A/N Thank you for all the reviews. You're all lovely, lovely people.
The pull down seat next to hers was lowered. Legs clad in pinstripe filled it, a wig was placed on the desk.
"Good morning Michael."
"Ms Crawley." Somehow he'd got it into his head that it was funny if he said her title with an affectation – Muzzz Crawley. "Coffee." He'd also spent the last two weeks of the trial bringing her a morning coffee, spat out by one of the machines in the now-closed court cafe. Completely, unaware, of course, that she preferred tea - he'd never asked - and that the only coffee she really liked was made for her by Anthony after he woke up and bought to her in bed with an almond croissant and a kiss - she couldn't expect him to know that because no one did.
"Thank you."
"Home stretch now. We've got, what? Two more days of evidence, a little bit of law to debate, a couple of days worth of closing submissions - I know you're looking forward to mine -" he wriggled his elbow into her rib cage playfully, she shifted away slightly with a scowl in his direction, "then Strallan will finally do some bloody work and sum this thing up and we're done."
"Verdicts."
He waved a hand, "yes, yes, but all the work's done, we just wait around for those."
"It'll be peculiar when it's finished." Anthony had been told to prepare for his appointment once the trial had concluded. He didn't talk very much about it but she knew he was nervous.
"So, Edith, what are your plans after this is all over?"
It took a moment for her to realise he wasn't talking about her and Anthony - she didn't have any plans for when that was over. She never wanted it to be over.
"Back to my pre-Snaresbrook life, I suppose. You?" She blew a stream of air across the slowly coagulating surface of the drink.
"I'm off to Woolwich for a murder." He took a deep breath as though he was about to address the court, "I was wondering if you'd like to go for dinner with me."
The coffee nearly shot out of her nose, as it was she coughed and spluttered. Bates looked in their direction, arching an eyebrow. Mrs Hughes clicked her tongue.
"You mean, on a date?"
"I do."
"I can't."
"Can't?"
"Well I suppose I could. It's just -" she eyed the door to Anthony's chambers.
The words clogged in her mind. She and Anthony had been together, if that was the right word, for just over two months. They'd spent nearly every night with one another. At the weekends they went to galleries and films and the theatre, or they just curled up in bed for a merry-go-round of sex, reading and eating.
There were no words for it, he'd offered none and nor had she. They weren't a couple, or partners, or an item. She wasn't a girlfriend. He wasn't a boyfriend. No one really knew about them. They'd said nothing to Mrs Hughes or HHJ Carson. She hadn't shared with Matthew at one of their lunches, or her Mother during their brief weekly phone calls. Thomas made lewd comments and arched suggestive eyebrows and, of course, he knew, because Anthony stayed with her in Brixton as often as she stayed with him in Notting Hill and Thomas was no idiot. But Edith confirmed nothing. She simply didn't discuss it.
In public they continued as they always had. There was no hand holding, or kissing. She didn't curl an arm about his waist or fit her hand through the crook of his elbow.
These were mere semantics though and they didn't bother her, because when they were alone, in private, she belonged to him, and he belonged to her. Finally, there was a place in the world where she fit. It was glorious, and she was gloriously happy. It came with an absolute faith that they would find a way to shape a future. They simply had to. It wasn't that the alternative was too hard to contemplate; she simply couldn't contemplate it at all. She was for Anthony, and he was for her.
"I'm sort of seeing someone."
"You're rejecting me for someone you're -" He bracketed her words with visual quotations and a furrowed brow, " 'sort of seeing'. I'm a very eligible bachelor you know." She shrugged, taking another sip of the horrid coffee. He grabbed at the section of white shirt covering his heart and leaned comically onto the desk, "your indifference wounds me, Ms Crawley! Have a care for my shattered heart!"
"Stop it for heaven's sake!" She looked nervously to the Judge's door. Still closed. Mrs Hughes sat at her desk though, firing Gregson a disparaging look.
He laughed and winked, "I hope the man you're 'sort of seeing' realises how lucky he is."
At the end of the court day Edith waited until the courtroom had emptied and then let herself into Anthony's chambers. He sat, as usual, behind his desk, typing up his notes of the day's evidence. He was glacially slow, a man who'd come of age before the computer age. As Edith stirred their tea the gentle tinkling of metal on crockery was accompanied by the rhythmic stabbing of key after key.
"You'll do that laptop a mischief." She held out the cup, he brushed an index finger along her thumb. Mrs Hughes knocked sharply on the door and Anthony took the tea, and his hand, away. Edith settled herself on the sofa.
"That was one of the dullest days this trial has seen, and I think you'll both agree that really is saying something." She handed Anthony a file he'd left behind and pulled Edith's pencil case out of her pocket, "You're getting to be as bad as him you know!"
Edith looked suitable sheepish, "sorry, thank you."
She bustled about, tidied the tea paraphernalia, brushed the creases from Anthony's robes, folded his wig and put it gently in the tin, "What was Mr Gregson pestering you about?"
Anthony continued to attack the keyboard. Edith's eyes flitted to him and back to Mrs Hughes, "actually, he asked me on a date." The typing stopped. His eyes left his notes and travelled across the desk but paused before they reached her face, scurrying back to the screen. Deep divots formed in his forehead.
"Goodness." Mrs Hughes looked down at Anthony and back to Edith, "did you accept?"
The typing resumed, but slower and lighter, he was listening to every word, if he'd typed a single coherent syllable Edith would be astonished, "no, he's not really my type. Far too polished."
"Too polished?"
"Smooth, charming, flirtatious."
"Well you wouldn't want to be burdened with those characteristics in a boyfriend!"
"Not when there's nothing behind them. He's undoubtedly been like that with a thousand girls before me and he'll be like that with a thousand girls after me. I'm nothing unique to him, and he's certainly nothing unique to me. I want to be with someone who interests me, and who at least seems to find me interesting. Gregson just asked me out because I'm young and female and there."
Slowly she tilted her head in Anthony's direction. He'd ceased all pretence of working and was looking at her, crooked smile and all. She beamed back at him.
Their silent contemplation of each other was broken by Mrs Hughes clearing her throat. Both their heads turned in her direction, "I have some news." She brushed at the lapels on her jacket and fixed her eye line in middle distance, "His Honour Judge Carson and I are getting married."
"What! Oh my –" Before she could finish the pronouncement Edith had dived into Mrs Hughes's chest, pulling her into a bear hug, "that's so exciting! Congratulations!"
Anthony got up and opened the door to his office poking his head out into the judicial corridor and shouting, "Charlie! Charlie get in here!"
Extracting herself from Edith's arms Mrs Hughes swatted at his shoulder, "Don't yell, what if he's still in court!"
"Oh it's gone 5pm, when has Charlie ever sat this late?!" He pursed his lips and looked down at his diminutive but deceptively strong clerk. With a sigh he looped his arms around her and rested his chin on top of her head, "congratulations Elsie."
His eyes darted to Edith's and she brushed away the gathering moisture, which absolutely wasn't tears.
"Strallan, why are you shouting for me down the corridor like some sort of lout?!" Carson surveyed the scene, eyes finally settling on Mrs Hughes with a small smile, "ah, you told them I see."
Mrs Hughes smoothed down her hair and patted Anthony's hand as she unhooked it from her back.
"You might have given me a little warning." He rocked back and forward on his feet, his expression torn somewhere between horror and happiness. He and Anthony shared a staid handshake, but it went on a little longer than was necessary. Edith went up on tip-toes to kiss him on the cheek.
"Do you mean aside from the conversation we had at dinner last night when I said 'I'm going to tell His Honour Judge Strallan and Ms Crawley tomorrow' and you agreed that it was the right time?"
"You said that?" He kissed her on the cheek.
She rolled her eyes and looked at Edith, "men!"
They followed one another out of the room, Carson's pleadings for forgiveness getting further away as they went down the corridor, "I was too busy looking at you, thinking how lucky I was, I must not have heard you!"
That left her and Anthony alone in the room together. He looked at her as though she might disappear without his gaze. She wanted to close the space between them and throw her arms around his neck. Something stopped her, but she couldn't say what.
He said it quietly, "They're in love."
"I should hope so, they're getting married."
"Not all marriages are based on love, Edith. Sometimes -" He took a breath and squeezed his eyes shut, "they're not all based on love."
It was such a curious thing to say, but he'd folded in on himself, turned his back to her, putting books into his bag. Books she knew he wouldn't read this evening. He stopped and turned back, looking relieved that she was still there, "You know I have to sum the trial up next week?"
"Yes."
"It'll be a lot of work. We won't be able to – that is – we'll have to –"
"I know, Anthony, we'll have to spend less time together."
"I want to take you out somewhere before I start. Maybe somewhere with Michelin stars, the whole nine yards, the theatre as well."
"You really don't have to do anything."
"I'll be seeing you less, and then I'll go to the Court of Appeal and who knows –" The words died at the back of his throat, "I wish it didn't have to be this way, Edith, I –"
The pause was pregnant, full of possibilities, of implications. She could've taken a pin to it, burst all of its secrets onto the floor. She didn't want to be that girl. The girl who needed to hear the words, as if the saying of them mattered when he showed them all the time. His mouth opened and closed and he looked down at his feet with a slow shake of the head. "Let's go home. I'm going to cook a delicious meal and have you for dessert."
She giggled through her disappointment and then let it dissipate with the flush that crept over her cheeks.
"I do like turning you that colour."
"I know. It's terribly cruel of you."
He led the way out, "what are we going to watch tonight? It's got to be something more light hearted than Breaking Bad, please, I'm still recovering."
"There are so many options." She tapped a finger on her chin, "How about Kavanagh QC?" Anthony laughed, "Judge John Deed? Wait, I've got it – Silk!" He knocked his shoulder against hers, running his fingers across her knuckles.
"I was hoping for less of a busman's holiday, sweet one."
"Black Books then."
The light sunshine of the early evening wrapped around her as they strolled across the grass to the tube station.