Okay, so my Muses are being butt-smears. "Difference" is barely coming along, despite the fact that I have the house to myself. This is the first chapter of a modern AU of Pride and Prejudice, and I'm posting it to tide you over until I can get the other bloody story finished. I'll be posting a chapter of one or the other every week. Sorry about this!
Anyway:
Summary: With a terrible loss in her life, and a continual reminder of it staring her in the face, Elizabeth is befriended by a kind stranger who vows to help set everything right.
A/N: I was going to post this after finishing "Difference," but, for reasons stated above, I've started posting ahead of schedule. Enjoy!
Disclaimer: Sadly, I do not own Pride and Prejudice. That honor still rests with Jane Austen.
Elizabeth leaned against the wall outside Lydia's room. Lydia and Kitty were sitting on Lydia's bed, discussing the fact that a very rich, very good-looking young man had moved into the neighborhood just days ago. Elizabeth herself had seen the man out and about on her many wanderings, so much more frequent in the summer than any other time, and had thought to herself that he seemed to require closer scrutiny than watching him from a distance could provide.
"He's so hot!" Lydia giggled.
"I know!" Kitty agreed.
Elizabeth smiled sadly to herself. At least the younger girls could find reason to be happy around this time of the year.
***
When Mr. William Darcy arrived in the small American village of Longbourn, the first thing he heard mentioned was one Miss Eliza Bennett. Amidst giggles and glances to others, he was informed that Eliza was the black sheep of her family. Wondering what could possibly be so funny about that, Mr. Darcy found his interest in this girl aroused. Through careful questioning, he found out that Eliza was the eldest of four girls, all of whom were summering at their parents' house a mile or two outside the village. Only the youngest, Lydia, was still staying at the house full-time, at the age of seventeen. The two middle girls, Kitty, nineteen, and Mary, twenty, were both at college. Eliza, at twenty-two, had graduated at the end of the previous spring.
She had been pointed out to him a few times on the street. She was a very pretty young woman, with long, straight, golden brown hair, bangs that continuously needed brushing to the side, and deep chocolate brown eyes. She had a pretty smile, though it seemed to him that it would be beautiful if it weren't for the—well, the something that haunted her continuously. The first time he saw her, he felt certain that her comparatively pale skin held no imperfections, only to find the second time he saw her that it was marred by a silver scar that ran from just below her left ear, down her neck, and across the small portion of her shoulder left visible by the jacket she always wore.
That jacket seemed very out of place, as did the jeans she constantly wore. No matter how hot the weather got, she was always decked from head to foot in denim, and her hair was always worn down, falling over her shoulders, past her shoulder blades, and to about the center of her back.
It wasn't until three weeks after she had first been pointed out to him that he met her.
He had been walking along, talking to one of his acquaintances, when they happened upon Eliza. "Eliza!" the young man, his name was Robert, called out.
The girl seemed to ignore them, her nose buried in a book, but after a moment she looked up, her pretty, haunted smile gracing her face when she saw who it was. "Hello, Rob," she said softly.
"How are you?" Robert asked. Without waiting for an answer, he continued. "I'm sure you've heard of our new neighbor," he said. "This is Will Darcy."
Eliza stood up from the bench she had been sitting on, her book on her seat. "It's nice to meet you, Mr. Darcy," she said, holding her hand out.
"The pleasure's all mine," Will said, taking it in his own, "and please call me Will."
Eliza's haunted smile appeared once more. "All right then, Will."
Robert nodded to both of them. "Well, you two have fun getting to know each other. I'm due at work."
"Bye, Rob," Eliza said, and Will nodded.
After he left, Will spoke, "I must admit, Eliza, when I heard about you, I didn't really expect, well, politeness."
A pained looked passed over her face, but was gone in an instant, and she smirked. "I suppose you heard the black sheep stories, then."
"Yes, I had," Will admitted.
"Well, the only reason I'm a black sheep is because the rest of my family is, to put it bluntly, insane. Not that I don't have my moments of insanity, but I like to believe that I'm pretty levelheaded most of the time. It's the rest of my family who have no control." This time, Will could easily perceive the bitterness, not only in her smile, but in her voice as well. "Oh," she said, as if remembering something, "if it's no trouble, could you not call me Eliza?"
"Well, what should I call you, if not your name?" Will asked, though willing to do what she wished.
"You'll be calling me by my name if you do what I ask," the young woman said. "Eliza's just a nickname, and one that I'm not too fond of. My name's Elizabeth."
Will smiled. "Well then, Elizabeth it is!"
The two of them continued talking about nothing in particular, just learning a bit more about each other, their hobbies, talents, favorite music, and the like. It turned out that Elizabeth was a writer, and had just sold the first book of a series she had written to a publisher.
"They're fantasy books," she told him upon his inquiry, "though they have a good bit of romance in them. I'm a sucker for a good love story."
"I wouldn't admit it to most people, but so am I," Will told her. He was almost surprised at the ease with which he was conversing with her, but ever since his sister had seen him being sullen and rude at the first non-family party the two had attended together, merely because Will had no one else to go with, she had set him on a path changing for the better, and he found a bit of his ill-expressed awkward shyness receding.
Will told Elizabeth a bit about his life as the heir to one of the biggest companies in America; the boring meetings, the fancy hotels, the never being in one place for long, and his intense desire to settle down. Elizabeth smiled and told him that she hoped he would be able to have his wishes granted, before checking the time on her cell phone and saying that she really had to be heading home. As he watched her denim-clad form disappearing around a corner, he found himself wishing that he could see her real smile, not the haunted one that had been all she had given the world when he saw her, and he found himself wishing that he could be the one to make her smile like that.