She reminded her of waves in the sense that she always seemed angry at what wasn't there. A constant flow of frustration, as though nothing was ever too perfect or misplaced. Feared at first glance brash and insincere; A loan voice which softened in time, unsecure like bathwater in a drain, consumed. The consistent, repetitive inaudible gasps like poetry a siren - And before you know it You're drowning.
Eloise’s fist rattled against the door, burning hot enough they almost merged together. Melting through the creamy glass panes, to engulf the presence on the other side.
“Mrs Debling, I must insist you open the door.” Eloise called an underground of enjoyment spreading throughout her. She’d always been attracted to chaos, the wandering eye lines of passing cooks and stewards only added fuel to the fire.
She wanted to be seen, known.
A variety of foliage ripples before her, as Cressida’s head popped up from between a group of sunflowers.
“Eloise, what on earth are you doing?.” Cressida panicked, grasping her friend's wrist and pulling her further into the greenhouse. The sodden scent of mulch and rain water, musty and sweet against her skin.
“I’m still deciding, a little bit of a lot.” Eloise explained stalking forward so that she was pulling the other woman instead. Settling upon a table in the far right of the green house. An array of tomatoes at different growing stages on display, a small collection of tweezers and cotton balls littering a decorative tray.
“And all this commotion was necessary? Damit Lou, I’m in the middle of planting my seedlings.” Cressida groaned, pulling away and leaning down to brush off her apron. It was at that point Eloise truly took in her friend's attire. Her blonde hair loose at her neck, small strands of gold hanging over her glasses… glasses Cressida hardly ever wore.
The brunettes took a breath then swallowed. “I am here to tell you, that I love you.”
There she said it. As though it were the most simple, obvious and knowledgeable thing. And it was for the five seconds between saying it and Cressida’s palm making contact with her skin.
Eloise gasped.
“I—-.” Cressida grimaced, shaking slightly her palm raised up between them perfectly almond claws darkened with soil. Thick beneath her nails, leaving contrasting lines of mud and beaten flesh upon Eloise’s cheek. “I’m sorry Eloise, Forgive me.”
Cressida gapped, her hand raising to chase the dirt as she stepped closer to the brunette. Timid and doe like in her approach, the younger woman refusing to meet her gaze. Eloise’s jaw flexed beneath her touch, neither pulling away nor attempting the gesture until the pressure of a warm palm pressed against her. The heat soothing in comparison to the burn that it replaced, Cressida’s thumb running beneath her eye to collect the tears that pooled there.
“Hey. I can’t take back my mistakes, but I do take ownership.” The blonde whispered, both hands now resting either side of the Bridgerton daughter’s face. “Eloise, you must rest your words.”
“Then let us practise wordless sentences.” Eloise breathed, her lip lifting to rest beside Cressida’s, not your touching but rather grazing against one another. Similar to a boyd in a brewing storm.
“Darling while my appetite is apparent I must urge you to mince your words” The blonde begged her hand reaching over to press against the brunette's lips. The cool pads of her fingers failing to border the events, Eloise’s kiss merely seeking refuge between the flesh of Cressida’s fingers.
“Your calls for silence have failed to seduce my curiosity” Eloise argued, her tongue weaving paths between the blondes' knuckles. Chewing lightly at the offending mental of Cressida’s wedding ring.
“Gods even the most ignorant would recognise your radiance.” Cressida whispers as the brunette's tongue travels between her fingers. Encompassing her pointer finger and sucking lightly.
“Then say you love me.” Eloise gouded as she kissed the tip of her finger.
“To those who crave agitation you are a delicacy Miss Bridgerton.” Cressida whispers her gaze flicking down to the plump flesh of the shorter woman’s bottom lip.
“Our success fuels their resentment.” Eloise promised, grasping the blonde's damp hand with her own. Her other hand reached to grasp her neck. “Mockery often disguises envy.”
Cressida’s breathing increased the sound her heart felt. Glossy eyed as she reluctantly pulled her face away from the other woman.
“You must go. Replace this moment in your mind so that we may move on from this. I will not lose you to this Eloise. I mustn’t.”
“You lose me either way.” Eloise threatened her eyes still wet as she removed her cloak, throwing it down atop of Cressida’s chair.
“If losing you is what I must do to prevent your pain then so be it.”
“Prevent my pain?” Eloise scoffed, watching as the blonde removed her glasses, slotting them into the pocket of her shirt sleeve.
“You would be ridiculed, abandoned in society. You’d never get the opportunity to study Lou.” Cressida explained fidgeting with her hands as she began pacing.
“Are you truly so blind?” Eloise asked after a moment, her frame suddenly tall against the back group of flora that surrounded her. Something magnetic and sharp to her face. A glum feeling settling within the pit of Cressida’s stomach, there would be no turning back from this.
“And what is it I am to understand?” Cressida pressed, exhausted and riddled with contempt for the journey of conversation.
“I am reduced to this thing,” Eloise cried, anger granted the better of her as she glared at the other woman. “this creature. A vessel of doting nausea, I am never empty of you. As are so many others, these weaves you conjure us are dangerous Cressida they transcend the dependable nature of demise. What is to come of us when death comes for you? What of Alfred? Or Cedric?”
“Do not bring my son into this.” Cressida yelled back, the backing of sunset shettled her storm. Eloise was able to see the newer greys of her hair in that light. “Air your grievances with me as you wish, convene a coup and strike me down but leave him out of this Lou!”
“Is it worth it? This quietus?”
“You’re being exaggerate.”
“It follows you now, I can see it encapsulate as though a second skin, you come to bed and reek of expiration, not of war, nor dispatch - the malodour of passing, carries your soul and you bare it proudly. This marriage will kill you Cressida, it will crush your spirit and there will be nothing left for me to salvage.”
“Do you think me blind? Deaf? Do you see me vapid, witless and doltish?”
“No. Never.” Eloise blinked a sudden sadness captivating her as she watched her beloved cry and agonise over her sentences.
“This canard is not lost on me. I hear the people speak, I see the change in what I mentor, and I pray they allow me these notions of uncertainty a moment longer. Eloise you are my sentience, a corporeal of my soul for decades so please grant me a pillar to rest my indecision. I am tired of carrying this cross alone. Am I a saint if they pray for my downfall?” Cressida asked, her palms raising to press against the sockets of her eyes.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” Eloise asked, her jaw locked and cast towards the ceiling.
“Tell you what?” Cressida all but snarled back, refusing to look up from her glaring at the potato sacks. “Which part did you want to know about Lou?” The brunette stood tall, her body jerking up taking a few uneven steps towards the other woman. Eloise unwavering, the small of her back concrete upon the side of the flower bed.
“How I wanted you in such an utterly grotesque manner that I couldn’t breathe? Seconds, minutes, hours all filled with the ordeal of you. How the very thought of you and Phillip together tore my soul?”
“And how were I to know?” Eloise argued back, her gaze now set on the older woman. Knuckles an impossible white, lightning in sand. “That you— that you wanted that.” The brunette shrunk back, the weight of emotion visibly dampening her bones.
“Eloise If the stars were the toll I would have paid it, I wanted you in the most simple, desperate and human way. I was interested in everything and was committed to nothing.”
“Not all those that weep, whimper, damn it Cress” Eloise snapped, her hand flying out to slap the table. “Turned inside out by devotion and our common but distant desire.
“Do not compare to me, Eloise.” shook, her face sodden, sunken and blue. The faint announces of the older woman’s incoming footsteps. Before reaching out to grasp her face. Cressida sighed, her face unmanageable as her thumbs explored the space beneath her eyes. “I wanted you in every untameable and chaste way, it felt like prayer.”
“Why does seem we must always have these conversations, where so little is said yet everyone is speaking? These are your people, this is our future and you are watching them dissolve into nothing Cressida.”
“Have you considered I do not know what to say?” The unsettling brooding of an echo bouncing upon each word, the greenhouse walls surly coated in the flowers discontent. A harrowing silence followed Eloise felt as though she were strung to the room, little from fear for the person before her but rather the anticipation of the moment to come. That settling of sickness deep in her gut, she stood tall grasping the other woman’s face.
“Sometimes not knowing, is exactly the reason to speak up.” Beats of silence. The blonde's head hung down to hers, the Bridgerton's eyes welded closed, the escaping tears a sign of poor craftsmanship - nothing less than magnificent to Cressida.
“I feel the earth, it is so comfortingly solid so certain that If we fall I could fall no further, nothing in all the seven circles could make my standing here any less heinous. If I am promised to hell, Satan please take me. There is nothing of light left here now.” Cressida begged, a foreign price upon her tongue.
The tendons in Eloise’s neck stick out in clear lines, her chin raised in defiance. Cresida can see her windpipe move when she swallows, the only sign of anticipation about her. The blonde's hand slides to the front of Eloise’s neck, her jugular firm, throbbing beneath her fingers. As she gently squeezed.
Eloise exhales a soft noise; something between a sigh and a whimper. Her pupils as though spilled ink bathing with her typical teal — the perfect picture of arousal.
It takes her back for a moment. This wasn’t her intention when she pinned the girl up against the table, not explicitly. She needed to feel in control of the situation, the anxiety of their situation becoming too much with every syllable that passed the Bridgerton woman’s lips.
Cressida urged for her silence.
Her mouth is soft and molten as they dive across her lips. Sighs of pleasure air their grievances as Eloise’s teeth sink into her lip.
“Don’t bite me,” Cressida scolds, holding Eloise's face with her hand. Stirring it roughly to the left allows further access to her flesh. The sweat on her neck is salty when Cressida kisses her there. Her pulse is racing under the blonde's tongue. Digging down into the depths of her collarbone.
Eloise moans into her mouth. A firm thigh pressed between her hips. A hand raising to brush the sweaty hair off Cressida’s cheek, nails scratching across her scalp. Groaning as she lathers then blows upon her slick skin.
“Is this what you were thinking about?” Eloise asks, licking over the shell of Cressida’s ear. Biting gently before pushing the blonde gently to her knees. “Or is this a little more up to speed?”
Cressida barely blinks as her cotton covered knees meet the cool concret. Crawling forward, gathering the he Bridgerton’s skirts and pushing a kiss onto the top of her knee.
“Beg for it.” Cressida demands her mouth inches away from where Eloise wanted it. The harsh dentals of her words washing lever Eloise’s heat.
Eloise refused, shaking her head profusely, her hands gripping onto the table beneath them. Her jaw jutted up as Cressida’s graze bore into her, her lips slipping down to kiss her cl*t through the fabrics of her garter’s.
“Sweetheart!” Cressida warns as she reaches forward to slap across the back of Eloise’s leg. A firm hand wrapping around her ankle, raising it to sit upon her shoulder. The of Eloise’s inner thigh, framing her love like a picture. Cressida ghosted her fingers across her sodden flesh as she whispered again. “Beg.”
“Cress'' Eloise snaps. "Make haste before I take care of matters myself.” Cressida tuts, tracing passive-aggressive circles over her cl*t with the tip of her tongue.
Cressida smirked, smoothing her tongue though the brunettes folds her bottom teeth scraping up against her cl*t.
“I belong to you in a way that you have never belonged to me. I am devoured by you and there is such little left of myself I fear I would cease to exist if you were to leave again.
“Tormenting lines of red etched their way across Eloise's chest, rampant corruption of his fair complexion. The brunette reached up to pull at the ties of her dress. Her hips buckled down towards the blondes awaiting mouth.
“Gods Cressida, I love you.”
“That is in itself the beauty of you I suppose, never quite there, just moments from view.” Her head pressed against the bridgerton’s knees, a thick burning sensation set upon Cressida’s throat as her lover coward and tightened around her tongue, dishevelled and rotten at Eloise’s feet. The sunken blondes face surly leaving an impression upon her skin, her lips infirm as they travelled blindly. The brunette hips rolling to chase her impressively high.
A sour, watering taste of Eloise flooded her tongue as the younger woman shook, chest battered with patterns of their love. Mouth weakened by one another’s taste. Each shakily breathing till the other surged forward for another taste.
Eloise lent over, weak hands clasped against her chest in mewling prayer, the blonde placed a kiss upon her lover's head, the bitterness left behind an offering of their impending end.
