There was an air of discord all around Thornfield when I rose the next morning.

Edward had returned as suddenly as he’d departed, like a phantom riding the changing winds which tore across the moor, causing a stir like I’d never seen before. The staff had already begun to chatter among themselves, spouting comparisons to fairy tales like Beauty and The Beast and wondering if Blanche Ingram would be making an appearance. The last matter was unsettling on so many levels it caused a shudder of dread to flow through my body. It was my nightmares come alive if she were to take residence before I could depart.

Descending into the main gallery, my head aching terribly, I was apprehensive to show my face in reception, knowing Alice had conspired with Edward as his spy. I didn’t know how to deal with this new betrayal or if I should react to it at all. It was another thing in a long line of slashes across my poor lost soul.

I was mortified to think he knew about the fit of passion in which I’d torn apart Thornfield in search of his secrets and the illness that followed. I cared little for his feelings toward Rivers since I was free to see who I wanted. I wished Edward didn’t know anything at all and had remained in Paris indefinitely.

Still, I couldn’t hide from the world. I had duties to attend to and a wage to earn, so an appearance had to be made at some point. I was too proud of my work ethic to abandon my post over a personal slight.

“Oh, Jane, there you are,” Alice said as I entered. “Something’s happened.”

“I know,” I said, preempting her news. I took my seat without glancing at her and fossicked in my drawer for some headache tablets. “I had a lovely encounter in the library last night. It was quite the surprise.”

Silence was the only response I received. Not wanting to get into an argument just yet, I took two tablets, retrieved a cup of water from the cooler, and washed them down. My eyes ached, as well as my head, from my restless night.

“Jane, I meant to tell you…”

“Have you been in communication with Edward?” I asked blatantly, finally glancing at her.

Her expression dropped, and her cheeks began to flush. “I thought if I could just make him see…”

“See what?” I prodded.

“I wanted to make him see leaving you was a mistake,” she finished, casting her gaze away. “I saw how you loved him, Jane, and I wanted him to come back to you.”

“Oh, Alice…” My expression fell, and all the anger and irritation I’d been feeling ebbed away.

“He was better with you. Everyone saw it. I thought if you two could work it out, then it would be like a fairy tale. You’d be happy, and so would he. I’ve never seen him happy, Jane. Not until you came along.”

“It’s too late,” I muttered, my shoulders feeling heavy. “It’s much too late to mend it.”

“Do you really think so?” she asked, rolling her chair across the floor to sit beside mine. “He came back, didn’t he?”

“He’s going to marry Blanche Ingram, Alice,” I exclaimed. “The only reason he came back was because he feels some kind of remorse. He made no attempt to reconcile.”

“But…”

“There’s no going back,” I said, sinking back in my chair. “There’s only forward.”

“I wished so hard for it,” she whispered.

“He’s promised himself to another. I must respect it and myself. To cry and claim I hated him would be empty and nothing but a lie. One can love with their whole heart, Alice, and even then, it mightn’t be enough.”

“I’m sorry,” she said again, and this time, I was open to hearing the sincerity of her words. Her intent had been noble but misplaced.

Hate, love, desire. What was so different about those feelings? In my current situation, they all seemed to be the same, all mixed together to make one blur of intense feeling I could scarcely contain within my walls. Should I love, hate, or desire Edward? I was composed of all of these things.

Staring blankly at the computer screen before me, my mind wandered. To where, I was uncertain, but something had triggered a vision, which appeared to me as clear as I saw Alice sitting beside me, her face ashen with remorse.

I could see myself at Gateshead, nothing but a small child, hiding in the window seat with a hardcover book squished again my chest. Jane Austin’s Pride & Prejudice.

“Jane! Where are you?”

Glad I’d drawn the curtain closed, I hoped my cousin John didn’t find my hiding spot. I could hear the delight in the chase twisted in his voice, and if he came upon me, I would be set upon. Clutching the book tighter against my chest, I held my breath and listened.

I was eight, and he was thirteen, and he had considerably more strength in his arm than mine, though he was overweight and ugly. He was a vapid human being, a bully in all senses of the word. Poisoned and coddled from a young age, he could do no wrong even when he was the cause of violence. Violence he delighted in to the point it became disturbing.

He punished me every chance he got, and every nerve in my body feared him. I’d already lost count of the ways he’d tormented me so frequent and varied were his ministrations. I’d been locked in closets, tied to trees outside, slapped, punched, and bitten. He even turned me in to Aunt Sarah for crimes I did not commit. John punished me through his mother and came out the other end shining like polished gold. She never saw him strike me, and for all intents and purposes, he was innocent as they came.

John’s footsteps were muffled on the carpet, so I couldn’t hear his approach, though I knew he was in the room. I was much too young to understand or believe in God, but I prayed nonetheless.

Without warning, the curtain swept back, and John stood over me with a look of triumph on his pudgy face.

“Ah-ha!” he cried. “What are you doing behind the curtain?”

“Reading.”

“Show me the book.”

I clutched it tighter, but this only served to enlighten him to my treasure. Snatching it from me, he lifted it high into the air and brought it down on my temple. The spine cracked against my skull, the force of the blow knocking my head back into the wall beside me.

He laughed mercilessly as I blinked, my thoughts scrambled. Feeling a warm trickle on my forehead, I lifted my hand and wiped, my fingers coming back red with blood.

“You have no right to take our books,” he declared. “You have no money, no say, and no permission. Mother says you should have been left on the street to beg like the dog your father was, not living here in our house stealing our food and sleeping in our bed! It’ll all be mine one day, and I’ll make sure you’re sent back to where you belong. You are a sneak, hiding behind curtains. A common thief!”

His words were not new to me, though, after a lifetime of hearing them, I had reached my limit all at once, and I lost control of my faculties. My head hurt, my heart ached, and I could suffer his oppression no more.

“You… You are wicked and cruel!” I exclaimed, my tiny fists shaking. “Bully!”

“What?” John asked, his eyeballs bulging. “What did you say to me?”

“You’re a pig!” I screeched.

He ran at me, his hands grasping my hair and my shoulder, and with a cry, he shoved me into the wall. I was sure I’d never forget the look in his eyes the moment I finally had enough strength to stand up to him. He had the wild look of a tyrant, a murderer, a violent sociopath, and it was terrifying to me.

I felt a few drops of blood from the cut on my temple drip down my neck and was somewhat aware of pain tearing through my scalp, but they were dulled by the fear I now felt. At first, I didn’t know what I did with my hands, but I became free of his grasp, all the while he called me horrible names, which should never be repeated.

In a fit of pure passion, I raised my little fist and punched with all the strength I could muster. My knuckles connected with John’s face, and a look of shock overcame him as he stumbled back. I hardly felt the pain of the blow as I watched tears well in his eyes. I only felt elation. Blood began pouring from his nose, and my chest swelled in triumph. For the first time in my life, I had bested John Reed, but it would be a short-lived victory.

“Mother!” he yelled, running from the room like the little weasel he was. “Mother!”

Aunt Sarah emerged and came upon the scene, followed by the maid and John himself.

She took one look at me, her expression pure thunder, and exclaimed, “Dear God! The monster!” She gestured to the maid. “Take her to the closet, and lock her inside at once! I cannot have a beast roaming free in my home!”

The woman grasped my shoulders, fisting her hand into the back of my jumper, and dragged me from the room. Aunt Sarah followed close behind, jangling the keys she kept in her dress pocket, and John brought up the rear, a smirk on triumph on his pudgy face.

I resisted all the way, which was a new thing for me, and the maid had a hell of a time trying to keep me under control.

“All I ever wanted was to be loved!” I cried as I was dragged through the house. “I tried so hard to be nice, to do what you say, and still, I am punished! He attacked me for fun! He always does! He deserved worse!”

“You deceitful little child!” Aunt Sarah bellowed.

“I am not! If I were a liar, I would say I loved you! I dislike you the worst of all, except for John! You have hated me from the first!”

“Shut up, you ungrateful child, lest I beat you before locking you in the closet!”

“You think I have no feelings, that I can do without one bit of love or kindness, but I can’t!”

“Lock her inside this instant,” Aunt Sarah instructed the maid, her cheeks red with rage.

“No!” I screeched as I beheld the maw of the open closet. “Let me go!”

I was shoved into the small space, my back colliding with the wall behind me. I was a mess of arms and legs and couldn’t right myself in time to force my way out. The door slammed closed, and darkness enveloped me, total in its blackness. The key turned in the lock, and still, I beat against the solid wood, working myself up into a frenzy. I beat so hard and for so long I passed out from exhaustion, my throat raw and my head throbbing.

The next thing I remembered was a sudden burst of light and hands dragging me from my prison, only to deliver me to another.

Children can feel, that is sure, but they can’t discern their feelings and make sense of them. I hated Aunt Sarah and my cousin John more than I’d ever had at that moment. I hated without remorse, and it wasn’t until I’d grown and learned about suffering and forgiveness that my contempt faded.

To move forward, one had to make peace with their past, no matter how terrifying it had been. It was a circumstance I was facing in my life for not the first or second time but the third.

They said the third time was the charm…

“Jane?” I heard a voice echo from faraway, pulling me back from my vision. “Jane, are you okay?”

I blinked once, wetting my tired eyes, then furiously as I came back to myself. Alice was still sitting beside me, her expression one of concern.

“Where did you go just then?” she asked.

“Nowhere,” I replied, turning back to the computer. “Just a daydream.”

“Some dream,” she muttered in reply, but I was too unsettled to explain further.

If magic were real, then Thornfield was alive with it. I was constantly having visions of my past as if the old house never wanted me to be free of the events that had shaped my quiet and hard exterior. Perhaps it had something to teach me, or it was just taunting. Either way, I had no choice but to watch and listen.

Perhaps I was succumbing to the same curse that had befallen Edward Rochester, the man I could not shake—or stop hoping would come back to me—despite my best efforts.

It was the curse of complete and utter madness.