"You-whooo~" Lucy called from the shade where she sat underneath the billowing tree. It was a large grandfather oak with dense leaves casting an enormous circle of darkness. "I have a picnic going if you lot'll care to join!"

Edward stalked over, stomping across the tall, overgrown grass. Resting the umbrella on Henry's shoulder, Veronica skipped lovingly to Edward's side. Henry struggled to aim the bow taught with the parasol between his arms. He cursed, letting the bow and arrow collapse to the ground.

As Edward and Veronica paced up together side by side to the blanket, Lucy swooned, marveling, "What a handsome couple you two look together." She smiled.

"Lucy!" Henry, appearing seamlessly out of thin air, reprimanded her, "Don't you think it imprudent to throw away your man like that?" He scrunched and flared his nose in distaste.

"No, not at all! You see, my parents are quite quite quite quite quite—" Lucy rattled on with gin in her hands. "—quite quite quite—"

"Okay!" Edward abruptly yelled, "It's quite something, we understand."

"Well," Lucy contributed, "It's quite wrong to get a divorce these days, and although we could, it's rather improbable because...Edward?"

"Yes, dear?"

"Do you want to get a divorce?"

Edward, for the first time, instead of automatically saying no these past few years, gave it a long and provocative thought, always saying: "No. You understand how social status works, don't you, dear?" Edward finally said, "Yes, I think I do!"

He proposed to himself that Henry could take him in like he did Veronica, but that was all a little too improbable, he presumed sadly.

Lucy stopped short of her thought process and whipped her head to face Edward's. "My family claimed ownership of you, so I'll be damned if they say we're to stay together!"

"My family will kill me if they've heard we've divorced!"

Edward couldn't believe what he was hearing. All these years, she has been with other men, and the moment he so much as laid an eye on Miss Veronica, she went and thought to throw the marriage away! Little did she know it was just Veronica for a short brief gaze. If only she knew what occurred that night she found him in the closet.

"Well, if it's to be that way," Edward crossed his arms, "So be it!" He was stubborn and was only sarcastic when following along with her.

His heart ached as he stared at Lucy, watching the love she held for him disappear along with the years they shared. The only problem: Edward still loved her. He fancied Veronica because of her majestic spell, and Henry for his grandeur, but for Lucy, well she's been with him for a while, and he was comfortable with that.

Henry laughed to himself as Edward's blatant attraction to Veronica destroyed his marriage. He thought to aid in the process and make a love potion for Lucy to muddy the waters even more. Yes, and then the tangles of the complicated love triangles can be wound together so tightly that no one will escape loose innocent! He laughed maniacally to himself. Raking his hand softly through Lucy's curls, Henry snatched a lock of her hair. In the dead of night, he collected worms, nightshades, and other flowers, and in a soup bowl, he mashed them together and spat into them, preparing them just for Lucy.

My perfect trap. . .he mused.

He collected a sample in a tiny glass bottle.

"Pass the tea will you, Henry?" Lucy swooned.

Henry sat next to her on the blanket, resting his shoulders so he leaned into her aura, feeling her heat radiate off of her skin. He bent down into the nape of her neck as she leaned forward to reach for the bread. Taking a long inhale of ecstasy, Henry smelled her blood rising in her flush veins. They throbbed with this invitation to puncher and let the smooth muscles recoil in response, contracting against his fangs. Lucy sat back up with a crumpet in hand, and Henry let out a shaky breath. He turned his thin nose away, keeping his distracted gaze down. He reached around Lucy as she leaned forward again to grab a biscuit, dusting something into her tea. Lucy turned and gave him a soft smile.

"What are you smiling for, dear?" Edward tilted his head in curiosity. His glare was insinuating: you want to fight dirty? Fine, let's fight dirty.

Lucy flushed at Edward's blue eyes. "Nothing, nothing at all. I'm smiling at this wonderful day. The sun is out, and there isn't a cloud in the sky." She clutched her hands to her chest. Resting back on her hips, Lucy leaned back, bumping her tea. "Oh, heavens me." She picked it up with dainty fingers and took a long drink.

Yes, Henry brooded, Edward will be vying for your attention now that yours is upon my figure, and Veronica will be left with no one to distract her from her duties. No one shall love her for fear of her loving them back and being able to die. My dear, Lucy, take one look at the only monster you'll ever love now. No more up-and-coming rich young men for you to throw away your marriage with. Now you'll feel what love should feel like and suffer from its unrequitedness.

"Darling?" Edward spoke again, his words were tough with sarcasm and full of hurtful emotion. "You're red as a tomato."

"Am I?" She took another sip. Henry grabbed the cup from her and pulled it away. Lucy turned and followed his hand to his eyes and froze. She held his gaze with a scared and flustered look.

"Lucy!" Edward yelled, snapping her from Henry's gaze. "You're pathetic, you realize that?"

"How do you expect me to live with my parents breathing down my neck about this marriage!"

"You're the one who's throwing it away!"

"Yet, I'm not the one whose lifestyle is on the line."

Edward stopped at that comment. It was a dastardly argument that threw him down the cliff edge. He tilted his head, and under his breath spoke, "Even a dumb broad can have money from her father to back her up."

"Why you!" Lucy got up to her feet, outraged. "I'll kill you is what!"

"Whoa!" Veronica jumped in front of Lucy, easing her to the top of the low-sloped hill. Their dresses glittered in the sun. "Come now let's not get too feisty over something so insignificant to the problem at hand. What about the church?"

"Oh! They can all go to hell!" Lucy spat.

She repeated herself over and over again, and Edward and Henry were left alone to listen to her voice fade away. Edward held a snarl to his face and drank the rest of Lucy's tea.

"What are you doing?" Henry didn't stop him. He smiled at Edward to catch his attention. And the plot thickens!

Edward gulped and tossed the cup, glancing once at Henry and then leaning away. "She's a terrible person for that. I hate being told what to do, and she knows that, so she manipulates my feelings to make it seem that it was my idea to go against my state of nature." He threw his hands sarcastically enunciating: "So be it that she does! She can't break the person inside of me! The image in the mirror is clear as day, sure it may fog from dust and moisture, but that image of me is still there! It will always be there!"

Edward gasped for air, leaning further down on his elbows till he lay across the blanket. He looked to Henry with an aching feeling of longing. "My image will never disappear. It will never change despite the sin and dirt rubbed into my skin. My eyes will be the same. My skin will be the same. It may be covered, but it's still the same."

His voice became softer as he gradually came round again in his circular thinking. "Despite the dirt, I'll be the same. Despite pain and suffering, I'll still be the same. I am who I am, and you can't change that." His voice cracked as tears began to well up. "I am who I am, and you can't change that at all."

He took a heavy breath and sat up. "I—I just" his voice was airy now. "I can't imagine how I can't get away with the things she does. She can have everything any way she wants." He grimaced at the thought. "She pleads to the servants, and they bow at her every need. I bow at her every need."

Anger and sadness flowed together down his cheeks. "But whenever I ask for a break, it's as if I committed the most atrocious sin known to mankind, and that I'm at fault for being the human being that I am. I can't always be perfect, Henry." Edward looked to Henry's feet. "But" he scoffed, "What do you know about that? You practically radiate perfection." Edward spat the word as if it were fire on his lips.

Henry smiled at the slight inclination of his attraction to him.

How lovely!

Chapter 5

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