measuring out the cough syrup with a tortured expression of someone who can't even think about artificial strawberry flavour anymore and she shrugged when he asked about her sister.
"...but I'm guessing the stables" she said and swallowed a spoonful. "Buergh. Because she said something about hay."
He hugged her, handed her the book that had fallen to the floor and smiled, all silently.
If he didn't work it out with Elizabeth, this was the girl he would be losing any day now. The little mirror image of Rose, but with all the fascinating tiny differences. A little more combative. A bit less elegant. At the same time, definitely more into dresses and less into getting dirty.
Now that he had both of them at home at the same time, he started noticing the differences that were not that obvious when it was just Mina playing Rose. He could sit for hours, thinking about these details and how they came to be.
He needed more time with them. All of them.
#
Rose was, in fact, in the stables. Sitting in the hay loft, looking outside at the long green expanse of the paddock.
"Hi, imp" he dropped on a small mound of dry grasses next to her.
"Dad."
"I'm going to ask you something and I don't want to beat around the bush or... whatever. I need you to answer me as completely as you can. If you think you can't tell me something, you know you just need to say that."
"Sure" Rose nodded, looking at him with a frown.
"You... Mina told you about the letters?"
His older daughter bit her lip and looked away.
"Aunt Catherine stole them and burnt them" she said tersely. "Because she didn't want Mom and you to talk."
"Yes. But... But there was more."
"Gifts" she sighed. "Mom made things for me. You sent things for Mina."
"Exactly. Now, Rose, the crucial question" he pulled her into his side, hugging her closer. "How important are the handmade things to your Mom?"
He saw her glance at him in surprise.
"Dad?"
"I need to know how... how much time she spends on preparing them. On sewing, knitting and so on. How... How invested she is in making them."
Rose sat back, leaning on the wall.
"Dad, it's like her second job" she said slowly. "I mean, she spends hours plotting patterns and draws special plans on her computer to help her do it properly. Half of her room is storage space for boxes and boxes of... things."
"So, pretty important, yes?"
"'Pretty important' would be correct" she shook her head. "I mean, if aunt Catherine had burnt something that Mom did, she must be, like, crushed. She spends hours and hours on preparing things. I only saw her plan a quilt for a Christmas competition and we've spent an entire afternoon just sorting the pieces and then she plotted that beautiful poinsettia on her computer and made it into a pattern for that huge quilt. And she planned to make another, with a snowflake..." Rose paused and covered her lips with her hand. "So the snowflake was supposed to be for me?"
Pure wonder in Rose's voice almost made him weep.
"If she was making two similar things and one would have ended up with Mina, the second was probably for you, yes."
"Mina said that Mom was making two of everything, so..." Rose's eyes watered. "And Mina's room is full of stuff Mom made. If she had sent a pair to each here, and aunt Catherine had stolen them, it's like weeks, or, or months of work lost!"
He had suspected as much.
"So... And now I'm asking you to speculate, Rose, so I know this is a bit..."
The eyeroll was all Elizabeth.
"Dad, just get on with this."
"Well. What would you say if someone told you that Mom's handmade is stupid and useless?"
Yeah. That was what Rose looked like when she was honestly angry, yes. A rare thing, reserved for kids who hurt horses, aunt Catherine and now, apparently, whoever had disparaged Elizabeth.
"I'd say that they were listening too much to grandpa Bennet" she mumbled. "He says crap like this all the time."
"Rose."
"Well, he does! And it is crap! He always says things like this about whatever Mom does that isn't her work. Actually, her work is stupid, too, because she works freelance and not at a university."
"So, Elizabeth's father says that her crafts are useless, yes?"
"Stupid, useless, pointless, waste of time, why don't you buy that in a shop like a normal person, I've seen similar in Tesco, why would anyone even look at it... All of that and more. And it's not like I've been spending a lot of time with him, too. And Mom wins prizes for her things, and he is all the time like, like a grumpy old troll. If she isn't working on her PhD, it's stupid. Including Mina."
He took a deep breath.
"What do you mean?"
"I overheard him" she looked away, reddening. "He said that Mom had wasted her life on being a mother when she could have been something one day. Unless Mina becomes someone important in the field, like, like an astronaut or something."
Well, that was rather...
"And he said she should have focused on her doctoral thesis instead of wasting time working for corporations that can't recognise how brilliant she is. But then he added something like 'before she uses up all her brain crocheting' or, I don't know, something like this."
"Ah" he chewed on the inside of his cheek for a moment. "You don't like him?"
She shrugged.
"Didn't really have much to do with him. I think he doesn't really like Mina all that much. I mean, he doesn't like Mom having Mina. He is disappointed that Mina doesn't have the best grades in everything and that Mom isn't pressing her to do some weird engineering degree."
He sank slowly backwards, looking up at the loft roof. Very, very carefully he set that point aside. It wouldn't do to curse in front of his teen, now would it? Especially if he wanted to say things about said teen's only grandfather?
That sounds like something to be discussed with Lizzy.
"And he speaks like this about your Mom's... everything?"
"As much as he said anything ever, sure. Never heard him say anything positive."
"Mhm. And others? I mean, I suppose aunt Jane likes the things your mother makes?"
"Not sure, but it looked like it. Mina would know better. Aunt Janey definitely likes Mom's baking, that much I know. And it's, like, the same category, right?"
He had seen Jane wearing a jumper and a knit hat that had the distinct feel of "not factory made". And Charles, whose long fingers didn't fit most ready-made gloves, had been wearing a pair of woollen, striped ones at some point, and they... well, he was apparently looking for things, because when had he noticed another guy's gloves the last time?
"And others? Kitty, Mary?"
"No clue. Never mentioned it."
"Grandma?"
Rose rolled her eyes.
"Grandma loves it. Especially when Mom makes something for her. She calls it pretty and sweet. And she has a lot of Mom's stuff in the dining room, now that I think about it. On the sofa, there was this crocheted throw that looked a bit like what Mom made for Mina, a big striped star. And" she frowned "and grandma asked Mom to make the chair cushions. And there were all these pillows and the big doughnut pillow..."
"So, grandma Bennet likes Mom's handmade and grandpa Bennet..."
"Hates it. Yeah."
"But it's not like he would destroy something?"
"Nah, he more like comments on it, every chance he gets. Even when Mom brought some crochet she was doing to a dinner and, you know, basically she couldn't be, like, workingthere, right? He still said stuff like this."
He nodded slowly.
"So if I told you it was Mom that said that her handmade is silly and useless?"
Rose groaned.
"She listens to grandpa Bennet way too much. She made all these things - for Mina and for me, right? - and Mina's room looks like a little craft fair stand. She has suncatchers in her window and the rugs, and blankets and Mom even made her marker pouches and hanging pockets and... You know. Stuff. A lot."
He nodded silently.
Elizabeth spent time on all of that. And now she says she doesn't care that it got destroyed? I didn't make the things I've sent and I'm still pretty annoyed about them...
"And it's not useless. It's like... like having someone say over and over that they care, you know? I was jealous..." she paused and he saw blush creeping up her face. "I mean when I saw all of them. She spent, like, hours on that. She even pays to rent a machine in the special shop that allows her to sew the big quilts so she doesn't have to do it on the normal small machine. And she spends hours picking the right fabric and putting the colours together. She says it's relaxing, but she is, like, very very focused on this."
"But is anyone..." he thought about it for a moment. "I mean. Did anyone say, well. That it's nice? Useful?"
"Grandma" Rose reminded him. "Well, and Mina. Mina can talk about this for hours. Mom taught her how to do a lot of this stuff, and she tried to teach me, during the camp, but we didn't have enough time..."
And Elizabeth always tended to listen more to her father than her mother. Which, usually, was the more sensible approach.
"And you...?" he prompted her.
She grimaced.
"When I was playing Mina, I couldn't really, because, you know, she wouldn't be saying every day that she loves that quilt that Mom made, like, three years ago, right? That would seem silly. And then when I told her that's it was me, we really didn't have enough time, and anyway, it would have sounded like I'm jealous of Mina for having all that stuff!"
"But you do like it, right? I mean, if, well, if these packages got to us... and I told you..." he trailed off. "Well, blast it. What could I have told you about a crocheted blanket?"
She rolled her eyes.
"Considering Mom put messages inside, you could probably have contacted her at that point like a normal grownup? Because, Dad, really. You two? Letters?"
"Hey, don't diss your parents, little one" he punched her shoulder. "I've talked about it with her, anyway. Seems..." he shrugged. "Well, we don't do talking very well, either of us. Apparently, both of us are better at writing, which is an effective way of communicating - as long as the message gets through."
Rose made a derisive sound but didn't comment.
He picked out a longer blade of grass and started pulling it apart slowly.
"Dad, what is wrong?"
His daughter, his older daughter was looking at him, all tense and anxious.
"Except for 'our lives'?" he quipped, a bit bitterly. "No, sorry, Rosie, that was unfair. But a bit true, too. I mean, we need to work this out, don't we?"
She nodded and picked a blade for herself.
"Mom has to transfer Mina to some other school" she said sternly. "Because the current one is awful. And they have to have a new place because that flat is owned by her parents and she feels like she owes them for it."
"I feel a 'but' coming" he provided when she paused.
"But she can't afford it. I mean, the flat. She kind of told me - when she thought I was Mina - that she's afraid to move because sometimes she isn't sure she can pay for the month if something happens with the clients. And that something happened in February last year - and Mina told me what - and if it was someone else but grandfather, they could have lost the flat."
"That was the company that refused to pay her in full?" he ventured a guess, but there were already gears spinning in his mind, calculating the best approach, the proper way of framing it...
"Yes, they said that if she doesn't like the rates they pay women, she can wait until the court case."
"She won that one, from what Charles said" he said absently.
"Yeah, but that meant she will only get money, like, now. And not back last year, when she needed it."
He nodded slowly.
"Do you think... Do you imagine your Mom would accept..."
She shook her head.
"No way. I mean, no way. When she explained about the flat, she was angry enough. And it's like... like they are holding this over her head, just a bit. I don't see her accepting much from anyone else."
When did you grow up that much, imp?
"I wonder... Dad, did we really mess her life up so much? I mean, she is... so stretched. What... what was she like, you know, before?"
You are growing up, definitely.
"Not that different, actually. I mean, I almost didn't notice her at first, I'm sorry to say. But when I did, I couldn't understand her, or myself."
####
There was a girl sitting in the corner of Charles' newest angel's tiny kitchen. In long, oatmeal-coloured jumper, beige denims and grey woollen socks. And pink glittery clips all over her messy hair. She looked up at him, nodded and went back to scowling at the screen of her rather shiny black laptop. As he looked around the kitchen, taking in the details - tiny range, lots of jars with preserves, hooks for all kinds of implements, from spatulas to sieves - she grumbled, made rude noises and banged at her keyboard in frustration.
He remembered having seen her before, but couldn't place it. Must have been a lot of people and she must have been... utterly unremarkable. Except that he didremember her, somehow, a bit. So she must have done or said something that...
Ah. The folksy girl. The cremes and beiges of her current attire morphed into the cream and pale pink of the linen outfit she was wearing at the time. Jane's little sister, apparently, whom Jane had to convince to leave the flat and see people. Someone made a remark about... whatever that was. A harvest fair probably. And quoted a song. The girl frowned and corrected the quote. He couldn't remember what the song was, what the quote was about, or anything else, except for the expression in her wide eyes as she stared up at him in annoyance when he glibly disparaged the necessity of correctly quoting folk songs.
The same eyes were now sparkling with anger as she fought with something on that incongruously spiffy machine. In her unbleached cotton and wool, she looked like an escapee from a community of eco-natural-green wackos, but the computer in front of her screamed "twenty-first century" with all the sleek lines and large screen.
"Need help?" he offered offhandedly. "I mean, I'm no expert, but maybe...?"
"Seriously?" she snorted, not even looking up at him. "Sure, give it a whack. Do you have some useful ideas as to how to modify a multi-layer neural network structure to allow for time dependency, so that an effective phoneme-separation algorithm for speech recognition would work on different speech patterns and speed?"
And she smiled at him, a bit crookedly.
And he had absolutely no idea what she was talking about.
"I thought so. So, if you excuse me, I need to force this stupid thing to cooperate or my advisor will be more disappointed with me than he is already."
He came back, again and again. Charles was "just dropping off shopping" for Jane (which usually took much longer than William would say "just dropping off" should take) and he was stuck in the kitchen-cum-living-room with Elizabeth. Charles reminded him that they had even been introduced already once, on a picnic Charles had organised for his team. And they had met, fleetingly, as Jane dragged Elizabeth to one event or another, where the girl stood silent and stiff (sometimes trying to read a book she had smuggled in in her handbag) - unless someone gave her an opening. Then she opened up, certainly. Happily discussing very esoteric and disparate topics - from folk music, to the history of British wool industry, to the future of artificial intelligence. Now that Charles had pointed it out to him, he could recall moments when he had seen her interacting with others, engaging elderly ladies in conversation about their various accessories and sometimes joining Jane when the topic turned to, of all things, baking.
It all seemed so completely incompatible with the computer industry that it took him a few weeks to accept that the tiny woman was, in fact, an engineering major. He tried making fun of it, but she frowned and humpf-ed with exasperation when he made a joke about programming a washing machine. In hindsight, she must have heard that one at least a dozen times before.
He wasn't interested. Not at all. She was strange, she was from a completely different background and her dissertation subject had more specialised words than proper English ones. She was not someone he would have imagined being interested in. Absolutely. Never.
Dammit.
She was also outspoken when she finally joined the conversation, exceedingly competent in her chosen areas, surprisingly confident socially if the element of business relationship was removed and very, very protective of Jane. He couldn't imagine anyone more perfect.
But he was not interested in her at all. At all.
He barely spoke to her after that exchange about speech recognition - but by carefully asking Charles, he had learnt that she had been granted a scholarship from some international foundation that supported Open Source - whatever that was - and was working at the same time on a project related to basis of artificial intelligence (which was what that speech recognition thing was linked to) and a theoretical dissertation regarding methods of software development. Which was where Charlie's knowledge of IT world ended, so he couldn't explain the link between the two.
"All I know is that she's brilliant, Will. Also, does some very weird things with everyone's computers. Mine had been blocking connection to my scanner, but Lizzy spent an hour on it and managed to convince it to cooperate. And ever since she helped with our servers we've stopped having problems with customers complaining our webpage is not working."
Of course, he couldn't discuss computers with her. He was competent - in the limited range he needed for business purposes - but no challenge to her. She knew next to nothing about real estate or business management, which he was deeply involved in, on both company and land ownership side.
What could two educated, cultural British persons of differing genders talk about in a public setting?
####
"...and I picked that book, thinking it must be hers, and offered it to her. She looked at it as if I was handing her a dead rat and asked - and you can probably imagine the smile and the raised eyebrows - 'Do I really look like I'm one to read poetry?', you know, with utter revulsion and theatrical shudder."
Rose snorted.
"So I tried to get away from the topic, and she closed the little electronic toy she had - she was apparently testing a new Palm model, just out on the market - and proceeded to trash my stereotypes about female tastes in literature. Finally, she admitted she liked romances - but 'properly written, none of that Harlequin Medical rubbish' - and conceded she couldn't stand war novels. Other than that, I felt completely chastised for my assumptions and happy to find a topic from which we could start something."
"Well, she does like some romances. I had a look at her bookshelves once or twice."
"Snooping?" he smirked.
"Just checking" she shrugged. "And I found a few familiar things, you know. Actually..."
He ended up going to the office around noon. Luckily there was nothing unexpected waiting for him, so he dealt with the documents quickly and collected a package of papers to review at home. He needed time to prepare for the evening.
Serious, calm and honest, William. There is no other way.
But be gentle and listen to her, you berk.
They were sitting around the dinner table, just like he had imagines sometimes.
Just a week since Mina had got lost in Lambton.
She was quite fine already - a little cough now and then, just out of pure reflex.
Georgiana had excused herself from the table, saying something about essays waiting for correction.
Mrs Reynolds had disappeared to her room after he had promised her they'd clean up after themselves.
The table was quiet, as they sat, all four, eating and watching each other.
Mina and Rose were making faces and he started to suspect they were actually conspiring.
Of course they were bloody conspiring. The whole situation was caused by them conspiring. Well, not the whole situation, just the current episode of that fifteen-year long soap opera. With him as the bloody main male lead, broody, stiff and upperclass. Thank God he never used any product to slick down his hair, or it would have been a telenovela rather than an honest British soap. For some absurd reason, it gave him some relief.
Elizabeth's blood-red peasant blouse made her hair look redder than usual, like the fire in the fireplace.
He couldn't really taste the food he was eating. It might as well have been cardboard - and Mrs R was talented enough to make cardboard edible, too.
Elizabeth was pushing the food around her plate.
Elizabeth was blinking at her plate.
Uh oh.
"I was thinking" he began quietly. "Rose? Mina? Are you done?"
Two pairs of golden eyes snapped up to him somewhat... guiltily?
"Yeah."
Rose only nodded.
"You can go, I think" he nodded towards the door. "And if the movie is quiet enough, I won't be checking on you... unless I hear screaming. And it better not be that abomination with the crystal skull, are we clear?"
Rose's poker face was nearly perfect, but Mina's blush betrayed their plans immediately.
He sighed.
"Find something else."
Rose's poker face turned to calculating and she shot Mina a glance.
"OK" the younger shrugged. "We'll find something else."
Mhm.
"Not Batman, if you please, Mina" Elizabeth said softly. Very softly.
"MOM."
Elizabeth sighed.
"Captain America will be fine. Just turn the volume down."
"But I wanted..."
"Chris Evans" Elizabeth speared a piece of potato with her fork. "Shirt off."
"Liz..."
She shot him a glance.
"Take it or leave it. It's either the Cap or your choice of Disney. Rose hasn't seen Moana yet, right?"
"OK, OK" Mina raised a hand. "We'll take the Cap."
The door thumped slightly as they shut it and he saw Elizabeth slump a little in her seat.
"Liz...? What just..."
"They will focus on Chris Evan's chest and forget whatever it is that they are trying to cook up" she explained with a smirk. "Sorry to be brutal, Will, but they are fourteen. I've seen Batman when I was twelve and that was much worse. Even if you count in Red Skull. Also, Mina had already seen it."
"Fine. I... I haven't seen it, so I'm trusting you on this one."
She glanced at him and then back at her plate. She was blinking again.
"Now, Liz... We have to talk about this at some point."
"We've talked about it a lot" she frowned. "I think... we know what happened, right?"
"Liz, I... I don't mean what had happened. I mean we need to talk about what will happen."
She let the fork go with a clatter.
"Yes. I suppose we should."
He saw her eyes, finally, looking at him. Straight. Wide open. Irises blown wide with apprehension.
He knew how to help with that.
"Liz, I think we can agree on some points, right? And work from there...?"
She nodded jerkily.
"We messed up. Both of us."
A nod.
"Aunt Catherine is completely crazy and Anne is on the way to the same state."
"I suppose so."
"We're now free of them."
A nod.
"We can talk... we can agree to do what is the best for the girls."
Another nod, and a look away.
"Please... please tell me if you feel differently, but I think they should not be separated."
A micro nod.
"And they need to be properly taken care of."
She even smiled, just a bit.
"And, Liz, I want to... I want to provide them with everything they need. A place where they can live together - adequate space and so on. And a school where both of them would feel safe. Mina isn't happy at her current school, am I correct?"
He watched as she fiddled with the napkin.
"It was supposed to be a good place, academically speaking" she said finally. "I was planning to transfer her the moment I found something adequate, in a reasonable distance."
"You know I can cover any costs of the change, and help to organise everything" he reached out with an open palm. "I'd rather not have her stay in that place any longer. Rose told me some pretty awful stories about it..."
She nodded slowly.
"That would be... I could accept it, I suppose" she grinned weakly. "For the girls' sake."
"For their sake, yes."
She drained her cup and stared at her almost full plate some more.
"I'm afraid I'm not doing Mrs Reynolds justice today" she said sadly. "But I can't eat. I think the way I slept for the last week had thrown my clock off balance."
"We can put it in the fridge as it is" he quickly adapted to the changed topic. "And if you get hungry when you're working, there is a microwave oven in the kitchen. We do get some luxuries of the current century, even in this house."
They exchanged weak grins at his attempt at a joke, and carried the leftovers to the kitchen. She wrapped up their plates - William's equally full - and placed them next to each other in the fridge. Slowly and quietly they filled in the dishwasher, stored any leftovers and wiped down the table and the surfaces in the kitchen.
He saw her leaning heavily on the tabletop near the range, her shoulders slowly and painfully rolling backwards and forwards, in clear attempt at relieving the tension.
"Liz, let's go upstairs, hm? Nothing more to do here, and you have to get some sleep, if you... If you plan to leave tomorrow" he finished heavily. "I'd rather not have you driving again on the last dregs of your energy."
Or, better, allow me to drive you, if you have to leave at all. Or at least let Brian. And take my car, instead of that matchbox car...
"Right" she nodded, squeezing her neck with a grimace. "I'll need it, definitely. I don't think I can write anything today, anyway."
They climbed the stairs slowly, each step bringing them closer and closer to the end of that week.
"Seven days" he said, feeling as if someone had put a tight band around his chest, preventing him from breathing in properly. "We've gone... so far."
And yet not far enough.
"Seven days" she nodded, not looking up at him. "It feels like a year already."
He stopped, letting her take a few steps forward before she noticed his absence and turned back to look at him.
"Liz?" he looked up at her. It wasn't often that he could put himself in such a position, so he was willing to make use of the chance to catch her eyes and finally have her look down at him. When he had her finally watching him, he slowly raised his hand and traced a line down her cheek, pushing an errant strand of her hair behind her ear. "Remember. You don't have to do it by yourself anymore. You don't have to."
She blinked, very quickly, and sighed. But instead of turning away, she nuzzled his palm with her cheek.
"I will try to let go, just a bit" she said reluctantly. "I'll have to learn to, I suppose."
"For their good."
"For their good."
He wasn't going to ask for more, not right now. The good of the girls was a good basis on which to build more.
Speaking of building, he had to review the house plans...
Elizabeth sighed and straightened with visible effort. His hand felt colder in the place where she wasn't touching him anymore.
"Sleep" he said again. "You need to rest before driving."
"Goodnight, William. I suppose I should start... noon-ish. To be in London at a reasonable hour."
"Let me know when you arrive."
She nodded with a half-smile.
"Thank you, Will. For helping..."
"They are my kids, too. How could I not help...?"
She stood there, looking too tired to talk properly.
"Yes" she finally managed and smiled, a bit weakly. Then she raised her hand and squeezed his fingers, before turning around and disappearing in her room.
####
He remembered the first time he held her hand in vivid detail. They were discussing the way that various fantasy worlds were still just Earth anyway and how rarely there was an author who would dare to free themselves from the Europo-centric standards, like Ursula Le Guin. Elizabeth was gesticulating, holding a volume of stories that was a size and mass of a brick, and it wobbled as she used it to underline some point.
He caught the book and slowly liberated it from her hand, putting it safely away on a window ledge near them and then, somehow, kept holding that hand and watching her face as her argument suddenly came to a halt as she seemed to lose her train of thought.
"I concede" he brought her hand up and finally - finally! - pressed a small kiss to the tanned knuckles. "She is a particularly unique writer. And I will read it. I promise. Now, would you consider it a good moment to eat something? I am starving, and I haven't seen you eat anything yet, and we've been here for" he checked his watch "three hours. By any standard, it's time to at least have tea."
He could replay the scene at will, with all the changes in her expression, from argumentative, to surprised, to blank, to confused, to suspicious. Of course she was suspicious, offering food at a larger gathering - thankfully, more social than business, this time - and offering to accompany her might mean some kind of declaration.
He had wanted to be as clear as he could with his intentions. She had to see them. He was laying his soul bare in front of her, wasn't he? Being attentive, being around, being thereall the time. And still, she looked at him in such a surprise when he initiated any kind of physical contact.
Well, yeah. That. Physical contact.
He could also remember the first - and the last - time he touched her shoulder from behind her without announcing his presence first.
She was sitting at the kitchen table, hair unusually tamed in one plait, one that started at the top of her head. A pair of huge, electric pink headphones isolated her from the world as she typed something, clicked and then waited. She looked tense and he saw an opening here - he could suggest... But before he finished that thought, his hand descended on her upper arm and the situation exploded violently.
Elizabeth jerked the arm away, striking the mug of tea that was standing next to her laptop - luckily, away from the machine. Her whole body went the other way, shrinking away from his hand and she fell off the chair she had been sitting on, while the chair itself, falling the other way, collided with his legs.
"Ouf" he managed to say before he noticed her catching the air with difficulty.
Hyperventilating.
He rubbed the place where the chair had hit him, moved the piece of furniture aside and crouched on the floor next to her.
"Hey, Liz" he reached out to her, but stopped the movement before he touched her. "Hey, it's just me. Jane let me in, Charles it taking her shopping."
She pressed her eyes with her fingers and nodded, still not looking up.
"A moment" she rasped. "I'm sorry, William. You startled me. It's..." she inhaled and held the air for a moment. "Sorry."
"No, my fault. I thought you had heard me."
She tapped the headphones.
"Noise-cancelling. I was listening to a text to speech app, looking for issues with nonstandard vocabulary."
"I thought you were working on speech recognition?" he frowned and she nodded.
"Yes, but it's all a part of the same projects. Anyway. Better now. Can you click the kettle on?"
He busied himself with the tea - loose leaf Earl Grey, a bit of sugar for him, a lot of milk for her - and watched her from the corner of his eye as she dusted herself off, picked up the mug, wiped the puddle of cold tea and checked the laptop and the headphones. Then she looked at the chair, set it at the table and moved her whole working setup around the table, to the bench by the wall. This brought her to a position where she was sitting with her back to the said wall, and not to the middle of the room.
Noted.
There were occasions after that when he had to forcibly remind himself to first go around her - keeping a reasonable distance of at least two steps - and only then initiate contact. He saw her stiffen up in a restaurant when a waiter reached around her to pour water or place the plate, in public places, when the next person in line was much taller than her - not a challenge...
If he was going to be anything, he was going to be that one person that paid attention to that.
####
So, Elizabeth agreed. The solution to point four was perfectly obvious, when he thought of it. Since they both agreed that the children should not be separated - and that they'd be much better off with Elizabeth, who could obviously provide much better level of care than he could - as long as his money was framed as "for the good of the girls" and supported by the fact that she'd be having now both of them, she would be willing to accept it.
He could do even better. He had a pretty good idea how much time it took people to hunt for a new flat.
Ha!
He pulled out the laptop and started clicking through real estate ads. Three bedroom - or four? No, three. Or two, if one was big enough for both girls...
First he limited himself to their current neighbourhood, but pretty soon the markers of reasonably looking, pre-furnished, three-bedroom in a quiet neighbourhood were all around the city. After all, the thing keeping her in that place was mostly the fact that her parents owned it, so there should be no obstacle to them moving somewhere else. The only issue would be Mina's school, but since she wouldn't be going back to that place - or not for long - that wasn't really a problem.
Ha.
For every location that made its way to his top ten choices, he started a check on schools in the vicinity.
Once he was done, all Lizzy would have to do would be to go and check the flats. For each of them, he would provide her the suggested schools - two to three per area, no more.
But, knowing Elizabeth, she would agree to the first flat that seemed livable, even if she didn't like it for some reason. Who was in London who could help... He flipped through the contacts on his phone. There was one person who could assist Elizabeth without being too obnoxious about it. He would have gladly gone himself, but that seemed a bit over the top. He was not going to control her choices, was he? It would be better to ask Charles to help. Much less intrusive.
####
So, William agreed.
She leaned on the door, listening to his steps as he walked to his room and closed the door with a resounding "snap" of the lock.
Good. It was good. It hurt, but it was the best solution possible. She had to admit he was the better choice to take care of them, even if it rankled. Pemberley was perfect as a place to grow up in, and she didn't even have to ask him. She had all that speech planned, about Mina's health and need to stability and appropriate environment and school. And William had said it all for her. She was quite ready to weep in relief.
Better not, or tomorrow you'll be driving with a mother of all migraines.
Two more things to do - talk to the cleaning team and to the girls. Well, Mina first.
And then, God, Monday. Monday the monster.
Meeting at the customer's office at ten and then - she winced - then the school. She had absolutely no idea what kind of procedures were needed to transfer a student, but there had to be something obvious to follow in case of a family moving. Here it would be just the student moving, but the same rules would apply, probably.
She would collect all the needed documents, and the custody agreement. They'd have to write the new version together, but that could wait, a bit. She would need to find the certificates of posting for the last packages, too, so that William could follow up on that.
She winced just a bit at the thought of...
No. You have to focus. Rose will have her Frozen snowflake this year.
Stop it.
#
"Whatever it was, they didn't like, completely make up."
"Why?"
"Obvious. They didn't kiss. If they made up, they'd kiss."
"So?"
"So it means they are still not staying together. So it means they are splitting us."
"No way."
"Absolutely. Whatever they think, I'm not going anywhere without you."
Rose curled up on her bed and looked at Mina who was still standing at the door.
"We need a plan" she said simply.
"And I know who will help us" Mina smiled widely.
"We just need to get up early, before they wake."
"Half five should be enough."
"Yep."
####
Elizabeth was up early, but apparently the girls had managed to wake up even earlier than her. Their room was empty, beds reasonably tidy and things carefully stored away. She sniffed slightly, looking at the evidence of the two of them living in the small space.
They were up to something, definitely.
She didn't have time to track down her daughters at that very moment, as the door downstairs opened and a group of cheery-sounding young people was invading the main hall.
Soon one team was outside, together with estate workers collecting all the fallen fruit and bringing it to the storage sheds in huge plastic containers, another was sorting out the worst of it and carting the rejected ones to the compost heap and another was upstairs, waiting for orders. She quickly directed them to the two rooms and threw open the door.
"Anything that looks like an actual thing, pack. Rubbish, out to the shed, you know where, I suppose?"
"Yes, Miss" one of the lanky boys nodded towards the back of the house.
"Very well. Important part - if you find anything that looks like a document, papers, ID, whatever official - put it in this container" she raised a plastic bin "and, once all done, leave it next to the study door. Clear?"
"Clear!"
She left them to it, not wishing to stay in these rooms a second longer than needed and went to her own room to pack.
"Miss!"
A cry from Anne's room brought her running.
"What is it? What happened?"
The room was mostly stripped of all contents, but one girl was using her flashlight to check behind Anne's bed and she was making the most excited noises.
"It's a bag... Like a plastic bag, and there are leaves inside!?"
#
Police had come and gone - the rather kind Sergeant William had introduced as Hanners collecting the dusty bag, making a lot of photographs and asking the cleaning team numerous questions - and now the rooms were bare, windows open wide and letting in as much fresh air as was possible.
####
The youngsters were now washing the floor in the main hall, or maybe the stairs already. Anyway, it was time to talk to Mina.
"I've discussed it with your father, kitten. And he actually proposed you staying here himself, so..." she smiled and shrugged. "I will pack your things and bring them the next weekend. Rose didn't take much, mainly one outfit for you to wear on the way back. You will make do for now with her things, I hope. Now, you will be good for your father and - with aunt Catherine and Anne gone - everything should be fine, right?"
Mina nodded, her face hidden in Elizabeth's jumper.
"We've spoken about it, right? You'll be much better off here than in London, kitten. And I'll come here every weekend and we'll spend these two days together. Or I will ask your father to bring you two to London, so we can show Rose - this time properly - all the interesting things we know. I tried, but two days was definitely not enough."
"M-hm."
"You know I love you, ducky" she said, sighing. "But you need more time with your father, and there's no time like present. And you know London at this time of the year isn't the best for you. You'd be sick for half of the time, and here you will have a chance to maybe, just maybe, not be sick at all. The air is so much better. And you said yourself that Rose's school is much nicer than yours. It will be much easier now that you've already met all everyone, and with Rose in at least some of the same classes, it won't be that hard to adjust to being you yourself there."
"I like it here" Mina said finally. "The gardens are just great and Rose could show me all the things I didn't find yet. And maybe she could teach me to ride a horse?"
"If... if you wish" Elizabeth agreed cautiously. "And if your father agrees. He rides very well, so you could take horse trips around the property, once you're good enough."
"Mom?"
"Hm?"
"What about Christmas?"
Elizabeth froze.
"I... I will talk to your father about it. We'll work something out."
####
Saturday morning started early, with the cleaning crew invading first the gardens and then the rooms left full of various random objects by Anne and aunt Catherine. He heard Elizabeth explain to them the simple rule - whatever seemed to be an actual thing, they were to pack in the boxes and transport to the attic; any documents were to be placed in a separate container and left by the study door and whatever seemed to be actual full blown rubbish, well. Soon the corridor filled with people carrying boxes - upstairs, bedding - to the laundry and trash - to the small shed beside the kitchen door. There were single pieces of cutlery found and one particularly enterprising girl had uncovered a rather suspiciously-looking bag of something behind what used to be Anne's bed.
"Don't touch it" he head Elizabeth say and soon he was calling Sergeant Hanners.
#
After the police had left, he found his eldest - of two, but it was still fun to call her that in his thoughts - behind the stables, watching the horses playing on the paddock.
"I've discussed the whole thing with your mother" he said plainly.
"Dad?"
"I'm guessing you would be fine with staying with her for a prolonged time" he stared ahead, trying not to pressure her into anything.
"Yes...?"
"She agreed - well, provisionally - to take both of you to London. With certain conditions, of course."
"New school."
"And a new, bigger flat. And I suppose with both of you staying with her, my financial contribution will not be rejected."
"So you'll pay for the flat."
"Well, we have still to sit and hash out the details, but that would be my plan, yes."
"Hm" Rose nodded slowly. "And she agreed?"
"Yes. I explained that I'm ready to provide whatever material assistance is needed for the new place and new school - for whatever you two would need. And she accepted that as a good enough reason."
"You will come?"
"Every weekend, imp. And I'll see what we can do about Christmas. Maybe I could come on the twenty-third? And then, well. See what the big city looks like when properly decorated?"
"OK" she kicked a small stone. "It will be... It will be good to spend more time with Mom. But only as long as you come often."
His daughter definitely wanted to go to London and stay with her mother. Now he saw that she also most definitely needed it. He managed to bring up a girl who apparently had more reserve than any grown-up should possess and he hoped prolonged exposure to her mother might actually cure her of that. It was all fine when an adult and a professional, like him, presented a stoic face to everyone, but Rose should have been enthusiastic. Maybe lack of Lizzy in her life was detrimental to this part of her socialisation? He had had that last month with Mina to show him how a child of that age behaved when not trying to play a grown-up every second of her life. Even with Mina pretending to be Rose to the best of her abilities, it still leaked - he didn't see it at the time, but, again, comparing the two of them consciously now...
"Go and pack" he said finally. "Just one bag, I will bring everything else next weekend."
"Thank you, Dad" she stood up and leaned in to peck him on the cheek. "I... I really, really liked living with Mom. But could you, maybe, you know, come during the week sometime? Just in case Mom can't transfer Mina to another school, maybe you could scare some of these old cats..."
"I will talk to your mother about it, darling. I certainly hope so. And during some weekends, I could take you and Mina for a trip somewhere, just to get to know both of you, at the same time. And yes, I think I should show up at the school from time to time. Just until we find a better place for you two."
She frowned, looking at the paddock again.
"And what about us, visiting here? Mina said she'd be OK with learning to ride, if I could show her everything, and I suppose..."
"I'll talk to your mother about it, don't worry. Now, run upstairs and pack. Reasonably!"
####
As Rose ran towards the house, he leaned on the fence, watching the horses morosely.
At least they will be happy.
Not that it was much better than his dream, of course. But it was still the best outcome possible. Girls would be with Elizabeth, he would come visit as often as possible… And they communicated! A full, proper conversation about the future. Actually resolving issues.
He sighed with relief. It was a good sign for them, wasn't it?
####
So, they communicated. Or... no? :)
Update: Someone asked for wordcount on the previous chapter - it was nearly 23k.
Also: if you want more interaction (as in, answers to questions or just to chat), head over to archiveofourown. The system of comments on FFNet is annoying and makes it impossible to answer guest comments once the story is completed...