Snowdrop (A Frankenstein Story)

Chapter 9

Every evening he went to her, she would always have some treat or drink ready for him. There would be pastries or fruit or entire meals waiting to fill his eager belly. He wondered, though, if the servants ever found her behavior odd. Georgia confirmed that they did think it strange and offered her more food at dinner. The creature, however, pleaded on behalf of their secrecy, that she stop. Instead, they turned their evening meetings into treasured and unchaperoned dates. They would talk for hours until Georgia, so overcome with exhaustion, would fall asleep against her will. Although the creature kept himself hidden in darkness, they both sought out the other with shy glances and quiet smiles. This communion was his greatest achievement, or so he thought.

Georgia was always full of questions, always thirsting for knowledge. She was respectful, an echo to her restrictive upbringing, but determined. Each night she would ask if he would kiss her and he would decline. There was no anger or scorn from being jilted, she simply moved on to the next question. Her thoughts were thorough and she seemed to see him as a difficult song, one she would have to practice and mess up many times before she got it right.

To him, she was an escape from his sins and the wretched loneliness he had been forced to endure. She was his sky with hair like a sunset and skin like the distant moon, peppered with stars. Her skin was smooth and untarnished, unlike his. He felt a growing desire to touch her.

"You remind me of the faerie stories Nettie and my governess used to read me when I was a girl. You have a gentlemanly air about you, but there is something primal and strong in you. Like a faerie king or forest sprite. Did you stray from your kingdom, milord?" She asked in a fit of giggling.

"Do people enjoy this talk from you, Georgia?" He asked. Fairies seemed to be regarded as something evil or tricky in this part of the world. He wondered why she would make such a comparison.

"No. Many regard it as nonsense or pagan speech. They're only stories. Part of me believes in mythical things. Were they not based on something real? Are you not something real?"

He conceded the issue. Surely, he was a mythical being, but he was not beautiful, only terrible.

She was sitting on her bed staring into the darkness from the drawn curtains. After a moment, she turned to him. "Something happened in England," she informed him. The reason why she was so far from home. "A rumor was started, about my father, but this rumor is, in reality, a truth we tried to keep secret. When people heard, they ended their connection to myself and Sir John. My inheritance, which was supposed to be mine until I married where it would then become my husband's, is being withheld. My claim to it is being contested by my aunt. To her, this rumor— truth— negates my claim to my property."

Her companion struggled to understand the complicated rules surrounding her wealth and position. He recalled what Eva, Agatha, Felix, and their father endured in the cottage where he spent the first portion of his life. They had fallen so far in society and endured exile. Was he right to assume that Georgia was now resigned to this fate? He wondered, then, if this was the reason she had told no one about him.

Each step he took towards her was slow and hesitant, but he needed to be close to her. "What does your aunt have to do with your money? Is it not yours?" He stopped as she tried to explain, but could not without revealing the rumor. "Is there someone who wants to marry you, but cannot without the promise of your money?"

She sat straight in her bed. "No. There is no one, my poet."

He resumed his path towards her. How could it be that no one was pursuing her? They would be foolish not too. If he were handsome and not cursed by the carelessness of Victor Frankenstein then he would marry her that instant. She would never suffer from the whispers behind her back.