I began my ritual as I always did, my fingers pressed to my lips before dropping them to the headstone with a whispered, “Bonjour, Mon amor.” My voice was thicker this time than it had been in years. In lieu of the intimacy of resting against his stone chest and the perceived distance of my bench, I sat on the grass facing him.
“I am sorry to have left you so long, but I have much to tell you. And ask you.”
A leaf from the nearby oak tree escaped and brushed my cheek on its fall.
“I missed you too. I… I know you are not here, not really. But I need to ask you something. And I need you to give me a sign. Please. Anything.”
The breeze gave a gentle waft, ruffling my hair.
“You were not killed by William, were you?”
An unnatural stillness surrounded me. For an unending moment, nothing happened. I waited, too afraid to breathe, to create an unnatural sign. Then a butterfly flapped delicately into view before finding perch on the nearby irises. Orange with black-tipped wings that fluttered easily. It was soon joined by a brother, small and white. Then a blue and a red friend came too. Dancing around the flowers as they swayed in the breeze.
“That’s a no?”
The littlest blue one flitted over and settled itself on my knee. This one was familiar. I had seen it, or one like it, last week and in years past. But he had never come close enough to touch, to land.
“Thank you.” The words came out of me in a rush. Tension abandoned me, leaving me boneless with desperate relief.
“I… I have… feelings for him. Not love, but… it could be. Maybe. And I don’t know what to do with them.”
My little companion gave a graceful flap of his wings.
My throat tightened as I tried to find the words. “I feel as though I’m betraying you. What we had. What we could have had.”
The grass beside my feet rustled with the breeze. The tears were there now, just hovering, waiting for the right moment to escape.
“I could not possibly have found someone you would hate more.”
Somewhere high up in the oak tree, the great tit that called it home let out its laugh-like call.
“I don’t know how to do this. If I’m even capable of it. If I fell in love again. And lost again… I would never recover. I’m not sure I know how to stop anyway. Nothing could have stopped me from loving you, not even your own efforts.”
With a last agitated flap of his wings, the small butterfly returned to the irises with his friends.
I rose and settled my back against the familiar stone. In Gabriel’s arms again, I let the tears go. One became ten became ten thousand. Tears for all the memories we would never make, for the kisses we would never have, the days that were stolen from us.
I made no effort to wipe them away. There was no point. Eventually, minutes, hours, days later, the world came back to me. Blue iridescent wings waving back and forth in the breeze on my knee, the great tit sitting on its lower branch, laughing at me, a breeze brushing through my hair, and his cool stone at my back.
I sat, enjoying the sights and smells and sounds and touches I had attributed to my husband over the years. Appreciating each and every one of them for their efforts. Thanking them silently.
“Thank you, mon amor. I do not think I will be by to see you quite as often anymore. I think it is time I make some new memories instead of mourning the ones we will never have. I will never, not if I live to see the end of time, love anyone the same way that I love you. I want you to know that.”
One by one, the butterflies flitted back to wherever they came from. The bird offered one last forlorn chirp. A bit of dandelion fluff whispered past me in the great gust of wind that pulled a few tendrils from my coiffure.
And then all was silent. And I rose with one last press of lips to fingers and fingers to stone. And I made my way out of the cemetery and into the sunshine.
Sixteen
CADIEUX HOUSE, LONDON - JUNE 13, 1816
William
Six and thirty and I’d never called on a woman, not with courting in mind anyway. And I was starting withher.
Kit returned from retrieving Lady Davina at the docks dirty and exhausted and more than a little irritated to work on my behalf this afternoon. His mood was much improved after I sent him to clean up. He yelled something about flowers in my direction as I was leaving.
I purchased a few blooms at a stall on the way, making an effort not to crush the stems in my fit of nerves. The walk was pleasant and the breeze offset the sun’s potential to overheat.
