I've come to believe that in everyone's life, there's one undeniable moment of change, a set of circumstances that suddenly alters everything. - Nicholas Sparks

November 5, 1919

The Branson Flat

Edith lay in her bed, listening to the early morning activity in the flat. Tom and Sybil were bustling around, getting ready for work, laughing and teasing each other. She sniffed. Sybil had burned the toast again. Her sister was such a quick study at important things like suturing a wound or delivering a baby, but for some reason she continued to struggle at mundane tasks like cooking. Not that she herself would know the first thing about how to make toast, she snorted.

The Crawley girls had been raised to marry peers and have children. Good posture and the ability to direct servants had been the defining characteristics of their education; small wonder that her sister was struggling. But she never gave up, never lost faith that one day she would serve Tom a three course dinner fit for a king with her own little hands. Not for the first time, Edith marveled at her sister's tenacity and unflagging hopefulness.

Of course, it helped that her husband was such a good actor. Tom pretended that every attempt was a major achievement, every piece of charred carbon just the way he liked it. Of course Sybil knew he was lying through his teeth, and she probably knew that he took lunch at the pub more often than necessary, but she appreciated the effort and loved him the more for his deceit. Those two had rose colored glasses affixed to their faces; they were so much in love that Edith didn't know how much longer she would be able to stand the happiness.

She had been here a month, and she no longer worried about being in Tom and Sybil's way…this flat was so huge that they could go all day without running across one another if they wanted to. That Granny Martha! She did not mince around when it came to spending money on those she deemed worthy. Edith rather enjoyed watching Tom's discomfiture at the opulence of this place. Served him right, running off with her sister like that.

The door to the flat slammed, and quiet settled down like a mantle around Edith, leaving her alone with her thoughts. She had gotten nowhere with the grandiose plans she'd made before she had arrived in Ireland. It had been silly to think she could get a job—doing what, for heaven's sake? She hadn't given up the idea; neither that nor a flat of her own, but she wasn't thinking about those things today. No…today was special. Today she was meeting Patrick for lunch. For some reason, the thought made her giddy with anticipation, and at the same time left her quivering with anxiety.

She hadn't seen him since the evening she'd been invited to the Branson home for a dinner to welcome her back to Ireland. Nothing like the dinners she was used to at Downton, here it was all raucous banter and good-natured teasing. She had been accepted without question; she was Sybil's sister, and that was good enough for them. Moreover, she had chosen to come back to them, of her own accord. Edith had felt so included, she had nearly begun to cry.

But after that magical evening, she had seen almost nothing of Patrick. He was laboring for his brother-in-law Daniel nearly around the clock, and according to Sybil this new work ethic was nothing short of miraculous. In the past, Patrick had gone from job to job like a honeybee, her sister told her, sampling each and never finding one to his liking.

When challenged, he had argued that he didn't mind work; he just liked fun more, and he couldn't see why the two couldn't go together. Tom had snorted and informed him that juggling several girlfriends at a time was not the kind of work that generally paid well, and it usually resulted in disaster, whereupon Patrick had shrugged and insisted that the right job was out there; he just hadn't found it yet.

And then he had. Two months ago, when the doctor had cleared him to return to work, Daniel had taken a chance and put his brother-in-law on his construction crew, and Patrick had fallen in love…with wood. Now his conversation was all about the mystery in the grain, the beauty just waiting to be set free with the right tools and the right ears to hear it calling. He had deserted the pub and the girls had deserted him, complaining that he was no fun anymore. He didn't care.

The Patrick Branson that Edith had met at the wedding party had been a mass of bruises, body hunched like that of an elderly man, nose swollen and blue. And yet, he had taken the time to sit with her, to tell her stories and jokes, to make her feel at home in this alien world. She had liked him very much. She had assumed that he was handsome, like his brothers—but never would she have believed that under the bruises and the swelling there was this ridiculously gorgeous creature! The discovery left her shy and awkward; she no longer knew what to say to him. Looks shouldn't matter, but they did, and this new Patrick was just too different. The easy comraderie of the wedding party was gone.

But now he had sent a message through Tom, asking her to have lunch with him at Murphy's Pub. Edith had been to Murphy's before; it was where Tom had introduced her to Irish beer, for which he had earned her eternal love and respect. But the prospect of being there with Patrick had her uneasy and worried. Maire worked there now, and Edith still was not sure how to take Tom's fractious sister. She had been polite enough, but there was a reserve, a coolness there, and Edith couldn't help but remember the horrible insults she had hurled at Papa not so long ago. Did she still feel that way? She wished Sybil could be there today. She wished she had just a tiny bit of the courage her sister had. She wished she had not told Patrick she would go.

Then she brightened as she remembered…they had Guinness at Murphy's. At least there was that.

November 5, 1919

Mater Misericordiae Hospital

As she went about her rounds at the hospital, Sybil was wondering what to do about her sister. Edith said she was enjoying herself—but was she? She really didn't do anything. It was a bit frustrating; everyone in Sybil's life now worked, hard. She felt guilty that she'd had so little time to spend with her sister, but Edith didn't seem to mind. She just seemed happy to be away from Downton.

And that was also odd. She'd been here a month, and showed no signs of leaving any time soon. Tom's family had been very kind to her, but they treated her like a priceless vase that had been given into their care…as if they were responsible for her but didn't know what to do with her. For her part, Edith had seemed grateful to be included in Sybil's new world, and determined to belong.

She remembered her own first days in Dublin, and shuddered. Edith should be happy that her sister had paved the way with Tom's family so she didn't have to suffer the hostility and mistrust that she herself had faced just because she was English! Darling Tom had tried to be a buffer, to show his family that his fiancée was different, but the hatred that ran through Ireland at the British 'invasion', as they saw it, was ingrained in their culture, and for good reason.

She wondered if they ever would have come round if it hadn't been for the attempted murder of their brother, and the part Sybil had played in his remarkable recovery. But for that drama and the bizarre happenings before…and during…her wedding, she might still be an outsider. And how bleak her life here would have been!

Before Tom, she had known nothing about what it meant to be Irish, to be dominated and subjugated for your religion and your language. Encased in her cocoon of British nobility, she had never even met an Irish person, had thought herself forward-thinking, a real rebel, because she believed in women's rights. She had known nothing about suffering, about the vast gulf between the aristocracy and the poor. She had been so blind.

She wondered, for the hundredth time, how Tom had ever come to love her, coming from such a hotbed of loathing for her kind. She had only seen him explode that one time when he was their chauffeur, when she had made the childish comment, "I know we were not at our best in Ireland", only to have him spit out the story of his cousin Eamon's murder during the Easter Rising. She really had been sure he hated her then, and had experienced a desolation at that moment that had enlightened her for the first time as to how serious her own feelings for him had become.

But he hadn't hated her. Tom was the most forgiving, the most genuine person she knew. She should have trusted him, should have known that he was too honest to let a moment's anger and passion change his feelings for her. She should have understood the depth of his love when he had first proposed in York. Should have said yes.

She shook herself back to her duties. Thinking of Tom always made her mind wander. Back to what her life might have been if she hadn't realized that she loved him as he did her. She had told him she was ready to travel—a silly thing to say, but the simple truth. It was the moment that her life had truly begun, the one that had changed everything she had once believed and taken for granted. "You are my ticket," she had told him, and the look on his face would be embedded in her heart forever.

She sighed. That was what Edith needed—someone like Tom to come along and change her life. But there was only one Tom. She chuckled to herself, remembering another conversation at Downton, with her granny Violet. "I will not give him up!" she had snapped, stamping her foot. And she hadn't…he was hers. Sybil was very much afraid that Edith was on her own there. She'd just have to find her own hero.

November 5

Murphy's Pub

"So, Pat, haven't seen you in here for awhile," said Colum. "Heard you were working, but didn't believe that! What brings you back into high society?"

Patrick flinched at his words. Wait till Colum saw his lunch date! He was debating the answer to that question, wishing he'd never asked Edith to meet him here. High society, for sure; what the hell had he been thinking? And why had she even agreed to come? Probably the prospect of a pint or two, if his guess was correct.

When he'd picked her up at the ferry last month, she had been shy and reserved, had barely said a word all the way to Sybil and Tom's flat. Nothing like the woman he remembered from the wedding party. That one had been fun. They had traded stories and teased each other all evening, laughing and sharing copious amounts of Colum's fine ale.

And then when they'd met again a few days later at Mam's for a welcome dinner party of sorts, she had barely looked at him. He wondered if he had imagined the woman at the wedding party, conjured her up out of his own boredom with the girls he was used to. She was just as lovely as before, and he glimpsed that beautiful smile when she joked with Tom or Sybil, but there was nothing there for him. The woman he remembered was gone.

He was jerked out of his glum thoughts by an intake of breath at the table next to his, and looked up to see Lady Edith standing in the doorway. In this environment she was a picture of gentility, like a spring flower peeking up in a farmer's field, rare and precious. He felt a sudden pride that she was there because of him. Pride, and a surprising stirring in the region of his heart.

Pinned in place by all the faces looking at her with curiousity, Edith's eyes darted around the pub in panic; she looked like a deer poised to flee. Patrick jumped up and crossed to her before she could do so, pasting on his best smile, and received a tremulous one in return. Christ, she was beautiful, he thought.

Moments later Lady Edith Crawley sat across from Patrick Branson, wondering if she should have come. She had never seen anything like him; she felt as if she were drowning in his blue eyes…losing herself. It had taken everything she had to keep her eyes off him at the Bransons', but here there was nowhere else to look. She was adrift, and it frightened her.

"How 'bout a glass of God's finest?" he asked. "I seem to remember that you and Lord Guinness were quite good companions." She blushed, he laughed at her, and just like that, they were friends again.

From there the conversation flowed, as did the beer. Maire wasn't working, thank God, so Edith didn't have to deal with that distraction. She felt the worry and self-consciousness drain out of her as she and Patrick picked up right where they had left off at the wedding party. He ordered fish and chips, and laughed at her pathetic attempt to eat out of the greasy paper. She brandished a chip like a sword and pretended to be offended. It was as if the strain between them had never been.

She asked about his new job, and watched his eyes dance as he shared his pleasure in the creation of beauty. He asked her what she thought of Ireland, and she told him that she liked it very much. The truth was, she liked him very much. She needed to stay here longer—maybe forever; she wanted to spend more time with him, really get to know him.

Oh dear, was she getting drunk? But she was feeling a connection, an electricity, and she didn't think it was the alcohol. She also didn't think she was alone in the feeling. It was new, and lovely, and when she recognized it she felt a thrill of something she had seldom encountered before in her life. It was joy.

Edith shivered at a sudden chill. It felt slimy and foul; glancing out of the corner of her eye, she noticed a table of men in uniform across the room. Cold eyes glared at her with disgust, but it was nothing to the raw emotion she saw when they looked at Patrick. Hatred. Why? Who were they?

"British soldiers," Patrick said in a low, tight voice. "Don't look."

"But why are they staring at us?" she asked, confused. "Do they know you?"

"They don't have to," he sighed. "I'm Irish, and you're obviously of a higher class than me, so we shouldn't be together. They see it as an insult."

Edith took a sip of her third Guinness, looking at him over the edge of her glass. "And are we?…together?" Her face flushed bright red as she heard the words, but it was too late to take them back. She couldn't believe she had just said that and, and by his look of shock, neither could he. It was the alcohol talking—had to be. Her embarrassment was so acute that she pushed back her chair with a rush.

"I should go." Her eyes filled with tears. She had ruined things. She would never be able to look at him again.

His hand reached out across the table and took hers. A shock of electricity passed through her at the touch, leaving her trembling. Two pairs of wide eyes stared at each other. Something had just happened here—Edith did not know what it meant, but in that one moment, everything between them had changed.

"Is this man bothering you, miss?" A rough voice penetrated the fog, and she turned to see one of the British soldiers standing by their table, his posture threatening.

"N-no, thank you," she heard her voice, as if from a great distance. "No, everything is fine…we're together."


A/N: In April of 1916 the Irish Volunteers, led by the radical Irish Republican Brotherhood, led an insurrection known as the Easter Rising in Dublin. In one bloody week more than five hundred Irishmen died, many of them civilians. The British executed sixteen leaders and imprisoned thousands of Irish nationalists. These actions inflamed public opinion and led to the eventual victory by Sinn Féin in the elections of 1918, and the beginning of the Irish War Of Independence.

Pronunciation Guide:

Sinn Féin - shin + fane