The gardener worked at the ledge where a low bed of flowers bloomed. The hedgerows had thickened into walls of glossy green. If he squinted his eyes and looked far enough, he’d see a speck of black in the distance, where The Preserve rested like a hibernating bear.
They were all islands.
People assumed loneliness was a condition of the poor, a consequence of too little, but loneliness lived just as comfortably in excess. He recognized its shape in every empty room of Thornfield Manor. The way his footsteps echoed off marble floors. The way one dinner plate filled a table built for twelve. No matter Jack’s circumstances, the silence at the center of his life remained constant.
He bore it, not with bravery or grace but with the dull, mechanical acceptance of a man who expected nothing more. Jack made peace with his solitary life in slow, grinding increments, the way a man makes peace with a terminal diagnosis.
Cursed to always be a distant observer. A protector that no one watched long enough to recognize. His path had been carved by his own design, of course, so he accepted it with unquivering resignation.
Daisy would live her life and he would ensure the cold never touched her again. A silent guardian who watched from the shadows, but never dared to interfere.
She would settle into a home filled with love and laughter. Her children would never know hunger the way they did. They would never know the brave things their mother did for their security, and that was the modest beauty of it. They never had to.
The world was full of whispered secrets. The more comfortable a person became, the easier the seedy truth became to ignore.
He wanted her to forget. Every struggle. Every tear. Every scream. He wished her a life of ease and pleasure, knowing all too well the pain of memories that overstayed their welcome.
His memory was long and filled with sharp, jagged edges he wouldn’t wish on anyone. Like a guest that lingered too long after a party ended, he viewed the world with sobering hindsight.
The silence in the absence of music. The unquenchable thirst for distraction after the champagne had run dry. It was a perpetual, haunting hangover that never faded, but it was also the only way he knew how to live.
So he accepted it.
“Pool’s ready for you, sir.”
Jack set down his tea and stripped out of his silk robe. “Thank you, boys. There are fresh scones in the dining room. Myrtle made them this morning. Help yourselves.”
“Thank you, sir.”
Setting a towel on the settee, he dove into the water.
The cold seized him like a fist, but his body quickly adapted. He swam beneath the surface, eyes open, watching the pale blue world distort above. Sunlight fractured and sound vanished.
There was a time when silence nearly destroyed him. The quiet before a heavy footfall. The click of a door. The chime of a bell. Silence threw every other sound into such sharp contrast, the smallest rustling could crash like a wave and leave a person drowning in fear.
It was why he liked music. He loved the chaotic, endless clatter of jazz and how it swallowed the silence in big chomping bites.
Music was a gift. A comfort. A chaotic distraction.
Silence was honest. It made a man face who he truly was. No masks, no noise, no more disguises.
As he neared the surface, a blurred figure took shape.
Jack breathed deep and wiped the water from his eyes. Nick stood, holding a towel and his robe.
“Sir, you have a visitor.” He stepped aside, and Jack’s heart stopped.
She was a radiant vision his brain instantly denied. He didn’t trust his eyes as his lungs forgot how to breathe.
The last of his breath rushed out in a single word, “Daisy.”
She raised her hand tentatively. “Hi, Jack.”
Her face had filled out, and her clothes were new, but her eyes still told a story of hardship that he suffered a pressing need to ease.
Jack rushed up the ladder, water splashing off of him in urgent disorder.
“Sir,” Nick muttered, handing him a towel.
