You're gonna need an awful big glass of water to get that down
Will's headache starts early. The grumblings of a possible headache start as they get off the plane, out into the sunshine. It grows as the car turns off the main road, under the arching 'Bennet's Farm' sign. It reaches the stabbing-behind-the-left-eye thing just as they get out of the car, and Jane Bennet walks to meet them. Well, it might not be that, so much as Charles's reaction. His smile, his kiss on both cheeks, her mother's pointed look at the next oldest daughter. It reaches all-head-encompassing heights as the event begins, the lights: dim, the music, frankly: country. They have, he grudgingly admits to himself, done a fabulous job with the venue. The farm is idyllic, the whole feel vibrant and fun yet somehow homely, traditional. He's not quite sure how they've done it. Either way, Charles finishes his speech, a few local democrats talk briefly, and, thankfully, not too damningly, the music starts up, accompanied by dancing, and Will's headache reaches blinding proportions. He sits on what he realises to late is a genuine hay bale, right in the corner, and tries to will his headache away. He's squinting, or maybe has one eye closed. He can't tell anymore. He does note, thankfully, that his staff are all coping brilliantly. Matt and Chris are chatting in the corner with some farmers, beers waving, jokes sailing, and hopefully, some politics talking. Viv is also chatting her heart out, engaged with a group of older women, laughing with them and looking at pictures of their grandchildren. Even Jaime is dancing with some unidentifiable young man. Caroline, of course, looks a little frosty, but that's no surprise. In fact, he realises, just too late, she's walking over.
"You look how I feel," she says, smiling sardonically.
"And how is that?"
"Like I wish I was off my head on vodka."
He can't help but nod agreement. Caroline sits down beside him, offers a few choice words for the person who thought of using hay bales as seating, and then sighs. "This is completely insupportable. I do get to the point when I just don't care about large swathes of the population."
Will grunts. He's not sure what other sounds would be possible without making his head spilt open. A cough disturbs them.
"I'm sorry," says Jane Bennet. "Mr Bingley asked me to bring this to you Mr Darcy."
He manages to look up to see the shining vision of hair and teeth and eyes, now wearing the denim as suggested by someone on the team. Someone who Caroline will no doubt attempt to fire on Monday. She's carrying it off much better than Caroline. It may have something to do with good grace and a genuine smile. She holds out a bottle to Will, smiles, and then turns to leave.
"Jen, is it?" interrupts Caroline.
"Jane," she says, and smiles. Again.
"Jane," says Caroline, as one might to a beloved niece. "Come and sit here, and point out your family to me. I just love these small town gatherings, you know."
Will notes, without much surprise, that Jane is genuinely touched.
"Well, all right. Thank you. I should only be a second though. I've promised to teach Mr Bingley to line dance." She laughs, shrugging at the craziness of it all. "It's so bizarre!"
"Very strange," says Caroline, between clenched teeth.
Will lowers the bottle from his forehead where it has been functioning as an icepack, to finally glance at the label. Grandma Bennet's secret-recipe lemonade. Typical. He looks up and catches Charlie's eye. Charlie grins, before turning back to the heartfelt conversation he is having with an old couple. He talks for a few seconds, shakes hands, and then walks towards them.
"How're you doing?" he asks them all.
"Wonderfu,l" says Caroline, teeth clenched.
"I'm great," says Jane, easy, honest.
"I want to die," mutters Will, placing the bottle back against his forehead.
"Good, good," says Charlie, clapping Will on the shoulder, enjoying his discomfort. "Jane, come and teach me how to do this. I've promised Brenda a go round the dance floor, and I can't embarrass myself in front of a hottie like that!" He turns and winks at the little old lady in the corner who blushes and giggles in return.
Will makes a noise somewhere between a growl and a grunt, which causes Charles to turn and say, "you want to come too Will? I'm sure Caroline would like a dance."
Will sends a look of such loathing to Charles as to hopefully kill him. No such luck.
"I'd be hopeless at this," says Caroline, gesturing vaguely ahead of her.
"Well maybe one of your sisters could teach them?" offers Charles, smiling at Jane. She smiles back. For a change.
"Sure. Lizzie loves a good dance."
"See Will? Lizzie will dance with you. Oh!" he continues. "The timing! Lizzie, right?" He catches a girl by her elbow and she spins round to face him, dark curls flying. "Want to teach a city boy with a stick up his ass to dance?"
Her expression which had been suspicious, largely mirroring Will's look of loathing, drops as she smiles. "Really?" she says. "And who might that be?"
Charles steps aside, and gestures in such a way which might legitimately be accompanied by a 'TA-DA!' "Will here has not moved a foot all night."
She gazes down at him for a second. "Really?" she says again, the loathing beginning to creep back. So she likes smilers. Tough. The headache is now stabbing at both eyes. Smiling is off the agenda. "You want to dance?"
He manages both eyes open to look at her. She is not smiling. "Not desperately," he manages to answer.
A tall, ruggedly handsome young man approaches them. "Jane, Lizzie? Want to dance?"
Charles grins. "Ah, see, Jane's about to dance with me, and Lizzie is trying to entice my friend Will here onto the floor, but Caroline…she is otherwise unengaged."
Caroline opens her mouth, and then closes it again.
"Really? Would you like to dance Ma'am?"
She closes her eyes for a second, breathes out heavily, and then plasters on her best smile. "Sure," she says. "Why ever not?"
"See, isn't that great?" says Charlie. "Let's go. Will, Lizzie, we'll see you on the dance floor." He takes Jane's hand and they walk away into the group of people dancing. Caroline shoots Will a deadly look, and then follows with her partner. Finally, he is left alone. Well. Not quite. There appears to be an angry looking girl at his elbow. She sits down with whumph of hay. "You think you're better than this?"
He turns to look at her. "I really don't."
She raises an eyebrow, then stares at his face for a few seconds longer, frowning slightly, before standing up. "Come with me."
"Really, I wasn't kidding about dancing."
She stands, looking even less enamoured, if that was possible. "I wasn't going to force you," she says, grabs his hand and pulls. "Bring the lemonade," she shoots back over her shoulder, as she drags him through the crowd towards the big barn doors, open to the inky night. She doesn't stop marching forward until they reach a fence which Will, ungainly at the sudden change of light, plus the disability of an excruciating headache, walks straight into.
"What the…"
She lets go of his hand, or more precisely, his wrist, and climbs up the fence until she's sitting on the top rail. "Come on," she says, patting the wide wood beside her. "I'll take the lemonade." She lifts the bottle out of his hands, takes a sip, and sighs. She turns, and realises that he still hasn't moved. "I'm not kidding. Get up here."
Will, contemplating how quickly he could kill himself out here, finally gives in. He hoists himself up the fence, swings his legs over, and sits down.
"Lemonade," she says, quietly, handing it to him, and then, "sip."
He raises an eyebrow. She is unmoving. He sighs heavily, and then sips.
"Now breathe."
"Oh good advice. Wasn't doing that before."
"Breathe." For a small, young woman, she is incredibly threatening. He sighs, and then takes a deep breath. And then another.
"Better?"
He turns to her, confused. "There was nothing wrong."
She snorts with laughter, and shakes her head. "Bull. You had a headache. A massive one."
"How the hell did you know that?"
She shrugs. "You were looking like how it feels. Keep drinking. It'll make it better."
He takes another swig of lemonade, and the stabbing ceases. It still pounds, but at least he can see now in the cool night air. They sit in silence, the murmur of the party behind them, crickets ahead.
"So you're his chief of staff?"
"Yeah."
"Oh."
Silence again.
"You're Jane's sister?"
"One of four."
"There are four of you?"
She smiles, slightly at his horror. "Four sisters. Five including Jane."
"Sheesh," he mutters, and takes another sip of lemonade.
"Well luckily we're all just about as charming as you, so, you know, we'll go far." Her voice drips sarcasm. He'd seen it in books, and never understood it, and yet, there it is, dripping with sarcasm. "You going to manage not to have a fit or something?" she asks.
"I'll be all right."
"Then I can go back to the party that I've spent every waking hour this week organising?"
He bristles. He can't help it. "I never asked you to drag me out here."
"No," she says. "And yet you were bringing the whole thing down with your delightful expression of pure unutterable joy." She sighs and adds as an after thought, "you had a bit of an Inigo Montoya thing going on." She swings around on the top of the fence, and jumps off.
"I wasn't going to kill anyone. Probably," mutters Will, more to himself than anyone else. Lizzie stops, and looks up at him, smiling slightly. Then she walks back to the party, leaving him alone in the star spangled darkness.
Fr: ebethbnet
To: charlottelu at warnerstantonandlane
Subject: The flocking flying party
Remind me never to go back into politics. No matter how desperate I get, no matter how wander-lusty, no matter how many times I rant to you about the government and education and how kids don't have to read anymore, no matter any of that, even if I tell you that I genuinely want to do it politics, don't let me. Chain me to your radiator if you have to. They're a bunch of blood sucking ass kissing hypocritical douche bags and I want nothing to do with them.
Remind me of all this when you've chained me up, just so that I don't get resentful.
Liz x
Fr: charlottelu at warnerstantonandlane
To: ebethbnet
Subject: It wasn't that bad, really.
Cheer up Lizzie. It could be worse. You could have a massive amount of Democrats all crammed into your farm telling you about policy and issues and…oh wait!
It wasn't that bad. Some of them were a bit pushy, a bit dull. A few were pure hell (naming no names, Caroline Formisano- that woman is charming and beautiful on TV. Clearly the screen adds charisma as well as weight) but most were quite nice. Charles Bingley was charm personified. If it weren't for the fact that he's clearly smitten with Jane (so, you know, you're probably stuck with him for a while) I'd go after him myself. What a bonus. Great prospects, and hot.
Anyway, where did you go half way through? I saw you and Bingley's chief of staff going out, and then you didn't come back for a good few minutes, and he didn't re-emerge for AGES. Did you push him into the lake? Please tell me you did. Although he maybe hotter than Bingley himself. Clearly not as charming, but still. Who cares when he's got those eyes, and that accent?
Charley x
Fr: ebethbnet
To: charlottelu at warnerstantonandlane
Subject: You sing cheep cheep chirp chirp and I will kill you dead.
You are weird and sick and twisted. You're mistaking hot for DEEPLY ANNOYING. It's an easy mistake to make, but still…And the accent? No. It's annoying. Clearly an affectation. Or result of private school. Either way, I don't like it.
You and my Mom should huddle. She too thinks that Jane and Charles would make a fabulous couple. I dread what she plans to do tomorrow, or what she may have already done. Oh sheesh…My mother is a liability. If I were Henry the what, 2nd? 3rd? I'd have accidentally had her offed by my knights by now. You know it's true.
Better go. The sun'll come up soon, and I probably could do with some sleep so as I'm not even more confrontational tomorrow. Got to keep the end up for Janey.
In the meantime, find yourself someone NORMAL. Clearly you're getting frazzled by a lack of male attention. We need to find us some dudes.
Liz xx
Fr: charlottelu at warnerstantonandlane
To: ebethbnet
Subject: LACK OF MALE ATTENTION?
Thanks for that Liz. I appreciate the underlining of how I haven't met a guy in ages and am becoming slightly desperate. No, no. Thank YOU.
And stop being such a grouch. Not only did I also go to private school, but you went to a private college did you not? So when I say HYPOCRITE, you say, ME!
You clearly need some sleep. As do I. And a man. I shall fall asleep and dream of William Darcy, and there's nothing you can do to stop me, so HA!
Charley