Sanditon revisited

7: I did not know women could play cricket

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In which Sidney Parker wishes to spend more time with Miss Heywood but twice ends up more furious with her than ever before

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Once again he was mad beyond belief and once again it was Charlotte Heywood who was the cause of it.

Officially, Sidney found himself in Sanditon so soon again for two reasons. One was to deliver Tom the unpleasant news that none of the London banks he had approached wanted to extend his brother's credit any further. The second was that both Tom and Lord Babington had begged him to attend the yearly Sanditon cricket match next Saturday; Tom because he wanted prominent players on the gentlemen's team, Babbers because Esther Denham unexpectedly had written a letter asking him to join the match and he did not want to go to Sanditon alone. Grumpily almost by habit Sidney had accepted, but he did not really mind going for reasons he shared with no one and did not even fully admit to himself. This secret reason made him actually look forward to the visit; he hoped to spend time with Charlotte Heywood, hoped for a possibility to get to know her better.

During the week he had been back in London, attending to his own business and trying to do something about Tom's, his sole source of joy had been reminiscing Miss Heywood. Their banter on the street after Mr. Stringer's accident, their playful afternoon with the children by the river, the comfortable stillness during their late walk by the beach. Her expressive face appeared before him again and again, different versions depending what mood he pictured her in; focused, annoyed, pensive, happy, innocently flirting. God, visualising her biting her own plush bottom lip made him think things one should not think about a lady unless she was one's wife. He did not have feelings for her, surely not, but she made him feel things and that had not happened for very long.

When Sidney's fiancé Eliza left him for a wealthier man many years ago, he had been heartbroken, bereaved almost to the brink to madness because he had been in love in the uninhibited way you only can be if you have not guarded your heart at all. Sidney had not, because he was too naïve to think there was any reason to do so, thus had allowed himself to fall head over heels for the beautiful Eliza even if he did not know that much of her character. It was a mistake which in terms of emotions cost him dearly, when it turned out that she was more pragmatic about what constituted a good marriage than he was. He had survived by putting physical distance between himself and the woman he loved and with time learned to efficiently turn off his feelings, at least any feelings that risked hurting him. He was very affectionate towards his nephews and Mary, loved his siblings dearly despite all their flaws and was fiercely loyal to his friends, but did not allow himself to be emotionally engaged beyond that. He prided himself in that he neither hated nor loved, that he after the fatal Eliza became something of an outlier with a hard resilient shell. He intended to never put himself in such a weak position again.

Now, he found that Miss Heywood was picking on that shell, threatening to break through. Even if he enjoyed her company, he feared she might be a 'Pandora's box'; if one lifted the lid a little, all sorts of dangerous things might seep out. Yet he felt compelled to lift that fictious lid by seeking her company again. He was unable to resist, and it scared him.

Returned to London, Crowe and Babbers encouraged him to partake in the more extensive pleasures the city had to offer compared to Sanditon. He joined them for drinking and cards one evening but found he was not in the mood for anything beyond that. When Crowe suggested they would visit the so called "boarding house" where they had been frequent guests in the past, both Babington and Sidney turned him down. Babington because Esther Denham currently inhabited his mind, Sidney because he was exhausted running his brother's errands, or at least so he claimed. Truth was, he was not in the mood for the company of courtesans. All he longed for were the innocent, amusing and challenging conversations with Miss Heywood, but he did not put words to that wish even in his own mind. He only knew he felt light at heart when he was on his way back to Sanditon.