Author's Note: Title is inspired by this quote from Pride and Prejudice as Elizabeth fully realizes her feelings for Darcy: "She now began to comprehend that he was exactly the man who, in disposition and talents, would most suit her. His understanding and temper, though unlike her own, would have answered all her wishes."
Also, I know there are people who think/would like to think that Mr. and Mrs. Bennet have a healthy marriage, but they really do not :( Is it any wonder that when Darcy insulted Elizabeth during his proposal, she turned him down? She'd seen what it was like to be in a marriage where a husband had little respect for his wife! I like to think that after the debacle with Lydia, they might both have learned some lessons, but... even if Mr. Bennet learned to be a more present father, I don't see a ton of evidence of increased respect for his wife, or any evidence that Mrs. Bennet became less silly.
No one will have a *perfect* marriage, not even Darcy and Elizabeth (I knowww, I'm sorry), but they are so well-suited for each other - AND willing to reflect, grow, change - that I have every confidence they would have a very happy and healthy marriage!
On the second night of their marriage, Elizabeth Darcy was lying awake in bed next to her husband. Darcy had blown out the candle on his bedside table, but Elizabeth had not yet done so with hers.
"Fitzwilliam," she murmured, testing out her husband's Christian name.
"Yes, Mrs. Darcy?"
A smile touched her lips at her husband's pronouncement of her new title, though the grin faded from her countenance as she remembered the topic she desired to broach.
"I am afraid," Elizabeth said at last, endeavoring to keep her voice more cheerful than she felt, " you will not always like me so well as you do now."
"I expect you are right; I am certain my love for you will only grow with time."
His reply was so earnest, so generous, that Elizabeth was almost dissuaded from her purpose.
"I wonder," she said, very quietly, "whether my father once felt the same about his bride."
Darcy sat up then, looking at her with deeply furrowed brows.
"I do not mean to insult you by the comparison," added Elizabeth with haste, for though her father had treated Elizabeth with nothing but affection, it was only on rare occasion that he could be said to treat his wife with genuine respect.
Darcy was silent for a moment, and Elizabeth was afraid that she had indeed wounded him.
"You may speak freely," she assured him; "I am enough acquainted with my parents' behavior that you shall not shock me, and after all, we are man and wife. If you do not feel at leisure to speak candidly with me, surely you can be frank with no one."
"Indeed," Darcy murmured. "Your disposition differs so greatly from your mother's that I must admit, I cannot comprehend the grounds for your concern. How could a man tire of a wife's good sense or cheerful temperament?"
"I am quite sure that at present, you mean what you say. But as Benedick says, 'Doth not the appetite alter?'"
"Elizabeth, if you are making a serious point about romance, I cannot say alluding to such a character recommends itself to your purpose," Darcy said dryly. "And if my memory serves, Benedick was there describing an increase in affection, not a decrease."
Propping herself up on her elbow to look at him, Elizabeth agreed, "Your knowledge of Shakespeare does you credit, but it was a comedy; of course the heroes and heroines ended in felicity."
"My love," murmured Darcy tenderly, tucking an errant curl behind her ear, "I cannot quite live by your philosophy to think of the past only as its remembrance gives me pleasure, but in this case, I hope it will reassure you that I persisted quite some time in waiting for your hand, amidst rather adversarial circumstances."
"That is before you married me and had to live with me," pointed out Elizabeth. "That is just my point. Even when you proposed marriage - the first time - you could not help but decry my family and my low birth. The more you must be in company with my family, perhaps your resentment of me will increase."
"There is not a day I do not regret the majority of what I said in that moment," Mr. Darcy said quietly. "Yet even then, I was willing to marry you in spite of whatever I perceived as hindrances to our union. Since that time, I have only grown more convinced that such things do not matter in comparison with your manifold attractions."
Just as Darcy had grown to know himself better, so had Elizabeth.
"I wonder," she murmured, "whether the observation of my father's disrespect for my mother had some bearing on my receipt of your proposal."
"I had not thought of that," Darcy said quietly.
Elizabeth laid a hand gently on his arm. "I have forgiven you a thousand times for any insult I received that day; you have increased my happiness a hundredfold beyond any pain you have ever given me. I certainly hope you do not hold against me all the things I said that I should not."
A soft smile touched Darcy's lips.
"I could not marry you when I did not think you could respect me," Elizabeth continued, "just as I could not marry Mr. Collins because I knew I could not respect him."
Darcy started. "Marry Mr. Collins?"
Elizabeth colored. "Yes. I did not wish to insult Charlotte by speaking of it, but now that we are married, I will keep nothing from you. Mr. Collins proposed marriage to me, I refused, and quite shortly thereafter, he most conveniently transferred his sentiments to my friend."
"Then when you said I was the last man on Earth you could be prevailed upon to marry," Darcy said slowly, his color deepening, "you meant..."
"It is not worth thinking of now," Elizabeth interjected hastily. "We were in the business of reassuring each other how happy we are, and how we shall always love each other, etcetera."
Though Darcy huffed a sigh of frustration, he could not help but chuckle the next moment. He lay back against the pillows once more.
"I do not suppose it is any comfort," he said, "that Mr. and Mrs. Collins have been married for some time now, and he still seems most satisfied with his choice of a wife."
"Not much comfort," concurred Elizabeth, "for the advantage is all his, and Charlotte is much less demanding than I am; I am certain I shall tax you far more than she does her husband, with as little as she requires for contentment."
"I should think that if they can be content, we should have even more confidence in our chance of connubial felicity."
"Now, that is a comfort; nothing can console a woman ardently in love so much as cool logic," said Elizabeth with a smile, sliding an arm around her husband.
After Fitzwilliam gently drew her closer, Elizabeth wrapped her arms around his waist, and laid her head lightly against his chest.
Perhaps it was because they were no longer gazing into each other's eyes that Fitzwilliam found the courage to utter his next comment.
"Is there anything in particular, my love," he asked gingerly, "which has brought on your concern? Have I given you any reason to think I am unhappy?"
"Not at all," Elizabeth hastened to reassure him, sitting up quickly so he might see her earnest expression. "You have been..."
She hesitated for a moment; emotion had welled in her chest and in her eyes, which were now filling with happy tears.
"You have been everything I might have wished, and more," she finished. "You have been everything good."
No one who had first seen Mr. Darcy at the Meryton assembly, so stern and proud, could have guessed how affectionate, how tender, he could be. The first two days Elizabeth had spent as his wife had been utter bliss.
His brows furrowed in concern, Darcy hesitantly touched his thumb to Elizabeth's cheek, wiping away a tear.
"I cry because I am so happy," Elizabeth explained, feeling nonsensical. "And because I am sad for what my parents have missed."
She hoped Darcy would not mind her talking of such things, but she had better explain lest he find her even more ridiculous.
"They have always worried over money, ever since there was no more chance of having a son," Elizabeth said, very quietly. "They can both be agreeable, to be sure, and I have seen moments of tenderness between them, and they managed to raise such an angel as Jane..."
"And you," put in Darcy, wisely refraining from any criticism of the Bennet parents.
Elizabeth sighed rather than respond to the compliment, and went on to explain, "My mother and my aunt Phillips have often boasted of my mother's beauty in youth. I can only suppose that is why my father married her, when they are so dissimilar in temperament. And when a woman's beauty naturally fades with time-"
"Mrs. Darcy - Mrs. Darcy," Darcy interrupted her, "we shall not share your parents' fate. The beauty of your spirit, my love, is not such that can lose its luster."
Of course, her husband made an excellent point; hoping for further consolation, Elizabeth wisely allowed him to continue.
"I own that in some ways, our temperaments differ. Yet we complement each other so well, and I would never..."
"Be candid with me, please," Elizabeth reminded him.
Darcy took a slow breath. "I was going to say, my dear, that I would never censure you or make sport of you in front of others, certainly not our children."
"Oh." Lizzy colored, both at the prospect of children - a common expectation of marriage, should Heaven see fit to bless them in that way - and at the nobility of Darcy's vow, to which she was quite equal. "I suppose, then, I ought not tease you?"
"You may tease me," Darcy assured her, all magnanimity. "I believe I may trust now, at least, that your amusement at my expense does not originate in true dislike."
"Certainly not," Elizabeth agreed, nestling closer against her husband's chest once more and issuing a contented sigh.
A comfortable silence settled upon them, and for a moment, Elizabeth allowed it to persist. She had been thoroughly reassured, or at least, realized that her concerns were not so bad as she had feared. In the quiet, she listened to a few of Darcy's heartbeats and relished the feel of him stroking her hair.
Finally, she spoke again with a smile against his nightshirt.
"On one point, at least, I may be assured," she murmured: "you did not marry me for my looks."
Darcy groaned, his head sinking back into the pillows. "Am I to be tormented forever by my past folly? One senseless quip when I did not know you and was determined to dislike everybody at the Meryton assembly cannot outweigh the dozens of compliments I have since paid to your beauty, my loveliest Elizabeth."
"Perhaps," Elizabeth said archly; "you are welcome to continue the compliments, and perhaps I shall find them more than tolerable."
Darcy looked so flummoxed that Elizabeth could not help but laugh and have mercy on him.
"In such a case," she added with a sparkle in her eye, "I shall certainly express my gratitude, husband."