Chapter Text
"Must you look at me as though I am a stranger?" I complained once we had both changed into our nightclothes and were preparing to go to bed, unable to keep the words to myself.
It was half our problem these days, I thought. We could not contain these thoughts within ourselves and it lead to fight after fight.
"You know, I look at you and I think that I know you so well, the way I used to. But then, the very next second, I just think that I don't know you at all."
I swallowed heavily, and this time it was not words that I pushed down.
"Do you realize that your words are incredibly hurtful?"
"I don't mean to hurt you."
"That does not change a thing though, does it? Whether we mean to or not, all we seem to be capable of these days is hurting one another."
He sighed, "It does appear that way."
"I don't know how to get back to who we used to be," I admitted.
I willed him not to say that there was no way back at all, and thankfully he did not.
I did not remember when I had last felt so lonely - there I was with my husband, yet I might as well have been alone.
We were in upstate New York for Oscar van Rhijn and Turner's November wedding, and with all the guests staying in Oscar's mansion by the Hudson, bedrooms were limited. It was thus that I found myself sharing a bedroom with my husband again, for the first time in months.
Or one might as well refer to it as torture - when the desire of one's heart was so close one could hear his every breath, yet so impossible to have.
In general, I had no one left but Aurora. My other supposed friends were not real friends, my son would rather avoid any room I was in and my daughter was an ocean away.
It had gotten to a point where I had even considered visiting my sister and her companion, even though Monica usually refused to understand me as well. She does, of course, understand me better than anyone except for George ever has, she just often does not wish to. It is the same for myself with her, I will admit.
"I wish we did not have to attend that awful wedding," I whined, despite the fact that I knew he was no longer interested in my whining.
"God! Why would Oscar van Rhijn even marry her?"
"Well, because in this society he cannot simply live with a companion the way Monica does."
"What? You mean..."
"Of course." My husband was not usually this naive.
"I didn't realize," he admitted.
"So, here we are, watching him marry that whore. I think he might come to regret that, even if he does need someone to play the role of his wife. She is not at all trustworthy."
"Of course not. But Oscar van Rhijn is old and shrewd enough to know what he is doing, don't you agree?"
"Perhaps, but I have no interest in watching her get married, and certainly not in having her join the extended family. Such a... whore," I spit.
"Bertha!"
"What! You don't agree that that's what she is?" My eyes flashed dangerously.
"You don't usually use the word, that is all."
"And I won't in company, of course."
"But you will with me?" he chuckled.
"Well, for now I may still tell you whatever I think, may I not?"
"Always."
Always. It had become a word whose meaning was not as clear as it used to be. It may not be always after all.
"To have to come all the way upstate for that whore!" I complained.
"Bertha!" he was chuckling now.
I smiled darkly, "It remains true."
He rolled his eyes. "Upstate New York in autumn is quite nice, however. If it wasn't for that wedding, don't you think it would be a beautiful place to be?"
"Maybe," I admitted. I understood him less and less these days. Perhaps in every other year it would have been, when it might have been romantic.
I quickly wiped away a tear that had escaped my left eye.
"Bertha... this wedding really is very difficult for you, isn't it?"
"It is, but I will survive." There was no need to tell him that I was certainly not crying over Turner and Oscar van Rhijn's wedding.
"You always do." I was not certain whether he meant it as an insult or not, so I just laid down on my side of the bed and pulled the blanket over myself.
He laid down next to me and I could not even remember the last time we had done such a thing.
"Are you cold, darling?" he asked. and he should not have called me such - not when it might be over again the next day.
"Only a little, it will be fine."
"Do you want to come here?" he asked, sounding uncertain in a way he never had before.
"Are you sure it's what you want?"
"I am. As long as it's what you want as well..."
I was in his arms in a second, I could not help myself.
I could not help the tears that escaped me either, now that I was finally back in his arms, they flowed out of me like the Hudson outside.
He must have felt them as they soaked the silk of his pyjama shirt.
"Bertha, are you alright?"
"I am fine, don't worry about it." I forced the words out of my throat.
"You don't have to deal with it alone, you know, darling."
And must he call me darling if such words would surely be gone again by morning?
"George," I sighed. "I am alone every day, I can deal with it. Let's just go to sleep, alright?"
"Is it truly the wedding that has upset you so?" he wondered, as I in turn wondered at his level of obliviousness.
"George," I sniffed, more tears sliding down into the silk beneath my cheek. When did any sort of control so thoroughly leave me behind? But then I had always been quite uncontrolled with him.
"You know I hate her... But I do understand that Oscar van Rhijn needs to do what he has to do. New York City is certainly not Albany, and these are not the middle classes. And now that McAllister has hinted at it in his book, time was running out really..."
"Did he really? That little rat."
I chuckled through the tears, "He really is a rat, isn't he? It's even worse in a sense, considering he is of the very same persuasion..."
"A traitor, really."
"Yes, a traitor. I've been considering going to visit Monica and her companion," I told him then - I was not sure why, when we had not spoken of delicate things in a very long time. It must have been the familiarity of laying here thus - it felt as though I could tell him all my secrets once more.
"Have you really? Well, I think it's a lovely idea. Do you want me to come along?"
Was he serious? Why would he come with me to visit my sister now that we were separated and he did not even stay with me at our house?
"If you can find the time... Your presence might soften her towards me," I said lightly, not expecting him to still want to accompany me by the time such a visit might occur. Certainly, once we got back to the city at the very latest, he would leave me again.
None of our conflicts were solved, much as he might allow me to cuddle him for the night - for reasons that quite frankly illuded me. It was a fluke, surely - a wondersome thing that I was allowed to have again for one night and one night only.
"You don't need me for that, but I will gladly come along nonetheless."
"Mhhh" I made, not wanting to ruin this night with the sharp claws of reality.
"We should go before Christmas."
Why did he have to insist on making this so hard - planting seeds into my mind of December days spent together?
"You do know that my issue with Monica is not her persuasion?" I asked him instead.
"I do know that."
"I am glad."
He still knew some of me, at least.
George kissed my hair and an unbidden sob escaped me.
"Darling... is this about Monica?" His voice was soft and gentle. Yet I could not manage to look at him in that moment, so I just buried further into his chest, clutching the fabric of the silk shirt with both hands, and he let me.
"It's... everything. Would you... would you just hold me, please? Just for tonight, I don't want to think about it anymore..."
"Alright," he said and I was grateful to him for indulging me just one last time.
Upstate New York would have been nice if it had been just the two of us, as we were now, I thought. If the stunning amber leaves and cool gentle air could make him permanently forget that he hated me.
But if one night of uninterrupted sleep and feeling almost loved again was all I could get, I would take it.
His fingers stroked my hair and I sighed quietly. "Sleep well, my dear," he whispered and I finally closed my eyes. My last thoughts were of what it would have taken for us to always remain this way.
Was it the day I told him we could no longer share a bed every night, for it was not what this class of people did? Was it the night he decided not to tell me about Turner in his bed? Was it the first lie I told about the Duke or the second? But certainly the third.
Was it when he decided to walk her down the aisle, despite being revolted by the action. Was it when I said Miss Brook was not suitable for Larry? Or when he tricked me at the ball in Newport? When I insisted on the marriage or when he moved into the Union Club?
All of these moments melted together into the enormous disaster that our marriage had become.
"Mhhh I wish it could remain this way forever," I sleepily mumbled into into his pyjama shirt.
Warm despite the cold November air, hidden away beneath a blanket, just the two of us. Cheeks reddened like apples and the feeling of being loved.