The Trials of the Honorable F. Darcy

by Sara Angelini

  Bingley looked at Jane. “I’m driving Darcy home,” he said to her. He gave her his keys. “Take my car. I’ll call you tomorrow.” He kissed her briefly and went to Darcy. He steered Darcy toward the exit without protest.

  Elizabeth followed Jane meekly to the shuttle, to Bingley’s car, and then home. She didn’t have the stamina or fortitude to assure Jane that she was perfectly fine; she had no energy to lie convincingly.

  Jane steered Elizabeth back to the house and led her to her room. She hesitated briefly, unsure whether Elizabeth would prefer company or to be alone. Jane decided to leave her alone but to keep an eye on her. When Jane returned to Elizabeth’s room with her suitcase, Elizabeth was sitting motionless on her bed, staring into space.

  “Can I get you anything, Elizabeth?” she asked. Elizabeth showed no sign that she heard Jane. Instead, she opened her suitcase and began to unpack. She would try to distract herself until that awful time when she had to get into her cold, empty bed. Jane watched for a few moments, completely at a loss. She had never seen Elizabeth in such a state. She didn’t know what to do, how to help her. She backed out of the room, leaving Elizabeth to her own comfort. A moment later, she passed the room and found Elizabeth sitting on the bed sobbing into a shirt.

  Elizabeth did not see or hear Jane until she sat next to her on the bed and put an arm around her shoulders. Elizabeth wiped her eyes and nose on the shirt, then waved it at Jane.

  “It’s his,” she laughed mirthlessly. “Somehow it got in my bag.” Jane squeezed her and Elizabeth stiffened slightly.

  “Lizzy, it’s OK. I’m here for you. Go ahead and cry.” With that, Elizabeth relaxed and leaned against Jane and had the longest, most desolate cry of her life. Jane left over an hour later when Elizabeth had cried herself into exhaustion with the shirt clutched tightly to her chest.

  ***

  Darcy wordlessly gave Bingley the keys to his car as they walked to the parking lot of the airport. His mind was completely blank; he didn’t remember anything between the carousel and getting into his car. Bingley drove them to Darcy’s condo in the middle of downtown. He tried to make small conversation but Darcy did not respond; he did not hear. The doorman recognized them both and let them in, seeing the dazed look on Darcy’s face. Bingley led Darcy up to the condo and pulled his bag in for him.

  He was very seriously concerned for Darcy; he had never known Darcy to be impulsive, and this whole affair had been nothing short of schizophrenic. He thought Darcy secretly harbored some hope of continuing the affair, of working something out. But Elizabeth’s rejection at the airport had been clear and profound. Darcy had obviously been hurt, stunned; something else Bingley had never before witnessed.

  Darcy allowed Bingley to herd him into his condo and switch on a lamp. He nodded wordlessly when Bingley called himself a cab and handed the car keys back to Darcy. He sat quietly in an armchair while Bingley poured him a drink.

  “I’m sorry,” Bingley said softly. Darcy nodded, still staring off into space. “Is there anything I can do for you? Anything I can get for you?” he asked. Darcy did not respond; he had already stopped listening again and ignored the drink Bingley poured. Bingley sighed. The door intercom rang and the cab driver announced his presence. Bingley told Darcy to call him if he needed anything but he didn’t think Darcy heard him.

  Darcy turned off the lamp and sat in sullen darkness. He was already berating himself for his impulsive behavior during the past two weeks. What had he been thinking? He mechanically went through the routine of getting ready for bed and climbed into the cold sheets in darkness. He lay awake for hours stifling the wellspring of emotions in his chest, stamping them down with grim determination. He would get her out of his system; there was no other option.

  June 16 - Sunday

  “Lou, you need to come over,” Jane said quietly into the phone. “It’s Lizzy. I’ve never seen her like this, I don’t know what to do.”

  “What happened? I haven’t heard from her for over a week,” came Lou’s concerned voice.

  “They broke up. Now she has to work with him and I don’t know if she can handle it. Please come over.”

  “I’m on my way,” Lou said and hung up. Elizabeth had always confided in him and he in her. She had been his staunchest supporter when he came out to his parents; he would never, never abandon her.

  ***

  Elizabeth was still in her pajamas and had not showered for two days. Lou knocked on her door and entered when there was no answer.

  “What are you doing, honey?” Lou asked softly.

  Elizabeth did not answer. Lou sat on the bed next to her. She had apparently been up at some point, as she was now lying on top of the blankets instead of under them, but otherwise appeared not to have moved.

  “I brought you a bagel; are you hungry?” he said, pulling out a toasted bagel.

  “Not really,” Elizabeth replied. She looked awful; her eyes were puffy and swollen, her hair was a mess, and she had dark circles under her eyes.

  “You really should eat something.” Lou rubbed Elizabeth’s leg. “And maybe get up and move around.” He wrinkled his nose. “And maybe shower; you’re kinda smelly.” He meant it as a lighthearted tease, to see if he could get Elizabeth to smile even a little. To his dismay, Elizabeth’s eyes welled with tears again.

  “I can smell him all over my skin,” she whispered. “He’s got this earthy smell, it reminds me of moss on a tree. He told me I smell like pears. He said he would never be able to eat a pear again without thinking of me.” She dissolved into tears again, as she had so many times over the past 12 hours; she had not slept at all.

  “Oh god, honey, come here,” Lou said and he lay down on the bed beside her. He spooned her from behind and let her cry, stroking her hair and her arm. When she had stopped crying, he put his chin in the crook of her neck.

  “Tell me what happened,” he said. He knew her better than even Jane, knew that she needed to get it off her chest.

  “I spent almost every minute of the whole two weeks with him,” she said. “It was surreal. I’ve never met anyone like him. I don’t know why it clicked but it just did. We were all over each other, we couldn’t keep our hands off each other. It was like being in a different world. Every morning I wondered if I was going to wake up from it but it never ended.”

  “And obviously you don’t want it to end?”

  She shook her head. “No, I’m crazy about him.”

  “Did he want it to end?”

  “No.”

  “Then why did you end it?”

  “Because we work together and it would be an ethical violation for an attorney to be involved with the judge on any of their cases. And really, Lou, it was so perfect, I can’t believe that it was real, that it would have lasted.”

  “Why not?”

  “It was so intense and so wonderful and so... so...” she swallowed hard. “He told me that he loved me,” she finished.

  “Do you think he meant it?”

  “I think he meant it then but I don’t know if he would mean it now.”

  “Do you love him?” he asked. She struggled for a minute, then nodded once.

  Lou sighed heavily. “Look, I know there has to be a way to get around the judge-attorney rule somehow. You can get your cases reassigned and take someone else’s cases. You could get a special dispensation or something, right?” he said. Elizabeth laughed shortly.

  “He’s not the Pope,” she said. “And in theory, yes, but in practice, no. We’d have to reveal that we’re involved and that would put all of our old cases into question and everything would be a big mess. Plus there’s only one other judge who handles any of our cases and it would be a big pain to have everything before her. She never decides anything right anyway. And what if it wasn’t real?”

  They lay together for a while longer and then Lou said, “Let’s get you up and washed and then we’ll figure out what to do.” He gently pulled Elizabeth up into a sitting position, then pulled
her to her feet. He pulled the crumpled shirt from her arms and began to toss it in the hamper.

  “No!” she cried, grabbing the shirt from him. He looked at her in surprise. She blushed and balled the shirt under her pillow. “It’s his,” she mumbled. Lou nodded in understanding and led her shuffling over to her bathroom. He pulled the tank top over her head and pushed her toward the shower. He saw five or six deep bruises on her low back. Hickeys.

  He touched one as she pulled off her pants.

  “They’re his, too,” she said quietly. He raised an eyebrow but she just looked miserable. He sat on the toilet while she showered. When he felt she had been in long enough, he flushed the toilet.

  “HEY!” she yelled. He smiled.

  ***

  Darcy had not slept at all. He had thought of her all night long. He had not yet progressed to logic, to see if there was any way to get around their situation. He was indulging in self-pity at the moment. He finally rose from bed as the sun came up and sat at his kitchen table looking out over the city. Once the sun had risen, he opened his suitcase and absently set about pulling out clothes. His phone rang but he ignored it. He heard Bingley’s voice over the machine checking in on him. He ignored it, didn’t even listen to the message.

  He followed his usual routine: pull out the dirty clothes from his suitcase and put them in the hamper for the cleaner to wash on Wednesday. Something slippery brushed across his fingers and he pulled out a pair of white silk panties. She had not washed them; he put them to his face and smelled pears mingled with her tangy scent. He crumpled them in his fist and threw them in the bathroom garbage can. Moments later he retrieved them and lay down with them on his pillow, finally able to sleep.

  Chapter 16

  Elizabeth managed to pull herself together enough to report to work early Monday morning. In fact, she got in early so that she would not have anyone in the front offices asking her about her vacation as she came in. She closed her office door and looked at her calendar. She had no court appearances today but tomorrow there was one with Judge Darcy. Wednesday she had Judge Clayton but Thursday and Friday were both Judge Darcy. She thanked the heavens that each day had only a single appearance; she did not know if she could handle an entire day before him.

  Charlotte noticed immediately that Elizabeth did not look as refreshed after a two week vacation as she should. Elizabeth declined her invitation to join her in the cafeteria for lunch, saying she wanted to get caught up on her messages. Late in the afternoon, Charlotte stopped by her office bringing her a cup of coffee. Elizabeth thanked her but silently wished her to go away.

  “So, want to tell me about your vacation?” she said as she sat in a chair across from Elizabeth’s desk.

  “There’s not much to tell. I didn’t really go anywhere or do anything, just slept a lot.”

  “Then why don’t you look relaxed?” Charlotte said directly. She wasn’t one to mince words.

  Elizabeth shrugged. “Maybe I got too much sleep. Listen, Char, thanks for the coffee. No offense, but I need to get ready for my case tomorrow,” Elizabeth said kindly. Charlotte stood up and looked at Elizabeth’s calendar.

  “Ugh, you have Judge Darcy tomorrow? He was in an absolutely foul mood today; I guess he didn’t enjoy his vacation either. That dude seriously needs to get laid.” Charlotte laughed and left Elizabeth’s office, closing the door behind her.

  Elizabeth swiveled her chair toward her window so that her back was facing the door and surreptitiously wiped a tear away from her face. She had no satisfaction from the report that Darcy was unhappy. She had almost hoped to hear that he was in a great mood; at least then one of them would be happy.

  She pulled herself together and finished up her work. She had prepared badly for tomorrow’s case; she knew he would yell at her. She left just before five o’clock so that she would be sure not to see him in the parking lot. She practically sprinted to her car and drove home, relieved that she had made it safely through her first day back. She went to the gym and took a long, long run on the treadmill listening to her iPod.

  ***

  Darcy pulled into the parking lot at work and saw Elizabeth’s car; she was already there. He went in through a back entrance to lessen the possibility of seeing her but his chest hurt none the less for it. He saw from the docket that she would not be appearing before him today; he thanked the stars for that, while at the same time feeling illogically irate that he would not be seeing her.

  He was brutal. He spared no attorney his criticisms. He chided the attorneys, defendants, and plaintiffs. He barked at his secretary and then had her order him lunch so that he would not have to go out. He wouldn’t have been surprised if she had spit in his sandwich but since he had no appetite and didn’t eat it, it didn’t matter.

  Over lunch, his cell phone rang; the caller ID showed “Bingley.” He ignored it. He saw that Georgiana had also tried to call him. He simply was not up to returning any calls. He got an email from Georgiana inviting herself to dinner. He didn’t reply.

  He powered through his afternoon docket, possibly more angrily than the morning’s. Even his bailiff steered clear of him. Instead of his usual tactic of getting the parties to settle, he made rulings on the spot. He was in no mood to persuade people to do the right thing; if they couldn’t resolve their problems, he would do it according to the law without mercy. He dismissed the claim of a 70 year-old widow against her hooligan neighbor. He ordered an unemployed father to immediately pay back child support with interest and penalties or face jail. He sent a prostitute and her john both to jail for 30 days.

  When he got home, Georgiana was already there cooking him dinner. He regretted for the first time in his life that she had a key and wished that she was not there.

  “Hi. You didn’t return my call,” she said indignantly as he entered. He slammed the door but didn’t respond. She rolled her eyes and turned back to dinner.

  “How was Mrs. R?” she called from the kitchen.

  “Fine,” he replied curtly. He figured he should make basic conversation and then usher her out as soon as possible.

  He tossed his cell phone and keys on the counter next to hers. He bit his tongue and suffered her one-sided conversation as she served them dinner.

  “Will, what’s wrong?” she said after a half hour of total silence from him. He blinked and looked up from his untouched dinner, as if seeing her for the first time.

  “Nothing, sorry. Busy day tomorrow. I’m behind.” It took a monumental effort to bite even those words out. She observed him for a moment, then picked up her cell phone.

  “I have a new puppy,” she announced. Nothing could cheer her up like a good puppy picture. “He’s really cute,” she said as she went to the photo album function of her phone. She wrinkled her brow and realized she had his phone, not hers.

  “Who is this?” she asked, handing him the phone. Darcy took the phone from her hand and his heart exploded in a spasm of pain as he saw Elizabeth’s face. They were lying in bed together; he was asleep and she was grinning at the phone. He snapped the phone shut.

  “It’s no one,” he said.

  “Uh, then why is she in your bed?” Georgiana said skeptically.

  “It’s no one,” he repeated. He did not know how he managed to sound so calm. He clenched the phone tightly in his hand, resisting the temptation to look at the picture again, to scroll through and see if she had taken any other compromising photos.

  Georgiana understood her brother very well; they had been very close since her mother’s death and he had become her surrogate father after their father’s death. He had stood by her unfailingly during her troubled teenage years, had made sure she got straightened out, and was devoted to her. Over the last few years she had begun to see him as an equal rather than a father figure. She knew his moods as well as she knew her own; knew his facial expressions, his mannerisms. She had not been paying much attention when he came home and had assumed that he was merely tired.

  Now sh
e looked at him and saw the circles under his eyes, his barely concealed desire to be alone, and most of all, his quiet dismissal of the mysterious woman in the photo. She could connect the dots and deduce that he was having woman trouble. That in itself was shocking to her; he had never been dumped. As far as she knew, he had always ended his relationships; she had never known him to pine.

  “I’m sorry, I’ve invaded your privacy,” she said quietly. He made no response, did not even look at her. He was still clenching the phone in his hand with white knuckles; she could see that he was very tightly coiled, his breaths slow and deliberate, his face eerily blank of expression. He had put a curtain around himself, shutting her out. She wasn’t even sure that he had heard her. She hastily gathered her things. “I’ll leave you alone. Call me tomorrow,” she said as she walked out the door. A few steps down the hall she jumped when she heard the phone smash against the door.

  Darcy picked up the pieces of the shattered cell phone. He instantly regretted smashing the phone; he wanted to see the photo again, to try to remember when this might have been taken. He wanted to read her expression; was she wrinkling her nose like she did so often when she smiled? Was she smiling dreamily or mischievously? Was this the first morning, or later? He cursed himself and picked up his house phone.

  “Darcy?” came Bingley’s voice. “I’ve been trying to call you for...”

  Darcy cut him off. “Can you get her cell number for me?” he asked.

  “I’ll try.” Darcy hung up without another word. He was rattled, surprised at his apparent inability to control himself. He had always been in tight control of his emotions, never rash, and not in the habit of destroying things. He did not like this facet of his personality and he needed to get control, now.