A/N: Sometimes, when the going gets tough on a fic, I procrastinate. By writing another fic. I don't even know how a healthy mind is supposed to work anymore… As always: reviews are terribly appreciated. Word of warning: trope ahead (but not yet in this chapter)!

Thank you, Deeedeee for being so awesome and indulging me.

She's lonely, rattling around the house like a lone pea in a pod. She misses her evening wine and chats with Mr Carson, the liveliness of her girls at the table in the Servants' Hall, a young footman torturing the piano (his words, not hers). The family has gone to London, taking everyone with them. Mr Branson has taken Miss Sybbie to Liverpool.

Her skeleton staff has cleaned every nook and cranny of the house, all the rooms have been aired, every carpet whipped. She's sent some of them home to visit with their parents.

It wouldn't be so bad if she had something to occupy herself with. To alleviate the loneliness, the boredom. But the machine that she builds from strong-armed girls and quick-witted boys is too well-oiled, too efficient. If she were to take a white handkerchief and run it over the top of the wardrobes in even the least-used rooms, it would stay pristine.

The letters from Anna and Mr Carson keep her entertained for a few minutes when she reads them and another few when she replies. She's taken inventory of the store cupboard, rearranged her parlour (and put everything back again - but she had found a postcard her sister had sent her seven years before) and she has started to take long walks on the grounds.

Normally her walks are purely practical: they get her from the house to the shops, the post office, church and back again. Now she's walking to the folly and back and at her return nothing has changed - there's not one small calamity, not a single minor problem that needs her attention.

Had Mr Carson been there, he would have kept her spirits up by thinking of odd jobs and keeping her up far too late at night, pouring her wine from his personal collection and telling her tales of his days on the stage (but only after three glasses of Burgundy, or two of port). Had Mrs Patmore been here, she would have had afternoon chats over tea and biscuits, sharing stories of her youth, of boys kissing her in the courtyard when she was a lass just starting out and she'd hear about the old cook, the old housekeeper and Charles Carson as he once was: tall, handsome and filled with duty and purpose (to Elsie he still is all of those things - she adds the rumbling voice that is so unique to him).

Of course it has been wonderful to put her feet up in the middle of the morning, to make herself a cup of tea when the mood strikes, to read her novels (she's already finished three). She misses talking about them to Mr Carson. He doesn't understand her predilection for the more gothic work, the 'unsavoury' (his words, obviously, she doesn't think human nature to be unsavoury, just often misunderstood and pushed into corners where it would naturally rebel), but he always listens attentively, asks her questions about herself, what she thinks, how she relates to the goings-on on the pages.

She is so deep in thought the telephone rings three times before she hears and she jumps up from his chair (she likes it better because it's softer, more comfortable). And it smells a bit of him, makes her feel a little more at home - even after twenty-five years she still doesn't feel like this is her place in the world, her home. Merely a house with a room that holds a bed, a wardrobe, neither of them hers). She reaches the telephone too late: when she picks up there's only the operator on the other side, telling her Mr Carson had tried to reach her. Should she call back?

"Yes, please."

He sounds a bit out of sorts when he picks up and she asks him what's wrong. He counters, asks why she thinks anything is wrong.

She laughs at his retort: "Oh, Mr Carson, why else would you call me?"

And she is right: something is wrong. Quite wrong, in fact. Mrs Bute, the reliable housekeeper of Grantham House, has handed in her notice, effective: immediately.

"Well, I never!" Elsie exclaims and she can hear Mr Carson grunt in dismay. "Has she had a better offer?"

Perhaps there's another family offering more money, a bigger house. Maybe Mrs Bute has accepted a proposal of marriage.

"That depends on how you look at things."

"Come now, Mr Carson." It's not a question, she knows he is well aware she is curious and he'll tell her if she pushes him.

"She is going to go to Kenya. As a missionary. Apparently she feels she has saved enough to make it through the end of her life whilst converting unsuspecting…"

She breaks in before he can natter on. "And now you are short a housekeeper."

"Mrs Hughes, I am always short a housekeeper when I'm in London."

A deep blush colours her cheeks.

"Flattery will get you anywhere, Mr Carson."

"Will it get you on the train tomorrow, so you'd be here by teatime?"

"No."

"What do you mean 'no'?" He sounds terribly put out and she laughs again.

"I need to find someone who'll stay here - with nobody here, who knows what might happen. I don't think Mr Branson will be back anytime soon; he sent a postcard. Miss Sybbie is enjoying having so many cousins to play with."

She doesn't care that her voice is sounding slightly sentimental. It cannot be helped. The little one looks like her mother more and more with each passing day: always hopping and skipping with a bright smile.

"Hmm. I'll send Thomas back then."

"Are you sure you trust him not to sell the whole interior to the highest bidder?"

He heaves a deep, weary sigh. "It's either him or Mr Molesley and with the Dowager here, I prefer having Mr Molesley at hand. For some reason she quite likes him."

"He is a kind man, Mr Carson, and he is very skilled. He is just intimidated by you."

"Me?" He scoffs and she knows that there must be a subtle look of pride on his face now, his chest puffed out a little bit.

"Well, Thomas it is then. You can always call him to ask how things are going."

"So you'll be on the ten-oh-four?" he asks, making sure, always so precise.

She smiles into the receiver: "With bells on, Mr Carson."

She sits alone for most of her journey, for a moment practically drowning in the flood of people who crowd Victoria station. She holds her worn valise tightly, finds the bus stop and hops on. It's exhilarating to stand pressed between other people after having been practically alone for two whole weeks.

When she reaches her final destination, he is standing there.

"Mrs Hughes, you are a sight for sore eyes."

She blushes, but hides it by handing him her suitcase and turning towards the house, squinting in the sunshine.

"It's still standing, Mr Carson, things cannot be that bad."

"Anna is doing what she can, but she's…" he halts, descends the stairs to the servants' entry.

"What? What's the matter with Anna?"

Her heart is beating too fast all of the sudden, a pressure building upon her breastbone. Anna had written her diligently the past two weeks. What could possibly be wrong?

"I'm not quite sure," Mr Carson starts and holds the door so Elsie can pass. "But she seems a bit under the weather."

He gives her a knowing look and she can feel a smile forming on her lips that she cannot hold back.

"You think she's…"

He shrugs, a kind of 'I'm-only-a-man-what-do-I-know' motion. He leads her through the Servants' Quarters, up to the attics.

"Mrs Bute's old room." He swings the door open and Elsie steps inside, looking at a bright room, a bit bigger than her room at Downton, the wallpaper newer, the bedding of higher quality.

London, she thinks, would be highly preferable if it weren't for the sixteen weeks of stressful goings-on and thirty-six of boredom. Only sixteen weeks of wine and tea and sherry, talk and laughter, advice and a sense of home.

She doesn't think she could stand it.

"Anna's had it cleaned and the linens and such changed. I've aired it the past three days, it should be fine." He looks at her expectantly.

"I'm sure it will all be up to standard, Mr Carson."

His pleased smile warms her and she has to busy herself so he won't see how happy she is to see him, how somehow it's him who makes her feel at home.

"I am right across the corridor, if there's anything you need."

They meet each others' eyes when he says that and Elsie has to bite her lip not to respond to him:

I need your chest to my back.

Your arm around my waist.

Your breath in my hair.