« Come on, Mary. Come back to our bedroom. »
He found her sleeping in her bedroom, several books about seizures lay on the mattress, and Mary, disheveled and exhausted had been sleeping on them. He knocked on her door, startling the young woman who woke up in a hurry, and blinked when she saw it was Tommy.
“Tommy! I…. Needed somewhere quiet to read.” She cursed herself in her head, thinking that her reply was possibly hard to accept as the whole truth. “Besides you haven’t been home in a while. Why would it be a bother to have me sleep in my old room?” The truth was that since he called for Grace in a nightmare, Mary became worried her presence wasn’t wanted or needed. Clearly, Tom felt unhappy and she misread him and his intentions.
“The room feels empty. That’s how I knew you have not been there in a while. It lacked your warmth.” She sat on her bed, her back was resting on the headrest and she looked up at the Shelby. “It is your room as much as it is mine.”
“…….” She tucked some hair behind her ear and wrapped her arms around her legs as Tommy walked into her bedroom. He noticed the books and read the title of one of them. Had she been studying his seizures in order to help him? It could be. Mary was capable of that. Their eyes met and Mary defensively said “I’m a nurse, Tommy. I’ve got to keep up with medical science.”
He could feel she was tippy-toeing around him and the Shelby didn’t like that she felt she couldn’t speak freely. He knew she had been worried. He knew she had been hurt by their last conversation. Still, she was trying to learn how to deal with his seizures instead of chastising him for not telling her earlier. However, the nurse had elected to sleep in her old room, a sign that she was not as fine as she said she was.
“You don’t have to…” but she shook her head and held onto her legs tighter. “Why do I feel that you’ve been avoiding me, Mary?”
“I’m not. I’m…” she sighed. “You and I both have lost a spouse. You and I… care for one another.” She chose her words carefully. “But you and I… are… not god’s favorite children.” She sighed and hid her face in her lap. “I can’t bring her back to you. I wish I could do it would soothe that pain for you. if I could, I would have traded places with her so you would have had her back and I wouldn’t… I would have been… useful.” She managed to say, breaking his heart and breaking hers as she saw his jaw tighten. Did she really think that he wanted her gone? Especially now?
“Do you think that’s what I want from you? To be useful, Mary?” He was at a loss for words and wiped his face with his large left palm. “I… do you think I took you to my bed because I wanted to use you? I—— miss Grace. That is true. I miss her. She was my wife, she was murdered and she is the mother of my child. Of course, I would miss her. Of course, I did love her. I said her name when I was at my worst, and you heard it. But that doesn't mean. That never meant you..” he stopped talking. His jaw tightened even more and Mary shook her head.
“ It is alright. We found each other when you most needed comfort. I. Brought it to you. I will always. Whatever I feel is irrelevant…” She shrugged and laid her legs flat on the mattress. The nurse tilted her head to the side and gave him a faint smile.
“Don’t you dare say that?” He warned her. Mary shook her head, fighting tears. “Don’t you dare imply that I am using you! Don’t you dare say that I don’t feel for you? Mary!”
“What do you want me to say, then? What is it Tommy, that you want me to say? Because right now I am damn tired…. I don’t want to keep to myself anymore.” She wiped some fresh tears and leaned against the headrest of the bed. “It just happens that I am in love with you, desperately so. I wanted to become your wife. I wanted to have your child. I wanted…but I realized that I might not have any of it because you don’t feel the same way as I do. The only thing I request…the only thing I beg of you is to tell me that you don’t feel the same for me. That you don’t want this. I beg of you to reject me, Tommy….. so I could…. So I could move on. So I could try and find someone who does feel the same. So I could try and… »
« Stop talking. » -he cut her short. His chest was heaving up and down at a fast pace.- «Stop talking… non-sense! Stop saying that I don’t feel the same! There is a war in my head, a war in my heart but it’s not because I don’t feel the same for you! It’s precisely because I do that…. I do! » He was breathing heavily and clenched his jaw tighter. His eyes were so intense that they reminded Mary of Sapphire.
« Go on! Go on now! You claim you feel for me and that’s why there is a war in your heart. You are hurting and you don’t allow me to help you heal. You claim you love me—-»
« I don’t claim it! Mary! I do love you! » He claimed and sat by her sides on the bed. « And it hurts…. It hurts because I am scared of losing you like I lost Grace. I am scared something happens to you and I am powerless to stop it. And I hurt you. I made you cry. I put you in danger and you stayed despite all of this. » he wiped her tears. « You went back to your room and you are still trying to help me. Mary. You are you. You are…. You are more than enough for me. You are more than I deserve because what good can I give you if not death and tears. »
« We don’t choose who we fall in love with. Tommy, you give me more than you think. You care for me. You welcomed me into your family. You supported me and my desire to have a career as a nurse. You… let me raise your son… our son. I chose you. I chose you now and tomorrow. »
« You don’t understand Mary. I hurt anything I touch. I lose the people I care about. I am cursed. »
She put her hands on his cheeks and stroked them with her thumbs. There was no way she would let him think that he was cursed, let alone that he was going to cause her death. She realized that there was a deep fear entrenched in his heart that started long before John and Grace died. Something that took hold of his heart and never left.
« Thomas Michael Shelby! Don’t speak nonsense to me, eh? Cursed? Do you want to talk about curses? Do you want to talk about being hated by god? I am afraid, every time you walk past the door of our bedroom, that it is the last time I see you. But it is what it is. We have to live our life. We have to…I want to have a life with you but I need to know if you want it too. Because if you don’t, then you will have to let me go, Tom. You will have to let me find someone who will want to have a life with me. I can still care for you even if my heart belongs to someone else. So please….. please! Tell me the truth. Tell me once. Are you mine? Am I yours? Are we doing this together? »
He looked at her, eyes shifting from left to right before he finally rested his forehead on hers. His hands grabbed her wrists and he stroked the back of her hands with his thumbs.
« You are mine. And I am yours….no one else’s. So we’re doing this together. The best way we can. »
« yes…love. Yes.”
-TBC-
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