An Earl Grey/Hamilton Inspired Micro-story
Weary of her lavish life with her boring English husband, but unwilling to break her sister’s heart by pursuing her brother-in-law Alexander, Angelica Church née Schuyler flees to Iceland. In the darkness of a winter morning, she wanders into a small cafe in Reykjavík. She warms her hands with a cup of Earl Grey and wonders what her dearest sister, Eliza, is doing at the this very moment. The winds howl outside, rattling the windows and nearly gutting the fire in the hearth. It is so loud that when a man introduces himself as, “Björn, from the Westfjords,” Angelica hears, “Earl of the Westfjords,” unaware that Iceland has no titled families. “Ah,” she muses, “An Earl. It wouldn’t be so bad to be married to an Earl in this fanciful place. It would be ever so amusing.” She marries the “Earl” on a whim and is rather shocked to find herself spending her days wearing itchy wool sweaters, picking her namesake herb and selling it by the quarter pound while Björn is at sea. Dissatisfied (she will never be satisfied), she returns to England and opens a small tea shop—a front for a radical abolitionist/suffragette group and lives happily ever after.
