I loved your latest prompt fic! If you’re still taking them, I’d love #7 from the list for siegfried x audrey.
This passed the word count of a drabble so I also posted on AO3! I hope you enjoy. ☺️
there's something in my soul that cries out when the seasons change
The front door closed on the last of the well wishers. Their platitudes and merriment echoed through the foyer, pressing against the heaviness of unspoken emotion that lingered in the house.
Audrey smoothed her hands over her upswept hair then nervously down the front of her best dress wishing she had the comfort and shield of her pinny as she moved from the front door and into the parlor.
She busied herself collecting abandoned plates and glasses, straightening crushed pillows but always in her periphery was her employer Mr. Farnon. He had insisted despite her protests on throwing her and Gerald a going away party. He’d been cheerful, almost manic in his manner and in his toast for their happiness and future but now he sat quietly, maudlin, scotch glass empty but still dangling in his hand as if he’d forgotten it was there.
The stack of plates and cutlery she collected rattled as she placed them on the sideboard seeming to break Mr. Farnon from his far off musings.
“Ah, Mrs. Hall,” he cleared his throat as he rose from his seat and set his glass down on the mantle. As of late she found herself constantly clearing empty cut crystal glasses from the mantle, beside his favored armchair and his office. She couldn’t help but notice that he was sleeping less and drinking more though he was no less thorough with his patients and sympathetic to their owners.
Mr. Farnon rubbed his eyes like a sleepy child - Jimmy before Helen carted him upstairs to bed against his plaintive protests and reaching arms, for his father James, Aunt Audrey or his favorite Uncle Siegfried. “Has everyone left?”
“A few minutes ago, yes.” The high back chair was a paltry barrier between where he stood by the fireplace and where she fidgeted with the doily atop its back, adjusting and readjusting trying to smooth it flat.
“I was sorry to miss goodbyes, Gerald non-withstanding.” And there was the elephant in the room, the cause for the chasm that seemed to have opened between them. Audrey wasn’t worried about him; Mr. Farnon was all bluff, no bluster; the chair wasn’t for his benefit but her own to keep her from going to him. Mr. Farnon’s emotional or physical wellbeing couldn’t be her concern anymore, though she’d been taking care of him, heart and soul, for years. Though he never knew it, Siegfried Farnon would always hold a piece of both, but she was marrying another, she had to reserve some small pieces for Gerald. He would love her, take care of her and give her a home she could truly call her own.
“He were needed back home, he’s heading out on the morning train to finalize our living arrangements.” Audrey’s eyes wandered over his tense shoulders, the hand that rubbed at the base of his neck and the rumpled silk of his vest that she’d ironed just yesterday.
Mr. Farnon moved from the mantle to the silent record player where the needle bumped along the edge of the record. He lifted the arm and flipped over the record and reset the needle, the crescendo of an opening big band number filled the previously quiet space though it didn’t quite break the tension.
“I thought you were staying with Gerald’s sister, Caroline, is it?” He turned just slightly, barely sparing her a glance.
“Carol,” Audrey gripped the back of the chair. “And no, we’ve made other arrangements.” She looked down trying to fight back a blush. She was no blushing school girl, this would be her second marriage after all but speaking about her new marriage with Siegfried embarrassed her.
“From what you told me she was sick, that’s why Gerald was so desperate to get back to the Lakes?” He put his hands in his pockets as he finally turned to face her, a pinch between his brows. And drag you with him, remained unspoken.
“She’s not so far off yet.” She moved back to the sideboard, picking up the discarded champagne bottle. Empty, and the joyous bubbles she’d drank to her impending nuptials with it.
“Gerald found us a cottage not far away from her home.” She turned to him with a smile but even though she knew it was false it felt brittle around the edges like the crumbled biscuit crumbs left on the empty tea tray.
“Ah, connubial bliss.” The asperity in his voice wasn’t lost on her. Audrey pretended not to hear as the song playing on the record player came to a cymbal crashing end.
He had been increasingly short tempered of late, where before he had opened up about his troubles asking for her help but he had become surprisingly tight-lipped. She distractedly refolded discarded napkins.
“When are you going to leave?” The question was like a barb straight to her heart and she dropped the napkin. He must have seen the stricken look on her face because he amended his question.
“Leave for your new home, I mean.” He drew a hand out of his pocket and held it out, conciliatory but he didn’t leave her time to answer before he continued.
“Because when I think about home, I think about you.” If a land mine had gone off in the parlor she would have been more surprised. “After a long day up in the Dales the thought of you here at Skeldale House waiting with a warm meal and us sitting here in front of the fire with Jess and Dash, that’s home.” At the sound of her name the golden retriever pushed her head up under his hand hanging by his side. The only smile he had spared for the dog as he ruffled her ears.
“I apologize, Mrs. Hall. That was unacceptable.” The words he’d just uttered and any vulnerability he had exposed had him doing an about face and heading toward the foyer.
Audrey was dumbstruck, Mr. Farnon’s mood was as changing as a Yorkshire spring day, starting with a blustery storm and ending with the warmth of sunshine on the damp fields. Before he made his escape she managed to speak, calling out his name. “Mr. Farnon!”
“Siegfried!” He was steps from the entry way, Jess at his heels when her desperate cry of his Christian name stopped him in his tracks, hand on the doorframe.
What was she to do or say with the thought of Gerald fresh on her mind but the honesty in his words spurred her forward her heels making quick work across the room. Audrey reached out and placed her hand at his elbow as she stopped in front of him.
“I’m happy for you,” he swallowed roughly. “And Gerald.” Mr. Farnon smiled but it didn’t reach his eyes. Jess whined pressing up against their legs and he reached down to pet her ears, his usually well coiffed hair falling slightly over his forehead. Without thinking Audrey reached out to brush it back, the warmth of his skin against her cold fingers a shock. She tried to pull away but he grasped her hand in his and held it against his cheek.
“Siegfried.” His name on her lips was but a whisper and she saw the intent in his eyes, how she’d longed for it these many years, her breath caught in her lungs as he gripped her waist, somehow both firm and gentle as he lent his head towards her but it was too late.
Gerald.
At the last moment she turned her head but not soon enough. The brush of his lips grazed the corner of her mouth, dry and warm with a hint of the scotch he’d been drinking. The prickle of his moustache sent her pulse pounding. Was it the situation or the feeling of euphoria that sprung within her breast? She was afraid to look at it too closely.
“Forgive me, Mrs. Hall,” he drug a shaking hand down his face as he stepped back, dropping his hand from her waist as Jess yelped at being trod on. “I don’t seem to be myself.”
Audrey was speechless watching as he smoothed his hair back into place and stalked down the hall toward the kitchen.
“Quite alright.” The words fell from her mouth into the empty foyer as she held her fingers against her lips. She heard the back door rattle in its frame as he shut it forcefully and then the sound of an engine as he cranked the Rover.
The record skipped and popped warbling over a farewell tune, a song that had been played until the record was scratched. Tears filled her eyes as it brought back memories of early days at Skeldale House when it had woken her in the night. The needle scratched as it was lifted and dropped again and again, the sweetly melancholic lyrics luring her back to sleep. A broken man missing his dearly departed wife.
Goodnight sweetheart, all my prayers are for you
Goodnight sweetheart, I’ll be watching o’er you
Tears and parting my make us forlorn,
But with the dawn, a new day is born
Goodnight sweetheart, sleep will banish sorrow
Goodnight sweetheart, ‘til we meet tomorrow
Dreams enfold you in each one I’ll hold you
Goodnight, sweetheart, goodnight
Thank you @dayas for looking over this for me, especially since you don’t even follow the fandom. 💜
Want one? Soft sentence starters
