Chapter Sixteen
Lavinia watches the wedding passionately–or tries to. In the back of her mind, she worries for her husband, the seat absent beside him, but yes, she watches the wedding with passion, surprising even herself.
The colors are deep and dramatic–the lush green of the the grounds, like an emerald, are the background for Mary. Her dress is delicate and beautiful. Mary appears soft and dreamy, as if she is painted in watercolor while the greenery of summer around her is done in oils. Nonetheless, Mary is the one everyone's eyes are drawn to. She glances down and smiles, almost shyly and it shocks Lavinia because she's never seen any expression like this on Mary's face before. She's beautiful, stunning–carrying the the flowers as tenderly as she would a child.
The groom is grinning so widely, his dimples so pronounced, Lavinia is shocked his lips do not split. There is a sparkle in his eye as he repeats his vows to her even as his voice turns serious with every word he speaks. Mary's voice is calm and slow. She is careful over every word. She deliberates over the vows, making them count. But her eyes never leave Mackenzie's. They are certain and sure, locked together, and the people sitting in the pews are just lucky to be there at all. They chose one another and they are certain and sure.
Lavinia wills herself not to think of her own wedding, the jittery nervous feeling in the pit of her stomach, the hope living and breathing in her chest. After all, it is so very hard to kill hope, especially a hope like Lavinia's, she who hoped against the overwhelming evidence that Matthew loved Mary because he was marrying her. He chose her–after she gave him a million ways out, after she tied up the letters they wrote one another with a blue bow and set them aside, after she asked him if he still loved her. Matthew chose Lavinia. So today, Mary chooses Mack.It is hard to kill hope, especially the stupid kind.
So, so, so, very stupid!
Don't forget the stupidity of it.
She presses one hand to her heart without meaning to and tears gather in her eyes. She realizes it is a little inappropriate, quite dramatic to cry at the wedding of a cousin by marriage, a cousin her husband loved more than her. Lavinia is not sure if he still loves Mary; the only thing she is sure Matthew loves is the drinking. The Matthew in their marriage now is one Lavinia does not know and does not want to know. She never planned on this Matthew. Sometimes, when she is very tired, when Matthew is so still she listens for his breath, she wonders if it is her. If Matthew married Mary, would he be this man? It makes her so very angry because he chose. She would like to scream at him: you chose me! And for what? For what? For this? But she doesn't.
Does he want her to just take it? Well, she won't.
It takes all of Lavinia's strength not to march up the aisle and grab Mary by the elbow. Where is your cousin, she might say. And they would find him, somewhere, in a drunken stupor. And then Lavinia would say, why, oh, why would you ever want to get married? They change, you see. But Mary does not glance her way. Mary doesn't think of Lavinia or Matthew. There is no triangle. There is only Mary and Mack.
Finally, the ceremony is over and the new couple walk back down the aisle from which they came, Mack raising their joined hands in jubiliation. For a moment, Mary's eyes ghost over the empty chair beside Lavinia.
And Lavinia realizes that not only is this an ending, the breaking of an everlasting, god awful triangle, but it can be a beginning too–her beginning. Goosebumps break out along her neck.
He does not get to choose everything.
If she stays...If she stays, she knows the way the story ends.
It won't ever be tender or sweet.
Then, one day he will grow to blame her. If she wasn't so–and he will fill in the sentence with some hurtful adjective.
She will cry. If she stays...she will cry often. She will taste misery on the tip of her tongue, even after he's gone; the smell of it, of alcohol, will cling to her skin and clothes, as if she is drenched in a vice that does not even belong to her.
She will be helpless to it, a little boat in storm tossed waves. She's never been very good at taking a stand but, oh. She cannot go on like this and her eyes fill.
She tells herself she will change. She tells herself all sorts of things to get through. She is always trying only to get through.
She tells herself that this is the last time she will cry, over Matthew Crawley, over Mary, over the whole mess of them.
She lies.
She drinks champagne.
When people ask where Matthew is, she lies.
Are you all right, dear? someone asks.
And Lavinia lies.