For You My Darling, Anything

Over the course of the past few weeks Cora, had begun to worry as she noticed Edith displaying behaviors that could not be explained with the disappearance of Michael Greyson alone. Edith had been keeping to herself and while that was quite in character for her middle child, it seemed more frequent than usual. She had given Edith a few gentle nudges, trying her best lure the young woman into opening up to her while making her feel like it was still her own idea. After trying for multiple weeks and coming up empty handed each time; she found herself more concerned than ever. There was a cloud of gloom that seemed to hang over her daughter wearing her down more each day. Cora would find Edith teary eyed...lost between reality and what was going on in her head. She was disappearing days at a time in London and coming back looking more tired than when she had left.
Edith had received the confirmation of her pregnancy weeks prior and since then she felt as though her whole world was falling apart from underneath her very feet. The mere thought of her parents finding out she with child was enough to make her feel sick. She was afraid of disappointing them more than she already had. 'Edith Crawley the County Failure' she thought to herself contemplating the result one night of careless stupor. Feeling alone and caged she had come to the conclusion that ending the child's life before it had even started would be her best option but upon her arrival to the procedure, she discovered she was not strong enough to make the decision to carry it through. Rosamund, who had been extremely relieved at her decision had already arrived with a new plan to secure Edith's secret and keep anybody from finding out the truth. The red headed woman had done her best to convince Edith to tell Cora and Robert but Edith was a grown woman and there was little she could do to persuade her. Still feeling a duty to help her niece she had decided to take her niece abroad for the remainder of the pregnancy. For how could she could not when Edith had always been the joy of her life.

Edith for as long as she had lived, felt this hole when it came to her parents(especially her mother). From a very young age she had known that she was different from Mary and Sybil. Even down to the color of her hair and eyes. Never feeling like she quite fit in with her sisters she ended up spending most of her time alone. Between Papa going off to war while they were young and Cora being pulled in a thousand different directions, she became dependent upon herself and soon it became to hard to let anybody in or trust them. There was so much risk in trusting someone, unless of course the person was Rosamund. She had always felt seen and loved by her aunt, but maybe that was because she was Rosamund's favorite. She never had a chance to be anybody's favorite till Rosamund had noticed she was different. Noticed she was special even though she was nothing like Mary or Sybil. Now even if Robert nor Cora had directly said they did not pay her as much of attention as her other sisters because she was not like them or because she did not mean as much to them as Sybil and Mary, in a child's world this was the only thing she had been able to come up with. So the older she had become the more independent and detached Edith had grown. That is till she had made the grave mistake of putting her trust in Sir Anthony's frail hands. Left at the altar, 'poor demented Lady Edith' burned in her mind. That was the first day since she was a child that she had felt important to her mother and yet it had to have been one of the worst days of her life. But if she was being honest with herself, when Cora had come and comforted her that day she had felt so scared and angry but at the same time she had felt a little piece of her stop breaking. That day she realized that all she had ever wanted was her mother's love and now that she had felt what it was like she wanted it more than she ever had. Once again though left to the claws of her own doubt she pushed Cora away, still terrified of opening up to someone. To let someone see how truly broken she was. Especially her mother.

"Don't forget dear...we are going to Switzerland to improve my french and I would like to take you along for company," Rosamund turned grabbing Edith's arm and whispered to her before entering the dining hall.