Fading away

Chapter 5

I spent the rest of the day with Madeline, while James was with Thomas, as he was quite interested in engineering. Madeline and I made use of the pool, and had afternoon tea together- she wasn't like the rest of them, she understood me.

"I understand that you married into money then?" she asked me at tea.

"Yes, yes I did."

"Tell me, how did you break the barriers between class?"

"Well our parents arranged it not knowing that we were of different status , when they found out they didn't approve and tried to split us, of course by then we'd already fallen in love." All Madeline did was smile, as if to congratulate me on not being in a loveless marriage. Of course her and J J married out of love, I suppose James and I were just lucky. Suddenly, I heard a loud laugh and saw James, J.J and Thomas entering the dining room. I looked over my shoulder to look at James.

"Can I escort a lady back to our room?" He asked me.

"Certainly." I smiled "Madeline I'll see you at dinner?"

"Yes" she nodded. We all returned to our rooms, and retreated to talk to our partners about our days.

"I missed you." I cooed into James's ear. So he kissed me, hard at first, and then softer, he wrapped his arms around me and lifted me off the ground, just as Margaret, our other maid walked in.

"Would you help me dress? I can't do a single thing with this corset on." I asked- hoping to make up for what she'd just seen. She nodded and proceeded to go to my wardrobe, I blew a kiss to James as I left to get changed. I picked out a deep red dress with black lace detailing, and again, and as expected, had my hair tied in a bun.

"You look positively beautiful." James complimented me, when I walked out of my room.

"As do you."

I was beginning to warm to the people I was spending time with now- Madeline was perfectly genuine and so was J.J, Thomas was a very nice man and the countess, even though being wrapped up in gossip, was a good conversation. For the first time I was looking forward to going to dinner, and socialising with people of my class. I held back for a while to do my makeup, while James went to meet Thomas and John in the dining room.

Alone, I made my way to the staircase, looking at the beautiful carvings on the way, and appreciating all I had. I reached the top of the stairs, the band played some song that I didn't care in the background, and at the bottom of the stairs, james was waiting for me...