Work Text:
Arras, May 15th, 1790
What does it mean to be a woman?
Oscar Francois de Jarjayes pondered this question intently as she leaned onto her balcony, breathing in the clean spring air of Arras.
Occasionally, a coughing fit would interrupt her reflection and leave her weary.
Where was she, again? Ah yes, what did it mean to be a woman?
What did it mean for her?
She glanced into the room behind her once again. Even though it was spring and the air was warm, a fire was lit in her quarters. But then again, there had been a fire lit almost every day and night now since she arrived in Arras after the Bastille.
She gasped for a deep breath to prevent a coughing fit that threatened to plow through her once more. Memories of the Bastille made her stomach turn, which aggravated her cough.
She focused her attention on the numerous chests and trunks that lay open in her room. Over the last few months, she had watched helplessly, having been largely bedridden with illness, as Grandmere and her mother, along with a trusted maid or two came and went into her bedroom uninvited and unannounced with the pretext of depositing yet another item into any one trunk.
When she had been well enough to get up to her feet and inspect the contents of these trunks – which seemed to increase in number over the weeks, a profound realization hit her. A question, rather. The very question that she had either avoided or not been permitted to ask her entire life:
What did it mean to be a woman?
But this question had become so urgent and pertinent, now more than ever.
Especially now.
Now that Oscar Francois de Jarjayes was dead.
…
Her body heaved once more and stiffened as she attempted to regain control. She mistook it for another coughing fit, and only realized that it wasn’t upon seeing fine droplets of liquid darken the white marble on which she was leaning. She was sobbing.
That seemed to happen a lot lately. A few months ago, when she had been in the thralls of illness, Andre had brought her a box of kittens to bed in an attempt to lift her spirits, but upon seeing their happy and innocent countenance, she took to weeping and weeping and weeping for hours on end. The kittens were removed immediately and Andre stayed the night with her. Poor Andre…
How he continued to love her was beyond her. She had been reduced to but a shadow of herself, both physically and in spirits.
Yet thankfully, things were much improved now.
The worst was over.
She had survived. Survived it all: the Ancien Regime, the change to Gardes Francaises, the Bastille, the White Plague, but mostly, the near loss of her now-husband. And to think that now, after all of this, a new adventure awaited her. Not as Oscar Francois de Jarjayes, but as Oscar Grandier.
And yet, she was grieving.
…
A knock came at the door, startling her from her recollections.
“Entrez,” she said, her voice soft.
It was Grandmere with a breakfast tray, followed by a maid who curtseyed and proceeded to deposit even more linen and other items that have arrived from the main estate in Paris. Their belongings were being moved gradually and secretly.
Oscar took breakfast with her nanny, a new habit that had taken place since Grandmere was sent to Arras and away from the chaos of Paris, both for her safety and her health. They were usually joined by Louise de Jarjayes, but the latter had already set sail towards England. It would not be long until Oscar rejoined her mother. However, their reunion would be a short one, for Oscar’s journey would not stop in England.
“Is all this really necessary?” groaned Oscar as she bit into her crisp buttered bread and nodded towards the trunks. She had no clue what she could possibly do with all this stuff.
Grandmere scoffed. “I will ask you not to tire my frayed health with these unnecessary questions, my lady.”
Oscar rolled her eyes. Grandmere now used her health as an excuse whenever she wanted to discourage bad behaviour from her wards. Who knew that at the old age of thirty-four, one could still be scolded. “Every bride must have her trousseau,” Grandmere concluded.
It was astonishing to Oscar how, despite the tumult and violence happening under her nose, the entire household at Arras was preoccupied with one thing: her nuptials. The words “bride” and “trousseau” were pronounced every other sentence to the point that Oscar would sometimes fake a coughing fit to discourage any further conversation. Even Andre had been employed in the service of these nuptials, having been asked to transport this and that, take this upstairs, put this to be washed, fix these garments and peel some vegetables. Neither his status as groom nor reduction in health condition protected him from Grandmere’s incessant demands. It did not help that they could no longer keep more than one man-servant either.
It was the end of an era indeed.
And yet despite these annoyances, Oscar would never trade this for anything in the world. Especially not for the phrases that were pronounced in the first six months after the Bastille, which consisted of endless questions about her health and how Monsieur is heartbroken and will likely be severely punished for her treason.
He wasn’t, in the end. Punished, that is. His loyalty had been ascertained. He stubbornly stood by his King and Queen and Oscar’s name was made to disappear as much as possible. The General de Jarjayes, had, with great regret informed Their Majesties that his one and only heir had died on the day of the Bastille. The rest of the details were concealed.
But it was all done in the name of protecting the daughter he loved most.
…
So, what did it mean to be a woman?
What did it mean to be a wife? A mother?
The answer, she knew, was in those trunks.
Linen that was embroidered and stitched with love by her mother and Granny with her and Andre’s initials; beautiful teapots and stacks of porcelain plates decorated with her favorite roses, commissioned by her mother especially for her; sachets of lavender and mint so daintily packed into cloth and tied with a ribbon by Rosalie’s hands; eau de lavande and eau de rose crafted by Grandmere according to her secret recipes; small portraits of her sisters and her parents drawn by one of her sisters, sent to her expressly so that she may never forget them; pretty ribbons and fabrics of the finest materials picked out carefully by Marie-Antoinette herself; endless parchments that Andre had written to document Grandmere’s recipes; packets of seeds of various garden fruits and vegetables and flowers to plant, accompanied by a manual (also written by Andre) on how to sow them, when to reap, how much to water and etc.; old silver that was polished and repolished a thousand times by the hands of every maid that ever stepped foot into the Jarjayes manor. And then there were the clothes, this time made by the expert hands of the good seamstresses of Arras, rather than the fancy houses of couture in Paris – clothes that were simple and comfortable for her new life in Nouvelle France. And with that, both Grandmere and her mother insisted on packing small garments for the baby, if there is ever to be one. Just in case, they told her, just in case. No one expects you to have them and it likely will not at your age and in your condition, but just in case.
There were secrets to womanhood, she had come to understand over the last few months from observing the women in the household scurry about. She had never stayed at home long enough to really notice them. She had never been interested. Or never allowed to be interested.
But they knew things that men did not. They knew about life, about death, about medicine, about cooking, about love, about the natural order of things. The women, it turned out, were neither weak, unwise nor unintelligent. Nor were they the creatures that were consumed by frivolous and silly things. They were keepers of nature’s secrets, bearers of life and sages of knowledge and experience.
Granted, they were not free, their destinies decided from the very moment of their birth. But then again, so was hers.
Did she really have more freedom in her life as a man? Or was she ignorant in the ways in which women found their freedom and fought their little rebellions in their own quiet ways?
Oscar’s own voice echoed in the depths of her mind as a conversation from a bygone time emerged to the surface:
“Majesty!” she had exclaimed, “Have you forgotten your position as the Mother of this Nation of France, as its Queen? The entire court is a-gossip about your association with Count von Fersen… Please… Please, I humbly beg of you… At this rate, you will end up in the most terrible danger, Your Majesty…!”
“Oscar,” the Queen, although not unaffected by Oscar’s speech, had returned with calm conviction, “Thank you for worrying about me so much… But it appears that I am unable to get you even to comprehend… or was it perhaps… an impossible thing for me to seek in you a woman’s heart…?”
Oscar clutched at her chest, pain swelling within her, unable to stop the tears from rolling hotly.
She had been on the side of the people. Justice had been a driving force in her life. Her convictions and her principles had guided her and kept her on path. And yet… throughout all of this, where was the heart?
A youth spent on a love that was forbidden to her…
Years lost from her and Andre…
Freedom had been given to her, but time had been taken away from her in exchange. Time with her mother, with her sisters, time that could have been spent differently. Memories that could have been made but never were.
And Marie-Antoinette… Her friend, her friend whom she loved and admired. That noble and kind soul whose friendship she sacrificed at the cost of her principles. Whose heart she had shut herself from for fear that it may just help her, Oscar, realize her own and that was simply not permitted. It was frightening.
…
The waves of the sea embraced the shore calmly and rhythmically. Its healing vibrations soothing Oscar’s soul and replenishing her body just as much on a day when she felt physically well as on the days it accompanied her through some of the worst bouts of her illness.
They strolled hand in hand. She leaned into him on occasion and he responded by depositing a gentle kiss onto the crown of her head. Both of them taking in the salty clean air of the sea, letting it purify any dis-ease in the body. Gratitude, filling their hearts for yet another day together, for they had seen days so dark and had met Death itself that every dawn and every moment was a profound gift.
This was one of many strolls they had been taking together since Oscar was well enough to venture out of bed. Not that Andre had been any better, although his recovery had been faster. The bullet that pierced him had narrowly missed his heart but it weakened him. Nevertheless, wounds healed more efficiently than plagues.
And against all odds, his eyesight began to see some unexpected improvement, which was short of miraculous. Most likely from prolonged periods of rests and the removal of many stressors.
Yes, the worst was over. A new adventure was afoot. Nouvelle France awaited.
But the hardest part was yet to come: rebuilding and starting over.
He helped her lower herself onto the comfortable sand of the beach. She leaned her head on his shoulder and he wrapped his arm around her.
She did not need to speak. She did not need to tell him. Andre understood perfectly. Had he expected that their union would finally usher in a new era of utter happiness and pure bliss? Perhaps he did at times when he was younger and did not know any better.
But so much had changed since then. A new day was coming. A new world. A revolutionary era.
And their marriage would not be any different.
Oscar would always be Oscar. But he was now a man and she was his wife. And he understood things now that he could not before. Once, he had been obsessive about his love for her. Had been possessive to a maddening degree, and he felt shame and guilt course through him when he thought of the ways in which he had hurt her with his suffocating love. But he had come a long way since then, having realized that he could not command her heart nor possess her. He could only, simply, love her.
He could only be by her side and be the mast that supported her in her storms and be the light in her darkest days. I am here for you, his embrace always seemed to say. I know you are in pain. I know you are going through a transition. It is hard, but I know you will conquer it. My knight in shining armor. My heroine, my Oscar. I am here for you. I will stand by you. I love you. And I will always wait for you, for as long as it takes.