I don't know what's happening to my life. Well, yes, I do. LBD is happening to my life. LBD is taking over my life. I had a policy: I didn't write speculative fiction for ongoing series. I refused to write scenes for TV shows or anything like that, that I knew would be seen on the actual show because I don't like being canon-balled. By LBD has taken over my life. So here. Have this thing that will become AU by the end of March, and probably done much better than I managed.

Inspired by Episode 80 and a lovely piece of art on tumblr by tea-hold-the-sleep that can be found here: post/40752415978/elizabeth-feeling-all-the-more-than-common.

The Stupidest Questions

Lizzie stared at the camera, still on, still recording, even though she'd done nothing for the past minute but sit here stupidly, gaping, trying to wrap her mind around the bombshell that Lydia had dropped before slipping quietly away.

Here Lizzie had been thinking that their father had been responsible for helping Lydia, or that the prosecutor had assessed the situation and been able to recognize a girl who'd been manipulated and strung along against her will, or maybe even that George Wickham had turned out not to be as much of a douchebag asshat as she'd thought.

But this? The truth? That Darcy had gotten her sister out of trouble? That Darcy had paid the entirety of that debt? That Darcy had, melodramatic as it sounded, saved them all from certain ruin?

She wanted to be shocked by his actions, but in all honesty, stunned speechless as she was, she had to admit that the longer she thought about it, the less shocked she became, because this really was just like him.

Did he do this for me? a tiny voice asked in her mind, stirring up a small bit of hope deep inside her.

No, she said to herself firmly, with a shake of her head. Don't start that. He's over you. With everything that's gone down in the past month, how could he not be? He's been here every day with Bing because he's trying to make up for his past actions with Jane. That's all.

Raised from her stupor, Lizzie stood suddenly and turned, intending to haul Lydia back in here and make her – ask her, Lizzie reminded herself forcefully; she wasn't going to let them slip back into the relationship they'd had – explain what had happened with a little more clarity.

But when she pulled her door open with more force than she had perhaps intended, she had to stop short, for there in the doorway, his hand raised to knock, was William Darcy.

"Darcy!" she squeaked in surprise, then hastily amended it to, "Will, sorry."

"I – was just about to knock," he said unnecessarily.

"Clearly," Lizzie replied, which won the ghost of a smile from him, and belatedly, Lizzie remembered the camera still filming, and would they always be doomed to awkward torso shots whenever he tried to enter the room? No, she said forcefully, because very shortly, he will no longer be a part of my life in any physical capacity. "Um, come in," she said, stepping away for him to enter the room.

He sat on the bench and glanced in some amusement at the camera. "You're filming," he said with another ghost of a smile.

"I'm always filming," Lizzie said, distracted, wringing her hands as she tried to figure out how to confront the issue at hand. She'd wanted Lydia, but Darcy – Will – would do.

"Lizzie, please sit," he said, gesturing to the other half of the bench. So she did.

"I'm gonna keep the camera on," she said. "Because I have something I need to say to you." He turned to her, expectantly, waiting patiently. "Lydia told me what you did," she said, and it came out in a rush, sounding more like one word than six, but he understood her well enough, because he grimaced and looked away.

"She promised me she would keep this in confidence," he said in a low voice.

"Yeah, well, we're trying this thing where we communicate openly and honestly with one another," Lizzie said unapologetically, "so I'm glad she told me. Honestly, I think she needed to tell someone, and I'm thrilled she trusts me enough now to choose me. But she told me, and I don't know how to even begin to thank you. What you did for us —" Lizzie was embarrassed to feel tears pricking her eyes; she forced them down and continued. "What you did for us, it can never be repaid, but you have my assurances that —"

"Stop, please," he said softly, one hand raised to halt the flow of her words. The look on his face was pained. "This is why I did not want you to know," he said. "I do not want you to feel that you are beholden to me in any way, Lizzie." His words were so earnest, so full of emotion that she felt the stir of hope again, but again she pushed it down because wasn't it just as likely that he didn't want her to feel that way because he didn't want any further connection with her than the ones he already couldn't escape?

"You owe me nothing," he continued. "Your family owes me nothing. I didn't do this to create a debt; I did it to discharge one. This happened, after all, because of me. If I had pressed charges after Gigi's incident, what happened with your sister could never have come to pass. I didn't. I was trying to spare her. Which makes what happened to Lydia my responsibility, if not my fault."

Lizzie had to look away at that, her emotions too jumbled and confused to allow her to continue to meet his gaze. "Well, I thank you all the same," she said to her hands.

"I . . . thank you for your thanks," he said softly, awkwardly, but it was the kind of awkward statement that had become so very endearing to her, not that she'd ever let him know it. "Did Lydia tell you this on camera?" he asked after a moment.

"Oh!" Lizzie said, realizing. "Yes. She did. I'll edit it out, don't worry."

"Well, I do tend to worry when I hear you say that because so often it seems not to happen –" Lizzie colored with shame at the censure until she realized belatedly that he'd been trying to share a joke with her, "– but, no. Leave it in."

Startled, she met his gaze. "Really?" she asked. He nodded once, decisively.

"Really," he said. "Gigi wants her story told, and while there isn't a great possibility that it might help in the future, it certainly cannot hurt. So leave it in. And you may leave this conversation in as well, should you wish."

"Thank you," she said softly, and one of their intense gazes followed her expression of gratitude, those gazes that left her infuriatingly short of breath and weak in the knees and reminded her very forcefully that this was the man who hand-wrote a confession of his wrongs for her, the man who shared incredibly personal information about his sister for her, who changed for her, who once dressed up in a bow-tie and newsie cap for her. This was the man who fell in love with her once, and why, the voice inside her head screamed, isn't it possible that he cares for you now as much as he ever did?

But it wasn't. And she knew it wasn't, and she couldn't handle the inner monologue, so she broke the gaze with a cough and an awkward, "What were you coming up here for?" as she remembered suddenly that his arrival at her door had had a purpose.

"Oh," Dar–Will said, as if he, too, had just remembered. "Your mother wanted you. I said I would let you know."

Lizzie closed her eyes and asked, "Is she hatching another convoluted plan?"

"Jane and Bing are practically engaged, do you really think she needs to?" he asked with an arched eyebrow and a smile that Lizzie was almost able to return.

"With my mother?" she asked in a dry voice. "She always needs to." There was a long pause, in which Lizzie cursed her nervousness that she couldn't seem to control. "Did she say—" Lizzie said then, just as he started to speak her name, and then they both broke off. "Please," Lizzie said, gesturing for him to speak.

"Lizzie," he said again, and hesitated. She could see conflict in his eyes, but could not, for the life of her, guess what was driving it. "Lizzie, you are too kind to lead me on," he finally said, in a rush, sounding agitated and emotional, and his words shocked her once more into speechlessness. "If you feel towards me the way you did in October, please tell me so. I would rather know the worst than have the not knowing hang in the air between us constantly. My feelings are the same. But if yours are as well, I'll never speak of this again."

"Oh, um . . . wow," was all Lizzie was able to say, because she had not expected that. Not in the slightest. But seeming to take her incoherency as something negative, Dar—Will spoke again.

"Understand that there's no pressure," he said softly. "I have no expectations of you, Lizzie. If your feelings remain the same—"

"How could my feelings possibly be the same?" she interrupted, risking a glance at him. "Knowing everything that I do now, knowing how horribly I misjudged you? When I think about what I said about you, to others, and to you–"

It was his turn to interrupt. "And what did you say that I didn't deserve?" he demanded. "I treated you horribly, judged you on a skewed interpretation of your family, and managed to insult you and everyone you cared about on more than one occasion. If there is one of us who should be embarrassed by past actions, it is I. You only treated me as my own behavior warranted."

"No, I didn't," Lizzie argued. "I overheard an offhand comment you made about my appearance when you were clearly frustrated, and I let my injured vanity and pride color my opinion of you from then on out. I blatantly ignored evidence that you had changed, and refused to see you in any other light than the one I'd cast on you after a moment's prejudiced judgement!"

He opened his mouth to argue further, but then paused, closed it, and looked away, a smile on his lips and a twinkle in his eye. "I am not going to play a blame game with you on this," he said. "Let us admit that we both acted poorly in the beginning of our acquaintance and leave it at that."

"All – all right, then," Lizzie said, and looked away, her cheeks coloring.

"And as happy as I am to be reassured that you no longer hate me with a burning passion," he continued, and Lizzie's blush deepened, "I do have to point out that that . . . isn't what I was asking." The air in the room was suddenly charged in a way that only William Darcy seemed to be able to make it.

He said nothing else, just sat there and looked at her, waiting, and in some disconnected part of her brain, she recognized that her viewers were going to love this when it aired, and then she realized that she really did have to say something, so she just said the first thing that came into her mind. "You're still in love with me?"

It was no louder than a whisper, quiet enough that she had no idea whether or not the mic on her camera would pick it up, and when Will answered, it was in a voice just as soft. "More than ever," he said, and the small voice of hope inside her practically sang with joy, and her heart was beating faster than ever because he loved her, he still loved her, and she had so needed to know that.

She looked at him then, trying to figure out what to say, what words could possibly express the magnitude to which her feelings had changed, what words could ever do justice to all that she had come to feel for him. And as they sat there, Lizzie trying to figure out what to say, Will's face grew more and more nervous in almost imperceptible amounts because she wasn't saying anything, and he didn't know what it meant, and Lizzie knew she had to put him at ease, and so, finally, with a muttered, "Oh, screw it," she threw caution to the wind.

"I'm sorry?" he said, looking so adorably confused, and Lizzie smiled, her heart overflowing.

"I said, 'screw it,'" she repeated, loud enough for him to hear, and then she took him by the suspenders – those incredibly handy suspenders – and kissed him.

When she pulled away, he sat there stupidly, his eyebrows disappearing into his hairline, looking thoroughly and adorably gobsmacked, and Lizzie had a feeling this was an expression Will Darcy had never had occasion to wear before.

After a moment, he closed his mouth and cleared his throat and straightened his tie and said, "Am I," in a voice that cracked. "Am I to take this to mean that you have come to reciprocate my feelings?" he asked, and Lizzie rolled her eyes.

"William Darcy," she said, reaching once more for those handy suspenders, "you are an incredibly intelligent man. But sometimes, you ask the stupidest questions."

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