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No! I am not Prince Hamlet, nor was meant to be;
Am an attendant lord, one that will do
To swell a progress, start a scene or two,
Advise the prince; no doubt, an easy tool,
Deferential, glad to be of use,
Politic, cautious, and meticulous;
Full of high sentence, but a bit obtuse;
At times, indeed, almost ridiculous—
Almost, at times, the Fool.
- T. S. Eliot, The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock
**
Love finds Colin in the middle of the ball with the Queen pointing a finger at his wife and never lets him go.
He has spent a lifetime thinking about all the ways in which love would change his life. Fantasized about how it would curl around his heart, transform him from a boy unmoored to a man with purpose, a family, with something to cherish and defend and protect. He thinks about his family and all the forms love can take: a friendship or a great passion or a tempest or a smoke made with the fume of sighs. It is ironic then that love, when it finds him, is most unremarkable. A steady, gentle thing. Involuntary, like breathing in fresh air in the morning and closing his eyes at night. Love, when it finally finds him, is everywhere: in the furrow of Penelope’s brows, between the folds of her skirts, smeared in the ink stains on her fingers.
In reality, love is this: war.
Tonight is not the first time that he’s been blown over by his love for Penelope, but it is the first time it feels like this, like falling, like standing on the precipice of something and waiting to jump. He had not known that love could be like this: a surge of fear threatening to bring him to his knees. A cold, calloused hand, gripping his heart. Loving Penelope is loving Whistledown and the strokes of her quill that bring down families, end betrothals, forge unions. Love is power and love is treason, love is the blood coursing through his veins, ready to pounce. Love is a woman who does not need him and will not let him save her and yet, here he is, here he is still, always, for where could he go, leaving his heart behind ---
The Queen points at Penelope and he knows then, with a calmness he’d previously thought himself incapable of, that this is it. She will never be his, he knows this now in his bones, not in the way he is irrevocably hers. She is too brilliant for him to contain, slipping through his fingers and spreading across London, across England, across the seas, on lips and words and papers. She is the sun. She will be forevermore.
Penelope steps into the center of the ballroom, out of the shadows, into the light. Next to him, he hears the hitch in his mother’s breath as it catches in her throat. She clutches his shoulder. Maybe she thinks him impulsive, maybe she thinks he will make a scene in front of the crowd. Maybe she simply thinks he needs comfort. She doesn’t know that he doesn’t. Colin’s hands are firmly clasped in front him, his feet rooted to the ground. He won’t charge forward to fight his wife’s battles. He won’t run. He will never run. He will do the only thing he can, the only thing she’s ever asked of him : he will be the kind man who loves her.
In front of them, Penelope surveys the room. She opens her mouth to speak and he takes a deep breath. Squares his shoulders.
Here she is, his brilliant wife. Here it is, the rest of his life.
**
Sometimes, she burns so bright that Colin is forced to look away.
He watches her from a distance, leaning on the doorframe, hidden in the shadows.
Penelope is seated in front of the mirror, applying rouge to her lips as Rae fusses with her hair. Today, his wife has been invited to a luncheon with the Queen, to meet some new patrons from the country. The invitation hasn’t been extended to him, and it would rankle more if this weren’t the fourth time in the last month that the Queen had summoned her, and her alone, for a private event.
He shifts by the door, careful not make a second. He treasures these quiet moments in the morning when he is the only one who gets to see her unmade, undone. Like this, he doesn’t need to share her. Like this, she is more his than the rest of the world’s. He knows this moment can’t last. She is the sun, and he knows that he doesn’t get to keep her. So, he leans his head against the cool wood, watches her get ready to leave him.
She rolls her shoulders and Rae steps back, gives her hair one last pat before maneuvering around him and leaving the room. His moment is over.
She turns around to look at him and her lip twitches. “I’ll only be gone for a few hours,” she tells him softly.
He smiles. “I know,” he says automatically, but his voice is quieter than he’d intended. “But that does not mean that you won’t be sorely missed.”
She walks across the room to him. “I’ll miss you too,” she promises. And then, she adds lightly, “But maybe you can take advantage of the quiet and start editing your journals again.”
He shrugs noncommittally. The truth is that his journals feel very far away, an unimportant reminder of a life he no longer leads. Every thought he has now is consumed by Penelope. When she is with him, he devotes himself to memorizing everything about her, the way her hair curls around her face, the way her lips twitch sometimes in her sleep, the feel of her arm slipping through the crook of his elbow. When she isn’t around, he rereads their old correspondences or reads books she’d mentioned enjoying in the past. What had he done before with his time? Was it only mere months ago that he’d spent his days untethered, floating through his own life? Editing his journals now feel like fulfilling someone else’s dream, nothing compared to how important it feels to learn his brilliant wife, catalog her every movement. Instead of replying, he bends down and kisses her forehead, careful not to mess up her hair.
“Are you looking forward to your luncheon?” he asks instead.
Her smile brightens. “I am.”
He stares at her. This close to her, he can see everything. He sees the shade of red on her lips, bright and bold. He sees the way her eyes have sharpened, the subtle way in which she’s drawn back her shoulders to stand up straighter, make herself a little taller. She’s excited for this, he realizes with a jolt. She’s looking forward to spending a day in court, sparring verbally with the Queen or whatever it is that they do. He feels a little foolish, and then immediately berates himself for being disappointed. Of course, she would want to go. Of course, she is looking forward to engaging in scholarly pursuits beyond the scope of their home. Of course she doesn’t view these engagements as tedious, as excuses stealing her away from him. He looks at her now and feels absurd for ever being envious of her, thinking that he and his journals could ever measure up. What had he been thinking? How could he be envious of the sun for shining, of the earth for turning, of the –
“Colin?” Penelope’s voice cuts across his thoughts. “Are you truly all right?”
She looks concerned now, a little furrow creasing her brows. He shakes his errant thoughts off and smiles at her again, brighter this time. Bends down to kiss her again.
“I am perfectly well, Pen,” he assures her. And he is. He will be, as long as she chooses him. Comes back to him. “And your carriage is waiting,” he gestures.
She frowns at him again for a moment before letting it go. By the door, he stands still, watches her collect herself and get ready to leave. At the end of the corridor, she turns around and looks at him, raises her hand to give him a little wave before disappearing round the corner and down the stairs.
For him, she always turns around.
**
After they reconcile, he cannot stop asking questions.
He is so hungry to learn everything about her. How did she realize that she liked to write? How did she get started? How did she collect her gossip, choose her printer, pay the paper boys, deliver her papers? Why did she use this turn of phrase, that sonnet? His urge feels insatiable; he wants to devour every single inch of her mind, taste every single idea she has ever had and savor her greatness. He had never known that there would be so much grace in just listening.
He knows that Penelope doesn’t understand. Sometimes, she humors him grudgingly and shares snippets, but he can sense her wariness. She doesn’t understand how he’s gone from anger to hurt to limitless curiosity in the span of a few weeks. She doesn’t understand that he sees her now. That something had shifted in him, slotted into place when she had stepped up and declared herself Lady Whistledown. He would claw his eyes if he were ever forced to stop.
A few weeks into their marriage, she finally relents. That night, she takes him across London in the dark and introduces him to the most loyal of her hired hacks. She takes him to parts of London that he had never been to, maneuvers through throngs of people like it isn’t dangerous. Like she isn’t a tiny person in an inconspicuous cloak fighting her way through the darkness. For the first time, he considers that maybe she isn’t.
The next morning, she takes him to meet her favorite paper boys, shows him her most profitable paper routes. She tells him how she’s learnt to time the release of her columns to coincide with the ton promenading. How her paper boys first target the modiste, then the shops, then the more influential neighborhoods where ladies would congregate. She takes him to her printers, introduces him to the men running the business. They can do this now in the light of day, now that everyone knows who she is, now that everyone steps back and lets her pass. She is no longer a maid delivering her mistresses’ papers, no longer a wildflower, no longer invisible. He feels the pull when they are in public, the weight of everyone’s eyes as if they are drawn helplessly to her with endless fascination. He can relate to their feelings. He, too, cannot look away.
Discovering his wife is humbling. Everywhere they go, he learns something new, finds another thing to love about her. The more he learns about Whistledown, the more of Penelope he finds, as if he’d been blindfolded his entire life and the scales are only now falling off his eyes, layer by layer. She is so vast, his brilliant wife, in all that she contains. How had he ever missed the largeness in her? How had he ever thought ill of it? How ironic that he had traveled so far, so desperately, to find a modicum of the purpose and strength she has discovered in her own home, within her own hands. He thinks back to a year past when Penelope had declared her grand purpose to him. My purpose shall set me free, she had said.
He had thought it uncharacteristically lofty back then, big dreams of a little girl. But she isn’t a little girl anymore. Maybe she never had been, even then. She is now a woman grown, the architect of his fate.
A few days later, they meet with the Featheringtons’ solicitor so that Penelope and her mother can begin to sort out their finances. They do not ask him for his input, and he finds that he has nothing of note to offer. This, too, is something he has yet to learn. One day, he will learn how to balance accounts and manage estates, protect and secure a legacy, but today he is utterly out of his depth. Today, he is simply a man who loves a woman, learning how to be a husband.
He thinks of families and love that endures, and the follies of weak men and the scars they leave behind. The women in front of him are so achingly similar, so careful with each other, hesitant to disrupt their new, delicate peace. He sees all the ways in which Penelope is just like her mother, sharpened by grief, a little desperate for, yet unaccepting of, love. There is so much still he has yet to learn, but at least he knows he is capable of this, to love her endlessly.
Sitting back, watching his wife and mother-in-law sort out their home in ways that he is certain aren’t strictly legal, Colin feels timeless, paper-thin. He is both here and not, a man and a husband and a little, lost boy. He is fifteen and breathless and knocked off his horse. He is eighteen and lost in the continent and found in her letters. He is twenty-three and on his knees, begging her to love him. He is anything, everything, as long as she still turns around and chooses him. There is so much he is yet to be.
He blinks and they are done. The women in front of him have figured out their future.
On their way out, Penelope loops her arm through his. “What were you thinking about?” she asks.
He blinks rapidly and she swims in front of him. His eyes had filled with tears without his knowledge.
“You,” he replies, sounding gruff and wretched and so hopelessly in love. “Always you.”
**
There are publishers clamoring for his book.
It is unexpected, but he cannot deny the frisson of pride their letters send through him. It has taken him several months to pick up his journals again but Penelope has been effusive and insistent in her praise. He has to believe that there must be some worth in it, for her to love his words so much.
Mr. Lumsden, the first publisher he meets with, is a nice man with kind eyes. “We must make haste, Mr. Bridgerton,” he says. “Your book will sell much better if we take advantage of the sudden renown that’s befallen your wife.”
Colin blinks. For a few seconds, his mind is utterly blank. “How does that signify?” he finally asks.
Mr. Lumsden winks. “People will read anything that’s been endorsed by Lady Whistledown.”
Colin tries to breathe. There is a hollow, sinking feeling developing in his chest. Naively, he had believed this would be a simple endeavor, an exchange of papers, a matter of transferring his words from paper to print. Now he sees how terribly mistaken he’s been. He clears his throat. “I did not think there would be such overlap between readers of gossip and travel.” Then, after a beat, “I merely wish to be judged on my own merit.”
Mr. Lumsden sighs, pushes his papers back towards him. The expression on his face, gentle and pitying, reminds him unpleasantly of Anthony, of impulsive choices and broken engagements. “We are here to sell books, Mr. Bridgerton,” he says. “I’m afraid I cannot help you if you’re unwilling to help yourself.”
Colin stumbles outside, his journals still clutched in his hand. It is a nice day, he vaguely notices. Bloomsbury is so different from the neighborhood in Mayfair he had grown up in. Here, he is no longer the Viscount’s son, worthy by name, respected by the virtue of the birth. Here, he is surrounded by doctors and solicitors and artists and authors, people who have created something with their own hands, their own minds. Here he is unworthy, turned away.
He visits three other publishers, and they tell him the same thing. He needs an editor, they tell him. He needs to find a way to make his words sharper, let his prose flow more naturally. Make his stories more palatable to the masses, to the men in society who don’t have his means to travel and the women who can’t. Does he not realize how lucky he is to have Lady Whistledown read his work? Won’t she edit his manuscript? Why doesn’t she write his foreword?
The sun is already setting when he leaves the last publisher’s office. His manuscript, crushed and folded, is a constant weight under his arm. In this moment, he is not quite sure where to go or how to reach his destination. He allows himself a few minutes to breathe, to sit on the nearest bench on the side of the road and watch the world pass him by.
Most of the time, it is easy to convince himself that Penelope loves him, that he is worthy of her exactly like he is. The crushing weight of unworthiness he feels is almost surprising, almost unfamiliar, like an old cloak he hasn’t donned in years. This is not the first time he’s failed her, not even the second. The realization sits on his chest like lead. What good is he if he cannot even create something meaningful on his own? Is this how he is doomed to live, first riding his family’s coattails and now hers? How long will it take for her to notice that she deserves better? Someday, she will surely meet a man who is smarter, more accomplished, someone who can match her in conversation and wit. Will she leave him behind if that day were to come? Or worse, will he stay and resign herself to a life of mediocrity with him? The thoughts rise, unbidden, within him until he is nauseous, a bitter taste in his mouth that spreads throughout his body. The insecurity that wells up in him is crushing, ugly in its insistence. He sits with it, the feeling of helplessness, until he is well enough to stow it away. He is a foolish, foolish man with big feelings, playing at a big life he is unqualified for.
A few minutes later, he lifts his head and looks around. Outside, it's dark now, and the streets are empty except for the lone carriage or the random inebriated stranger. Life has, once again, passed him by. He gets up, straightening his coat, brushing a leaf off his sleeve. Then, he goes home.
**
At White’s, he pretends he doesn’t hear the snickers.
Instead, he lets Benedict buy him another drink. It is his fault after all, for dragging him out of his home. It does not take very long before Fife and Stanton, with the rest of their friends, come find him. Fife saunters over, clinks their glasses together.
“How is married life treating you, Bridgerton?” he asks, his voice jovial, almost a sneer. Colin waves his glass at him in a failed attempt at distraction. He knows he must choose his words carefully. Knows now how crucial words are, how quickly they can change the entire fabric of his existence. The last time, Penelope had punished him with her silence. Those months he had spent yearning for her letters seem unreal, like a nightmare. It was very nearly intolerable then; he is sure it will kill him now.
Fife doesn’t wait for his answer. “Could you believe her audacity?” he scoffs, looking around. “That little chit, under all our noses,” he shakes his head. His little friends jeer along with him.
“If my wife ever did something like that, she will be promptly dealt with,” Stanton agrees. “Ban her from society, I say,” he raises his glass.
“Keep your wife on a short leash, Bridgerton,” Cho adds, clinking their glasses together. “You don’t want her so out of control now, do you.”
He feels Benedict stiffen next to him. “That’s enough, gentlemen,” he says firmly. He is glad that Benedict has something to say. He himself is devoid of words, rendered mute. An image of Penelope comes to his mind, sudden, unbidden: sixteen and helpless and trapped in yellow, hunched over her bed, writing her way out of her lot in life. He thinks of her, teeth bared, oozing with rage, the scorn in her words barely disguised as wit. What would she do now, the little girl who almost brought the Queen to her knees. Would she ruin them? Would she ruin him?
Next to him, Colin hears Fife laugh in response, say something cutting in return. He feels bruised, overplucked like a broken string. These people had once been his friends, his confidants. Once, he had wanted to be just like them. Now, Fife leans over him, elbows on the table. He isn’t smiling anymore. “Control your wife, Bridgerton,” he says through gritted teeth.
He swirls his glass, the last remnants of his bourbon shine like golden embers. “Careful, gentlemen,” he finally bites back. “We wouldn’t want this conversation to get back to Lady Whistledown, would we?”
He is met with jeers. “Come now, Bridgerton,” Wilding says, spitting his name out like dirt. “Are you really going to hide behind your wife’s skirts and let her fight your battles?”
The thing is, Colin is tired. It is so tiring to pretend that he isn’t, that a lifetime worth of his own mistakes aren't etched into his skin every single day. It is so much work to fight, to hold a grudge, to try fail. Instead, he finishes his drink. It is late and Penelope is waiting for him.
He sets down his glass. “Yes,” he replies.
**
He is out of sorts and more sober than he’d like to be when he returns home.
When Colin stumbles into their bedroom, Penelope is seated in the middle of their bed. She is immersed in her writing, her brow furrowed, one side of her lip twisted up in concentration. There are papers strewn everywhere, covered with ink-stains and scratches. He is pretty sure she’s writing a novel, although she won’t tell him anything about it yet.
He loosens his cravat and flops onto the bed, displacing multiple papers and squashing a few underneath him. His mind feels muddled, he feels too weary to think. Distantly, he wonders how many of her papers he just ruined, whether Penelope would rebuke him for it.
She doesn’t. She gathers the rest of the papers and together with her desk, moves them out of the bed. Pulls him closer until he’s lying next to her, his face buried into her side, inhaling the warmth of her skin.
He lies there for a while. Being around her, being enveloped in her scent is grounding, a reminder of everything real and tangible. She doesn’t speak, doesn’t ask him what’s wrong, just lets him stay there near her, and he loves her for it.
After a while, he speaks. “Promise me you’ll ruin me,” he mumbles into her skin. “If I ever do something to hurt you, or tell you to do something you don’t want, promise me you’ll ruin me in Whistledown.”
He expects her to laugh but she doesn’t. She is silent for a beat, considering. She always considers him, takes him seriously, and it’s a feeling so foreign it still takes his breath away. His heart is so, so close to breaking again.
Finally, she replies. Her voice is soft, a murmur, almost a whisper. “What happened tonight?” she asks.
Colin huffs into her skin. “I just --,” he lifts himself up. “I just don’t like how some men talk about their wives. Like they’re children to be handled.”
Penelope hums, considering. “Marriage is rarely based on love or mutual respect,” she says. “You have always known this,” she chides him gently.
He sits up on the bed. “Yes, but,” he frowns. “It is freeing, is it not? That’s what mother always told our sisters. That’s why you told me you sought to marry, to gather your independence.”
“There are aspects to freedom in a marriage,” she agrees. “But it is selective. She can perhaps retire to the country once she bears her husband a few heirs. But there are still things she can’t do. Have her own funds, buy her own home. There is so much that young ladies aren’t taught.”
Colin stiffens. “Pen, I hope you know that I would never let anything like that happen. Whatever you need –”
She cut him off with a a flick of her wrist. “But it is still your will that counts,” she gently corrects him. “Colin, you’re the kindest man I know,” she looks sad when she tells him this. “But a young lady should not have to depend so heavily on the kindness of others.” She takes a deep breath. “Today, I have the Queen’s favor. What if that changes tomorrow? What if you then order me to stop writing? I shall have no recourse, no leverage, nowhere to go.”
He feels breathless. Regret claws within him; all this time he had known but he hadn’t seen. All this time, he had thought her to be the architect of their fate, but it is he who holds their future together in society. His impulsiveness, his words, his actions – they all have power over her. He thinks of Anthony, on the verge of forcing Daphne into a lifetime of unhappiness in the name of propriety. He thinks back to a year past, laughing, never in my wildest fantasies, subjecting her to endless ridicule. He thinks of the weeks before their wedding, and perhaps this is a part of your planned entrapment , after she had trusted him with her body and soul. He has hurt her. All he has done is hurt her, hurt her, hurt her.
“And this does not make you angry?” he asks, his voice louder than he’d intended.
Penelope shrugs. “It does. But it is a reality I have lived with my entire life.”
She turns towards him then, his beautiful, brilliant wife. “Today, my words have power,” she tells him simply. It is the most truthful she’s ever been with him. “I shall continue to wield it for as long as I can.” She is so dignified, so steadfast in her love for him, always has been. He, on the other hand, feels graceless, his love and his envy and his own failures seeping together, clogging every pore, oozing out of him.
He will love her forever, he realizes. This is the kind of love that will never ever go away. This is the kind of love that starts wars and ends dynasties. He will love her no matter what, even when she brings down the kingdom or starts a revolution, or when she gives birth to their children, and they grow old together and watch their lives unfold. He will love her till his last breath, even if she leaves him or discards him or hates him someday. She is in every part of him, she thrums under his skin and spreads like warmth under his fingertips.
Colin swallows. “Would you have married me if you had the choice?” he asks quietly.
She is quiet for a bit, perhaps unaware of his heart hammering in his chest. “I do not know,” she finally says. He closes his eyes, feels her words pierce through him. And then she continues. “But I know that there is no universe where I do not love you. I think I was made to love you.”
They are sitting so close now, their bodies molded into each other. He can feel the weight of her arm on his chest, her thigh against his, her breath caressing his face. They are two bodies, intertwined; two souls, breathing as one. He shivers slightly. Tomorrow, he will visit his solicitor to open a trust for his wife, so that no one can touch her money without her permission. Tomorrow, he will update his will so that she never wants for nothing in his absence. Tomorrow, he will make it easier for her to leave him, if she ever chooses to do so.
“Thank you for marrying me,” he whispers in her hair.
She smiles at him. Her face is a dichotomy, happy and sad. “You make me so happy, Colin,” she tells him earnestly. A beat of silence, and then – “You will be such a good father one day.”
He smiles back at her. The heaviness between them fizzles, disappears. Just like that. “Our daughter will be brilliant,” he declares. “Just like her mother.”
She kisses his hand. “I hope that in time she’ll find a suitor as considerate as her papa.”
“Absolutely not,” he cuts in, only half-joking. “Our daughter shall never marry, I forbid It! She shall change the world instead.”
Penelope laughs. She looks at him so softly, touches his face like he’s something delicate. Something to cherish. Like he’s more than a catalog of his failures. “Maybe she can learn to do both,” she replies. And then, after a pause. “Her mother did.”
He is undone. Flayed open by her words, fragile under her touch.
“Even then,” he swallows past the lump in his chest. Clears his throat. “You must still ruin me if I ever act like a brute.”
She laughs. Her eyes sharpen, a wicked glint in them now. She tugs him down until he’s almost on top of her, her hands twisted in his hair, tugging slightly at the roots. “If you want to be punished, Mr. Bridgerton,” she whispers in his ear, “I believe we can arrange that.”
And then she flips them over.
**
He loses Penelope to the crowd minutes after they arrive at Lady Danbury’s soirée. She is dragged away by a group of women, and although she tugs him along, he soon finds himself lost, unable to follow the threads of their conversation. Instead, he excuses himself to go get a drink and slips into the quiet of one of the corners of the ballroom. No one pays him much attention. Every eye has, as it always does nowadays, lands on Penelope. Sometimes, he sees them look at her like a particularly difficult puzzle to solve, and the blood rises in his throat. They look at her like with fear and disdain, like they love her in the way one loves the glow of a rapidly approaching ball of fire, the glint of a sharp knife before it lodges in one's chest. They clamor for her attention, yet turn it away. She sizzles among them, a spark ready to detonate.
Suddenly, it's all too much. He stumbles out to the adjoining terrace, taking in gulps of fresh air like it can soothe the ache, the crushing feeling in his chest. It's too much, he can't breathe, there's no air filling his lungs, everything and everywhere is just Penelope, Penelope, Penelope --
He takes a few deep breaths. In the quiet of the night, alone and unseen, he allows himself a moment to be unkind. He thinks of all the lives they could've led, the ones where Whistledown didn't exist, the ones where she gave it up for him. They would linger together in the corners of ballrooms, dance the waltz at midnight, and then he would take her home and love her and protect her and keep her. She would look up at him with eyes full of wonder, you're astonishing, Colin , and he would bask in her gaze, in his worth. She would come to him on their wedding day and tells him that nothing is more important to her than them, their family. It was never that important, she would tell him, not like our marriage. Not like our lives together. They would travel the world and retreat to the country in the winter and he would show her his journals and she would look at him, admiration in his eyes, and tell him it's the greatest thing she's ever read, that he's the greatest writer to ever live. He would be an important man with an important life and a beautiful wife. She would be her own person, but always his. Witty, but not loud. Well-versed, but demure. Brilliant, but more importantly, lovely. Without her fire --
It crashes down on him, again and again and again, these worlds so visceral and so simple and so very his. Out here, he is a small, ugly man envious of his wife, too proud to love her, too weak to stop. A sob rises from deep within, and then another, and another until his cheeks and once again, he can't breathe and it's simply too much for him to bear.
He doesn’t hear the footsteps until they are too close.
“Mr. Bridgerton.” He whirls around to face Portia, looking at him impassively. Hastily, he tries to compose himself. He smooths down his hair and hopes she doesn’t notice his embarrassed flush or the tear tracks on his cheeks.
“Portia,” he gasps out. “I was just –”
She narrows her eyes and he snaps his mouth shut.
“Mr. Bridgerton,” she cuts him off. “I was married to an unkind man. He was so weak and cruel, and he couldn’t even take care of his family when we needed his protection. All I wanted was for my daughters to know something better, to know what true security feels like. But Penelope, she opposed me at every turn.” She laughs, a harsh, mirthless sound. “Penelope has always been my most stubborn child. Even barely out of her leading strings, she was always so set in her ways. I tried to get her to learn music and sewing and tried to dress her in bright colors, all to attract a good suitor, but all she would want to do is read. It’s like she always had this,” she grasps for her next word, her fingers twitching in thin air. “— this fire, this anger, and it terrified me. I didn’t know how to rein her in. I did not know how to keep her.”
Colin swallows, his throat incredibly dry. He is, once again, on the verge of tears.
She tilts her head up at him. Up close, he can see the weariness deep in her eyes, the lines on her forehead accumulated over a lifetime. The corners of her mouth twitch, almost lift. “I did not know how to tell her that this world does not forgive young girls for being brilliant. I spent so long trying to contain my daughter that I never got to know her. And she tried, god knows she tried to show me who she is, until one day she simply… left me behind. I never got to see her turn into the person she is today, and it is a regret I will carry with me for the rest of my days.” She pauses, closes her eyes.
When she looks at him again, her eyes are sharp. She is no longer a wife, beaten down into submission, but a mother, a keeper. He suppresses the chill that runs down his spine. “You must not make the same mistake,” she tells him.
His eyes burn. “Portia,” he starts. “I would never –,”
She cuts him off again like he isn’t even present. “Penelope has loved you her entire life,” she says. “I never wanted her to marry you because I was afraid that loving you made her weak. But I was wrong. Loving you has made her strong. Given her the strength be herself.” A pause and then, “You must never ever change that.”
Colin feels the tears run down his face again, but he makes no move to wipe them away. He wants to tell her that Penelope has him for an eternity, to do with what she pleases. That her dreams are his dreams, his life hers. That he was weak, but only for one small, insignificant second. Instead, he grasps Portia’s hands in his and holds them to his chest, lets her see the ugliest, weakest versions of him, teary-eyed and wild-haired and irredeemable.
She looks at him for a few seconds before softly wrenching her hands away, turning around to observe the rest of the guests mingling inside the glass doors. He mirrors her, and for a few minutes, they stand side by side in the quiet, the two people that love Penelope the most. Then, she scoffs out another sound, half-laughter and half-disbelief. “Look at what she made,” she murmurs, shaking her head.
And Colin does. Whistledown isn’t just gossip, isn’t even just power. It is an idea. It is possibility. It is strength. It is why Lady Melchor has finally been able to ask for that annulment. It is why Lady Trowbridge has figured out that she was being fleeced by her solicitor. It is what makes him so certain that his daughter will change the world someday. It is purpose. It is planting a dangerous seed that whispers, unbidden, in a woman’s ear: but why not me.
He rubs his eyes harshly, trying to dry his face. Pretends not to see Portia also discreetly dabbing at the corners of her eyes. “You know,” he finally says wryly. “She’s writing a novel. She won’t admit it to me yet, but she is.”
Portia laughs, half-resigned, half-manic. “Of course she is,” she replies.
One day his wife will be the best novelist in Mayfair. Colin knows this like he knows the back of his hand. They both do.
She starts to leave, and then abruptly stops to whirl around and look at him again. For a second, her features soften, and she looks almost affectionate. He can almost believe that she likes him. “Penelope has loved you her entire life,” she repeats, then reaches out to squeeze his arm. “Maybe it’s time you let her.”
**
The next morning, he wakes up to find Penelope already awake, sitting up in bed and staring at him.
He sits up. His mouth feels like cotton, his eyes heavy. The events of last night are at the forefront of his mind.
“You disappeared yesterday,” she tells him softly, without any accusation in her voice. “I couldn’t find you.”
His heart aches again. He had wanted to spare her his ugly thoughts, but has hurt her regardless. He tries to shrug it off, pastes a smile on his face. “I just needed a minute,” he assures her.
She looks at him for a few more seconds before letting it go. There is quiet between them as she turns away from him. Fastens her robe over her nightgown and crosses the room to sit in front of the mirror. Smoothens her hair. He
“Forgive me,” she blurts out after a few minutes. Colin sits up in bed, confused, but she isn’t looking at him. She stares straight ahead. “I couldn’t choose you.”
His heart lurches in his chest. There is a ringing in his ears, distant but all-encompassing.
She takes a deep breath and her shoulders slump. “Before we were to get married, Eloise told me I must choose between Whistledown and the Bridgerton name. I thought it would be easy, like swapping one name for another. All I’d dreamed about my entire life was to be a Bridgerton, of course I was going to choose you. I even burned my columns. Even later, after writing to Her Majesty, I thought that I could do it. I thought it would be easy, I have loved you so much for so long, but I couldn't. I can't.
His chest aches. His legs tremble. The relief he feels is so palpable, so euphoric that he is boneless, a floating kite with the strings cut off. Nothing will ever matter more than this, more than her. She's not leaving me, he thinks, with breathless wonder. Finally, she turns around to look at him. In the morning light, she’s resplendent, clad in nothing but her nightgown and robe and wild hair. In this light, he can make out every single imperfection, every single freckle on her skin. Her hands are coarse and smudged with ink and angry red papercuts. His brilliant wife is so, so very young. There is an eternity where he will get to love her. There is so much of her he will get to see.
She lifts her hands, as if in penitence, unaware of the thoughts in his head. “I’m sorry I couldn’t choose you over her, over me. I tried so, so hard, but I just --- I love you very much, Colin, but not more than this.” She gestures vaguely at herself.
The calmness that spreads through him is a relief. He sees it now, how small his life would be without Whistledown, without her brilliance pushing him into something, off the ledge. Nothing will ever matter more than this. Nothing will ever matter more than her.
He gets off the bed and comes to stand behind her, and then kneels in front of her so she can look at him in earnest. This is his altar, his place of worship and she is every single of his prayers come true. He reaches forward and encircles her in his arms, holds his entire universe close to his chest.
“You do choose me,” he tells her, and he realizes the words are true as he utters them. “You choose me every time you let me see you like this. Every time you let me read your brilliant columns or share your ideas. You choose me every time you smile. because every part of me is filled by you. “Penelope, I---,” he trails off. His breath catches in his throat and chokes on all the words he can’t bring himself to say. What could he say that would convey to her the enormity of his love? She is his entire soul, living outside his body.
“Sometimes I am overcome,” he admits, desperate. ”But never doubt that I am so proud of you. Please, Penelope, I could not bear it.”
He thinks of all the parts of her that he does get to keep. The way she sneaks his favorite snacks for him during family gatherings, jots down funny things she overhears on her palms so she can come home and tell him about them, tells everyone about her husband the writer. The way she loves him without inhibition, assuredly, fervently, loudly. He thinks of Portia squeezing his arm – maybe it’s time you let her.
He looks up at Penelope now from where he rests on the floor, on his knees with his arms wrapped around her stomach. Her eyes are half-closed and she lightly runs her fingers through his hair. He wants to stay right here for the rest of his life.
He takes a deep breath while his heart threatens to beat out of his chest. “Pen,” he starts. He feels her humming in response, the sound vibrating through him. And then he leaps.
“Could you please help me with my journals?” he asks.
**
Traveling with Myself by Colin Bridgerton is a success.
Penelope, despite his protests, throws him a party to celebrate. She spends hours transforming their home, making it fit for a soirée suitable for both their families and their new friends in Bloomsbury. Spends hours fussing over little details and finding new ways to showcase his book. He, in turn, spends that time fussing over her. She is five months along now, dazzling with their child, radiant with the glow of pregnancy.
As the evening proceeds, he finds himself, uncharacteristically, in the middle of a crowd. He has always been a flirt, charming women with superfluous words and a beguiling smile. This, however, is different. This is real. This, too, is something he is yet to learn. Here, the people aren’t interested in his charm but his thoughts. They want to know his innermost desires, the motivation behind his words, the reason behind his travel. They want to rip him open, know him at his core.
When it finally gets to be too much, Colin excuses himself to get a glass of lemonade and soothe his parched throat. When he’s done, he picks up a second glass and decides to take a turn around the room. He gravitates to the corners, finding momentary comfort in the silence, in being out of view. The entire room lies ahead of him, thrumming with life and murmuring words penned by him.
Every single person he has ever loved is in this room. Here is his family, beaming with pride and the occasional jab at his expense. Here, inexplicably, is Portia Featherington, looking supremely uninterested while still managing to talk about his book to anyone who would listen. Here is his wife, carrying his child. He thinks about all the times they had talked about their shared hopes for their children. In his mind, he can envision a little girl with red curls and blue eyes, so tangible he can reach out and touch her. But there is a small, secret part of him that hopes they win the heir race. He wants his children to have their mother’s name, to honor her extraordinary legacy. He wants her name too, stamped on his skin, spread across his soul.
“There you are,” Penelope exclaims from beside him. He startles out of his dreams. Her brow is furrowed as she looks at him quizzically, but her eyes shine and she holds a well-worn copy of his book. She is the sun, the harbinger of his light, shining on him.
“We were just discussing some of your marvelous adventures in chapter five,” she tells him excitedly, glancing back at a group of their friends who are waiting for her to return. “Maybe you could come read some of it to us?”
He feels, uncannily, like he’s on the precipice of something again. Something he’s searched for is now within reach. Penelope moves to return, but when he doesn’t immediately go with her, she pauses. Turns around and looks at him, hand outstretched.
“Come on,” she says, her voice soft and firm, all at once. “Tell us everything.”
He loves her so relentlessly. He loves her words and her strength and her soft, delicate hands. He loves her for all the children they will have and for all the ways in which she will break his heart. He sees his entire life intertwined within her fingers, their past and present and future, yellow and blue and green. And this, and this, always this.
Here she is, his brilliant wife. Here it is, the rest of his life.
He reaches out and steps into the light with her.