February 22nd, 1891 — Ari Fisk's House, Bartonburg

He'd owled first, this time, to be absolutely certain that he was not going to show up in the middle of some obscure Jewish holiday. Alfred had half expected Ari Fisk to turn down his request for an audience, just because he could. When he'd received the indication that he could come by after Fisk's workday at the hospital concluded, he was vaguely uneasy. It was what Alfred had wanted, of course, but he couldn't help but suspect there might be something else at play — some sort of a trap. Being able to waltz in to Ari Fisk's sitting room with only a day's advance notice felt too easy, and there was no part of this courtship process so far that had been easy.

Alfred had thought through about a thousand different pathways this conversation could take. He thought he was prepared for anything. He was still incredibly nervous. He'd ended his own workday early to ensure he was presentable: clean clothing, without any notable wear, and no sea salt dried on his skin. There wasn't much to be done about his hair, unfortunately — it was by nature not presentable. If cutting it short might have made the difference between this conversation going smoothly or poorly he might have given it serious thought, but he didn't think the way he looked had much to do with anything, really — how much difficulty Ari Fisk wanted to give him during this conversation was out of his hands, at this point. The other man would have decided from the moment he'd agreed to meet with him.

" — I guess I'm here to ask for your advice," Alfred said, awkwardly. They must have already exchanged pleasantries, because he was here in the parlor, but his stomach was so tied in knots that he honestly couldn't have said what words either of them had spoken so far.

Ari Fisk / Elias Grimstone (feel free to delay replying as long as you need for the other thread!)

  

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MJ made the most Alfredy of sets and then two years later she made it EVEN BETTER

He had told Zelda he would try to help, however he could manage it. He did not know if this had come about at her suggestion or entirely at Darrow’s own will, but either way, given his resolution, he had no good reason to turn it down, however little he might be looking forward to it.

And Dionisia was working a late shift tonight, so Ari could not count on her to act as a buffer here. But perhaps this time that was for the best, because although she had been present at that Passover debacle, she had not been witness to the confrontation at the hospital and all that had happened with Zelda long before it, and so they had never quite seen eye to eye on this.

All that aside, Ari had resolved to come into this evening’s encounter with an open mind - or at least the hope of one, only and only if Darrow was going to be trying too. He looked smart enough, Ari noted with a hint of surprise, and had come in looking a great deal more uneasy than he usually seemed to be in Zelda’s company, though that was no surprise.

Ari had just made a perfunctory offer to ring for tea - he was not about to sit here and offer to drink with him, as though they were friends - but truthfully Darrow did not look any more inclined to sit around drinking tea than Ari felt in the mood to, so thankfully they came to the crux of it before they could be crushed by the weight of the awkwardness in the air caving in.

“Alright,” Ari said neutrally, taking a seat on the sofa opposite Darrow, though not feeling any more comfortable for it. But if he sat down he was less likely to succumb to the urge to hex him, so it was probably sensible. “What on, exactly?”

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   J. Alfred Darrow

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Ari Fisk had not laughed at him, so that was something. He hadn't had any reason to suppose he would, except that Alfred felt so ridiculous and utterly laughable himself. He had never known Ari Fisk to be particularly prone to laughter, though, and certainly not on any matter that involved him — or Zelda, for that matter.

"I want to marry Zelda," he began. He thought, but did not say, obviously. That was the whole purpose of courting someone, after all, and unlike Uncle Hamish the Fisks knew precisely what great lengths he and Zelda had gone to in order to get themselves courting to begin with, so the fact that he had serious intentions was unlikely to come as a surprise. Still, it might not be a particularly welcome statement, given how icy his reception still was with most of them. He had never been intentionally invited to anything in order to have an opportunity to interact with Zelda, and he saw no sign that was apt to change soon. They'd strung together a fair few interactions at parties hosted by third parties, but that was a slow way to win them over, to say the least. If he was a typical suitor he might have been welcome to visit her in her parlor every week-end, and instead they were sneaking a few moments together in her garden at midnight. Which wasn't going to happen again, no matter how much he had to drink. Zelda had said she might work something out so they could see each other, just before they'd parted on Friday night, but now that he'd sobered up Alfred understood the risks too well to encourage that. And Uncle H was right, much as he was loathe to admit it — if they didn't let him marry Zelda, the continued association was doing her no favors.

"I want advice about how to convince your father," he said. He flexed one hand awkwardly against the top of his trousers. What he really needed, probably, was an intermediary. He hadn't had a single conversation alone with Brannon Fisk ever, actually, which didn't make it easy to advocate for himself — but he knew better than to ask Ari Fisk for that.

  

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MJ made the most Alfredy of sets and then two years later she made it EVEN BETTER

“I’m glad to hear it,” Ari said dryly, though glad was not the word. That said - open mind, Ari, have an open mind! - he did believe Darrow’s sincerity, and was impressed that he was still admitting it freely, still undeterred, still here after the way his general presence had been received. Maybe it made sense, that Zelda had found someone as stubborn as she was. (Of course, Zelda and he had recently been doing a little more together than they were supposed to, so he was not altogether convinced they were taking it quite as seriously as they should.)

But - they were in love, Ari supposed. Or at least Zelda was. No, Darrow must be, to put himself through all this. (Ari wasn’t sure he would have put himself through the Fisk family if he’d been an outsider desperate to marry one of them, to be quite frank.)

Darrow was definitely serious, if he was talking about convincing their father. “Because you’ve been doing so well with everyone else in the family?” Ari asked, arching an eyebrow - although not meaning to be unduly snide. “What I mean,” he explained, “is that he’s not the most suggestible man. You’d probably have better luck starting with the Minister.” He laughed briefly, as if it were a joke. Of course, Ross also answered to Ros, and as far as Ari knew, Ros hadn’t grown any fonder of Darrow either, so even that probably wouldn’t make up half the ground he needed for Brannon Fisk to ever agree.

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Alfred frowned, though nothing Fisk was telling him was news, exactly. Alfred knew he had not made much progress on the task of ingratiating himself to all of her siblings, but if that was a necessary prerequisite, he might have to consider Uncle H's admonishment about the undesirability of a long courtship a little more seriously. Truthfully, though, he had not been expecting Ari to give him any piece of advice that would make Brannon Fisk like him. He was working from too much of a deficit to have any timely progress in that department. He was hoping, instead, that there might be a way to reason with him. If there were a series of boxes he could go down a list and tick off, one by one, he would — he just needed to know what the boxes were. When he'd initially asked to court her, her father had asked rather pointedly about his living situation. Things like that he could fix, and if he had some confidence that the list was finite and that he might someday reach the end of it, he was happy to start moving through them immediately. He lived in a shared flat because it was convenient and saved money, but if that was the only thing standing between him and a proposal, he'd have a lease on a proper house by the end of the week.

If, on the other hand, half the boxes on the list were things like convince the Minister to like you, it wasn't going to be half so easy. He could change a lot of things about his current situation, but he could not change who he was, nor could he change the things he'd done. If those were insurmountable obstacles and he was never going to earn even Brannon Fisk's grudging permission to propose... he was going to need to have some rather difficult conversations with Zelda, sooner rather than later.

He bit his tongue for a moment, wondering how to convey this sentiment without sounding glib. It wasn't that he didn't care about having a passably good relationship with her family, or that he wouldn't have put in the work to repair it if he thought it was manageable — he just thought, realistically, that ship had sailed and wasn't pulling into port again for a good long while.

"I'm not interested in suggesting," he said eventually. "I want to... build a case, I suppose, like a solicitor. I know he doesn't like me. I don't think he will anytime soon," he said, with a shrug. "But I want to walk in and say, look, I've got it all figured out, and if I've thought through everything and I've got answers for all of his questions then he won't be able to say no," he explained, gesturing through the process vaguely with one hand as if he supposed it might be just that simple. Point A, point B, point C, marry Zelda.

"...Unless you think it won't matter," he added, after a slight pause. "In which case, I'd like to know that, too."

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MJ made the most Alfredy of sets and then two years later she made it EVEN BETTER

Ari might have pointed out that if Darrow had been smarter about this, he should have built up a case like that before waltzing in and attempting to court her the first time - rather than just going ahead and courting her even after Brannon had denied his permission. The bad first impressions would take some undoing for all of them, that was clear: but it sounded like Darrow could see that well.

But would their father still refuse a suitor’s proposal if it were a sound one in all regards but for a personal dislike of his character? That was a good question. “I can’t speak for him,” Ari admitted first, wary of guessing at his father’s mind at this point in time, and of making or breaking Darrow’s hopes without being certain one way or the other, “but I think having a strong case for it would help immensely. If you at least prove that you can properly support her... he’d like you better for that, anyway. And he has always hoped that Zelda would marry one day.”

Marry respectably, that was, but since Zelda was unlikely to have any other suitors appear out of the blue at this stage, their father probably couldn’t be as picky as he might have liked. (Poor Xena was only now on the brink of marriage after a run of bad luck in that realm, so being picky had hardly served her that much better.) And if Darrow could both make an effort to tone down, if not negate, the aura of - unruliness - about him and his lifestyle, and avoid making any more waves in the wrong direction when it came to his attachment to Zelda, Ari supposed he still counted as respectable, just about.

“Have you got it all figured out?” he asked, curiously. It was one thing to say it all, but rather different to actually follow through.

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That was an excellent question, and Alfred would like to have answered it confidently, but the best he could do, really, was: "I think so." Which wasn't much, but his voice was riddled with optimism. He'd given this a good deal of thought in the abstract, and much more serious thought in the past two days, since Uncle H's admonishment about lengthy courtships.

"I've got a stable income," he pointed out. "But I got the impression he didn't approve of my being gone so often to earn it. So I've got an idea about that," he said, leaning forward and putting his elbows on his knees as he explained. "Sailing instruction at the Sanditon. It would have me here every May through September, at least. And we could live at the terrace."

He paused, anxious. He thought Herbert Fudge would agree — they'd always been on good terms, and Alfred had lived at the Sanditon before. He hadn't actually asked, though, so this was all theoretical — no sense volunteering for a job he didn't actually particularly want unless it would make a difference with Brannon Fisk. Hence being here talking to Ari; he wanted to know there was a chance, before he went rearranging his life.

"What do you think?" he asked nervously.

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MJ made the most Alfredy of sets and then two years later she made it EVEN BETTER

He had to smile wryly at that impression. “No, I wouldn’t say that he did,” Ari agreed, relieved Darrow had already recognised that so he didn’t have to be the one to put it plainly. If he kept sailing, Zelda at least was busy with her Ministry job in the meantime - for now, probably, depending on when they had children - but it would be a lonely life for her, if he were always leaving her behind.

But, it seemed, Darrow had considered this - even seemed hopeful or nervous or both to be saying it - and the idea he had come up with was... not an awful one, actually. Oddly, Ari could picture Zelda living at the Sanditon quite easily. A sailing instructor was still probably not amongst Brannon’s ideal career for a son-in-law, but Ari was surprisingly encouraged by the fact that he seemed entirely willing to sacrifice his usual routines to smooth over the picture a little. And better the picturesque safety of the Sanditon terrace than whichever borough of London Darrow lived in now in some little flat.

“It’s not a bad thought,” Ari admitted, forgetting to make it sound begrudging. “I can’t say he won’t still have a few complaints about it,” he mused, “- but he complained about moving to Hogsmeade for months and still did in the end, so that’s hardly insurmountable. And - you expect you would be happy doing that in the long term?” He knew little enough about Darrow’s job now - knew more about the naval career and the presumed-death and all the rumours about cannibalism and whatnot that were probably sheer embellishment anyway - but whatever he did now, it would probably be quite a change to be ambling about at the Sanditon instead of truly travelling.

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   J. Alfred Darrow

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Alfred bit his tongue. If they were just speaking about the career aspect of it, the short answer was no. He'd tried giving sailing lessons before, to appease Evander when his brother had needled him about working closer to home and doing something less dangerous. He didn't hate it, but it wasn't real sailing, either. Half the job was making young socialites who wanted to seem accomplished feel good about themselves, and Alfred wasn't really the type to find any pleasure in pandering to socialites. And the sailing itself was dull; tottering about in the shallows and missing the wind and turning lazy circles until they decided to pull in again.

But if all he cared about was his career, he wouldn't have been in England right now at all. He could have gone off on another expedition, if all he wanted was waves and wind in his sails. He wanted more than that. He wanted Zelda.

"I'd be happy to be with her," he said with a shrug and half a smile. It always came back to that, in the three and a half years he'd known her; he was quite hopelessly in love, and there was nothing to be done about it now.

  

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MJ made the most Alfredy of sets and then two years later she made it EVEN BETTER

There was not quite the element of enthusiasm Ari had expected in the way he answered - no eagerness to teach people, no obvious excitement about making a home at the Sanditon - but maybe that was telling, too. In a good way, if marrying Zelda was more important than what he did from day-to-day; if he was willing to sacrifice commitments to other things he loved for another. He was... more sincere a man than Ari had originally conceived, given everything. More candid, more honest, no pretensions in his manner.

It was good their courtship had given them plenty of time to think about what they wanted, and the sacrifices Mr. Darrow was now considering - because too rushed or too thoughtless and it seemed likely that they might come to resent each other for any changes they were forced to make. Maybe it was a good sign, too, that Zelda had been entirely exasperated with the whole courtship arrangement just the other day and even then none of that frustration had been directed at Darrow in the least. 

“You love her, then?” Ari said. It was hardly even a question, and perhaps not one he was asking for the benefit of Brannon, either. But in spite of Ari’s expectation of the answer (he had better love her deeply, particularly if he had had no compunction in sleeping with her several years ago), he fancied it couldn’t hurt to gauge the strength of Darrow’s feeling from hearing it straight out of his mouth. Far be it from Ari to judge anyone’s marriage, with the inherent hypocrisy of his own, but he did generally believe that love ought to be a significant ingredient if it had a hope of lasting happily.

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The question surprised him. It was the sort of question one expected, in a conversation like this, but the answer had been obvious to him for so long that it was strange to think it wasn't equally obvious to everyone. Sure, Ari Fisk didn't know him, but he knew more than most people did about his history with Zelda. He'd tried moving on, time and time again. After Ari's assault in the hospital supply closet, after the disaster at Passover, after months of frosty treatment from her family and no word at all from Zelda. He'd planned a trip to India to try and move on, because everything in England reminded him of her. Even so, time and time again, he found himself back here — not literally, of course, because he had never before made it into Ari Fisk's parlor, but metaphorically here, trying to piece together a way in which the two of them had a future.

"So much," he admitted, with a sorry sort of smile. "And she loves me, too. Though I never got the impression that counted for much, where your father was concerned."

Not that he'd had any conversations with Brannon Fisk about love. The impression was more one he'd inherited from Zelda, he supposed; that no one in her family trusted her to determine her own happiness, and that they all still thought her a child.

  

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MJ made the most Alfredy of sets and then two years later she made it EVEN BETTER

Ugh.

He hadn’t wanted to like Darrow. Thus far the facts had been wholly against him: there was too much to forgive, a lot that couldn’t be forgiven. And so Ari had very firmly imagined that he would continue to dislike him, or at least be no more than begrudgingly polite, until he and Zelda had been married and settled for - oh, five years, or so?

But Darrow had seemed nothing but honest, and if he had tried to fake that kind of feeling, it wouldn’t have worked - wouldn’t have sounded the way it did, wouldn’t have come with that apologetic smile, like he couldn’t even help himself. And now, having to witness this - seeing him here pleading for advice and willing to do anything and so modestly happy at the thought of being with her - Ari was finding it very hard not to like him. Mistakes he’d made with Zelda besides, he was increasingly convinced that Darrow merely meant well, and loved her, and was really rather... sweet. (His messy hair was a little bit endearing as well, not that Ari would admit to looking.)

He kept his mouth shut to survey him a little longer. “You’re right, it probably doesn’t,” Ari allowed eventually, “but it makes a difference to me.” And perhaps would - or should - with some of their siblings? Not that they could force their father into one opinion or another if he was set on it, but it would be much easier for him to turn away a man the whole family disliked than it would be to deny a suitor who had that support. And, anyway, if Darrow managed to get his approval, then he would be everyone’s brother-in-law, and in an ideal world Ari would still be able to enjoy the next decade of Fisk family dinners without half the table glaring daggers at someone.

“I’m not sure how much that counts for, though,” he admitted. Darrow had come here looking to gain Brannon’s approval, after all, not his.

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   Cassius Lestrange, J. Alfred Darrow

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It took a second for what he'd said to click, but when it did, Alfred couldn't help but grin. For the first time since Zelda had read him into her scheme about just forging ahead with the courtship and hoping the rest of the family would eventually get on board, he felt optimistic about it actually working. He'd trusted her when she said it would, because she knew her family better than he did, but it had always seemed far-fetched, and the past eight months had shown few, if any, signs of progress. If he could convince Ari, though, who had far more reason to hate him than any of the rest of them did, maybe this actually could work.

Not that he thought Ari was convinced, from one encouraging comment. One swallow did not a summer make, but it was a step in the right direction, and it was unexpected.

"I think it counts for something," he said, still grinning. "Thank you."

  

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MJ made the most Alfredy of sets and then two years later she made it EVEN BETTER

“You’re - welcome, I suppose,” Ari returned, smiling a little in spite of himself. (He was still a little annoyed at himself for not hating the man when it ought to be so easy to: but this was better in the long term, he told himself, being constructive about their relationship, so that he and Zelda did not get desperate about it.)

“Words alone won’t be enough for our father, I’m afraid,” he qualified, fancying Darrow had already come to the conclusion, but hoping to hammer it home. He could talk about what he would do, but until he proved it... “So it’ll be your actions that actually count. And it’s probably best not to ambush him again with any of this,” Ari put in, although Darrow had probably guessed as much from the courtship ‘announcement’, and Ari had rather facilitated his barging in over Passover, too. He’d written first before coming today, so he had certainly learnt his lesson there.

“Though I do have to warn you,” Ari added casually, still debating with himself whether he ought to mention it, just when they had made a little progress - “if there are any repeats of what you and Zelda were up to the other night and he finds out, it will be over for good.” (Zelda had said nothing else had happened beyond the mark on her neck and that was likely true.) But, whatever had happened, Ari wasn’t sure if Darrow knew they’d been caught out on their Friday evening activities, and he did hope, a little, that this would give him pause before trying it again.

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   J. Alfred Darrow, Zelda Darrow

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Alfred nodded at the caution about actions over words. He had been expecting as much, because if Brannon Fisk was the sort to be swayed by sentimental declarations his resolve would have wavered long before this. He knew Zelda had told her father how she felt about the situation (and made it obvious, besides, with the courtship business), and Alfred himself had never been interested in hiding how fond he was of her. Brannon Fisk was interested in more concrete things, though, and it was those solid foundational elements Alfred would have to line up before he went to talk to him. But Ari being on his side, even if he was only a little on his side and even if it was only grudgingly, was just as important of a foundation block as where he intended to live, he thought. Ari might have said he wasn't sure it counted for much, but Alfred wasn't convinced. From everything he knew about the Fisk family, he thought Ari's opinion counted for a great deal, not just with their father but with all the rest of them, too.

His optimism stopped in its tracks, however, when Ari got to this last point. "Oh," Alfred said. His smile had fallen and he was sure his eyes had widened slightly despite his best efforts to keep his expression neutral. He did not want to give away how entirely unprepared for this he was, but of course he was unprepared for this. How had Ari Fisk even known about it? It wasn't as though he'd seen them through a window, or something, because he didn't even live at that house. Zelda must have told him, but why on earth would she have done that? Alfred knew she'd told him about the first time, years ago, but the context had been rather different — he'd been gone, and their whole relationship had been on footing that was much less sure, and she'd been worried about being pregnant. None of those were true in this instance (Zelda did know there was no chance of her being pregnant, after Friday night, didn't she? He knew she was young and comparatively innocent but she had never given him the impression she was naive).

"Uhm," he said, reaching up to nervously rub the back of his neck. He could feel heat in his cheeks and ears and knew his face was getting red all over. He wondered if he ought to try and explain himself, but he didn't know what he would have said. No, it won't happen again, I know it was stupid and I only did it Friday because I was drunk was hardly going to win him any points from Ari. Nevermind that it was more or less the same excuse he'd had when they'd slept together three years ago, and then it had gotten him hexed. He could have clarified that he hadn't done anything that might have gotten her pregnant, but he was under no illusion that Ari wanted to hear details of what they'd gotten up to on Friday night, particularly from him — that was another fast track to getting himself hexed, no doubt.

"— Right," he eventually said, which was as close to a promise not to do it again as he currently felt he was capable of verbalizing.

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   Ari Fisk, Zelda Darrow

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MJ made the most Alfredy of sets and then two years later she made it EVEN BETTER

It had put a slight damper on things, Ari noted, as the air changed and Darrow’s expression fell. Still, although Ari endeavoured to keep an inscrutably straight face as his company writhed in suppressed panic, he had to confess he was a little pleased by the reaction.

Their fear of being found out if they overstepped was about all he had left as a weapon to deter them from getting in trouble, at this point. Certainly, if Zelda had not had opportunity to explain yet that he and Dionisia had helped her cover it up this time, she may well do soon, but for the moment Ari would take this as an opportunity to impress that if something regrettable happened, someone would inevitably find out. And just because he had no intention of selling them out to Brannon did not mean anyone else would hesitate.

And he was still on Darrow’s side, he was, but it was hard not to find his wide-eyed bewilderment a little bit funny. Perhaps if he said he knew a little Legilimency... No, that was unnecessarily mean. Letting Darrow stew on it in silence would do just as well. His reddened face said quite as much as any number of protests would have. To that end, Ari only gave a shrug and a sage smile that meant something like unfortunately, I always know everything. He expected he would not know as much about his siblings’ lives if Delia Fisk was alive to be their mother, and the softer parent; since then, Ari supposed he had fallen into that vacancy by virtue of being both the eldest and a comparative pushover.

But Darrow did not need to know that too well just yet. “Good,” he declared. “I’m glad we understand each other. Just - be patient. Play it safe, and I promise there will be an end to it.” To the waiting, he meant, and that also depended on Darrow following through on all he had said.

(Ari supposed he might have offered them this parlour, if they ever needed a little better privacy that was not a society event - and could even stick a playing Elliott in there with them as some distraction, or heavy-handed symbol of the consequences - but he thought better of pledging himself too far to this cause for them before he’d at least figured out where the rest of his siblings stood.)

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   J. Alfred Darrow

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