Louisa

"Can I tell you something?" I ask about an hour later, hesitantly but also, for some reason, desperate to get this off of my chest.

Michael doesn't answer, he just looks at me and I know that's a yes.

"It's not just guests that I'm hiding from. It's the couple that got engaged." Michael continues to look at me. I feel that he's waiting for me to elaborate. "The boy, Charlie, is a friend of mine." I pause. I can feel a heat spread up my neck and onto my cheeks. "A special friend."

"Ah," Michael nods. "I thought I recognised him. The boy from the garden. Your lover." He laughs lightly.

"No!" I lean forward suddenly. "No, not really. Well, almost but not quite." The blush is getting worse. I put the champagne bottle to my cheek, but it isn't very well chilled anymore.

"Do you love him?" Michael does not look at me. He's scowling. I don't think I could convince him of anything just now. He seems as though he knows it all.

"I'm not sure," I hesitate. "How do you know?"

"You just do. It just happens. It's difficult to describe."

I mull this over for a second. "I think I love him."

"You don't," he offers me a dry smile. "Trust me, you wouldn't be as calm as you are now if you did."

"Oh," I'm silent for a moment. "I'm still upset, though," I add, as though I need to justify my feelings.

"Of course you are, but it'll pass soon enough." Michael is slouched in the chair, watching the fire. The bottle of vermouth is cradled on his chest like a baby. "You'll find another young boy who speaks sweet words and knows what to say to make you want him. But when it comes down to it, he won't know how to make you come."

My eyes widen. Was that some sort of a challenge? If it was, I cannot rise to it. I must not. I do not look at him, I do not respond to the feelings that rush through me -- my body is calling for me to reach out to him. It is as though we are joined by thousands of tiny strings which go taught when he says something like that. They tighten to the point of breaking, trying to get me close to him, but I must resist.

I cannot be a notch on this man's bedpost. He does not know me well enough to love me and so he must simply want to use me, and then what? What will be left of me? I will pine for him for months, only to find out one day that he has married another. To be left alone.

These thoughts are so true, so strong that the strings between us loosen. I will not go to him, yet I do not want to leave his company.

"What is it you do, anyway, Michael?" I ask.

In the next three hours we speak of many things. We cover religion, politics, and family; to none of which does Michael hold any strong feelings. I tell him of what has transpired between my family and he looks sorry for me. He tells me he, too, went to boarding school, but both of his parents are still alive. He runs his father's business since his father retired and is set to inherit an estate near Chester. Finally, we speak of romance. It turns out that Michael was married once, but his wife ran away, and he hasn't heard from her in over five years. He had to get a divorce. I've never met anyone who's divorced before. As a result, he is very much against marriage.

"Well, I want to get married soon," I tell him, expecting little reaction. It is normal for a woman of my age to expect marriage. Many of my friends from boarding school are already married and a few of them have children.

"You shouldn't want marriage, not when you're so young. You should be experiencing things!" I think I may have found a subject on which Michael is passionate.

"I have experienced things."

"Like what?"

"I own an entire estate -- that's an experience a lot of people don't get to have."

"I meant personal experiences, Lou. For example, I'm sure Charlie was the first, and only, boy you've kissed."

"I've kissed plenty of people!" I retort, perhaps with too much confidence. But really. This man doesn't know me from Eve. I could be the intercourse master for all he knows. And who is he to judge? He might be rubbish!

"Oh really," he laughs. It makes his eyes crinkle. I'm struck again by how handsome he is -- perhaps I am too focused on looks? He has a wonderful smile though, so full. It makes his eyes look so kind. It changes his whole face.

"You have a wonderful smile," I tell him. I'm not sure why I do. I feel as though he should know, perhaps he will stop being so serious all the time. And, for all I know, no one has ever told him before. Then again, if someone told me to smile more, would I? Probably not, I decide. It would make me even more serious, just to spite them. Michael just laughs, though, showing more of that smile. "And yes. I have kissed many people. I'm a good kisser -- I've been told that I am." It is a blatant lie, though he does not need to know that.

"By who?" He asks. It's a fair question. Now that I think about it, it does seem strange for someone to simply tell you how good you are at kissing -- it's a bit patronising, really. And, the more that I consider it, I'm not sure anyone has actually said those exact words to me. I can remember thinking them about Charlie, but am I simply confused now? Did I think that, or did he really say it?

"Louisa," he begins when I have taken too long to reply. "You are an innocent. A little heavy petting doesn't change that. And it shouldn't! Stay innocent, for as long as you can. It's much less complicated."

Michael gets up then and takes a walk around the room. It's very dark outside now, it must be close to midnight. I go to the library door and open it. The noise from the party is just as loud as it was when I came to this room, so I assume it's not ending any time soon.

"I think I should talk to him," I slur. I can hear a woman's laughter; I wonder if it's Victoria.

"Who?" Michael is picking things up off the desk and putting them back again. I would tell him off -- it is my father's desk, not even Uncle uses it -- but he looks strangely at home there. It suits him.

"Charlie, obviously! I should tell him how I feel, tell him that he's making a mistake!"

"No, you shouldn't," Michael looks at me -- really at me -- with alarm. "That is an awful idea."

"Why?"

"Lou," he comes over and closes the door, taking my hands and leading me back to the couch. It does not escape my notice that this is the second time he has called me by my pet name. "He will not change his mind." He is not slurring as much as I am and yet he has drunk so much more. So? I ask myself. Sober does not equate correct.

"He might!" I begin, but Michael is already shaking his head.

"He won't, I can guarantee it. This isn't nice to hear, but he is not in love with you." He looks sad. I don't want him to look sad.

"He might be, you don't know Charlie."

Michael nods. "That is true, I don't know Charlie. But I do know that he announced his engagement to everyone and, from what you've told me, he planned it well in advance. He has thought about this and made a clear decision."

I'm standing up and shaking my head. "No," I draw the word out for a couple of seconds. "It's fine, I'm just going to go and talk to him, just a little conversation."

I head towards the door again, but Michael stops me from opening it by placing his hand on the door, over my shoulder. I am boxed in by him. I can smell him, he is so close.

"Why not talk to him in the morning?" He asks. He looks sad again, or -- wait. Is that pity? Does he pity me?

I'm being led back to the couch and he sits me beside him. He's warm and he smells like . . . like what? Like a man, I think. How odd, I didn't realise that men had a smell. I could get quite cosy here.

"Talk in the morning," he puts his arm around my shoulder, leaning his head atop mine. "It's too late tonight."

Okay, I'll talk to him in the morning, I think. Or do I say it? I'm not sure, I think I'm falling asleep.

August 22^nd, 1929

I wake on the couch in the library. The fire died long ago, and the room is cold. Why am I in the library?

I wish I hadn't woken up. I had the most vivid dreams -- Michael and I were in bed together. The things he did to me were divine. I feel a shiver run down my spine when I think of how his hands on my breasts had felt.

This feeling is very rudely interrupted. My stomach rolls, nausea grips me and a cold sweat breaks out all over my body.

My God, what have I done to myself?

I sit up but my body feels as though it's stuck in sludge. I am slow, my stomach feels almost swollen, and my head is fuzzy.

I think back, I remember the party, the people, the engagement, oh Lord! I came in here because I was sad. I must have drunk quite a lot.

I stand up on shaky legs, taking myself to the library door. The house seems to be back to normal -- either staff worked through the night or it is later than I think it is.

In the bathroom I examine myself in the mirror. I look a state. No wonder, I think. The engagement comes back to mind.

I was going to talk to Charlie, wasn't I? I was meant to find him and convince him to change his mind. Whose bright idea was that? I'd rather feel this ill on a daily basis than beg Charlie to choose me.

A crushing grief battles the fuzziness in my head. I thought I loved him, I think to myself, allowing tears to escape. I can feel myself beginning to become hysterical. What's the point of being here when I am so utterly alone?

There were several times in boarding school when I was chastised for being dramatic. The first was when I was seven and my then best friend, a girl called Rebecca, told me that I was no longer her best friend. She told me it was a girl named Emily, who was new to the school. So, I trapped Emily in a cupboard and told Rebecca that she'd gone home. Emily was found by the teachers only a half hour later and I received lines for that.

When I was twelve, a group of girls made fun of me because I'd had my courses through the night. The blood stained my night gown and they all saw it. In return I took scissors to their night gowns and destroyed them all. My parents had to pay for the damage, and I received a caning.

The last time was when I was sixteen and my friend Alice was going home for a week in October. I didn't want her to leave, so I feigned an illness for a few days before. She was worried and didn't leave, instead she stayed with me. It turns out that it was her grandmother's funeral and she missed it. I hadn't known, but I felt awful. Especially when one of the nurses at the school called a physician for me who declared me perfectly healthy. They thought I'd done it to get out of classes, I didn't bother correcting them.

I'm not sure where this spirit in me comes from, though I'm certain it's my mothers' side of the family.

Now, I decide, though I already know I am overreacting, I am going to the beach and I will simply drown myself.

I feel wretched as I leave the front door. There isn't a soul in the house, though, which is a small mercy. I encounter no one until I reach the garden.

Michael is sitting on the steps between the lawn and the driveway. Of course he is, I think to myself. His dinner tie is askew, his dinner jacket is lying on the ground beside him and his hair is a complete mess. There is a dusting of stubble covering his jaw and I find that it really suits him -- it makes the jaw more pronounced; squares it off. He is smoking a cigarette, a filthy habit however much I enjoy the smell (perhaps because it reminds me of my father, though I cannot be certain).

I ignore him the best that I can, trying not to blush when inevitably the memories of my dreams come to my mind. I walk past him on the steps, and straight ahead.

"Good morning to you, too," I hear him chuckle behind me, though I do not turn. I pay him no heed.

It startles me when, just a few seconds later he is by my side, matching my gait with ease. "I am in no mood for conversation," I warn him, not slowing.

"Not a morning person, eh?"

"Not today."

"And just where are you headed dressed like that?"

I am still wearing my burgundy velvet dress, and I look as rumpled as he does. I had to take my hair out of its pins earlier and so I'm sure my hair is wild as well.

"I'm going to drown myself if you must know."

"Ah. I've felt like that some mornings after drinking, myself."

"I am not ill from drink, you imbecile." A lie, of course, though it's true that's not why I'm drowning myself.

He chuckles slightly. "I suppose this is about the boy, then?"

My stride falters for a fraction of a second in surprise. How could he have known that? Oh no, think, realising that I spoke to him, quite extensively, last night. Indeed, I spent most of the night with him, didn't I? I do not reply, but the brief hesitation was enough to give me away.

"What's wrong? Did he not break off his engagement when you told him how you loved him? I'm shocked, I thought he would click his fingers and exclaim 'of course!'"

Now we have reached the trees, which takes a bit more care. There are roots all over the ground and quite a few nettles and brambles.

"Leave me alone," I tell him, navigating a particularly difficult patch of dirt. "I don't want company."

"A life without love is not a life worth living, they say. Is that it then? If you can't have him then you don't want anyone?"

"No," I answer, though I don't know why I bother. I suppose I don't want anyone to believe I'm that pathetic.

"What did he say when you spoke to him, then?" Michael laughs, though I find this far from humorous. I hike up my skirt in order to climb the crumbling, waist-high wall that is all that separates the woodland from the beach. "Did he simply reject the idea? Or did he feign anguish and tell you that he loved you more than anything, but you could never be together because you were too good for him?"

I turn to him, one leg over the wall, ready to snap at him, but I teeter and sway, losing my balance, and he grabs my waist on both sides, his hands are large and warm, soaking through the thin material of my dress.

"He did not reject me," I speak through the shock. Michael is very close and despite my ire for the man I cannot look past how truly handsome he is. This close I can see every line on his face, every tiny mark, detail and scar. "I would have had to have offered him something to reject."

Michael stands still for a moment, reading my face. He has not moved his hands. "So, you didn't speak to him?"

"No. I did not," I reply softly, ashamed of my cowardice. I go to move, but he holds onto my waist tighter.

"So, you finally accepted that it was not love, but a mere infatuation?"

"No," I repeated, now indignantly. "I have not."

I move then, throwing my weight to the other side of the wall and bringing my left leg up just in time to hike it over the edge. His hands slip from my waist and I head towards the sea again.

"Wait," Michael calls as I reach the water's edge.

After a second of thought, I begin to take my wristwatch and bracelet off. It would be too much of a waste to have them ruined in the sea.

I'm laying them neatly on the sand when Michael reaches me.

"You're not serious, are you?" He laughs at me. I have to admit; I had been braver when I could not see the water. Now it looks choppy, grey, and freezing. It doesn't seem to matter how hot it gets here in summer; the water is always cold. In any case, it's an overcast day -- the clouds are thick and opaque. The sand was not the brilliant white gold that it had been a few days ago, now it is edging towards a duller beige.

Despite these reservations, I feel compelled to go into the water simply because Michael believes that I either can't or won't.

"Of course. I seldom joke about such serious ideas," I look to Michael, challenging him with my eyes. For some strange reason I thought he'd try to talk me out of it, like most men would. I know for a fact that if it was Robert currently watching me he would plead with me -- he would say I am too beautiful to worry about such a silly boy, that men fall in love with me wherever I go -- he'd go through the necessary dramatics for me to change my mind.

What I find in Michael's eyes is mirth.

"On you go then," he says, gesturing to the water before taking a step back, folding his arms and tilting his head to one side.

"What?" I ask before I can stop myself.

His nostrils flare slightly, as though he's silently laughing. "Far be it for me to stop you. It is in the name of love, after all."

I turn to look at the water again. Damn it. I've changed my mind.

"I can't do it with you watching me," I claim, not looking at him. "Someone may think that you did it to me. You'd be charged with murder." I'm sure he is laughing at me; I'd laugh if the tables were turned. This thought only serves to make me angrier. It's a feeble excuse, and I know it, but I can't really go into that water. Worse yet, I can't begin to go into the water and turn back -- I'd have to commit to it. "It's far safer for you to simply go back to the house and forget you ever saw me here-" I finish with a scream.

The world is tipped on its side. He's picked me up! As I focus my vision, I realise he's cradling me like a baby.

"Put me down!" I cry out, being jolted as I notice that he's walking into the water. "You're fully dressed, you lunatic, stop this!"

"I find it difficult not to encourage friends to follow through on their plans," he smiles at me. I scream as my backside touches the water for the first time. He's now over waist deep.

"It's freezing!" I scream again. I would try to let go of him, wriggle until he drops me, but then I'd be submerged in the water.

"It is," he agrees, "the things we do for love, eh?" He keeps going despite my protests until he is chest deep in the sea. I'm using my arms to keep as much of myself out of the water as possible, but I'm still partly submerged, meaning that I have pulled myself as close to his neck as possible. Our faces are an inch or two apart.

"Now," he says as he finishes walking. His trousers and shoes will be ruined, he'll have to throw them away. "As far as I can see it, we have two options." He takes a deep breath, trying to stem the cold, I suppose. I can't imagine what he feels like, his feet soaked but still wearing his shoes.

"I can either let you go," Michael dips me a little further in the water to demonstrate, to which I let out a pathetic gasp and cling to him all the harder. "Or," he lifts me again, securing his grip behind my legs and around my shoulders, "you can stop talking nonsense and I will remove us from the sea."

"Yes! Get out of the water, please," I agree. I'd already realised what a stupid thought this had been in the first place and I was happy to admit that I didn't want to do it anymore. There was no humiliation in admitting defeat if it meant that he would be saved from the icy depths with me. Exactly, I think to myself. If he ever brings it up again, I will claim I was worried for him, not for me.

"On the condition that you admit you were never going to go through with it," Michael smiles down at me. He looks smug but it's diminished ever so slightly due to the chattering of his teeth.

"What?!" I cry out. That would be like saying I was wrong. It would also be lying. "I was! I was, I swear!"

Michael 'tsks' and frowns at me, dipping me in the water, causing me to squeal again. "No, you were not. You had a silly crush on a boy that never came to fruition and you were upset. You were not suicidal."

I suppose he has a point -- in fact, he's entirely accurate, but I'll be damned if I admit that.