A/N: So sorry for the delay! Thank you to everyone who "nudged" me here and on tumblr. Always, always nudge me! Things have been crazy at work and I am working on a huge, huge project that I will share with you all as soon as it is ready (here is a clue: imagine a place you could go everyday with an update...BUT we are getting ahead of ourselves.) Anyway, much thanks to everyone who nudged and who still has interest in this story. For a little while, I told myself that people were over it (bc I was kind of over some Downton Canon stuff) so if you are still invested...great! Let me know because writing time is limited with this other project happening.

Take it away, Lavinia...

Chapter Ten

For Lavinia, the room feels like the single glass of champagne she drank at her wedding, simmering with bubbles that rise to the top of the glass. But she can find no reason for it, except perhaps the clue of Cora's secret smile–demure yet effervescent, much like the champagne. She tries to sort out Robert's expression, the darting eyes that keep resting on Matthew, or Edith's pale face that watches Lavinia herself, but she cannot.

Lavinia takes a small sip of wine instead.

"Well, I can't hold it in any longer," Cora begins.

"Cora, I think, perhaps..." Robert interrupts but his sentence simply runs on top of Cora's announcement.

"But Mary's coming home!"

The Dowager Countess's fork and knife slip through her graceful fingers and fall with a clatter. "Mary? She's coming back?"

"She says for a visit," Cora replies and her face is alight with excitement and unless the light is playing tricks, brimming tears. "But I hope," she whispers this last bit, her hand on her heart. Lavinia is sure she is the only person who notices. "I hope."

Lavinia's husband clears his throat, raises his glass in a silent toast. "Well, that's wonderful then." His voice gives away nothing. Lavinia thought that once they were married she would grow to learn how to read him like her most treasured book but he only grows more and more distant, more and more flat, like a character that is easily forgotten.

Lavinia does not examine her own feelings. She cannot. She has learned to lock them away, in a secret place, to be taken out and unlocked when she is ready to rifle through them and actually feel them. This way her face remains emotionless. For a brief second, Lavinia wonders if this was Mary's trick.

Hide it all away, where no one can see what love or grief one bears.

Isobel, ever practical, speaks next. "And what is the reason for this return?"

Cora starts to speak but Robert lays his hand on top of hers so it is his words to fill the dining room. He, like Matthew, clears his throat. She knows Robert thinks of Matthew as a surrogate son and wonders if gestures like these are learned–the tilt of the head, the adjustment of a cufflink. She wonders if Robert still wishes it was Mary sitting in Lavinia's place. "She's coming with another family...the Banks-Duncans. The parents are staying in London and Mary is bringing the brother and sister to stay. She said...she said, the parents may join us later." His words are rough. Yes, there is a part of him that is happy, Lavinia can tell, thrilled at the idea of seeing his Mary but there is something else too, some dread, some hidden wish he forgot to lock away that Mary is coming to take away and it's almost as if Robert cannot catch his breath.

Men do not know how to lock things away as women do.

"Well, that's very strange," the Dowager finally picks up her silverware. "That is just very strange. Who are these people?"

"The ice cream baron," Edith says aloud, like a humming in the room. "You remember, Granny, Mary said she wasn't interested, that they were only friends..."

The Dowager scoffs. "You don't bring a friend on a trip back to see your family."

"Exactly," Edith replies.

The Dowager lays down her wine glass. "You do not bring a friend on a trip back to see your family, with his family in tow." Her eyes flash to Cora and Robert. "Is she engaged?"

Lavinia and Matthew both wince at the same moment, though for different reasons. Their marriage, already on a lacking foundation, is only shakily growing, each of them giving into compromises out of guilt and helplessness, neither one of them as blissfully happy as she imagined they would be while she laid with her head on his heart on their honeymoon in Italy. Ho fame, she said. I'm hungry. And she was and he filled her. Now, she is ravenous, the wounds or holes in her are gaping, and there is nothing to nourish her.

Cora's smile returns. "No, she isn't."

"Not yet," Edith retorts.

"Well, that explains it," the Dowager adds and even her breath appears shaken. "Mary would want things done correctly and the boy, the baron, the whatever-may-have-you has to ask Robert before he can officially ask Mary for her hand."

Lavinia hears Matthew suck in a breath.

"I hope he isn't a great bore," Edith snaps. "I hope I don't have to hear about how wonderful this ice cream baron is either. I simply could not bear it. And I wonder if they'll get married h or..."

Matthew exhales.

I simply could not bear it.

"I'm sure Mary has chosen wisely, if she has chosen at all," Robert asserts. "We can only guess as to why she is coming–"

"Oh, Robert," Cora laments. "I know she is your little girl but it is painfully obvious, isn't it? And isn't this better than if she didn't involve us at all? I think it's marvelous, this effort she is making. Isn't it better that she wants us to meet the man she loves?"

Matthew swallows the rest of his wine.

Isn't this better?

Lavinia is not privy to the words Robert and Matthew murmur over cigars and port. More importantly or less importantly depending on one's point of view, Lavinia is not privy to how much port Matthew ingests.

You are not his keeper.

You are not his keeper.

But she is, in a way. When did she become a measuring jar, measuring every sip and glass, dividing the amount drunk by the amount of time elapsed, and of course, the subjective part–his behavior, the darting of his eyes, how he touches her or doesn't, what words he uses, what he does or does not say.

The women are silent, thinking their very loud thoughts. Mary's mother and grandmother, Lavinia can only imagine, are equal parts elated and worried. Who is this man she is bringing home? Edith is jealous, for form's sake. And Lavinia is...

She wonders if Mary will be able to see how unhappy Lavinia is. She wonders if Mary will look at Matthew and Lavinia and their marriage and think: I could have made him so much happier. Lavinia doesn't know what would be worse, if Mary sees them and thinks that or: I'm so glad I got away.

He has more to drink when they arrive home. His mother, who holds her tongue as often as Lavinia can imagine, says, "Matthew," in the same tone of voice she probably used when her boy was seven. But now he is a man. He is head of the house, the future Earl, and he continues to pour, a smirk on his face.

"I think I deserve it, don't you?" he asks. His voice is just a bit mean. She's read the stories and heard about them–the men who came back from war changed–and a part of Lavinia hopes that this is what the drinking is, a delayed reaction. She lies to herself. She is no better than him. She lies because everyone knows it is about Mary. They are all pretending. "After the shock we've had?"

"I don't think it is shocking" Isobel replies cooly, "for a daughter to return to the home she grew up in, to her family, for a visit. By the time she comes, it will nearly be a year since she left."

The Spring. Their one year anniversary, Lavinia realizes.

"Oh, Mother! It isn't a simple visit and you know it." He raises his voice.

"I won't talk to you when you are like this," Isobel replies quietly and walks away, leaving Lavinia to her husband.

"Matthew," Lavinia murmurs and touches his elbow. "You are right. It was a shock. Understandably–"

His head hangs forward. "Let's just go to bed, Lavinia."

They do just as he says. No one ever talks about the awkward moments in life–when you know your husband has some type of feeling (at the very least) for another woman and you must go up to bed and sleep beside him. No one talks of the walk up the stairs, or the turning of the knob, or the changing of the nightclothes. It feels hot in the room, though it is winter and there are crystals on the windows. But it feels hot, as if she cannot breathe.

And then his hands are on her face, his thumbs brushing away tears she never shed, as if she is made of porcelain. He murmurs her name: "Lavinia" against her mouth and Lavinia is only thankful that he says the right name and she kisses him back with all that thankfulness, which feels close enough to love, until they rolling across the bed and grabbing at one another's clothing.

"Oh, Matthew."

It is a sweaty bout and sloppy, like they are strangers kissing, bashing noses and biting lips on accident, and when it is over, Matthew falls forward. She thinks he says, "Thank God," against her shoulder.

What does he mean? Thank God. What can he mean?

But he is already asleep. There is no room or time or space for questions in their marriage and Lavinia falls asleep wondering if all marriages are like this, the husband's sweating body coldly pressing the wife's into the mattress, tears in the back of the throat she does not have the energy to shed, with the husband's last words before sleep Thank God and meanwhile, the wife cannot even ask what he is thankful for. She only knows it cannot be her.

Something wakes her in the night. It is not a sound or a noise. Matthew only grunts as she rolls him over so she can move. Her monthly courses have started again, on time. There is no baby. Again. She starts to feel the usual sadness and grief for what could have been but it is not there. She only remembers her husband's words: Thank God. Thank God.

And then she remembers that this is what Mary is coming home to and for a moment, Lavinia wishes she could warn her: don't come back...if you're coming back for him, he isn't worth it...your life can only be better for being gone.

Of course, these thoughts startle and upset her. They aren't right. She goes back to bed and Matthew is too deep in slumber to reach for her and Lavinia thanks God, hating herself as she does.

A/N: So it's very interesting to write from these different points of view and not third person because Lavinia/Matthew etc are not privy to what is going on with Mary and you, the reader, are not privy to what happened to Mary after the last chapter...But you will be...if you still care. Are people reading this? lol