Author- 4give4get
Rated- T
Disclaimer- I own nothing.
Serena- Whoa, I got a lot of reviews. (A lot of reviews for me, heh…)
Margaret920- I'm glad you approve of the language. Wasn't sure if I was doing it alright. I'm also glad you think an American for Mary would be interesting! :P
T- Thanks for reviewing. Uh, yeah, nine chapters is an estimate. BUT, I am writing at least two sequels to this I've decided, so maybe you'll read those… Thank you for saying such nice things!
distorted realities- Thank you for being such a good reviewer! You keep me inspired!
llGeekGoddessll- Yes, since Jane and Lizzy were so close, I figured Mary, Kitty, and Lydia would be also. Thanks for the review!
Serena- I love you guys SOOOOOOO much, you ALL keep me inspired! Truly…
Chapter Five…
Mrs. Bennet was not pleased with Mary when she arrived back at Longbourn, that much was certain. She returned two days after Mary herself, having waited until the following morning to depart from Pemberly. And taking an extra day on the journey with no Mary to object to such a thing as she had done before.
Mrs. Bennet's complaints were as follows: Not only had she made more of a mess of their family's name, after all the scandal of Lydia, but she had also forced them to cut their visit at Pemberly so much shorter.
"We shall never be invited back now!" Mrs. Bennet cried.
"I do not care, madam," Mary spat, gripping the table that separated them, "And do you honestly think that Lizzy wanted me there? The only reason we had been invited at all was that bloody Mr. Ashby!"
"And you could have had him, Mary!" the woman screamed, "You ruined the one chance you were lucky to get and now you shall die an old maid!" Mary momentarily considered throwing the bowl on the table in front of her. She gripped the table harder.
"And so I shall be an old maid." Mary countered, "I should rather be alone than marry. And if I am ever within the same vicinity as Miss Bingley, I shall perhaps throw something much worse than cake at her."
"Why, you…"
Mary turned on her heel and darted from the room, her braid swinging behind her. She took extra care to slam the front door for good effect. She ran along the back of the house, her boots splashing through the mud of the garden, mercilessly splattering any plant in her way and finally looked in the window boxes. In the third one, beneath all of the daisies were three good-sized books. She smiled and held them to her chest as she went to hide them in her room.
Mrs. Bennet no longer spoke to her. You can likely imagine how much Mary cared about that. Very little, I assure. Mary spent every hour she was not working, reading a book of James Latimer's. She felt her ideas and opinions changing, molding, and then remolding, changing like seasons and weather. Books really do open your mind. She left the books she read in Mrs. Coleman's window box, and always checked her own window box for new ones.
And somehow, Mary knew someday she would be caught. That day came a few weeks after their disastrous Pemberly visit. It was Mrs. Hall, naturally. The woman had taken it upon herself to make sure that no new heathen books ever entered the front door of Longbourn again, and frequently "cleaned" Mary's chamber. It was a very similar scream to the scream Mrs. Hall released when she found A Critique of Pure Reason. Mary even guessed what had happened—it was like that day a few months ago all over again.
"Mary Bennet! I shall lock you in your chamber and you shan't see the light of day for ten years!" her mother screamed at her, grabbing her neck and leading her into her room.
"You disapprove of my reading materials, madam?" Mary glared at her, struggling in her grasp.
"Not only that, but I have found something else," Mrs. Bennet's face was pale white and livid. Mary was actually surprised. Something other than the books? She racked her mind for some other offense she could have possibly done. Mary did not wait in suspense for very long, however. Mrs. Bennet opened a book to the cover page and pointed to it.
James Latimer's name was signed on it in ink. Mary felt a frightened feeling tightening in the pit of her stomach. She did her best to omit nothing, however.
"This is who you've been getting such books from?" Mrs. Bennet shrieked, "That horrid American?"
Mary said nothing.
"Answer me! Answer me, you useless thing!" Mrs. Bennet slapped her over the face. It was the first time Mary had been hit by her mother and stared at her in shock… and broke.
"Yes, madam, he is."
"Even Lydia's actions were desirable able as compared to this," Mrs. Bennet seethed through clenched teeth, seizing Mary's shoulders, "Americans and un-Christian books. the world shall never know about you! You shall disappear, Mary. Your father was right all along, you were a mistake."
"You are not my mother," Mary hardly dared to breath. Mrs. Bennet was even frightening when she was so angry—the angriest Mary had ever seen her. Mary knew she would not win this time.
Mrs. Bennet had half turned away at the end of her speech, but then turned back, her face indescribable, "You say I am not your mother? Well, you are not my daughter!"
She slammed Mary's head into the wall and stormed out of the room, locking the door. Mary felt a little dizzy and her head ached horribly, but she forced herself rigid and tried the door. It truly was locked. She stumbled to her bed, the world was fuzzy and swaying back and forth in a maddening rhythm. She buried her throbbing head in her pillow and cried the first tears of her life in eight years.
Mrs. Bennet was true to her word. The door was only unlocked when Mrs. Hall brought her meals. Each time, she sat perfectly straight in her desk chair, her face frozen in an emotionless countenance, as not to omit any feeling. That was the one thing she happened to have in her favor. Mary was determined they should get no reaction out of her. She wasn't so sure she would be successful, either. How many more days could she take of this immense boredom?
As a child, Mary complained of her chores like most children do. Now, she would have killed to be able to mend an apron, or wash dishes, or do the laundry, just for something to do other than read, stare out the window, and pace back and forth with no other company than her mad thoughts.
I shall not be suppressed. I will remain who I am. They may lock my physical body up, but not my mind, she thought over and over.
In her last resort, she began writing a novel. Her heroine? A sixteen year old girl, Alice Strider with a questionable disposition. And the more Mary thought about it, the more she realized Alice was more of a victim than a heroine. The story was about a girl whose mind gets warped by insanity and her diary starts answering back to her. She becomes obsessed with it, and soon having actual conversations with it. Then, the book tells her to murder her parents—which she does. Confused and horrified, Alice falls deeper and deeper into madness, before she is finally arrested and sentenced to be hanged.
Mary decided to write it in first person. It would be a confession written by Alice Strider in the confinement in her prison cell the day before she would die. Mary had little confidence in her writing, but it didn't matter—it was merely to pass time:
"And the most frightening entity yet was that over the noise of the storm, a clear, crisp, sobbing noise could be heard from downstairs. The sound of a weeping child. Upon hearing it, my body went absolutely rigid where I lay. Was it merely a sound out of my imagination? Or was it the ghost of a murdered child, now haunting the place? Or course, reason argued the former. Ghosts did not exist. But how could I so soon forget the latter? How could such a bona fide sound be all in my head? It sounded as perfectly clear as my own breathing and the thunder above."
But she soon ran out of ink and could not retrieve any more from Mr. Bennet's office. She therefore was forced to shove it in a drawer where it would stay for some time, her mind absolutely forgetting about it.
She wondered if James knew what had happened to her. Were there any of his books still in the window box? Mary was certain that if Mrs. Bennet ever saw him at Longbourn she would likely pick Mr. Bennet's musket up and shoot him herself. Well, that would be some amusement. Amusement—something Mary had not had for a very long time indeed.
With each minute seeming more like ten, it was hard to keep track of the days. While Mary felt herself going gray and dying, it had hardly been a fortnight by the time she was brashly interrupted by a clanking noise on her window.
Mary had been currently lying on the floor, simply staring at the ceiling, not thinking. For if she did think, her mind would become as broken as Alice Strider's was. Perhaps to write of madness one must experience it first, she thought. So, am I mad?
Upon first hearing the noise, she wondered if her mind had finally come undone. To make sure, she rose from the floor and examined the window. A rock came flying out of nowhere and hit the glass again, while bouncing off and then joining its predecessor in the garden below. Mary did sigh in relief. Rocks were simply being hurled at her window—she was not imagining it.
She looked down to see James Latimer standing beneath her window, and the sight of him was almost as alien to her as if he were wearing a jester's outfit and not his usual regular trousers and shirt. Mary did not stare for long but simply unlatched the window and opened it, slightly peeking her head out so he could see her.
"Miss Bennet!" he called up to her, his usual large, unnecessary grin playing on his face, his eyes blue as ever.
"If Mrs. Bennet finds you here, she will quite literally kill you," Mary warned him.
The evening was fading into night, and as the darkness set in and the moon rose, she could only barely make out anything on the horizon. Well, bother the horizon, my biggest problem is standing in the back garden.
"Let her try," James countered, glancing around before looking up to meet her gaze again, "And tell me you haven't gone back on your word and have decided to stop reading my books, now."
"Would it really matter if I did?" Mary demanded, "No, Mrs. Bennet found them! And she saw your name in them, too! So you had better get out of here! I've not left this room in weeks and doubt I ever will again. It was agreeable meeting you, sir, good day!"
She reached to close the window, but he shouted again, "Miss Bennet! Please, don't go yet. We've yet to finish our conversation."
"What else is there to say?" Mary wanted to know, looking at him.
"Many things," James kicked a rock, "There are many things to say. In fact, get quite used to me, because there will never not be anything to say between us. What I have to say topically is this: Are you the girl I met that summer afternoon in my aunt's parlor or not? Because I don't see her anywhere."
"Stop being ridiculous," she sighed, rubbing her temples, "Of course I am she, who else would I be?"
"That Miss Bennet was a lot harder to beat, I can assure you, madam," James said coldly, "That Miss Bennet did not care if she was alone in the world. That Miss Bennet needed no one else's approval. That Miss Bennet was willing push anyone's limits. That Miss Bennet was one of the few people I could respect."
Mary felt oddly hurt by his words. She had been spoken to coldly all her life, but somehow it was worse when such a tone came from James's mouth. Somehow his blue eyes made her feel guilty for the first time in her life. Somehow they made her feel so sad she wanted to burst into tears right there. Somehow they made her feel as weak as a newborn infant. And somehow she couldn't look away.
"I do not need anyone's approval," Mary began slowly, "And I certainly do not need yours. Have a good evening, Mr. Latimer."
She closed the window and put out her candle so she was sure he could not see in—that he would only see a dark window. Mary took heavy steps to her bed and fell onto it on her back, staring up at the white ceiling.
Another rock it the window, but she ignored it. Two more. Four more. After the fifth rock, no more followed. James Latimer had left. Her whole body was trembling with emotion. Excess emotion, in which she had no idea what to do with. She pushed her hands together in attempt to still them. She thought over the last conversation.
"And I certainly do not need yours," Mary repeated aloud, her voice breaking the immense silence of the room, "I certainly do not need yours."
Had she gone mad? Mary could not honestly say. The only thing she could honestly say was that her last statement was a complete and utter lie. Who was she kidding? It was only in an effort to convince herself, really. She did need James Latimer's approval. As soon as she let herself think it, she was utterly horrified with herself. What did bloody James Latimer matter at all?
Well, had she not considered him a friend? A friend's approval is always wanted, right? No, she thought, this pondering is absurd! I most certainly do not love James Latimer! …An American… No, it is not possible.
After assuring herself this, she reread what she had of her novel and decided it was total garbage and threw it back in her desk drawer. Rubbing the back of her head, Mary thought more on what James had said. Was she so different than when he had met her?
She stared at a crack on the wall and suddenly… everything fit together.
James was right! For her whole life Mary had taken pride in being likely the only girl in Hertfordshire with an actual backbone, and she was simply sitting in her chambers and accepting punishment like this? No! The old Mary Bennet would not have stood for it!
And the old Mary Bennet returned. She laughed out loud for the folly of Miss Bingley with cake in her face, and laughed when she thought of Lizzy's hopes for her and Mr. Ashby, and laughed when she thought of Mrs. Hall's fear of her, and laughed of the color of Mrs. Bennet's face when she had discovered James Latimer's books.
Why, we do not even have a dye to color our wool that shade of purple! Mary could always laugh about things. Mary never cared about anyone else's opinion of her. How could she go mad when she had so much else going for her?
She fished a pencil out of her drawer and continued Alice Strider's story. When her pencil no longer sat so comfortably in her hand, she put it down. Smirking her "Mary Bennet" smirk in triumph, she silently thanked James Latimer and went to bed.
Oh, I hope he forgives me…
End Chapter
Serena- Sorry kind of short. Please review.