A Duo against the World:

The gravel crunched beneath them and the carriage swayed as it always did turning onto a drive. Cecilia bit her lip as the house came into view; Thomas fiddled with his cuff. Nerves were getting the best of the pair, but, as soldiers in a war, they put on their fronts like plates of armor.
      Thomas adjusted his cravat and said, "Don't worry. It'll all be over soon enough, though I confess I will be sorry to see the gaggle of adoring young ladies dissipate because of our agreement." The word tasted foul in his mouth, the very essence of his torture. Cecilia cast him a sideways glance and smirked at his sarcasm.
      "Shouldn't you be more concerned about it being us two against the world?" A sudden soberness filled her voice, and the weight of her words echoed in the silence between them.
      Thomas, adopting an air of confidence he didn't quite feel, said, "I'm more worried about the rest of the world being against us."

The night began like all others--carriages pulled up to the doors, guests were announced, and gossip was shamelessly exchanged. The whisperings started almost the instant Thomas and Cecilia walked through the front doors and didn't stop for the rest of the evening.  Cecilia leaned heavily on her escort, hoping he might somehow shield her from Society's harsh remarks. This, however, did little more than provoke the Gossips into fantasizing a scandal.
      Dinner was served just in time to save the couple from yet another introduction, and the party-goers took their seats. It was not ten minutes into dinner when a mumbling at her side caught Cecilia's attention. If she strained her ears, she could just make out the words: "Seems the young poet has finally abandoned her childish notion of true love and rejoined the realms of reality." 
      This biting observation was followed with another, rather sharp observation spoken a tad too loud for the privacy of the aforementioned whispered conversation. The speaker, a stout, horse-faced old woman, clearly directing her comment straight at Cecilia said, "Perhaps she has thought better of her actions than to contradict those who know more than she." Cecilia could feel the woman's eyes on herself, summing her up. 

      Cecilia, foolishly proud that she was, could no longer take this. Rumors she could handle, a little harmless gossip here and there was only to be expected, but when it was so blatantly stated--practically to her face--she would not tolerate it. She cleared her throat, but never let her eyes wonder from off her plate as she interrupted their conversation, "I'm afraid it was rather less climactic than all that. You see, we are quite in love." 

      The ladies, now abandoning their former attempts at being discrete, both turned toward Cecilia only to convey how utterly appalled they were at the notion. "My dear," the first of the two chided, "have you not been listening? Love simply does not exist." 

      Cecilia was growing more and more frustrated, and her voice was rising along with her annoyance as she once more endeavored to make them understand, "Your superior age is a credit to you, to be sure; but do not be mistaken in thinking that your minds can lend any of that knowledge to your heart. For the heart, like any other muscle in the body, must be exercised else it will lose its health and become as the hearts of this society: ignorant, decrepit and useless."
      It was the second, more persistent, of her two combatants that spoke now, "Well, I never! Young lady, I suggest you learn what is and isn't proper and conform to the rules of this society, or else there might not be any of it left for the likes of you when you come to your senses. "
      Just as she was about to really give the two reprobates a piece of her mind, something stopped her. Cecilia inhaled sharply, surprise and something else she couldn't quite name surging through her body. Thomas's hand was a burning chill on top of hers, and she had to fight the urge to draw back from the shock it sent up her arm. After a moment had passed in which Cecilia's next exhibition lay stillborn on her tongue, Thomas removed his hand.
       The next few minutes of their dinner were a two-front war. On the one side, Cecilia fought the urge to give her dinner companions a rather sound tongue-lashing on the virtues of innocence of the heart. On the other, her mind raced to understand the turmoil of flutterings within her stomach; the pulsing of her skin where Thomas's hand had been, reminding herself it was only to keep her silent.
 Surely it was all diplomatic. It had to be.