July 5, 1893 - Thomsett Home, Bartonburg, Hogsmeade

"Someone is here to see you Miss Sisse." The butler announced as entering the sitting room. The room had once been her mother's domain but slowly Sisse had taken it over. Today she almost wished she had sought refuge in her room instead. But with Matthew and her father at work and Henry out of the house she was entirely alone and someone had to be able to receive guests even if it felt as if the world had just ended. Sisse nodded mutely. She had no idea how she'd manage to get through a visit with anyone, but she couldn't let herself shatter only to have to try and hold herself again when someone showed up so she supposed it was a good thing the caller had arrived now.

With a thick swallow, Sisse nodded at the man, not even bothering to ask the caller's name. Instead she waited until he'd left to show the visitor in and dashed a hand over her eyes in case any more tears were leaking. Mr. Hamston was too polite to mention any crying he might have heard or seen, but visitors weren't always as tactful as the staff.

The very last person Sisse had expected to see in her sitting room that afternoon was Lester. "Have you heard?" Her voice broke as she looked at him, feeling lost. She didn't, couldn't, be the one to break the news to him.

Lester Hatchitt

  

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*sniff* Bee made her look all grown up <3

If his mother had heard, she probably wouldn't have let him out of the house. As it was, Lester was out of the back door as soon as he read the letter, going — somewhere. He'd walked up to the Bixby front door before realizing that if they wanted him there, they would tell him. Then he just walked around Bartonburg, sweating in his jacket, convincing himself that this wasn't real while his eyes swelled. He hadn't cried yet, but that was alright, wasn't it, because —

He hadn't even really thought through seeing Sisse until he was sitting, looking somewhat bedraggled, in the parlor. He shook his head at her when she asked, then said: "It can't be real."

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He'd heard. Some of the pressure eased and she felt as if the bay of tears might break forth again. "It-" Her voice broke as she tried not to cry. She tried to clear the lump in her throat but that only made it worse. "I-" And then the tears were gushing forth and somehow she'd crossed over to Lester and wrapped her arms around him needing something, anything, to hold on to in this moment.

  

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*sniff* Bee made her look all grown up <3

Lester rubbed Sisse's back with his palm, and swallowed back the emotion rising in his throat. He couldn't cry, because it couldn't be real. So he rubbed her back and waited.

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Had Sisse been thinking she knew this would be a horrible idea. She'd blush when looking back at it. It would put them right back to that awkward place they'd been in for a year, and so soon after they had mended it all. But she wasn't thinking. All she knew was that he was a safe place to land. His warm hand on her back was soothing, the fabric of his jacket under her cheek warm.

At last her eyes red and swollen she stepped back and look at him, dashing her eyes on her sleeves. "I'm sorry." She sniffled. "I should have...." She trailed off there was so much she should have done. She should have tried to share the burden at the very least. "Here, sit." She gestured to the couch trying to get the ground back under her feet so to speak. She had to bottle this all away, had to keep living. "I'll ring for some tea." SHe was trying to so hard to be the lady of the house, so hard to pull herself back together, but was she really fooling anyone after that little display of her's?

  

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*sniff* Bee made her look all grown up <3

Lester sat down, a little more rumpled now from the hug, and looked at her almost quizzically. Sisse was able to access her emotions right away, but he hadn't cried yet. "Tea is — tea's good," he managed, because Sisse looked like she needed Lester to agree to tea. They could fall back on the formalities. But Lester was convinced they shouldn't have to.

"They haven't found a body," he pointed out, sounding desperate even to his own ears.

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Sisse rang for Mr. Hampston, feeling a tad pretentious doing so in front of Lester. The butler must have been right by the door for he opened it right away. "Could you bring us a tea tray?" She asked him sweetly. "Of course, Miss." He bowed out of the room leaving the two of them alone again.

No they hadn't. "She couldn't have..." Sisse's voice broke again and she just barely managed to add. "Not with the lightening and the fall. Not to mention the water." She remembered her own close call in the lake, and Sloanes the summer after. Managing that when injured? She didn't think it was possible.

  

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*sniff* Bee made her look all grown up <3

Lester shook his head, as if he hadn't heard her. "But they didn't find a body," he said, "How'd they even know it was her?" She could have landed on shore, or in the forest, or maybe the giant squid had helped her out. Sloane would be fine, she'd come wandering in in a few days, and everyone was wrong.

It was disappointing that Sisse was wrong too.

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set by lady!

It was sneaky, that little tendril of hope that his words tugged at. In the days and weeks to come Sisse would learn how dangerous hope could be. She'd watch it tear her friends apart and she'd learn just how very real this all was, how the second oldest of Sloane's brothers had seen it happen. But in this moment, that small sliver of hope made Sisse want to reach for Lester's hand. But that would be a bad idea and now that she was more composed and aware of her facilities she couldn't give in to such indications. He'd made his feelings perfectly clear back in December, regardless of how he sometimes looked at her, or how her heart hammered whenever they were even a fraction closer than was strictly necessary.

Tamping down on such foolish notions, particularly in a time such as now, Sisse lowered herself into a chair across from him, burying her hands into the folds of her dress as it pooled around her, resisting a similar urge to sit on her hands. Holding the extra fabric beside her legs was going to have to be good enough.

"Maybe they got it wrong?" There was no reason to hope, Sloane's family wouldn't have written otherwise, but still Sisse wanted to believe Sloane was out there somewhere. "But why would her mother write us then? If she wasn't sure?"

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   Lester Hatchitt

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*sniff* Bee made her look all grown up <3

Sisse could poke holes in his logic — (logic was a strong word for it, but Lester couldn't see it that way right now) — all she wanted; he wasn't going to believe it. Lester gripped the arm of the couch as if it would bolster him. "I don't know," he said, "She is missing, after all — I understand why the Bixbys believe it."

But he wasn't going to give up on her. Sloane would never forgive him if he did; he'd hold out hope for her, and he'd do whatever he could to find her. Besides — they'd been friends since they were infants. Lester felt like he'd just know if she was dead, like something in his body would recognize it — and he didn't feel that now.

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Sisse hadn't disagreeing with her friends, with anyone really. It always made her feel sick to her stomach. She could feel her jaw tightening with tension, but she couldn't agree with Lester. The truth escaped out of her in quiet words, "I don't think I can bear to hope." Not after her mother. Not after everything.

And then the nervous words starting pouring out, "I know that sounds horrible, but I can't have my hopes dashed, can bare to mourn her more than once. If her family believes, I just...." The tears were welling again, threatening to fall down her cheeks. She dashed her hand over her cheeks feeling one escape. "I just, can't." She couldn't meet his gaze and found herself looking at her lap feeling every ounce the traitor that he likely saw her as.

  

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*sniff* Bee made her look all grown up <3

Lester frowned at Sisse. He'd expected her to believe him. It was so obvious to him that Sisse couldn't be dead that he didn't understand Sisse's disagreement. He hadn't been here for very long, but Lester stood up — even though Sisse was on the verge of tears. "I have to go," he said. His tone was stony. Why was she so committed to being wrong?

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The pain redoubled at his words and now the tears were coming down again. Mutely Sisse nodded, standing up from her chair and turning away from him, trying to hide how much it hurt to lose him yet again. But that was the thing, she'd lost him before. She hadn't lost Sloane before and what she'd said to Lester was true, she couldn't bear to hold out hope only to have her world devastated again. So while she wished for nothing more than to rush to Lester to beg him not to leave she was too embarrassed, to hurt, to allow herself to move even an inch toward him

  

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*sniff* Bee made her look all grown up <3

She was crying. A lot, now. It went against Lester's instincts to leave but he could not stand to be here pretending that Sloane was dead. He stood up and put one hand on her shoulder, and gave it a squeeze. "Goodbye, Sisse," Lester said, and left the parlor.

  

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set by lady!

Sisse had not heard, nor expected Lester to approach her after those words, but his hand fell warm on her shoulder. Perhaps he did not hate her after all. Oh, how that small gesture made her wish to turn, to bury herself in his chest again, and let him hold her, let him convince her that somewhere out there Sloane really was still alive and well. But she held herself rigid instead, squeezing her eyes closed, and her stomach lurched against the confines of her corset. She couldn't make herself say goodbye it'd seem to final and despite her brave thoughts she could not bear the thought that it might be the final goodbye she ever made to Mister Lester Hatchitt.

The door clicked closed behind Sisse and she found herself sinking to the floor, arms wrapping around her knees as her gown was washed with all the sorrow the seventeen year old could not contain.

  

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*sniff* Bee made her look all grown up <3