scathach124:

I wanted to write a short drabble where Mary asks Lavinia to be godmother to her first child, because in my Lavinia!Lives headcanon, Lavinia is George’s godmother.

When Lavinia
was invited by Mary to tea on Thursday, she was expecting merely an
ordinary afternoon at the Crawley’s London house, with predictable
but pleasant conversation. Her expectations were met for perhaps the
first fifteen minutes as she supplied Mary with normal questions –
how was her pregnancy coming along, what were the arrangements for a
nurse, and was Sybil coming from Dublin to help? Mary answered them
wholeheartedly; she was quite looking forward to having her first
child, and Lavinia was content to listen to her plans in a strangely
excited voice.

But when Mary
said what she had clearly been itching to say, Lavinia nearly dropped
her teacup.

“Matthew
and I were wondering – hoping, actually – that you’d agree to be
godmother to our child.”

All Lavinia
could murmur initially was a breathless, “Oh my.”

Despite her
awkward history with both Mary and Matthew Crawley, Lavinia did not
doubt that they saw her as, at the very least, a good friend –
whenever they were all in London they would meet for dinner and Mary
invited Lavinia to tea quite often. Indeed Lavinia had no bad
feelings towards either of them: she was more than glad to see them
happy together, as she always suspected they ought to be. But what
Mary asked her stunned her, to put it politely.

Eventually,
Mary broke the pointed silence. “I know it must be rather
surprising, me putting this on you all of a sudden. But will you
accept?”

“Don’t be
silly,” Lavinia laughed, though nervously. “I couldn’t
possibly—”

“Of course
you can,” Mary cut in. “I have full confidence that you’ll be a
wonderful godmother to our child.”

“But
surely… I don’t … why me?” Lavinia stammered.

“Why not
you?” Mary said. “You are a very good friend to both myself and
Matthew, and we know you love children – you were quite good
with Sybil and Tom’s little girl when they were here for Christmas.
We think you’d be a perfect godmother to our first child.”

Lavinia
ducked her head, smiling abashedly. “I’m terribly flattered, I
really am. I honestly wasn’t ever expecting anyone to ask this of
me. Least of all the two of you.”

“It was
all Matthew’s
idea,” Mary confessed. “He
still thinks very highly of you, and he wanted to have you involved
in our family somehow.”

Lavinia
blushed. One thing she admired about Matthew was that he frequently
thought of others; the man probably did not have a single selfish
bone in his body. “Matthew’s far too kind, though I don’t know if
he realizes what he’s saying by having me involved in your family.”

Mary
rolled her eyes, though in a mildly annoyed manner and not meaning to
be rude.“Oh good heavens, Lavinia. You deserve this more than
anyone, and I’m sure that you will be a wonderful godmother. You’ll
see the child whenever we’re in London, and I’m certain that they
will grow to love you very much.”

“I’m
sure I’ll love them very much as well,” Lavinia said.

Mary
grinned excitedly. “So does that mean you’ll—?”

“I
don’t think I can refuse such an honor,” Lavinia answered. And
she was rather happy
to accept – this offer, she
felt, was what truly signaled that neither of the Crawleys still
dwelled on the awkwardness of the past, as Lavinia still did. If they
were willing to make her a part of the family and allow her into the
life of their child, then they had forgiven her for the role she had
had in keeping them apart.

“Oh, how wonderful!” Mary set aside her teacup and took one of Lavinia’s hands in her own. “This means so much to me and Matthew.”

Lavinia returned Mary’s friendly smile. “And it means just as much to me.”