Still Evening
I never would have proposed to you at all. Sigh. There it was again. That horrible sentence roaring back into the forefront of my mind.
I could not sleep. Sleep should come easily. I had spent the whole of last night awake and had caught just a few hours of slumber during the afternoon. Racing from one emotion to the next had exhausted me. I needed to rest. Yet my mind would not quiet.
Someone rapped at my door.
Somehow I thought it would be one of my sisters. Or Mrs. Vane. Someone with some new crisis that needed solving.
Yet here he was. Darcy. Shivering slightly, wearing his dressing gown and, if I knew his habits (and I think I did), nothing else. Darcy and I had both moved to guest chambers as our suite of rooms were still occupied by Rebecca and family, making his journey down the drafty hall necessary.
"May I come in?"
Fitzwilliam Darcy can always be relied upon to ask the difficult questions.
And It was a difficult question indeed. One might think the obvious answer would be an unequivocal yes. I mean, the man had just rescued my sister, saving the good name of my family in the process. Yet. . . .
I never would have proposed to you at all.
I should not hold against him words that were undoubtedly spoken without thought—without realizing the impact they would have. But I was not certain I could share his bed again knowing he did not care as much for me as I did for him.
Despite my reservations I bid him enter. He placed his lamp upon the bureau, surveying the room with a distant, disinterested eye that communicated he was searching for words rather than judging the contents of the space. He seemed nervous.
Though I never feared violence from him, I must admit I began to feel a bit nervous myself when he drew a knife from the pocket of his dressing gown.
"I prefer my method of murder," I said.
"Smothering," I replied to his baffled expression, "Far less messy. Though I suppose there could be something cathartic about a good stabbing."
As if just now realizing he was lovingly fingering a knife whilst standing silently in my bedchamber without explanation for his presence, he said, "Oh," then he pulled from his other pocket a pomegranate.
Probably the very same pomegranate I had carried with my Persephone costume until I had mislaid it sometime during the first half of the ball.
The look Darcy was giving me proclaimed that he felt the addition of the pomegranate had explained everything rather than merely shifted the tone of this encounter from vaguely threatening to just perplexing.
More perplexing still, he placed the pomegranate next to the lamp on the bureau and began to saw it in half with the knife.
"I thought back. I think I know what I said that upset you yesterday. And do not attempt to tell me you are fine," he said as he continued to saw away. It was more of a job than it should have been. I suspected the knife was dull.
"I had no intention of doing so," I replied, "I was going to say, 'It certainly took you long enough'."
He continued sawing.
"Well?" I asked impatiently when I became apparent he would say nothing more until he had opened the blessed fruit.
Realizing sawing would do him no good, he tried stabbing instead. The pomegranate shot across the room. "Give me a moment," he said as he went to retrieve it.
"Why are you mutilating my pomegranate? I had wanted to taste that."
"You will taste it," he said, now hacking at the unfortunate fruit.
"I think the knife is dull."
"Hold your comments, please, you will not wish to sully this moment with your sharp tongue. This will be a stupendously romantic gesture if you will just bear with me."
"Will it indeed?"
"Indeed."
"That was the thirteenth word you spoke to me after our marriage," I said. I regretted the words as soon as I had spoken them. Remembering such a thing displayed my sentiment too obviously.
Darcy halted his plight. "Indeed?"
I nodded.
He went back to his work.
"You might simply tell me what you wish to say," I wheedled. My hopes were rising too high. I could not take the suspense. "I am sure the pomegranate is not necessary."
"It is most necessary. Just hold on a moment more. I have nearly opened the bloody thing."
I grinned. If I have accomplished anything in my marriage it is teaching my husband how to curse.
"All right. Give me your hand," said Darcy.
I offered my hand. He turned it palm up then knelt before me.
"Ignore all of the preface," he said.
"I will never ignore the preface. The preface is the best part."
"Hush. Let me do this properly."
"This is where it gets romantic rather than comedic?"
He nodded. He began placing pomegranate seeds into my outstretched hand one by one.
"Are you counting out loud?"
"I have not slept in more than a day. I cannot concentrate. Would you please be quiet?"
"Never," I replied, causing him to glare at me. Not a full Glare. But still a glare. In the middle of what was purported to be a romantic gesture. The man really was too much. I did the Stare of Madness back at him with no actual hope of achieving anything with it. He was obviously already mad.
"I am sorry," I said, "I will behave now."
At last he said, "There. It is done now."
I glanced down at my hand, it was full of red sticky lumps that rather looked like pustules. I had never had a pomegranate before and had imagined it would be more appetizing. "Is this the romantic gesture?" I asked.
"Yes."
"Pomegranate seeds?"
"There are twelve of them."
"Yes, I heard you count them." I paused waiting for elucidation, none came. "I think this gesture wants a bit more explaining."
"There are twelve of them."
Have I told you how frustrating this man is?
"Hades tricked Persephone into eating six seeds."
"Yes, and I am giving you twelve,"he said, repeating the emphasis.
"I think we're are at an understanding on the twelve bit. The why of it is really where there is still some confusion."
"Persephone ate six seeds and was thus forced to spend half of the year in the underworld. She spent the other half of the year with her mother Demeter, goddess of the harvest, whose despair at losing her daughter made the earth grow cold and the crops die, bringing about winter."
"I am aware of the mythology," I said, still not fully understanding his point. "I am quite certain Mama would bring about a perpetual winter if you tried to give me back so I am not sure the analogy holds."
"Yes, but I gave you twelve seeds."
This again. "So you are saying you like me and you wish to keep me all year?"
"No, I am saying I love you and I would risk worldwide famine in order to keep you with me until the end of my days."
"Oh," I said. I was too stunned to say anything else.
"I said I never would have proposed to you and that is true.
I had dismissed you that first evening we met, yes, but within days I was enraptured by you, and by Bingley's ball I was so in love with you I knew if I did not get away from you madness would overtake me an I would beg for your hand.
I had planned to escape to London and never see you again.
It would have been the greatest mistake of my life.
I spoke so flippantly because I thought you knew—I thought you must see how much I felt for you. "
"I suppose I should say—I suppose you might like to know. . . ." I trailed off. This was more difficult to say than it ought to be. He had just laid his heart out before me I had only to take it.
"I suppose I should tell you that I love you as well," I finished at last.
"Yes, I know."
Infuriating man. I contemplated shoving pomegranate pustules in his face.
"You are not supposed to say 'I know'!"
"Why ever not? I did know. You were rather obvious about it."
"I was not!"
"Well, no. Not at first. In fact I was convinced you hated me after the Netherfield ball. That was a great wound to my pride. Your continued indifference became a wound to my heart. However, these last few weeks it became apparent your feelings had change dramatically."
"These last few weeks, indeed! I did not even know I loved you until yesterday."
"That does not surprise me in the least. You are not the most introspective person."
"Excuse me," I said, nearly shouting. With more dignity I continued, "That is entirely . . . not false."
Darcy chuckled. "Indeed."
"So am I meant to eat these seeds now?"
"No, first I must beg you to do me the honor of continuing to be my wife."
"You are proposing?"
"Yes."
"You are not going to enumerate my faults to demonstrate the clear-headedness of your decision?"
"I think your faults rather apparent and my head is not at all clear. I think I may be delirious from sleep deprivation, actually."
"Arse."
"I love you."
"I love you too, you snobbish arse," I said. Then I tossed the entire handful of seeds into my mouth.
I instantly pulled a face.
"Not good?" Darcy asked.
"A bit chewy," I replied, speaking with my mouthful in a most unladylike manner. "And not as sweet as I thought they would be."
"You do not have to eat them."
"I cannot very well spit them out. It would be horribly unromantic."
"Am I to understand from this that you are consenting to my proposal?" he asked.
I swallowed. "Yes, Mr. Darcy, I think I am."