AN: This chapter has been rewritten so many times and I'm nearly happy with the motivation and flow, though some of the dialogue needs work and I'm still tossing up how Elizabeth responds to everything, but I'm posting in the hopes that I will have an epiphany for the rest of the tale. I have got a new job so will be working more, and really need to work on the other book, that might have a chance of being published, but I'm a bit obsessed with this one and just need to get it done and out of my system! Comments/suggestions/corrections welcome :) Thanks ever so much for reading! No idea how long it will be before the next chapter is posted, sorry...
Chapter 17
We're in Elizabeth's bedroom, about to head out for a day trip to watch the Avon Descent in Caversham for our Sunday date. In fact, we had left before Elizabeth realised she'd left her phone somewhere in her room. While we were looking for it, we got a little distracted. Well, I kind of distracted her, and somehow we ended up in her bed, and it was shaping up to be an epic make out session. It is still early days for us, we've been catching up on Sunday mornings regularly for about two months, I call her more often than I should, and she has spent a few evenings at my place, watching movies and getting comfortable with the idea of us. I'm still getting a handle on the intoxicating physical sensations I had all but given up on feeling at the ripe old age of 28. I'm about as awkward as Robert Pattinson playing a 100-year-old vampire trying to not bleed the teenage love of his life dry. Another cultural reference I can thank Georgie for. Elizabeth can't stop laughing for about 10 minutes when I mention that to her.
I'm lying next to her, soaking up the feel of her lying half across my body, while she continues to laugh at me. She takes up such little real estate in the world, let alone her own bed, but she totally fills up every part of me with intense joy, and the awareness that she owns me, heart and soul, takes possession of my mind. The words are out of my mouth before I know it.
"Marry me."
She jerks off my chest like a lightning bolt. "What?"
"Did I say that out loud? Wait, what did I say out loud?"
She narrows her eyes at me, while I close my eyes and wonder if there is such a thing as backsies for a proposal of marriage. "I'm sorry. Can we just say I was channelling Edward Cullen?"
"Were you? I mean was it just a thought bubble, like an experimental thought that slipped out. I have those all the time." She looks hopefully at me, but I can't deny the strength and the truth of my feelings for her.
"It was a thought bubble, or more like an explosion, but no, I don't think I was experimenting. I'm so sorry – it's too much I know, I am just so happy, you make me so happy, and I just want you to be mine. All the time. In every way. I guess I'm just trying to say how much I love you. I'm sorry it came out like that."
"You love me? You really think you love me, after 2 months?"
"Well, 2 months, plus one year of long-distance infatuation, so that's something." I blow out a breath in contemplation and take a moment to catalogue my feelings. "Yeah, I really do. I love you. I love you like there's no tomorrow, like you are all of my tomorrows. But I don't mind if you're not there yet, though I am hoping and praying you do get there. And I totally didn't think it through, but I really don't want an answer right now, because the look on your face tells me it's not going to be the one I want to hear."
"This is a big deal, Fitz, a really big deal." She gets up and starts to pull away from me, but I hang on to her, sitting up and pulling her back to me. "No! It totally doesn't have to be, baby, please. Just forget about it. Just keep kissing me, and we'll pretend I never said it." She lets me nuzzle into her neck and I manoeuvre her back down so I can keep kissing her until I feel the tension leave her body. I know I'm just putting off the inevitable, and that she's just letting me, but she is so easy to kiss. I always want more, but neither one of us is ready for that, nor do I think she was kidding about me needing "to put a ring on it" first. It's definitely part of why I blurted out that proposal, but I wasn't thinking about sex at all when I spoke, as hard as that might be for her to believe, given where we are right now. I just wanted what I felt to last forever, right now. That's corny, even in my own head. What the hell do I know about love or forever?
"Lizzy? Are you home? Who owns the fancy silver truck that is blocking our carport?" We break apart as soon as we hear the piercing voice from downstairs. Her Mum came home earlier than we expected. Elizabeth is checking her reflection and rearranging her clothes, hair and face so it doesn't look like I've just spent the last 20 minutes mauling her. I do the same. She takes a deep breath before she opens the door. I'm right behind her and pull her back into me for one last hug, slipping her phone into her hand. "I'm sorry, babe, I found your phone 20 minutes ago, this is on me." She reaches up and kisses my chin, "S'ok, Fitz, this is probably a good time for you to meet them while we have an excuse to get away."
General chaos ensues while I am introduced, simply as Darcy, to all the female family members who are present, as well as Mrs Hill, an old family friend who rents out the semi-detached granny flat at the back of the house. Apparently, she just popped in to borrow a can of coconut milk to make her famous curry laksa, a recipe handed down from her great grandmother, which she is still unwilling to share, much to the consternation of all the Bennet females. Given the way she is looking at me, I suspect the immediate need for coconut milk is not the only reason she popped across the back lawn. Elizabeth starts edging to the front door, with me in tow.
"Ok, Mum, we're on our way out to Caversham, I just needed to get my phone—"
Her mother completely ignores her and focuses on me, reaching out to grip my forearm as she gives me a complete once over. Her smile, reminiscent of Jane's but somehow more covetous, grows wider by the end. Elizabeth actually steps in front of her mother and detaches her hand from my arm. Mrs Bennet doesn't skip a beat.
"Well, this is lovely. Darcy, you're a new friend of Lizzy's?" She pauses to see me nod before continuing in the same breath, "You seem to be a very well put together young man, and if that is your car out there, you are obviously financially secure." The younger girls giggle at this comment, as Lydia disappears from the room. Mrs Bennet doesn't appear to notice. "You're a little bit older than Lizzy, aren't you? Actually, you look familiar. Have I seen you somewhere before?"
"Oh, Mum! Lizzy is dating the Fitzwilliam Darcy!" Lydia returns, brandishing the newspaper cutting from the Times all those months ago, along with a few other articles about me that she has obviously been collecting and then proceeds to ask me exactly what I'm worth, who lost all the money, who killed my father and why Lizzy has been hiding me from the family all this time. Mrs Bennet tries to grab at the cuttings, while Mrs Hill shuffles closer to Lydia to peer over her shoulder at me.
Mary, daughter number three, tries to admonish Lydia with a diatribe about the vanity and ultimate meaninglessness of wealth and riches, while dragging her into the kitchen, ostensibly to retrieve the requested can of coconut milk. Catherine, the next youngest, follows along mainly to remind Lydia that she saw me first last summer and that she knew Lizzy had a thing for me all this time. I look to Elizabeth, who has stayed my initial desire for immediate flight (she knows me well), by placing a gentle hand upon my tense and trembling arm, while I shift uncomfortably on the worn vinyl couch I have sunk into next to her.
"Lizzy, have you been keeping things from me? Why would you hide the fact that you two are seeing one another?" Her mother's tone is vaguely curious as well as disapproving. "And was that a picture of the both of you in the paper?"
"Yes, Mum. He and I have been seeing one another for a couple of months. You know how private I am. That's how I like it. And given how we managed to end up in the paper 2 months ago, I just didn't want any more attention, so we've kept everything quiet. We only told our friends recently. Anyway, how do you even know who the Fitzwilliam Darcy is?" She looks at me apologetically as she's speaking to her mother, but it is Lydia who answers as she has returned, looking like an angry, triumphant tabby cat. "That's not even his full name. And that's not all he's hiding. I know all about you! I know you're the one behind all the dodgy business deals, but you've managed to blame other people and hide behind your famous name. His sister is a disaster too, shacking up with some guy when she was at some fancy art school in America and she's not even out of high school yet. And people are still saying your father's death was no suicide—"
I was rigid with rage, but it was Elizabeth who interrupted. "How dare you! Those are all lies! You don't know anything about the Darcys! Where could you hear such things?" She turned to me in abject horror, but all I could see was red and had no words for the assault against my character that seemed to come out of nowhere.
"I'm not lying, Lizzy! He's covered everything up with his money and his influence. He can break any law he likes, and he just gets away with it. It's sick, and you should know better, Lizzy, even if he is made of money." At this point, the matron of the family tries to step in, as Elizabeth takes two steps towards Lydia, mouth agape but making no discernible sound.
"Now, Lydie, I'm not sure you can just start throwing around accusations. I don't always watch the news and though I do remember some questions about the Darcy family, I know the government would have looked into all of it properly, if things were that bad." She looks at me vaguely for a moment, while Lydia scoffs and thrusts the cuttings into her hands and starts reading the headlines about my father's mysterious death, his string of lovers, the corrupt politicians and councillors, dodgy back room deals and the usual "rich white men ruining the world" diatribe. Lydia continues to point out details her mother might have missed, even going so far as to bring up articles on her phone that she's obviously saved for such an opportunity as this. For the first time, Elizabeth has no idea what to do, while I sit on the couch like a statue.
I've heard all of this before and can have nothing to say. I am beyond embarrassment but the mask of disdainful boredom I now wear hides a serious worry. It doesn't surprise me that no one ever questions what they read in a headline or wonders if it was ever hard for me to lose my mum, to see my father collapse in a self-destructive vortex of unacknowledged grief and shame, all in the public eye, or how much harder it was for me to resurrect my family name, my father's business, protect my little sister, while managing a disorder that precludes reaching out for a helping hand. All they see is the public scandal. But how did a fifteen-year-old girl, find out anything about Georgie? How could she have fabricated such a story, so close to the truth, or why? I know the answer, but I cannot bear to acknowledge it.
Lydia and Catherine continue their conversation about me like I'm not in the room, exclaiming about who I have been linked with in the past, names all originally associated with my father, before they move on to less than subtle questions about my sexual preferences. My rigid and unyielding posture has begun to attract attention. The more I hear my family story being dissected and manhandled, the more I sink into myself. By this time, the other girls have returned from the kitchen, and I am a statue on the couch beside Elizabeth. Mrs Hill is ushered out the door by Jane, who returns to find Elizabeth breathing deeply, her lips taut and thin, jaw clenched, eyes burning in rage or shame, I can no longer be certain.
"Are you all quite finished?" She is speaking to the room but looking only at her mother. "And you wonder why I kept him away from you." It's not a question, it's a statement, spoken as she gets up off the couch, pulling me with her. I follow automatically, processing still, while her mother moves to stop her.
"Now, you wait just one minute, Lizzy. Don't you think I deserve to have my questions answered? We don't know anything about him! These stories all had to start somewhere! What, is he too good to speak to people like us?"
She shrugs her off, pointing back at the empty couch, struggling for some semblance of control. "He has been sitting right here in our living room, listening to you talk about his life, his family, his friends, as though it was some TV show! If you wanted to get to know him, you should have spoken to him, not about him."
I hear her defence of me as though someone else is speaking. It spurs me out of my frozen state at last. "I think it's time for me to leave, Elizabeth. I don't care what your family think of me." I turn to speak to the room at large. "Do you think I could ever care what people like you think of me! You have no idea what my life is like and I'm not sure it's within my power to make it intelligible enough for the simple-minded who feed on gossip and innuendo."
Lydia pipes up. "You haven't denied any of it, have you? You just sat there and said nothing and let Lizzy defend you. You can't defend it because it's all true!" She laughs, but it is Elizabeth's look of shame that breaks me. I let go of her hand as though it burns. How could she do it? Her betrayal is the catalyst for me to release all the sulphurous anger, but I turn it all on Lydia, stalking towards her. "I don't have to defend my decisions, explain my private actions to the likes of you. You're just like every other ignorant, worthless nobody in this miserable backwater. Blind hatred and envy, coupled with avaricious greed, makes you entitled to be judge and jury. I have no idea what you are talking about, but if you continue to spread this vile slander about my sister, my company, my family or me, I will bring the full weight of the law down on your head, and on the heads of every one in your family!"
I was towering over her by this point, my pointed finger inches away from her trembling face. I belatedly noticed that Elizabeth had been futilely hanging on to my arm trying to drag me away, to stop me. In that instant, I knew I was scaring Lydia and every other Bennet in the room, but the pain of her betrayal of my family was too much. I shook her off, glaring at her, my body quivering as though a panic attack was imminent, but it was just righteous indignation. "Caz was right, I should have stayed in my own world. People who understand me. You have taken enough from me and mine. I don't owe you anything." This last I spoke directly in to the eyes of the love of my life. I didn't stay long enough to see more than the crumpling of her face and the conflagration of all my hopes.
