Chapter 24
Chapter Twenty-Four
The following day, Isabella walked alongside Hermia and Phoebe through the village just beyond Branmere Hall. It was a quaint place, similar to Rochdale, and Hermia immediately made a beeline for a bakery where she seemed to know the owner quite personally.
What is that like? Isabella wondered. To be so integrated into the life here that you are welcomed everywhere?
“I like the flower stall,” Phoebe told her. “I have made it a weekly thing now to bring my papa some flowers. He says he does not care much for flowers, but I once found a four-leaf clover for him, and he kept it. I think he still has it, and I know he keeps a flower from every bunch I buy him.”
“I think that is very sweet, Phoebe,” Isabella answered. She still felt very hollow and aching in her body, but she wanted to try to put on a brave face for the young girl. “What is your favorite flower?”
Phoebe hummed, making a spectacle of putting her finger on her chin and thinking. “All of them! I do not want to pick favorites because then it makes it seem as though the other flowers are not good enough. But they are, so I like to keep my papa’s gifts varied.”
“She is going down the alphabet,” Hermia said quietly. “She is quite keen to find a flower for every letter. So far, despite the lack of order, she is succeeding quite well.”
Phoebe nodded, proud of herself, and for a while, as they strolled through the village and perused the bakery and the flower stall, as well as a lake that Hermia took her to, she felt the heaviness lifting a little in her heart.
For the first time since the ball where everything had gone wrong, Isabella felt as though she could breathe slightly easier.
It was not a feeling that would last, but she savored it nonetheless.
Still, throughout the trip, she thought of Oscar.
She thought of how he was enduring. If he was still buried in his study or chambers.
She wondered if Morris still cried for the two of them, or if he noticed Isabella was gone at all.
She wondered if Oscar might have mentioned her in that journal, the words he might have written down without ever voicing.
Did he apologize in his journal? Did he admit his faults and wrongdoings? Did he blame her?
She pushed those darker thoughts aside, buried her pain once more, and bit into the pastry that Phoebe had recommended she buy, and she forced a smile as the flavor of apple burst over her tongue.
At Rochdale Castle, Oscar shut himself away in his study and pored over ledger after ledger that he had already read through a dozen times.
He kept staring at his journal, and he did not think about the ink-stained pages he had scrawled through the day after he had ruined everything between Isabella and himself.
He grabbed it roughly and read the last page.
And now she has gone, and all I did was watch her leave with her packed belongings.
For he had let her leave, had he not? He could have asked her to stay, could have gone to his knees and begged for forgiveness, but Oscar did not have it in him.
As he buried himself in parchment and ink, he had buried his own mind and heart in that cold, dark place he knew so familiarly, so nothing hurt.
He looked up, startled, as his study door flew open. There in the doorway was not his wife. Heaven, Oscar had a moment where he hoped it would be, and his heart rose. But no, it was Edmund, not his Isabella.
“We must speak,” Edmund said sharply. “And you will not turn me away like you did yesterday.”
“I did not turn you away.”
“You did not even look up at me or answer when I spoke, so yes, you did. But I will not watch you spiral, Oscar. I have seen it before and will not again.”
“Then leave me in peace,” Oscar muttered. “Leave me be—”
“Damn it, I am your friend,” Edmund hissed, striding toward his desk.
Oscar flinched back as Edmund slammed his palms onto his desk to get his full attention.
“I am your friend, and I will not let you go through this alone, but I will not coddle you. I will not say, poor you, no, for I care too greatly about Isabella to do that. She is hurting; you are hurting, and as your friend, I cannot watch this continue.”
“Then I—”
Edmund shook his head viciously. “Do not order me to leave. I will not listen.”
“Edmund,” he growled. “I am spiraling just as hard as I did when my parents—when they… when they did what they did that night. I am not myself; I am not in my own head. Do you not understand?”
“No!” Edmund cried. “No, I do not, but that is why I persist. You have forced your wife out of your joint home, but you will not order me out. I know you think nobody should or that you do not deserve it, but Isabella cares. Goodness, I care. And you know what, Oscar? People who care do not just let you wallow like this. It is scary sometimes.”
Oscar stared at his friend, but he could not feel anything. Not even a pang of guilt at that point. There was simply nothing. An empty chasm had opened in his chest where he wanted his heart to be, but it was long gone and buried.
“Edmund,” Oscar said, his voice still in that cold tone. “Do you know what Isabella said at the ball the other night? She said that she was not in a loveless marriage.”
“How can you quote her but not process what that means? How could you let her leave knowing that she believes that?”
“Because she ought to be!” Oscar snapped, rearing up to his feet, matching Edmund’s stance.
“Because it ought to be loveless, so she does not get hurt like I have already hurt her. I am a beast! The ton says so, I believe so, but she…she insists that she does not, but for how long? What lengths will make her see?”
“Why do you want her to?”
“What?”
“Why are you insistent on turning her against you?”
Oscar stilled, and something deeply buried in him pulsed with a second of life. “Because… because then she will not loathe me so much later, when I reveal my whole, true self to her.”
“You are so desperate to prove this misconception wrong that you cannot see what you have lost on a baseless, awful rumor. Oscar, you are not a beast. A man with violence that was trained into him through war, a man with scars, is not a beast. You are simply a man with a past. A past you did not ask for. Listen to me.”
“I will not—”
“Oh, you will,” Edmund laughed humorlessly.
“You will, because I am your friend, and if you will not hear it from me, then you will hear it from nobody. You entered the army to escape your incorrigible, despicable parents, but you are still punishing yourself for things you did not ask to go through. But you know what you are doing? You are hurting your wife through this punishment. You are hurting yourself.”
Edmund sagged back, shaking his head.
“When will you let yourself be forgiven? Oscar, you cannot atone for every life you could not save, but you are just a man. One man cannot save a whole battalion. One man cannot be held responsible for the loss of lives in war. One man cannot shoulder what your parents put you through, so why do you still force yourself when happiness is right there in front of you with a beautiful face and a kind soul that has endured your temperament?”
“Edmund—” Oscar’s voice was strained, but his friend still shook his head.
“She has looked your darkness in the eyes, and she has still wanted to stay. She has not left to get away from you, or because she fears you. She has likely left because she is hurting and will continue to for as long as you allow yourself to wallow.”
“Please leave.” The plea came out unbidden, and Oscar hated how vulnerable he sounded.
In that moment, he was a young man pleading with his family to still want him.
He was still a paraded boy in the ton, hoping he had performed well enough for approval until the next time.
He was still the man who had clawed his way out of an attempted death by poison, wondering why he was so unlovable?
How could he let any of that go?
“Oscar.” Edmund’s voice softened considerably as he finally sat down. “Oscar, I do not like seeing you like this. You are hurting, and you do not deserve to, but you are putting that pain on the one woman who has stood at your side, no matter what.”
“She deserved better than to see me lose control at that ball.”
“Perhaps, but that was one night—”
“And if there are others?”
“You do not scare her, Oscar. Has she ever told you that? I can see it in her eyes when she looks at you. It is not the look of a lady on eggshells, waiting for her husband’s next outburst. It is the look of sheer adoration. Do not tell me you do not see it.”
“Of course I see it,” he snarled. “That is why it terrifies me. I will let her down.”
“Oscar,” Edmund groaned. “I saw how you looked at Isabella’s sister’s family.
You want that. I wanted to ask you about it, maybe tease you, but I am seriously asking you this now.
What is stopping you from having that? We all have our demons, my friend, but it takes a woman like Isabella to look squarely at your particular demons and stay grounded.
And she has not run from you, not really. Not for that reason, at least.”
Oscar turned his face away, both angry and ashamed. He was thoroughly berated and forced to face himself, and he could not stand it.
He did not deserve Isabella; he did not deserve the easy happiness she offered him. He did not deserve nights of pleasure and days of laughter, not when he carried such heavy burdens.
But there was a small voice in his head that asked, What if you do?
If you can just learn to live alongside what you have been through rather than fight it. What if you do, because she has proven that she wants to stay?
“I will not ask you again, Edmund,” Oscar said, his voice barely a whisper. “Leave. Leave me alone.”
“Then I will, but I only ask that you think over what I have said.”
“Fine,” he muttered, waving his hand dismissively.
Edmund took another moment, fixed his cream-colored cravat, and stood up. He left the study door open on his way out.
Oscar could not even find the strength to close it.