Chapter Text
Agatha was in her favorite place, laying propped up in his lap so she could stare at him like a sweet little owl. Colin was grateful for her company. They had run through his entire repertoire of games: chin tickling, peek-a-boo, allowing Agatha to yank at his hair while she laughed. Now he was waiting for his wife to return upstairs so that he could make his request.
Aggie was grabbing his finger while he tried to tug it away when Penelope appeared in the doorway with a smile.
“How are you, my Pen?” he asked, wincing as Agatha batted at his cheek with her little fist. The endearment no longer felt like he was borrowing something from his past self. It was a statement of fact now, that they belonged together.
“I’m well, and how are the two of you this afternoon?”
He smiled at her as charmingly as he could manage. “Agatha and I were discussing that today is a fine one for a promenade.” The sun was shining and Colin longed to be outside after weeks trapped in the house.
“Oh you were? And I suppose Agatha also reminded you of your dizzy spells?” Penelope’s brow furrowed with concern.
Colin held Agatha up so he could squish her plump cheek against his. “Please, Penelope. I haven’t felt the sun on my face in so long. And Agatha has never been to Hyde Park either.”
Agatha gurgled adorably at the sound of her name. She was the perfect accomplice and Colin vowed to be the finest father to her that she could imagine. Penelope couldn’t resist the two of them united toward a goal, not when he was pleading with his eyes and Agatha was performing the particular type of magic only a small baby could.
Penelope sighed in the long suffering way of a mother but she spoke affectionately. “Why do I sense this is only the beginning? The two of you are far too charming.”
“All will be well, you’ll see,” Colin said, rising slowly and carefully. There was no need to concern her when he was so close to his aim. “We can bring a footman as a precaution.”
Before long, they had arrived and Colin tilted his face up at the sky, basking in the gentle breeze against his face. Never had he been so grateful for such a simple pleasure. And having Penelope on his arm made the experience complete. He wondered if they had wandered here during their first courtship. Mrs. Hudson walked a distance behind, carrying Agatha, while a footman shadowed them but allowed them their privacy.
Colin pulled Penelope toward a bench by the river, seating them both there a little too close for propriety. They watched the swans gliding over the water in silence, and all felt peaceful. It was his first time in public with his wife, and he realized how freeing it was not to care too greatly about others’ opinions of them. If the Ton thought him besotted with her, what was that to him? He reached for her hand, tucking it against his side so it wasn’t too noticeable. Penelope smiled at him contentedly.
“You see? Feeding the ducks is good for the spirit,” he said, with a sly sidelong glance at Penelope.
She tried to hide a huff of amusement, but he was certain he caught an eye roll.
“Indeed, Colin,” Penelope replied. “But I regret to inform you that those are swans.”
She said it so patiently, so kindly, that it took everything in Colin not to burst out laughing. It was such a delight to tease Penelope. She was the quicker wit of the two so he relished putting her on the wrong foot with his silly jests.
“Ah, I see now. They are so terribly easy to mistake, you know. Especially with my addled mind,” he finished rather pitifully.
Suddenly he felt a hard poke in the chest and looked over to Penelope with her arms crossed and an exasperated look on her face.
“You are smirking! Terrible man!”
Colin finally released his laughter and Penelope joined in, uncaring of the passersby who glanced curiously in their direction. It reminded him of times before, when they were engaging in the most commonplace pastime, but taking great pleasure in it. And Penelope looked so at ease, so happy laughing with him on the bank of the Serpentine. Then the smile slid from her face and her eyes widened.
“Colin, how did you know?”
“Know what?” he asked, still enraptured by the sparkle in her eyes.
“I only told you after we were married…that I thought it rather ridiculous you couldn't tell swans from ducks.” She gestured meaningfully toward the water and Colin’s heart gave a sudden thud.
“I do not know. It simply…surfaced when I saw them. That it would make you laugh.”
Penelope’s eyes lit up. “Well done, darling.”
Colin simply sat, trying to take it in. He remembered. If he sat quietly, he could almost pull the memory toward him.
“Were we abroad when you told me?” he asked. They were on foot, and the air felt different. Warmer, thicker. They were near water.
“Yes! Yes, we were on our honeymoon.”
It was still maddeningly elusive. Mere wisps, images and words that teased at the edges of his mind. But it was there. Their past was still there.
“There’s nothing more,” he said, shaking his head as if wishing to jar the memory loose. He wanted it all– he was greedy for every kiss, every whisper of affection. “I can’t find anything else.”
Penelope squeezed his hand. “Don’t force it. It will come in time.”
When he met her eyes, he was startled to see that tears were running down her face. Colin felt a lump in his own throat, seeing her relief, her happiness. Penelope smiled at him through her tears.
“Don’t mind me. I’ve been so emotional since the baby was born.”
“There is a tear for each moment you’ve loved me, I believe,” Colin replied tenderly, wiping her eyes with his handkerchief.
“It’s just so lovely that you remember one of our jests. That when I tell you of our honeymoon tour, you were there, and you know you were there.”
Colin pulled her into his arms, completely uncaring if he caused a scandal by embracing his wife in public.
“Thank you for being the keeper of our memories when I couldn’t. For remembering our love when it was just a feeling inside me, one I couldn’t put into words.”
Penelope framed his face with her hands, still weeping. “You’re here now.”
“Pen,” he said gently, “don’t misunderstand me. I only remember that bit.”
“No, I understand,” she replied. “I mean the way you look at me. You look at me as you did then.”
Colin understood. It was their love that bound them together, and all would be well.
“Perhaps I will remember more with time. And until then, I can continue looking at you this way,” he smiled.
“Lately, I’ve wondered if you remember more than you know,” Penelope admitted. “You call us your girls. Even before Agatha was born, even when we did not know if we would have a son or a daughter, you called us that. You always said you simply knew she would be a girl.”
Colin blinked, trying to take it in. “I thought of you that way from the moment you brought little Aggie to me. I knew you were my girls.”
Penelope nodded eagerly. “And the way you always hand me the center of your toast at breakfast while you eat the crust…I didn’t wish to point it out, but that was our habit as well.”
He had done so without thought, simply sensing without knowing that it was Penelope’s preference. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
Penelope kissed his forehead tenderly. “At first, I denied it. I was too afraid to hope. And then, I wasn’t entirely certain if you were remembering or if it was a coincidence. I love this Colin so dearly, my Colin who has been injured and must endure so much. You were struggling, and I didn’t wish to add to your burdens. Or make you feel that I would love you more if you remembered.”
Colin’s heart swelled at her compassion for him. At the way they found each other again, at his belief that they were meant for one another and he would fall in love with her repeatedly for the rest of their lives.
That night, Penelope lay beneath him on the bed, bare and glowing in the moonlight. He pressed a tender kiss against her stomach.
“Have I kissed you here before? I seem to remember it.”
“Yes,” she breathed. “But you know this. You know there isn’t an inch of my skin that you haven’t kissed before.”
“I must be thorough,” he replied with a wicked grin. “It is the only way to remember it all. Now, have I kissed you here?”
Penelope gasped as he found that extra tender spot at her inner thigh where he loved to bite, and he continued his teasing questions with kisses to match, intent to uncover every moment with her, every piece of her that he could.
______
The memories didn’t return all at once. They didn’t come as a flood, or even a steady pattering of rain. No, they arrived like the soft, gentle fall of a snowflake coming to the ground. Each one intricate and beautiful. Each one delicate, and prone to melting if he tried to catch them in his outstretched hands.
He had to let his past come to him, to wait gently and patiently. Seemingly out of nowhere, they would arrive. Penelope’s face, distressed in a garden at moonlight. A hard tug of his hair as he sat on the velvet seat of a carriage. The sound of Penelope’s labor pains through a heavy door as he paced in the hallway.
Some of the memories were fully formed. Others had to be examined to place their importance, and Colin would write about them in his journal. At times, he consulted Penelope, or one of his brothers, someone who had been there and could provide the context that he needed to understand.
He was still prone to dizziness, to sudden spells of piercing pain in his temple. But he always had Penelope to bring him a cool cloth, to soothe him with her presence and her words and her touch.
Best of all, he had Penelope to steal glances with. He could enjoy the way she blushed when he smirked at her, the way he would look up from snuggling Agatha and see her watching them with a soft look on her lovely face.
And he had his children. After Agatha there was Thomas and then Jane and then George. Each new pregnancy, each birth, brought back precious memories of Aggie’s first days, healing any lingering cracks of grief for what he had missed. They were a family.
Slowly, he recaptured enough of his past to form a blanket of pure truth covering ground that had been barren before. And when he reflected on it, he knew that it was more than enough. For he had fallen in love not once, but twice with the most remarkable woman he could ever imagine. He was changed, but in every telling of his life story, in every memory, he would always be hers.