Pluto in Retrograde
(It wakes me up inside -- )
It was a summer morning of no particular consequence in rural France. The sun rose crushed and tired but no less bright and the clouds retreated beyond the horizon, leaving only a dry, sweltering heat and the occasional burst of wind. It was the kind of weather suited to hiding in cool parlours, sipping chilled tea and talking of inconsequential things, perhaps taking a short walk in the shaded gardens out back. It was the kind of day Christine looked forward to; the warmth felt lovely in her bones and the aches in her joints tended to melt away with the humidity.
She wasn't quite sure what made her decline tea and a stroll with her daughter and a music lesson with her granddaughter, usually the highlights of her increasingly shorter days. And she wasn't quite sure how she found herself sitting on the porch steps with a book -- Dickens, of all things: she hated that insufferable English wet-nose. She pulled her hair free from its now-customary bun, letting it tangle in the harsh summer wind, and waited.
Beyond the large sprawling house, there was nothing but half a mile of dirt road unfolding over a field -- a useless waste, in her opinion, she would have preferred the estate overrun with trees and flowers decades ago. However, as the Vicomtess de Chagny, there had been reputations to uphold and now, emerging somehow mostly unscathed from the too-recent war and terror, the other members of her household tended to cling to memories of older, more peaceful times. That much, at least, she could not grudge them.
So it was that she saw him, still a long way and a long time off, knew him before he was more than a smudge on the horizon. She smoothed down her dress with careful hands, tucked her hair behind her ear in an old nervous gesture she hadn't fallen back on in years, and cocked her head to the side, letting a small smile grace her lips. Making herself as comfortable as possible, she settled in with Great Expectations and waited, occasionally glancing up to watch the distant figure making its way toward her.
It was a longer wait than she expected. Nearly eighty pages in, she heard the soft scuffle of feet on stone, the slightly uneven drag of a limp. Christine set her book carefully aside, held onto the railing as she descended the steps. The sun was already halfway down the sky, casting the beginnings of shadows over them both.
After a pause, she was the first to speak. She pursed her lips, opened them, found herself wanting to laugh. "Well, bonjour, monsieur. It's certainly been a while."
He did laugh, a throaty cackle not completely without its former malice. "Oh, Christine," he said, touched her cheek quickly and shyly. "Look at you." His hands brushed her shoulders, neck, flyaway hair, never for more than an instant. "Look at you."
"Not for years, thank you," she said, trying not to flush like a young girl under his gaze. Oh, how could she have forgotten -- the old man's smile widened slightly, if slightly dampered by an assortment of new scars, his hand finally came to rest under her chin, tilting her head up.
"Christine," he breathed again, as if he simply enjoyed the sound of the word on his tongue, and then, "It's good to see you."
At loss for words, she simply shrugged. "You're thinner than you were," she said suddenly, not thinking it would be possible but he had managed somehow, as if he had been boiled down to nothing but bone and gristle. The one cheek she could see had sunken in, his hands were colder and knobbier than before. It was the loveliest sight she had seen in years.
"Only whittling away at the unessential," he told her with a shrug, "nothing important was lost." Even his voice, despite an unmistakable growl in the lower registers, seemed as beautiful as ever. "And you, Christine, time has treated you well."
She snorted -- and again as he slanted a bristly grey eyebrow at the distinctly unladylike sound. "My daughter takes good care of me and my grandchildren are growing up happy. That is all an old woman can ask for, I suppose." Something in his eyes flashed: pity, perhaps? Sighing, she stepped away from him, breaking all contact. "Oh, Erik, why did you come? You can't just waltz back into my life and then leave things the way you found them. It doesn't work that way."
There was no answer. She didn't expect one.
They stood silently, at the base of the steps, under the far reaches of an apple tree, looking at each other over years of built-up silence. Finally, softly, something changed. "Then leave with me." He ignored her sudden bark and laughter and pressed on, a familiar honeyed tone entering his voice. She winced, but he didn't seem to notice. "There's nothing left for you here, Christine. You know there's more to life than tolerant daughters and happy grandchildren."
Her eyes flashed suddenly, dangerously. "Perhaps for you, Erik, but your trifles have been my life. They are my life, monsieur. You should not have come, I was happier with my memories." She smiled, a little sadly. "Good day and aurevoir, old friend." Without giving him time to respond or giving herself to cry like a damned fool, she tottered back up the steps and into the house, closing the door firmly behind her.
It wasn't until she stood at the window, watching him limp back the way he came, that she allowed the tears to fall.
It ended up that Christine did have that music lesson with Marguerite, a small, sweet child she tended to dote on entirely too often for her son's taste. She also sat in the parlour, drinking lemonade, and tried to get past one word of Dickens without her eyes crossing and her vision blurring. Finally, she gave up on anything resembling productivity and rose to stare out the window, where he had finally disappeared back into the heat waves and far-away trees. And there she stayed, until one of the maids came to announce supper.
"Grand-mere," Marguerite said softly -- always softly, dear thing, tugging at Christine's hand as they entered the dining room. "Are you okay, Grand-mere? You look so sad."
Christine did her best to smile at the girl, not such a chore after all, and shook her head. "Don't worry about a foolish old woman, dear heart," she said, pressing a kiss to her fingers before smoothing them over the blonde curls. "I'll be fine."
As everyone bowed their heads in prayer, Christine watched her family, gathered around the table. There was Philippe: a good, if war- hardened man and his wife Jacqueline; her own, dear Charlotte, whose Jean-Luc had been lost in the fighting; silly, gangly Gregoire who was barrelling through Grace with all the usual subtlety of a thirteen-year-old boy; and of course, Marguerite, staring at her plate, a worried twist tainting her pretty mouth. "-Amen," Gregoire finished, his head snapping up automatically.
"Amen," Christine echoed. She let the maid serve her two spoonfuls of roasted potatoes before excusing herself from the table.
Quickly, before she lost her nerve -- oh, God -- she left her book of arias on the piano along with Raoul's old engagement ring -- Marguerite had always coveted it anyways -- and walked out her front door, calmly, carefully, resolutely not looking back.
The moon was new, and so she saw nothing of him until she reached the main road, nearly falling over the waiting carriage in the process. The door opened silently, in the sudden pool of lamplight she could see a hand extended to her. "My lady?" he greeted: apparently the years had done nothing to iron the sarcasm out of her voice. She took his hand and climbed in; as she settled herself on the padded seat, he tapped on the roof and they lurched forward into the night.