Everything Has Changed Now

Chapter 5 - Hope is a waking dream

Chapter Summary: 

Will Colin finally find Pen? Find out in this chapter.

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As Colin wakes up from his settee, he does not find Pen and gets anxious. Their private chamber is rather dark and blurry, the candle lighting the chamber in the corner on the desk seems to be almost dead.

He calls out her name but she doesn't reply, fear starts to engulf him as his heart races. He steadily moves to their bedchamber looking around frantically as the place appears unfamiliar and too quiet. After entering, he suddenly notices that the floor beneath him is starting to crack following in his footsteps.

He scans for Pen hurriedly, his heart pounding louder in his chest, however her absence is clearly noticeable. Colin then sees Pen outside the bedchamber gazing at him in sadness, tears flowing down her cheeks.

"Goodbye Colin" she says, her voice sounding distant. "Don't look for me Colin" Her voice now echoed in the walls as he started sensing the earth shaking beneath him. He placed his hands covering his ears as a loud cracking noise came from the floor next to him.

He shouts for her. The roof begins collapsing above Penelope and he presumed she would die if he did not intervene to save her. "Pen, give me your hand. We need to get out of here," he shouted distraughtly. He held out his arm to her beyond the door. Penelope remains idle. "Goodbye Colin" she says once more as she seems to be drifting away, her voice sounding even further. She repeats those two words until the roof collapses on her.

"PEN!" Colin shouts deafeningly as he awakes in a sudden, in a sitting position, scaring Benedict. Benedict approaches him and consoles him immediately as Colin is looking all scared and sweaty. "Colin, it's fine, I am here." "Did you have a nightmare?" Benedict was still half asleep but trying to calm Colin, softly placing a hand on his shoulder.

Colin, breathless, was slowly drifting back to reality as he realised he was staying in a hotel with Benedict in search of his wife just after he was examining his brother believing he was in his own bedchamber at the Bridgerton house.

Benedict offered him water and sat beside him for a while listening to the reason he shouted. Colin was unable to gather his words, shifting back to a dreamlike state while attempting to recall what he supposed he had just experienced.

'What could this be? Why was their home breaking?' Colin reflected. It could only mean that their 'home' was broken because his wife, Penelope, was no longer there. She was the pillar that supported his home and now she was gone. Visioning her bidding him goodbye was heartbreaking and he preferred to forget that dream.

While in his dream, the sensation of permanently losing her felt so real and intense.

Colin was shaking as sweats dripped off his temples and tears began rolling incessantly down cheeks, his heart raced, booming. He had been traumatised.

After a while Benedict retreated to bed while Colin paced the bedchamber, panting, attempting strenuously to return to his normal state before falling back to sleep.

The following morning, as soon as Penelope woke up she felt sick and threw up three times before deciding to finally break her fast with some plain bread. The journey was not over and she had yet to meet the individual who would help her find a suitable accommodation to permanently settle.

To help her feel better and hit the road sooner, the maid had mixed up a concoction for her. Penelope had no intention of halting there for very long. The sooner she settled, the less she would experience the journey sickness and shifting of locations also seemed to affect her due to her current condition.