A carriage ride trough Willingden

insightful dream

Oh. That was not good. Although a smile on his face said the opposite. It was so unexpected. This dream! Well, not really. After all, he'd felt it before in Willingden. The attraction he had for her. Her closeness was so reassuring. And yet arousing. Not in that forbidden way, that is, but not only.

Sidney shook his head and ran his hands over his face several times. Alone at the thought of her, his heart beat faster. That smile. Her eyes. As honest as they were. She was so loving and intelligent. A few times, in Willingden, he had heard her discuss Greek philosophers with her father.

He had to find a way to talkt o her, apologize for his behavior on the ball, he hast o tell her that he liked her. More than liked her, which he had trouble admitting. The fear of ever loving again and get hurt was too great. Besides, she didn't know everything about him yet. How dirty and worthless he felt. She was too good for him. He would never deserve her. This wonderful, warmhearted creature who seemed to have a heart of gold. Dogs could tell.

Grumpy.

Ha, that dog had to help him. He had to get her to go for a walk with Grumpy and him and they could talk. Yeah, he should try that.

With renewed courage, he stood up and shaved and carefully selected the brightest vest he had to look more friendly. And secretly Sidney wished to match better with her. With her light-colored dresses.

"Sit here!" 

Charlotte said vehemently to Grumpy to stop him from running after her again. After all, she didn't want one of the workers to stumble over him and get in trouble.

"Please, I just want to go up there for a minute..." she pointed to the scaffolding.

"Then I'll be right back." 

Grumpy whimpered miserably and Charlotte almost went soft, but suddenly the little puppy stood up and wagged its tail excitedly.

"Oh, no," Charlotte thought, because she knew exactly who was coming towards them without turning around. She got up and ran quickly to the ladder and climbed it up as fast as she could so as not to run into him.

"Hello my little one." She heard the dark voice of Sidney Parker.

"Come here."

Of course Charlotte couldn't resist to look back and now she became soft and just had to smile at the sight.

Sidney Parker. Tall and broad and irresistibly handsome, bent down to the woolly little fellow and crawled him behind the ears. It had become a sort of ritual between the two of them, which she could observe every time Mr Parker came to pick up the dog and take him for a walk.

Grumpy stood there with his tail wagging, waited for the crawl behind his ears and then jumped up at his chosen master until he softened and took him in his arms. He held it away from his face a bit, because he didn't want to be licked. It looked like the two of them were having a serious conversation during which Sidney heard from Grumpy where Charlotte was, because he suddenly looked up and saw her standing up there.

Half engaged in a conversation with his brother and Mr Stringer. A small twinge of jealousy ran through him as he saw Mr Stringer smiling at her, but Charlotte did not seem to reciprocate his advances or simply not notice them. She pointed at the houses and talked to Tom until he noticed Babington and Crow and came down the ladder as quickly as possible. Shortly afterwards she came after them, but immediately tried to leave the men alone and disappear.

"Miss Heywood." Oh, no. She stopped and took a short breath, then turned to face him with her chin up.

"Mr Parker."