Despite tween Georgiana's constant bugging over the last two years, he's never really gotten around to acquiring a Twitter account.
But now he has.
William Darcy is on Twitter.
For her.
No, not Georgiana.
The other her.
In the last two minutes, he's followed her, then his sister, then Charles. Just to make it look a little less creepy.
No one follows him - that he knows of, anyway.
The first time he visits her profile, he's a little overwhelmed by the middle-classness of it all. Sure, he's always known she's a scholarship kid - but the way she beats him in almost every subject sometimes makes him forget she doesn't have the after-hours tutoring everyone else in the class gets.
There are a few words under her picture (a very becoming picture, actually). Her photo up top, the banner-like thing, includes her sisters. He's never met either of them, but he's still pretty sure Lizzy outshines them both.
"Intergalactic princess doomed as undercover student. Nerd. Sister. Daughter." He reads the description.
He wonders briefly if he should write something on his faceless page-thing too.
He doesn't.
He's always been smart, so it doesn't take much to set up text updates for any tweets from people he follows.
He ignores almost everything she tweets.
He's too busy beating her in Trigonometry and AP English.
He wonders, occasionally, if she's followed him back. But he doesn't feel too comfortable tracking the people who follow him.
Seriously.
He's not twelve. He's sixteen. That's practically twenty.
He's a college sophomore when he gets that text update.
Technically, it's not that important to know that "thelizben" is following him. He doesn't really need to smile at his phone in the middle of Advanced Accounting.
But he does.
And he skips the library and the computer lab tonight, for some reason.
When he taps on the app in his room, it takes a while to sort through all the tweets - and ads, apparently.
But at least the notifications tab makes it rather convenient to check her profile again.
"Undergrad slave to the academe. Girl. Friend. Ex private school brat. Book-lover. Don't hate me. I don't hate you either."
He doesn't stop smiling for the rest of the night.
The third time he checks her profile, her brown hair is being kissed by the sunset behind her. The limited background view looks distant yet familiar. Tibet, he thinks.
"Journalist. Daddy's girl. Writes for a living. Almost legally blind. Figures."
He smiles in the middle of the most boring board meeting in the world. Richard kicks his shin and raises a brow. Darcy laughs.
Actually laughs.
It takes him two weeks before earning back all office respect.
He doesn't really regret it.
Twitter is useful. He's known that for a while.
Twitter updates him every time Lizzy moves or gets promoted. Twitter keeps him in the loop when Jane Bennet gets married. Twitter makes him ready to dance with the maid of honor. Twitter informs him - probably in a mind blank moment on Lizzy's part - that said maid of honor thinks he's a snob and a jerk.
He tosses his phone on the bed before closing his eyes.
He doesn't check Twitter for a while.
A while ends up being a year.
So this random running into her at his corner coffee shop is purely coincidental.
She apologizes when she finds out he's the one she'd cut in line. She mumbles something about an emergency case and no sleep and late nights and deadlines.
She offers a reconciliatory hand after paying for his latte.
"For old times' sake?" She shrugs.
"Of course." He grips the offered palm firmly.
"Cool. Thanks. Don't be a stranger."
She's out the door in a whirl.
His heart has a mind of its own.
"Zombie who writes for your doctor's office. Single and satisfied." The words are emblazoned right beneath a picture of her and her dog - Hamlet, he thinks. Its fur patterns are just that bit different from Romeo's and Benedick's.
Her profile never fails. It's like a psychiatrist's dream.
Need an upper? Check Lizzy's profile.
It's been a lonely birthday, but he smiles anyway.
The thing with Twitter profiles is that, unlike Facebook, it doesn't think it's a good idea to bug your followers about your correcting that typo in your personal write-up. One tweet hits the world at large. Tweaking your profile? Could care less.
So he's completely blindsided by what his smartphone is shouting from his hand.
"Sleepwalking ninja. Girl next office down. Bride-to-be."
His hand shakes for a little, then for a lot.
His chest starts pressing down on his lungs like a Spanish Inquisition torture device. His eyes feel ready to - just - fall.
It's amazing how much one picture tells you.
It's George. He knows it's George. That smug smile is patented.
And, just in case he hadn't already deduced enough from that sickening look-at-each-other profile picture (Lizzy, really?), the first three tweets on her "liked" tab say it all.
"Promise I'm paying off that ring, peach." The oldest one already has him nearly throwing up.
"Who gets the girl? I get the girl."
"Darcy was a joke. Picked you out right under his nose."
He doesn't really regain full consciousness until his feet hit the sidewalk gravel.
"Darcy?"
"Lizzy! Don't, please don't - don't - " He's panting, in the middle of the night. One way or another, he's found himself at Lizzy's front door at two in the morning. Security is a joke. She's in her pajamas and glasses. She's adorable.
"Don't marry him," he makes out one minute and one quirked eyebrow later.
Suave.
"Him?" She blinks at her surprise visitor. She's smart. And observant. He knows she'll figure it all out -
She crosses her arms. "George Wickham?"
He nods, mouth open.
He wants to wash the images out of his brain. ASAP.
He wants her to tell him it's all not true.
He wants her to not be George Wickham's. To be his instead.
"Lizzy, I - "
"Come in." She pulls him by the elbow. She's strong. Really strong. Journalism does that to a girl. Maybe.
She shoves him on her couch. He barely has time to make out the decorations in her one-bedroom condo. It's NYC. She must earn pretty well to get a place like this.
He's shocked when she sits down next to him.
"Lizzy?"
"Don't blow my cover," she whispers. Her eyes are level with his. He's shorter when he sits down, apparently.
"Cover? You - "
"No, sh!" She leans closer. His heart races embarrassingly fast. "He's coming in ten minutes. Hide when I tell you to."
"Hi - hide?"
The door swings open prematurely. Wickham is drunk, and high. He's about to strike Lizzy when Darcy strikes him first.
When he crumples to the floor, his phone slips off him.
Lizzy gets it.
Right away.
"Yes!" She's unlocking and searching and clicking and sending.
It takes Darcy a second. Just one.
George is a - case?
"Darcy - you ass," the pile on the floor mumbles. He looks at Lizzy before George's hands reach his feet.
"Shut it, George," Lizzy snaps. "You're done."
"Like you and Darcy aren't?" Somehow, the tool is still talking - even after Darcy's two additional kicks in the ribs.
"None of your business." Lizzy smirks.
She looks up at Darcy after that. Her eyes are glassy and radiant.
"Don't marry him," he says. Because what else.
"Was never going to." She smiles.
He likes Twitter, still does. Ten years doesn't cancel out new technology entirely.
He still doesn't tweet.
But he finally writes his profile.
"Programmer. Husband. CEO."
Three words are all it takes.
"Mrs. Darcy."
Hers only needed two.
A/N: This idea popped into my head a month after I joined Twitter and refused to let my brain go. I hope it made you smile a little! Thanks for reading :)