46
Catherine put down her book with a dreamy sort of sigh. Victor, stretched out on the sofa with a magazine, glanced at her over the top of it.
"Enjoying your book?" he asked.
Catherine had hardly left the parlor window seat since Christmas. She'd received a couple of new books and had been steadily devouring them. Usually Lydia and Anne were the bookworms. Apparently Catherine had simply needed to find the right kind of story. She'd been so absorbed with her reading she'd not even touched her new embroidery kit.
"Oh, yes," she replied. "It's so romantic! The boy loves the girl so much and does such romantic things. He writes her poems and gives her flowers…" She trailed off with another sigh, then went back to her reading, all snuggled up in her nest of blankets and throw pillows.
Victor kept on looking at her. Fair hair glowing in the winter sunshine, bent over her book. She was such a sweetheart. Friendly and charming and affectionate. Someday, he knew, a boy would love her very much. Probably several boys. A small lump formed in his throat and he swallowed around it. Seven years of her life had passed by in a blink. All too soon she'd be all grown up. A beauty known for miles around.
He squashed that thought like a bug before it could skitter any further.
"What sort of romantic things did you do for Mother?" Catherine asked, starry-eyed. "When you were courting?"
Victor's mind went blank. The children didn't know much at all of the circumstances around his and Victoria's wedding. They knew it was arranged, but not how quickly. They didn't know about the corpse bride. Or the villain. That was nothing for little children to hear. Especially dreamy and romantic ones like Catherine.
"Oh, uh, well, we didn't really court, did we?" Victor told her at last. "It just sort of...happened. You know. We got along and liked each other and were kind to each other, and that was that. That's...well, that's sort of romantic, isn't it?"
Catherine's disagreement was writ large on her face. She was such a pretty little thing, but when she scrunched up her nose that way she looked a lot like Lord Everglot.
"I played the piano for her," Victor offered lamely. "Sort of."
"You really didn't ever do anything romantic at all?" Catherine pressed, disappointment in her voice. He was dashing all of her hopes and dreams of a handsome prince just by existing. Victor hoped her love stories weren't giving her expectations mortal men could not meet.
He laid his magazine across his chest and thought, staring up at the ceiling. He always angled the handle of Victoria's teacup to her dominant hand when he handed it to her. He never finished the raspberry jam, her favorite, so that she could always have the last bit. On very cold nights he pushed the hot water bottles closer to the foot of her side of the bed.
Was any of that romantic? Somehow he sensed this was not the sort of thing Catherine was after.
"Oh!" he cried, sitting up a little as he remembered. His magazine slipped to the floor. "I climbed up her balcony once!"
"Oooh!" Catherine squealed. She leaned forward eagerly. "Really? Like Romeo?"
"Yes," Victor said, sitting up fully. "Just after we met. Uh…"
Now he regretted mentioning this. The circumstances had not been entirely romantic, and he was not prepared to answer any questions. But Catherine was staring at him so expectantly with those enormous doe eyes...
"Yes," he repeated, running a hand through his hair. He spoke carefully. "Er...your grandfather was not happy with me, and I didn't think he'd answer the door, but I wanted to see your mother."
All technically true. Thankfully Catherine didn't ask why Finis had been unhappy with him. She didn't need to. As far as she knew that was her grandfather's default state toward Victor, completely everyday and ordinary.
"So I climbed up the ivy," he went on. All these years later he could still feel it under his hands, feel the dampness from the snow seeping into his shoes, the cold air through the tear in his jacket. "I landed on her balcony and she let me in."
Catherine gasped, hand to her mouth, delighted and scandalized. "Into her room?" she asked in a whisper.
Victor nodded. "And...well, that was when I told her I loved her. Well. Not in so many words. That I wanted to be with her always, I think was what I said. That I'd been nervous about getting married, but that the moment I met her, I wasn't nervous anymore."
Catherine was grinning so enormously Victor couldn't help but grin back. Catherine put a hand to her heart.
"Oh, that is so romantic," she swooned, falling back into her blanket nest. "I hope someone loves me that much one day."
"I'm certain someone will," Victor told her, that lump back in his throat.
They were quiet for a moment. Eventually Catherine went back to her reading, pulling her blankets close and angling herself toward the light from the window. Victor picked up his magazine and set it on the table. He gazed at his and Victoria's wedding portrait on the mantelpiece.
"Would you ever fight a duel over Mother?" Catherine asked, suddenly. "To win her hand?"
The middle of Victor's chest throbbed. A burst of adrenaline shot up his spine. "What?" he asked.
Catherine lifted her book. "The boy gets challenged to a duel by another man, the villain," she explained. "For the girl's hand."
"Duels are not romantic," Victor said, not quite able to look at her. His words came out a bit more stern than he intended. "Not like in books. I'd...er...imagine."
"I know," Catherine said, sounding hurt. "I think they're silly, it's just a story. I only wondered."
That was a relief to know, honestly. He was getting a trifle sweaty and his scalp was prickling. He took a deep breath.
"Uh...well...if she wanted me to," Victor said. "Defense, like that. I mean, if she chose someone else, then no. I wouldn't."
Catherine nodded, accepting that. Victor's heart was going like a rabbit's out of sheer remembered terror. But he'd done it, hadn't he? Taken up a fork in defense of someone he loved? He'd lost, it was true, but he'd tried his best all the same. And then been rescued in his turn, out of love. Victor rubbed his temples.
"Oh, wouldn't that be the saddest thing?" Catherine remarked. Victor looked at her questiongly. "Imagine. Oh, that makes me want to cry. Mother loving someone else. Choosing someone else over you. Wouldn't you have been so sad?"
The gut-punch was even harder this time, primed by his already heightened state. An icy hand closed around his heart. Oh yes, he would have been very sad indeed, if Victoria had decided she did not love him and had married someone else. In that moment he was transported back to that alleyway lined with abandoned coffins, just as if he'd never left. Until that day he had not cried since the day he buried Scraps. In that alley out back of the kitchen, he had cried. So hard at one point that one of the kitchen staff had glanced out of the back door at him with pity and curiosity.
"I'd have wanted to die," he said quietly.
He had, hadn't he? The very idea of returning home, seeing Victoria happily on someone else's arm, having to watch for years while she had someone else's children and smiled that way at someone else and….it all made him as queasy now as it had then.
Then, remembering that he was speaking to a seven year old, hastily added, "I mean, not literally, never that, not ever, but...yes. I'd have been very sad."
Catherine nodded wisely. "Just an expression," she agreed. "I understand." Then, more brightly, she added, "And it doesn't matter because we're all here and happy now!"
Victor could only slowly nod. Once Catherine was absorbed in her book again he stood, bid her good morning, and left the room. In the entry he paused for a moment with his face in his hands.
Slowly his heartbeat went back to normal. After a time the adrenaline subsided and his skin stopped crawling. At last he just felt hollow and sad. Sad for his past self, despair at the thought at what might have been. Worried for his daughter's future. About her getting her own heart broken. Or worse.
He rubbed at his face again and gave his head a little shake. He was overcome by the desire to see Victoria. Not even to speak to her. Just to lay eyes on her, be near her. This time of day she usually met with the housekeeper, so Victor headed for the kitchen.
There she was. Sitting at the worktable with the housekeeper, her profile to him. Her ledger and pen and cup of tea before her. The humid air of the kitchen was making her hair frizz out of her bun. She turned when he came in and the rush of warm affection and comfort he felt when she smiled at him made his knees go weak.
"Victor! Good morning," she said, pleasure to see him clear in her voice. She did not ask why he was in the kitchen or what he wanted. Judging by her expression the housekeeper was wondering those things, but she said nothing.
Victor pulled up a stool and sat down next to her. Every muscle in his body relaxed. All tension left him. His heart warmed up again.
"Had you any special requests for dinner this week?" Victoria asked, angling the menu draft in his direction. He barely glanced at it before smiling and shaking his head.
"Anything you like," he told her. "Do you mind if I sit here?"
"Of course not," she said. And she returned to what she had been doing.
Victor did not interrupt her work. He sat still and close to her in their homey kitchen, cooking smells filling the air, watching her cheeks get pink in the warmth and listening to her speak congenially with the housekeeper.
Just to be near her was enough. He couldn't help wondering if this counted as romantic. He certainly thought it was.