Just A Dash of Historical Fantasy! Celtic Fiction: We Come Back: Vol. 1: Chapter 7.1- Waiting on a Storm
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Waiting on a Storm
Jack woke up the next morning wondering
if what he had experienced could have possibly been real. Did he really fall in love with a woman he knew almost nothing about? The closer he got to her the more he questioned himself. The more he wondered if everything he had come to know was wrong. Did he have to be this man society deemed him to be? What if she were to take his hand and marry him and belong to no family of high class, or wealth? He wondered if his feelings for her would change. When it came down to it, what was he risking? Was he risking the love of his siblings, who depended on him to keep their lives in order? What about his estate?
These were the things that he pondered over his breakfast this morning.
The breakfast consisted of delights he didn’t often enough appreciate.
He took his breakfast out on to his terrace allowing the early morning sunlight to fill his soul with glee. He knew that within the day he would see the person who has made his life completely flip upside down, for better or for worse. His world was no longer filled with mundane conversations, expected outcomes or temporary fixes.
The distractions that once plagued his mind had been erased entirely in 48 hours.
The knocks he heard coming from his bedroom door seemed far and distant, as he scoped the vast forest that lay before his eyes. When the knocking ceased, he was not too surprised to see Hoss sit down beside him. Hoss stayed silent with him for some time. The words he spoke seemed rehearsed, as if it was the hardest sentence he had ever spoken.
“Jack, I know why Miss Astraea left.
I… well I overheard Miss Delaine speaking to her sisters, and though they were aghast by her behavior, I do not believe either will speak up about what they have learned.”
“I know Hoss. I realize that Miss Delaine told her an outrageous falsehood in order to better reach her own despicable goals. You need not repeat what you have heard.”
He reached over and laid his hand on Hoss’ shoulder, squeezing it gently. Hoss’ sigh not only released his anxiety but revealed his curiosity.
“I wonder how you intend to handle this poor event.”
“Well it is rather simple really. I plan to make Miss Delaine’s falsity a truth.”
He stood up, refilled his tea and took another bite out of his toast and marmalade.
“This is the best peach marmalade I have ever tasted I do declare.”
Hoss was puzzled by his demeanor, as he seemed to take everything that had occurred so lightly.
“Jack, I don’t understand. What do you intend to do? What can you mean to create a truth from her falsity? And for God’s sake, what has the marmalade got to do with any of it?”
“The marmalade has nothing to do with anything, I was just commenting on the great flavor that we so seldom acknowledge.”
Hoss leaned back heavily in his chair.
He couldn’t understand why Jack always felt the need to prolong the suspense or his agony until the last possible moment. Jack smiled, having seen Hoss give up.
“Miss Delaine said that I was engaged, and I intend to do just that.”
“Marry Miss Delaine?” Hoss looked as if a bitter taste refused to leave the tip of his tongue.
“Of course not Hoss, now you aren’t making any sense at all.”
Hoss stood to leave, having had enough of this game of cat and mouse. Jack laughed, and stopped him, forcing him to sit back down beside him.
“I intend to propose to Miss Astraea this very day, upon her return.
I will allow Miss Mary and Miss Lilly to remain in our company for as long as you please, if not just for the sake of Beathan and Mason, but Miss Delaine will leave today.”
“I agree with your plan, however I don’t understand it. The first I have heard of Miss Astraea was yesterday and yet you are ready to spend the rest of your life with her?”
“You are exactly right; I do wish to spend the rest of my life with her. How can I explain the need? If I was a bird, a robin let’s say, if I had no wings, I would only live a half life. I would survive for this is no question, but I would not fly. I would never know the feeling of floating high above the tiny ants below. Would I not be a fool not to choose the wings?”
Hoss smiled, Jack hardly ever revealed a sentimental poetic side, and that he was choosing to do so now, was most indeed a good sign.
“I am going to give her my mother’s claddagh ring, if she will accept me.”
Hoss started to say that there was no room for any idea that she wouldn’t accept him, but thought better of it, for he really knew nothing about this woman other than she was nothing like any other woman he had ever had the pleasure of meeting. Such a response of denial at such a proposal suddenly becomes possible, if not even probable.
“Strictly to ease my curiosity,” Hoss started, “Do you know where she is from? Or her last name? How old is she?”
Jack remained silent.
“You know not, do you? Some things about her are obvious from her attire, such as her financial status his high and her manners reveal she is of the upper class, but that is not much to go off of.”
“I don’t need to know anything about her outer world Hoss, because I already know her inner world like the back of my hand.”
“Oh yes, do enlighten me? How is it that you could possibly know her inner world already, when some husbands who have been married over thirty years still claim to know nothing about their wives?”
“I know her inner world, because it is identical to my own.
Do you not see, Hoss, that she is not like an ordinary blossom, there will not be one like her on the next tree. I am going to propose to her, and I have gone over lists of ideas of the worst possible things she could tell me, and nothing short of her being a man or already married is going to change that.”
“Then a toast?” Hoss raised his glass, “To your never-ending happiness Jack, may your true heart and undying loyalty serve you well!”
They clanked their glasses together, and drank down the last drop within each of their cups.
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