I sighed after another moment of daydreaming, knowing I had tasks that needed attention. Not my favorite, that’s for sure. But then, I doubt wrangling computer cords is anyone’s favorite. I got down on my hands and knees and crawled under the desk to see if there was a hole drilled in the back for a power cord to feed through. Somebody must have used it in the modern era I rationalized. But maybe not. I wondered if Robbie could help me. I braced my hand on the concave inner corner and pushed, backing myself out from under my desk, when I heard a mechanical click, and then the dusty slide of wood.
JOURNALS. Three of them stacked on the top of the desk. Leather-bound, gilded, and tied with a silk cord, the pages of which, shared the private thoughts of a young woman who’d lived a long time ago, in this very house.
When I’d untied the cord stiffened with age, and opened the first book, I was captivated from the first page. To the point I forgot about everything else and got lost in her words…
7th May, 1837
I visited J. today. I shared my news with him. More than anything I would wish to have his understanding of my regret, but I know that it is out of the realm of possibilities until such a time as I meet my maker. Then I may know his feelings on the matter…
…What shall be the price of Guilt? Just five letters in a word that buries me with its weight.
…My bitter regret that now must always be born in an endless silence that has broken the hearts of all those I ever loved.
…Today I also gave my agreement to marry a man who says he wants nothing more than to care for me and to allow him to cherish me.
…So I will go to live at Stonewell Court and make my life with him, but I am very afraid of what awaits me. How will I ever rise to the standard of what is expected?
…Darius Rourke doesn’t yet understand that I do not deserve to be cherished by any man. I am torn, but alas, I am unable to deny his wishes for me, just as I was unable to deny my beloved Jonathan…
M G
Marianne George, who later became Rourke, upon her marriage to a Mr. Darius Rourke, in the summer of 1837.
The hair on the back of my neck tingled as I looked up from the journal, and out at the picturesque view. The coincidence was unbelievable.
My book of Keats, the first edition of poems, given to me by Ethan on the night he proposed, had belonged to this same Marianne as well. How could I ever forget, For my Marianne. Always your Darius. June 1837, in the elegant ink scrawl of an earlier era, as an inscription? A lover’s gift. I cherished what Darius had written to Marianne. So simple, yet so very pure in the sense of how he saw her. He loved her, and yet, for whatever the reasons, Marianne had felt unworthy of his love. Guilt weighed down on her. As it does for me. As it does for Ethan.
And now we were living in their house? I could hardly believe it. She mentioned Jonathan—the name carved on the mermaid angel statue down in garden, facing soulfully out to sea. I realized now, the statue was a memorial for her lost Jonathan, and not a grave. Because he had no grave. Jonathan had been lost out there in the beautiful and sometimes terrible sea. She loved him…and then he’d drowned. And Marianne felt she was the one accountable for what had happened to him.
She loved him…and then he’d drowned. I understood Marianne’s pain better than most people could. I understood it because, I too, longed for the release of my own guilt. Probably wouldn’t ever happen for me. Some things just have to be accepted even so the outcome will never change. Because the fact remained; I knew what it meant to feel responsible for the loss of someone you loved…and would never see again in this life.
Yes, I sensed him watching over me, but that didn’t take away the enormous loss I felt from missing him. The hole in my heart that his death created was still a cavern. The guilt I wrestled with daily, still feeling it was mostly my fault, remained within me. I missed my dad. I hadn’t realized just how much his love and support had protected me until I experienced the loss of it. I missed his presence. I missed his love. I just missed him.
Dad, I miss you so much…
As if to shake me out of my sad thoughts, I felt a kick and then a nudge. I smiled and rubbed my expanding belly. “Well hello there, butterfly angel.”
My angel poked me in the ribs for an answer, making me laugh at the timing. The movements didn’t feel like butterfly wings anymore at twenty-six weeks, but the name had stuck in my head. “I suppose you’re telling me you want to eat, which means I need to put some food in, right?”
“Brilliant child we have, baby, and I agree wholeheartedly. You do need to eat,” Ethan said behind me, draping his big hands on my shoulders and inhaling deeply. He scraped his beard along my neck as he nuzzled the sensitive spot with kisses. I leaned back into him and tilted my neck for better access, and an inhale of my own—he always smelled so amazing. My man liked to smell me, too. Everywhere. A bit kinky, but it showed how he bared his honesty with me. I liked honest. I needed honest in order to function in our relationship.
“Ahh, you’ve caught me talking to myself again.”
“Not yourself, but little lettuce, and that makes all the difference. I don’t think we need to ship you off to Bethlem Hospital just yet,” he quipped.
“We have a lettuce baby this week?” I shook my head at how funny it was to me that he could memorize every fruit and vegetable on that prenatal website. He was right every single time, too. I was starting to think he might have a photographic memory. Ethan remembered everything, while I was getting “pregnancy brain” and forgetting just about everything I’d ever learned. I felt another jab. “Here, feel. Baby is kicking right now.”
He spun the chair and knelt in front of me, quickly pushing my shirt up and the waistband of my leggings down, to expose my bump. I pointed to the spot where the action was happening and we both watched. It took a minute, but then the slow roll of what was most likely a tiny foot, poked my skin out as clear as day, before retreating back inside the space just as quickly.
“Awww, did you see that?” he asked in wonderment.
“Um yeah,” I nodded, “I felt it, too.”
He kissed over the spot very gently and whispered, “Thanks for looking out for your mum and seeing that she eats on time.” Then he looked up at me with a serious expression—not stern, but not smiling either—just intense and full of emotion.
“What is it?” I asked.
“You are utterly amazing, you know that?”