A/N: Greetings readers! Thank you for the reviews from the last chapter. I had written it a few months ago but between a surgery, moving across the country, and other life events, it got lost in the folders of my google drive! I'm currently beginning a new job and new phase of life, but I hope to be writing more. I've always loved how FF is a community, especially now that I've finally started writing and publishing my own. In my life, I'm new in town and experiencing the first flutters of a new crush, and there lies the inspiration for this chapter. I can't always write from experience, but this one comes from my own heart!

The assembly rooms in Willingdon were small, familiar, and hot. All the local gentry and tradespeople from the three nearest villages had come; and Charlotte knew practically every face in attendance. It was a stark contrast to the elegance she had seen in London and Sanditon, and as such, Charlotte's finery was subdued at such an occasion. Most of all; this ballroom was missing the fixture she had been used to all summer long; she thought that being childhood chums with her dancing partners would be enough encouragement to enjoy herself tonight despite her lovesickness.

It was not.

The first two country dances she paired with her father; who always danced well. Normally he and her mother maintained their chaperoning position on the outskirts of the room, but the sight of his wilted daughter, newly returned from her summer in Sanditon convinced Mr. Heywood to take the floor. The third set she spent wrangling flirtatious little sisters, and somewhere in the midst of the fourth, her world was knocked upside down.

The dance was a reel, and she had partnered with one of the neighbor boys she had grown up with. The lively, quick dance often called for frequent changing of partners, and as such was a favorite for young gentlemen and ladies to take a full assessment of their prospects. A reel meant the chance to dance with someone you were too timid to speak with otherwise. Though Charlotte had begun this dance with no intention of flirting, it was during this reel that she first joined hands with the man who would be her husband, and father of her children. It was during the last partner exchange of the dance, she was spying a spot along the wall to sit and rest afterwards, and a new face appeared before her, already smiling.

"I don't know you." Charlotte blurted out, before she realized how rude she was. He only laughed.

"I wouldn't think you did." Responded the stranger. He didn't offer his name. Just a grin and a firm hand as they turned in a circle, and back to their original partners they went.

Charlotte continued to stare, somewhat stupefied. At first, she did not know that what she felt were the first rushes of love and affection, as they in no way resembled her complicated emotions for Sidney. From the first glance, and for all of their years together, very little about James would resemble Sidney Parker. The night they met, James wore a blue coat, a shade much lighter than she'd ever seen Sidney wear. He was shorter, thinner, and his voice did not boom like Sidney's had. No grimace marked his face, no tale of woe preceded him. James almost always wore a smile, and though he had known sadness, he was a man of deep joy.

As the bows of the dance were made, Charlotte couldn't help staring at James, wondering who he was, as she knew everyone in the parish. Her curiosity turned to embarrassment when he turned his head, and caught her gaze. When she whipped her head away, she missed the grin on his face when finding her looking across the room at him.

After being escorted to a table of refreshments, she was soon set upon again. This time, the stranger had returned with another man. It was Daniel Langford, the curate of her parish. Daniel had been a dear childhood friend, like an older brother to Charlotte. She was, for the first time that night, delighted to see someone.

"Mr. Langford! Dear Daniel, it has been so long." Charlotte shook hands with her old friend, who greeted her with equal enthusiasm.

"Charlotte, Miss Heywood. May I introduce to you a friend of mine from Cambridge, Mr. James Dryden." Daniel gestured to his friend, the stranger whom she had danced with.

"Mr Dryden." Charlotte curtsied low to hide her blush.

"A pleasure Miss Heywood. I didn't want you to think me rude during the reel for not introducing myself." James said with gentleness and familiarity.

"Of course not." Charlotte stammered. She was tongue tied! How was this possible?

A loud knocking on her bedroom door woke Charlotte from her slumber. When she realized that she had been awoken from her dream, she slammed a fist into her pillow in frustration. Somehow, she always woke up before the best part. Raising her head, she saw that the sun was barely risen, but knew she must make haste.

"Come in Reed." She called to the maid who had just knocked upon her door.

Reed has been her ladies' maid since her marriage, and sometimes nanny to the children when required. Of all the important people she had met and made acquaintance with during her time as a countess, no one knew her like Reed knew her.

"Morning, Madam. A letter arrived for you last night, and I have some tea for you."

"Bless you. Is Anty ready?"

"Yes ma'am. He is waiting for you in the hall."

Charlotte sat up and put on her dressing gown with a sigh.

"Madam?" Reed said in a knowing, concerned voice.

"I dreamt of James again."

"I figured as much." Reed said, in her thick Yorkshire accent. Somehow, it always comforted Charlotte to hear people speak in those tones, so different from the people she had been raised with.

"It was the assembly where we met, this time. I could see every detail; his blue coat, the scruff of his not-quite-a-beard, and I felt the callus on his hands from the reigns of his horse. You remember the horse he had then, called Cleopatra?" Charlotte responded, as she crossed the room and took the coffee and letter from her maid.

"Yes ma'am," Reed said simply, with a knowing gaze, and a pain in her own heart, "Now, Lord Anthony is waiting."

It was an early September morning, and Anthony was headed back to Ampleforth College for another school year. Charlotte always hated saying goodbye to him, especially since she began to do it alone last year. In the earliest days, James would have accompanied their son on his journey, until two years ago when Anty had insisted on going alone to prove his maturity. It broke her heart that he never had the opportunity to be joined by his father again on that trip from Middlesmoor to Ampleforth.

Anty was waiting for her in the entrance hall as she descended the old wooden stairs. He twirled his hat on his hand in a way she'd seen James do countless times, and stopped only when she came up to embrace him.

"I'll miss you my darling." She breathed as she held her firstborn close.

"I know Mama. I'll miss you and the girls so much." He responded. His sweetness, his sincerity was the essence of who his father had been.

"Respect the priests and professors, study well, and write to us when you are able. Light candles for Papa."

"I know. I do every Sunday night."

"I'm proud of you, my boy. I'll come with the girls in December to fetch you for the Christmas holidays, and then we will be away to London and Grandmother's house. It will be here before you know it." Charlotte finished and released her hold on Anthony.

He stood over a head taller than she did, taller than his father had ever been. It struck her how much he needed the example of a good man in his life. He needed to be a man of stature in character as well as his imposing physicality. She couldn't have chosen a better father for her children, but losing him was out of her control. Remarriage suddenly occurred to her, not for her own sake, but for Anty's. She quickly shook this notion off.

"I love you, Mama." Anty leaned out of the carriage window as she waved him off down the drive, towards the rising sun.

Alone she walked back into the Abbey. The girls would be woken in an hour for prayers, and she cherished the minutes of solitude before their chatter controlled her day. In her fist she still had the letter Reed had brought her this morning. She recognized the bold script on it, and took it to James' old study, a room she had always been able to think in. After he had died, it almost became a shrine to his memory. The only detail she had changed about it was hanging his portrait above the mantle, in place of a hideous landscape she had made during their first year of marriage.

Charlotte settled in the large chair behind his desk, pulling her feet up like a child beneath her. She stared up at his portrait. It was a part of a pair; husband and wife. Her portrait hung in James' old dressing room. The portraits had been commissioned by the previous earl as a wedding present to his heir, and had served to remind Charlotte and James during their marriage of the reasons they were together, of the great love they had for each other, and of the legacy they hoped to establish with their union. Painted during their engagement, the portraits were of two people absolutely smitten. He looked just like he had the night they met, and at her insistence, painted in that same dusty blue jacket. She always came in here to read the letters, the letters from Sidney. It was a way of subduing the emotions that came over her with every letter, under the gaze of her late husband, the schoolgirl's tendencies to blush and sigh had to be reigned in. So far, they had been unexciting and dull letters, but time had moved on and life was generally less exciting than when she was twenty. Comparing their children's education, the price of tea, and the state of the King's health was status quo. The nearest thing she'd had to an endearment from him was "I hope you and your family are in good health."

Our reluctant lovers finally were regaining the confidence and comfort to let romance back into their hearts, and their words. Today's letter from Sidney was such a letter:

My Dearest Charlotte,

I hope you will not think ill of me for this letter. I came to a realization yesterday, a day full of the mundane, that my correspondence with you has been chiefly dull and commonplace. This letter has been forming in my mind since then. I sat in the House in the morning, and after listening to hours of debates over grain taxes and such, I decided to walk home from the chambers of Parliament, and acquaint myself with the people of the city that day. It was early afternoon, with the sun full in the sky, and I took to a park on my route. There were a great deal of people walking and talking, many of them clearly courting young couples. I watched them for some time, and chuckled to think if any of them saw me looking, and wondered who the strange old man staring them down was.

There was one pair in particular who I was continually drawn to. I think perhaps because they reminded me of us long ago. The gentleman had a dark and solemn visage, not unlike mine, and his lady seemed to delight in teasing him and being contrary to whatever he said. I watched him go from confusion, to annoyance, to delight as their walk progressed. Their chaperone looked to be the young lady's grandmother, or some other elderly relative, who was primarily concerned with her dog that resembled a rat. As such, this couple often found occasion to brush one another's arms, or entwine their fingers when they thought no one was looking. The young lady even stole a kiss from her beau at one point, and I emphasize that she stole it from him, and not the other way around. Her boldness, his reserve, but both of them clearly besotted.

All this to say, it reminded me of days when you and I shared looks and small touches in ballrooms and drawing rooms. It made me mourn for the courtship I threw away for Tom's sake, and my regret that I was not to be the great love that made you wife and mother. At night, I dream of your soft laugh and assuring touch. Though I am not a praying man, I pray that we may turn back time in some small way, and that perhaps you can find it within you to give in to another great love with me. I await your next letter with the excitement and nerves of an 18 year old boy, and love you with a constancy that befits my true age.

Ever yours,

Sidney