Pride: an austen reimagined novel | 1

Chapter Eight: Austin

Cassandra had decided it would be a great idea to invite Anne for lunch. Naturally, then, Anne had got food poisoning, spent the night, and was currently violently throwing up in one of our guest rooms while Lily was on her way over.

We were at our aunt's place in London, and she was thankfully nowhere to be seen. Neither, for the moment, was Fleur... Although, I expected she was going to turn up at some point; she usually did at the worst possible times.

"The place has a great reputation, how was I supposed to know?" Cass asked as Jax paced. "You can believe I'll be giving them a terrible review."

"Do you think she's okay?" Jax asked, his brow furrowed.

"She's unlikely to die from food poisoning, brother," I said, returning to my book.

"She's been throwing up since they got back yesterday."

"Yes, but only if she eats anything," I replied testily.

"She has to eat to live, Oz."

I rolled my eyes. "I'm sure she'll recover, and then she can go back to school and it will all be fine."

"God, what the hell has you in such a mood today, Oz?" Jax asked, finally sitting down.

I ignored him, but I could feel his eyes boring into me.

"Leave him be, Jax," Cass laughed. "You know what he's like."

"I will not, he's being even more of an insufferable prat than usual."

"One of us has to be an insufferable prat, brother. It's what lets the other one do what he likes. Or shall I be the happy-go-lucky twin and you can be the heir Aunt Celia dreams of?" I snapped.

It wasn't fair to Jax, I knew that. But, sometimes it irked me that I'd wordlessly decided to be the one who followed all Aunt Celia's stupid rules and acted the way she deemed appropriate. Most of the time, I was happy to sacrifice whoever else I may have been so Jax could do what he wanted. But, for the last couple of weeks, it had niggled at me, and I wasn't sure why. All I knew was that I was snapping a lot more at my twin recently, and, as much as I couldn't stop it, it didn't sit well with me. We rarely fought, and even more rarely fought over nothing.

"You? The one she dreams of? Minus the tattoos and hair, maybe." Cass grinned.

I sighed. The tattoos Aunt Celia rarely saw as I made sure to cover them up whenever we saw her; I don't think she knew just how many I had. The hair though, that was something she complained about frequently. I was sure my aunt only condoned it because Fleur went on about how she thought it made me more handsome. Comments like that made me want to cut it, but that would have appeased Aunt Celia too much.

"Am I not allowed some personality, Cassandra?" I asked. "It's still better than the way he gallivants around."

"Gallivant? I don't gallivant!"

"You sort of do-" Cass started.

"Not helping, cousin!" Jax pointed at her, then turned back to me. "What's put you in this ridiculous grump, Oz?"

The door burst open and I was saved answering by the very thing that had me in such a ridiculous grump. I flew out of my seat. Lily stood in the doorway, looking like a drowned rat. Albeit a very adorably angry drowned rat; her eyes flashed in annoyance as she looked around the room.

"Lord, what happened to you?" Cassandra cried.

Lily scowled. "A very kind car drove through a puddle as I was waiting for my second bus. Suffice to say, the driver was not pleased I was dripping all the way through his precious vehicle."