“Let’s focus on getting ready. Miss Wilson will settle you first while I do my makeup.”
“We both look perfectly fine,” Beth protests as Mother unlocks the front door and they stomp inside, blinking in the dim, empty foyer.
“We cannot arrive at the Ashmonds’ in what we’ve worn to tea, and you need at least another two layers on your skirt.”
“Why?” Beth asks, standing still even as Mother continues toward the stairs. She feels her composure slipping. “Why must we continue this charade?”
“It is not a charade,” Mother dismisses, a hand on the railing.
“Mother,” Beth exclaims.
Mother turns slowly, the foyer between them. “If the lace bothers you so much, we’ll find another modiste.”
“It isn’t about the lace.”
“I know you would prefer to... see your friend more, but we’ve found a compromise. Why can’t you be satisfied with that?”
Rage slips up Beth’s throat, constricting her lungs. “Gwen is not—”
“That’s all she can be,” Mother says.
Beth feels the words like a blow to her stomach. It’s not that Mother won’t acknowledge it. It’s that she can’t even imagine a world where Beth and Gwen could be together.
“I know it isn’t fair, but we will find ways for you to see each other. And someday it will be more than enough. You’ll see. These feelings fade. You learn to live with compromise.”
Like it’s easy. Like living in a purgatory state of sadness is nothing.
Mother waits for some smart rejoinder, but Beth doesn’t have one. Of course Mother’s fine with compromise. It’s all she’s ever known. But Beth—Beth wants so much more than empty, ashen compromise, for both of them. This half life willneverbe enough.
“I can’t do this. I’m not you” falls out of her mouth before she can think to stop the words.
“Excuse me?” Mother says.
It feels like something has cracked inside her chest, all her hurt surging forward. “The bowing and scraping and bending ourselves to Lord Ashmond’s views on everything. Giving up our politics. Giving up Gwen and Lord Havenfort—” Her breath hitches. “We are giving up everything for them. And the way Lord Ashmond talks to you—the way youlethim talk to you—it’s like—” She breaks off, swallowing her words as Mother narrows her eyes.
“It’s like what, Elizabeth?” Mother asks, her voice sharp now.
Beth straightens her back. This wasn’t part of the plan, but someone needs to say it. “It’s like he’s Father, all over again. You agree with everything he says, even when I know you don’t. You laugh like he’s funny. And you let him talk down to you all the time, like you’re unworthy of his consideration and should simply be grateful he looks on you at all.”
The silence that follows brims with every unkind thing that’s ever been said in this house, every slight, every fight and ugly moment. And all of the ways neither of them ever made a move to stop them, never stood up for themselves, never fought Father. They wouldn’t have won, Beth knows that. But they can now.
They don’t have to submit to repeating the future like it’s inevitable.
“I don’t want us to live like this. And I know you don’t want to either. You can’t possibly want to live like this again. Please, Mother, if you just spoke with Lord Havenfort, let him prove to you that—”
“Enough!” Mother yells. “You do not get to have everything you want in life.” Her voice is suddenly low and cold, not even allowing for the barest possibility of another way. “You’ll have a manor and a husband and a fortune for generations. That is more than anyone can hope for.”
“It’s not,” Beth insists.
“Beth.”
“I can hope for more,” Beth says, her voice rough as the tears finally fall, as anger gives way to desperation. “You should hope for more.”
They stand staring at each other, Beth begging for her mother to value her own life as much as she values Beth’s security. To take a chance on their happiness being worthsomething.
Mother just shakes her head. “I have all I’ve hoped for. I’m going to lie down. Miss Wilson will help you dress for dinner.”
She turns and heads up the stairs, shoulders curled inward, defeated, unwilling to hope or want or listen.
