Page 45 of Lucy Undying

Now Arthur’s gone again, but all Mina wants to do is talk about my wedding. She says I should wed as soon as possible, so that we can be married ladies together and plan our homes. Though she noted that my own future home prospects are much brighter than hers. She and Jonathan will be quite poor as he slowly takes on more of the duties of his employer.

I told her she can live with me and have anything of mine, hoping she would say yes. Hoping she would understand that when I say she can have anything of mine she wants, I mean me. She can have me. But she laughed and said the time for me to buy her lovely gifts has passed, as she is now my friend, not my governess. And then—

And then she said our time of being together like this is nearly at an end. She sighed and smiled and seemed perfectly content.

It was a knife to the heart. I recognized her tone and expression. Because it’s the same way I feel about Mother dying. Mina’s not upset by our impending separation. It will be a relief to her. She does not love me, not the way I love her. She never has, and she never will.

I panicked.

“Live with me,” I insisted. “We’ll keep house together. You can buy anything you need, anything you want. We don’t have to get married! We can stay as we are forever.” I grasped her hand, but she did not answer by squeezing my fingers back.

“You don’t understand anything about me.” Her voice was so cold I dropped her hand and wrapped my arms around myself. “I have no desire to stay as I am. You have no idea what it is to be poor. I don’t want my comfort to depend on your affection for me. To be forever kept by you, subject to your whims, with no legal rights to anything. Can you not see how cruel that is, Lucy? How unfair? I’m going to make my own way. To make certain I’m never dependent on anyone. My fortune will be my own, and it will be a fortune I make for myself.”

“I’m sorry,” I gasped, doing my best not to cry, because then she would chide me for trying to manipulate her, as she always did when I cried over little things. “I was teasing, of course. Can you imagine such a thing, us keeping house together? I would drive you mad, always leaving my little paintings lying around, half finished. I suspect you would murder me.”

Mina laughed. “I could never murder you, silly creature.” Then she relaxed and held my hand once more as we walked.

I didn’t say that she is going to be kept by Jonathan, subject to his whims, dependent forever on him. His whims have far less money behind them than mine do, and his odds of delivering her a fortune are minimal, while mine are guaranteed. I didn’t say anything else on the subject, and I didn’t cry, or beg, or confess my love.

But I can’t stay in this room with her sleeping so nearby. I want to tear out my hair, to fling myself onto her bed, into her arms, to beg her to make new secrets with me between the press of our lips. I want to devour her, and I want her to look at me and want me, and I want her to see that she has never really seen me at all, and I want her to want to see me. All of me. I want and I want and I want and none of it matters. None of it changes anything.

I’ll walk in the dark to the ocean, and maybe it—the ocean or the darkness, it matters not—will fill me.

40

Whitby, October 6, 2024

Iris

Elle’s so quiet and still the entire train ride, I worry she’s gone catatonic or something.

I can’t understand why she agreed to come at all, since clearly she hates Whitby. I might have jumped the gun by inviting her. Wanting to know someone and actually knowing them are very different things.

The train lasts forever. I left Lucy’s journal in the safe out of fear that something might happen to it, and I miss her like she’s my best friend.

I stare out the window as we pass an ancient viaduct. Lucy said something about Whitby in one of her entries, I think. I wonder what she thought of it. If she loved it there. If it felt like an escape from oppressive Hillingham.

If her traveling companion was so still and white she might as well have been carved from stone.

But as soon as we step off the train, something loosens in Elle. Her expression softens. She takes in the city, curled and sprawling along the coast. “It hasn’t changed,” she says. “I thought it would feel different, but it doesn’t.”

Given that she told me it was a bad place, I would have assumed that was a bad thing, but she laughs and links her arm through mine. I’m surprised, but also relieved. Maybe she gets trainsick, or maybe she was dealing with something I’m not privy to. But I no longer regret inviting her as she guides me out of the train station.

We aim for a narrow lane winding through the charming old harbor. The west side of Whitby is newer urban sprawl, but the east side looks frozen in time, and that’s where we’re headed.

Eastern Whitby is built into hills and cliffs overlooking the ocean, nestled in between lush grass, towering rock, and waiting ocean. The houses are mostly redbrick and whitewashed boards, all with the same reddish-orange roofs. They follow the organic lines of the land so well that they almost look natural. On a hill looming over everything is a weathered stone castle, or maybe a church. I didn’t do any research before we came, which was probably a mistake. But so far, I’m charmed by Whitby. It doesn’t strike me as a bad place at all.

The charm fades a bit when I check my phone’s map. The house isn’t along the harbor or beach walk, but rather in the hills. There are numerous walkways and infinite stairs winding up, so it won’t be hard to get to. Just annoying.

“Tea!” Elle chirps. “I’ll be right out.” She darts into a tiny shop. I walk onto a pier and lean against the railing, staring down at the dark water. It’s quiet here, a marked difference to the bustle of London. There’s old and busy, and then there’s old and sleepy. Whitby is the latter.

Elle returns and hands me a cup of coffee. There’s a brisk wind coming off the ocean. Even though it’s sunny, I wish I had brought a heavier jacket. At least Elle thoughtfully got me a hot drink. I hold the cup between my hands and breathe in the steam. Elle holds her tea the same way, staring down at it as though she can read her fortune through the lid.

“My dad died in Whitby,” she says without preamble.

I choke on a mouthful of coffee. Once I have that under control, I turn to her. “Oh my god. What? I’m so sorry.” No wonder she was distant and withdrawn on the train!

Elle’s gaze shifts, sweeping over the harbor before resting on the cliffs in the distance. “It was a long time ago. I wasn’t allowed to feel what I needed to feel about it, though. Anger isn’t a pretty emotion, my mom always said. My grief became a wound that never healed. But now I know I’m allowed to feel what I need to. What I want to. And standing here, I can at last acknowledge my anger. He wasn’t around to protect me from my mother anymore, and I resented him for abandoning me and for escaping. Which I know is an odd way to look at a tragic death, but that’s what it felt like. That he got away, and I was stuck.”

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