Archive of Our Own ^beta

It’s late. The servants’ hall is empty, the kitchen cleaned, the windows shuttered. Mrs. Patmore has gone up twenty minutes ago, Mrs. Hughes too shortly after. The maids and hallboys are long gone, retired upstairs just like Ivy and the rest of their sad little excuse of a friend group. They aren’t really friends, are they? Not with Jimmy not caring a lick for any of them, with Alfred mooning over Ivy without much regard for anyone else, and certainly not with Daisy sniping and barking at the whole lot of them whenever her mood shifts unexpectantly. Which happens a lot, lately, and which she tries to deny even in the private enclosure of her own mind. She’s fine, and she’s acting entirely reasonable.

(It really doesn’t matter that Ivy had looked beautiful with her blush on, or that Daisy’s stomach had twisted as if she were on a chairoplane when she had complimented her Charlotte Russe, or that Daisy only ever seemed to get so very, very irritated whenever Alfred lingered around in the kitchen for no reason at all.)

When Daisy opens the door to the back yard, she is greeted by the smell of wet earth and fresh water and the steady sound of drops of water hitting the cobblestones. It’s raining. She stands in the doorway and watches, just for a moment, how the light falling out of the frame behind her reflects off the glistening stones. Her own shadow warps and breaks in steadily growing puddles. The sight reminds her a bit of a ghost.

A noise cuts through the whooshing of the downpour, barely audible.

Daisy frowns, turns her head just so- Had she imagined it? It had been so faint, maybe- No! There! Again, it’s quiet, but unmistakably there underneath the pitter-patter of the rain.

On a whim, she leaves the shelter of the doorframe and goes to investigate. She steps under the arcades lining the yard, sheltering her from the rain, and slowly makes her way along the wall. She tries to keep her steps as quiet as possible, so that if the sound comes again she can hear it. And yes, there it is again. A bit clearer to make out now, so she must be closer.

She tiptoes towards the edge of the building, wriggles through stacks of crates, slowly slides her head around the corner, careful to not get wet – and freezes.

A hunched figure sits at the wall, not a meter away, and even in the dark she recognizes the breadth of the shaking shoulders and the jet black hair, loosened from the rain.

It’s Thomas.

Daisy stares, not able to move, as another stifled sob drifts towards her. A tremble travels through Thomas’ frame. Is he crying-? He can’t be. Not Thomas. She tries to convince herself, shows her own mind memories of his cold eyes and biting words, sharp as a tiger’s teeth, of his all-around unpleasant character. Another sob shatters the image.

With a pounding heart and shuffling feet, she takes a step forward, mindful of the rain. “Thomas?”

He stills. Then, with his back still turned towards her, his hands come up to scrub furiously over his face. He takes a wobbly breath before replying: “Go back inside, Daisy.” Not a hint of his usual bite. He resembles more a drowned cat than a scary tiger, she thinks, and must suppress a chuckle at the picture her mind paints.

She doesn’t follow his order and instead leans against the dry wall. “What are you doing out here? It’s raining.”

“Oh, is it? I haven’t noticed.” Ah, there it is. She has half a mind returning back inside and leaving him out here, manners be damned. But his next breath, stuttered and hitching and very much unthreatening, keeps her feet rooted to their place and her chest filled with something that would have been sympathy had it been anyone else.

“…Are you alright, Thomas?”

To Daisy’s shock, the simple question is enough to send another sob up his throat and out his curled-up body. His hands reach up to wipe his eyes dry once more. It must be rather unsuccessful, considering he’s sitting in the middle of a downpour.
He doesn’t answer, just cries, and Daisy’s stomach twists uncomfortably as she stands there and wonders what to do. She could just go back inside, into the warmth of the kitchen, the dryness and quiet of the servants’ hall. Mr. Carson is probably on his way to shut the doors for the night, making his rounds one last time through the halls of the Abbey today. He’d smile at her, all tall and kind, and would she offer him a nightly cup of tea, he would probably decline and send her up to bed. Somehow, the thought vexes her – she’s not a child anymore, thank you very much, and can decide herself when she goes to bed.

Her shoulder stays leaning against the dry wall as she carefully asks: “What happened, Thomas?”

“Y-you wouldn’t want to know.” He presses out, voice wobbly on the sobs he tries in vain to suppress.

“I asked you, didn’t I?”

Instead of making him angry with her persisting, he almost seems to become desperate. “You’re- you’re not supposed to- They’d really hate me, if I- if I told you of all people, it wouldn’t be right-”

In her bafflement, she pushes off the wall to lean a bit closer. “You- who- what?”

“I can’t tell you, I really can’t. It’d dis-disgust and, and, and shock you and-”

The irritation rising in her stomach shadows everything else for a moment. Crossing her arms, she answers: “I can think for myself, thank you.”

He doesn’t reply, sniffles accompanying the steady pitter-patter around them.

“You’re gonna get a cold like that.”

He shrugs.

Daisy sighs. “Come on, get back inside. You’re doing no one any good, moping ‘round out here.”

He doesn’t make to stand, scrubs at his nose instead. Daisy suddenly notices that his sobs have subsided.

“…Why do you care?” He asks quietly, and there’s so much heaviness, so much bitterness and vulnerability in this one question, and no trace of his usual haughty arrogance. Daisy has known Thomas for years, more than half a decade, yet she’s never ever heard him like this. It almost sends a shiver down her spine, and she swallows.

“I’m the one who’s gonna have to make the extra cup of tea and bring up the tray, aren’t I?”

Thomas huffs a breath, tired and bitter. And then, close to a wonder, he actually heaves himself up. He’s strangely ungraceful in doing so, stiff as he leans against the wall to look up into the rain for a moment. The drops wash over his wet skin, his hair plasters against his forehead, yet he simply looks up into the dark.

When he finally turns towards Daisy, waiting under the shelter of the arcades, her eyes meet red rimmed ones who’ve lost- something. She can’t pinpoint what, exactly, but something is missing in his gaze.

“How long have you been out here?”

“Not long enough.”

“What, are you trying to get sick?”

He shrugs, not denying her question. Bewildered, she turns away, frowning while she leads them back into the shelter of the staff’s quarters. The door to the butler’s pantry is closed, but light streams through the window into the hallway. So Mr. Carson is still up.

Without saying another word Daisy goes back into the kitchen, and like a lost lamb Thomas follows her. Or like a ghost, a shadowy apparition, soundless yet heavy as he floats in her footsteps. She turns around a few times to make sure it’s still him behind her, and not the bloody monk, or whichever ghosts are said to haunt the abbey.

Daisy unceremoniously tells Thomas to go hang his coat and cap and everything else soaked through up in the servants’ hall, in hopes that the dying embers in the hearth are still hot enough to dry the water out of them. She busies herself in the kitchen while he does, stoking the fire of the stove back to life and putting on a kettle. What are you doing? Shoots through her head. You don’t even like him, no one does. No one would blame her if she would let him be, to stew in his misery alone, and not care about his worries – he’s never cared for hers, has he?
But Daisy can’t help feeling compelled to, at least, get to the bottom of what has made him so unlike his usual self. (And another part of her feels drawn to his misery, to the heavy line of his shoulders and the hopelessness in his voice – she wants to take a closer look, investigate, because the heaviness in her own heart whispers about having found its mirror image in his-)

Thomas stops in the doorway when he returns. He just stands there, in his shirtsleeves and with his dripping hair.

Daisy throws him a kitchen towel he catches automatically. “For your hair, so you don’t drip all over the floor.”

Without a word, he complies, toweling off the wet strands. Daisy goes to get two sets of cups and saucers, and when she returns his hair is in quite the disarray, strands poking up and to the side, and she is too late to stifle her giggle.

“What?” He asks, frowning. The effect gets lost between the now wet towel in his hands and his hair flopping down into his eyes. Disgruntled, he tries to push it back into what could perhaps be called an orderly fashion. Daisy hadn’t known his hair was so…floppy. It’s a small thing to notice, insignificant even, yet it changes the picture of him she’s had in her head. He almost seems human, suddenly.

“Sit.” She orders with a nod to the kitchen table. And he does, heavy and startingly quiet. He looks down at the floor in front of him, unmoving and hunched over, as if he wanted to make himself small. Or as if he were carrying something too heavy upon his rounded shoulders.

When the water is boiled and the cups are filled Daisy goes to put one in front of him – with the other, she lowers herself onto the chair on the other side of the small table. He doesn’t make a move.

“I didn’t boil that to go to waste.”

With a grunt, he takes a sip.

They are quiet for a while. Daisy thinks she can hear Mr. Carson shuffle about in his pantry, but the noise is so muted she could as well have imagined it. Her thoughts drift, back to Ivy and Alfred and Jimmy as they always do. She still remembers how Ivy had all but jumped at the opportunity to go out with him, had practically fallen into his arms. He didn’t appreciate her, everyone with two functioning eyes could see that.

“You know, I really don’t like Jimmy.” She says, just to fill the silence. The late hour has made her tongue loose enough to say something so blunt. And while she had expected some sort of reaction – be it a grunt, a frown, admonishing words even – Thomas’ head jerking up, wide-eyed, and him snapping: “Don’t say that! He didn’t do anything wrong.” is decidedly not what she had anticipated.

Wrong-footed, she argues: “Well, he did try to get under Ivy’s rocks-”

“He has every right to-”

“Not like that, he doesn’t!”

“Just- keep him out of it.”

“…Out of what?”

Thomas seems to realize what he said and ducks his head, shaking it as he takes another sip of tea. “Never mind.”

But now Daisy’s curiosity is peaked. With narrowed eyes she puts her cup down and leans forward. “Thomas? What did he do?”

“Nothing.” He shakes his head again, eyes finding the ceiling. “He really didn’t do anything.”

“So…what did you do?”

His eyes find hers – and suddenly, all the emotion she had witnessed in the backyard is back. His brows knit in a picture of devastation, and his eyes are glistening with what really looks like tears. But Thomas doesn’t cry, not to begin with and certainly not two times in one evening.

“I ruined everything, Daisy. That’s what I did.”

And then he tells her – tells her what he had done, tells her how Jimmy had reacted and how Alfred played into it, and what Mr. Carson thought of it. The story leaves her reeling, sitting wide-eyed at her end of the table with her fingers locked tightly around her cup and her mouth opened into a small o. She doesn’t say anything when he’s finished, doesn’t really know what, her thoughts racing – and of course, Thomas takes it as what it must look like.

He huffs a laugh, twisted and hollow, and slides his hands away from his own cup, making to stand. “You’re shocked – see? I knew you’d be.”

She watches as he sends his chair back and stands. An air of defeat clings to him, even bigger than before, and his movements are slow and sluggish almost, weighted down by what is now out in the open between them.

He pushes his chair back to the table, all neat and tidy like he always does – it’s a habit she has seen Alfred try to copy but never quite get right, and Jimmy making fun of – and then he just stands there for a second, hands hanging at his sides awkwardly. He looks lost, eyes flitting across the floor without settling on anything. He clears his throat. “Well-” He begins and sends a smile across the table that looks so forced it must hurt his jaw. “-I’d appreciate it if you didn’t go around and tell what I just told you. At least not as long as I’m still around.”

Automatically, Daisy nods – then the words reach her, and they snap something into gear inside her mind, making her eyes focus and her mouth close momentarily. When she opens it again, words she hadn’t planned on saying leave her lips like a waterfall: “How long ‘ve you known?”

He stills, gaze finally meeting hers with a frown. “What?”

Daisy can’t help the blush from rising into her cheeks, nor her lips from quivering up into a nervous grin as she forms the scandalous words. “That you- you know. That you’re…That you like men? That you’re lavender?” Her voice is barely above a whisper, heart pounding. She’d never thought she’d says something so…so bold, and to someone’s face nonetheless. Her chest is filled with excitement at her own daring.

But Thomas doesn’t seem to share the feeling. His frown deepens, and his lips press together. His gaze doesn’t leave hers, and the intensity of it slowly drains out her giddiness. “Don’t go around asking questions like that, Daisy.”

“Why not?”

“Have you listened to anything I just told you? It’s more trouble than it’s worth.”

“Oh.”

“We shouldn’t be talking about it anyway. It’s not a topic for-”

Irritation propels her words forward again: “Don’t tell me it’s not suited for me! I can very well decide on my own what I can take and what not!”

Her sudden anger is mirrored – Thomas’ brows lower, his body grows tense and he snaps with his usual bite: “Oh, you’re big girl, then, are you? You can take it? Well then, you surely want to know what Carson said to me, just this morning- You want to know what he said, to my face?” Thomas takes her silence as a sign to continue, eyes glimmering with rage. “He said I’m foul. That I’m foul, that my world is revolting, that I should be horsewhip-” His voice catches in his throat, comes to a sudden halt and leaves him breathless. He blinks rapidly, looks away again and all his fight leaves him in one shuddering exhale. The light coming from the hallway catches on his eyes, glistening again.

The silence between them is heavy, tense, filled with so much Daisy probably shouldn’t know and Thomas shouldn’t have said. But something is different this evening, a change in the atmosphere, a crack in his careful façade, stubbornness in the cook’s assistant’s mind – whatever it is, it’s enough to lay them bare and open in front of each other. Thomas’ vulnerability evokes something inside Daisy she can’t name, and she feels compelled to meet him where he is, to match him. So, after having watched him fighting for control for multiple seconds, she says with a pounding heart and a heavy tongue: “If you should be horsewhipped, then I should be too.”

It takes a second or two for the words to sink in. He stares, just to the right of her, still and unmoving as his mind catches up with the revelation. She waits with bated breath, fingers cramping around her cup, and watches as emotions flit over his face, too quick to make out, changing again and again. In the end he settles on rolling his eyes up to the ceiling, still wet, and huffing an unbelieving breath. His mouth twists bitterly as he mutters: “You’re having me on.”

Indignation shoots up inside her, effectively burning away her anxiety. “No, I’m not!”

His head snaps down towards her, gaze finding hers. His pale eyes are sharp, boring into her with so much intensity she unconsciously leans back in her seat. “You’re having me on, Daisy.” He intones again, slower and more intently. It feels like a test, a question – a last offer for retreat, to take it back. Offered to her by Thomas, of all people, who she’s never seen give anyone so much as a second chance, never mind a way out for their own benefit and his loss.

His sudden kindness, this olive branch he’s reaching out to her, is strangely enough the thing that cements her decision. With a deep breath and a straight back, she answers as she holds his gaze: “I’m not.”

His eyes widen, his stare melting from intense to vulnerable in a split second. They look at each other, and Daisy feels that, for the first time in her life, she is seen for who she really is – and is seeing someone else for who they really are.

It takes them a while to find their voices again – quiet and unsure under these new circumstances, both unused to the truth lying in the open, precious and unharmed.

Eventually, Thomas slides back down into the seat opposite her, eyes traveling away from her and to his cold tea. Then, he snorts.

Daisy almost jumps at the sudden noise. “What?” She asks, voice nothing more than a whisper.

“Didn’t you use to have a crush on me?” He looks up, frowns, yet his lips are quivering as if on the brink of a grin.

She blushes, shrugging. “Maybe- I think I was overcompensating.”

The corners of his mouth lift into a smile she’s never seen before on him – wide and genuine and amused. “Choosing the queer one to crush on – I think the others don’t give you enough credit.”

“No one gives me enough credit.” She replies, scrunching up her nose in annoyance.

“I know.” He nods, not a trace of irony in his voice. His earnestness throws her off, a bit.

“So? What are you going to do?” She asks, changing the topic bluntly. Maybe she can throw him off too.

With a sigh, he sinks back into his chair. “I don’t know. There isn’t much I can do.”

“You could talk to Jimmy-”

“No, I won’t. He’s been through enough.” He shuts her off immediately, then adds a bit slower: “Either way, I don’t think it’s his doing. Someone must’ve put him up to it. He wouldn’t be so mean, not on his own.”

Daisy can’t help scrunching up her face. “Wouldn’t he? I think he’s awfully full of himself.”

“He isn’t, not really. Not once you get to know him…”

“Seems like you’re the only one who does.”

Thomas shrugs, neither accepting nor denying her words. It’s curios, how much easier he suddenly is to read. Like a fog or a sheen curtain has lifted between him and the world, and all of a sudden she can make him out clear as day.

“Well, we have to do something.” Daisy says resolutely, straightening in her seat. She’s always been better at doing than thinking.

Instead of catching her enthusiasm though, Thomas stills, and his wide eyes find hers. Surprise paints his features as he repeats: “We?”

The implication of him being left reeling by this simple show of companionship is a bit much, especially this late, so Daisy chooses to ignore it, at least for now.

“I could have a talk with Jimmy. Or Alfred, or both. I know Alfred would listen, and I could bring Ivy to side with me-”

“Daisy, don’t take this the wrong way – but I doubt you’d be able to change any minds. This isn’t a simple fall out. It’s a matter of law, and, and faith, and doing what’s right-”

“Then they should add a bit of kindness into it! It’s not like you killed a man.” The comparison makes an idea pop up in her head. “What about Mr. Bates? I’m sure he can be very persuasive.”

Thomas snorts before she can finish the sentence, falling back in his chair and rolling his eyes. “Oh, yeah, sure – as if Bates is going to help me.”

His contrariness annoys her, him shooting down each of her ideas as if she wasn’t at least trying to come up with something. “But there must be something we can do.” She protests with a frown.

“There isn’t, Daisy. There really isn’t.” He stares at his cup, voice distant and low, looking like a man who had already given up. He’s quiet, and Daisy is too – that is, until an idea forms in her mind. A very unusual one, a very daring one, but she’s been bold this entire evening, so why stop now?

“…Yes, there is.” She says into the silence, slow but steadily. Thomas barely reacts, only lifting a brow. “There is a rather…obvious solution, actually.” She speaks carefully, throwing him a pointed look as he glances up with a frown.

“Whatever are you on about-” She lets her gaze slide down to his fingers, then to hers, then looks up again with raised brows. She is met with a picture of shock: wide eyes, opened mouth, stillness.

“We’re not-” He starts, swallows and licks his lips as the words crack and croak unbecomingly out of his throat. When he tries again, he all but hisses, utterly aghast: “We’re not getting married!”

“Why not?” She should probably feel a bit more frightened or cowered by his arguing – but she doesn’t. It’s almost easy, now that the thought has entered her mind, to imagine it becoming reality. Now that she knows what she does about Thomas, and he knows what he does about her, it’s not as absurd an idea as one might believe.

Thomas seems to think differently. “W- why not?” He repeats, flabbergasted. “Why in god’s name should we? You’re already far too deep in this mess-”

“Thomas.” She stops him and waits until his eyes meet hers before she continues. A strange sense of certainty unfolds inside Daisy’s chest, a calm confidence she hasn’t felt before. She is confident her plan will work. “What do we have to lose?” She asks, genuinely.

The question silences him. He looks at her, wide-eyed, not used to her daring. She isn’t, either.

“They will think I forced you- they know about me, they’ll believe I’m leading you on or summat.” His voice isn’t as sure as before, his protest slowly withering away.

“So let them. It’s not like you ever cared about what they think of you.”

“It’s not that. They know about me, but they don’t about you, not yet.”

“I can take care of myself!”

He lifts a brow, sceptic to his very bones.

“Weren’t you the one who said I wasn’t given enough credit, just then?” The slightest hint of a smile steals upon his face. She leans forward. “It’s the safest way, Thomas. No matter what’s going to happen- you won’t go to prison. Not with a loving wife by your side.” She adds with a bit of a grin. Saying it like that, saying wife feels real and exciting – more exciting than it ever had with William, she notices with a bit of a twist to her stomach.

Thomas watches her for a second longer. Then, his shoulders sag down and he yields, mumbling: “You’re barmy.”

It’s as much of an admission as she is going to get, she is sure, and a spark of excitement surges through her body. “If they think me capable of marrying William, then I’m surely capable of deciding to marry you. We’ll need an appointment at the registry, as soon as possible- what about tomorrow?”

“Tomorrow?”

“The sooner the better! We’ll go down to the village right after breakfast – Mrs. Patmore can do without me for an hour or two and Mr. Carson- well, I don’t think anyone will question you missing then too.”

“…You really want to do this?”

“Yes. I do.” She giggles at her choice of words. “See, I’m already practicing.”

“Daisy, I mean it. This isn’t like it was with William – I won’t fall dead after a couple of hours- at least, let’s hope I won’t. This is for a lifetime.”

“I know.” She nods, growing serious. “It’s not like it’s bad luck or something, Thomas. We are safe with each other, aren’t we?”

“It’s a lie.”

“Only to others.”

He sighs, irritated yet playful. “I forgot how stubborn you can be.”

She leans back, grinning. “I have a lifetime reminding you of it, then.”

“Daisy?” His voice is toneless, laden with nerves and disbelief.

“Thomas?” She doesn’t tear her gaze from the house in front of them.

“What are we doing?” He mutters, heart in his throat.

“We’re taking our lives into our own hands, that’s what we’re doing. Don’t make us regret it.” And she takes his hand and pulls him through the wooden doors into the courthouse.