Elizabeth was still in the kitchen by the time the Bennet family and their guests made their way, en masse, to the dining room. They came in a noisy cavalcade; Mrs. Bennet was asking impertinent questions that just flirted with the edges of propriety and Mr. Bingley was doing his best to answer them and to find something good to say about the "charming" nature of the house. Caroline Bingley trailed in their wake, sniffing with what might be anything from derision to a reaction to the faintly lingering smell of Lydia's ruined dish, or the amount of dust stirred up that day or, perhaps, as an allergic reaction to some plant matter that might have made it in during the course of the afternoon and early evening while the windows had been opened to let the house air out.
Lydia and Jane came next, Lydia still making any number of juvenile suppositions about the relationship between Jane and Mr. Bingley and poor Jane, finding even her saintly patience wearing thin, was hissing at Lydia to be quiet.
At the very end was the only silent member of the party, but the gleam in Mr. Bennet's eye and his barely suppressed look of amusement spoke volumes. He would be of no help in keeping either his wife or youngest daughter in check, preferring instead to take a perverse sort of pleasure in watching them make fools of the whole family.
The table was as ready as it could be made, groaning nearly audibly under the weight of the dishes and place settings set upon it. It sat four very comfortably under normal circumstances, and having six diners would have been cozy but still allowed for each person to have at least a bit of elbow room. Seven was perhaps the most people it had ever seen at all one time and looking at the arrangement of chairs and place settings brought the phrase "crammed cheek by jowl" vividly to mind.
With a great deal of fuss and apologies from the more polite members of the party, everyone was at last settled into a chair.
There was an awkward pause as the Bingleys looked to the heads of the Bennet family to lead the way with the serving of the meal, but Mr. Bennet was distracted with an aside to Jane and Mrs. Bennet seemed to relish the bizarre sense of anticipation and made no move to reach for a dish.
Since the family normally dined casually and simply passed things around and stood on no ceremony, Elizabeth began to reach for the platter nearest at hand, intending to offer it directly to Mr. Bingley, who sat on her right.
"Elizabeth!" Mrs. Bennet called sharply, effectively silencing the other murmurs of conversation at the table. "What can you be thinking? We haven't blessed the meal yet."
Without missing a beat, she turned her attention to Mr. Bingley and gave him a simpering smile while fluttering her lashes exaggeratedly. "I do promise that I didn't raise these girls to be heathens! Elizabeth has just never had a sense of what is proper! You mustn't think her behavior is an accurate reflection on the rest of the family."
"But, Mama," Lydia interjected, obviously confused, "we never pray over the meal."
"Hush, Lyddie!" Mrs. Bennet cried. "I never heard such nonsense! 'We never pray-' Indeed!"
Face burning with a mixture of fury and embarrassment, Elizabeth thought savagely, Please! Don't make the mistake of thinking I am anything like my ridiculous stepmother or my ignorant sister!
In the next minute, she was wishing with some vehemence that she could simply disappear altogether and never associate with her family ever again. In an act that seemed designed to utterly mortify everyone at the table, Mrs. Bennet launched into a sort of chanting prayer, complete with hand gestures that made Lydia and Caroline (her neighbors to either side) have to dodge out of the way or else be struck in the face.
Elizabeth risked a glance around the table, taking in the offended look on Miss Bingley's face as she leaned away from Mrs. Bennet and closer to Mr. Bennet, who looked more amused than ever. Jane's face was not visible at all, as she had bowed her head and buried her face in her hands; the posture might have been inspired by either piety or pudency, but Elizabeth would have wagered on it being the latter.
Charles Bingley appeared bemused, looking from Mrs. Bennet to Jane in some consternation. He seemed concerned for Jane's sake but was clearly unsure whether he could or should do anything for her.
Lydia was leaning uncomfortably onto Elizabeth's left side, shaking with her not at all silent laughter. In response to the noise, Mrs. Bennet increased in volume, her voice unwisely leaping up an octave or two, landing on the notes with cracked imperfection. Wincing, Elizabeth fought the urge to cover her ears with her hands and rudely elbowed Lydia in an attempt to get her to move or to shut up. For her pains, Lydia shoved her back, sending her nearly crashing into Bingley's shoulder.
He startled and looked down, giving her a wry smile in response to the way she mouthed "Sorry" up at him.
Bingley's gaze returned to Mrs. Bennet for a brief moment before he gave a little shrug, winked in a way that seemed to indicate he was willing to overlook the insanity that had gripped the table and returned his attention to Jane.
It was in that moment that Elizabeth knew that the man on her right was utterly and without question the most perfect man that her sister could ever have fallen for.
To distract herself from her mother's continued keening, she ruminated briefly on the horrifying question of what his odious friend, Mr. Darcy, would think if confronted with such a display of social ineptitude.
It seemed likely that he would be behaving much as Caroline Bingley currently was, that lady scarcely making any effort whatsoever to hide her distaste for everyone and everything about her. Had Mr. Darcy actually been a witness to this scene, Elizabeth might have expired on the spot, for he would certainly have taken it as confirmation that his low opinion of her was natural and just. But he was not here and it was, therefore, amusing to imagine him sitting next to Miss Bingley, each of them wearing identical expressions of disgust.
"Madam," he might say, interrupting Mrs. Bennet's awful wailing and silencing her altogether with one of his cold, disapproving looks, "I beg you to cease that racket at once. Anyone walking by outside might imagine you to be torturing felines and I cannot be seen in the company of anyone less perfect than I. In fact, I shall leave you now as nearly everyone in this assembly is beneath my regard."
Coming out of her imaginings to find Miss Bingley doing a creditable job at imitating the expression she had just been picturing on a decidedly more masculine if no more haughty face, Elizabeth could not help but think how perfect the pair would be for each other.
However much he might have redeemed himself in her eyes tonight, Bingley's unfortunate taste in friends remained as a strike against him. She would have liked to hold his sister's rude behavior against him as well, but with another glance around the table as everyone exhaled in relief at the "prayer" being over, she had to admit that one could not choose one's family and nor should they be made to be accountable for having the misfortune of being related to less than desirable people.
Restored by having been able to find a way to laugh over her stepmother's ridiculous antics and reassured that Mrs. Bennet's outlandish behavior hadn't been enough to immediately persuade Bingley to flee in terror, Elizabeth did her best during supper to keep the general conversation to topics that were both appropriate and interesting.
Having foreseen the need to play a role such as conversation mediator, she was instantly able to break into her stepmother's less than subtle line of inquiry about the seriousness of Jane and Bingley's relationship with an observation about how cold it was getting with the holidays just around the corner.
Thankfully, Mr. Bingley took the conversational thread and ran with it, saying wistfully that it was his favorite time of year.
"Is that because of the holidays or the weather?" Elizabeth laughed back at him. "For I cannot fathom that even you, who seem so eager to be pleased by life's vagaries, can be charmed by grey skies and endless rain."
"Look at me," Lydia piped up, mocking. "I use big words and talk about dull things like the weather."
It was, unexpectedly, Caroline Bingley who took it upon herself to reply to Lydia's impertinence. "Of course it's the holidays that Charles looks forward to," she sniffed. "He is as giddy as a child about them."
To her right, Mr. Bingley laughed as though his sister had been implying some sort of joke. Seeming wholly unperturbed by the censure that had been readily apparent in Caroline's words and tone, he replied cheerfully. "I own that I am! But there is nothing wrong with that. We are all far too grown up and dull the rest of the year; why should we not make merry when we have the opportunity?"
"Indeed," Jane put in, seeming to have regained some of her composure. She sent a brilliant smile Bingley's way. "It is very evident that children see the world through eyes that believe in magic and every good possibility. This time of year especially, they are so alive with wonder and happiness. It's a joy simply to be around them, and for my part, I would wish to emulate some of their behavior."
"Only some of their behavior, my dear Jane," Mr. Bennet put in, unable to let the opportunity for his favorite remark to slide. "But take care you do not become as silly and ignorant as your youngest sister in the process."
Every eye at the table slid to look at Lydia, who seemed wholly unaffected and merely continued eating with the sort of gusto one might indeed find in an ill mannered child.
"I think it would be easier to let ourselves remain so innocently childlike if we did not always have to work so hard," Elizabeth spoke almost without thinking about what she was saying, she was so eager to get the conversation back into neutral territory. "Although I suppose even our workplaces make some effort to give us a sense of holiday. Blue Line is having a party at the end of this week."
"Oh, a party!" Mrs. Bennet could always be counted on to react with exuberant delight to the prospect of any party, no matter if it was to be a dull work affair to which she was not even invited.
"That is very good of them to do," she approved. "Will there be dancing?"
"I doubt it, Mama," Elizabeth managed. "But I have heard they are having a meal catered and will give us a break of a few hours. It is, perhaps, the only good thing about working the hours that I do. Anyone from another shift who chooses to attend will not be paid to come in. "
"What hours do you work?" Caroline asked, smirking.
"I go in at four in the afternoon."
"And you work for Blue Line?" Caroline pursued. Her manner was almost gloating now, as though she had just discovered some particularly juicy secret. "That name seems familiar somehow, but I cannot place what they do."
"You heard it from Darcy," Mr. Bingley informed his sister, dabbing at his lips with his napkin in an altogether too casual manner. "Do you not recall? When he was last over for supper he mentioned having recently purchased it."
"Who is this Darcy?" Mrs. Bennet broke in. "Some great friend of yours, I suppose?"
"Oh, yes," Bingley replied, still too casual. "We met in school and he knows more about business than I shall ever be able to retain. He is a very great help to me in matters of running a company."
Elizabeth could see what her stepmother was thinking as she digested that piece of information. In order to head off whatever grossly impolite speculation about Darcy's wealth the other woman was about to make, she turned to address Mr. Bingley.
"I was quite shocked when I heard Mr. Darcy had bought Blue Line. I do hope he is not in the habit of dismantling companies for the sake of profit. It would be so vexing to find myself out of a job thanks to him."
Bingley choked and Jane shot Elizabeth a warning look. The rest of the Bennets looked on with renewed interest, knowing that they were not privy to whatever meaning Elizabeth had intended. No one, it seemed, but Caroline Bingley had any sort of ready response to that barbed remark.
"It is obvious to me that you cannot know Mr. Darcy very well at all if that is what you think," she said, coolly indignant. "Why, there he is doing everything he can in this terrible economy to save jobs or even create them, but all anyone can see is that he is at the head of a large and growing corporation."
Including you, Elizabeth thought cynically. You're so in love with his pocketbook that you are blind to his faults and virtues alike!
She was so startled by her own thought, at having ascribed Darcy some virtue, that the next few moments of conversation quite eluded her. But of course the man had to have some good characteristics, she scolded herself. Else he could not possibly have the respect he had, not from his fellow businessmen and not from decent men like Charles Bingley. Satisfied that she was only being fair in allowing him not to be wholly without redeeming qualities, she returned her attention to the conversation at hand and was baffled at finding the conversation had turned to a rather lively debate on the merits of automobiles and the likelihood that they would eventually become the default mode of transportation, replacing horses and carriages altogether.
The rest of the evening passed along in a similar manner, with Elizabeth running interference on troublesome topics and Jane and Mr. Bingley both seeming willing to assist with keeping conversation to determinedly neutral ground. Mrs. Bennet could never be wholly repressed and nor, it seemed, could Lydia. Each of them made several remarks that had Jane and Elizabeth blushing in mortification.
But if they were impolite and improper, Miss Bingley hardly fared any better, at least in Elizabeth's estimation. Her words were always very civil, but her smiles and her tone were often cutting or disdainful. Mr. Bingley seemed wholly unaware of her superciliousness, or at least made a good pretense of not noticing. In any event, he did not correct her or give her so little as a warning look.
In this interaction, Elizabeth could see the mirror of the relationship her own father had with his family. As the head of the household, he really ought to have been curbing the more outrageous behavior, rather than laughing at it and mocking his wife and daughter. What a boon then, a stronger man might be!
Nice and pleasant as Mr. Bingley was, Elizabeth knew that she could never wholly respect him so long as he continued to let his sister run amok in such a fashion. Dearly as she loved Mr. Bennet, Elizabeth knew she did not altogether respect him in the way she felt that she ought. And while Jane was made from very different stuff and might not have the same issues that Elizabeth would, Elizabeth worried that Jane had not thought enough about whether she could be happy with Mr. Bingley when he was so permissive.
Resolving to talk it over with her elder sister at the earliest opportunity, Elizabeth somehow made it through the rest of the night without thinking more than once or twice about Mr. Darcy and about how he seemed to command respect even when he had done very little to earn it.
A/N: Good news, everyone! I've actually finished writing the rest of this and will be able to post it on a weekly basis from here on out.
Okay. That's a lie. April Fool's?
Sorry this one is so short and that it took so long. I fear it will be a bit unsatisfying, but it did allow me to start nudging Elizabeth in the right direction. And I hope you can all pick up what I put down to guess what we'll be seeing in the next chapter. /eyebrow waggle
Speaking of which...
I don't think I have ever replied to a review in so public a fashion, but I am going to take a moment to do so now. This is mostly because I couldn't PM, but also because I want to let everyone know what to expect. Regarding the comments urging me to "get to the good stuff already," I want to get to the "good stuff" - really. I do! I want to have Darcy and Lizzie be around each other and I want to write all the delicate unfurling of their secrets and their love. However, I don't want to do that the expense of the whole story. No one has a life that can center around just one thing, so we will be seeing more of all of Elizabeth's life, whether that's work or Jane or her family. Ditto for Darcy. If you're looking for instant gratification, you may want to find another story to read. Or just stop reading this one until it's finished, haha.
Okay, I'm done and hopefully that doesn't sound rude. I just wanted to let people know I will be taking my time and not rushing ahead. No matter how much I want to.
If you're still with me or if you're new, thank you from the bottom of my heart for taking the time to read! And if someone out there recc'ed me (as I suspect may have happened given the amount of new followers I've seen in the past few weeks), please let me know so I can thank you directly! I appreciate it!