The dance at dinner held no time for normal conversations. Rather like having children, one was constantly interrupted. A few words thrown here, mouthed there, snatched from the wind in passing. Conversations lasted all night, or paraphrased to microseconds. The language of bodies spoke. The eyes took in everything. Gossiping was easy. Bantering was constant. Flirting sometimes flitted around the room. Insults traded. Swear words an integrated vernacular.
….."Did you see 1-10's date?"
"Escort?"
"God I hope so, surely she can't be the real deal?"
"He must have money."
"Loaded. They're on their fourth bottle of Moet."
…"You going to the pictures after?"
"What time is it?"
"Starts at 12:30."
"Will we…"
"…be finished in time?"
"We'll have to work our asses off."
"Only if Daisy's going."
….."I'm allowed to dream, you know."
"Ethel, your dream consists of men and money."
"Nothing wrong with that."
"Yes but the men who come in here are not necessarily going to be looking at the staff for a wife rather than a good time."
"Nothin' wrong with a good time."
"True, but you need to be careful."
…"A couple more years and I'll have enough for a deposit for a little farm."
"You want to farm, William?"
"You'll have mud up to your knees and shit up to your elbows."
"I've always wanted to have horses."
Like insects the staff crisscrossed the floor, plates in hand, pause, bend, place, take, refill, and flit away. The waiter's stations acted as hubs, drawing them and pushing them in soft repose. Paths intersected, words whispered, lives danced on.
She knew the warmth at the nape of her neck was not from the sun that stretched through the windows. Her head was down as she typed the orders into the micros, she felt him though angle up behind her with recognised assured movements. The down coating of her exposed skin felt the movement of air, and her nerves responded to the electrical fission.
"Do I get three guesses?"
"For what?"
"For the alarm."
"And then I give you the answer? If you don't guess right? Sounds too easy." She stabbed the send button on the computer screen, turning a raised eyebrow at him as she waltzed off to attend one of her tables that had suddenly caught her attention.
They crossed paths at the pass in the kitchen, waiting as Mrs Patmore and Daisy lined up plates to take out.
"Then a clue?"
'I already gave you four clues. Anymore and I'll have given you the answer."
"You seem to have a penchant for games Mary." He prodded her in a whisper that would not have been heard over the exhaust fans that ceilinged above the hotplates.
"You seem to be a worthy opponent."
They parted with plates delicately piled with food that was also art, to opposite sides of the room, small smiles lingering at the corners of their mouths.
The sun arched in the sky, and the golden beams shifted to lengthen across the floor.
Matthew stood at the marble topped sideboard, rearranging the bread boards and making room to plate up the tiny saucers of olives speckled with chilli for the night. Her line of sight across the room was uninterrupted to him, as she worked at the end of the bar, organising bills and swiping cards to settle accounts, her eyes were drawn upward. His hair glowed in the shafts of afternoon sun behind him, and she almost snorted to herself as the word halo seemed to lodge itself between her ribs. Matthew caught her then, and smiled in return, not understanding. His face contorted in an exaggerated look of contemplation and question.
There always stretched a question between them.
Life moved quickly in this line of work, a form of fast momentum that allowed little of a life beyond. She was born into it, had been brought up in it, understanding how consequences of choosing a normal life outside of hospitality meant choosing other than her family. She had been marked by the acute awareness of how life could pass by too quickly, and how there was the ingrained mantra to relish the small daily particulars, instead of dreaming for grand gestures of a fairy-tale life. All that mattered in the end was the love of her family, good food, a shared glass of wine and the knowledge that she was good at her job.
Her job, which meant spending almost every waking hour of her day in this cavernous place that felt more like a home than her top floor apartment, with a bed she visited only briefly and a kitchen barely used. She breathed in the safe feeling of comfort that Downton washed over her, and by extension how that also encompassed her family.
And Mary realised as she took in his goofy lopsided grin, how Matthew had silently manoeuvred himself into her thoughts as already being under that umbrella. Matthew had taken up more space in her daily thought processes, than she was willing to admit, more than Edith and her parents combined. He pervaded her brain matter and melted her heart, but it was confusing to understand how she could be affected so easily, given her natural rejection of anything of a personal nature.
Yet the light-hearted ease with which they effortlessly danced around each other brought sunshine into her heart. It had been too long and exhausting playing the games of an untouchable dutiful woman bound by expectation and the challenges brought by reaching for the glass ceiling. Matthew's acceptance of her striving to make Downton an exceptional place worth the challenges she had to face with her father. He succinctly got her vision, and as she gazed at his emblazoned golden hair now, made her feel like he actually got a little piece of her as well. It lifted her spirits, that tiny thought and she understood why she didn't seem to be able to stay angry or feeling ill-just at him for long. He was unlike all the others that had wanted to invade her world.
She held up four splayed fingers, her palm openly facing him, as Alfred asked her a question arresting her mind, but not skipping a beat with communicating with Matthew across the room.
She saw his hands pause briefly in their work, olive oil dripping from the spoon, his eyes fixed on her expectantly as he waited for her to continue. A brief glance around the room showed her that no-one was paying them any particular attention, so she raised one finger.
First clue
Mary rocked her hand side to side and then touched her ear.
Maybe sounds like...
Her body then went ridged, a straight point of attention and she saluted briefly, then immediately traced a figure of eight in the air, whilst punching numbers into the micros to appear that she was totally engrossed in her task.
Army... maybe sounds like army...
Two fingers were thrust into the air. A peace sign?
Second clue.
The wisp of metal indicated that the cash register's drawer opened. Mary held up a coin as Matthew squinted trying to make out the denomination across the distance. Maybe he should get his eyes checked? She briefly pointed at it with her other hand and quickly placed it back, closing the till. She looked at him openly then, and seeing his befuddled expression, sighed audibly as she looked for the closest ice bucket, flourished an ice cube between two fingers and then placed an imaginary crown on her head.
Queen...
Three fingers wiggled like leaves in the wind, as his focus honed in again.
Third clue.
This time Mary did consciously slow down and check where each and every staff member was within the room. Their attention had to be elsewhere, the barmen occupied with drinks and coffee orders, Carson decanting a dark red at one of the stations in the middle of the room, the kitchen staff with heads over plates or hidden by some kind of steam or smoke. Matthew watched her eyes, and how they took everything in, as always. He waited, his hands stilled over the bucket of dark ovals, as he was happy to patiently wait, how could he not?
Shade found light across the room and they fused. The lengthening sunlight reflected in her eyes, twinkling with mischief as Mary held up her left hand and pointed to her ring finger. The air seemed warm and thick in the cavernous space, weighted somehow with meaning and intent. A simple gesture really, but one with very little deviation of explanation. It was meant to be light hearted in the name of the game that they were playing, although it was far from that.
Mary suddenly shifted, unable to physically hide the wave of discomfort that bringing up the implied clue had caused in her. Which immediately followed self-chastising at her slip of armour, and self-loathing that even now, years later, she was still affected by it.
Matthew frowned trying to follow. She didn't wear a ring there, but was obviously indicating something about commitment, or engagement or marriage. Her awkward body language confused him, whether it was meant in relation to the clue, or whether Mary had somehow shown him something hidden in her soul he wasn't sure. It muddied his immediate guess and the answer felt almost out of reach really. He was sure it was on the tip of his consciousness...
She pinched her fingers together, to shorten the word perhaps, and he knew then how ironic Mary's humour actually was.
The night held them both apart and too busy for idle chatter. The constant long days had quelled the need for anything other than the most basic necessities. Nerves were also tested by unreliable patrons and ever changing table numbers. Matthew and Mary orbited each other, wanting to connect and knowing it required more than service would allow.
She wondered if he had grasped her clues and whether they were ridiculous enough for him to have guessed.
He wanted to laugh with her over a glass at the end of the night, and tell her how he could still feel the laughter rumbling around his belly at her efficiency of the game.
They never got the chance.
Matthew found a desolate and broken Alphonso weeping drunken tears in the men's lavatory and pried him out into a dark corner of the lounge, before urgently whispering to Mary to go and comfort him. His fellow team and entourage all gone, misunderstanding that he probably had escaped to the casino, Alphonso blubbered some Italian woman's name over and over again. Mary seemed to understand the situation, and knew the only course of action was to get him back to his hotel safely. Matthew fetched her bag and coat, and just as she supported the stumbling and clearly incoherent racing car driver towards the front doors to drive him home, Matthew ushered them quickly to the secret passage, where he confidently punched in the code and told Mary that he would lock up. She barely had time to raise an eyebrow in Matthew's direction before disappearing into the bowels of the building.
Matthew swung the heavy metal gate slowly so that it wouldn't creak, the metal wheel spokes clicked loudly in the stillness of the very late night. His breath extruded until there was no longer any stale air left. A very late night, as he looked at his phone, or early morning really.
His apartment felt cool after the day's physical exertion. His bag dropped near the kitchen table, the keys clattered on the worn wooden surface. Matthew clicked the 24 hour news on to see what he had missed going on in the world, and strode towards the bedroom stripping off his shirt laden with the smells of the kitchen as he went.
He missed it the first time, thinking the noise was only part of the murmuring television. The methodical patter of the shower slowing down his heart and mind as he relaxed. The second time the vibration on the wood piqued his ears, and he strode to his phone, water drops sliding down his back to cascade to the floorboards. A drop swelled at the end of his hair sticking out from his brow and splattered across the illuminated screen as he swiped it.
You guessed? I wasn't sure you would!
You had me at ice...
It's melting you know...