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Chapter The 18th...or the one that follows the previous one. |
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Marry him? It was a dream; it had to be. And yet, there he was, on his knees before me with a pleading look in his eyes.
Marry him? Yes! Of course! Absolutely! Was this not what I had been wishing for? Dreaming of? Desiring? Was this not the secret, deepest aspiration of my heart? Had I not longed for this moment since I understood that man and woman could be more than friends in a sand box?
So why could I not form one simple word: Yes?
The silence lingered between us as I stood astonished and conflicted. I could see it in his eyes. He had realized almost before I had what my answer would be. His eyes went from pleading and passionate to desperate and sad. "Millie, we could be happy here. Say you'll marry me."
"I...I can't," I said and pulled my hand away.
"Why?" He asked, and he sounded so hurt that it nearly pierced my hear to hear the simple word.
I allowed myself to walk past him, back to the edge of the cliff. I felt the need for the fresh air, as it seemed to be stubbornly keeping itself from my lungs. Besides, this way I did not have to look at him, see the pain, feel the pain, as I turned him down.
"It is not that I don't..." I let myself drift off. Love. A simple word, yet so dangerous, so complicated. I could not bring myself to say it at the moment. "You are engaged," I offered as a reply. "I cannot, I will not make you break your word to your fiance. It is not who you are. You know it as well as I do."
"We are not, that is to say Miss Palmerston and I, are no longer betrothed," he said.
I whirled around so fast that my skirts wrapped about my legs. "You?"
"No. You are right about me. Once I give my word, I do not take it back...no matter how much I regret giving it. No, Miss Palmerston broke it off, late last night. She is going to marry Marcus instead. Thankfully he is more rich than I am, and so he has caught her eye. I was foolish to ask for her hand in the first place. It was done out of duty to my family."
"Oh." Somehow that was all I could manage. He must have expected me to say more, but I didn't, causing yet another silence to befall us.
"Millie?"
"Yes?"
"I am not engaged. My offer to you, it still stands. I want you to marry me," he said.
"Because I am now rich? Now good enough for your family to accept?" I asked, turning my head away. I was not sure if I could bare to see his reaction. What if that was why he was asking me?
"Oh Millie..." He said, his voice filling with something like pity. I felt a lump growing in my throat. This was it. The time for him to admit that his family had prodded him to make a good match while he still could before the news of Marcus and Miss Palmerston reached the local ears.
"Millie, when I said that I do not take back my word, even when I regret it, I meant it. I gave my hand to Miss Palmerston, but never my heart. I regretted every moment of our engagement because...because my heart was always yours and my loyalty as a husband should have been given to you as well. I am not sure when I realized it, but I have always loved you Millie."
As he spoke, my eyes began to burn and tingle. Before he was finished, they were wet. Tears? It had been so long since anything had made me cry. Why this? Why now? Were they happy, sad? I could hardly tell myself. I could tell he was waiting for an answer, but my throat was choked up. No matter how hard I swallowed, I could not seem to remove the lump enough to form words. As I tried to gain control, I focused on the tree. Through blurry tears I stared sternly at it, as if it would, simply by the will of my mind, magically release me from the bind I was in.
Suddenly Edmund's hands were in mine. I wretched my eyes away from the tree to look at him. He was down on both knees, kneeling before me in the earth soaked from the earlier rain. He appeared so humble, so small, so desperate as he held each of my hands in his own.
"I want you to be happy Millie, but God help me if it is selfish, I want you to be happy with me. I want you to be mine for the rest of our lives, to eat at my table, share my hopes, sorrows, and joys, and be with me at night. I want your love more than I have ever wanted for a single thing. Please say you'll marry me and make me the happiest man on this earth. Say that you love me!"
I cannot point a finger at an exact cause, but his pleading and begging, his tender, passionate words only made the tears come more swifter. I tried to talk but only a sob managed to push past my lips. I swallowed hard, again trying to find that control. How badly I wanted to say yes, yet could it be that easy?
In one moment, could I go from his servant to his wife? Could I change my mind, leave my loving uncle, and stay? It was all happening so quickly, it made my head spin. "I..."
Subconsciously, I took a step back. Perhaps I had been readying myself to raise him up so that I could give him my answer. Whatever plan I had had in mind, it was not fufiled.
I had been closer to the edge than I realized, and the earlier rain had made the ground soft. In a flutter of a heart beat, I felt the earth dissolve beneath me and the next thing I knew, I was plummeting downward.
Anne Onymous · Wed Oct 07, 2009 @ 02:27am · 0 Comments |
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