Work Text:
They were going to kill Bunny. That I knew. As I sat at the kitchen table only a few hours before, scraping my nail into the varnished wood, they told me in confidence their plan. Calm and collected, like it didn’t even matter. Francis told me of it like he’d rehearsed it countless times. Henry said nothing, only looking down whenever the former got too into detail.
I sat now in one of the guest bedrooms wondering why they told me. Did Camilla know? Had being a constant victim of Bunny’s misogyny drove her mad? Was this her plan to begin with? Lying in the warmth of the covers and staring out the window, gazing into the backyard where Bunny was just this morning, I pondered my part in this.
Then someone knocked. I realised there was only one person it could be. Bunny had long since gone to bed, Henry would not knock at this hour, I could hear Charles and Camilla playing the piano and laughing below me. Francis.
“Come in.”
The door opened gently and in he came. Silk pyjamas, tousled hair and a look of sympathy.
“Richard.” Was all he said.
“Francis. You’re okay?” He nodded, stepping into the room and closing the door behind him.
“I came to ask you that. Henry didn’t scare you off, did he?” I shook my head and neglected to tell him that, in fact, it was him who told me. Henry was an accessory in this plan he found so exciting to discuss. And it seemed I would be too.
“No, uh, he didn’t. Come sit, are you not cold?” The window was open and a bitter draft had been filling the room. Francis was easily cold. He walked over and lay beside me. He smelled of cigarettes. Per usual.
We sat in silence for a while, a rare occurrence in the country house. Between Bunny’s rambling and the hassle of dinner, it wasn’t often where we could sit still at all. “Who else knows?”
“All of us. Expect Bunny, of course.”
That sentence made me think. When did it become all of us, and Bunny? Henry, Camilla, Charles, Francis, Richard. And Bunny. So I asked him.
“It was Italy for Henry. He came back different.” He paused his answer to roll and face me. “Usually, Henry could put up for Bunny heaves more than I. But he never speaks of Italy.”
“Why do you think?”
“You know how Bunny thinks, Richard. About everything. About men. About men like me.”
“Meaning what? Henry is like you? No way.”
“Richard, come on. Henry would be anything for Edmund. You don’t need two eyes to see that.”
I sighed and rolled onto my back. I stared at the ceiling above me and wondered if there was somehow a way I could stop them.
“Don’t stress, Richard.”
“I’m not.”
“You are. Don’t. There’s nothing you could’ve done.” His wording made me feel worse. Speaking in past tense, as if he was already gone.
“Even to you? Couldn’t tug your heartstrings a bit,” I spat, “I mean really, where’s your morality gone, Francis?”
He looked at me with a severe lack of predominant emotion. He appeared sad, angry, and entirely calm all at once.
“I don’t suppose you entirely understand how Bunny infuriates me. Infuriates all of us. He’s crude with Camilla, incessantly nosy with me, talks the head off of Henry. As he has done, everyday, for the whole term. He refuses to take part in the rituals!”
“It’s murder, Francis.”
“Henry doesn’t see it that way.”
“Get out.”
He stopped at this. I only just realised that we had both now sat up. No longer laying in comfort and murmurs, but barking the heads off each other, which may be a perfect example of Bunny’s effect.
“What?”
“I think you heard me.” I notice now, in hindsight, the nerve I had to talk to him this way in his own guest bedroom. But he left anyways. His warmth close behind.
——
It hadn’t been anywhere close to an hour, but it felt like longer. Camilla and Charles had went to bed now. The house lay quiet in a triumphant reminder of my isolation. I felt guilt.
I didn’t even realise I had stood up until my hand grasped the cold door handle. I creaked through the corridor and came to a halt when I realised Francis had been doing the exact same thing. He had come to me. I had come to him.
“Richard.” Was all he said, again, in a whisper now.
We walked in silence to his room. I felt sick as I walked by the bedroom where I knew Bunny was sleeping. Bunny, who I despised so much I admired. I scowled at his every word, and yet, I couldn’t imagine this house without him.
When we got to his room the closeness of earlier in the night was not mirrored. I sat on the floor by his bedside as he explained the ‘redistribution of matter’ Henry claimed.
“You will help, won’t you Richard?”
“Yes.”
He fell asleep not long after, assuring me that he wouldn’t mind if I joined him. I refused. The floor was where I felt I deserved. My knowing of Bunny’s murder is something I will never forgive. I could have warned him. At any time I could’ve grabbed Bunny Corcoran by the shoulders and aired out every bit of their plan. I could’ve set up opportunities for him to redeem himself.
But I didn’t.