Now she took him in her arms and laid down on the cool cotton sheets of her childhood bed. As she lay there, the sun began to set outside the wide window, where freshly cut flowers sat in Le Creuset vases. And as the sun set, her thoughts spun. It had been a whirlwind twelve hours since she received the phone call with news of her mother’s heart attack and she hopped on the first morning flight to Ohio. The transition from her new life suddenly into her old life felt surreal and jarring. She couldn’t reconcile the person she was now with the person she used to be, and she couldn’t get the image of her father’s disappointed, resentful face out of her head.
At the same time that her old life felt light-years away, it was also hard to believe that it had been eight whole years since things had gone sour between her and her father. In some ways, it felt like just yesterday that she had “let her whole family and community down” by not agreeing to follow her father’s plan for her. What he wanted was for her to marry her high school (and on-and-off-again college) boyfriend, Carl, who came from a respectable family of lawyers, doctors, and war heroes who had been the pride and joy of Pemberley, Ohio, for generations. Darcy had tried hard to feel passionate about Carl, tried to convince herself that he was the one, but at the end of the day their days together felt dry and their nights left much to be desired. Mr. Fitzwilliam’s wishes for his daughter were twofold, and the second fold involved her doing what a truly good and honorable woman would do: give birth to children and dedicate her life to raising them. Like the first fold of his plan, this didn’t work for her either.
“I don’t have to marry him, Dad,” she had said, sitting across from him at the long, stretching dining room table.
“No, you don’t,” he had replied triumphantly, as if the card he held would surely win this game. “Not if you don’t mind living on your own money.”
“You mean—”
“That’s right. I’ll restrict you from access to your inheritance, and I certainly won’t finance your life while you gallivant around New York City doing Lord knows what.”
Darcy had considered this momentarily, but ultimately knew what she had to do. Her happiness was in jeopardy, after all. She rejected her family money, broke up with Carl for the dozenth time, and moved to New York in search of what it meant to be independent.
“We made the right decision, didn’t we, Little Lion?” Sometimes she wasn’t so sure. After all, this was her first Christmas with people other than herself, and here she was talking to a stuffed lion, the only thing she had ever truly been able to confide in. It wasn’t that she didn’t have any friends; it was just that nobody could understand her the way an inanimate, nonresponsive object could.
“You’re pathetic,” she said to herself, then apologized for the insult. Her therapist, Dr. Springs, liked to talk to her about self-love and going easy on oneself, something Darcy knew almost nothing about. In the way of self-care, all Darcy really knew was setting goals and working toward them, then rewarding or punishing herself depending on the outcome.
“Don’t beat yourself up,” Dr. Springs liked to say. “You can’t pour from an empty cup. Take care of yourself first, otherwise you’ll have nothing to work with.”
She repeated these messages in her head, telling herself that she’d have to relax and put her life back in New York aside if she wanted to be of any real help to her mom at all. Her mom would be okay, wouldn’t she? If Mrs. Fitzwilliam was telling the truth, then she was on the mend and would be good as new by Christmas. This would be a onetime thing and life would go on as usual. But Darcy knew all about her mom’s bad habits and faltering health. She’d been a lifelong smoker, had a sweet tooth the size of Mount Everest, and was one of those women who made it look glamorous to start drinking Belvedere at ten in the morning. When Darcy had held her hand upstairs, it had felt cold and frail. A small wave of fear rolled through the pit of Darcy’s stomach.
She unzipped her Louis Vuitton suitcase and took out her favorite Kate Spade deco dot pajamas. She took out her toothbrush and the lavender-scented, self-cooling eye mask that she never slept without. As she carried these items to bed, she felt exhaustion rise up as if from nowhere to claim her. It closed in around her foggy head, causing her eyelids to droop suddenly. I’ll just sit down for one minute, she thought, letting the weight of her body plop down onto the bedding. She let her eyes close, and before she had time to protest, she fell asleep, clutching her belongings to her chest.
* * *
The next morning, Darcy woke, startled and disoriented, at the first sign of sunlight. Where am I? she wondered for a brief moment, before the reality of waking life came flooding back. There was a knock at her door.
“Who is it?” she called out.
“Lorna, dear.”
“Just a second!” Darcy looked down at her fully clothed self. She tore off her clothes and slipped into the Kate Spade pajamas, not wanting word to get around that she had fallen asleep in her clothes. “Okay, you can come in,” she said, once she felt presentable, more like a civilized human being and less like the sleep-deprived workaholic she was.
The door opened and there stood Lorna with a silver breakfast tray, supplied with a pot of steaming-hot coffee and a sprig of honeysuckle.
“You didn’t have to do that!” Darcy insisted, standing up to meet Lorna halfway.
“Your mother insisted,” Lorna said, brushing off Darcy’s attempt to help her and setting the silver tray down on Darcy’s nightstand.
“How is she doing?” Darcy sat cross-legged on the bed and picked up an orange from the tray.
“Honestly, dear, she’s not doing very well. Nothing to worry about, really, but Dr. Law doesn’t want her going to the party tonight. He thinks it’s better she rest. Gather her strength.”
“Lucky,” Darcy said, before she could stop herself.
“Sorry, dear?” Lorna looked alarmed.
“Oh, ha,” Darcy scrambled to explain, “of course I didn’t mean she’s lucky to be ill. I just meant that I myself am sort of … uncomfortable about going to the party, so I meant my mom is lucky that she has a good excuse not to go. I didn’t mean for it to be insensitive. I’m worried about her, of course, I hate to think—”
“Darcy.” Lorna’s tone was gentle, warm, and forgiving. “I’ve known you long enough to know that you’re anything but insensitive.”
“Really? Most people think I’m a coldhearted bitch. Excuse my language.”
“Well, those people don’t know the real you. They only know your tough exterior you’ve developed from years of having to fend for yourself. But I’ve known you since you were a baby, don’t forget. You can’t fool me.”
“Well, thank you, Lorna,” Darcy said earnestly. “That means a lot to me.”
“You’re very welcome. Now, why don’t you want to go to this party?”
“The same reason I never come home!” Darcy explained, throwing her hands up. “Because half the people in this town take it as a personal offense that I left! And they’re all going to be at the party. Not to mention my own dad, who uses every opportunity he possibly can to try to make me feel bad for leaving. And if my mom’s not well enough to go to the party, why should I? She’s the whole reason I’m here, isn’t she? I should stay upstairs with her and keep her company.”
“First of all, your mother knew you would say that, and she wants me to tell you that she insists you attend the party. She’s been wanting you at an annual Christmas party for eight years, and now that you’re here, she won’t take no for an answer.”
“What? Why?”
“Because,” Lorna explained, “she wants you to reconnect with the people who love you, the place where you came from.”
“Oh boy.” Darcy rolled her eyes, but she had a gnawing feeling that her mother was right, that maybe she actually could benefit from reconnecting to her roots. Pemberley wasn’t perfect, and she’d had her reasons to flee, but living here she’d never been half as lonely as she was in New York. Her life back in
Pemberley had been slower, sure, but it had feeling, it had substance. It had late-night conversations at the Tavern and all-day picnics in the fall. And, lastly, her life in Pemberley had familiar faces with good intentions, people who knew her and always wanted what was best for her, even though they never understood her, not really.
“Now, second of all, I hope you don’t take this the wrong way, but besides your father, nobody cares that you left. They’re all over it. They have their own lives to worry about. And nobody thinks you’re a freak; they’re all too busy thinking about themselves to think of you at all.”
“Lorna!” Darcy laughed.
“It’s true, dear. Nobody blames you for leaving home and following your dreams. If anything, you’re probably respected for it by now.”
“I hope you’re right, Lorna.” Darcy smiled.
3
Darcy descended the spiral staircase at five thirty in the afternoon, not a second earlier than she had to. She had reluctantly taken her dad’s advice to go shopping at Bloomingdale’s and was now wearing an Herve Leger cocktail dress with an open back and a tight fit. Perfectly hugging and outlining her slender curves, it was just the right amount of provocative. Trying to make the sale, the shopgirl had emphasized the words “deep-sea blue” and “flirty cutout,” but Darcy hadn’t needed any convincing. She had swiped her Amex without trying on the dress.
The entertainment hall was decked floor to ceiling in silver and gold, and the waitstaff bustled around in black and white. The guests, who grew in number by the minute, held champagne flutes and china teacups filled to the brim with eggnog, greeting one another with practiced delight and forced excitement that echoed throughout the great room. Darcy zigzagged through the crowd, nodding at vaguely familiar faces she hadn’t seen in a decade and dodging those that were more familiar, who she was more comfortable avoiding. If she were to spend a whole night talking to people she didn’t want to talk to, and do so without dwelling on the fact that her mom was weak and recovering from a heart attack that very well could have killed her, she would need to start on the eggnog ASAP. It was nice to revisit home and to be with her mother, who she adored, but every hour away from work was an anxious one for Darcy, and there was nothing she hated more than being stuck around people she knew probably gossiped about her behind her back. It’s December nineteenth, she said to herself. You’ll be out of here by Christmas. You can do this.
She found the bar and ordered her first drink of the night. The milky bourbon warmed her throat and spread through her body in comforting, tingly waves. Just as she took that first gulp, she looked up and saw Chris Mayfair—who had been her first kiss, among other firsts, in the ninth grade—striding toward her with a big grin on his face.
Darcy had been single for almost six years by this point, but that didn’t mean she hadn’t had her fair share of boyfriends, not to mention a fair share of broken hearts she’d left behind. Chris had always been handsome, but now, as he approached her, he looked more picture perfect than ever before, a tan, toned, chiseled specimen of a man who looked like he had walked straight out of a Ralph Lauren catalog and into the Fitzwilliam Christmas party.
“Look who it is!” He pulled Darcy in for a hug as if they’d stayed close throughout all these years.
“Chris! Hi!” She put on her best smile, even as she recoiled from his embrace. It wasn’t that she didn’t like Chris; it was just that she was cagey around anyone who was so quintessentially Pemberley. The crew cut, the cardigan, the Colgate-white teeth. She had called things off with him at the end of ninth grade because of his unappealing passion for baseball and the fact that he was, when all was said and done, a dull conversationalist.
“I can’t believe how long it’s been. How’s New York treating you?”
“It’s, uh … it’s pretty great, actually. I’m—”
“You know, I’ve always wanted to go to the Big Apple. See a show on Broadway. I heard they have an ice cream parlor where you can get bowls of ice cream as big as your head. Is that true?”
“It’s true.” She nodded, trying not to grimace. “Serendipity.”
“It is like serendipity, bumping into you after all this time.”
“No, I meant … that’s the name of the ice cream parlor.”
“Annie! Over here!” He wasn’t listening to her anymore, but instead was waving over a pretty blond woman with an elegant giraffe neck, who looked lost in the crowd, helpless as a deer in the headlights. She saw Chris and slipped through the growing crowd toward him. Once she was standing there, Darcy could see the blinding diamond on her finger and the pregnant curve of her stomach.
“Darcy, this is my wife, Annie.” He beamed, putting his arm around her. “Annie, this is Darcy.”
“The Darcy?” she asked, extending her hand for Darcy to shake. “I’ve heard so much about you.”
“You have?”
“But of course she has,” said Chris. “You’re Darcy Fitzwilliam! Not only the only Pemberley High graduate to leave home, but the only one to make it big all on her own. You’re the only one of us not living off Daddy’s dime, as far as I know. Not to mention you’re the only one of us who, you know, hasn’t settled down.”
“Very admirable.” Annie nodded, though the tone in her voice suggested she didn’t find it admirable as much as pitiful.
“Ah.” Darcy smiled graciously, then tried to change the subject. “So, you’re having a baby! Congratulations!” She took a sip of her eggnog.
“It’s our fourth, actually,” Chris informed her proudly.
“And our first girl!” Annie added.
“Fourth?” Darcy balked, almost spitting out her drink.
“Yes!” the couple cheered in unison.
“You’ve been raising three boys? I can’t imagine how you have time for—”
“Oh, well, we have help,” Annie interjected. “It’s not so hard when you have help.”
“Of course.” Darcy finished off her eggnog.
“And Annie stays home with them,” Chris chimed in. “It’s not like she has to work.”
“Of course.” Darcy nodded along, trying not to look like she wanted nothing more than to disappear into thin air.
“When do you think you’ll start a family?” Annie asked earnestly. “It truly is the most rewarding experience. And I know a lot of people say that, and you’re like ‘Well, that can’t be true,’ but it is; it really is. I wouldn’t trade it for the world.”
“Well, isn’t that lovely?” Darcy gave her a thin smile. “I’m just not quite there yet. Things are really busy at work, and I don’t exactly have a man lined up.”
“Oh.” Annie looked concerned. “But you’ve started thinking about it, haven’t you? We women don’t have all the time in the world, unfortunately.”
“Why are you still single?” Chris asked. “You were always so popular with the boys.” Darcy wasn’t sure if she could detect a hint of gloating in his voice or if it was only in her imagination.
“Maybe I’ve lost my charm!” She laughed awkwardly. Annie and Chris just blinked. “Excuse me,” she said. “I think it’s time for a second drink.”
4
The eggnog was strong enough to get her through an average Christmas party, but the night was young and this party was already shaping up to be anything but average. So she ordered bourbon on the rocks and did her best to stay invisible. She saw her twenty-one-year-old brother, James, arrive with his fiancée, Michelle, then saw her seventeen-year-old brother, William, arrive with what must have been his girlfriend du jour, and made a quick break for the stairs, deciding she’d hide out with her mom for the rest of the evening, whether she was welcome there or not.
“Darcy!” It wasn’t her brother’s voice. In fact, it was the only voice she wanted to hear. She turned around to see Bingley Charles, her very best friend from high school and college.
“Oh my God, Bingley!” She jumped off the stairs and tackled him with a tipsy hug. He hugged her back, and they stood
there embracing for several seconds.
“I can’t believe you’re here!” He shoved her playfully.
“Me? I can’t believe you’re here!”
“Well, I’m here every year. Haven’t missed a single Fitzwilliam Christmas party.”
“Really?” She was shocked. “Why?”
“Unlike you, I come home for the holidays. Your mom has always sent me an invitation, so I make an appearance.”
After college, Bingley had moved to Los Angeles to pursue a career in acting, and she hadn’t seen him since.
“I had no idea.” She stared, wondering how she could have become that disconnected from her best friend.
“How would you? You’re too busy being one of the most powerful women in New York City!” He grinned warmly. “You know, when most people call their friends that, they don’t mean it literally.”
“Oh stop.” She tried to downplay her status, to not attract too much attention. “I’m not that powerful.”
“That’s not what Forbes magazine says,” he reminded her. “They don’t put just anyone on their covers, you know.”
“You’re too nice to me,” she said. “You always have been.”
“Well, you’re one of the only people on this earth that I can stand, so most niceness goes to you by default.”
They laughed, and Darcy squeezed his hand lovingly.
If Chris Mayfair was catalog model handsome, Bingley was movie star handsome. He had undeniably sculpted good looks, but unlike Chris, those looks came with character and personality, quirks and asymmetries that made his face just as lovable and unique as it was handsome.
“And…” Bingley surveyed the room with a grim glare. “From the looks of it, you’re the only bearable human being at this party.”