Berena Gentleman Jack AU └ fic courtesy of @belligerently
She can see the discomfort on Miss Campbell’s face whenever Edward is present, and she also sees the ill-concealed glee when she bites her lip as Bernie sends Edward to the stables. There’s promise hidden in that smile, hope in those sparkling eyes.
She’s able to finagle an invitation for tea in two days time, a shyly issued request from Miss Campbell, and she happily accepts. The sigh from her sister notwithstanding, Bernie finds it hard to dampen her excitement. There’s such possibility, fruit ripe for the picking.
“Have you ever been kissed, Miss Campbell?” she asks, when they’re alone, when the tea has been cleared away, the door shut right behind the maid.
Her eyes flutter, but Bernie sees how they stop for a moment in her lips, how Miss Campbell’s tongue just protrudes between her teeth. How delightful to see, how delicious.
“I...I have,” she says rather carefully. “But I fear that it has never quite been to my liking.”
“Perhaps you haven’t been kissed by the right person,” Bernie suggests, her arm on the back of the divan, her fingers dangerously close to Miss Campbell’s shoulder, to that enviable décolletage. She sees the blush on Miss Campbell’s cheeks but her eyes don’t stray from Bernie’s face.
“And what would you suggest, Miss Wolfe?” she asks, looking up through lashes, a thin rod of steel strung through her words now.
Bernie leans forward, can hear Miss Campbell’s breath quicken, her lips parted, her breath lovely, smelling of lemon and tea, and then the door opens, the maid bustling in with a letter, fresh from the post, and Bernie curses her promptness.
“I must be away, Miss Campbell. But perhaps we might meet again? I find your company quite diverting.” She holds her hand out, feels a thrill when Serena’s hand meets hers, leans down to place a kiss on her delicate wrist.
“That would be lovely, Miss Wolfe,” she says, a full smile dimpling her cheeks as she looks up.
“Oh, please do call me Bernie. I feel as if we’re already fast friends, too close for formalities.” The smile she bestows on Miss Campbell is warm, the woman is so lovely.
“Bernie, then,” she says, and her voice curls around the syllables, making her name sound quite wonderful in a way Bernie’s never heard before. The slight squeeze of her chest is welcome, if a bit foreign, and she rubs her thumb against Miss Campbell’s hand once, twice, before taking her leave.
When they next meet, it’s once again in Miss Campbell’s parlor, though she sits closer to Bernie than before, leg almost touching Bernie’s, the heat through the fabric palpable, and it makes Bernie’s heart soar.
“I’ve been thinking,” Miss Campbell says, slowly, always choosing her words, so proper and careful, “that it’s only right you call me Serena as well, as we are becoming such bosom friends.” Her hands fist together, worrying, wrinkling the fabric of her skirt.
Bernie reaches out to halt the movement, their hands touching, fingers tangling for a moment. “Serena,” she says, “what has you in such a state?”
“You remember,” Serena says, how good it feels to have permission to say her name, to think it, to know it in her heart, “when last we spoke, you intimated I may not have been kissed by someone who knew what they were doing. Or who, perhaps, was not well-matched with me.” Bernie nods, waits for what’s to come, can be patient, will be patient, for her, for this one.
“Yes,” she says, leaning in ever so slightly, sees it mirrored in Serena’s movements.
“I wondered if, perhaps,” here her eyes flick back down to Bernie’s lips, “you might know of a worthy candidate.” Bernie doesn’t want to misunderstand Serena, doesn’t want to be mistaken, waits, for a long, perilous moment, for Serena to lean another fraction of an inch further in.
“I think, perhaps, I might,” she says, a smile on her lips, parroting back the word that Serena slipped nervously into her request.
Their lips meet, a blissful moment, beautiful and soft, utopian in its simplicity. Bernie resists the urge to slide her fingers into Serena’s hair, too much to risk mussing her curls. Instead, she squeezes their joined fingers, feels an answering squeeze even as Serena pulls away, the kiss all-too brief, but no less wonderful.
Her eyes are shining, like a new world unfolded before her in those several seconds, like a paradise has been made known to her. “I’m so pleased you came today, Miss Wolfe,” she says, ever so slyly, her smile quirked, her eyebrow raised, and Bernie doesn’t stop the laugh rising up from her chest. She rests her forehead to Serena’s, places a kiss there too, Serena’s eyes closed in blessing.
“I look forward to our next meeting,” she says, and takes her leave as swiftly as she came.
