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Lucille
Lucille stepped gingerly into the Garrison, her light footsteps loosing themselves among the cheering and singing of the pub. The barmaid pulled herself from the edge, stepping in front of her questioningly, after noticing her dazed look.
"Can I help you?" Grace asked, and Lucille's lips tipped up.
"I was looking for Tommy Shelby." She said and the barmaid nodded her head toward the private room that she had met his brothers in the other day.
"He's in the private room." She said, and Lucille could feel her judging gaze resting over her. "Can I get you a drink?"
"Oh, no thank you." She said dismissively, before turning into the room without knocking, shocking Grace slightly.
As Lucille had walked to the pub, she had wanted nothing more than to turn back as her feet carried her to a conflict that she had wished would never happen. There was too much hope in her as she stepped into the room where Tommy was drinking. She had wished that he would be the one to come to her, but she had realised that he was too scared. Of what, she didn't know.
"Tommy?" She called, her body slipping through the door before she rested it shut.
He sat in the same place that he had the last time she had been in the room with him. Although, this time, he was surrounded in numerous empty glazes and a cloud of smoke, as well as an empty whiskey bottle by his side.
"We need to talk." She said.
As she came toward him, and he realised that it was her who had spoken, Tommy stood hurriedly to his feet. The cigarette was put out against the table and he straightened himself in front of her.
"What about?" He asked, and Lucille chuckled slightly, attempting to ease the tension in her own shoulders.
"Come on Tommy, we have a child together. We can't go on like this anymore." She said, stepping forward to take his hand.
He looked down at it, feeling the softness of her skin in his rough palm. It was comforting, thanks to the images from years ago that it brought, and he found himself trailing his fingers over her knuckles in patterns, just as he used to do.
"You don't understand." He muttered.
"But I do!" She said, the frustration evident in her voice as she almost bounced on her toes. "Did it not mean anything to you? Was it just a temporary comfort?"
His hand had reached up to place itself on her cheek.
"Of course it meant something. You meant everything to me." He said, and her hopeful gaze faltered, before he had even realised what he had said.
"But not anymore?" She breathed out, shaking her head.
"That's not what I said. Don't say that-" Tommy said.
"But is it not true? That what it feels like to me." Lucille said. "I feel like we're an inconvenience."
"If anything It's me that's an inconvenience, Lucille." Tommy said. "I'm not the man you think I am."
"I love you, Tommy. Not anyone else!" Lucille pleaded with him. "I gave myself to you. I left my home for you, my country. I risked everything. We have a child together!"
Lucille felt herself shouting at him rather than talking with him. But with all the pent up anger being released, along with it came the memories of that time those years ago in which they were both happy, together. Although she could never block out the fact that a war had been battling only miles from her home, it was a time in which she envied.
She couldn't bring herself to call her memories of that year absurd. Lucille had dug them up willingly, wishing to bathe in them and soak up the emotions that had felt so infectious then. They had given them a daughter, and the gift of childbirth was one greater than any other. She couldn't hate those memories out of pettiness. Not now.
But waiting was supposed to be erotic, as writers said. But to her it was painful; Lucille was in a foreign country, with people she didn't know and dangers she would never even imagine, and yet she was waiting for him to choose her fate with him.
"Damn them for what they did to you in France!" She continued, her voice breaking slightly as she watched his face crumble all of a sudden.
"But that's over now. You're home." Lucille said, her voice barely above a whisper. "And It's your choice whether you want to be with me or not. But I can't wait for you to let me in. I don't know what your afraid of Tommy. But I do know that it'd do so much good for you, if you tell me your troubles."
She was pushing through the door and out of the Garrison, before she had even realised that she had left him. She knew she was being unfair, but so was he. Tommy couldn't expect them to wait around forever. Lucille had to do what was right for her daughter, and no one else.
"Lucille!"
Do you think the suffering for both Lucille and Tommy will be over soon?
