With a rueful smile, he picked up his needle and thread.
He was an artist. He needed to stop pretending that sleep was ever an option.
Morning dawned bright and rosy over the Benson residence, the birds chirruping from the hedgerows as if full of the night’s gossip. Amelia, lying motionless in bed with wide-open eyes, listened to the tweeting and fluttering of wings with half-distracted panic as the sensation of a heavy weight settled on her chest.
There were already so many things to do. So many small jobs to oversee; the servants sometimes forgot, and nothing could be forgotten. The butcher had to be paid, while the fishmonger, haberdasher and ribbon-seller had to be avoided until there was enough money to pay them. A cheerful letter had to be written to Daisy and Matthew, giving absolutely no indication that money or goodwill were running short—and then she simply had to write a letter to Mr. Whitaker, her late father’s business associate, asking if there were anything left that could feasibly be sold…
…Good Lord, she couldn’t sell any land. She simply couldn’t. Amelia tried to breathe, her chest horribly conflicted, the thought of washing her face and dressing suddenly as distant as the moon.
Knocking. Not at the door; knocking from a little way down the corridor, in her mother’s room. The plaintive, heavy thump of a cane against a rug, along with a reedy undertone of a voice that wanted desperately to be heard.
Amelia closed her eyes, the weight suddenly crushing enough to physically hurt. All smaller jobs would have to be put aside, at least for now. Her mother wanted her—and from the sound of the cane, it couldn’t possibly be for anything good.
As if on cue, a frantic knock came at Amelia’s own door. She barely had to give permission before Eliza entered, subdued and silent, hairbrush and slippers already in hand.
‘Perhaps you wish to rise early, ma’am.’ She said it very carefully; Amelia’s heart tensed, aware of how cruel she had been the previous day. Now the poor girl was too frightened to talk to her… but still, how appreciative she was of the small deceit in Eliza’s words. The lie that Amelia would choose to visit her healthy mother independently, instead of being constrained to aid her sickening one.
‘Yes. Perhaps I would.’ Amelia yawned half-convincingly. ‘Thank you for anticipating my whim.’
She dressed and arranged herself as quickly as she could, with Eliza’s wordless help, before padding down the corridor. Wincing as she heard the sounds of an argument coming from her mother’s room, Amelia opened the door as quickly and unobtrusively as possible.
‘My lady.’ Elsie, a maid who curtseyed as soon as Amelia appeared, wiped away a tear as she sniffled. ‘Ex—excuse me. I know it ain’t my place, and—’
‘Is not.’ Amelia stared. ‘Go to the kitchens. You shall work there until you learn to speak with a modicum of correctness in front of your betters.’
She waited, hoping against hope that Elsie could see the promise of escape that lay in her seemingly cruel words. It was the only way of letting the poor girl leave the room without enraging Lady Benson, currently sat in her high-backed embroidered armchair with an expression of bewildered rage. It was either that or sack her on the spot; she had already had to plead with one humiliated lady’s maid, trying to make her understand that nothing said in front of her mother had any permanency… all that could be said were soothing things to try and placate her moods, which grew more and more unpredictable by the day.
Elsie stared at her, a look of mutiny settling on her face. Amelia bit her lip, wishing that the transfer of thoughts from one mind to another were more than a parlour trick sold by charlatans.
Risking everything, she tried a lightning-fast wink. Elsie blinked, clearly confused, before understanding dawned.
‘Yes, my lady.’ She curtseyed as rapidly as she could, already moving the door. ‘I’m sorry—I mean, my apologies.’
Amelia nodded sharply as the girl made her escape, vanishing through the half-open door as fast as her legs would carry her. Letting out a silent, profound sigh, she turned to her mother with a carefully arranged expression of polite curiosity.
That girl must be sacked immediately, Amelia.’ Lady Benson leaned forward, speaking with a low, conspiratorial tone. ‘She has been stealing my jewels. My beautiful pearls are gone. Gone!’
‘I see, mother. Of course.’ Amelia’s heart sank further. She knew for a fact that Lady Benson’s pearls had not been stolen; her mother had insisted some weeks ago that the necklace and bracelet be moved to a different place in her dressing room, as a security measure. ‘You are entirely right.’
‘Sacked without a letter, as well!’ Lady Benson nodded triumphantly as Amelia squirmed. ‘See to it as quickly as you can, my girl. You cannot trust that class. Thieves, all of them.’
Amelia nodded her head, lacking both the energy and spirit to argue with her mother. The dark, terrible advantage to her mother’s altered state was the ability to simply ignore one of her orders; she didn’t even have to raise objections any more. Elsie could simply work in other parts of the house for a month or so, making sure to keep her head down, and then resume her normal attentions to Lady Benson after her mother had safely forgotten the incident.
Her mother, forgetful? Cold, proud, insistent upon every formality—but never forgetful. Amelia swallowed, sitting meekly beside Lady Benson. Time was a master of surprise, and none of the surprises seemed particularly pleasant.
‘Well, mother.’ She smoothed down her skirts, determined to make the best of things despite the unpleasant start. ‘The weather continues fine. Perhaps you would enjoy a walk in the gardens before breakfast, or a—’
She paused, alarmed, as her mother gripped her sleeve.
‘Amelia, I am most terribly cross with you. Cross, and hurt.’ Lady Benson’s voice quavered; her rheumy eyes were filled with tears. ‘I cannot believe you have treated me so cruelly.’
Amelia tried to smile, clenching her fists, as yet another piece of her ordered world slipped away from her. She knew for a fact that she had done nothing that could have possibly displeased her mother—there was no way she could know about Jean, after all. This was another, distressing symptom of her mother’s failing health; an addled mind, creating discord where there was nothing but tranquillity.
‘Mother, forgive me. I had no idea that I had committed such a lapse in good behaviour.’ She swallowed, hoping she wasn’t going to weep. ‘Please, tell me where I have erred. I will commit the fault to memory, and endeavour to never displease you in this fashion again.’
‘Well, I—I am scandalised.’ Lady Benson’s fingers, thick and stiff at the joints, tugged fretfully at her skirts. ‘I, your own mother, forced to hear of your intention to be married from Lady Maybury? It is not to be borne, Amelia! Absolutely not to be borne!’
Amelia paused, briefly unsure she could keep speaking. Lady Maybury, a dear friend of the Benson family both before and after the death of the duke, had died shortly before Matthew had joined the regiment.
Her mother did not remember. How could she have forgotten the death of her friend? And as for her intention to be married… it was simply too strange for words.
‘I… I apologise.’ She couldn’t speak of Lady Maybury as if she were alive; it felt wrong, conjuring up a dead woman. Even deception came more easily than that. ‘I was unaware that knowledge of my attachment had become more widely known.’
‘It’s intolerable. Intolerable.’ Lady Benson kept picking at her gown; Amelia clenched her fists tighter, fighting the urge to take her mother’s hands in hers and still the fretful movement. ‘That I must hear of my daughter’s intentions from a friend, however well-intentioned Lady Maybury was… to think I have not met the man, Amelia. After all of my instruction, my warnings… there will be scandal. A scandal is unavoidable…’
Her voice faded away. Amelia watched, sick at heart, as her mother’s face became worryingly slack. There was that look again; the one she hoped fervently each morning to never see again.
She
was slipping away from her. Her mother, the fire-breathing dragon of the ton, was vanishing by degrees—and according the doctors that asked vast sums for each and every visit, there was nothing that Amelia could do to hold back the devastating tide.
‘Forgive me.’ She leaned over, gently placing a kiss on her mother’s forehead. ‘I will bring him to make his introductions as soon as can be arranged.’
‘I… oh, yes, dear. Yes.’ Lady Benson absent-mindedly patted her hand, the storm of the previous moment abruptly turning to calm. ‘Always so obedient, Amelia. I know I can rely on you to perform every duty. Your brother can be such a harum-scarum boy—have we had news of him from Eton?’
‘... Yes.’ Here was a lie that hurt less; Matthew had indeed been a disobedient child at Eton. Amelia smiled at the decade-old memory. ‘He let an adder loose in the Latin room.’
‘Oh, such japes.’ A mischievous smile appeared on Lady Benson’s face. ‘We must pretend to be angry with him, when he returns for the summer.’
‘Yes.’ Amelia nodded. ‘Yes, we must. Shall I tell Rose to bring you your breakfast, mother?’
‘Oh yes, dear. Please do.’ Lady Benson nodded, her anger apparently quite forgotten. ‘With the strawberry jam, if you would be so good.’
Such a situation was impossible. Amelia keenly felt the impossibility of it as she gently kissed her mother’s forehead, leaving the room as Lady Benson smiled.
How many people dreamed idly of the impossible? And how many of them found themselves trapped in the impossible, soon after?
She hoped, as she always did, that work—the problems that danced in front of her eyes, screaming to be solved—would bring her cheerfulness, but the sadness of the morning would simply not abate. It stayed with her, an echoing shadow, through the rest of the day’s business; the household instructions, the small economies, the begging letters to tradesmen that she loathed to write. By the time the appointed afternoon hour came—the hour that was meant to free her from all woe, at least for its duration—the sadness was twinned with Amelia’s ever-present panic.
Her chest felt as tight as a drum; even as she greeted Jean, leading him to the dressing room, she felt her heart fluttering like a moth against the glass of a lamp. It was only as she stood in front of the glass, looking at the newest gown Jean had made for her, that she felt even the smallest easing of her tension.
The gown was, as always, a triumph; a light, quiet dream in soft, dark satin. Not quite a mourning-dress, but close to it; simple in appearance, but evidently complex in construction. Amelia looked at herself in the glass, wondering why all she could think of were funerals.
‘I do not like this colour.’ She knew that she was lying, but couldn’t find the words to express the true source of her melancholy. ‘It makes me look terribly old.’
Jean’s voice came from the other side of the screen. ‘Terribly old women are terribly wise.’
‘They are also terribly lonely.’ Amelia shivered. ‘Everyone they love has gone.’
‘... Come out. Let me see.’
Amelia slowly emerged from behind the screen. There Jean stood as always, waiting to inspect his own work; the fit, the drape, the shine of the gown as she walked and turned. She risked looking into his eyes, trying to see if she were correct—had she failed? Did she look old, and lonely?
His green eyes burned with feeling. Amelia bowed her head, almost wishing that she hadn’t seen the conviction in his gaze. It was as if he had shouted at her, taken her by the hands and screamed.
You will never be old. You will never be lonely. Not with me.
‘You are completely wrong.’ Jean’s tone brooked no argument. ‘You are enchanting.’
‘Oh, of course. Enchanting.’ Why did her laugh become so shrill, so offensively brittle, when she was nervous? I’m sure men will fall into my lap—they have successfully avoided such a fate for two previous Seasons, but I’m sure one will be hooked before the spring is out.’
‘You will have my gowns.’
‘True.’ Amelia looked down at the gown, briefly smiling at the beauty of it. Even on her thin frame, even with the strange, dark colour that made her think of tombs and storm-clouds, the dress managed to give her a shape that she was sure couldn’t truly exist under her clothes. ‘I will have your gowns. I will have your gowns, and Mother to manage, and money trickling through my fingers like water, and no clear prospects, and Matthew and Daisy expecting a welcome party when they return, and—and there are all sorts of bills to pay, and… and Mother…’
She stopped, aware that she was trembling. She brought a hand to her neck, ready to scratch the patch of skin at her nape, but paused as she felt Jean’s eyes on her.
‘I… I fear we are reaching the same crux of the argument as we did yesterday.’ Why couldn’t she stop shaking? ‘Everything is ready to fly into a thousand pieces, and it falls to me to be vigilant. To solve each problem as it comes, and remain alert as each one is solved, and—’
‘Madame.’ Jean’s voice was close; grave, low, almost a whisper. Amelia shivered at its proximity. ‘I think you know what you must do. What you have to do.’
‘But I do not.’ Amelia’s voice broke, becoming treacherously wobbly. ‘Or rather I do, but I cannot decide what must be done first, and what must be done best, and what will happen without my intervention, and what will require my—’
She stopped, wild-eyed, looking at her arm. Jean’s hand was wrapped around her wrist, holding her in place, his touch equal parts scandalous and unspeakably comforting.
‘No, Madame. Do not think of tomorrow, or next week, or the Season. None of these things exist.’ His eyes travelled over her face, lingering on her mouth, exactly as they did when he had watched her eat. ‘Think of this very moment, this exact instant. What must you do? You know what you must do.’
Kiss you. The thought rose unbidden from somewhere deep in Amelia; she blinked, shocked, before putting it aside. That couldn’t possibly be what the man meant.
‘Madame.’ Jean’s hand tightened. ‘You have to weep. To cry.’
‘I—I beg your pardon?’ But even as she spoke the words, Amelia felt her eyes beginning to sting. Biting her lip, a rush of heat rising to her face, she managed to force her next words out. ‘It is not done, for an English woman to weep in company.’
‘I am not company.’ Jean’s words, darkly undeniable, settled somewhere in her. ‘And I am giving you permission to weep.’
Permission? How dare he. Amelia didn’t need permission to do anything. She knew she should feel offended at the very prospect—but instead, to her great shock, she felt relief. More relief than she had felt in at least two years.
Someone was finally giving her permission to break. Someone who had strong arms, which would catch her if she fell.
‘I see.’ Amelia nodded, biting her lip—and fell, with a raw, broken sob, into Jean’s arms.
Time passed. How much, she couldn’t tell. All she knew with any certainty was what she could feel; the heat of her tears, the linen of Jean’s shirt growing damper as she wept. Jean’s arms around her, warm and sure and safe—utterly, utterly safe.
How wonderful it felt, to finally cry. She had never allowed herself to do it; the occasional tear had fell, in weaker moments, but Amelia had prided herself on never sobbing. Not since Matthew had come home, openly weeping from his blinded eyes, and she had realised that she would have to be the strongest person in the family.
But her family barely existed anymore. Not as they had before, at any rate. And weeping openly in Jean’s arms, sobbing so hard her throat hurt, was a release so ecstatic that Amelia could barely stand it. Jean was silent; he simply stood, holding her, his fingers making slow, soothing circles on her shoulder-blades as her sobs gradually lessened.
When she finally came back to herself, the reality of what she had done brought Amelia’s heart to her throat. She pulled away, red-eyed, holding a hand to her mouth as she saw the stains her tears had made on the bodice of the g
own. ‘I—oh Lord. I have ruined the silk.’
‘Amelia.’ The sound of her first name in Jean’s voice, lightly-accented, trembling with feeling, almost stopped her heart. ‘I do not give a damn about the silk.’
Amelia stared at him, wordless, searching for the correct words to reply—but this was not a moment for words. Not with Jean’s hands on her bare shoulders, warm and rough and holding her exactly as she needed to be held, firmly, ready to keep her upright if she fell. Not with his eyes burning as he looked at her, revealing every sentiment that she had tried so very hard to keep contained.
No. This was not a moment for words. This was the moment to fall apart—and never had falling apart looked more attractive.
She was going to do it. Amelia heard her old self shouting, somewhere inside her; you are going to ruin yourself, you slattern, for a man with no title? No money?
Yes. Her soul spoke for her, effortlessly drowning out her former voice. Yes, yes, yes.
It wasn’t a kiss for the ages. It wasn’t the swooning, dreamy débutante’s kiss that Amelia had always imagined receiving; slow, choreographed, exact. The fumbling, shaky touch of his lips to his didn’t resemble anything she had previously imagined—it was too raw. Too vulnerable to imagine ever existing; a breeze falling on snow.
But Jean’s reaction was real; his intake of breath, the way his eyes closed, as if unable to believe what was happening. The way he leaned back, breaking the fledgling kiss before it had even begun, and opened his eyes to simply look at her…
And then his arms were around her, his body pressed tight to hers, his mouth meeting her lips in a blinding kiss. A kiss that ripped her every idea of a kiss into shreds, branding her with this kiss, this once and future kiss, as the only kiss that would ever matter.
‘Amelia.’ His voice was low, husky; a plea for something Amelia didn’t know how to give—but that she wanted to, oh-so-much. His arms held her tighter, crushing her to him, but the weight of him was comforting—more than comforting. Safe, and yet dangerous at the same time.
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