Yours

by Cariaren

Summary:

Sidney has written a letter to be delivered to Charlotte in the event of his death

Notes:

Don't read anymore if you haven't watched Episode 1 and don't want to know the big spoiler.

 

So, Andrew Davies.
I get it; a hero giving up love to do his duty is pretty solid Jane Austen plot. (E.g., Edward Ferrars)
I get it; you hoped you'd have a second series and you'd fix it, and that would also be pretty solid Jane Austen plot. But seriously. The adaptations of Sense and Sensibility, Pride and Prejudice, Mansfield Park, and so on and so forth et cetera et cetera.... They didn't run two seasons, and those were legit Jane Austen. Why'd you think you would get more?
Geez, and there's really no fix for not having Sidney and Charlotte. I don't really care what other characters you toss in to Sanditon, it just isn't going to find the same magic.
And then, seriously, to kill him off????? I was crossing my fingers that, even though Theo James wasn't joining, we might get a final reveal a la Carol Hathaway/Doug Ross (ER TV series, for those who aren't old like me) with Sidney returning in the very last minutes and Charlotte gets to be with him.
Ugh.
So.
I am also constitutionally incapable of messing with established canon, so I'm left with severe suckage. Therefore this, because I have to have *something*, and really you didn't give sufficient grieving in Episode 1, just moving on all perky. Ick. This note is probably longer than the actual fic/letter, but the point in posting is to try to get myself out of my angry, angsty funk, so I'm being self-indulgent.

Anyway, the idea here is that the trunk we see coming from Antigua in Episode 1 contains this letter for Charlotte. Because that could still be canon.

Dearest, most beloved Charlotte,

I hardly know how to begin, but I feel compelled to put pen to paper.

If you are happy, if you have moved on and think of me no more, burn this letter posthaste as the ramblings of a fool.

Indeed, I feel foolish beyond measure, expressing such maudlin sentiment as to find myself the object of much-deserved scorn should misapprehending eyes discover my note.

But in my waking nightmares I remember your eyes as I shut the carriage door, and I recognise that I was not the only one to pay an excruciating price for my brother’s dreams. I must release the words I stoppered that day.

I love you, Charlotte. In the deepest and most hidden parts of myself, I secreted away *my* dreams, safe from destruction by any outside force, but always only dreams. I see our life together, our home and children and smiles and… It is the most exquisite pain, those few moments when I indulge my weakness and cling to what *must* be memories of my future, so vivid they are.

I have done my very best to follow your admonition and make Eliza happy. She is my wife; I have attempted to give her what she wants, but it is a weak attempt when everything is hollow. This letter will be put in with papers to pass to Tom and Mary in the event of my death, so I feel free to tell you these things without having disobeyed your instructions. If I am gone, she is my wife no more.

Should it offer you any comfort, know that I have thought of you constantly. Sometimes I even manage to smile.

Find joy, most magnificent of women.

Eliza laid claim to my life and my body, but I find that I am, in heart and soul, eternally

Yours,
Sidney J. Parker