AN: Thanks for reading! So the last chapter was maybe the cheesiest thing I have ever written, next to this one. As such they are my favourites, but in a really super cringey kind of way. You know, the secret guilty pleasure of watching terrible Hallmark romances because every now and then something magic happens - good dialogue finds great actors and voila, it's synchronicity? Or, maybe it's that you watch so many your standards start to slip... Anyway, enjoy or cringe, or both!
Also, I'm including a lot more description because I really dislike writing it, which is another reason I've chosen my home as the setting. You'll see a lot of different places in Perth and Western Australia before I'm through. Sorry, I'm practicing using describing words! I almost always skip over reading the descriptive text and paragraphs in books, unless I'm reading Tim Winton, but I gave up on him because his stories became so depressing, the amazing descriptions of setting and scenery couldn't make up for the vaguely suicidal tendencies his stories induced. If you want amazing descriptions of Western Australia, read Dirt Music, Cloudstreet or the first of his memoirs, Land's Edge (I quote from that one in a later chapter). I've become simpler as I get older, I just want low angst happy endings. Hence the recent obsession with P&P variations...
Oh, and I also changed the name and relationship connection of Darcy's Aunt and Uncle, Richard's parents, as I realised I gave Anne Darcy two sisters, but Richard needs to be a Fitzwilliam to stick to cannon, so Darcy now has an Uncle David (and wife Emily), to go along with Aunt Catherine (dB) and mother Anne. I haven't updated the earlier chapter and it won't come up until later but for those who notice the discrepancy, sorry. And I can no longer remember why I decided Darcy needed a different first name, and for all those who dislike Fitz as a nickname - so do I and so does he. It comes up in Ch 13, but I'm afraid Elizabeth likes Fitz, especially because he doesn't like it and no one else uses it, which makes it hers. I don't know who is going to win, but I suspect his "real" first name will make a difference, somewhere down the line. If I can manage to finish this one. This one is so much harder to write than Sufficient Encouragement. And it's still not nearly as good, IMHO!
You may want to read the last little bit of Chapter 10 again, before jumping in below...
Chapter 11
Her car was still in the parking lot when we got out there. We both stared at it until Georgie took her phone out.
"Uber will be here in 3 minutes, Wells. Go find her. She's wandering around Kings Park somewhere, she won't be far."
I wait until Georgie is safely in the Uber and on her way home before I start walking towards the obelisk that stands at the eastern most point of the park, above the cliff that faces towards the Swan River and the city. It's always lit and offers one of the best views of Perth, especially at this time of night. There's still a few partygoers, tourists and naturalists wandering around, but there's always a respectful quiet around the war memorial, and in the park and promenade leading towards it.
Kings Park is huge, but most of it is unlit at night so though I don't see her anywhere, I'm pretty sure she's close by. I could easily have missed her along the way, so I just stand at the railing below the State War Memorial and look out over the city. I haven't been here for years. We used to come for the Dawn Service on ANZAC day, every year, until Mum died. She said it was important to remember the people we owed a debt to. To be grateful for the freedom given to us by those who sacrificed and served in ways we can't even comprehend. I look back to see the hundreds of names listed in the halls under the memorial, a blur at this distance, but the weight of each name and the families they represent, coupled with the memories of my mother, fall heavy in my gut. One day, I'll come again.
I walk back to the carpark following the promenade that leads to the Flame of Remembrance and the whispering wall that surrounds it, and that's when I see her. She's sitting at one end of the semi-circular wall, and she's watching me as though she's been following my movement all this time. She's hunched into the faux fur wrap my sister had brought for her, her shoes off and her knees drawn up under her dress. I thought I understood yearning before this moment. I was wrong. I make sure there's no one else seated in the arc of stone between us and then I take my seat at the opposite end of the semi-circle and turn to whisper towards the stone behind my head.
"Elizabeth."
She smiles and nods. "Hey, Fitz. I did that really girly thing of walking away, hoping you would follow. We need to talk, but without any distractions."
"Like music, dancing, other people?" I smile in agreement.
"I was thinking more of the distraction of our chemistry, but I'm beginning to think it doesn't help even if you're all the way over there. Let me just get this out. I don't regret meeting you or giving you my first kiss. It was "magic", for want of a better word. I just don't know if I can believe you when you say it was your first. I understand OCD, how it flips on and off sometimes, how it's actually an irrational conditioned response and how powerful the compulsion is, but you were so confident with me right from the start – there was no hesitation – it's hard to believe you've never touched someone that way before. I am a naturally affectionate and demonstrative person, it's unnatural for me to distance myself from the people I care about. But even I'm more circumspect with people I've just met. Or insulted."
She quirks a smile toward me and shifts in her seat, one leg twisting down and the other crossing over it to hang below the seat so she can free her hands. She's not looking at me, her words are just above a whisper, and though she's 25 metres away from me, this is still the most physically intimate conversation I've ever had, and every part of me is on fire right now.
"Do you want to touch me now?"
"I'm a breathing, heterosexual female, Fitz. Of course, I want to touch you."
"So, here's the thing. I don't want to sound like a jerk, but I've had women throw themselves at me since I hit puberty and grew 3 feet in a year and filled out everywhere that matters. To this day, the thought of touching any of them just makes me sick. Literally sick. I've had to excuse myself so many times to go and vomit in the bathroom like some f-ing bulimic when they wouldn't take no for an answer. Ask Charlotte about me – I had to be an absolute prick to everyone to ensure that people wouldn't come near enough to touch me. I am a completely hands off CEO and leave all the direct people management to Richard and my COO, who is a female version of Bing, I swear."
I turn to look at her, wanting to see her face and I say the rest facing her, no longer whispering towards the wall, hoping the words reach her anyway.
"I have never wanted to touch anyone until I saw you. I have never wanted anyone to touch me, until I touched you. Elizabeth, I have dreamt of you every night since last summer, and not a day goes by that I don't think about you. I ran because you are part of a world that meant a lot of pain to me growing up. I am struggling to separate you from a world that twisted my mother's death into something that made me afraid of the world and the people in it – their germs, their taint whatever. It took me a long time to learn to manage it myself because I now have trust issues thanks to the people whose demented therapy made everything worse, but I've never been able to overcome it. Never found a person outside my circle who is worth overcoming it for. And I've never really challenged myself to really get beyond it. I've just organised my life so I can live as normally as possible. I kind of got used to it and it seemed too hard to try for anything more. Until the day I met you, and it stopped being hard. There was nothing to overcome. I wanted to touch you, to kiss you, to hold you. So, I did. And you let me. And then I freaked out."
"You did. So, where do you want to go from here?"
"Back to your place? I'm kidding, though I feel like that kid in the chocolate factory for the first time, hungry to try everything I have been denied all this time."
"Well, my place is my parent's house, and you are welcome anytime, Augustus Gloop. We keep a well-stocked pantry, which is where you'll find the chocolate. How about we try going on a date, maybe lunch or something fun, like bowling or a movie? Georgie has my number, tell her I said it was ok to give it to you. Text me sometime and we'll make it happen."
She gets up to leave, gathering her shoes, effectively making any reply impossible so I sprint around the flame towards her, catching her as she rounds the bend.
"You can't just leave me like that." I pick her up and deposit her on the low wall in front of me and I keep my hands on the wall, close enough to touch her, but I don't. I torture myself with her nearness. She smiles up at me, neither startled nor afraid of my aggression. "Oops, I did it again," she sings to me and laughs. "I didn't think for one minute that you'd let me leave just like that. Anyway, who's going to walk me to my car?"
She is the definition of a dove and a viper, and I lean down to kiss her smile with my own. My hands weave through her hair, gripping her as I deepen the kiss with her permission. She drops her shoes and grabs the front of my jacket, pulling me to her as she arches her neck and makes a space for me to step closer. She pulls away after what seems both like forever and not nearly long enough and I sink into her, pressing my forehead into hers, both of us breathing heavily.
"Well as second kisses go, I'd say we both earned a gold star there. Not sure how the rest of the world would judge it, but as I don't plan on letting the rest of the world kiss me, I don't think it matters. I just want to be completely clear about something. This chocolate factory is neither free, nor a free-for-all." She starts mouthing the lyrics to Single Ladies with the relevant hand motions, until I figure it out and start laughing.
"Tell me I can keep kissing you? Please?" She smiles her approval as she pats my chest, pushing me away so she can collect her shoes, jump down from the wall and head to the carpark. When I help her down, she threads her free hand into my arm, and I revel in the simple joy of being touched and loving every moment of it. We talk for another hour standing at her car. She lets me hold her, and she touches my face, my hands, my chest while we talk, with totally innocent gestures, that I feel so deeply, I think they are going to leave marks. Her hands are so small, she fits so perfectly against me and being so close to her is intoxicating.
I begin to realise that I have denied myself this kind of human connection for so long, I no longer even acknowledged the need to myself. If Georgie wasn't a hugger by nature, I wouldn't even be able to remember what hugging felt like. But acknowledging the need is like a dam bursting. I am no longer paying attention to what she says, I just want to crush her to me and never let her go. I begin to tremble violently and stop breathing. Eventually I hear her voice bringing me back to myself. I had caged her within my arms, but she was just calmly speaking to me, almost as though to a child, and breathing deeply while she stroked my back to try and remind me to breathe. I was in a full-blown panic attack, and I hadn't had one of those for years. I sink to my knees, gasping for air in front of her and she cradles me to her, whispering softly that she is with me, and that everything is ok. I pull her into my lap, and it takes another half-hour for me to calm down enough to convince her I can drive home. I make her promise to see me tomorrow, and on the way home I am trying to come up with reasons for her to need to see me every day.
I think I've just made myself her project. Damn.
