Attempting Elizabeth (10 page)

I pulled out a piece of paper, quill and ink and wrote as neatly as I could:

My name is Kelsey Edmundson.

Kelsey Edmundson woke up on the couch in her apartment in Anaheim, California, where she had fallen asleep reading a book.

She was Kelsey Edmundson and only Kelsey Edmundson.

As a work of prose it wasn’t very elegant. My brain was scattered and I wasn’t sure exactly what I was saying. I just knew, somehow, that it was important to say who I was; to write a piece of my story on that paper.

I folded it neatly in two, creasing it down the middle like a book. I’d fallen asleep basically with
Pride and Prejudice
on my face, so I laid the paper down, face up and open on Georgiana’s pillow. I lay down on my stomach with my cheek pressed against the paper.

I don’t know how long it took me to fall asleep, but it was a long time. I’d allowed myself to hope that this might work, and the excitement was making it hard for me to relax. Finally my eyes drifted shut.

I woke up, on my own couch, wearing my ratty sweats, with
Pride and Prejudice
still smashed against my face.

“...the silliest girls in the country.”

The relief swept
over me like a paralyzing wave. I couldn’t move. I couldn’t breathe. And then I dissolved into tears. I’d started to be convinced that I’d never make it out. That I’d be stuck as Georgiana forever. I’d never seen anything as beautiful as the Southern California sunshine streaming in from our large living room window. Just the feel of it was so totally different from the feel of the sun in England, or the fictionalized England, I’d been living in for the last month.

Crap, how long had I been gone? I grabbed my phone from the coffee table and checked the date. It was the morning after I'd fallen asleep reading
Pride and Prejudice
. I had been stuck as Georgiana for almost a full month, but no significant time had passed here in the real world.

It was barely seven a.m., but I was starving. Luckily, my local Chinese delivery is open twenty four hours. I called and ordered enough food to feed a family of four for a week and then jumped in the shower. I dissolved into tears again as the warm water pounded down on my head. The amazingness of indoor plumbing cannot be overstated.

Tori wandered out into the kitchen at around 8:15 and looked at me in blurry eyed confusion. “Why are you eating Chinese food at this god-awful hour?”

“‘Cause I’m hungry and I haven’t had it in ages. It’s so good! Want an egg roll?”

“What are you talking about? We ordered from the Emerald Dragon like three days ago.”

I stared at her blankly for a minute. “Oh, yeah. Um, the thing is, something weird happened to me last night—“

Tori sat down in a chair on the other side of the kitchen table and looked at me earnestly over an open cardboard box of fried rice. “I know, the whole thing with Ashley. What that little bi—“

“Actually,” I cleared my throat. “This doesn’t really have anything to do with that whole thing. Well, maybe in a way. I mean, it could have been the inciting incident, but that’s beside the point.” A crease had appeared between Tori’s eyebrows. I knew that crease, it was the “I am becoming increasingly concerned for your emotional stability” crease.

“I need you to keep a really open mind,” I added.

“Always.” Tori nodded her head sincerely, but the crease got more pronounced.

“So, you know how I’ve always wanted to meet Mr. Darcy?"

Tori nodded, looking confused.

"Well, I did.”

Blank stare.

“I, um, well the thing is, I got into
Pride and Prejudice
,” I continued. “Somehow I jumped into the book and into a character. And I kind of lived there for a few weeks until I figured out how to get out.”

“Lived there? As in you lived inside a book?” The crease was reaching new levels of deepness. She needed to stop doing that to her forehead or not even Botox would help her by the time she hit her forties.

“Yes. Like in Regency England, as Georgiana Darcy—that’s the character I somehow randomly jumped into—except really, when you think about it, not
actual
Regency England. Frankly everyone was just too pretty for real life.”

“Is this some kind of joke?” she demanded.

“No. It's not a joke. I said you have to have a
really
open mind.”

“There’s open and then there’s crazy. How exactly did you manage to get into a book? Magic?”

“I’m not entirely sure about that part, actually. You know,” I said slowly, “It’s almost like I’m Dr. Samuel Beckett, but for fictional characters.”

“What does Samuel Beckett have to do with it?”

“You know, Dr. Sam Beckett from
Quantum Leap
? How he jumps into people?”

Tori’s mouth gaped open as she glared at me. “Are you seriously talking to me about a television show from the 1980s right now? That sort of thing doesn’t really happen. I mean, it
can’t
happen.”

“But I think it can. I don’t know exactly how it works, just that I fell asleep reading the book and kind of woke up in it. As Georgiana.”

Tori’s face relaxed. “See, you fell asleep. You must have just been having a really vivid dream.” She laughed, but it sounded a bit forced. “How much wine did you have last night?”

“Not enough to make this up. I’m sure this actually happened.”

The crease snapped back into existence with surprising speed. “You can’t have been inside a book for weeks, Kels. I saw you last night and now here you are this morning. Obviously a dream.”

“Yeah,” I speared a wonton with a fork and popped it in my mouth. “I think it’s like Lucy and the wardrobe. No matter how much time you spend there, not a lot of time will have passed here.”

“Honey, you know Narnia isn’t real, don’t you?” Tori had leaned forward and her voice was gentle, as if she was talking to a child. Or a pet. Or a crazy person.

“Yes, I know Narnia isn’t real.” I paused for a minute. Did I really know that? I mean, I got into
Pride and Prejudice
, could I get into
The Chronicles of Narnia
too? Or maybe into
Anne of Green Gables
? Or—total nerd meltdown alert—any
Star Wars
book? I felt a cold sweat break out my forehead at the thought. Holy magical book jumper, Batman! Could I
be
Princess Leia?

“Was it only wine?”

I tore myself away from my frantic mental list-making of every book I could possibly try to get into to look over at Tori. “What?”

“Last night, you only had the wine? Nothing…else?”

“Are you asking me if I’m
on
something?”

“Yeah, kind of.”

I guess I didn’t really blame her, but it still kind of stung. I’d known her fifteen years, in which time I’d never even smoked a cigarette. But I guess if she was telling me something so spectacularly bizarre, I might ask the question too. “Just a glass of wine, not even enough to get tipsy.”

“You were really upset. Maybe it’s kind of like, well, you know…” she trailed off looking uncomfortable. “Didn’t you have that one uncle who…”

“Uncle Greg? He had post traumatic stress disorder. He was in a
war
for goodness’ sake! It’s not a genetic thing.”

“Sorry, I’m just worried.” The forehead crease was completely out of control now. Her mention of my uncle had spooked me. Not because I thought she might be right and that I was experiencing a severe mental break (I’d already discarded that theory relatively early on during my stay as Georgiana), but because if she was thinking about my family it might occur to her to call my mother. That could only turn out badly.

I chewed slowly on another wanton. “You’re probably right. It was probably just a vivid dream.”

Tori looked at me suspiciously. My change of heart was a little bit too quick to be believed.

“Seeing Ashley must have made me overly emotional...and then the wine. And you know how I am about
Pride and Prejudice
.”

“Obsessed?”

“That’s one way to put it,” I agreed. “I tend to obsess about things, don’t I? I guess I just got caught up in a silly dream.” The sincerity was fairly dripping off me at this point. I felt bad straight up lying to my best friend, but it was either that or the loony bin. If Tori got ahold of my mother with this kind of story, I could kiss any peace of mind—and any chance at trying to jump into other books—goodbye for God knows how long.

I’m not sure Tori entirely believed me. She shouldn’t have, she knew me well enough to know I was lying. But she wanted to believe me, and that went a long way.

“Can you believe Ashley? Do you think she was all over Mark because he was with us, or what?” I figured a change of topic would help. And food. I nudged the package of egg rolls closer to her.

“Probably. Charlie said she attached herself to Mark right after we went to the bathroom.” Tori finally accepted my offer of an egg roll. “She’s got issues.”

“Totally,” I agreed. With any luck Tori would launch into a tirade on Ashley’s issues and forget all about mine. I could care less about Ashley, but if Tori believed that was the root of my temporary lapse of sanity, she’d let me slide easier.

Luck was with me. Tori spent the next ten minutes going through an entire order of green pepper beef and listing every single one of Ashley’s faults and assuring me I was much better off without Jerkface Jordan.

I was relieved that her focus was off me, but the loss of my green pepper beef seemed a high price to pay.

~

Tragically, I could not be Princess Leia. No matter how hard I smashed the novelization of
A New Hope
to my face before falling asleep, I couldn’t get in. This was a blow, but not entirely unexpected.
Star Wars
, no matter what I tell myself, isn’t exactly great literature. Maybe whatever this weird novel-jumping ability was, it was limited to classics.

But it turned out I couldn’t be Anne Shirley either, or Viola in
Twelfth Night
, or Carroll’s Alice. I didn’t bother to try any of the Brontë sister’s books. They might be interesting to read, but who in their right minds would want to live
Wuthering Heights
? I even tried two other Austen novels,
Emma
and
Persuasion
(Anne might not be the spunkiest heroine of all time, but I could suffer through for Wentworth).

Nothing.

That last bit confused me. If I could get into an Austen book, shouldn’t I be able to get into
any
Austen book? Or what if the whole novel-jumping thing was a one off. What if I couldn’t even get back into
Pride and Prejudice
.

I didn’t want to end up as Georgiana again. However, I would trade use of a limb to be Elizabeth Bennet. She’s not self-conscious and lame around hot guys like I am. She’s spunky and witty and charming. She also doesn’t allow herself to fall for losers, or at least not fall hard enough that it does her any permanent damage.

If Lizzy was the goal, then picking the right scene was of the utmost importance. There was still a part of me that shied away from Darcy’s first disastrous proposal. I’m not sure I could handle that much awkward. I’d probably throw myself at him and agree to marry him, which would just keep popping me back to the start of the scene anyway.

So I found a scene with Elizabeth at Longbourn after she returned from her visit to Charlotte. I figured it might be easier to slip into Lizzy when she was home, in her own surroundings.

I fell asleep on my stomach, my cheek pressed tightly to the page.

Mid-morning sunlight was streaming in through the windows of the small sitting room. I blinked a few times to adjust my eyes. The sitting room seemed packed with women, all with similar curls in varying shades of brown. I looked down quickly at my dress. It was a perfectly serviceable morning muslin, but nothing near as nice as what I’d worn as Georgiana. I could tell that it wasn’t new. The top was even a bit tight across my chest like it had perhaps been handed down instead of made for me. Speaking of my chest, Darcy must really have been a saint if what he’d noticed were Lizzy’s fine eyes…

I almost squealed in excitement. I’d done it! I’d made it into Elizabeth Bennet! I was Lizzy!

“I am sure I cried for two days together when Colonel Millar’s regiment went away. I thought I should have broke my heart.”

I looked up from the examination of my chest to gaze across the room at Mrs. Bennet. She was surprisingly pretty. Though why I found that surprising, I’m not sure. Maybe because she’s always played older in the movies, but she couldn’t have been more than forty. She had, after all, produced five relatively good looking daughters and Mr. Bennet had basically admitted he fell for her looks when they were young.

There was a long pause. I glanced around the room, waiting for Lydia to respond to her mother—I’d re-read the scene a bunch of times before trying to jump and knew they’d be commiserating together over the soldiers leaving town. Mary was the most easily distinguishable as she sat flipping through sheet music in a corner and looking dour. Right next to me was a girl about fifteen or sixteen, so either Kitty or Lydia. Sitting together on the settee each with needlework in hand were two more sisters.

That must be Jane,
I thought of the one with the light brown hair.
Wow, she is really pretty.

The sister next to Jane looked up at me, quirking a dark brow. Her eyes were wide and almost almond shaped. They were a rich chocolate brown framed with nearly black lashes. Fine eyes.

Oh, crap.

“Lydia?” Elizabeth promoted. There was a spark of laughter behind those amazing eyes. “Are you feeling quite well? You look a bit far off.”

No, I wasn’t feeling well. I’d just managed to pop into possibly the most vacuous, annoying little sister in all of literature. What exactly was Lydia’s line? “I’m sure my heart shall break,” I sniffed. That wasn’t quite right, but close enough.

“If only we could but go to Brighton,” Mrs. Bennet sighed dramatically.

Lizzy and Jane shared a small smile.
Yes,
I thought derisively,
if only we could. Oh, but wait, I do! And I hook up with Wickham, the sleaziest of sleazes, while I’m at it.

“Oh, yes!” I said through gritted teeth. “If one could but go to Brighton! But papa is so disagreeable.”

“A little sea-bathing would set me up forever.” Mrs. Bennet sighed mournfully at the end of this pronouncement. I resisted the urge to roll my eyes.

“And my Aunt Phillips is sure it would do me a great deal of good,” said the girl next to me. Kitty. So that was all the Bennet sisters’ identities solved. All the Bennet girls together in one room and I pop into Lydia. The universe obviously hates me.

I made it through an afternoon and evening with the Bennet family. Seriously, Lizzy and Jane must be saints. I was ready to murder both Mrs. Bennet and Kitty at least four times over before sunset. I’m sure the real Lydia had never been so eager to go to bed, but at the first mention of turning in for the night I was upstairs like a rocket.