Chapter Text
(For whom the division bell tolls?)
The division bell is bound to ring in twelve and a half minutes –a timeframe to which Anthony has become privy by virtue of accidentally eavesdropping on the Speakers of both Houses while getting breakfast at the Stranger’s Bar this morning–, and Kate’s fingers are skirting perilously close to his belt.
Actually, scratch that, they’re already there; even with all his blood rushing in his ears, Anthony can hear the faint clink of her nails against the metal of the buckle.
“Kate.” He tears his mouth away from hers with a gasp, his chest feeling painfully constricted inside his pinstriped shirt and blue jacket. She has divested him of his tie, and of the awful robes, and they are all currently lying in a heap on the dusty floor, paying company to the million mothballs and dust bugs that inhabit the cupboard-sized, dimly lit room that she’s pulled them into.
Not to be deterred by anything, Kate takes the sudden break of their heated kiss in stride, opening her mouth against the side of his neck, just above his shirt collar, and twirling her tongue in a way that makes Anthony’s eyes roll to the back of his head, and his hips snap forward –which, in turn, has the effect of reminding her of her previous plans for his belt.
“Kate,” he tries again, but his hands are moving from her waist to her ass and he’s pushing the words into her lips, kissing her again, because he simply cannot help it. “We have to go.”
His belt comes undone with a snap, as though trying to contradict him.
“Kate.”
The third must indeed be the charm, because her hand halts its movements on his buttons and zipper, and she pulls away for a second to look at him, her dark eyes half-hazed, half-exasperated.
“We have to go,” Anthony repeats, capitalizing on her brief moment of attention (or distraction?).
“We have time,” she counters, leaning forward to nip at his lower lip.
If something can be said about Kate Sharma, Liberal-Democrat and Right Honourable Member of Parliament for Chesham and Amersham, is that she knows how to be wonderfully idealistic.
It makes him smile, even though he knows he should not be encouraging her unrealistic aspirations, lest they end up shagging in a place weirder than a nondescript, semi-public broom closet in the middle of the Palace of bloody Westminster.
“You have time,” he replies nevertheless, because for all their posturing and airs of self-aggrandized servitude to Queen and Country, the duly elected certainly like to keep their business hours as late as possible. “I have to vote and – no, don’t.”
Her nimble fingers have resumed their previous work on his trousers, finalizing it in two economic movements, and they’re verging the edge of his underwear. Anthony breathes through his nose, and regretfully orders one of his hands to move away from her backside in order to catch her wrist before she can do any more damage.
“Kate, I can’t,” he isn’t exactly pleading with her, but his voice has taken a croaky turn that reminds of Hyacinth when she’s begging for a puppy. “This is not… We don’t have time to finish. I’m too, ooh – Kate.” He’s going to be late. Her hand is wrapped around him and he’s going to be so fucking late.
He breathes through his nose once again, his head hitting the wall behind him with a dull thump. “I’m not eighteen anymore.”
“Oh, I’m aware, my lord.” She flashes him a cheeky smirk, her eyes glinting wickedly, and seriously, Anthony hates her, truly really hates her, can’t stand how good she looks and how soft and right her skin feels against his and –
Like gunpowder in a cannon, his whole body shoots forward and he twirls her around, inverting their positions so that she’s the one pressed against the wall this time.
“You’re a menace to society,” he tells her, before catching her mouth in a bruising kiss, his hands rushing to lift the skirt of her Very Sensible Dress. “Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”
By the time the bell starts ringing, thirteen minutes later, her jacket has joined his robes and tie on the floor, he’s panting raggedly against her neck and, he’s pleased to report, they have both come –which makes Kate a right-all-along, accurately-predicting, realistic idealistic, he supposes, but Anthony’s feeling too content and triumphant to begrudge her the small victory, or her seemingly superior time-management skills.
Focused on catching his breath and softly nipping the side of her neck at the same time, he doesn’t notice it first, his mind barely registering the all too familiar sound of bells tolling throughout the building (and half Central London). But then, Kate suddenly tenses under him, her hands halting the lazy caresses she’d been laying upon his back, and he realizes.
“Is that…?” He lifts his head from Kate’s shoulder.
The division bell is, indeed, still ringing –has been for the past minute at least–, but the sound reaching them is not the well-known, pre-assigned chime for the Lords, the one Anthony can hum and replicate even in his sleep, but the distinctly different one used to call the MPs into the Commons Chamber for a vote.
So, calling Kate.
“Shit.” She scrambles to disentangle herself from him and starts fixing her hair and clothes. Anthony knows better than to try and help her, so he does the same, busying himself with becoming presentable and disposing of the condom, and resolutely ignoring the drop of his stomach when Kate steps away and he can no longer smell lilies.
“Told you,” he remarks instead, imprinting as much smugness as possible into his voice, because he mastered the unnoble art of overcompensating a decade ago and he hasn’t unlearned it yet.
“It’s the vote on subsidy control,” Kate explains, unprompted, as she crouches down to retrieve her jacket from the floor. She shakes it a couple of times to expel the residual dust before quickly slipping it on, then takes her long hair –all that wild, thick hair– between her fingers and does some sort of magic on it, because when she lowers her hands, it’s neatly pinned into a trim twist next to her nape. A few pats on her dress, and a little bit of strategic pulling on the skirt, and voilà Kathani Sharma, respectable MP.
“It wasn’t supposed to be till this afternoon, or later even, because Villiers kept hammering on about EU regulations and refused to give way to anyone, but Thompson must have managed to push it forward, somehow.”
“Sounds riveting.”
She snorts, bends again to pick up his tie and hurls it at him with surprising accuracy. Anthony catches it with one hand and carelessly throws it around his neck, caring not very much where it lands –he’ll be wearing his robes later, and the white miniver collar will hide it anyway.
“Yeah, well, I don’t get to choose,” Kate chuckles. “The perks of democracy, I guess.”
Here they go again.
They haven’t the time –or he, frankly, the inclination– to cross swords yet again on the relative merits of having a quasi-non-elected, permanent legislative body, so he ignores the jab (and it was a weak one anyway, certainly below Kate’s usual standards) and silently raises a hand to disentangle a lock of hair that’s become caught in her earring. As soon as it’s freed from the tiny golden hoop, it curls against her cheekbone, framing it beautifully.
“Shall I expect you later?” he asks, looking away from her hair and into her eyes, which, through mere coincidence or as a product of his previous actions, are already fixed upon his face, dark and inscrutable like a lake at night.
For a moment, she simply holds his gaze, as though trying to figure something out, before her lips curve into an amused, devilish grin.
“I don’t know,” she replies, with a thoughtful tilt of her head. “Is your back up to it, old man?”
Oh, the cheeky little…
“Let me worry about my back,” he tells her pointedly, cupping her jaw with one hand to press a fast, biting kiss to her mouth. “In fact, better worry about yourself, and that overweight sausage you call a dog. See that he has enough food and water, although–”
He’s interrupted by the division bell ringing yet again, his words drowned by the loud chiming –last call, by Anthony’s estimation, which means…
“You have three minutes to get to the Commons,” he informs Kate, and watches with amusement as her eyes open cartoonishly wide.
“Gordon Bennet, you’re right,” she tuts, moving away from him with one last, parting ghost-of-a-peck to his lips.
“I cannot believe you just said Gordon Bennet with a straight face.”
She ignores that in favour of scolding the air –or well, him– on her way out (“What were you thinking, distracting me from my duties?! Insufferable, horridly vexing man…”), and Anthony hears her complain with his eyebrows raised and what surely constitutes a healthy dose of hilarity –as if it hadn’t been she who had located and pulled them both inside this very broom closet, not thirty minutes ago… As if it hadn’t been her clever manoeuvres effectively ‘distracting’ them from their duties…
“See you later,” he calls out, one second after she’s opened the door.
Kate gives him one last look over her shoulder, one last insolent grin. “Cheerio.”
And just like that, she’s gone, closing the door behind her with a considerate click and leaving him there, in the middle of a dusty cupboard, with his trousers half done, three buttons open at random on his shirt, his tie hanging haphazardly from his shoulder, and his crimson robes collecting dirt on the floor.
Also, with an unexpected, delicious feeling of satisfaction and wholesomeness.
Not bad, he thinks, for his first week back in Parliament –or, indeed, for a relationship that isn’t even two months old.
Not bad at all.
(Give way to Lady Whistledown)
LADY WHISTLEDOWN POLITICAL PAPERS
April 20th, 2022
Dearest gentle reader,
Easter recess is finally over and this Author, much like Parliament, is back in session –and in fashion, it seems: a warm welcome to all new readers to our illustrious ton! You and your sagacious minds are much cherished in these realms.
[On the topic of fashion, check below the Blowing the Whistle section for pictures and commentary on the latest fashion trends in politics – and brace yourselves for some truly questionable sartorial choices.]
Aristotle was right, my darling readers, and we are all, indeed, political animals – but never more so than in the last week.
As Parliament reconvened on Wednesday, it is as though the spring air and the Easter break have served to reinvigorate the minds and souls of our most distinguished representatives and public officials, infusing them with a much-needed vigour –this Author has expressed concern in the past about the wilting condition of some Lords and MPs, and is very much pleased to see them regain a spring in their political step, at least.
Unfortunately, for the Labour leader, Sir George Crane, this newfound energy has translated into his parading in the most outrageously ugly shirts ever –only surpassed by the Prime Minister’s horrid ties. Meanwhile, Agatha Danbury, the fearless leader of the Lib-Dems and the Queen of Sass, could barely contain her face or her tongue at her colleagues’ attires, and she has left us with so many Burns –with a capital B–, and so much Meme material that this Author has felt compelled to document them in a separate post, just to do them justice.
As many of you gentle readers know and have pointed out, with Prorogation rumoured to happen sometime in the middle of summer, the next few months constitute the last hurrahs of this Parliament’s session, and of the second year in Jack Featherington’s Conservative Government.
If four years ago, when he managed to rise through the ranks under ex-PM Portia Featherington –no relation, this Author must insist–, someone would have told us he’d successfully stage a coup in the Conservative leadership, win a staggering majority in a General Election, and form and maintain a Government for two years, this Author would have suggested a trip to the GP.
[If you want to read more about our Prime Minister’s unseemly journey to power, click on the Featherington v Featherington tag here or in the sidebar.]
But here we are, two years in, and with both Westminster and Whitehall buzzing with activity once again, this blog, like the sweet, kind-hearted teapot from Beauty and the Beast, is overflowing with political TEA.
(For more circumspect political commentary, please, kindly refer to The Times or the Guardian, although one could argue, as this Author has done numerous times before, that it is behind the seemingly trivial and inconsequential things where the truth really lies, especially in politics.)
Ding-dong, the nasty yellow teeth are gone! You read right, darling readers, after the Wakefield scandal –which this Author first reported here–, a letter of resignation has been finally pried out of Lord Rutledge’s cold, dead hands (although not before he could claim his April salary and expenses). And with him gone (and hopefully, behind bars – remember you can still donate to the victims’ relief fund), his parliamentary seat becomes vacant, and you all know what that means: you guessed right, a Wakefield by-election!
This by-election is an exciting prospect, as we have not had a decent race since the Chesham and Amersham snap-by-election that brought us the delightful Miss Kate Sharma. Speaking of Miss Sharma, she travelled to the noble city of Chesham during the Easter holidays in order to have a day-long surgery with her constituents: as the story goes, one of them –a most gentle reader, surely– asked her opinion on our political TEA and she, without losing an ounce of her characteristic coolness, apparently replied that she much prefers political CHAI. This Author strives to please, Miss Sharma, so we shall see what sort of beverages can be concocted among these pages.
In other news, Lord Bridgerton was seen rowing on the Thames last Tuesday. Lord Anthony Bridgerton, for those uninitiated, is a favourite of this blog: a crossbench peer from a most illustrious and well-loved family, he is what the Victorians would call a Rake, with a string of lovers and a reputation for wild partying –allegedly, because the Viscount apparently shares this Author’s belief that no day is a good day to make Rupert Murdoch’s day, and he never, ever leaves a paper trail (although the same cannot be said about a ‘women trail’, pardon the pun).
He has, however, been keeping a disappointingly low profile recently –nothing since his alleged thirst with bombshell singer Siena Rosso–, but let us all hope that trend has been broken and we will soon delight in the rumours of his exploits once again (failing that, we will have to content ourselves with watching his interventions in the House of Lords, which are surprisingly entertaining).
Joining him for his early-morning practice was Tech mogul and billionaire Simon Basset, the Viscount’s best friend from Oxford and, as of May of last year, also his brother-in-law, after his long-awaited nuptials to Daphne Bridgerton-Basset. @TamaraTweets, one of our dearest readers, was having breakfast around the area where they docked their kayaks after racing up and down the river and was able to procure high-resolution pictures for this blog. Thank you, Tamara, democracy salutes you!
Political twitter was set aflame on Friday by…
(Family and other maladies)
“Is that the Viscount Bridgerton, Lord Anthony Edmund Bridgerton, of Aubrey Hall? Is it truly him? In the flesh?”
Anthony has just taken a judicious sip of his brandy and expertly left it to steep on a side-table, but as soon as he hears the string of questions, asked in a deliberately high-pitched voice, he practically leaps over the side of the armchair in his efforts to retrieve his glass and down it in one go. It is supposed to be a sipping spirit –and an expensive one at that–but that does not matter to Anthony. If his gut is right (or, more to the point, his ears), he really needs the pick-me-up.
When he’d booked a private parlour at White’s this afternoon, he had in-part done it to avoid this exact scenario, but clearly, life does not care for him or his plans –he should have gone to the Athenaeum.
“Hello, Benedict,” he says, voice coming out rough because the brandy was indeed a sipping spirit, and closes his eyes momentarily, trying to delay the moment his brother rounds the wing chair on which he’s currently sitting and appears in his line of vision. It doesn’t work that well, or at all, because when he opens his eyes, there is Benedict, dressed like a dreadful hipster and with a light in his eyes that tells Anthony that the ten-second delay has only served to give him ideas.
Indeed, as soon as he notices Anthony’s gaze on him, his brother clears his throat, pulls out his iPhone and holds it in front of his face in what Anthony recognizes as his Declamation Stance from his theatre days in Sixth Form.
“If we, Lords and Ladies of the House, cannot criticize this Government, or any Government, without the threat of punishment,” he reads out loud, “if the people of the United Kingdom cannot peacefully and respectfully protest what they consider unfair, then we cannot, my lords and ladies, in all good conscience, call ourselves a democracy.” Benedict puts a hand to his chest, bringing down the phone too and smashing the screen against his shirt. “Swooning, Lord Bridgerton. Swooning.”
Anthony cannot help but snort at his brother’s ridiculousness. “Shut up.”
“I though you limited your interventions in the House to backhanded jabs at people you find annoying and/or stupid, and really technical soliloquies that no one truly comprehends,” Benedict comments, taking a seat on the contiguous wing chair, “not actual causes.”
That is an absolute oversimplification of reality, though Benedict does have a point: that type of passionate, morality-charged, Churchillian speeches are definitely not his style.
“Desperate times, desperate measures, and all that,” Anthony shrugs, trying to appear nonchalant even as he feels his temper rising once again. “I just don’t see why we must put up with this Government’s authoritarian tendencies, sweeping majority in the Commons or not. And you should be grateful.” He points at Benedict. “If this abomination of a Bill passes, your artsy street performances of standing naked in a cage in the middle of Charing Cross or whatever will land your bones in jail in no time.”
“I have not once in my life stood naked in a cage as part of a street performance,” Benedict loftily points out. “Now, for fun… That’s an entirely different matter.”
Anthony snorts again.
“Will it pass?” Benedict asks after a beat, his brows furrowing.
“Unless some of my fellow peers and half the Conservative MPs grow a spine overnight… Yeah, probably.” Anthony once again tries to contain the ball of rage simmering in the pit of his stomach, if only because the employees of White’s don’t need to suffer through his temper tantrums (they’ve already seen him shitfaced, high as a kite, and dancing a conga, there’s no need to pile onto all that). “I intend to nit-pick and tweak the hell out of it, in any case.”
“My hero.” He again touches his chest with a comical sigh.
“Shut up.” Anthony kicks him lightly on the thigh. “What brings you here? Actually, don’t answer that, I don’t want to know. How did you find me?” That’s the better question, because either his brother has put a tracker on him, or he is more predictable than he thought, and both are circumstances which need immediate addressing.
It is now Benedict’s turn to snort. “You butt-texted us again. Have been sharing your real-time location on the family group chat for a couple of hours now.” He smirks devilishly. “Also, if you think I can’t work out that you’d either go to your office or one of your three favourite clubs, I have a bridge to sell you.”
“What?!” Anthony contorts his body on the wing chair to slide his phone out of his pocket and quickly discovers that, indeed, the screen’s unlocked, and not only has he been broadcasting his location to his whole family but has also sent a string of unintelligible texts, called Amazon’s customer service twice, and subscribed to a playlist called ‘Party Girls Tunes vol. 2’ on Spotify. Also, his battery is close to dying.
“Fuck.”
“Yep.” Benedict chuckles. “By the way, Hyacinth was delighted to see you were at Microsoft after lunch. She and Greg are convinced you’re getting her the new, unreleased Xbox for her birthday, so if you’re not, I suggest you make the trip back and start pulling strings.”
Anthony has pulled on strings to get Hyacinth the new Xbox –to be released next month, his meeting today was simply to arrange delivery and sign the NDAs–, but after weeks valiantly fencing off her multiple pleas and heart-wrenching puppy eyes, he’d meant it to be a surprise.
“Fuck,” he swears again, throwing the useless phone on the side-table and bringing a hand up his face to pinch the bridge of his nose.
“You truly are terrible with technology, Sunshine,” Benedict tells him, in a supposedly-commiserating tone that’s too gleeful to even insinuate sympathy –although he makes up for it by taking the phone and start undoing whatever shambles Anthony has left there. “I suppose it’s a good thing you don’t do social media, or you’d probably end up sending a dick-pic to Lady Whistledown on Christmas morning or something.”
“I don’t take pictures of my dick.”
“Probably why you’re single,” Benedict quips back, before frowning at his own words. “Or not, actually. Why are you single again, if you don’t take nor send dick-pics?”
Five minutes with his brother and Anthony already has a headache.
“Go away,” he groans, covering his face with his hands. “Or if you’re gonna stay, make yourself useful and call a waiter. I need a drink.”
“You need a passcode,” Benedict happily ignores him, except to lean forward and push the button on the table that calls a waiter into the parlour. “Anyhow, Mama kindly requests your presence at Bridgerton House this evening for dinner. I’m supposed to hunt you down and escort you there myself, if necessary.”
Before Anthony can reply, a waiter appears by their side, drink menu in hand and ready to take their order. They ask for two pints, and Anthony makes the executive decision to park the inevitable discussion until after he’s had at least one fortifying gulp of beer, and not a second earlier.
“You’ll have to make my excuses to Mama,” he tells Benedict after two fortifying gulps of his beer. “I can’t go to dinner today.”
Benedict, glass of beer suspended halfway to his mouth, groans and drops his head against one of the chair wings. “No,” he moans. “You have to come. Otherwise, she’ll have my head. She and the kids have been complaining that they haven’t seen you in ages.”
“I saw them on Easter Sunday!” Anthony defends himself. “We were at Aubrey Hall for the whole break! You were there too!”
“Yeah, three weeks ago,” Benedict retorts. “That’s like, three centuries in parents’ time! C’mon, Ant,” he pleads, pouting comically. “You’ve missed the last two family-dinners. Even Daff and Simon are coming tonight…”
“I’m busy!”
“Brooding and drinking at your club?”
“I’m working!” Anthony gestures to the flat screen hanging from the opposite wall, and to the Commons debate playing out on it, which, before his brother’s sudden appearance, he had been intently watching.
Benedict gives the screen a swift glance and, probably following a younger sibling instinct long-entrenched in him, opens his mouth to contradict him (if his bellicose expression is anything to go by), before his brain registers what he’s just seen.
“What is that?” he inquires curiously.
“BBC’s Parliament TV. Live,” Anthony replies in a monotone, unnecessarily pointing to the white logo on the top-right corner of the screen.
“Yes, but what is it?”
“Nationality and Borders Bill, second reading.” Anthony frowns at the screen and takes an even bigger gulp from his beer than before. “Another piece of travesty legislation.”
“Sounds dreadful,” Benedict comments with a grimace, tilting his head to study Elizabeth Cowper’s face; the Secretary for the Home Office has spent the whole debate sneering and smirking at her fellow MPs left and right, but her face right now as she listens to an SNP representative, is a study in smugness and misplaced superiority. Anthony’s almost tempted to ask Benedict to pick up his brushes, if he wasn’t sure that recording her countenance for posterity is both a waste of his brother’s talent and paint.
“Ooh!” Benedict coos suddenly, after the SNP fellow has finished his intervention and the camera has panned out to show a wide shot of the Chamber. “Is that Kate? Our Kate?”
Anthony looks up from his notes to the screen where, yes, Kate has stood up and looks ready to speak. Before Benedict arrived, he’d seen her stand up at least three times without being given way, so it’s a good thing that she’s been finally allowed to speak, or he’d never hear the end of it tonight.
(That is, if they see each other tonight, which is a possibility but in no way a certainty, because they are, as the kids say these days, casual.)
“I don’t know, let’s see,” he mutters sarcastically, in reply to Benedict’s question. “Indian girl? Permanent scowl? The straightest back in the Houses of Parliament? Yeah, I’d say that’s Kathani alright.”
“Ssssh, she’s speaking, turn up the volume,” Benedict orders, before reaching out for the remote and doing it himself. He rests his elbows on his knees and pushes his face between his hands, watching with interest.
For the seven and a half minutes of Kate’s intervention, none of them speak or do anything except watch the screen. She’s talking about refugees earnestly, denouncing issues on human rights and making a point of signifying the Government’s hypocrisy and the counter-effectiveness of the proposed policy, and it’s the type of self-righteous, black-and-white, passionate address that would normally make Anthony roll his eyes, but after his own impassioned speech at the Lords today, he doesn’t have a leg to stand on. Besides, he kind of agrees with her. Some things should be black and white.
“She was so great!” Benedict starts clapping as soon as Kate sits down, tucked snuggly between Lib-Dem MPs who pat her on the back and the shoulder. “I’m so proud! Aren’t you proud? Our baby girl, so grown-up! A true politician, in her own right!”
“She was alright,” Anthony concedes. “But you’re younger than her. And you met her in Cambridge, so you two were, in fact, grown-ups. And Kathani is definitely not our daughter.” He refuses to even entertain the implications of that sentence, particularly in light of their most recent activities.
Benedict sends him a bored look.
“I dream of the day when you two will pull your heads out of your arses and finally realise you’re perfect for each other.”
“I dream of the day when you stop dreaming about my sex life,” Anthony deadpans in response. “It’s disturbing.”
“Who’s talking about sex here?” his brother cleverly counters, quick as a whip. “Although yes, that’s part of your problem, the blatant UST.”
“I’ve told you I don’t understand your hipstery acronyms.”
“Unresolved Sexual Tension, my dear brother, unresolved sexual tension,” Benedict translates, almost spelling out the words. “It’s the only thing to explain the constant bickering and fighting. You two need to shag.”
No, Anthony thinks, that’s certainly not the problem.
Not that there is a problem with Kate, not really. Anthony doesn’t know why he hasn’t told Benedict yet that they’ve started hooking up, or why they are keeping it a secret in general: the first time had been so sudden and unexpected that the thought of telling someone didn’t even cross his mind, convinced as he was that it had been a one-time thing and would never repeat itself. And then, as it’s happened again and again and again, talking about it felt too awkward, or too strange, or too… something.
Besides, it’s not like they’re dating or anything –they are simply two consenting adults funnelling their mutual physical attraction into the best proper channel for that. Plus, half the time, he’s not even sure Kate actually likes him –she certainly doesn’t miss any chance to aggravate him–, and for at least a third of that time, Anthony isn’t sure he wants her to. Things are much less complicated without getting feelings involved, and both of them already lead pretty complicated lives as it is.
In fact, if he thinks about it, this arrangement he has going on with Kate is perfect: they have great sex –truly mind-blowing, earth-shattering, great sex–, and none of the complications of a relationship.
“Daphne, Colin, and Mama agree with me,” Benedict adds, smugly pulling the Family Council card while completely oblivious to where his older brother’s mind has gone.
But yeah, that’s an entirely different problem: their families. As it happens, their mothers are old friends –at the very least, old friendly acquaintances–, Kate has known Benedict since he decided to break centuries of Bridgerton tradition and attend Cambridge instead of Oxford (and she met Colin shortly after that), Anthony’s pretty sure Gregory and Hyacinth want to adopt her (or is it the other way round?), and her family, including her delightful little sister and her stupid pudgy dog, is so intertwined with his in general that, were any of them to learn something’s going on between him and Kate, they would become unbearable, simply unbearable –which probably accounts for why he hasn’t said anything to anyone, not even Benedict or Simon.
Suddenly feeling very pleased with himself and his own choices, Anthony goes back to paying attention to his brother.
“– and Eloise definitely thinks that Kate’s too good for you, but deep down, she agrees as well.” Apparently, Benedict has continued listing the family members that think he should pursue a relationship with Kate, which seems to be all of them, by the sound of it. “Franny, who also agrees, pretty much confirmed it the other day.”
“Stop talking to our mother and siblings about me.” Anthony lightly kicks him in the leg again.
“Come to dinner tonight then, and we can all talk about you with you,” Benedict replies, cool as a cucumber, with a toothy grin.
“I’ve told you, I have to work,” Anthony automatically replies, glancing at the screen for the first time in a while and realising that, while he was being distracted by his brother’s malarkey, the debate has come to an end and the Speaker has started calling a vote. “Fuck, the division.” He turns around fully and quickly picks up his fountain pen. “Be quiet now, I have to focus.”
He is not so much interested in the general outcome of the vote –with the Government’s majority, that’s pretty much decided beforehand–, as in finding out which Conservative MPs dilly-dally or drag their feet to the Ayes Lobby, because those are the ones he will have to lobby (discreetly) into voting against the Bill, or at least supporting the amendments he and some other Lords have planned for it.
“Is it over now?” Benedict asks as soon as the Speaker reads out loud the tellers’ result. “How sad. Now you can come home for dinner with your family.”
Without raising his eyes from his leather notebook, Anthony shakes his head in amusement. His brother is like a dog with a bone sometimes.
“You’re like a dog with a bone sometimes,” he tells him, raising his head and capping the fountain pen in the same movement. “And not quite, I still have to – wait, what the fuck is he doing?”
At his sibilant hiss, Benedict’s gaze moves from his brother’s face to the TV, where a wide shot of the Chamber is playing out again, showing the MPs as they collect their papers and shuffle to the exit.
“Who, Mr Speaker?” he asks. “I believe he’s internally cursing the day he accepted the job. That teller has a terrible sneer, it’s visible even from here.”
Anthony clicks his tongue, impatient and annoyed. “Not the Speaker,” he clarifies. “Bloody Thomas Dorset.”
“Which one is Bloody Thomas Dorset?”
“Velvet green blazer, floppy hair. On the floor, right corner, close to the Box.”
Benedict narrows his eyes, searching in the crowd of MPs for Thomas Dorset like he used to search for Wally’s white-and-red striped jumper in those ‘Where's Wally?’ books when they were children.
“I’d say,” he pronounces gingerly after he locates the man in question, “that he’s chatting with Kate. Not a terrible crime, is it?”
Anthony scowls, gripping his pen between his fingers. Dorset is doing much more than simply chatting with Kate –he’s leaning forward, and casually grazing her arm, and smiling like a fool, and being horrendously obvious in his intentions while generally not realizing he and his (surely) dreary conversation are both irritating and unwelcome, because everyone knows that Kate always gets a cup of Chai after divisions, no matter the hour, and he’s stupidly preventing her from fulfilling that one particular necessity.
(The worst part is that, even though she’s probably craving, Kate doesn’t seem in any rush to leave either: she’s replying to Dorset, and pointing to something on the Order sheet, and smiling back –although it’s more of a sort-of-guarded, polite smile–, and doing everything and anything except dashing away from the Chamber and the bloody idiot.)
“He’s a Conservative MP,” Anthony explains to Benedict, pointing at the screen and harrumphing audibly.
“And?”
“And he has gone out of his way to cross the floor (literally, not parliamentary) and fawn over a backbencher from a different party who has just thrashed his Government, not twenty minutes ago!” He throws his hands up. “In public. Has he no shame? No pride? No political loyalty?”
“You’re exaggerating, they’re only talking,” Benedict reasons. “And I think he’s an independent MP now. Didn’t he get the Tory whip removed from him during the whole Brexit-deal rebellion?” he points out and Anthony mentally curses him, because his brother generally acts as though he doesn’t care for politics but now, he’s had to choose this exact moment to prove that he, in fact, has been paying attention all along –and remind Anthony that, in another universe, Benedict would have made a brilliant politician.
“That’s irrelevant,” he argues, nonetheless. “His views are conservative.”
“What does it matter to you? You have no political affiliation, remember?”
What does it matter to him, indeed.
“I simply like to see things done after a certain orderly fashion and it upsets me greatly when they’re not,” he sniffs delicately, reaching out for his pint on the side table. He glances at the TV screen over the rim of the glass and when he realises that the Chamber is finally empty, swallows a sigh of relief with the rest of his beer –there is no way Kate is still with Dorset, she is probably rushing to her office right now, or the nearest Costa.
Benedict, for his part, appears to have been studying him, head tilted, eyes narrowed again, lips slightly arched in a thin smirk. “Are you jealous? You sound jealous.”
“Don’t make me hit you with my notebook,” Anthony replies, raising the aforementioned object with his free hand. “The wisdom of our whole democracy will fall on your head, and you won’t like it one bit.”
His terrible joke falls flat, because apparently, what pikes Benedict’s interest is the fact that Anthony was telling the truth when he’d said that he was working, which is completely insulting, to be honest –by the way his brother is laughing incredulously, anyone would think Anthony has spent the past twelve years living off the taxpayer’s money while jolly slacking off.
“Oh my God, you’ve been taking notes?!” His laugh booms across the small room as he stretches out his arm to snatch the notebook from Anthony’s hand. He flips through the pages in quick succession. “Not even a doodle here. Anthony, you big swot!”
“Shut up.” Anthony kicks him a third time. “Yes, Benedict, I take my duties seriously. Would you like to follow my example every once in a while, perhaps?”
“And deprive you from the pleasure of constantly reminding me of them?” Benedict asks ironically. “I could never be so cruel to you, brother, I love you way too much.”
“Right, as long as you love me…”
Benedict laughs uproariously at that, and to Anthony, it feels like a balm of approval that he didn’t even know he needed.
“C’mon,” Benedict eventually says, when he gets tired of laughing. He downs the rest of his beer in one go, clicks off the tv, and climbs to his feet, the leather notebook still in his hand. He uses to lightly tap Anthony in the head. “Enough democracy for you for one day. Bridgerton House awaits.”