Page 19 of Third Time is the Charm
“Maybe…” was all Jane said, not having enough information to disagree with her. “It just doesn’t make sense. Charles won’t talk to her really unless their parents are around, and he won’t tell me why; he just said that she hasn’t changed and that he’s given up on her and their relationship. My only thought would be that he knows about her and Darcy. But then why would he still talk to Darcy and not to her.”
“I don’t know,” Beth agreed, stacking the empty food cartons on the coffee table and picking up her glass of wine again. “Who knows what her plan is… All I know is that I’m no longer an obstacle in it, which is fine by me. My main concern right now is figuring out what I’m going to feel seeing Darcy again, and how I’m going to handle it without making a mess of myself.”
“I’m sorry…” Jane murmured, feeling guilty knowing that she was the cause of their meeting again.
“Don’t be, Jane. Maybe it’ll be a good thing, for me… like some sort of closure on the entire situation since I haven’t seen him since that night. At least, I hope it will,” Beth sighed, the truth finally coming out. “I’m just tired, Jane; I’m tired of fighting off his memories. I’m tired of fighting to forget everything good that happened between us, the words, the touches, the intimacy, the fire. Everything reminds me – or tries to, and my dreams are no better.” She took another long sip of wine, the exhaustion of her battle evident in her voice. “Sometimes, in the middle of the night, I swear I can feel him next to me again, and God help me, I miss him and I just wish he were a better man – to me, at least.” A few rogue tears streaked down her face. “I know the next few days are going to be rough, but I need it because I don’t seem to be able to move on without that final, solitary, solidifying ‘good-bye.’”
“Well, you know if there is anything that I can do, please tell me. I don’t want to make this any harder than it already is for you,” Jane began, biting her lower lip, contemplating if she should say what she was about to. “I think… I think I should tell Charles that you are bringing Colin, or at least that you are bringing a date.”
Beth raised her eyebrows, wondering where her sister was going with this.
“I haven’t told anyone – not even mom. I figured it would be better for you to maybe have that conversation when you see her tomorrow. But, I think I should tell Charles so that he can decide if it’s something that Darcy should know.”
Beth felt her face begin to flush in irritation. “Why should he need to know? Jane,he doesn’t care about meand hewon’t carewhether I have a date or not.” He didn’t deserve that kind of pre-emptive insight into her life.
“Beth, I know what you said happened, I know what it looks like, I understand – I really do, but you have to understand that while you’ve been dealing with this by yourself in Boston, Charles has been dealing with Darcy here – the more frequent phone calls, visits, dinners, drinks. I didn’t see him for a while after, so I don’t know that I would classify what I saw as ‘sad,’ but Darcy’s been driven – determined – for what I don’t know. But underneath the now very thin, cool exterior, I get this feeling of desolation from him, like he’s trying to do something that he knows is impossible. It’s incredibly disheartening if you pay close enough attention,” Jane paused, noticing the anger rising in Beth’s expression. “Of course, none of that justifies what he did to you, but I think this weekend is going to be hard on the both of you for different reasons, and I’m not going to try to purposefully make someone suffer at my wedding, especially when that person is either my sister or my fiancé’s best man.”
Beth closed her eyes, draining the last of her wine before responding.
Ok, maybe she had been holding out with the small hope that seeing her with Col would hurt Darcy, at least a tenth of the way he had hurt her.
And if it was going to hurt him, it would regardless of whether he knew about it ahead of time or not.
“You’re right,” Beth acquiesced. “This is your day. You need to do whatever you think is best for everyone involved. Purposely trying to hurt Darcy is only going to bring me farther away from the closure that I need.”
“And maybe Charles won’t want to tell him, I just don’t want to make that call…” Jane offered, softly.
Beth just nodded, stood and picked up Jane’s wine glass from the table and walked into the kitchen to rinse both glasses out. “I’m going to head to bed; traveling just drains me.”
“Alright. Well, there’s nothing really going on tomorrow. Lydia flies in in the afternoon; I’m not sure if she’ll stop by here or just go straight to mom’s. I was just planning on packing,” Jane said, standing and walking to the beginning of the hallway.
“Ok, sounds good. Wait, is George not coming with her?” Beth asked in confusion.
“No. She responded for one. I’m not sure if it has anything to do with Darcy or their deal… But she’s coming alone.” Jane shrugged her shoulders, unsure if there was more of a reason there or not. “I’ll see you in the morning.”
Drying her hands, Beth moved to give her sister a hug. “Thank you.”
“I’m always here for you.”
“I know.”
Laying in her bed, the familiar feel and scent of her recent home surrounding her brought her no comfort as she tossed and turned trying to fall asleep. The frustration of not being able to shut down her brain just one more thing to add to her pile of disorganized emotions.
She wouldn’t cry anymore.
Beth kept thinking it, even as she ignored the watery streaks down her cheeks. What was most upsetting – most aggravating – wasn’t what Jane had told her, or that she wanted to tell Charles about Beth bringing a date. No, it was the flutter, the tingle inside her chest – like blood rushing back into a limb after it’s fallen asleep – at the rationally hopeless thought that maybe Darcy was suffering just as much as she was. She’d cut off her heart from all of these feelings, and at the first crumbs of hope, it sprung back to life. And just like with a limb, that feeling seeping back into her heart burned painfully as it begged to be brought back to life.
And she cried not because she wanted it, but because she shouldn’t.
She shouldn’t want the feelings, the pain, the inevitable disappointment thatalwayscame witheverythinginvolving Darcy. She should want Colin – the gentleman, the one who treated her respectfully, considerately, kindly, the one with the movie-star smile and the dazzling personality that miraculously came along with it. But no, she neededhim– the cold and callous one, the too-proud-for-his-own-good one, the devastating and devastatingly handsome one, the insufferable and yet, impossibly desirable one.
She couldn’t win every battle with her emotions, finally letting her tears sing her to sleep.
Why did everything about Darcy have to be so damned intolerable?
Why did he have to be everything she needed?
Chapter 6
