15 September, 1894 — Bartonburh

This had been his sister's house. Standing in it, the past tense felt wrong. It was still very much hers, every atom of it, even if she was gone. Pictures of her family on the mantle. Her paintings on the walls. Her half-finished embroidery on the arm of the chair in the parlor. The entire house felt as if it were waiting for her to come back from her walk in the park, where she'd been with her husband when the earth opened beneath them. If he shut the door and walked away it would wait like that forever, eternally on the verge of his sister walking back in through the door.

They couldn't leave the house alone any longer, though. People were coming next week to take things away. Much of it would be sold at auction; the things that couldn't fetch a price would be donated. He was here to collect the sentimental things first, but the task was — overwhelming. It might have been less so if he'd just been picking up things for himself or his remaining siblings, but there was also Cecilia's child to consider. What questions would he have, when he was older? He barely spoke now, but someday he would ask about his parents. Someday he would want to see their things. Ezra couldn't anticipate what he would be curious about, so he was turning over every trinket he saw and tried to imagine it from a dozen different angles.

The problem with that was that anything could be meaningful, if you looked hard enough for meaning. He couldn't pack a box, because so far he hadn't found anything he didn't want to keep. But he couldn't bring the entire house back to the Cotswolds with him.

He needed a minute. His chest was feeling tight. He and grief were familiar bedfellows; he knew well enough when it was tightening it's grip on him. He put down the things he was holding — exactly as they had been, the same positions and angles Cecilia had left them in the last time she'd touched them — and made his way out of the house. On the front porch he closed his eyes and took a deep breath. He sat down against the front door, knees drawn up and his elbows resting on them, and exhaled heavily.

He'd have to go back in. There was a timeline he needed to stick to. But first he needed to breathe.

---

Rosalie hadn't walked this street since before the Pit opened and caused so much destruction. It was an easy one for her to avoid, as it wasn't near her parents' home or Noble's workshop, but she still knew it would've been a lie to believe it was a street she avoided unconsciously. Cecilia had been her favorite of Ezra's siblings, the one she was most excited to call her sister, (not that Rosalie had anything against Johanna, they just hadn't clicked the way her and Cecilia had.) and even though that particular dream had never come to fruition and their friendship had gone with it, Rosalie still couldn't quite believe Cecilia had died.

Died, just as Ambrose had, in a thoughtless, meaningless accident.

Today, however, walking this street was an unavoidable task, for she was to have tea with her mother's old friend who lived only a few houses down from where Cecilia used to.

It might've been easier to floo, but then Rosalie would've had to explain why she hadn't wished to walk on such a beautiful autumn day. She would've had to mention the beautifully kept house she had to walk past and the baggage associated with it. She would've had to endure the pitying eyes and pushy encouragement to move on. Which meant facing the street and all the grief associated with it.

However, as Rosalie spotted Ezra's hunched position on the porch, she couldn't help but wish she had floo'd instead. They hadn't parted well at the last function when he'd approached her, when he'd asked if there was anything else she wanted (you she wished she had said), and he was grieving. Rosalie didn't imagine he would react well to her presence, but - "Hello." She greeted quietly. "I'm sorry about Cecilia."

But - Rosalie had never been able to leave well enough alone.

---

Ezra startled at the noise and looked about to see who had spoken. He found her in the same moment that she'd said Cecilia; not your sister, not her married name. Someone who had known her intimately enough to be on a first name basis, but not so intimately that they were sharing grief on the same level; she'd still offered condolences to him. Of course it was Rosalie.

He was acutely aware that he was a mess. He didn't want her to see him this way. Ezra chambered to his feet and pressed the heels of his hands against his eyes briefly to try and bring himself back fully to the present moment. "Th — thank you. I — yeah." Why had he started a second sentence? There wasn't anything else to say.

---

His struggle was obvious and Rosalie had to dig her nails into her palms to keep from reaching for him, from offering a lifeline in whatever nightmare he was currently living. She remembered the aftermath of Ambrose's death too well and, even though his death didn't involve spouses or children, she could certainly empathize with the profound sense of loss.

"Is there someone here with you?" He certainly didn't seem well enough to be here alone.

---

Someone to look after him, she meant. "No," he admitted. Maybe that would have been a good idea, to have some kind of support, but there wasn't anyone. Hanna and Byron were both grieving, too. This was his task, not theirs. His mother, perhaps... but the truth was that his relationship with his mother wasn't like that. It would never have occurred to him to ask her for help with something like this. He had the sense that she would be too practical — undoubtedly more efficient, but too hasty. Things would get thrown away, things they couldn't get back later. His mother didn't keep things their father had used, when he'd been well. What was the point of that, she would have said — he's not using it now. He's not getting better. Cecilia wouldn't be getting better, either.

No, he'd rather be here alone.

"It's fine," he told Rosie. "Just needed a minute."

---

She knew she ought to leave, that her intrusion on his grief was the last thing he likely wanted at present. However, in the years since their parting, Rosalie hadn't yet been able to release her hold on the invisible string binding them together. Even when she knew it was slipping through her fingers at a dizzying rate, even when she knew he'd fully let go in the aftermath of the modiste. Aside from today, Ezra had been infuriatingly fine since this spring. He'd been able to approach her and attempt a conversation without the heaviness of grief upon his shoulders. Rosalie wished she was capable of the same.

"Would it be alright if I took a minute with you?" She asked from her spot still at the bottom of the stairs.

---

Ezra's breath caught. It was an impossible thing for her to have asked. There was no reason for the two of them to sit together here — they were nothing to each other now. If she stayed on the porch with him anyone could see them sitting together, and wonder what they were doing, just the two of them in front of an empty house. If she went inside — well, they couldn't go inside. Ezra wasn't ready to go back inside yet, to be surrounded by his sister's memories again. To start up the process of turning her life into mere memories again.

He exhaled. It was an impossible question, but he couldn't turn her away; he didn't want her to go.

"If we don't talk," he conceded.

---

Even as Rosalie walked up the stairs and took a seat besides him, she remained unsure of both her actions and his request. Remaining here with him would cause more issues than leaving would, especially seeing as she would most certainly be late to tea. And if they weren't going to speak at all then what was the point? She could understand not talking of Cecilia or their past, but surely they could manage some sort of conversation? Something even as mundane and useless as the weather even.

Rosalie wanted to reach for his hand, to provide him whatever sort of comfort she still could, but remained with her hands folded in her lap.

---

She honored his request; she didn't even verbalize her agreement. Ezra leaned against the frame of Cecilia's front door and let out a long breath. There was an inexplicable relief in having her company. She understood — or he could pretend she did, anyway, as long as they weren't speaking. A question would have ruined it. A poorly placed observation might have done the same. But standing here an arm's reach away from her with nothing but silence between them was enough. There was something she brought to the air on the porch, just by virtue of her presence and her silence, and that thing was that he was no longer alone facing down the enormity of Cecilia's house.

He closed his eyes and took a breath.

A long moment later, he opened his eyes again. "Thank you."

---

It was a concentrated effort not to turn her head in his direction throughout the few minutes in silence. He hadn't specified that she couldn't study the changes in his appearance since their last interaction, but Rosalie was almost confident the weight of her stare would push him over the edge. So, rather than look at him Rosalie focused on the rose bushes lining the edge of the garden, the late summer blooms vibrant and beautiful against the house of shadows behind them.

She turned her head only when he spoke and answered quietly, "you're welcome." The time had come now for her to leave, for them to return to their separate tasks and lives. And still Rosalie sat besides him on the porch. Still, her hands itched to hold his.

---

He felt less volatile now that he'd taken a moment of quiet with her here, but still jittery; it was like his skin itched all over, but not in a way he could scratch. He wanted physical contact, but there was nowhere to get it. His family had never been the sort to embrace — all too caught up in their own heads to manage that kind of support. Obviously he could not ask Rosalie.

"I should go back in," he said. He was probably as ready now as he was likely to ever be.

---

He should go back in, she ought to attend to her tea, they ought to return to their lives. And yet, Rosalie didn't have the strength to stand just yet. This was a glimmer of how things were meant to be, a single glimpse into what their lives might have looked like if she hadn't been so foolishly immature and reckless. She would have supported him through this loss as any loving, supportive, doting wife would. He would have been able to lean on her as he was presently. They would have had one another.

And, because of her, they didn't.

She didn't reply to his comment or give any sign of her understanding until a long pause had passed. When it did, she looked at him for a second before asking quietly, "would it be alright if we stayed for a minute longer?"

---

Ezra had waited out the silence, in no rush to spring back into action until she had acknowledged his departure. When she finally spoke he answered with nothing more than a nod. He settled back against the door. He didn't need an explanation; he hadn't given her one. He trusted that she wouldn't have asked it lightly.

After a very long moment, he said softly, "People might see." He didn't care — he had no reason to mind his reputation, these days — but Rosie might.

---

Rosalie was certain rumors were already swirling about her stopping here today. With their history being what it was, his very recent tragic loss, and her general reclusiveness lately, they were nearly always being watched if out in public. Her mother would question her relentlessly on it later, Delphine would give her odd looks, her father would huff. But, quite frankly, Rosalie didn't care.

"Okay." She replied with a small shrug.

---

He frowned faintly at her non-answer. It was clear that she didn't care what people said, but he thought she should. Her life shouldn't have been ruined by their failed engagement, years later. His life hadn't been — he'd been ruined long before she came around.

"You aren't still..." he started, an unfinished question. She had been looking into ways to cure him, to fix the thing that plagued his family; he'd assumed she would give it up when she came across no answers, like he had. It had been a long while since she'd started, but her continued presence on the porch made him wonder. He couldn't finish the question, though; couldn't talk about exactly what it was she had been doing without referencing the curse. And then it would all come out wrong, and he wouldn't even know what he'd said.

---

Rosalie turned her head towards him but allowed silence to elapse for another minute as she considered his unfinished question. There were two ways he could've finished it, both equally upsetting for nearly the same reasons. On one hand, he could be asking if she was still in love with him, which she felt was a fairly obvious answer. But to ask it so blatantly ... did he mean something by asking? Did he still love her too?

Rosalie bit the inside of her cheek, a nervous habit she thought she'd abandoned years ago. Ezra wouldn't ask that so openly, would he? But, if he wasn't asking about that, then he had to be referring to her research. The stacks of notes and papers she had on her desk, the ideas that were nearly always swirling around the back of her mind. She hadn't actively worked on it in the past few weeks but she did still hope to find a solution. A ritual. Something.

In either case, the answer to both questions was a quiet "yes."

---