Chapter 12 A Bleak Future #3
Elizabeth shed a tear that might have been a perfect match for Mr Darcy’s.
“Have I condemned my daughter to a life of misery? Have I made her as jaded as myself and my parents before me? Is my family line cursed to endure hollow, loveless marriages for generations to come? Is there not some way to break this mould?”
Grandmama took Elizabeth’s hand.
Elizabeth tried to pull away. “Please, Grandmama, I beg you, no more. I have seen enough. I have not the fortitude to withstand another of these scenes.”
“This shall be the last. But it is necessary.”
Jane and her family had arrived at Pemberley for a visit. She had three children: Frederick, Susan, and Edward. Somehow, Elizabeth could not see Jane’s husband. “Grandmama, did Jane marry Mr Bingley?”
“These scenes are for you—to understand the person you have become. Who your sister married does not signify.”
Unlike Elizabeth, Jane seemed genuinely happy. Jane’s children ran off to play games with Elizabeth and Mr Darcy’s children, leaving Elizabeth to converse with her sister. She asked Jane, “How are Mary, Kitty, and Lydia?”
“Mary and Mr Blakewell are now expecting their second child. Kitty and John Lucas are also expecting, hoping for a son this time. Lydia’s husband is recently promoted. Now that Major Denny has been given a raise in pay, perhaps Mama will not need to send them so much of her pin money.”
“Speaking of Mama and Papa, how are they?”
Jane sighed. “They are much the same as ever. Mama continues to dote on Papa, and he continues to tease her in return. If only he made an effort to return her affection, they could be so much happier. As it is, none of us ever knew what a loving marriage ought to be, and we were left to find our own way. I wish Papa would open his eyes and see just how much he has missed in their five and thirty years together.”
Elizabeth was appalled. But how could the Elizabeth in the scene not react? Everything Jane had just described mirrored what she witnessed in her own marriage to Fitzwilliam; this version of herself still resented him, and herself for giving in to his proposal.
Throughout this marriage, she had ignored Mr Darcy.
She had prided herself on thwarting his efforts to bring them closer together.
Elizabeth had always been her father’s daughter.
Had she become her father? Had her misery all these years been of her own choosing? Once again, tears sprang to her eyes.
Wisteria. At last.
“Grandmama, is this the future that must be? Or is it a future that may be, one of endless possibilities?”
“Anything that has not come to pass is not yet decided. Your past has been written into the Book of Time by your own hand. You hold the pen, and it is your own writing that decides which of those futures will become the present.”
“But Grandmama, I do not know what to write. I know what I want the ending to be, but I cannot foresee how to reach it.”
She listened, but there was no response.
“Grandmama? Please, I need your help. You have shown me what I must avoid. Now I need you to show me how I may avoid it. Please!”
She waited for several minutes, but Grandmama had gone, leaving Elizabeth alone with her thoughts.
She threw herself onto her bed and wept.
She thought about each moment with Mr Darcy. Every time he offered tenderness, I turned away. Through my callousness, I have moulded him into the man I settled for, and never the man I wanted.
He had tried in every way to be that man—the man she should have wanted—but she never permitted it. He refused to give up on me, but I fought until there was no fight left in him.
Her thoughts turned to her eldest daughter.
Emily looks up to me in the same way I have always looked up to Papa.
I could have taught her to be loving and kind.
Instead, every time she tells me that her father is a fool, intending for him to overhear, a part of him dies.
When that happens, a part of the beautiful person she could have become withers away with him.
But all of this was in the future—a future that had not yet come to pass and might still be avoided.
Could Elizabeth be happy in a marriage with Mr Darcy and thus save her daughter from a similar fate?
She had no idea where to begin. No—Grandmama had shown her exactly where she needed to begin: with herself.
The wedding was still three weeks hence.
Three weeks for Elizabeth to salvage an impending marriage that she still did not want, but to make the best of it for her future daughter’s sake as well as her own.
Could she learn to love Mr Darcy? If she somehow came to love him, would it change everything? Would it change anything?
Elizabeth needed something—anything—to take her mind away from her brooding.
She returned to the sitting room at the parsonage and perused the shelves.
She found a novel titled Her Ladyship Strikes Back by Stephanie Vale.
“Strike back,” she murmured. “That is what I must do. I must strike back against the person I do not wish to become.”
She made herself comfortable in a chair and began: It is a truth universally acknowledged that a single gentleman with a good fortune, a strong intellect, and a huge problem will believe that he can solve the problem single-handedly.