Page 5 of The Spinster & the Sock

To make matters worse, my ancient and pious grandmother stands over us, her wrinkled jaw hanging as though the shock of what she just witnessed broke it from the rest of her face. The astonishment soon contorts into a scandalously pleased grin accompanied by a tsk, tsk.

I want to stand. Where is the nearest rosary so I can stab myself in the chest with it? I must explain to my grandmother that I am not wasting my virtue on the man laughing nervously beneath me. But before I can do anything to make the situation better, he opens his mouth and makes it worse.

“Alright, one of two things is happening right now—”

I try to rise, but giant hands clamp indecently around my waist

“—No, you stay where you are. You’re warm, and that big ass dress of yours is the only thing keeping Gertude there from getting another eyeful of my Johnson.”

Wondering who he is calling ‘Gertrude’, I attempt to roll away, but his hot fingers grasp harder and jar me back down on…what I can only assume is his Johnson.

He continues, “Either this just turned into some Ghost of Christmas Past bullshit and I’m fucked, or we’re still playing out the Downton Abbey thing and now we’re gonna have to do something cliche like get married. Meaning we’re both fucked.”

It’s my turn to be left red in the face with my jaw hanging. Shocked, I act before I think and am stunned as my palm comes in contact with his cheek. My skin stings. Oddly enough, he doesn’t seem phased and instead, blinks.

Once, twice, three times, and then laughs. “Oh my god, I am alive! I was worried because I have a gorgeous woman sitting on me and for whatever reason the trusty ol’ boy downstairs isn’t responding. Thought for sure that meant death. But my face hurts like a bitch. Nice swing, by the way. I’m alive!”

He won’t shut up. Somehow, this strange, loud, annoying man cannot comprehend how very serious this predicament is, and as he continues to exclaim that he is alive, my grandmother’s hysterical wheezing becomes audible words, and I am certain I have died.

“Josephine Dashwood! While I must confess, I am a connoisseur of appropriately timed indecency, of all the indecent things I could have pictured you doing in your life—”

The cockeyed man beneath me flashes my grandmother an impertinent smirk and interrupts, “What indecent things have you done?”

“This!” Grandmother snaps a response, her wide eyes like daggers in our direction. “This is undoubtedly the worst! Come, off to your father. And you…” Her long, bony finger wags at the naked man who still has not stopped talking. “You, sir, will make this right!” As she turns to leave, her skirts ruffling like an offended chicken, she peeks over her shoulder and I swear I see a grin creeping across her old face.

My heart sinks.

Making it right can have only two meanings.

Marriage or a bullet. Probably my brother Stanley’s bullet, lodged precisely in this man’s heart.

Although I know it’s his fault, I feel bad for him. I look down at the poor, slightly overweight, freckled man who, for the first time since rescuing himself from drowning in a literal puddle, has closed his mouth. The comical, confused expression he has worn for the last thirty minutes fades into something more understandable: fear.

Fuck

Blaze

“You, sir, will make this right!” Gertude screeches.

My elation disappears.

I’m alive. Which means this is real, and I’ve somehow Outlandered myself into Regency Era London. My stupid joke about marriage is suddenly a little too legitimate. Not only that, but this whole fucking thing is real. A looming marriage to a perfect stranger over a misunderstanding is actually only the cherry on top of the shit-storm I realize I’m in.

How did I get here, and better yet, how the fuck do I get home?

What I guess to be eighteen years later, after a carriage ride that was absolutely not the most awkward I’ve felt in my entire life, we pull up to a quaint estate. Gerty was kind enough to let me put clothes on before leaving Jo’s shop, and thank fuck Jo had more than dresses in stock. If I wasn’t so busy freaking the hell out over Magic Treehousing myself, I would be over the moon to be wearing authentic period pieces like these trousers, button-down shirt and overcoat. The just-barely too-big and stiff-as-the-dead shoes can piss off though.

Slightly nauseous either from the ride or the imminent danger of meeting “The esteemed Mr. Dashwood,”—who really knows—I spring out of the little door the second the wheels stop turning. I can’t quite read the look on Jo’s face when I turn back to help her down the step, but as I assist Gerty down after her, Jo speaks.

“Grandmother, this has all been a misunderstanding. We don’t really need to bring Father into this, if you would just let me explain!” Gerty, Jo’s grandma, it turns out, holds her hand up.

“You were alone with a man, and he was entirely unclothed. I do not see how there is anything to misunderstand, Josephine,” she says before, quite literally, turning up her nose and stalking off towards the door leaving Jo and me shoulder-to-shoulder at the gate.

“So on a scale of shit to fuck, how bad is this? Would it be better or worse if I just bolted?” I whispered, throwing a thumb over my shoulder.

“We have absolutely reached fuck at this point, and it would most definitely be worse if you bolted,” she huffs, clearly not impressed with my almost serious attempt at lightening the mood. Then a thought occurs to me.

“Jesus, Mary, and Joseph! You must think I was raised in a barn. Where the hell did I leave my manners—I never introduced myself!”