We Could Get By

i.

Sunday morning crept in through the window, filtering through the white curtains and bathing Nellie in gentle yellow beams. She yawned, shaking the sleep from her wild curls and entertaining the idea of a picnic. There was scarcely much else to do Sundays, anyway. Toby certainly wouldn't object (though Toby rarely objected to anything anyway). Sweeney was a different matter entirely. 

She gazed wonderingly at her companion, who slept in a messy heap on the other side of her bed. He might take some careful convincing, some gentle prodding, though the man hardly ever left her side when all was said and done. 

His mood was almost always a mystery these days, as changing and unpredictable as the sea outside their big bedroom window. He was getting better, though, she thought, since leaving the grit and grime of London. For all his sulking, his brow furrowed less, hands clenched less frequently into tense fists. The clean, salty air was doing them all a great deal of good, banishing the ghosts that had followed them until they shrunk so deep into the crevasses of their new little cottage that they couldn't be remembered- little more than wisps reminiscent of a life long-gone.

Maybe if I make sandwiches, she thought.

Sweeney shifted closer to her, snoring quietly. He was younger in the sunlight, she noticed. The warmth erased the lines that, before, had seemed a permanent part of his visage. For a moment, she allowed herself to close her eyes again, head settling as close to Sweeney's as she dared. Sunday's soft temptation to drift back into sleep nearly overtook her. The world was blinking awake outside the window, gulls squawking their greetings to the sun and the waves and each other. The beach would be filling up soon, colorful umbrellas stretching from one point far on the horizon all the way down to another, the happy chatter of tourists floating along on the breeze. Even when the winter drew in and a chill blew through their house, it would be just as perfect as it was now. It had to be. After all, they were here at last. Nothing could steal him away, no winds could blow his affections elsewhere- not anymore.

Nellie heard the floorboards creaking in the hallway beyond the bedroom door, Toby's careful feet padding quietly out to the kitchen to steal a pastry for breakfast. She placed a gentle hand on Sweeney's shoulder, relishing the warmth beneath her fingers. It would be far too easy to spend the entire day in bed, had Toby not been up and about already. For so long, the mere dream of a morning like this was enough to satisfy her, the simple fleeting imagination of how it might feel to sleep nestled against him just once. She hated to wake Sweeney now that he was sleeping peacefully beside her of his own accord, but the day certainly could not carry on without him.

"Wake up, love. No sense sleepin' the day away, hm?"

He groaned and pulled abruptly away from her, burying himself beneath the covers and increasing the distance between them. His tousled hair stuck up comically, a stark black halo against the crisp white of the pillows that shielded his face from the sun. She swung her legs over the side of the bed and forced her feet into the slippers that sat waiting.

"Alright, then, but we're having breakfast without you."

She didn't mean it, of course, and they both knew it. The promise of breakfast was usually enough to coax him into the waking world. Nellie took the opportunity to kiss his head while he was too sluggish to protest and sat carefully on the edge of the bed beside him.

"Come on, Mister T. I was thinkin' we ought to have a picnic. You and me and the boy. It's a lovely day. How's that sound?"

He grunted again, but this time, he opened his eyes. It's a start.

The pale blue of the picnic blanket could have melted right into the endless sky. Toby had immediately busied himself with constructing a sand castle a few feet away where the rolling waves washed up and created the best sand for building. Every once in awhile, a seagull would venture too close and he would have to take on the task of shooing it away. Along the shore, a few smaller children were attempting sand castles of their own, their parents looking on from the comfort of their blue-and-white striped beach chairs. Mr. Todd sat close beside her, hunched and quiet like some sort of gargoyle. We're a family now. A good and proper family. Nellie's fingers danced across the blanket to her companion's hand. Startled, Sweeney dug into the picnic basket for a sandwich.

"'S good," he said through a mouthful of food, a little more enthusiastically than he had probably intended. Nellie beamed, though she cursed herself inwardly for frightening him. She unlaced her boots, placing them on the blanket beside her. Toby motioned for the pair to look at the castle he'd attempted, a little white figure waving his arms and frightening the gulls. If Toby knew what they had done for this life, their cottage, this picnic on the sand, he would take off running and never look back. Nellie smiled and waved back at him.

"Isn't this just lovely, Mister T? We should go sailin' sometime," she mused, digging her toes into the cooling sand. "Imagine you 'n me out on that boat over there, just floatin' along. We could sail all the way out to the lighthouse." The sailboat stood proud and white against the darkening blue-grey of the sky. The distant lighthouse was an alabaster column next to her pointing finger, a tall man with a red hat keeping careful watch over the sea. Nellie closed her eyes and let the sand melt into waves beneath her, let herself rock gently with the rhythm of the ocean. Their imaginary boat sailed them out to the rocky base of the lighthouse, and her hand drifted to the safety of Sweeney's much larger one. She expected a variation of "We don't have a boat" or even "You don't know how to sail". 

Instead, the weight of his hand on her knee dissolved her sailing daydream. The gold band on his finger glinted in what remained of the sunlight. Nellie allowed herself to admire it for a moment before placing her hand over his. It was the culmination of everything she had waited so long for, worked so hard to make real. The blood on their hands had been worth it. A gruesome means to a lovely end. She studied Sweeney's face, his sharp features, his far-away eyes fixed on some point in the distance visible only to him. Gone were the days of pulling away, of cold shoulders and empty beds. It was difficult now to imagine him as anything other than what he was in that moment, soft and almost serene, like an oil painting. She refused to lose him to the phantom of a time so long ago, to the warped memories that still cowered in the corners of his mind and grasped his ankles with claws when he walked by.

"It's done, love. All of that's behind us now, hm? We've got a good life here, you 'n me." Nellie rested her head in the crook of his neck. He's still here. Here and with me. The waves crashed against the shore mere feet away and the salt in the crisp air stung her nose. No stench of the sewers, no sweaty crowds and grimy streets. No ghosts hiding in the lamplight. "Nothing can hurt you out here, dear." He leaned his head against hers in response, the weight of love and reassurance bringing a smile to her face. She brushed her fingers over the bumps of his knuckles, the rough skin of his hands.

"I know," he said, barely audible over the sea sounds. It was enough.