Fitzwilliam Darcy, Rock Star

by Heather Lynn Rigaud

  Elizabeth nodded and stepped away, letting Jane have her needed privacy.

  Jane signaled to Charles that he could come to her now. “Can I touch you?” he asked softly.

  Jane shook her head no.

  “What happened, Jane?”

  Jane knew she owed him an explanation. “I realized some things this afternoon, that Slurry was hurting us all, and we needed to stop it. To pull away.”

  Charles’s eyes revealed the pain he was feeling. “Why didn’t you talk to me?”

  “I tried,” she said, her voice dropping to an intense whisper. “I tried to talk to you and all I got was ‘wait.’ And I waited, and what did I get? ‘It’s All a Joke’!” Jane stopped and visually struggled to regain her control.

  “So you did hear that?”

  Jane nodded, her eyes cast downward.

  Charles pushed aside a surge of anger. “Jane, that was never about you. I don’t know how you could ever even think it was.”

  “But I did!” she answered him, her voice full of wretchedness. “I did! I thought you were tired of me and I thought you wanted to break up with me. And frankly, now I don’t know what to think.”

  Charles’s expression sobered. “My God, Jane, I love you!”

  Jane looked like she had been struck. “Please. Don’t say that.”

  “Jane?”

  Jane took a deep breath. “I have to go.”

  “But we need to talk.”

  Jane shook her head. “Charles, I don’t trust you, so I don’t know what we have to talk about.” She turned and left the room, rushing so he wouldn’t see her tears.

  ***

  The next morning, Jane took Elizabeth to the train station. Mechanically Elizabeth got a ticket and took the metro north to Grand Central Station. There she took a subway down to Greenwich Village.

  As she rode, her mind traveled like a train on the same track. She remembered the events of yesterday, from waking up in Darcy’s arms, all the way to her talk with Caroline. She traveled the same route again and again, without finding any answers.

  She was so deeply lost in her thoughts that she was only slightly surprised to find herself not at the lot where she had left her truck a lifetime ago but at Darcy’s building. She realized that her thoughts weren’t going to give her any peace, so she entered the building and asked the doorman to announce her.

  The doorman was a kind man who had been in the Darcys’ employ since the late seventies. He recognized the young woman from her last visit. “I’m sorry, Miss Bennet. Mr. Darcy is away and won’t be returning for a few weeks.”

  Elizabeth was shocked at the disappointment she felt. She thanked the man and left the building, feeling completely adrift. Numbly, she returned to her truck, paid the huge bill, and started her drive home.

  Automatically, she turned her radio on. She smiled when she heard Jane’s voice singing to her.

  Once I could believe

  Everything you promised.

  That pretty story you told me,

  I held it close and loved it.

  Now I’ve gotten smart.

  Now I’ve learned some things.

  Now I know that what once was a start

  Is just an ending.

  The longest good-bye

  I ever knew

  The longest good-bye

  Was the day

  I said hello to you.

  With a deep breath, Elizabeth accepted that she was going down. She couldn’t avoid it. She didn’t know where he was and couldn’t contact him for at least two weeks.

  Oh, she knew in an emergency she could reach him, through Caroline or something, but this was hardly an emergency.

  No, she had to face her worst demon now: herself. She had two weeks to do what Caroline told her to do: pull herself together and figure out what she wanted. She laughed to herself. She didn’t need two weeks. All she needed was twenty minutes. She wanted him.

  The song ended and the announcer came on. “That’s Long Bourne Suffering, who really stole the show at the MTV awards last night. And you can see LBS. They are touring with Slurry now and they have dates coming up at Madison Square Garden at the end of this month. I’ve got tickets for that show for caller number twelve…”

  The words died away but not the impression. It was a surprise to Elizabeth to realize that she had reached one of her goals. Her band was being talked about on a major radio station. Somewhere, during the tour, she had become a hit. Oh, they still had a long way to go, but they had made it.

  Elizabeth found the knowledge puzzling. She had dreamed of this for so long and she had expected that when she made it, she would feel different, be different. She looked in her rearview mirror at her reflection.

  The face she found there was basically the same, but as she stared, she found tiny differences. Mileage, the voice in her head told her. She wasn’t the same Lizzy Bennet who had left on tour back in March. But she wasn’t quite finished either.

  The other thing that surprised her was how little her success meant to her. She was surprised and certainly happy. But she certainly wasn’t fulfilled as she had always imagined she would be. Success had proven to be not a panacea but merely a job. She received satisfaction from her job well done, but that only went so far. She found that she still needed something. She needed Darcy.

  He wasn’t perfect, that was for sure, but she needed to talk to him. She needed to find out what she felt for him, to figure out if he was right.

  With a deep breath she realized her train of thought had finally stopped. She had the answer she needed. And now she needed to wait.

  Chapter 15

  On Thursday Mrs. Bennet answered the phone at her home. “Oh hello, dear. No, I haven’t asked them yet.”

  Elizabeth and Jane exchanged a look. They were enjoying a quiet dinner with their parents. Both of them could tell by their mother’s tone that Lydia, her baby, was on the phone and probably asking for a favor. Kitty and Lydia were working for their aunt and uncle as nannies over the summer.

  “You know, dear, they don’t have much time off,” Mrs. Bennet spoke into the phone. “All right, all right, I’ll ask them.”

  “That was Lydia,” Mrs. Bennet said, unnecessarily, as she hung up. “You know how they have been working so hard all summer, and their friends are going to the beach next week, and they wanted to know if one of you could fill in for them, so they could have a little vacation.”

  Elizabeth rolled her eyes. Mary was away at the Tanglewood Music Center for an eight-week fellowship, which left her and Jane to cover for Kitty and Lydia. It was pointless for Elizabeth to remind her mother that she and Jane had been working hard for the past four months. She sighed and looked at Jane.

  Jane’s expression surprised her. The deep sadness that had shadowed her since Tuesday lifted, and she smiled slightly. “Tell Lydia I’d be happy to go to Aunt Maddie’s.” Jane then looked to Elizabeth and winked.

  Elizabeth considered her sister’s hint. She had to admit the idea had merit. Getting away from Mom and spending a week with her aunt would actually be more relaxing. Watching her young cousins would give her something to do besides thinking about Darcy and how she had screwed up with him. “I’ll come too,” she volunteered suddenly.

  “Hey,” she said excitedly as a thought occurred to her, “we could go and stay with Aunt Maddie, and when Lydia and Kitty come back next weekend, we could go see Mary at Tanglewood.”

  “That is an excellent idea, Lizzy,” Mr. Bennet pronounced. Elizabeth and Jane had been disappointed that they would be back on tour during Mary’s big performance at the end of her fellowship, but at least this way they could share some of the experience with her. Mrs. Bennet called the Gardiner household back to finalize the plans. After dinner, Elizabeth found Jane staring at the two bouquets of flowers sitting in vases in the living room. Both were of pure white roses. One arrived Wednesday, and the second had arrived today. The first card said simply, “I’m sorry”; today’s read, “Forgive me
, please.” Neither had been signed, but that was unnecessary. Jane knew exactly whom they were from, as did Lizzy.

  “Are you going to call him to let him know where to send tomorrow’s flowers?” Elizabeth teased gently.

  Jane smiled slightly. The sadness was back on her face. “I don’t think so,” she answered vaguely.

  “Jane,” Elizabeth said, all her concerns expressed in that one syllable, “you have to do something. You are so miserable, and I know Charles is too. I saw him at the De Bourgh party. He looked like he was dying.”

  Jane looked up to her sister with gentle reproach in her eyes. “I don’t think it’s a good idea, Lizzy,” she said softly.

  “Couldn’t you just talk to him?”

  Jane shrugged. “And say what?” She looked away, shaking her head. “No, I made a mistake. I moved too fast, and I trusted him before I should have. Now I have to pay the price.” She held up a hand to stop Elizabeth, who was already drawing breath to protest. “I know; you think I should talk to him and let him explain. But I don’t trust him, Lizzy, and if I don’t trust him, how is anything he says going to make a difference?”

  “But you love him.”

  Jane closed her eyes for a long time, then she opened them slowly and said, “I thought I did. Maybe I do. I’m just not sure.” With a sad look, she left the flowers and went to her room to pack.

  ***

  Elizabeth couldn’t be sure whom she felt worse for: herself or Jane. It was a tough call. She sat alone in her room and felt a pang of intense loneliness. She lay down on her bed, arranging the pillows so that, just for a second, she could try to believe she was back in the loft, in his bed, her head resting on his shoulder. She closed her eyes and tried to remember his scent and the sound of his heartbeat, the rise and fall of his chest against her cheek.

  The memory failed; the moment faded. She sat up, feeling even more alone. The now-familiar dull ache settled upon her heart and she wished for the millionth time she hadn’t walked out on him, that he hadn’t pushed her so. Was it only three nights ago that she had slept in his arms? It felt like a lifetime ago. She hadn’t meant to hurt him. She really hadn’t, but nothing could change the fact that she had.

  She was filled with a deep longing to find him, to make it better. But did he even want to see her? It was so hard to know what to think. Caroline believed he did, but what if she was wrong? What if the time away brought him to his senses and he realized he wanted nothing to do with a moody bitch like her?

  She drew her Gibson into her lap. A memory of his words returned to her, surprising her. “My home is yours,” he had told her that morning. His words comforted her, even as she questioned them. Did he still feel that way? Could he understand that she had just needed time? Could she somehow make things right with him again?

  As her fingers begin idly picking out a tune, she laughed softly to herself. What exactly was “right” for her and Darcy? The moments when they were together and happy seemed dwarfed by all the times they were fighting or angry. She wished they had shared more good times together, but with a surge of regret, she realized how much of it was her fault that they hadn’t. He had said it; he had loved and admired her for months. How had she missed this? Why had she been so dead set on disliking him, so blind that she missed the warmth he offered her? It was mostly because she misunderstood him. And a moment of fairness made her admit that he was so very hard to understand. But she realized that the fact of the matter was that she had been prejudiced against him from the start.

  She felt stupid now. Stupid and unworthy of anyone’s love or admiration, and yet, even as she felt she didn’t deserve it, she craved Darcy’s love more than ever. She longed for the warmth in his eyes when he spoke to her, the dry jokes that made her burst out laughing, and his soft, deep voice saying her name again.

  Her hurting and sorrow were too much, and she found herself stringing words together into a song. It was rough and unfinished, but it expressed her feelings better than her heart could.

  Tears ran onto the paper on which she wrote the words and chords. On a whim, she created a song file by recording it on her computer. She wasn’t sure what she was doing, but she just needed Darcy to hear her song, to know that she was hurting too, and to maybe feel better. She agonized a moment, questioning her actions. Was she being a fool? The file sat on her desktop for a long time as she stared at it and thought. If she sent it, she would be committing herself. She would have to trust him.

  That thought made her stomach turn over. Trusting others had never been her strong suit. She was much more comfortable trusting herself. But then she looked at her small, lonely, empty room and realized that she didn’t want this and that if she were ever going to move beyond it, she would have to trust him. In a rush, she sent the file to Caroline, with a request for her to forward it to Darcy. She bit her lip, wishing she had Darcy’s email address, but this was the best she could do.

  Then she sat back on her bed and pulled her Gibson tight. It was done, and she hoped that he would understand.

  ***

  “Hey!”

  Charlotte’s heart lurched in her chest as she recognized the voice on the other end of the line. It was last person in the world she expected to hear from.

  “Richard?”

  He laughed, a warm, rich, touchable sound. “Don’t sound so surprised, Char. I can dial a phone, you know.”

  Charlotte grinned. “I know. So how are you?” she asked, puzzled by his call.

  Richard sighed. “I’m good. I’m kind of missing all the company of the tour. You get used to living in the middle of a hive of people, you know? It’s hard to readjust to the quiet when you’re home.”

  “Oh, so that’s why you called? You’re lonely for the tour?”

  “Something like that, Char,” he said, in a way that let her know that it had nothing to do with his call. “What have you been doing? Keeping busy?”

  Charlotte struggled to steady her breathing as she answered him. “I’ve been hanging out mostly. Getting caught up with things at home and going to some of my old haunts.”

  “Going out with Lizzy?”

  “No, she and Jane have gone off to stay with their cousins for a week.”

  “Oh, that explains it.”

  “What?”

  “Jane,” he explained. “Charles isn’t speaking to Darcy right now, so instead he’s been calling me to moon over Jane every night. He can’t find her.”

  “Oh,” Charlotte said, not sure how to take this information. “He’s taking it badly?”

  “He’s crushed, Char.” Richard’s voice held sympathy for his friend. “I’ve never seen him like this.”

  “That’s too bad,” Charlotte replied. She felt an awkward pause in the conversation and asked, “So what else have you been doing?”

  Richard chuckled. “You’re not going to believe this.”

  “Tell me,” Charlotte replied.

  “I’ve written a song.”

  “Really?” Charlotte was surprised. “Can I hear it?”

  “That depends on if you come back on tour or not,” Richard said in a deceptively easy way.

  “Ooooohh, I see a carrot dangling before me.”

  “Char,” Richard’s voice was relaxed and sincere, “the song is not worth you coming back for, but I do hope you come back. I miss you.”

  Charlotte’s lip was trembling as she heard him speak. “You do?”

  “I do. More than I can tell you. Please say you’ll come back.”

  “Richard,” she said, her voice ragged.

  “I know,” he hushed her soothingly. “It’s not just your decision. I’m sorry; I didn’t plan on calling you to ask you to come back. It just slipped out.”

  Charlotte nodded, even though he couldn’t see her. She pulled herself together and tried to think of something safe to say. She opened her mouth, and her heart defeated all the rational plans her mind had made. “I miss you too,” she whispered.

  “Char,” his vo
ice was heavy with emotion. He wanted nothing more than to drop the phone and run to her.

  “Richard?”

  “I’m here,” he said. He took a deep breath and blew it out. This was so hard, but every second convinced him it was right. “Can you just talk to me a little, Char?”

  “All right,” she said, oddly touched. It was so infrequent for him to ask her for anything. “I almost got into a fight Saturday night.”

  Richard listened to her dear voice as she talked about her adventure at the local bar. He smiled as he pictured her face, telling her story. He was breaking his promise to himself by calling her, but he had to. He had missed her too much, and he was terrified she and the others would not return to the tour.

  He’d promised himself at Hazelden that he would remain celibate for three weeks. He figured that if he could do that, he could then go to Charlotte, tell her he loved her, and ask her, hell, beg her to forgive him. He wished he could offer her more. He was hardly a prize. She deserved so much more. But he had tried to let her go, to push her away, and still she loved him.

  What else could he do? He had wanted so badly to tell her how he loved her that last day of the tour. But he couldn’t then. First he had to prove to himself that he could love her, that he could stop sleeping around and be true to her.

  But he was weak. Seeing her at the VMAs had been his undoing. She was so beautiful that night. All he wanted to do was hold her and kiss her again and again. Instead, he had been terrified by the idea that LBS might be leaving the tour.

  In the end, it didn’t matter. He still would go to her, even if she didn’t come to him. But the fear had haunted him and he had, in a moment of loneliness, called her, to hear the sweetest voice he knew. And now he knew he was hooked. She had told him she missed him!

  If his new addiction was phone calls to Charlotte, he could live with that. It was certainly less destructive than drinking or sleeping around, and if it helped him, helped them get back together, he was frankly all for it.