I pulled the prompt from a generator here: http://writingexercises.co.uk/subjectgenerator.php
This is from another perspective in my story The Alchemist's Wife.
The prompt is: Is there anything you regret?
He wished he had kissed her more.
He remembered when he first kissed her.
Not their first kiss on their wedding, a quick, chaste, unfeeling
peck on the lips. But really kissed her.
In that respect she was irresistible.
He wished he had realized it sooner. That sort of intimacy had
eluded him for so long in his life. It didn't fancy him as much as
the action of melting metals and mixing chemicals did. As did women.
If she hadn't been thrust upon him under the contract of marriage,
he never would have looked twice at her. Shouldn't she have married
someone who could provide a happy, fruitful life for her? Like his
brother. Corvus knew Adam had feelings for Georgie. Who could miss
them, as he was always chasing after her, finding reasons to be
around her, letting her borrow books. Given, Corvus would have been
mad not to think that she was pretty at least. She had all the
respects people cared about in a woman, and she did her duty as a
wife to him, taking care of the household. He hardly cared about
that.
He hadn't cared for so long.
He regretted that too.
“You shut yourself away for hours on
end after you come home from the university! There is no
companionship in your books and whatever else you're working on down
there!” She had raised her voice at him in the offensively,
cheerful yellow drawing room. The broken clock clanged at 11:30 pm;
she was usually in bed at that time and he astonished to find her
waiting up for him.
“I can't bring myself to believe that
you're content living your life holed up in a basement and a
laboratory. Perhaps you are, but I'm not. Call it selfish if you
will, but I don't care. Not only is it detrimental to your health,
but what about me? You're my husband, but it feels like I don't even
have one. Has it ever occurred to you that you need people in your
life, that you need companionship and friendship and affection? Well
so do I! And the affection I crave is from you, the only person I
can seek it from!”
His mouth had gone dry, and a small,
warm, guilty sweat formed on his brow underneath his dark brown hair
hanging over his cheekbones. All that spark and anger was not
usually expected to come out of someone with her usual temperament.
Perhaps he shouldn't be surprised. He had to fight a small smile
from creeping to his face. He formed his hands into fists so tightly
that his nails dug into his palms; but it didn't stop the corner of
his pert lips from drawing up.
“I...I wasn't aware you cared.”
That was the only thing he could think of to say.
She scoffed haughtily, any unladylike
gesture he didn't expect to come from her either. The smile was
becoming harder to mask, and she noticed, her brow knitting even
tighter, and the muscles in her neck tensed. He had never seen her
this way before; forceful, passionate with anger, perplexed. The
warm guilty sweat that was forming on his brow lowered to his neck
where heat formed and spread even lower throughout his abdomen. But
he felt remorseful at sensing her surrender, and her vulnerability.
This was what happened when someone had been bottling things up for
too long. He had wondered how long she would be able to keep it
bottled up. In return, he wondered if the same thing would happen to
him in time.
“Well, I do. Perhaps I'm wrong to do
so. But it's not like I have any choice. Even if you weren't my
husband, I'd still like you. That much is something my heart has
gathered all on its own. If you'd only see that. If you'd only come
up from the basement and your...your...experiments long enough to
notice.”
She had stomped up the stairs, wiping
angry tears from her bottom lashes before they could roll down her
cheeks for him to see them. Her bedroom door slammed shut and Corvus
was left there, his shoes glued to the drawing room carpet and his
legs frozen stiff. The smile had crept more visibly onto his face
until finally he found himself grinning.
But why?
His insides lurched with guilt at
having made her feel this way when he knew she deserved better. And
he knew he was incapable of giving it to her. But there was
something else. The surprise of seeing her like this, like he had
never seen her before aside from her usual gentle, kind, comforting,
and ladylike self. He had finally witnessed what he knew she was
capable of. The spunk and passion she so desperately wanted to show,
but, for propriety's sake, couldn't. It had made her glow, all of
that hurting rage seething inside of her. Fire had sparked in her
eyes, burning through her mind and soul as she poured herself out to
him, so hot that it could have melted gold.
And he had stood there, like a
dimwitted fool, smiling at her.
He reached the top of the stairs, not
aware that his legs had taken him there, and he heard the soft cries
of Georgie through her closed bedroom door. He raised a hand to the
door, wondering if he should knock. Instead he turned the knob and
let himself in without so much as a moment passing by and then closed
it behind him.
The click on the door jamb roused her
from her boudoir, sitting there in front of the mirror in nothing but
her nightgown, her hair half out of the twisted and curled
masterpiece on her head. If there was something he had always
admired about her, it was her hair. Like precious, glimmering gold,
he thought.
She wiped her face dry with her
handkerchief, and gave him a stern, strong look, ready to defend
herself. Corvus chuckled at her iron-will.
He got to his knees beside her, staring
up at her. Heart beating so hard he thought it was going to burst
through his chest at any moment, he made sure his eyes read
sincerity. Perceptive, another thing he admired about her when he
had the time to notice. He had noticed, well before they were
married. He wasn't opposed when they first proposed the idea to him.
Perhaps that was one of the reasons why. There were many things he
admired about her, he just didn't realize it. He was so wrapped up
in his work and life's pursuits to realize anything he could feel for
anything, or anyone else.
He took her hands gently, stroking her
knuckles with his thumb. When she looked into his eyes and her face
softened, Corvus brought his arms up to wrap them around her waist,
pulling himself to her, his head pressed her side. She tensed for a
single moments, but then relaxed and returned the embrace by wrapping
her arms around his shoulders.
Corvus knew that he was incapable of
giving Georgie what she deserved, but damn it, he might as well try
to.
He loosened their embrace, and their
hands met again. There was a hopeful, understanding smile on her
lips. He barely noticed his hands travel up to her neck, caressing
the side of her face. And soon, he was bringing her lips to his for
their own sweet embrace.
Why hadn't he done this more?
Now especially when he might not ever
see her again?
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