Chapter Text
John was thirteen years old when his father, James, took him to a man who pulled at his ears and checked his teeth and ultimately deemed him 'well enough'. The man took him then—John hadn't even known to say a proper goodbye to his mother—and brought him to the largest house John had ever seen.
Everyone in the house was prim and proper. At least, until they were well below the family's main floor, and then it could be a bit loud and raucous. John became a hall boy, running from the kitchens to the laundry to the shoe shine and was tossed around like a ball on the rugby field.
There was scarcely time to breathe, but at fifteen, he became a footman. Not a particularly important footman, but a footman all the same. The jacket chaffed, and the shoes pinched, and the wig was forever dusting powder into his eyes.
But with the promotion came more pay. And days off. Which meant days he could visit his mother and sisters and brothers and see where all that extra pay was helping the people he loved.
Then one day, when he was sixteen, he was asked to clear the dishes in the family's sitting room. The family had all left to promenade, but it was still the single most important duty he'd ever been assigned.
Checking his jacket was set smartly, and his wig was fully covering his unruly brown hair, John marched to the sitting room, a tray under his arm.
Calling hours had been earlier in the day, and teacups and plates with half-eaten petit-fours sat on every single flat surface.
His mother had five children—two older brothers and two younger sisters—and he'd never seen so many dirty dishes all in one place as he did in that sitting room. Come to think of it, it he didn't think his family even had this many dishes.
He chuckled to himself and began to arrange the soiled wares on his tray.
A loud shout stopped his heart in his chest. He wasn't meant to chuckle, wasn't meant to say anything other than 'yes, sir' or 'no, ma'am'. Even though he was alone, someone had somehow heard him.
No, no, no, no. His sisters were getting older, they'd need dowries and dresses and…. He needed this job. He needed a promotion to Junior Footman—something which today's assignment very much suggested he was close to.
A hurricane in pale blue whirled into the room, followed by a girl in yellow.
The two girls—one with dark hair, the other flame red—giggled, digging through the couch cushions.
"I can't believe you lost it," said the red-haired girl.
"It was right here!" The other grunted, her arm disappearing nearly to the elbow as she fished.
"You really don't need to—"
"Yes, I do. You'll love it!" The girl's face changed, so expressive he could practically feel her fingers landing on whatever she was looking. "Aha!"
He stood stock-still, dumbfounded, as the dark-haired girl lifted a book in triumph.
Mister Corrins had been teaching him to read, but so far he could only get through basic primers. This book, by comparison, was massive—a whole inch thick, pages gilded in the way that you knew the printed text inside was absurdly small and poignant. The cover was cloth-bound instead of beat-up paper holding more beat-up paper.
It was, by far, the most interesting book he had ever laid eyes on.
Or maybe it was the girl holding it.
The girls giggled again, the red-haired one tittering behind her hand while the other laughed loud and true, her whole body jerking as if there was too much joy to contain within it.
The hurricane started up again, and the girls whirled towards the door, but not before the dark-haired one stopped in front of him, took a whole piece of cake someone had left untouched, and ate half in one massive bite.
She winked and set it back on the plate on his tray.
John's job was to maintain a neutral facial expression. He was pretty sure slack-jawed counted.
"Oh, El," the red-head giggled as they disappeared down the hall.
El.
Eloise.
He'd just met Miss Eloise Bridgerton.
And it was like a light had been turned on in a room he hadn't before noticed was dark.
"Footman!" Eloise calls as he passes by the library. "John, right?"
It takes all his concentration to press his lips together and keep his face still as he bows in the doorway. There isn't anything he can do about the blush creeping up his neck and settling, hot, in his cheeks.
She knows his name.
(Frankly, if she'd called him anything at all, he would have agreed and changed his name right away.)
"Can you help me? I'm afraid I've yet to grow to a height where I can reach the top shelf. Terribly annoying since that is where Anthony keeps all the good books!" Her voice rises more and more towards the end until she's shouting, her mouth tilted towards the door as if hoping her older brother will hear her.
"Sorry," she mutters, turning back towards the bookshelf. "I've read most of these on the lower shelves, but not the top."
Mouth dry, he steps forward. "Is there a particular volume you're looking for, Miss?"
She huffs, crossing her arms. "In truth, I do not know what's up there. Read me the titles and I shall choose."
"Alright." He will shine Mr. Collins' shoes and press his laundry and do any horrible errand Mr. Collins asks of him for the rest of his life in gratitude for teaching John how to read.
John starts to read the titles slowly and carefully, testing each word before he says it aloud. No use mispronouncing something and having her think him an uneducated idiot. (He is uneducated besides what Mr. Collins believes he ought to know for his position and the few things he has overheard from the older Bridgerton brothers when they are home from university. But he'd prefer if she didn't know that.)
"Don Quixote," she says. "That sounds interesting. Exotic. Don't you think?"
He pulls the tome from the shelf and hands it to her. "Of course, Miss."
(Later, he'll overhear the brothers laugh about Eloise's mispronunciation of Don Quicks-o-tee, and his cheeks will flame anew. Not because he's embarrassed to have mispronounced the word (because who knows how to say Key-ho-tay the first time they see that word!?) but because he let Eloise down.)
"Have you read it?" Eloise asks in that quick, snappy way of hers.
John startles backwards. "Uh, no."
"Hmm." She stares at the book in her hands. "Well, you shall read it after me."
And then, her hurricane departs.
Later that night, Mister Anthony catches him in the library, studying the titles of the books by candlelight.
"Anything I can help you find, footman."
John steps back with a nod, casting his eyes downward. He is not supposed to be in here. "Forgive me. Miss Eloise was looking for a book today and I thought I'd see if I could find something on the subject for her."
"Ah." Anthony inclines his head. "What was she looking for?"
Saliva sticks in his throat, but he manages the bald-faced lie. "Botanicals."
"Eloise? Really?" Anthony's face twists. "Why?"
"It is not my place to speculate, sir." John's heart is about to dig its way out of his chest if it beats any harder.
The eldest Bridgerton brother has always struck John as too tightly wound. He grumbles at everyone, impatient as though it is a great feat to not shout every minute of every day.
With that same type of huff, Anthony pushes past John and quickly pulls volumes from the shelves. "Here."
John catches the books as they're nearly thrown into his gloved hands. "Thank you, sir."
As much as Anthony grumbles and complains, he loves each and every one of his siblings. Would die for them, John expects. And that draws its own kind of respect.
Anthony waves him away. "Don't thank me. Just hope you don't have to accompany Eloise on a day when the bookshop has a new shipment come in."
Penelope Featherington reads Don Quixote after Eloise finishes with it. John sneaks it to his own room after it is left in the sitting room and stays up late into the night, much to the chagrin of his roommates.
Eloise is fifteen. Old enough to know that women are not allowed to fence. Still, he leaves a pair of vaguely sword-shaped sticks he pulled from the wood pile in a place where she and her friend will see them.
That night, he stands at the edge of the dining room, water pitcher in hand, as Miss Featherington holds a towel full of ice against the bruise on her temple and Eloise argues that kind of accident is exactly the reason why women should be allowed to learn how to fence.
By the time she is sixteen, there is very little John would ever refuse Eloise. (It is his job, after all.) Except the night she comes to him, demanding to leave the Hastings' Ball.
"I need to go, and I need to go now."
"Has something happened, Miss?" His hand reaches out of its own accord, but he stops it so it hovers mid-air between them.
"No. Well, yes. Something is about to happen and we need to stop it."
She presses a fat shilling into his hand and climbs into the carriage before he can protest more. Another fat shilling goes to the driver. John's heart lodges itself somewhere around his bowels when he hears the address.
Still, he hops on the back and squeezes his eyes shut, trying to figure out just what he's supposed to do now.
The carriage takes them all the way to Fleet Street in the inner part of the city. There are a million dangers everywhere.
"Please, Miss Eloise, it is not safe." He blocks her way when she tries to step down. "We should return to the ball."
"You've already taken half my pin money."
"I'll give it back," he promises. The shilling already feels dirty in his pocket. He'd trade every pence in his name to get her out of here. "Please."
Her small gloved hand comes to his chest, and John momentarily forgets himself. It's enough of a lapse for her to push past him, another shilling pressed into his hand.
Fuck.
A hired hack rumbles down the road, a dark shadow on an already dark night.
Eloise runs towards it.
John lunges, sputtering, his vision momentarily going white.
But Eloise stops. She waves, flagging the carriage forward. The hack slows and then drives away.
"Ha!" Eloise giggles, clapping her hands in front of her chest.
John is quite certain he's had a heart attack. His terror and Eloise's particularly girly, giddy grin wars in his brain.
"Come on, let's go." She brushes past him and opens the carriage door herself.
His legs start to work just in time to secure the door behind her. Good God.
His mama taught him not to take the Lord's name in vain, but he strongly suspects this will not be the last time he does so with Eloise Bridgerton.