Definitely Not Mr. Darcy

by Karen Doornebos

  Regency life was grim for women, very grim, and this, too, had been one of Austen’s messages, just not the one Chloe had wanted to acknowledge.

  The carriage came to a jarring halt in front of an old limestone church that looked to have come straight out of a fairy tale. Bay-leaf garlands draped the stone gateway to the churchyard. A round rose window adorned the front of the church. A fuzzy figure stood in the doorway, holding open the door for guests. If she would’ve just worn the glasses Henry made for her, she could’ve seen it al clearly.

  “Anyhoo, it’s a beautiful morning for a wedding,” Mrs. Crescent said for the video cam as she looked out of the carriage window at the blue sky frosted with white clouds.

  Chloe slumped back in her seat. “Morning. Who gets married in the morning, anyway?”

  Mrs. Crescent frowned. “We do, dear, here in the Regent’s England. Have I taught you nothing?”

  A footman opened the carriage door to hand her out.

  “I won’t marry him.” She turned to Mrs. Crescent, who, short of breath, stepped out of the carriage with the footman’s help. She had left the baby with the nursemaid and her husband and children, al at Bridesbridge Place, so she could be Chloe’s matron of honor. Chloe had one and only one bridesmaid: the breast-feeding Mrs. Crescent. The bride herself? A divorced single mom with a child nobody knew about and a tryst everybody knew al about. It was warped.

  Together, bride and matron of honor walked under the bay-leaf garland and into the churchyard. Tombstones, old crumbling tombstones, littered the green grass around the little church. Chloe couldn’t do this, no matter how fake the ceremony.

  “Who dreams of getting married in a white bonnet trimmed with white lace, anyway? I want a tiara, a veil—an engagement ring, for God’s sake.”

  She stuck out her left hand. No ring. Regency couples rarely marked their engagement with a ring, and certainly, this debacle al owed no time for a ring.

  A camera swung toward her as her white shoes navigated the cobblestone path to the church door. An older man in knee breeches and a black coat with tails cut a familiar figure at the door. He took off his black top hat, bowed to Chloe, and opened the church door.

  Chloe practical y tripped over a loose cobblestone. She gripped her nosegay of pink rosebuds tightly. It was her dad.

  She stopped. “Dad?!”

  “I believe that would be ‘Father,’” he corrected with a smile. “You look beautiful, Princess.” He held out his arms. He came forward, the church door closed behind him, and they hugged as if she were five years old al over again.

  “Oh my gosh! How’s Abigail? Does she miss me? Is she here?!”

  Chloe pul ed away. He smel ed of too much Ralph Lauren aftershave.

  “Of course she misses you. But no, she’s not here. She’s at Ned’s. She’s happy to be with her cousins. She’s fine. We came for you. Our little princess.”

  Chloe sighed. Happy as she was to see him, she wanted to see Abigail more than anyone back home.

  He held her hands. “Someone has to give you away. Right?”

  Her mother appeared at the door in an appropriate mother-of-the-bride beige silk gown, a color Chloe knew her mom would never wil ingly wear, topped off with a poke bonnet. The churchyard, tombstones and al , spun around her. She was getting married. Al over again. Her parents were mother and father of the bride. Al over again. A dummy girl was swinging from a noose. She shuddered.

  Her mother gave her a Chanel-lipstick kiss. How they stil managed to afford their little luxuries on their reduced income was beyond Chloe. How did they afford to fly over here? “Darling. You look as if you’ve seen a ghost. And wow. You’ve lost weight! But real y, we’re so proud of you, sweetheart.”

  “You are?” Chloe linked arms with her dad for support. Did they realize why she was getting married?

  Her mother crinkled her nose. “I’m afraid you do need a shower.”

  Funny, but Henry had instal ed a primitive shower at Bridesbridge just yesterday and she’d used it today. But it was hardly a shower, more like a cold sprinkle of water from a bucket for a total of one minute.

  Chloe’s mom waved her hand in front of her face. “Have you been drinking, Chloe?”

  Chloe breathed through her nose.

  Her mother leaned in and whispered, “Your betrothed paid for our plane tickets. He’s quite the gentleman. He deserves better than to have his bride inebriated at the wedding ceremony.”

  Mrs. Crescent made her way up to the church. She cleared her throat. “Ahem. I’m Mrs. Crescent.” She held out her hand and Chloe’s father kissed it.

  Mrs. Crescent blushed, because, of course, this behavior would’ve been de rigueur back in the eighteenth century, but in the nineteenth, kissing a woman’s hand meant much more. But how was he to know?

  Chloe’s mother noodled between her husband and Mrs. Crescent, even though there was plenty of room on the landing. “So pleased to meet you.

  I’m Mrs. Parker.” She extended her hand. “My grandmother was a titled English lady, you know.”

  Heat rose from Chloe’s chin to her forehead.

  Mrs. Crescent seemed unimpressed.

  “Perhaps your family knew her. Lady Blackwel ?” Mrs. Parker waited a moment. “Lady Anne Blackwel ?”

  Mrs. Crescent checked her chatelaine for the time. “No. I’m afraid I don’t know the family.”

  Chloe’s mom tossed her head, but when you have a poke bonnet over your hairdo, such gestures lose their effect. “Wel . Our little Chloe is quite the celebrity back in Chicago.”

  “I am?” Chloe opened her silver vinaigrette and took a whiff. She was feeling faint.

  Chloe’s mom directed the entire conversation to Mrs. Crescent. “Everybody’s been fol owing the blog, the twittering—”

  Chloe stomped her calfskin pump on the church step, but it didn’t make a sound. It just hurt. “Blog! Twitter! I knew it! Who’s been blogging?”

  “Why, your betrothed, dear—”

  “He’s not my betrothed!” She popped out her hip and crossed her arms, while her mom, suddenly aware of the camera, oozed like a jel y donut.

  Her mom smoothed down her gown, smiled, and spoke right to the lens. “We’re so excited she’s marrying a landed English gentleman. Imagine.”

  She clapped her gloved hands together. “An English gentleman choosing an American—”

  “Imagine,” Chloe interrupted, swinging the camera toward her. “I haven’t had a toilet for three weeks and he’s been tweeting—” She whipped the nosegay against the church door, but at that moment the door opened, and the curate ended up with a bunch of flowers in his face.

  “Oh! Excuse me, sir, uh, Father—I apologize.”

  When her dad bent to pick up the nosegay, her mom rushed to the curate, apologizing in a hushed voice.

  Her dad put his arm around her and nodded his head toward the video cam as he whispered, “The cameras, Chloe. They’re filming. Think about your reputation. Abigail. Our family. The family’s reputation. Previews of the show are al over the Internet in order to promote it. In a month it’l be on international TV. We came here thinking this is what you wanted.”

  “I thought it was what I wanted,” Chloe said. She turned her back to the church and the camera. “England. Manners. A gentleman. Eighteen-twelve. The most romantic time in history.” Not to mention the money. But the past few days, while she struggled to prepare for this sham of a wedding, had given her time to think about the money and she realized that she had the power within herself to turn her business around. She’d taken copious notes with her quil , planning just how to go about it. She looked down at her white pumps on the gray stone.

  The church bel tol ed out the time. One, two, three—Her dad talked louder now, and the bel s drowned out his voice. The boom boy jockeyed around them with the mike.

  “Let’s just have some fun with this, okay? Your mother and I came al this way.”

  Chloe sucked on her strawberry-stained lower
lip.

  “It’s just a game. For TV. This isn’t real. Pretend you’re an actress. A movie star. Think of al the buzz this show wil generate about you. You can do anything you want after this. I was against this when you found out it was a reality show, but it’s very tasteful.”

  Chloe smiled. “It’s just like I wrote to you. Not a hot tub in sight.”

  Seven, eight, nine gongs. She looked up into a lime tree. She knew about lime trees now, because of Henry. A bird bounced among the branches. The bel rang ten, and the last gong echoed. The ceremony was supposed to begin at ten. She opened her white silk reticule and pul ed out the glasses Henry made, hooking the silver over her ears.

  Her mom scurried over and took Chloe’s gloved hand in hers. “If you’re disappointed about the wedding party itself, angel, wel , so was I. Real y. I mean who wants to settle for a wedding breakfast for eleven people instead of a steak dinner for four hundred with a live orchestra? When I found out there won’t even be a wedding cake, I . . .”

  Her mother kept talking, but Chloe focused on the bird. It was a green finch.

  Her mother patted her back. “. . . but I guess that’s how they did it in 1812. Sad, real y. When you two real y do marry, you’l have a real wedding.

  I’l see to that. Let’s go, dear. It’s time. Do take off those glasses. Since when do you need glasses? They look so—horsey.”

  Chloe kept the glasses on. Her dad stuck the nosegay in her right hand and linked his arm in her left. Just as they stepped over the threshold of the church door, she heard a finch cal out.

  The church felt twenty degrees cooler and smel ed—like churches smel everywhere, al over the world. Vaulted ceilings and carved stone moldings added to the chil . Candles flickered in the drafts. With his perfect profile, Sebastian stood at the altar, waiting.

  For a fake wedding, it sure felt real. She leaned on her dad. Henry wore a bottle-green cutaway coat and practical y paced in his pew.

  She wanted to wrap her arms around him, or at least catch his eye. But he was the only one not looking at her, the bride, as she made her way to the altar. Even Grace glared and drummed her gloved fingers on the scrol ed pew railing in front of her. Immediately after the wedding, Grace would be sent home. She had lost the competition. But of course, filming her watch the wedding made fabulous drama, so she had to stay.

  For a minute it did seem like a movie and not like the real thing. Chloe felt like she was looking down on herself getting married—again. The first time around, sixteen years ago, it seemed exactly the same. Movielike. Unreal. An out-of-body experience in a white dress. Back then, of course, the white dress was appropriate. As a thirty-nine-year-old divorcée with an eight-year-old stateside, not to mention her ice-house moment, it seemed downright scandalous.

  Sebastian, the cad, in a tight black cutaway coat, white breeches, and black shoes, looked the part he was playing. Chloe could tel he didn’t like the glasses. He kept squinting and clearing his throat as the curate spoke.

  She looked around the rim of her bonnet for Henry.

  The curate had already started the ceremony. “. . . and therefore is not by any to be enterprised, nor taken in hand, unadvisedly, lightly, or wantonly, to satisfy men’s carnal lusts and appetites, like brute beasts that have no understanding . . .”

  How could you take this lightly? She looked up at the rose window.

  “. . . but reverently, discreetly, advisedly, soberly, and in the fear of God; duly considering the causes for which Matrimony was ordained.”

  She was sober al right. A lot more sober than she was hitting the laudanum at the crack of dawn this morning. Two video cams turned in on her.

  “. . . if either of you know any impediment, why ye may not be lawful y joined together in matrimony, ye do now confess it . . .”

  Chloe looked up at the curate, and opened her mouth, afraid that nothing would come out, but it did.

  She let her rosebud nosegay drop to the stone floor. “I can’t marry him.”

  “Pardon me?” The curate’s book slid down from his chest to his side. A great rustling and shuffling and whispering came from behind her.

  “Wel , that’s a relief!” Grace stood up. “It saves me from having to announce an impediment—or two.”

  Chloe’s mother stood, too, and leaned on the pew in front of her, apparently for strength. And Henry—where was Henry?

  Chloe looked straight into Sebastian’s eyes. “I can’t marry the wrong Mr. Wrightman. Even if it is just for TV.” Her eyes darted around the church.

  Henry was gone.

  Whispering rose up to the church’s vaulted ceiling.

  Sebastian grabbed her by the arm. “What are you doing?” He lowered his voice to a whisper. “You can’t do this to me in front of everybody.”

  Mrs. Crescent stepped up to the wedding group. “She can’t mean it, Mr. Wrightman. She’s just nervous. Let me talk with her.”

  The curate furrowed his brows.

  The cameras stayed on Chloe.

  “Let go of me,” she said to Sebastian, and yanked her arm away from him. A ray of sunlight shone through the rose window. “You’re no gentleman. And you never wil be. You’re not the brooding, silent type. In fact, I don’t know what you are, and you don’t know what—or who—you want. I don’t care how much money you have—you can take it and stick it into your breeches for al I care!”

  Sebastian stepped backward, his perfect jawline askew.

  Cook—Lady Anne—made her way up to the altar. “Miss Parker—let me explain.”

  “No, let me explain.” Chloe stood next to the marble altar draped in a maroon sash. Her voice echoed throughout the pulpit. “The real gentleman here is Henry, who stands to win nothing and gain nothing. The rest of us are just modern-day screwups in gowns and cutaway coats. Pretending.

  Grace is pretending so she can win back her family’s land that her great-great-great grandfather lost gambling. I’m pretending I’m not divorced, with an eight-year-old daughter at home waiting for me.”

  The smal crowd gasped. Henry was stil nowhere to be seen.

  “I thought this was real. It isn’t. Everyone’s pretending—except of course, for Lady Anne, who, as far as I can tel , is the real deal. But the rest of us? We can’t even act like Regency people. We know too much, we’ve done too much, and said too much to even pretend to live in the nineteenth century. Here, Grace.” Chloe tossed her nosegay to Grace, who caught it. “You marry him. For TV or real life or land or money or al of the above. I don’t care.”

  Chloe untied her wedding bonnet. Her dad tried to pul the cameramen away. She dumped her bonnet upside down on the altar, where the cameras filmed a vibrator, a pink MP3 player, whitening strips, a pack of cigarettes, and condoms wrapped in black foil tumble onto the maroon altar cloth.

  “Dear God!” Mrs. Crescent gasped. “Don’t throw it away now, Chloe. We’ve won. Don’t.”

  “We can’t live like it’s 1812. Not even for a few weeks. Come and get your stash, Grace. I’m going home. Back to my daughter, where I belong.”

  The curate stepped up to her and put his hand on her shoulder, but she shrugged it off.

  Grace stepped up to the altar. “I have absolutely no idea what you’re talking about. These aren’t mine.”

  “Don’t be stupid, Grace. This is the twenty-first century. I had my gloves on every time I handled them. A simple dusting for thumbprints wil prove they’re yours, and if that doesn’t work—there are always DNA tests.”

  Chloe’s mother barreled up to the pulpit. The cameras loomed in on Chloe from the front. She felt hunted. Her dad clenched his teeth. Her mom’s manicured nails clawed at her even through her gloves. She had to get out of here.

  She hoisted up her gown, dodged them al , and ran al the way down the aisle, out the church door, down the steps, past the tombstones, and right smack into the white wedding carriage, an open barouche covered in pink peonies and pink ribbons. Not just one, but four horses turned their heads.
She untied them from the hitching post, clambered up to the driver’s perch, and with a shaking hand, flicked the reins. The horses lunged forward. When she looked back she saw everyone had spil ed out of the church, past the stone fence, but nobody else had a horse. They had al walked to the wedding in their finery! She brought the horses to a trot. The great carriage rattled along, peonies flew off, ribbons flapped, her updo col apsed.

  When she final y reached the iron gates that marked the end of the deer park and the beginning of the real world, she stopped the carriage. The gravel road ended. A paved road intersected it. She hadn’t seen blacktop in weeks. It looked so unnatural, yet so promising. The open road. It was the American in her, al right, thril ed to hit the open road.

  A red Jaguar whizzed by on the wrong side of the street, because of course, this was England, and it startled the horses. She couldn’t exactly ride a barouche into town, now, could she? She stepped out of the carriage, guided the horses to a wrought-iron hitching post on the edge of the deer park, and tied them to it.

  She stood on the edge of the blacktop, looked east and west, fol owed the road with her eyes. Thanks to the glasses, she could actual y see the road twist into the distance. Which way to civilization? She went west. She bunched up her gown to jog, and tried to run, but her shoes didn’t cooperate. They had even less support than her stays. Who knew she would actual y miss her harness of a sports bra and running shoes? She slowed to a walk, letting her gown fal back to her ankles.

  She passed English farmland pungent with manure and grasses. A hawk circled overhead and she thought of Henry. Her thoughts always circled back to Henry. Sunshine poured down on her and she felt naked without a bonnet and, for once, she could actual y use a parasol and fan. Sweat dampened her silk stockings and her lower back, so she stripped off her pelisse and gloves. Those lemons she rubbed under her underarms this morning were not exactly meant to hold up under a power walk in nineteenth-century wedding attire.