The season has finally fallen upon this years debutants and no one is more displeased than Margret Nighthower. Margret has always wished to travel and see the parts of the world she reads of, yet since the passing of her farther, Lord Nighthower, sh...
The carriage was silent, the only noise coming from the impact of the horses hooves hitting the cobblestone beneath. Tobias cradled his injured hand with his other as Elizabeth made subtle glances toward the blood pooling on his knuckles. Gilbert examined his hand and was trying to fashion a makeshift bandage out of old handkerchiefs, whilst Ophelia watched him with curiosity. Little Angelica rested her head against the wall of the carriage, her eyes drooped and the subtle bounces seemed to nurse her into a light slumber, across from her sat a unsure Margret, staring straight at the moon that illuminated the sky, so bright that if London fell into a blackout, the driver would still be able to navigate their way home, simply from the light of the moon. The carriage came to holt and immediately Margret sprang out and made a B-Line for the large door in hopes to run to her room and pretend to be anywhere else, to bury her nose into a book and forget the events of tonight.
"Margret." His voice rang out forcing Margaret's escape to come crashing around her. "A word."
The next thing Margret knew she was in there fathers office, she hadnt been in here since his death, the fire had been lite and the grand green arm chair was placed as it has been for years beside it. The oak panelling trapping her in the room. Tobias pointed to the arm chair, offering and she accepted, awkwardly perching on the green leather whilst the sound of a chair scraping over toward her echoed in the room.
He sat in the chair and a deafening silence consumed them. Margret glanced around the study, Tobias hadnt changed a thing, apart from the piles and piles of documents that consumed the desk, everything was the same. A drawing of mother and father drawn on a pier when they honeymooned in Italy, a family portrait hung above the fire, a stoic picture of their farther hung behind where there farther would work, the desk. The trolley of glasses and whiskey in the corner, it was all the same.
"Im sorry."
It was so quiet Margret didn't think she heard him correctly. Her eyes snapped to meet his.
"I am truly sorry Margret." He repeated. "It was wrong of me to react so violently, and for grabbing you so hard. Margret if I could turn back time I would and I would have handled the situation completey different."
"Why?" was the only question Margret could think of asking her brother. An open ended question, one with many possibilities for consideration: why would you turn time? why would you apologise? yet he knew exactly what she meant.
"We have history." Tobias answered not breaking eye contact.
"History?"
"Yes history. A history I would prefer to be kept in the past." He said standing and pouring two glasses of whiskey before offering one to Margret who arched an eyebrow, "we both know this isn't the first time your drinking whiskey." Margret tilted her head in admission and took the crystallised glass and downed its contense before handing the glass back to her elder brother who smiled in approval.
"Is it about that girl?" Margret asked.
Another moment of silence. A pause whilst Tobias downed his whisky before the sound of glass meaning glass rang out, and he turned back to his sister.
"Her name was Felicity. I called her Flick..." he paused, "she was everything, the sun, the moon, the days, the nights, summer and autumn and winter and spring all in one. She was..." a choke. A real choke up, Margret hadnt seen him cry since the one time she had caught him after dads death. He had been crying in the attack, hiding away from sight when Margret wanted to read one of dads old travel journals to feel closer, they were up in the attic and she had caught him. She had sat beside him and held his hand and the pair cried together for hours. They had never spoken about it, yet since that day there has always been some bond between the two, a closeness, a shared vulnerability. Margret walked toward her brother before consuming him in a large bear hug.
"She was my everything Margret." He whispered in Margrets hair whilst he stared at the fire, a single tear threatening to spill over the lid of his eye. "and he-"
"-I know." She didn't but she could guess that Archibald Jenkins had in fact contradicted her expections of him being a gentleman, in truth he was a dirty slimy dickhead who didn't deserve any of her attention, nor any woman for that matter. The pair separated and looked into each others eyes, they said everything they needed, the same thing it had after the attic. Never to be spoken of, but it happened.
With a nod Margret walked out of the study and up to her room. The second the sound of the door closing Margret let out a small shaky breath, closed her eyes, and cried for her brother.
AN: By the way I see Chace Crawford as Archibald Jenkins
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