Elizabeth knew before she went to bed that tomorrow morning would be a horror. Before they'd dropped Charlotte off at her house, Mrs. Bennet made Mrs. Lucas promise that they'd come over for Saturday morning brunch with the rest of the Lucas family. At the moment Mrs. Bennet and Mrs. Lucas were having a heated discussion on the latest Bingley gossip, both Charles and Caroline.
"You know Jane danced with him all night," Mrs. Bennet bragged loudly, though Mrs. Lucas was right next to her. Both the men in the room merely rolled their eyes and continued to talk about football, not at all interested in who's daughter was doing what with whom.
Mrs. Lucas shook her head. "I'm not sure that's such a good thing, you know. He's been known to have had quite a few girlfriends in the past."
Mrs. Bennet merely waved her off. "I've seen the other girls he's dated. None of them can even begin to compare with Jane's beauty."
"Beautiful or not, he's still dated a lot," Charlotte's mother persisted stubbornly. "We all know that Jane is the prettiest girl on Cape Cod. He would be a fool not to fall in love with her."
Mrs. Bennet looked very proud of herself for a moment, then her face scrunched up as she remembered an unpleasant thought. "Speaking of fools, how about that William Darcy character?"
Mrs. Lucas' eyes lit up in a way that eyes tend to do when gossiping. "He may be a fool, but he's a rich and famous fool. Or, at least he was. Still rich, mind you," she told the girls that were seated in various chairs around the room. "You'd all be fools if you didn't at least try to get his attention." Lydia and Kitty giggled with excitement, for they hadn't actually conversed with Darcy yet and still had high hopes that they could change his mind about being so inconsiderate.
"Excuse me Mrs. Lucas," Elizabeth added politely. "But I don't think that Darcy wants anyone's attention. He ignored both me and all the other partnerless girls." Silently Lizzie thought Mrs. Lucas must be a fool for trying to set up anyone with someone so distasteful.
"I wouldn't want any of my girls associating with that arrogant, mannerless, and mean tyrant!" Mrs. Bennet crossed her arms over her chest stubbornly.
"Mother!" Jane was shocked at the strong accusations her mother was making against a person who could hardly defend himself at the present time. "We hardly know him!"
"Didn't stop him from insulting you, did it?" Mrs. Bennet bit back, and Jane knew it was pointless to argue. "Anyway, Elizabeth, promise me that you'll never encourage him?"
Elizabeth looked up from the book she was reading for her English class and sighed, annoyed at her mother's tirades. "Yes mother, I promise that I will never willingly dance with William Darcy."
Her mother huffed and accepted the promise as adequate. "Well, that's that then. So I heard that Caroline Bingley..."
And so the gossip went on like this for the remainder of the morning. It wasn't long after Elizabeth's promise that Charlotte and Elizabeth were able to disentangle themselves from the conversation and go on a bike ride.
The Cape had many attractions for tourists, and several for wildlife preservation. In Cotuit there was a conservation that was right nearby their neighborhood and was easily accessible by bike. It was a dirt road that went along for nearly a mile and ended at the water. The girls decided to travel down that path that morning, and sat down on a bench to gaze out on the water and the gulls swooping down to get fish. They could feel the slight breeze come in that marked the change between summer and fall, and they tried to ignore it to bring back the memories of that summer.
"So your sister and Bingley?" Charlotte smirked after a while.
"Yes," Lizzie replied somewhat defensively. She knew that Jane had liked Bingley last night, but it'd only been one day. She felt that it wasn't right to jump to conclusions only after one meeting, and besides, Jane always had always liked people after her first meeting with them. Lizzie was often jealous of the amount of friends that her sister had, but too often she heard what they said about her behind her back and realized that Jane never really had a best friend beside Elizabeth. Elizabeth made sure to treasure both Charlotte and Jane for this reason.
"She'd better hold on to him," Charlotte warned. "Otherwise he'll think she's not interested in him."
Elizabeth furrowed her eyebrows. "She's shy!" Charlotte and Elizabeth had been friends for many years, after they met in kindergarten and realized that they lived close to one another, and even though they were very close, they still disputed over many things. Romance and boys were a main argument during sleepovers.
Charlotte shook her head. "That doesn't matter. If she doesn't show she's interested, then he'll leave. Just watch. Boys are so easily distracted." Charlotte was speaking from experience on this one, for her only potential boyfriend left her while she was deciding on whether or not to accept his offer to take her out to lunch. Though she'd never entertained a thought for him, she'd learned a very important lesson about boys that day.
"Give her more credit," Elizabeth prodded. "It's only been a day. Besides, shouldn't someone be sure that they like someone else before encouraging a relationship?"
"By then it could be too late." Charlotte turned her attentions back to the water and watched a lone sailboat float across the water. "Just watch, you'll see."
***
It was the Bingley's and Darcy's first day of High School, and already the teachers knew that their students attentions would hardly be focused on their studies. A few teachers were wise enough to bargain with the kids, that if they allowed a few minutes of free time to chat with the celebrities then they would have to give their undivided attention to the lesson, but some were not quite aware of the excitement of their students and continued to teach the lesson despite the uncontrollable giggling. Charlie's protests of, "I'd actually like to learn something," and "what if this is on the test," remained un listened to by his new classmates, who just thought that everything he said was the funniest thing ever.
Whatever classes he had with Jane and Darcy, he made a point of sitting in the middle so that no one would claim him as their seating partner and pass notes all class. He knew that no one would dare talk about anything to Darcy, and Jane was too good of a student to talk in class. So for two out of his seven classes, he was completely safe. There were two additional classes that he had with just Darcy, but even then someone managed to talk to him.
Rumors blazed through the school like a wildfire, revolving especially around the newly budding romance of Charles Bingley and Jane Bennet. They would spend many of their lunches together, either in the public library next to the school, hunched over books and doing homework, or when there wasn't much homework to be done, they would just walk the streets of Main Street Hyannis.
Occasionally Elizabeth or Darcy would join them, and sometimes both at the same time. When this happened it was mainly Jane, Charlie and Elizabeth making conversation. Darcy mostly just absorbed his surroundings and listened intently to the Bennet sisters in particular.
Caroline Bingley turned out to meet most, if not all, of Elizabeth's suspicions, and became the Queen Bee of the junior class. There had never been many cliques before, but all of the smaller popular type groups merged with Caroline as dictator. Though many of the teenagers there wished they could be part of the new empire, Elizabeth thought that all of their color coordinating depending on day of the week and strutting about the old school like they owned it was stupid and unnecessary. They had a mutual distaste for each other and took careful measures to avoid the other at all costs.
This was a hard feat for the both of them, as they had many of the same SL classes together. Caroline could only take SL classes, and unfortunately the subjects that they were together in Caroline was only better at by a few points. It became an unspoken rivalry between the two to see who could get the higher points on a quiz or a test. Charlotte naturally thought that their childish squabbles were pointless, but Elizabeth revelled in the chance to prove herself. The class found enjoyment in these games too, and between taunting the two and asking Caroline for autographs, it was amazing anyone got any work done.
Eventually as the weeks went by, the Bingley's became less of a novelty and Charlie was able to talk to Darcy without the fear of twenty five people listening on, much to all the newcomer's enthusiasm. Classes slowly lulled back into their previous excitement factor and teachers became much more patient with the celebrities. None of them really liked Darcy or Caroline very much, but Charlie seemed to be a gift from God to the school. Charlie was in love with the new environment as well, and thought the simpleness of it all was very cute.
"So what do you think of the school?" Bingley whispered to Darcy during science one day. Though he was bright, most of the material discussed was taught the year before, and it took a lot of effort on Bingley's part to keep up. Today was one of the days that he felt lazy enough to not listen.
"It is not up to standards when it comes to simple things like cleaning, but the academics are challenging enough to keep me interested," Darcy breathed back in his pompous way of speaking.
Charlie nodded slightly in agreement, though he disapproved of his friend's tone. "What do you think of the girls? I don't think I've seen a more attractive group in all my life."
Darcy's mouth seemed to turn in an almost- smile. "Yes, you were always into the natural types. I, on the other hand, was quite content with the California race."
Charlie rolled his eyes. "If by content you mean disgusted, then yes, you were content. You say I like them natural, and I say you like them brainy and fiery. Trust me, this is a good of a place as any to find such a girl. You can't mean to tell me that you haven't found a single smart girl to hold your interests?"
Darcy paused, uncomfortable with the topic. Females had never been his strong suit and all this talk of their race lately had drawn a line between the two of them, especially during lunches when Bingley would hide out with Jane and leave Darcy with Caroline, whom he despised even more than all of the girls in California. "It seems that someone has... captured my, er, special attention, as it were."
The brilliant grin that crossed Bingley's face was bright enough to light the room. "I'll bet it's Elizabeth, isn't it?"
Darcy realized his mistake just then, knowing that his friend was bound to tell his sister, and the resulting effect would be for the whole school to find it out via Facebook. Or, even worse, Twitter, Tumblr and Facebook. He needed an excuse, and he needed one fast. "She has intelligent eyes," he defended.
Bingley's face fell. "Oh, that's all?"
"Is there something you'd like to share with the class, you two?" their stout Environmental teacher scolded from the Smartboard.
"No ma'am," Darcy stood up straighter and shot a dirty look to Bingley.
"Ah, you're no fun..." Bingley whispered back and began to copy the notes that their teacher had written on the document during their argument.
What Darcy kept from him is that he was fonder of her mind than her intelligent eyes.