inthewildwood | fanfiction: call it your day number one (Reply)

Title: call it your day number one
Fandom: The Musketeers (2014)
Characters/Pairings: Fleur Baudin, Constance Bonacieux; one-sided Fleur/Ninon de Larroque
Summary: It's not so awful as she thought it might be; she did want to confess all this, she just didn't know how.
Rating: G
Warnings: Internalized homophobia

"I think there's something wrong with me," Fleur says. She's sitting with Constance at the kitchen table, preparing food for supper. Constance is plucking a chicken while Fleur peels carrots. Fleur stares down at the carrots, carefully slicing the rind away from the core, making sure not to look at Constance. She thinks she won't be able to say anything more if she looks.

"Are you ill?" Constance asks immediately. She leans over, pressing a cool hand to Fleur's forehead. "Do you have a fever?"

Fleur lets Constance push her hair back without protest, though it's been a long time since anyone stroked her forehead like she was a child. She thinks, after what she has to say, that Constance will recoil from ever touching her again. "I'm not sick." It's true, and yet not; there's nothing wrong with her that purging or bleeding will cure (she thinks) but surely there must be something dank and fetid inside, that crawled into her and nested in the hollow places of her heart. How else can she explain it? How else can she justify herself?

"Are you hurt, then?" Constance asks, withdrawing her hand. She's still looking at her, worried; Fleur won't look up, but she can feel the heaviness of the other woman's gaze. "Have you injured yourself?"

"No, I-" Fleur takes a deep breath. "What's wrong with me is wrong in my mind. I think." But that's not entirely true either; she's not a madwoman, not really. If she was, she could throw responsibility for her feelings away, blame them on strange humours or odd turns of the brain. She thinks it would be easier that way, but she's not a coward. It would be a lie. She was told not to lie. Ninon told her not to lie, and she clings to that, even though she feels as though she's betrayed everything else her teacher stood for.

"Oh." Constance is still plucking the chicken, one-handed, but her gaze hasn't left Fleur. "What makes you think there's something wrong in your mind? You seem as healthy as ever to me."

Fleur abandons the carrots, and lets her hands fall into her lap, twisting handfuls of her dress between her fingers. "I'm not sure how to say."

Constance touches her shoulder gently. "Can you try?"

She is trying, but it's so hard. "I don't want to be married," she blurts out. "My father says I'll have to someday, even though he let me put it off, but- I think about it and I just- I can't do it, Constance. It's horrible." The thought of a man's hands on her, drawing up her skirts and panting wetly in her ear makes her stomach heave, and then makes bile rise in her throat because she knows she shouldn't feel that way; it's not normal. Even women who hate their husbands have found comfort with other men. She can't, and the knowledge is as pure as anything she's ever known to be true. She knows it, right down to her bones- knows she'll never be fit to be a wife, knows there's a wrongness in her that would blight any hope of a happy marriage. She's poison, through and through.

Constance is still gently rubbing her shoulder. "It's not so bad, not wanting marriage. I've known many women who didn't; it isn't something we all choose for ourselves. Perhaps if you find someone you truly love-"

"I can't!" Her voice is rising hysterically, unnaturally shrill. "I've tried and I've tried but I can't do it. I don't want a man. I don't want that. I don't ever, ever-" She's crying and she can't stop and Constance is gently drawing an arm around her shoulders and murmuring soothing nothings. "The idea is- I've thought about it, I've tried so hard and it makes me sick and I can't do it. I just can't." She still hasn't gotten to the real heart of it, the part that will make her friend draw back in disgust. She's afraid to, but she's got to, and she doesn't know how to put it into words.

There's a long silence, punctuated only by the sounds of Fleur trying to catch her breath, before Constance says quietly "does this have to do with Ninon?" Her friend is a perceptive woman, and it's only taken this slight hint for her to probe deep into the secrets Fleur's tried so hard to keep hidden. It's not so awful as she thought it might be; she did want to confess all this, she just didn't know how.

"I loved her so much," Fleur says, staring down at her hands. Her fingernails are worn down the the roots from her biting. "But she- she wasn't like me. She scorned marriage because she didn't wish to be someone's property, but she liked men well enough. She told us that we could wield power over them, if we were wise about it." That, more than anything, was what had broken her heart; this beautiful woman she'd admired so much spoke for women's freedom, but not for the reasons Fleur prayed for. She didn't want to be property, didn't want the title of Madame. Fleur would take that title in a heartbeat, if Ninon had offered to her. If she had had the opportunity, in a different world, to be Fleur de Larroque. It was the stupidest dream she'd ever had, but she hadn't been able to stop dreaming it.

"Oh, Fleur." Constance is still gently rubbing her shoulder. "I know she cared for you. Not in the way you wanted, perhaps, but-"

"The trial," Fleur says, her voice shaking. "The Cardinal was asking me questions, and he said such terrible things. He- he asked if she'd seduced me, if she'd plied me with wine and taken my dress off. He made it sound so disgusting." She makes a small, helpless noise in her throat. It had been so hard, standing before the Cardinal, not looking at Ninon because she'd known if she'd looked that everyone would see what was in her heart and it would have ruined everything. Ninon would have been convicted simply because of what Fleur harboured in her heart. She'd kept it secreted away, locked like a treasure chest, and in the end it hadn't even mattered.

For the first time since beginning her confession, she looks up. Constance's mouth is set in a hard line, but she's not looking at Fleur; she's glaring at the half-plucked chicken as if she wants to wring its neck all over again. "The Cardinal," she says, sounding as if her words come from between gritted teeth, "is not a good man."

"He's a man of God," Fleur whispers. She's twisting at her skirt again. "He's a man of God and the King and he-"

"Fleur." Constance pulls Fleur's hands away from her skirt, taking them in her own instead. "Fleur, I need you to listen to me. Cardinal Richelieu is a powerful man and a wily one, but that doesn't mean he'd good or right. What he said to you at Ninon's trial- he said it for his own ends, because he needed to bring Ninon low because she threatened him. It had nothing to do with your feelings, do you understand? Nothing that happened was your fault."

Fleur wants so badly to believe her. "But- he said it was corrupt and foul and-"

"Corrupt?" Constance makes a scoffing noise. "The man takes mistresses and hires assassins as part of his daily routine, and he thinks he can judge what is and isn't corrupt? I hardly think so. Don't worry about what Cardinal Richelieu has to say, Fleur. He's as flawed and fallible as any of us."

"But-"

"If it's only what he said that's worrying you," Constance continues, "then you don't need to worry anymore. We all answer to a higher power than Cardinal Richelieu, I can promise you that."

Fleur finally meets her gaze. "But what if God thinks it's wrong too?" Surely there must be something wrong about it, or she'd know other women like her. She's heard of men who loved each other; usually it's in the context of how they met their end, on a bonfire in the Place de Grève. And she's heard sermons on the subject of Sodom and Gomorrah, how the evil of what people did to each other (sodomy, her brain supplies, sodomy and foul desires) caused God to rain destruction down on the city. But it's always been men in these stories; she's not sure what, as a woman, her feelings amount to. Trivial amusements, perhaps; small things to be brushed aside in the greater work of marriage and childbearing. She's seen women kiss each other on the cheek, clasp hands, and then leave to return home to their husbands. It makes something burn in her chest. Why is that permissible when what she feels isn't? Why must she feel such terrible, impossible things?

Constance touches her face lightly. "You're such a good girl," she says. "You're kind, and you're honest, and you've never done anything to harm another person in your life. When you account for yourself before God, don't you think he'll remember that? Or will he tell you that you'll be condemned for loving too much?"

"I don't know," Fleur says honestly. "I wish I did."

Constance pulls her into a hug, and Fleur holds her breath for a long moment before letting herself relax. This, at least, is some comfort; Constance knows what she harbours in her heart now, she she hasn't pulled away in disgust or called her a monster. She's as kind and loving as she ever was. Fleur doesn't know what she's done to deserve it.

"I don't think," Constance says, finally releasing her, "that you've done anything wrong. Your heart is your own, and you should dispose of it how you choose. I'm not of the Church; I can only tell you what I believe for myself. And I believe you're a good, kind person who shouldn't need to worry about what God thinks of her. All you need to do is live according to your conscience."

"I'm trying," Fleur says. "I'm trying, but- if my conscience says I'm wrong-"

Constance takes both of her hands again. "Then I want you to ask yourself why you think you're wrong. Is it because you're doing something wrong, or because you're doing something you've been told not to? It seems like a small difference, but it's not one to be discounted. And," she adds, "I think it's a difference Ninon would recognize."

That last pronouncement, more than anything else that's been said, is what makes the knot in Fleur's chest loosen a little. "Do you really think so?"

"I think she'd want you to seek your own happiness." Constance smiles at her. "And if you find someone- some woman- you love, who loves you as well, why shouldn't you enjoy that? Men and women have done far worse things in the name of love." She turns back to the table, plucking out another handful of chicken feathers. "Does that make you feel better?"

"A little," Fleur admits. "But I don't- I'm not sure where to start from here."

"Well," Constance says, "you can start by finishing the carrots. And after you're done, we can discuss you finding some sort of employment that would let you put off marriage for awhile longer. Just until we find a permanent solution. Does that suit you?"

Fleur picks up the paring knife. It feels lighter in her hand; her whole body feels lighter. They haven't fixed everything, and she knows the road ahead will be hard. But she has Constance know, who knows everything and still believes in her. It's not a solution, but it's a start. "It suits me very well."