(no subject)
After the engagement party, June found himself doing to Aubrey exactly what he'd done to Keenan and Avalyn. The bitter process of killing a memory. The burial of names and faces and voices intimate to him as his own father, but the Windham's second son is lost to him now with the marriage to his pretty fragile bride and her soft, timid smiles. June had seen her that night, only in passing. Had seen her before on the docks and before at a party. Knew she was only meant to be a wife and never a woman, something for a man to attach to his name and to his reputation, a trophy on a fireplace mantle.
He tortures himself with the fantasy of the two of them cohabiting, sharing the same bed, making love to each other even if it's with the intention of having a child to carry on their name. He imagines there will be a day where Aubrey genuinely learns to love the girl.
But it won't be yet. Before that, June has to learn to let his possession, his belonging, go. It burns him to know Aubrey will be someone else's soon, because June is the one who dragged him kicking and screaming out of his personal circle deep in his mind, far away from the real world. June is the one who took his innocence, became so intimately familiar with every inch of his body and psyche. It really isn't fair. But it makes perfect sense.
The Mallory residence is hosting a party of their own tonight, although June is no where to be seen, wandering somewhere in the great halls of the manor, watching the moonlight on the tall towering windowpanes.