Pride & Prejudice: The Untold Stories~Lydia’s 16th Birthday at Brighton

June 12, 1812, Brighton 

Sixteen! What a fine thing to be sixteen! Lydia Bennet preened in front of the mirror wondering if she looked as grown as she felt. Sixteen was a delightful age. Old enough to really be courted. Old enough to marry! Old enough to make her own decisions! Ha!

And there was a ball this evening and although it was not given in her honor of course, there was no one to stop her from pretending it was. She had a new gown to wear, scarlet with very daring sleeves that were so far off her shoulders they hardly covered anything at all.

Of course Papa would not be happy when he got the bill, and she would surely get a lecture about overspending her allowance, but that was a problem for another day. It was her birthday! She ought to have something new, a gown which reflected her new, grown up status!

She had also obtained two excessively long ostrich plumes to wear in her hair, just like the ones Miss Bingley had worn in the autumn at the Netherfield Ball. True, Miss Bingley was a shrew but her gowns, indeed everything she wore, were much to be admired.

“Well are you not a picture!” Dear Harriet Forster had come into her bedchamber. “You will match the gentleman’s coats!”

“I have heard it say that if you want a gentleman’s attention, wear red,” Lydia informed her. “Men like red.”

Harriet giggled. “I think you mean a bull but then again, is there really any difference?”

The two ladies entered the assembly room arm in arm. As Lydia had hoped would happen, all eyes turned towards her as they did. Some of the old hags, sitting in the corner with their sherry and their mob caps clearly disapproved of her. She saw lips tighten and glances exchanged and decided to put a little extra sway in her hips just to tweak their noses. The gown suited her so why concern herself for the opinions of old married women? She was hardly seeking the approval of the matrons for goodness sakes.

“Well, well, well.” Denny showed a proper appreciation of her as she approached him where he stood with Captain Carter. “Little Lydia Bennet looks like she’s wearing the King’s scarlet.”

“Is this your way of enlisting?” Carter teased. “Or did you wish to blend in with us men.”

“Is that what you think?” Lydia asked. She took her fan and drew it lightly against the bodice of her gown. “That I look like a man?”

Carter’s eyes were busy following the fan but it was another voice that answered her question.

“If you two gudgeons think that Miss Lydia is indistinguishable from us men,” said Mr Wickham, stepping forwards to join their little group, “then I shall have to insist you go find yourself some spectacles immediately.”

The two were immediately alight with protests about what they had actually meant to say but Lydia scarcely heard them. Months she had known George Wickham and finally he paid her some notice!

“Its good to know there is someone around her who can give a lady her due,” she said with a teasing pout. “Especially you! You have always ignored me in favor of my sisters.”

Wickham took a step closer, effectively putting his back to the other two. “Heaven forfend, dear girl. You do not truly think I have neglected you?”

“Uh-uh! You cannot call me a girl now. Not anymore!”

“No? Why is that?”

Lydia did what she could to swell her bosom. “Because I am sixteen today. I am full grown!”

“Sixteen today? Well, happy birthday.”

“And me so far from home.” She pouted again. “I am certainly looking to you gentlemen to make it an occasion for me.”

“Upon my honour, I could do no less,” Wickham promised. “Will you grant me two dances? I hear they will be waltzing later.”

“The waltz to be sure,” she said with a giggle. “And another if you really wish to entertain me…two others if you wish me to entertain you!”

His eyes widened and he took possession of her hand. “Three it is then, and if there is not the promised waltz, I shall go directly to that orchestra and pull my sword on them.”

She giggled again as he kissed her hand, then gave her a meaningful look and turned to stroll away.

“I think Mr Wickham is in love with you,” Harriet said, coming from behind her, her tone amazed and breathy.

“Do you really think so?” Lydia asked thoughtfully. “He used to favor my older sister Lizzy and a lot of people think we look alike.”

“You are much prettier than Lizzy,” Harriet assure her. “And with a much better figure! No, to be sure the man I saw did not prefer any lady but you!”

Lydia blushed, her eyes finding, again, Mr Wickham walking through the crowd. As if he felt her eyes upon her, he looked back and met her gaze, giving her a little wink. Her heart skipped a beat. “I am going to marry that man,” she said.

“Oh you should!” Harriet enthused. “Would it not be wonderful? You could marry him and then we would always be together with the regiment. I was sixteen when I married Colonel Forster you know.”

“I might have known as much given that you are only seventeen now,” said Lydia with a laugh. “But sixteen is a fine age to marry I daresay.”

“Would you parents allow it? They might not, you know, not with three elder sisters unmarried.”

Lydia shrugged. “In truth, it is four but…” She contemplated it a moment, then said, “I daresay there are ways to get around that sort of thing.”

The two ladies shared a giggle.

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