AUTHOR'S NOTE AND A TRIGGER WARNING: Please note that this chapter is rated M due to a suicide scene (not real), discussion of suicidal thoughts and light sexual content. If such things are too upsetting for you, for any reason, please skip this chapter – it will be clear enough in the next one what you have missed plotwise, so you will be able to keep up.
The cottage is ready by the middle of October and Matthew is struck again what a wonderful, thoughtful woman his wife is.
It starts with his bedroom. The mattress is level with his wheelchair and there is a sturdy frame he can grab to transfer himself into it. The thought that with a bit of practice he should be able to do it himself, instead of being put to bed like an infant, takes his breath away. And this is just the beginning.
All the light switches and servants' bells' cords are at the height one can reach from a wheelchair. All the doors are wide enough and the furniture spaced enough to make it easy for him to pass through. The desk in the library and the small dining room table are perfectly aligned with his wheelchair as well. There is a sink, the counter and the mirror in the master bathroom which are at the height perfect for a person sitting down. What's more, Mary got a shower installed in addition to the usual bathtub, with a wide bench and sturdy handles. There are handlebars in the water closet as well. He has no idea how she even thought about such arrangements – he didn't. They are such gamechangers for the goal of his comfort and independence that he really should have considered the possibilities himself, but he was so depressed that he barely gave thought to preparing their house. It was all Mary and she somehow went to great lengths to make it as comfortable and adjusted to his needs as possible. He feels both humbled, ashamed and incredibly loved.
"How?" he asks, looking around the master bath with incredulous eyes. "How did you know to arrange it like that?"
"I didn't," she answers with a proud smile, "But I wrote to Dr Coates and asked for his recommendations. He was incredibly helpful in his answer; he even sent me drawings and instructions on how to build the support frames. Wilson found them very easy to follow."
He shakes his head, so deeply touched that he doesn't have words to express it.
"You're marvellous, darling," he says in an inadequate attempt at it. "I don't deserve you."
"You have it the other way around," she answers teasingly and bends down to kiss him.
xxx
By the time they move into the cottage, William is recovered enough to start light duties as his valet, despite being technically still on medical leave from the army. His broken ribs are healed, but still tender enough that he has to be very careful not to shatter them again. Doctor Clarkson remains concerned about the state of his collapsed lungs and stated that he is unlikely to declare William fit for return to the front until at least another month, more likely two. With the state of situation at the front and the perspective of the end of the war finally, finally imminent, it is likely William won't have a front to return to after he completes his recovery and as such he gladly accepts Matthew's offer to become his valet, to Molesley envy and displeasure.
However bad Matthew feels about dropping Molesley for good, he feels vindicated by the ease with which William takes over from Bates. Their camaraderie from the army is as strong as before and William's matter-of-fact approach to his disability is a huge relief. In a perfectly natural way William assumes that Matthew wants to do as much as possible for himself and steps in only where it is necessary, busying himself instead with taking care of Matthew's clothes and possessions and not baulking at all at the more unpleasant aspects of his disability. His captain was injured and the injury resulted in a different type of duties than he had been performing previously; that is all that is to it – the captain is still the same person and William doesn't see any reason to treat him any differently. He is proud and happy that he managed to save the captain's life; he feels only sorry that he didn't manage to save him from such a life changing injury – but there is nothing to be done about it other than make the captain's life as easy as possible. He also cheerfully volunteers to serve at their table, even though it is well beyond the scope of his new position, claiming that serving two people at dinner is hardly overworking him.
"How do you find your room, Mason?" asks Matthew when he and William are arranging the rest of his belongings brought from the Abbey and Crawley House. "Obviously I haven't been to see it myself."
"It's perfectly alright, sir," answers William with an easy smile. "Nice view. I only regret Daisy is not moving here as well, but she says it wouldn't be proper, what with us engaged and living in the same house like that, so she stays at the big house for now. But I will see her plenty during the day, when she comes here to cook, so I don't mind."
"Have you decided on the date for the wedding?" asks Matthew and frowns thoughtfully. "And when you do, wouldn't you prefer to get a cottage of your own? Privacy is quite precious after you're married…"
He trails off, but doesn't allow himself to dwell on his own regrets now; this is about William and Daisy.
William shakes his head and unpacks more of Matthew's books.
"Daisy says she wants to wait until the war is over and the convalescent home is closed," he says, barely hiding his obvious disappointment. "She says Mrs Patmore needs her help too much when she's not busy here. She's a hard worker and very loyal, my Daisy."
"Surely someone could be found to replace her for a week or two," says Matthew in disbelief, but William only shakes his head.
"I wonder if she doesn't have second thoughts, sir," he confesses quietly, avoiding Matthew's eyes, but his pain is as obvious as his earlier disappointment. "I've been away so long… Maybe she thinks I grew strange to her."
"Has she told you that?" asks Matthew, yearning to comfort William, but without any idea how. From what he says, Daisy hardly sounds like an eager bride, and his heart clenches in compassion for his friend. He knows this kind of heartbreak all too well, even if it has been ultimately resolved in his case.
"No," says William and raises his head from the stack of books. "It is probably all in my head. Too much time to think while I was recovering. Where do you want those books, sir, in your bedroom or in the library?"
xxx
Mary reaches absentmindedly to lift a box full of plates when Carson, who came along to both inspect and help to arrange the dining room at the cottage, startles her so much she nearly drops it all.
"Allow me, your ladyship!" he booms, crossing the small room in record time and taking the box out of her hands. "You shouldn't lift or carry such things yourself! If you need help, just ask or ring the bell, it's a job for William or Jane, not you, and in your condition too!"
"Thank you, Carson," says Mary with uncharacteristic meekness, touched by his obvious distress on her behalf even if she finds it entirely unnecessary. The box wasn't so very heavy at all! "I will try to remember that."
It strikes her that she will really have to make an effort to remember that, something which used to be so obvious to her that she would have never even attempted to do otherwise before she went to the front. If something needed transporting from one room to another, being packed or unpacked, or lifted from the floor, Mary used to ring a bell and order it done – and it was done, promptly. She never had to think about doing anything like that herself; she had servants for that. But then she was in France where she obviously had none; where she was the one who had to get out of her ambulance and help to push it out of the mud when it was stuck, and somehow she got used to just lifting things which she dropped, packing her own suitcase and picking up anything she wanted to use. Three months back at Downtown have been apparently not enough to cure her out of this new habit quite yet.
She wonders what Carson would say if she told him that she reached to unpack those plates because she used to wash her own in France and decides to restrain herself from the impulse. The dear butler did already fluster himself into a near heart attack once; it's better not to provoke him into another one.
Even if she is terribly tempted to see the look on his face.
xxx
The moment when all the helpers are out and they sit down to their very first dinner in their own dining room, just the two of them, feels simply magical. Matthew is wearing a black tie, Mary one of her evening gowns – he did tease her with a playful threat of just showing up in his usual uniform, but he has made the effort for their first night. It was Matthew's idea to put a record on Major Summers' gramophone, shipped to him from France some time ago, so they are eating with the music coming through the open double door from the sitting room where they decided to keep it. If it wasn't for Matthew's chair and the familiarity of being served by William, they could just as well be back at Wimereux and they both feel the intimacy of this moment acutely.
"I like this song," says Mary as William leaves the dining room after serving them the dessert. "What is it?"
"It's from a show that flopped," answers Matthew, his eyes electrically blue and so close. Their dining room oval table sits only eight at the maximum and they saw no reason to sit on the opposite sides of it, so he is right next to her. "Zip Goes A Million or something like that. The song is Every Cloud Has A Silver Lining."
"Do you believe it?" asks Mary whimsically, listening to the lyrics.
"No," answers Matthew honestly. "Not anymore, not after everything I've seen. But I do believe my own life is much more abundant in silver linings than I had any reason to expect just weeks ago."
"It's funny," says Mary, her fork lying forgotten on her plate as her fingers reach to play with her long necklace, her eyes unable to leave Matthew's. "Mine too."
It's like gravity, Matthew thinks as his lips meet Mary's, an unstoppable, constant force of nature which simply can't be rationally denied. He can taste chocolate cake on Mary's lips, in addition to the dearly familiar and unique taste of her, he can smell her perfume, irises and vanilla as usual, all around him, he can feel the softness of her skin as his hands frame her face, he can feel that he is on fire with want for her.
Except he isn't, not the whole of him at least, and that realisation pulls him brutally out of the haze of kissing Mary.
"It is late," he says, his voice heavy with regret. "We should go and get some rest."
He avoids her heavy lidded eyes with pupils blown wide by their amazing kiss; it hurts too much to contemplate how much he is disappointing her now. As he pushes himself through the sitting room, he has to stop himself from hurling that bloody gramophone through the window.
xxx
Mary settles in her new bed, in her new bedroom, so different from her old one – the walls green and soothing instead of red and patterned – and looks wistfully at the door connecting it to Matthew's. Her lips curl in a wry smile when she remembers a much younger and much sillier version of herself lecturing her parents about the wisdom of having separate bedrooms. What she wouldn't give to share the bed with Matthew right now!
It's been less than three months since that awful day at Amiens battlefield. Matthew is hurting, hurting so much still, but she is starting to see first true signs of hope. He is talking more, if still mostly bitterly. He is sometimes smiling, if still mostly wryly. He is starting to take interest in different things, even if he is often brooding afterwards at another reminder of his limitations. And, what is most important and most hopeful, he is seeking her company much more rather than pushing her away. Their evening tonight was simply lovely, despite the bitter note at the end, and she decides to treat it as a promise of many such and much better evenings to come. They will get through this too.
Focusing on those hopeful thoughts, Mary falls asleep.
xxx
She is driving again through the battlefield, Corporal Wakefield by her side. The shells are falling down all around them, their noise deafening and the explosions shaking their car and their very bones. The steering wheel is nearly impossible to turn, getting stuck and unyielding, and her vision is constantly obscured by the blood trickling down from her throbbing head. And yet she forces herself to drive, she is pushing the throttle with all her might, because she knows Matthew is hurt and she has to find him.
"You're too late, you know," says Wakefield, only it isn't Wakefield anymore, it is Lavinia sitting by her in the ambulance, absurdly dressed in the beautiful green gown and jewels she was wearing to the concert Matthew introduced her at. "He would not have been here if you accepted him in 1914, he would have stayed at Downton, safe."
"No!" Mary cries in horror. "He would have been conscripted anyway, even if he didn't volunteer."
"But he wouldn't be here, would he?" says Lavinia calmly, but with a sneer Mary has never seen on her pretty features and hasn't thought her capable of making. "He would have been with a different unit, maybe somewhere safer. You don't know and will never know, but you should know that it was you who pushed him to volunteer in the first place."
"I do know that," snarls Mary, drowning in familiar guilt. "But it's not too late. He is out there and I am going to get him out."
"Oh, but it is too late, my dear," says Isobel, dressed in mourning clothes, impossibly taking Lavinia's place. "You should have thought earlier about the consequences. But you were too cowardly and too selfish and now my dear, darling boy is lost."
"I couldn't have known!" yells Mary in despair. "And I've regretted it every minute since! But it's not too late, you're wrong! He will be alright, I will get him out!"
"Will he?" asks Isobel with clear scepticism. "Will he really?"
And suddenly Isobel and the ambulance disappear and Mary is standing over the shell hole into which Matthew and William were thrown – except Mary can't see William this time, only Matthew, sitting in the mud in his wheelchair and looking up at her accusingly.
"I will never be alright again," he says coldly, his blue eyes like ice, without a shred of warmth for her. "You were too late and you made me like this."
"No!" whispers Mary, horrified. "I know I made you join the army, but this is not my fault! You would have been called up by now anyway, and it wouldn't have made a difference if I came any sooner for you. I came as fast as I could."
"You mistake me, darling," says Matthew with a wry smile which makes her shiver with fear for some reason. "You didn't make me like this by coming too late. You made me like this by coming for me at all. I wouldn't have been like this if you left me to die."
"How could I have left you to die?!" cries Mary. "I love you!"
"And your love made me like this," hisses Matthew with cold fury. "But not for long."
He reaches down and Mary notices him bringing up his Webley pistol to his head.
"NO!" she screams, desperately searching for a way down into the shell hole, for words to stop him doing what he is clearly intending to do.
"Oh, yes," says Matthew, still in that cold voice she has never heard from him before. "I am just rectifying your mistake."
And he pulls the trigger.
xxx
Matthew's eyes shoot open at the sudden desperate, terrified screams coming from the room next door. It takes him but a second to realise they are Mary's.
"Mary!" he cries, desperate himself to get to her, to see what has scared her so. He turns on his bedside lamp, blinking off the remnants of sleep.
Mary doesn't stop screaming.
Fuelled by fear and determination, Matthew reaches for the bar by the bed and pulls himself with effort to the edge. His wheelchair is next to it, positioned by William for easy transfer, and Matthew has rebuilt much of the strength in his arms and upper body, if not even got stronger, but he has not yet had the time to practise doing it without assistance. He hesitates, afraid of falling. In all truth he should just ring for William, but somehow it doesn't occur to him.
Another earth shattering scream, this time of his name, makes him abandon any doubts or caution. Mary needs him and he has to get to her. He grasps the bars firmly and hauls himself from the bed into the wheelchair. He falls into it more than sits, jostling himself badly and making his legs fall awkwardly against the footrests, but he doesn't end up on the floor, so he counts it as a success. Barely taking any time to adjust his legs, he grabs the wheels and propels himself towards the connecting door.
What he sees behind them chills his blood.
Mary is trashing on the bed, her hair dishevelled, her face frighteningly pale, tears flowing down from her closed eyes. She alternates between screaming and whimpering, obviously trapped in whatever horrifying scenario her nightmare conjured up.
Matthew wheels himself to her as fast as he is able, grabbing her face gently and calling her name. It takes him several awful minutes, filled with her screams and his desperate pleas as she is fighting him, before he manages to wake her up. She sits up, looking at him with unseeing, wild eyes, before throwing herself at him and embracing him desperately.
"Thank God!" she keeps whispering, sobbing, "Thank God!"
Matthew keeps hugging her, with one hand holding her head gently and another caressing her back. He is shaken, truly shaken. How many nights Mary has been tortured like that with him none the wiser? With nobody to comfort her, to assure her that whatever horrors her mind brought back she is safe now?
"It's alright, darling," he says softly. "You're alright, you're at Downton. You're safe."
She shakes her head angrily against his chest, still clinging to him with all her might.
"It wasn't about me," she says among ragged breaths.
Matthew swallows. He hates that so many of her nightmares are about him, even though he shouldn't really be surprised. After all, bad things happening to Mary are a common occurrence in his nightmares.
"What was it?" he asks quietly. "Was it the shell?"
"No," whispers Mary. "Not in the end."
She shudders violently then looks up at him with wide, wild eyes.
"You must promise me, Matthew," she exclaims frantically. "You must promise me that you will never leave me!"
Matthew gapes at her, puzzled by her impassioned plea.
"What do you mean? Of course I do not intend to leave you. I couldn't easily do that now even if I wanted to," he jokes weakly, trying to lighten the atmosphere and, judging by Mary's glare, failing miserably.
"I mean it, Matthew! You must promise me! However hard things are for you, however miserable you are, you must, you absolutely must, promise me that you won't leave me! I couldn't bear it," she dissolves into desperate sobs again and he finally understands.
"Darling," he says, swallowing thickly, feeling wrecked with guilt. He has been very careful to never voice his darkest thoughts to anyone, especially Mary or Mother. And yet somehow she sensed or guessed enough for it to plague her sleep. "I cannot promise to not die before you – we cannot know what future brings – but I do promise I will never do that by my own decision. However miserable I am, I am not going to do that to you or Mother. I promise."
Mary just clutches him harder, her tears wetting his pyjamas.
"Have you ever wanted to do it?" she asks finally and Matthew must have hesitated a moment too long because her eyes grow wide in shock. "Oh my God, you did! You did! How could you?"
"But I didn't do it," says Matthew hoarsely. "I'm so sorry, darling. I've never wanted you to know."
"Do you still feel like that?" she asks in a whisper, her eyes boring into his as if in an attempt to get the truth straight out of his brain, even though he can see how terrified she is of the possible answer. "Do you still feel that you'd prefer to be dead than here, with me?"
The pain inherent in the question makes his heart break, but he is honest when he answers.
"No, not anymore," he answers and is shocked to find it true. He hasn't even realised how far he has come from those first terrible weeks at the hospital. "I'm not saying that I never feel utterly wretched and miserable – you know I do – but I don't think that way anymore. I am so grateful to be alive to be with you and our baby, even though I wish with all my heart it was on different terms."
"So you promise?" asks Mary, still in a whisper. "Can you promise me that this is the truth?"
Matthew nods firmly, taking her hand and putting it over his heart.
"I can. I do. I truly don't feel this way anymore," his voice breaks as his hand holds hers tighter against his chest. "Even then, at my lowest, I never wanted to leave you. It was just… Everything else was so dark and horrible and hopeless that I could not see a way to live this life, or find the strength to do it. I honestly thought that you would have been better off without me to pull you down into my misery."
"But you don't think like that anymore?" she asks again anxiously and he feels so terribly guilty.
"No, darling, I truly don't," he repeats. "I am not happy yet – not properly – but I believe you when you say that I will be. I'm starting to see it."
Mary frowns.
"And do you believe me when I say that I am happy with you?"
Matthew swallows.
"I do," he answers thickly, with honest wonder. "I can't wrap my head around that, I don't understand how you can be when I can give you so little of what you deserve, but I see that you are. To realise that just my presence can make you happy… It's the most humbling but wonderful thing I've experienced in my life."
Mary's face finally relaxes in relief.
"Good," she says. "It's good to know that I've managed to get at least this much through this thick skull of yours."
They startle at the light knock on Mary's door, followed quickly by Anna, with a shawl over a modest nightgown, stepping into the bedroom.
"Milady, are you alright?" she asks, then startles herself at the sight of Matthew by her mistress' bed. "Oh, excuse me, Captain Crawley! I did not expect to find you here."
"It's alright, Anna," he answers drily. "I did not expect to find myself here either."
Mary frowns as looks at him questioningly, probably realising only now that he shouldn't have been able to come to her like that, not without assistance.
"How did you manage to come?" she asks, Anna's curious eyes seconding the question.
"I used the bars you got installed by my bed to get myself into my chair," he answers, feeling rather proud of himself, especially when they both stare at him in awe. He looks up at Anna sheepishly. "I'm afraid I must ask you to wake William up though. I am not yet able to get myself back to bed, even if I got out of it."
"At once, sir," says Anna and leaves to fetch William.
"I don't think she will have to actually wake him," says Mary with visible embarrassment. "It seems I've already raised everyone."
"William is a sound sleeper, so I wouldn't be so sure," answers Matthew lightly. "And I'm glad you woke me up, at least. I hate the thought of you dealing with it alone when I'm just a door away."
He sees her open her mouth to say something, but then she reconsiders and kisses his cheek lightly instead in thanks.
He would pay a lot to know what it was she wanted to tell him – and why did she feel she couldn't.
xxx
Somehow that awful night serves as a catharsis of some kind. Mary can't put her finger on it, but she feels it when she wakes up to face her first morning in their new house and she is sure Matthew feels it as well. It is as if some of the fog surrounding them and separating them from each other, for all the time they spent together, has lifted to let them see each other more clearly and regain some of their old connection. Maybe it's because she can finally believe that he wouldn't prefer to be dead than with her. Maybe it's because he can finally believe that she's honest about being happy with him, however he is. Maybe it's the fact that she needed him and he came. Whatever it is, she feels lighter than she has been in months.
She goes into the dining room and is thrilled to be welcomed by Matthew's gentle and sincere smile.
"Good morning, darling," he greets her in his beautiful, deep voice and she is even more thrilled to detect no bitterness or sarcasm in his greeting. She has no illusions that he is over his depression or suddenly reconciled fully to the reality of his new life, but she hasn't seen such a genuine, joyful smile on his face since Amiens and she relishes it now.
"Good morning," she greets him back, feeling her cheeks stretching from a wide smile.
Breakfast is lovely, there is no other word for it. They are served by William, each with their own newspaper – he with The Manchester Guardian and she with The Sketch – the sun is shining brightly through the tall windows, with still green lawn stretching towards orange and yellow trees behind them, and it all feels so impossibly cheerful, peaceful and domestic that Mary feels her chest might burst from happiness.
"What are your plans for today, darling?" she asks Matthew, giddy at the normality of asking such a question of her husband and the way he smiles in response before answering.
"I have physiotherapy after ten and I know I will have to rest afterwards before luncheon – I have Sybil overseeing it today and isn't she a slave driver! Then afterwards I would want to start going through the changes to laws I have missed during the last four years; I know there are hundreds. I want to be somehow prepared before I get back to the office."
Mary beams at him, delighted that he is actively planning for his return to work. She has to suppress a chuckle at the thought of how distasteful she used to find him having a job and how little it counts now against this proof he is getting back his stubborn independence and with that, his will to live.
"What about you?" asks Matthew, equally pleased to see her honest smile. He has seen enough of her forced, false ones for a lifetime and vows again to do everything in his power to give her as many real reasons to smile as he possibly can.
"I am going to help Mama with preparation of the expense report for the convalescent home," she answers brightly. "And I plan to have Edith for tea, if you can believe it. But the weather is so lovely, especially for late October, that I was thinking of spending some time in the garden beforehand. Could I talk you into accompanying me, after luncheon?"
To her relief, Matthew answers without hesitation.
"That would be delightful."
They exchange smiles and go back to their breakfast.
xxx
"You're lucky you don't feel it," says Sybil as she is moving electrodes over the muscles in his legs. They both observe with fascination as the muscles twitch in response. "If I adjust the power wrong, at least you won't know it!"
Matthew gives her a wry smile.
"You mean you're lucky I wouldn't know if you made a mistake. I don't know if you'd be more mortified by causing me pain or by admitting the indomitable Nurse Crawley is not infallible, after all."
"Oh, that wholly depends on how happy Mary is with you at any given moment," answers Sybil with a smirk. "Because if you make her unhappy, I can always apply this rod by accident to the parts you do feel, without any dent to my conscience."
"Duly noted," says Matthew dryly. "Don't worry, I'm trying my very best to be a decent husband to her."
"It's comforting to hear that you are doing the bare minimum then," says Sybil sternly, applying the electrode to his other leg. Matthew looks at them and thinks that while it's obvious that they look much thinner than they did three months ago, they don't objectively look very bad. It's still surreal to him that they are attached to his body when he can't feel them at all. Which makes him consider Sybil's words, actually, and not the part about the kind of husband he is or can be to Mary.
"Wouldn't it be better for you to have a guinea pig with some feeling left to train on?" he asks curiously. "How are you going to learn to avoid mistakes if neither you nor I can notice them?"
Sybil glares at him.
"Give me some credit, Matthew. I have been trained before Major Clarkson allowed me to perform this procedure on you."
"It wasn't me who mentioned adjusting the power wrong first," points out Matthew teasingly and succeeds in making Sybil laugh.
"Oh, alright, I am a bit nervous!" she admits with a smile. "But I am also very happy I got the opportunity to learn such a novel treatment. I mean, galvanism and faradism have been long in use, but not for injuries like this. I feel very cutting edge."
"You're welcome," answers Matthew with a cheeky smile. "Glad to be of service in the name of Nurse Crawley becoming a pioneer in medicine."
"I would like to, you know," admits Sybil suddenly and earnestly. "To be a proper part of advances in medicine and I don't mean just as a VAD or even a proper nurse. I want to be able to do something meaningful to help, to change things."
Matthew looks up at her in surprise.
"You want to become a doctor?"
Sybil bites her lip, but nods.
"If I manage to get into university," she says darkly. "I didn't exactly receive a proper education for it, even though I've always wanted to. But if that doesn't work out, I will study at least to become a fully qualified nurse."
"I think you will be marvellous, whether as a doctor or as a nurse," says Matthew sincerely, then adds with a smirk. "But I would still advise you to practise first on somebody who can tell if you are setting this thing too high."
Sybil pretends that she's going to poke him with the electrode in the ribs and manages to cover up her move just in time before the matron approaches them and catches her in the act. Matthew barely holds in his laughter.
When she's gone, with a parting look of disapproval at the two of them and their most unprofessional levity, they both burst out laughing.
"You were this close to being demoted to serving tea and cleaning bedpans," sniggers Matthew.
"I know!" says Sybil, wiping her eyes. "And it would have been your fault for provoking me!"
Matthew looks surreptitiously around to check if anybody else in the physical therapy room is likely to overhear their conversation.
"What does Tom think about your plans?" he asks Sybil in a whisper. Any concerns he might have on this account – and he didn't have many, knowing Tom Branson – are quickly put to rest by her brilliant smile.
"He supports them fully," she says proudly. "He told me I can do anything I want when we marry and I believe him."
"But isn't he dead set on going to Ireland when he's freed from the Army?"
"Royal College of Surgeons in Dublin has been allowing women to study medicine since the 1880s," answers Sybil staunchly. "I can very well study there."
Matthew nods, impressed, but having been raised by Isobel Crawley, feels forced to issue a warning.
"Being married may be a hindrance for you in that goal," he says. "Mother experienced many times that even if women are allowed to enter a profession, the assumption often is that they do it before or instead of marriage."
Sybil scoffs, her eyes fiery.
"I will find a way. I won't let this kind of ridiculous restrictions and outdated views stop me," she says fiercely and Matthew believes her. "Speaking of marriage, how was your and Mary's first day in your new home?"
"The day was wonderful," says Matthew, sobered by the memory of Mary's screams. "I only wish I could tell the same about the night."
"Your nightmares or Mary's?" asks Sybil and the way she's looking at him makes him think she knows the answer.
"Mary's," he says heavily. "This time, at least. Sybil… Do you know if they are always so bad for her?"
"It varies," says Sybil sadly. "My bedroom is next to hers – that is, it was until yesterday – and she only wakes me up once or twice per week with her screams. I know though that she wakes up from them much more often than that. It's just that not all of them make her scream or cry in her sleep."
"So you have been comforting her?" asks Matthew, hoping desperately that it was so, that Mary didn't have to suffer like that alone for months while he didn't even realise. "She wasn't alone?"
"No, she wasn't" says Sybil at once, putting away the electrode to touch his arm in comfort. "I was there every time it was truly bad. I'm a light sleeper."
Matthew exhales, some of the tension he's been keeping from the moment he woke up and realised it was Mary he was hearing finally leaving him.
"Thank you," he whispers. "Thank you for being there for her while I couldn't."
"She's my sister," answers Sybil plainly. "And she went to the war for me."
For a moment, she focuses on the settings of the battery before confessing quietly.
"I feel terribly guilty. She only went there for me and she came back broken in multiple ways while I… I am alright, mostly."
"I feel guilty too," admits Matthew, words pouring out of him. "I knew she wasn't alright after the dugout; I saw it. But maybe she would have been alright by now if I didn't fail to stop her from going back, if she didn't have to go through all those hellish months to make it worse. I should have thought of something to make her stay."
Sybil stares at him incredulously.
"Matthew, there was no way on Earth you could have made her stay. She wasn't going to listen."
"I should have tried harder though," he whispers, not at all convinced. He knows Mary is stubborn and contrary – God, doesn't he! – but he should have thought of something to convince her. "Or, at the very least, I should have noticed earlier how badly she is struggling with it now. She mentioned having nightmares, I've seen she was often not eating and that her hands were trembling when she got upset and yet I've been so obsessed with my own misery I didn't put any of this together until Major Clarkson said it's shellshock."
"I haven't put it together like this either," says Sybil, frowning unhappily. "I suppose I didn't want it to be true. Although the time she blew up on Edith at the breakfast table did make me wonder."
"Must have been because of Carlisle," notes Matthew through clenched teeth, "She was terrified he was going to publish the story and then got to share breakfast with the person who made it public in the first place. No wonder she lost control."
"I still can't believe Edith told someone of it," says Sybil, shaking her head.
Matthew scoffs.
"Told someone. If only!"
Sybil's eyes narrow.
"You seem to know more than me," she says, staring at him intently. "What exactly did she do?"
"Wrote a letter to the Turkish Embassy, describing the whole thing, or at least what she thought she knew," explains Matthew bitterly as Sybil's jaw drops. "The Ambassador's wife made sure that half of Ton heard the story in the next few months."
When he raises his head, his eyes are furious.
"I can't get over it, Sybil. Not truly, however hard I'm trying. I know that it's been five years, and that Mary did her own share of terrible things to her, but when I think about how far she went to ruin her life, to expose her to public shaming… I simply can't."
"Please tell me she didn't at least know what really happened to Mary," pleads Sybil, horrified. "It's bad enough on its own, but if she had even an inkling and still decided to go through with it…"
Matthew shakes his head.
"As far as I know, she didn't," he says hoarsely. "Considering that Mary herself either doesn't understand it or doesn't want to accept it, I doubt Edith could have gotten the true version of events. I don't think Mary told any details to anyone before she confessed it to me."
"I tried to make her see it for what it was," says Sybil with evident frustration. "I hope I got through to her, at least a little. But even so! How could Edith…"
She trails off, biting her lip again.
"Mary told me that she took her revenge and that it was ugly. Do you know what she did?"
Matthew nods grimly.
"She prevented Sir Anthony Strallan from proposing to Edith."
Sybil gapes at him.
"How on Earth did she manage that?"
Matthew shrugs uncomfortably.
"She told him that Edith laughed about avoiding some ghastly old bore."
"And this was all it took for him to leave without a word to Edith and never show up again?" asks Sybil incredulously.
"Apparently. He must have felt rather insecure about Edith's feelings for him and Mary can be convincing when she wants to be."
"It still means he's a fool and a coward," huffs Sybil, angry now on Edith's behalf. "Tom wouldn't be so easy to chase off and neither would you!"
"Wouldn't I?" asks Matthew pensively. "In the end, I didn't stick around to find out what was keeping Mary from giving me an answer either."
Sybil rolls her eyes.
"It would spare everyone a lot of headache if you waited longer, but in all fairness you did give Mary more than plenty of time. You spoke with her, you asked her, you waited for months for her answer. How can you compare it with what Strallan apparently did?"
"I just understand feeling vulnerable and afraid to be hurt more," he says, but thinks that Sybil may have a point. Even at his most dejected, he wouldn't have taken Edith's words regarding Mary as gospel and it boggles his mind that Strallan did take Mary's. Was this man completely blind to the relations between them?
"Anyway," says Sybil, deliberately changing topic as is packing the electrodes and the battery away. "That's the end of the pleasant part for you when I do all the work and you just lie there looking pretty. Time to build up some sweat, Captain Crawley, if you ever want to be able to get yourself in and out of your chair by yourself."
Matthew pulls himself up with her help and smiles with resignation as she reaches for the weights.
"I already did," he tells her smugly, barely hiding his excitement at the memory, the reason for the act notwithstanding. "I used the support bar to get myself out of bed and into my chair when Mary was having a nightmare last night."
Sybil gapes at him in horror.
"Matthew Crawley, have you really transferred yourself into the chair without calling for any assistance? Are you out of your senses? You could have damaged whatever you have still functioning!"
He gives her a sheepish look, but remains firm in his conviction that this was the only possible way he could have behaved.
"Mary needed me," he says simply.
Sybil just rolls her eyes in exasperation and starts counting the repeats of his first exercise.
xxx
Edith looks around the light and airy sitting room and doesn't quite manage to hide her jealousy. It's clear she is trying to make an effort though.
"It's perfectly lovely," she says sincerely enough. "You did a wonderful job with setting up this old place."
"Thank you," answers Mary and pours herself more tea. Her nausea is getting much better, but her appetite is not really coming back. She suspects Dr Clarkson is not going to have good news for her regarding her iron levels and sighs internally at the inevitable fussing it is going to bring from everybody. "It is a lovely house, so I had great fun decorating it."
"And you get to share it with a man you love..." says Edith wistfully and Mary tells herself to be sympathetic and not get too sarcastic. She can understand loneliness and a deep conviction that any chance of happiness has been ruined long ago. Even if it boggles her mind that anyone could pin their hopes of happiness on Strallan.
"I am very fortunate," she admits honestly instead. "There were so many moments when I did not believe it could ever come to be... For all kinds of reasons."
Edith looks astonished by Mary's frankness but also avidly curious.
"What changed?" she asks, "I know you've always loved him, whatever stupid thing made you not accept him before the war, but we all thought he was truly in love with Lavinia. I've read her piece in the article, but it's obvious that it's not true, at least to anyone who knows them."
Mary's first impulse is to snap that it's none of Edith's business, but stops herself in time. They are both trying, after all.
"We were thrown together into rather desperate situations," she says simply. "It made it impossible to deny that we both still cared for each other very much. All that was left to do was to clear some old misunderstandings."
Her voice trails off at the end, as somehow her new sunny sitting room disappears and she is again in the birch copse, rising sun barely able to pierce a mixture of thick fog and gunpowder, Matthew's gun so heavy and awkward in her sweaty hands.
"Mary? Mary!"
For a moment she is confused about what Edith is doing in France, but then she blinks and finds herself back at home again, a cup of tea shaking slightly in her hands. Thankfully it is empty enough that she hasn't sloshed any liquid over her skirt, but she puts it down carefully just in case.
"Please excuse me," she says in a controlled voice. "I was miles away."
Edith doesn't look fully convinced that everything is alright – which it is, so seriously, there is no need for such grave looks! – and Mary hastens to change the topic.
"What about you?" she asks curiously. "Any affairs of the heart while I was gone?"
To her astonishment, Edith blushes scarlet, even though she insists there were none.
"I don't believe you," says Mary bluntly, her curiosity piqued even more by Edith's desperate denials. "Come on, spill. Who was it and why has nothing come out of this? Also, how have you ever managed to keep it secret from Mama and Granny?"
"Oh, don't ever mention it!" groans Edith, still brightly red. "It was the most idiotic thing I've done in my life and I would love nothing better than to forget it all. I'm never going to tell anyone and if I did, you would be the last person to tell! You would never let me live it down if you knew!"
Which is probably a fair enough assessment if the whole thing is indeed as embarrassing as Edith seems to think it is. Pity though, Mary would pay a fortune to learn what kind of romantic disaster had the power to get her sister into such a state when recalling it.
"Any handsome, single men among the new arrivals at the convalescent home?" she asks instead. She is adequately happy with her own life to feel benevolent enough to wish Edith luck if there are.
Disappointingly, Edith shakes her head.
"The most recent one is very badly burnt," she says sadly. "You can scarcely see what he used to look like between bandages and the scars. I want to weep whenever I look at him."
Mary nods, sobered by Edith's description and the memories of numerous wounded soldiers, burnt by explosions or gas and usually screaming their heads off in pain, who she had to transport to whatever help they were able to provide for them.
"I hope he is going to recover," she says only, her heart filled with compassion for that stranger.
xxx
"I see you decided to make an effort for the second night in a row," points out Mary when Matthew wheels himself into the dining room, dressed in black tie.
"I know my wife has standards, even if I find them ridiculous at times," he answers with a smile. "Just don't expect white tie when it's the two of us."
"No music tonight?" she asks lightly as William is serving entrees and Matthew scowls briefly.
"Not tonight," he answers, the smile back on his face. "I couldn't think of a record which would fit my mood."
"Which is?" asks Mary with a bit of wariness. He looks quite happy, but she can't be sure how much of it is for her benefit only.
The flirtatious glint of his eyes is enough to reassure her.
"Overwhelmed by the beauty of my dining partner, of course. Which is exactly as it usually is when I'm sharing dinner with you."
"Even when I was perfectly horrid to you?" she asks teasingly. "Even when I compared you to a sea monster waiting to devour a helpless, innocent princess?"
"Oh, especially then," answers Matthew, his eyes darkening. "I haven't been able to purge that image out of my mind ever since, however much I wanted to at times."
Mary thinks she sees William smiling and shaking his head slightly as he leaves the dining room to get the soup, but she's too busy flirting with her husband to care.
xxx
Their second night at the cottage, it is Matthew who has a nightmare.
"We're quite a pair, aren't we?" observes Mary drily, carding her fingers through Matthew's hair as his breathing slowly calms down and his eyes are losing their wild look. She waves away the apologies for waking her up he's trying to make in a shaky voice. "Don't be so absurd. You're going to be lucky if you're not woken up by me in two or three hours."
Matthew considers it briefly and stops apologising.
"Do you want to talk about it?" asks Mary and instantly regrets it when Matthew flinches violently.
"No," he rasps, his eyes full of horror all over again. "Absolutely not."
Mary nods in understanding and, after settling herself more comfortably against the backboard, goes back to petting his hair soothingly.
"All nightmares are bad," she says musingly. "But some are simply indescribable."
Matthew nods in a wordless agreement.
They don't even notice when they fall asleep.
xxx
Matthew wakes up to a sensation which is both painfully alien and wondrously familiar. There is something heavy lying on his arm and chest, and something silky and soft tickling his face. His nose is full of the scent of irises and vanilla.
It shouldn't surprise him so much to find Mary sleeping soundly on his chest when he opens his eyes, but somehow it does.
Maybe because the last time he woke up like that was on the last morning of their honeymoon which was nearly three months and a lifetime ago.
He waits for the inevitable moment when he recoils from her, too mortified by his body to want her half as close as this (even though he wants her so much at the same time), but it doesn't come. Instead, for the first time in a long time, Matthew feels at peace. He just lies there and allows himself to feel the warmth of Mary's body on his and the slight puffs of her breath on his neck, each of them gloriously, soothingly reassuring that she is alive and well and here, and pushing the last remnants of his nightmare away, together with the sunlight pouring softly through the white curtains over the French window of his bedroom. He moves his arm - slowly, so very slowly to avoid waking her up, she needs more sleep so desperately – and hugs her lightly, his hand caressing her back delicately. They are alive, safe, openly married and in the house of their own. His gaze drifts to Mary's waist, even though it is hidden by blankets. Impossible as it sounds, they're going to have a baby. He has Mary in his arms and she's his wife.
At that moment, he doesn't think about all the things he doesn't have. He just feels so terribly, terribly content and at peace and basks in those half-forgotten feelings. Until now Matthew has not let himself fully realise how desperately he missed it. Why has he ever found the prospect of sharing a bed with Mary so terrifying, at least now when he regained some of his control and dignity? Why on earth was he so set on denying himself whatever types of intimacy with his wife he is still capable of?
The scent of her hair hits his nostrils again and he feels the thrice cursed stirrings of phantom desire for her in his brain, but without any corresponding reaction from his body and he's reminded as painfully as possible.
Ah. That's why.
But as painful as it is to be reminded of his loss – their loss – all over again, he can't even think of giving up the weight of Mary in his arms or the pure pleasure of caressing her back while she sleeps so peacefully. If anybody came here to get her away from him, they would have to pry his fingers off her and he is not going to give her up himself, not now, not when he is also reminded how very much he used to love simply holding her like that.
How very much he still loves holding her like that now.
xxx
Mary wakes up slowly and with huge reluctance. She is more well rested than she remembers feeling in a very long time and so wonderfully comfortable. She can feel Matthew's chest moving slightly with each breath underneath her and the steady, reassuring beat of his heart. His warm hand is caressing her back in the most soothing manner possible and she doesn't want to wake up because it is the nicest dream she's had in months.
Except it feels much too real to be a dream.
She blinks slowly and opens her eyes to see Matthew's blue ones looking straight at her.
"Good morning, my darling," he says quietly. "Have you slept well?"
"Better than I have in ages," she answers, still completely stunned at the place and position she finds herself in. "You make for a most comfortable pillow."
Matthew chuckles softly.
"Apparently."
He looks so adorable like that, his blond hair all dishevelled and his face still softened with the remnants of sleep, his cheeks rough with stubble which somehow just makes him appear more handsome, that she can't resist.
She kisses him.
What happens next seems equally inevitable and completely unexpected.
As soon as her lips touch his, Matthew responds by pulling her tightly to him and deepening the kiss with a passion she remembers so very well but which she has given up as lost forever. One of his hands holds her firmly by her back as the other travels slowly to her derriere, making her gasp when she feels his long, strong fingers caress and grasp possessively. Her hands go to him seemingly out of their own volition, one sneaking into his thick, soft hair, the other clutching at his arm, and all the time their kiss goes on, their lips unable to get enough of each other, their tongues dancing together, their eyes mostly closed in the sheer pleasure they share yet opening periodically to confirm that it is not a dream, that they are really so close, so uninhibited, so on fire.
Matthew breaks their kiss but before Mary has time to feel more than a second of disappointment, his lips find her neck and travel alongside it, leaving a path of bliss in their wake. She moans, she can't help it, and she can feel his lips twisting into a smug smirk at causing such a reaction in her, so she pulls his hair and bites lightly on his earlobe in retaliation, smug herself when she succeeds in making him gasp in turn.
She feels his hand pull her nightgown up and caress the exposed skin of her thigh, which emboldens her to start unbuttoning his shirt; delighted with every inch of his chest she exposes without the slightest protest from him. How she missed being allowed to see and touch him like this! Her fingers play eagerly with the sparse hair there, so much darker than on his head but still unmistakably blond, then explore the taut skin on his slim belly and she thrills at hearing his breath hitch at her actions. The exhilarating assurance that she can give him pleasure still, even if not in the same way as before, fills her with such overwhelming, giddy joy she nearly laughs as she starts feasting on his neck now. He is hers to love again, whatever has happened to him, and she is close to bursting from it all, even as she tries to convey her feelings to him in her every kiss and caress.
She groans again when one of his hands touches her breast, his initial hesitation quickly replaced by assurance and purpose, while the other one travels slowly upwards her thigh, when suddenly she hears the door of her bedroom opening and Anna's light steps inside. She must have come with her morning tea.
"Milady?"
"I'm in Captain Crawley's room, Anna," Mary answers, hoping against hope that her voice sounds normal. "I will be with you in a moment."
She turns back to Matthew, looking at him mournfully. The moment is sadly and most definitely broken and she can see the shock of what they've just been doing plain on his face. She strokes his cheek, hoping to communicate to him somehow how very much alright she is with this development.
"Maybe I should tell Anna to wait until I ring tomorrow," she says cheekily and, with the last quick kiss to his lips, goes back to her own bedroom.