The words came out scraped and ugly, and Jane’s expression did not change, but her hand tightened on mine.
“Not of Bingley. Not of the engagement. I am happy for you—desperately, unbearably happy—and if you tell anyone I cried, I will deny it. I was jealous because you are the beautiful one, Jane. I have always been the sharp one, and the world made itspreference clear early on, and I have spent twenty years making the most of what I was given.”
“Lizzy—”
“Do not say anything nice or gracious because I won’t hear it.”
She pressed her lips together and nodded.
“At the Meryton assembly, Bingley pointed at me and said one of her sisters is quite pretty. Not beautiful. Not the jewel of the county. Quite pretty, which is the compliment you give a woman when you want to sound generous without committing to admiration.” I drew a shaking breath. “And then Darcy said he was not going to dance with a woman slighted by other men. Then Bingley turned back to you, the light followed him, and I was left standing behind a potted fern with Charlotte Lucas. I laughed, because laughing was the only alternative to crawling under the refreshment table and weeping into the fruit punch.”
Jane’s eyes were bright. “You acted like you did not mind.”
“Because I did not want it to matter. And I could not admit that Darcy’s opinion, a man I did not know—had the power to wound me. So I turned it into contempt. I wore it like my armor, and every time he did something decent—every time he brought the tortoise or the strawberries, every time he knelt on a carpet or walked beside me at a gallery or shortened his stride to match mine on a pavement—I told myself it was strategy, because admitting it was genuine would have meant taking the armor off and admitting I was just the girl behind the potted fern.”
I let the tears flow freely—no sense holding them back. No sense reclaiming my pride.
“And Jane, I thought you were soft, that your habit of seeing good in everyone was a flaw. You needed my protection, or so I told myself, because it gave me purpose. I was not the pretty one, but I was the perceptive one, and I defended that territory with every observation and cutting remark I could muster.”
“And Darcy threatened that,” Jane said softly.
“Darcy destroyed it. Because he did exactly what I do. He stood at the center of a situation and arranged it according to his judgment. And when he was wrong, I told him so. I accused him of managing for his own purposes, but I have done the same. He decided you did not love Bingley. I decided he was incapable of goodness. And we were both wrong.”
“Then admit it and forgive him,” Jane said, as if the solution were as simple. “Papa always said that a man’s character is not determined by his worst mistake but by what he does when he recognizes it.”
Jane repeated that tired old adage—the one I had shared with Darcy.
“He did exactly that when he set out to bring you and Bingley together. He recognized his error in siding with the Bingley sisters. He admitted as much, but he didn’t tell me the truth until… until it was too late.”
“Too late for what?” Jane’s face was completely open. “For forgiveness? But Lizzy…”
“Hear me out.” I wiped my eyes furiously. “I’m not like you. I cannot just forget and forgive. I need to analyze, to anticipate, and to guard against future infractions. I cannot trust…”
“But what did he do that was so wrong? I take it he told you his mistakes, and when he told Bingley, Charles waved it off and insisted he accompany him to Gracechurch Street.”
“He told me too late,” I repeated. “He wanted me to love him before I knew the worst of him.”
“Oh…” My sister’s mouth rounded into a wide circle. “And do you love him, Lizzy? Is that the problem?”
I nodded and then shook my head, unsure which question I was answering. “The point is I fell first without knowing, and… I don’t know if I can trust him again.”
“For wanting your love?” She reached for my shoulder. “Would you tell him you drool on your pillowcase?”
“Jane, that is not the same.”
“Isn’t it?” She laughed. “The man wants your regard, and perhaps he should have been more forthcoming, but Lizzy, you hated him already, and then, if he had told you—which, I daresay, this business is not your business, but between Darcy and Bingley, affecting me, not you—but if he had volunteered on that first day. I’m bringing the tortoise to get my foot in the door so I can speak to Miss Bennet and I will also give Miss Elizabeth more reason to hate me so she will not mistake any of my attentions… then where would you be?”
“Better than I am now, weeping onto the same pillowcase I apparently drool on.” My eyes watered, and the laugh was wet and noisy, aching, and then Jane laughed, sweetly like musical bells. Two sisters, one pretty enough and the other magnificently beautiful.
“I am sorry,” I said. “For trying to manage you. For presuming to know your heart better than you knew it yourself. For treating your gentleness as weakness and your forgiveness as naïvety. You were right about Darcy. You were right from the beginning. I could not bear it, because your being right meant I was wrong, and I have built my entire identity on never being wrong.”
“You were not wrong about everything. He did do a terrible thing.”
“He did. And then he undid it. He crossed London with a tortoise, gave up his pride, and fell apart confessing in a library. I walked away, and now I am lying on a bed in Cheapside with marmalade on my sleeve and my face looks like a boiled pudding, and I do not know where to begin.”
Jane propped herself up on one elbow. “It’s rather simple. Tell him what you want. No wit. No argument, just trust that it will be enough.”
“I am afraid.” I sat up, wiping my face with my sleeve, which was already ruined. “But then, so was the sad dragon.”
