Miss Bennet's astonishment was soon lessened by the strong sisterly partiality which made any admiration of Elizabeth appear perfectly natural; and all surprise was shortly lost in other feelings. She was sorry that Mr. Darcy should have delivered his sentiments in a manner so little suited to recommend them; but still more was she grieved for the unhappiness which her sister's refusal must have given him.

Part I

It was the first time either of them had had a moment alone together—really alone, no mom hovering, trying to stuff cornbread into either of their mouths because they'd grown so unappealingly skinny in the interim months. Dad had informed her that he was glad she was back with as little emotional expression as possible, before retreating back to his den, wearing a banal smile. Even Lydia was obviously happy to see her, and had a lot ofthings to say, if her furtive smirking was anything to go by. She made a mental note to avoid being alone in a room with her younger sister.

Now it was just Lizzie and Jane, Jane and Lizzie. In Jane's room, the place where they always went to talk about the things only they would understand—no Lydia, no parents, no camera.

"Oh, Lizzie!" Jane hugged her for the second time that day, very differently than the first. It wasn't a "we're back home for a holiday and we're sisters and practically best friends so we hug in greeting, of course" hug this time. "I've been really worried about you."

"So I take it you're caught up with my videos?"

She avoided looking her sister in the eye as she asked. Lizzie had been dreading this conversation like she never dreaded conversations with Jane.

"Lydia sent me a couple very insistent texts."

"She sent me morethan a few."

She plopped down on the bed and sprawled out, face half-squashed into Jane's sunny, checked comforter. Her big sister put one comforting hand on her shoulder. Lizzie suddenly remembered a moment just like this—in seventh grade, when Sarah Bryant had been cast as Miss Adelaide in her middle school production of Guys and Dolls instead of her, she had lain on this very bed, crying for an embarrassing forty-five minutes. Jane had been the only one who understood why she was so upset, how badly she wanted that part, how much that rejection had stung.

Jane just had a way of understanding other people, a natural sympathy—it was a trait that Lizzie had never been more envious of.

"I'm sorry I didn't call you about this," she continued, voice muffled by the pillow. "I was going to, right after it happened. I wanted to—I just didn't even know where to start."

"I…understand."

"A part of me didn't want you to see any of it. Even though there wasn't any way to keep the…stuff about you a secret. I didn't want hurt anymore than you already have been." Jane smiled in reply, weakly. "Are you…feeling okay?"

"I'm more interested in how you feel, Lizzie," she replied, fixing her younger sister with a significant look.

"It's been a weird couple of weeks."

They lapsed into silence, the weighty events of the last few months, hanging in the air. She knew it would be hard for Jane, who always saw the best in everyone and everything, to talk about all of the people in their lives who had so crushingly disappointed her expectations.

"Poor Darcy," Jane said, without provocation.

"Poor Darcy?" Lizzie's head shot up off the bed like a bottle rocket. "How can you say that after what he did to you?"

"I'm not happy about what he did or thought I did, I'm not happy about any of it…" Her voice faltered a little, but bravely, she continued. "But I can't help but feel sorry for him."

Of course, Jane was going to be Jane, why should she have expected differently, Lizzie thought, flopping back into her sister's pillow.

"I wish I had your generosity of spirit," she muttered, caustically.

"He always seemed so uncomfortable and out-of-place here in town," Jane continued, thoughtfully. "It's just weird to think that part of the reason was that he was falling for you. Not that it's weird to think of someone having strong feelings for you, Lizzie," she added, hastily, and her younger sister was certain, though still face deep in pillow, that she could hear the barest hint of a smile in Jane's voice.

"Against his better judgment, of course," She rolled over onto her side, the memory of that whole conversation still so fresh, so raw in her mind—especially after hours of trying and failing to edit it before realizing there was nothing that could be cut that would not materially damage its integrity. It could be posted wholly or not at all. "Don't lose any sleep over Darcy. Now that he's seen my videos—" She felt a pang in the pit of her stomach. "I'm sure he's come to his senses and realized he doesn't love me and that he probably never did."

It was not unlike something Charlotte had said to her, during one of their many, many post-letter late night discussions in Charlotte's refrigerator box of an apartment. Her bestie, bastion of sound logic and practicality that she was, had reasoned that, considering his pride, William Darcy's feelings, strong as they might have been, would never have survived watching over fifty of her videos. Moreover, if he had thought there was even the slightest chance that he had a shot with her…well, he never knew her at all.

But it sounded so much more melancholy when she voiced this sad likelihood aloud. The thought of being loved for being someone you never were in the first place depressed her.

"I'm sure that's not true." She knew Jane meant it, too.

"That's sweet of you…" Her younger sister ran a hand through now unkempt, frizzy auburn hair. "Honestly, though: Darcy, in love with me?" A hollow laugh. "It's just…I mean…who could have predicted that?"

There was a long, pregnant pause.

"Jane…"

"I'm sorry, but I have to be honest—"

Lizzie pulled the pillow back over her face and groaned.

"You sound like Charlotte!" The down muffled her exclamation to a reasonable volume—God forbid mom come upstairs to investigate the cause of her distress. "You aren't going to claim you saw this coming."

"Did I think that Charlotte's boss would happen to be Darcy's aunt, and that he would use auditing Ricky's web video company as a pretext to fly out to San Jose to confess his love for you? Of course not." Lizzie peaked out from a corner of the pillow. Jane hesitated. "But—knowing all that actually happened…I can't honestly say I'm shocked."

"If this was all so glaringly obvious, why didn't anyone warn me?"

"I tried to, Lizzie—" Jane was trying very hard to keep the amusement out of her voice. "You were the one who refused to believe he liked you."

She wanted to argue over this, but she knew Jane was right because the only kind of lying Jane ever did was of the white variety.

"He was just doing his aunt a favor," she grumbled. "And I happened to be there, so it was probably just a fit of temporary insanity, brought on by months of drinking bad, non-organic coffee…"

Lizzie's arguments had never sounded feebler to her own ears.

"Lizzie, he said he came to Collins and Collins just to see you."

It annoyed her that she couldn't think of Darcy as a creep, no matter how hard she tried. He wasn't Ricky, nothing about him seemed stalky, even if (objectively speaking) following a girl who hated you to the Bay Area to tell them of your passionate love was not normal. Maybe it was because she'd been just as bad, spending three quarters of her videos talking about him to the internet en masse. Maybe she felt like more of a creep, really, when it came down to it.

Despite his many, many character defects, 'creepy' was not one she could comfortably pin on William Darcy.

The way Jane framed it almost made Darcy sound like some sort of romantic figure.

"Well, I'm sorry to have ruined his big gesture," she replied, more biting than she would have usually been, especially with Jane. "I suppose you think I should have given him a chance."

"Of course not, Lizzie," Jane frowned. "I know you've never liked Darcy. Charlotte knows, Lydia knows, your viewers even know…I'm just sorry he was the last one to realize that. It seems as though you really blindsided him."

"Well it's not like I…" she lingered distastefully over the phrase. "Lead him on or something. I mean, he never even acted like he wanted to be around me."

That's probably because he was actively fighting against how he felt. That Darcy had had the temerity to admit this to her face made Lizzie's blood boil, but an infinitesimally sized part of her, a part that she would never admit existed to Charlotte and probably wouldn't even tell Jane about, was weirdly flattered by the strength of his feelings.

She could no longer cavalierly joke that he was a dispassionate automaton—she knew just how much passion he was capable of.

This train of thought is definitely a runaway.

"I guess you weren't imagining it when you said he was always staring at you," Jane drew her out of her unsettling inner monologue, softly. She sounded almost wistful. Lizzie nodded, feeling an unpleasant burning at the tips of her ears when she considered what his intense scrutiny had actually meant. "Are you…really okay, Lizzie?"

No, I'm really not.

November had unexpectedly turned into one long, hard look at herself—a real self-examination that she had hitherto been unwilling to admit she needed to do. Lizzie hadn't literally examined herself, though the hours and hours of videos she had would have made it easy. Charlotte had even needled her about it, had suggested it would be an interesting thought experiment, to sit down and think about how it all would look from his perspective.

But Lizzie wasn't like Charlotte. Imagining what Darcy had been thinking when he watched her mock, insult and borderline slander him to thousands of anonymous YouTube subscribers could never be an "interesting thought experiment" to her.

Of course, the real reason she hadn't re-watched the diaries was that she was afraid.

She was afraid of looking at herself and, for the first time in her life not liking what she saw.

"I'm fine."

"Do you want to talk about it?"

She just watched Jane for a moment, trying to guess her thoughts. She had wanted her big sister so badly these last few weeks, to comfort and reassure her—but Jane was caught in the middle of it all, the one truly innocent party in this giant mess, and Lizzie knew that even her sister's quiet strength had its limits.

"Do you want to talk about it?"

One small, faltering smile was all the answer she needed.

"And yet I meant to be uncommonly clever in taking so decided a dislike to him, without any reason. It is such a spur to one's genius, such an opening for wit to have a dislike of that kind. One may be continually abusive without saying any thing just; but one cannot be always laughing at a man without now and then stumbling on something witty."

Part II

"The D Word," as Lydia liked to call him, did not come up in conversation between them again for over a week. Neither did Bing or Caroline (who would have naturally followed from such a train of thought.) There was almost too much to be said, and Lizzie didn't want to add to Jane's burden, when mom kept asking her why she hadn't seen him yet ("What did you even move to Los Angeles for?") and Lydia kept vocally bashing him, his sister and his "douchey best friend" because she seemed to think that her older sister would be comforted by it.

She wasn't.

"I can't believe it."

Lizzie looked up from her lackluster turkey sandwich to see her elder sister walk through the kitchen door. Their mother was out running errands, Lydia with her, and dad had gone to the hardware store to pick up more model glue in anticipation of his annual train set extravaganza.

"Can't believe what?"

"I can't believe George did that."

The already dry turkey seemed to turn even more rubbery and unappealing mid-bite. She nearly gagged as she forced herself to swallow it.

"I can't believe we still have half a bird left of this." She waved around her sandwich emphatically. "I should have made Charlotte take more soup."

"I'm serious, Lizzie." She sat beside her younger sister at their worn, walnut kitchen table. One of the blessings of Jane being on vacation was that she could more easily keep up with her sister's vlog-making efforts. "The idea that George spent that much money in less than a year…and then asked for more…and then lied to us about it. I just can't believe it."

"I can." Lizzie said, grimly. An uncharacteristically dark shadow passed over her face.

"Are you sure there hasn't been some big misunderstanding?"

Jane sounded so hopeful of this outcome, the more cynical Bennet in the room couldn't help but actually laugh.

"Jane…you're doing it again."

"Too nice?"

She nodded.

"Way too nice. Only one of them can come out of this not looking like a total ass, and weirdly enough…" She swallowed again, mentally preparing to say out loud what she'd been thinking for weeks. "I'm pretty sure it's Darcy."

"But George is…he always seemed so...charming and friendly. And he really liked you."

Lizzie pulled a face at the disconnect in Jane's brain at this troubling new information, painfully reminded of how she had struggled to come up with one positive attribute for Darcy way back in the spring. But Jane was nothing if not dogged in the pursuit of the sunny side of things, particularly when it came to people, and so "tall" it had been. Her sister could say something nice about anyone, but when it came to George Wickham, she was pretty sure Jane would die trying.

Granted, at first she had hardly believed the things Darcy told her about him. Lizzie went back over every conversation she'd had with guy, every text, every exchange of communication trying to find some shred of good. But after several hours of frustrated pondering, all she could come up with to recommend him was a superficial, vapid sort of surface charm and a really great pair of shoulders.

"They must have had a really strange upbringing." She picked at her sandwich. "One of them acts like a dick and the other one actually is."

Jane, in spite of herself, laughed.

"I never thought Darcy was as bad as you did. But I'm surprised you're able to joke like that about it all..."

"I wasn't when I was reading the letter, trust me..." Lizzie replied, ruefully. "Jane, be honest: do you think I was wrong to just believe what George told me about Darcy in August? I mean, do you blame me for it?"

"Of course I don't blame you...I mean, it probably was a mistake to publish that video where you accused him of all those things," she added, the closest Jane would get to an admonishment. "Without checking your facts."

Lizzie snorted, blowing a stray strand of hair out of her eyes at this classic Jane Bennet understatement.

"Good thing we used fake names, otherwise Darcy really could be slapping me with a defamation of character suit."

"So you definitely believe Darcy's side of the story, then."

She physically twist in the lopsided, mismatched chair, obviously surprised this was even a question.

"Of course!"

"Well, in your video you implied you were going to reserve judgment," her sister pointed out.

"Oh, that." Lizzie paused, thoughtful. "That was for the viewers benefit, mostly. I didn't want them to think I just blindly believe the last thing I've been told."

"But you do believe him," Jane pressed, evidently a little surprised. Perhaps it was because she'd never seen Lizzie give Darcy the benefit of the doubt the entire time they'd known him, or maybe it was because she found George's version of events more plausible.

Both stories were a little ridiculous, from where Lizzie was standing.

"There was something else in Darcy's letter. He told me other...things George has done."

Worse things.

"What other things?"

Lizzie didn't speak for a long time—it was as if she was considering whether or not to speak at all, mentally weighing the benefits of being explicit against the cost of betraying someone—someone she didn't even like, but against every instinct, she respected.

"It doesn't matter," she finally said. "The point is that Darcy has no reason to make these things up—trust me. Besides," Lizzie added, thoughtfully, "Charlotte's right. He's a lot of things, but he isn't a liar."

"You do know Lydia's trying to get her hands on that letter."

Standing up, she smirked before going to deposit the remnants of her bedraggled Thanksgiving leftover of leftovers lunch in the trash under the sink.

"Don't worry," she called over her shoulder. "I've hidden it so well, not even Lydia can guess where it is."

"Wow. You're really taking this seriously." Lizzie's back was to her, so she couldn't see Jane's face, but it was one of those classic Jane statements where she was saying one thing and meaning several more.

"It's weird..." she finished scraping the plate and moved over to the sink to needlessly rinse of the three remaining crumbs. "Darcy just trusted me with this information, some of it really personal, when he knows about my vlog. I guess I thought I...owed it to him, to keep his private life private. I mean, what's left of his private life." She was fairly certain she was holding onto his last shred of privacy…undoubtedly this was why he hadn't tweeted anything since November.

Not that she'd stalked his twitter, or anything. Or wondered if he was stalking hers. Or that she was uncomfortably aware of the possibility that he still watched her videos every time she posted one.

Because that would be weird.

Jane said nothing, but her sister could feel the look on the back of her neck, one of those serene, penetrating gazes that sometimes made her wonder if Jane understood Lizzie Bennet's mind better than she did.

"It's just strange thinking that I owe William Darcy anything, I mean, I don't really, but it feels like I do...I'm sorry Jane, I'm rambling."

"Don't apologize, Lizzie. You can always tell me anything." She rose from her own chair to give Lizzie another comforting squeeze on the shoulder. "Always."

Wiping the last drop of water off the plate she finally, having no excuse not to, turned around. Jane was smiling—but it was clear from her expression that she wasn't going to push it. The only sound in the room for a long moment was the faint ticking of their father's favorite hall clock. It was one of those comforting, familiar sounds that harkened back to simpler days. Listening to that tick-tick-tick, for an instant Lizzie could pretend they were kids again, that Jane was still living at home, that there were no confusing recalcitrant millionaires or ethically suspect videos in her life.

Just for that instant, though.

"Lydia wants you, me and Charlotte to go out with her to Carter's tonight before Charlotte has to drive back for work...I keep thinking I'll run into George there." She pulled a face.

"He'll be out of town again soon enough, I'm sure."

"Hopefully never to return." Lizzie crossed over to the fridge, ostensibly to make another dent in the third pie her mother baked for the five of them. "Do you think I should confront him about this, or tell other people? I keep going back and forth about it in my head."

Jane considered the problem.

"Well, we don't really know exactly what's going on with him. Maybe he's trying to get his act together after all those mistakes he made when he was younger."

Her younger sister gave her a look laced with skepticism.

"Some of those 'mistakes' weren't that long ago, Jane..."

"Nobody's all bad, but people sometimes act the part if you expect them to," Jane continued, gently but firmly. "You've got to look on the bright side of things sometimes, and hope for the best. Everyone deserves a second chance."

She said it with such a blind, moral conviction that Lizzie almost believed her.

This was written to fill the void of never getting a version of this conversation in LBD. It was pretty heavily influenced by the 1995 adaptation, as might be obvious to someone who has seen it as many times as I have. Some people are speculating we might get this conversation when Jane comes home for Christmas, which I hope proves accurate—but until we do, please enjoy my spin! Both of the quotes are from chapter 40 of Pride and Prejudice.