The Artful Dodger: The Continuation

Chapter 1

Belle awoke from yet another dream of Jack. She looked down at the bed where he had once told her he loved her. She missed him dearly and wondered where he was. She hadn't heard about any hangings since the death of Captain Gaines, but still wasn't sure what Jack's fate would be. She needed him, just as he had told her he needed her, those few weeks ago.

Fanny walked into the room with a tray. It consisted of a bowl of soup, a glass of water and a hand-painted card, featuring Belle working at her desk with a book in one hand, a vile of some odd substance in the other. "How are you feeling? And I'm not just talking about your health. Do you miss him terribly?" She asked sympathetically. "Do you think he is missing you? Do you dream about him? Do you remember him saving your life, my goodness, how romantic." She paused before asking her final and most important question. "Do you love him?" 

Belle lay silently, recalling moments spent playfully teasing and laughing with Jack. A smile spread across her face. She knew the answer to Fanny's final question, of course she loved him, she could not bare to live life without him. All she wanted was to be laying there with him once more.

Belle began to relive that morning, that morning when she awoke to find he had fallen asleep checking her pulse. A single tear rolled down her cheek. Fanny wiped it away but then took it as a invitation to leave. 

After this Belle tried to go back to sleep, it was the only place she could be with Jack, in her dreams.

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An hour or so later, Lady Jane strolled in and opened the curtains. "Rise and shine now, Dr Sneed says you should be feeling well enough to come out and have some tea in the garden and I think that would be good. It should give us ladies some time to talk." She tried to sound like her confident self but Belle could hear that there was some sadness in her tone. "I am not well enough to get up, let alone go outside, I am happy where I am, just let me lay here."

Jane sighs but then walks out of the room. Belle overhears her two parents talking in the next room, "Come now dearest," she heard her father say. "She just needs time, she had a major operation. I'm sure she will be up and about again once more very soon. Messing around with her medical journals, no doubt." 

Belle lay there and relived that day, one of the best and worst days of her life. She sometimes thought it would have been better just dying that day because the agony of not being with Jack was worse. Another tear fell down her cheek, then two more. Before she knew it she was practically drowning in her own tears.

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Hi everyone! I'm sorry if people think my writing is cringy or anything but this is just the way I write. I will continue writing this if everyone is enjoying it.