Archive of Our Own ^beta

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Oxford Professor Tolkien had written a funny little book a few years prior. The man had a knack for poetry and riddles. Nick had no talent in these fields but had enough appreciation to commit a few to memory.

One came to mind when his car pulled into the once-grand gateway of the old house:

"All things it devours:

birds, beasts, trees, flowers;

gnaws iron, bites steel;

grinds hard stones to meal;

slays king, ruins town,

and beats high mountain down.”

The answer had been time. Time eats all in the end, and the evidence was crumbling before them.

The house—much like many on West Egg—had been abandoned, this one longer than most. The once-stately structure was now a shadow of its former self. Ivy crept up the walls, weaving through broken window panes and gaping holes where ornate carvings had once adorned the facade. The roof, sagging and weather-beaten, had patches where shingles were missing, exposing rotting beams beneath. Shattered columns leaned precariously, their grandeur eroded by years of neglect.

Inside, the air was heavy with the musty smell of decay. Wallpaper, once richly patterned, hung in tattered strips, peeling away to reveal stained and crumbling plaster. The floors, once polished marble, had lost their glimmer, their surfaces dulled and scarred by years of dust and neglect. In some places, the marble had cracked and shifted, leaving jagged edges where the stone had given way.

Daisy fumbled with the door handle, which was rusted and stiff. Nick, ever the gentleman, helped her open the door. She gave a nod but didn’t look at him at all, too entranced by her ghosts. Nick couldn’t see them, but they were evident in her eyes.

The hollow click of Daisy’s heels on the deteriorated marble floor was the only sound that broke the oppressive silence. Ornate chandeliers, their crystals long since dulled by grime, hung from the ceiling like forgotten relics.

“It’s so quiet.”

“It has been,” Nick looked down at his cigarette, “for a long time.”

“No jazz?”

“The bands are gone.”

“No dancers?”

“Only nurses and soldiers.”

“We should dance, Nicky.”

Nick pinched the cigarette and stashed it behind his ear. “With no music?”

“That is music. Can’t you hear it?”

Nick heard nothing but the whine of the window and the snow brushing against it. The silence was almost too complete, broken only by the faint rustle of the disintegrating curtains. “Sure, Daisy.”

She did not swing the dancers of their youth—the jitterbugs or the Charleston. No, because Daisy was a lady first—she waltzed and twirled with the sigh of the wind, her movements a melancholic ballet. Her furs had fallen into the loose powder and ash, but she gave no sign of noticing it. Nor did Nick at first—for this was still beautiful Daisy—once bright and gentle as cherry blossoms, but now faded, floating like willow vines. The graceful, fluid steps of her dance belied an inner tempest; each movement was a silent lament, an elegy to what had been lost. Her feet, though delicate, seemed to drag as if burdened by invisible weights, and her arms, once so elegantly poised, fluttered like the frayed edges of a forgotten dream.

Even grace could be found in the weeping willows. It fit her better too, and she danced with her ghosts, her ballet a quiet protest against the crushing stillness around her. Her pirouettes, though refined, spoke of a heart twisted with sorrow, spinning not with joy but with the aching emptiness of bygone days.

The artist in Nick allowed him to imagine what she saw: halls filled with light, washed clean with the scent of lovely perfumes and pomades, rivers of champagne bubbling over. Yet, the reality was starkly different. Nick didn’t see what Daisy saw. No gold and marble. No flutes of spirits or music. Only ash and snow kicked up by her bare feet, the remnants of grandeur long gone.

A gentleman would have stopped this delusion, spun her around, and given her a good smack, but for once, Nick found his pity outweighed formality. He simply picked up her furs and draped them over one arm, his gaze following her with a somber understanding.

Let her have this one last time.

When her feet grew numb and her arms heavy, she would open her eyes, and her ghosts would vanish, leaving behind only the quiet echoes of a dance that had become a requiem.

And she’d never want to leave.

          never wanted to leave...

              never wanted to leave...