Chapter 19: It must have been love

"This is the way the world ends, Not with a bang but a whimper" -T. S. Eliot

"What?" he asked. His voice was steady and he seemed unaffected, as though he did not know to what she was referring to. The truth was that he had no idea.

"Didn't you hear what I say?" she asked and took away her hand from him. "I simply desire to know if you intend to stop the acting."

"What acting?"

"How could you, Darcy? How could you play with my life so?" her voice was high. She was angry and she tried to calm her nerves, but could not.

"Elizabeth, what on earth are you talking about?"

"You know exactly what I am talking about." She paused and looked at his eyes angrily. "I am talking of this ridiculous marriage of ours"

"Ridiculous?" He almost yelled. "Madam, I demand you to tell me at once what you mean."

"I am referring to your agreement with Lady Catherine" she screamed.

Darcy's eyes widen and for a moment he froze. He could not think or breathe; he just blinked sometimes. Suddenly, he hit the table with his right hand and said "Who told you that?"

Elizabeth simply looked at him, trying not to cry. But, that was almost impossible. She then, put her hands on her face just to hide it from him. Darcy kept looking at her until he stood up and slowly approached her. He gently put his hands on hers, putting them down, revealing her face. But, she was looking down on the floor and Darcy with his hand touched her cheek and turned gently her face to look at him. "Elizabeth..." His voice was soft and caring.

"I loved you!" She yelled. She jumped up out of the chair so quickly that he never saw it coming. "I loved you, and you destroyed me. You took my heart and ripped it up. You might as well have staked me!" The change in her features also caught Darcy by surprise. Her voice filled the room. So much grief, so much anger. So unlike the usual Elizabeth. She strode toward him and hand clasped over his chest. "I loved you and you used me the whole time."

"And I love you" he replied quietly and took a step closer to her "If you doubting my intentions, let me say that the deal hardly affected my choice." He paused. "It was always you and always will be."

"You made a fool of me, Darcy" she screamed and wiped with her palm the tears, which were now falling down on her cheeks. "You lied to me! You hurt me! But I suppose that this is natural, since you never felt the slightest esteem towards me."

Darcy within in a second, he was standing in front of her and said "Elizabeth, be still; don't struggle so like a wild, frantic bird, that is rending its own plumage in its desperation."

"I am no bird; and no net ensnares me; I am a free human being, with an independent will; which I now exert to hate you." she replied and pushed him away, but immediately he encircled his arms around her, forcing her to stand still. Elizabeth was now trapped in his arms and could not make a move, until she suddenly broke. She let herself fall into his embrace and put her hand on his chest, until she could not breathe from the crying. Darcy tightened his hug and kissed her forehead, brushing her hair. After a second, she took some steps away from him and looked at him in the eyes. "Tell me, how could you?"

But he did not speak; he just only looked at her. "Richard told you, didn't he?"

"It hardly matters"

It was his turn to scream, loudly "After all the thousand times I've told you I love you, how could you let one word break your faith in me?" he paused "I can see it in your eyes, that you honestly believe that I do not want you anymore. The most absurd, ridiculous concept—as if there were any way that I could exist without needing you!"

Elizabeth froze "No, you do not love me." she screamed back. "I thought you were totally different from what I see in front of me." He looked at her the way all women want to be looked at by a man, with passion and pure love. He loved her so deeply that he could not imagine his life without her, it would tear him apart. "I have been such a fool." She was calmed now, more calmed that she have ever been in her whole life, it was despair.

"But, I love you Elizabeth. Truly I do" He smiled understandingly-much more than understandingly. It was one of those rare smiles with a quality of eternal reassurance in it that you may come across four or five times in life. It faced-or seemed to face-the whole eternal world for an instant, and then concentrated on you with an irresistible prejudice in your favour. It understood you just as far as you wanted to be understood, believed in you as you would like to believe in yourself, and assured you that it had precisely the impression of you that, at your best, you hoped to convey.

"I just need to be left alone" said she.

He loved her, and would love her; and defy her, and this miserable bodily pain. He opened his mouth. The words were there. He was about to say them when a jolt of terror went through him, the terror of someone who, wandering in a mist, pauses only to realise that they have stopped inches from the edge of a gaping abyss. The way she was looking at him - she could read what was in his eyes, he realised. It must have been written plainly there, like words on the page of a book. There had been no time, no chance, to hide it. But there was nothing to say. There was only emptiness, as there had been before her. As there would always be.

"I have lost everything", he replied and sat on a chair. "Everything". He looked at her as a man might look at a faded flower he had plucked, in which it was difficult for him to trace the beauty that had made him pick and so destroy it.

Elizabeth froze; she had never seen such display of vulnerability in his person. She closed her eyes and then walked away. But, Darcy caught her before she was about to enter her chamber. Elizabeth turned to face him "What is it now?"

"You must let me explain" he begged.

"It would not alter anything if you do; it would not erase the fact that you manipulated me"

"I did not" he whispered, but she was not there to hear it. She had already stepped into her quarters and closed the door behind her.

The whole world was one big giant ball of light to him, and he felt like a bug inside it, waiting to be squashed. He felt like there was no sense of purpose, no direction. There was nothing waiting for him at the end of the rainbow. No pot of gold for all the pain he was feeling now, or the pain he has felt before. He just felt empty and lost, as if he was looking for something that can never be found. He felt lost that he could not explain it to anyone and that no one would understand. He felt left out, standing alone, waiting endlessly for a ray of hope which probably would never come. But nothing ever made this pain go away. Or the fear. He did not fear what people fear. Not the loss of life or riches—Roman feared losing himself in this swamp called existence. He feared becoming the person he did not want to become, and most of all, he feared himself. A Fear about his own potential to destroy and destruct. To obliterate. To suffocate his own life. He feared all that and he was afraid no one will ever know what his heart ached for, or how bad he had it. How it was supposed to feel after all when you lose a part of yourself? It was like a part of your heart ripped out, leaving you breathless. Elizabeth belonged to his soul, in fact she was his soul; he breathed only for her and spoke when she wanted him to do so. His life now was all about her, really.

Elizabeth hours later had decided to exit the room. She made believe herself was that she could not bear to be left alone, like that room would shallow her in, but the deepest part of herself wanted to see him, if he was alright. When she knocked in his door, there was no answer; she then walked to the drawing room when she finally found him. He was seated in a chair, sleeping, having a bottle of brandy next to him. Elizabeth approached him and observed his features a little more; he was so handsome and drunk.

And once, he startled awake with his face wet and his chest aching, she reached out to lay her hand on top of his. The gesture was so tentative, her expression so anxious, you would think she had never touched a man before. As if she was worried that he might break or burn or bite. Her cool hand lay on his for a moment, gentle as a moth. She squeezed his hand softly, waited, then pulled away. With all the awkwardness of a young lover, she was trying to comfort him; she didn't have the slightest idea how. He looked at her, without speaking. But, there she was, more beautiful than ever. Her eyes were red and they had something about them that Darcy could not clearly understand.

"At least, believe me when I say that I love you." It was all that he managed to say.

But, she did not speak. There is a point when the anguished soul finally despairs. A moment in life when the heart, the will, and even the spirit crumble. Some say that after much grief and drowning in tears, it is possible to pick up the pieces and carefully repair what was shattered. I say may. For the chains of despair have no key, and the soul destroyed by that monster can never hope to be unaffected. There are things done that cannot be undone.

Thanks again to my beta, who is beyond perfection. Please do not hate me for this chapter, things will get better in the future. The previous chapter is edited if you want to read it again and again I am sorry for the mistakes.

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