Chapter 26 No Title for This One
No Title for This One
Harr
I will not even address this page to the ghost of Harry. The thought even of that nonexistent gentleman knowing about what transpired this morning makes me squirm. Yet I must write it down. I feel if I do not pin the memory down it will disappear.
Well. Perhaps it would be best, but…
Last night, after a particularly long session of serum-making, even my powers of sleeplessness were taxed.
Georgiana and I were deep in a discussion—a question of whether Leyden jars could be made to discharge their electricity over time, instead of in one big shock—and I was so tired and distracted that I forgot my room was now Miss Darcy’s and, instead of making my way downstairs, I collapsed into bed alongside her.
I awoke slowly, comfortably, feeling a sort of gentle tired ache around my heart. Georgiana was a lump in the bed next to me, only visible as a tangle of locks. I ought to be embarrassed by this, but I could not be. I was too warm, too comfortable.
Before I could slip away down the stairs, Georgiana stirred and stretched. Blinking awake, she turned, saw me, and smiled.
“Morning,” she said in a gravelly voice.
“Good morning.”
“We ought to be more careful of the hour, I s’pose,” she said, still in her sleep-roughened tones. “We did not even wash our faces last night.”
“Did we not?” I struggled to remember through an unaccustomed haze of drowsiness.
“Mm, no indeed.” With a yawn and a wormlike wriggle, she inched closer to me till her head shared my pillow. She reached out a hand and touched my face. “Oop, jam.”
“Jam?”
“From the sandwiches last night. You’ve still jam on your chin.” Gripping said chin, she wiped at it with her thumb.
“Well, so too have you.” I mirrored her actions, wiping at her bottom lip. Without thinking, I popped my thumb in my mouth, sucking away the morsel of sweetness.
The sleepy smile vanished. She was looking at me, quite awake. She, too, licked the jam from her thumb.
“You’ve… a bit more,” I said.
“Have I.”
“Yes. Here, let me…”
I tugged a little at the neck of her sleep shift. The collar was tight; I undid the knot that held it closed. Her breathing stopped when I folded it aside, exposing a little more of her skin. There, perhaps two inches below her collarbone, lay another blackcurrant splotch.
“Shameful,” she murmured. I could feel her voice through my hand. “I must have eaten like a child. No more jam sandwiches while we work, I think.”
“No more jam sandwiches,” I echoed. I scarcely heard myself.
I suppose I was still half-asleep. That is the only explanation for how I came to do it. I leaned down close, and, instead of wiping the jam away with a finger, I closed my lips over it and sucked it away. Blackcurrant jam, and pear soap, and the lab, and recent sleep.
Georgiana gasped. But she was not pushing me away.
Both her hands threaded through my hair, pulling me closer, almost crushing me against her.
Then she was pulling my head up to hers, lining our bodies up, one of her knees sliding between mine, and I could feel her breath on mine, and something bright and warm seemed to have cracked open in my chest, and oh God, we were going to—
“Mary?”
We had just time to jerk apart before the door opened and Mamma came bustling in.
“Ah, there you are,” she said. “You gave me quite a turn, child. I found your bed empty and thought we had another runaway elopement on our hands. But of course, you would never do such a thing. I am glad to see you just came up here in the night. I suppose you got cold?”
“Yes’m. What? Yes. Cold. I was cold.”
“Well, you must ask Betsy for a bed warmer tonight. I’ll not have you crowding our guest.”
“She did not crowd me, madam,” said Georgiana. “I… er, was also… cold.”
“A bed warmer for you, too, then. No—for you, two bed warmers, my dear Miss Darcy.” She threw back the covers on my side. “Now come, Mary, we’re to have a morning visit from the Longs, and you know how they are—their morning visits are actually before noon.”
I followed her down the stairs, washed, dressed, had my breakfast, and made appropriate noises to the Longs.
It was a bit like trying to politely go about your business whilst on fire, but I did it.
Georgiana, with the excuse of her illness, avoided the morning visit and spent the next few hours “in bed” (actually in the attic working on a batch of promising purple serum).
When next I saw her, she said nothing of our morning activities, so I did not, either.
Soon I wondered if the incident had simply been a dream, after all.
I rather hope it was. Heaven knows what she must think of me otherwise. And we’ve more important things to think of.
No. I don’t hope that. I ought to do. But I cannot.