Saffiyre

He had been about to pull away when Thomas’ hand reached and joined his own on Thomas’ shoulder, and the Captain blinked at Thomas, a little bit surprised. Maybe he should have pulled away, but he hadn’t the strength to, somehow Thomas’ nearness was drawing him in.

“Why-“ the Captain swallowed the dryness in his throat and tried again to talk, his voice pitched just as quietly as Thomas’ was, giving him time to change his mind on his answer. “I would like that,” he said, instead, not wanting to ask the question that came into his mind.

“As would I.”  Thomas’ eyes drifted half closed, a touch-starved part of him soothed by the Captain’s closeness.  He’d lost track of how long it had been since someone had simply touched him; warm and lingering, and without ulterior motive.

“But that is an adventure for tomorrow, after the wedding.”  He yawned, turning his face against the pillow to (more or less!) hide it.  A token politeness, since he didn’t want to let go of the Captain’s hand.

“It does sound rather nice, though… Rather… nice…”

/Curiouser and curiouser,/ he turned his head to watch as Thomas slept.

It took a while for him to really waken, and remember his routine, which, as he looked at the clock, he had already vastly upset, but he could blame that on Thorne. On being messed around with the rooms. No one would blink twice that he was snarking about Thomas; it would be more strange if he didn’t.

“More softness in the world cannot be a bad thing,” The Captain shifted so he could watch the way Thomas’ face changed as he spoke. “I thought at times in the war; a little more would not go amiss.”  maybe, he thought, such a war would have never been if more men were like Thomas.

The Captain’s hand reached and touched Thomas’ shoulder, “in times of hardship, I seem to see that men like fantasy and beauty, even if it is not as it appears. The truth can be ugly, and I find there is so much that is ugly in the world. Maybe it is easier to believe a dream of beauty than the terrible truth.”

“I wish I had spent more time reading, when I was alive I hadn’t the patience for it, I found other things to distract me.”

How strange that a fool who had died alone, unloved and tricked, should find himself here in death.  Unexpectedly comfortable in bed with a… friend.  Anchored in his skin by the weight of the hand on his shoulder, a ghostly warmth through the brocade of his waistcoat.  

Soft.  

“I’d thought it was quite an embarrassing thing when I was alive, and yet?  Death has perhaps given me perspective on the matter.”  With his cheek still pressed against the pillow, and dark curls flopping defiantly across his brow, Thomas reached up and folded his hand over the Captain’s, holding it to his shoulder for another moment.

He felt thin beneath the thick, structured fabric, with light, knobbly bones that would have made him a poor soldier.  “I heard Mike speaking of something called an audio book.  A novel in the form of recorded music, I believe.  As neither of us can turn pages in proper books, perhaps…”  

The Captain had been very fond of his mother, but he had always thought himself to be much more like his father, which was no bad thing. “No no, I’m my father’s son, my mother always used to say.” Death hadn’t taken memory away, for which he was grateful. “She was a good lady, though. A nurse in her time, you know. Quite well respected and didn’t take any balderdash or jiggery from any one.”

“Tommy is quite nice, a bit softer than Thomas,” The Captain either didn’t notice, or didn’t react when Thomas moved a bit closer, it was maybe more true to say that he didn’t mind; the contact was comforting even as strange as it was, when one could not touch the living or the living things.

“Well, it suits the moment I must say. Do you know many poems like that which you can just rattle off?”

With his back to the window, Thomas couldn’t see the way the sky had finally darkened to black, or the stars that were picking themselves out in the summer night.  But he could hear the sounds from elsewhere in the house begin to take on that slower, sleepier edge, as the guests began to settle in for bed.

“Mm, softer, yes.  Perhaps that’s why I liked it.  Quite unfitting for a gentleman, of course, but it was a name of my own– one I didn’t have to grow into, which came with no weight of expectation.”

No invisible, ever-changing hurdles to jump, and nobody who would be disappointed when he didn’t live up to them.

“Of course!”  Thomas cracked a smile, his cheek pressed against the pillow and giving him a lopsided look.  “I read voraciously in life, and I’ve tried to commit as much to memory as I can, now that turning pages is beyond me.”

The Captain’s hand reached and touched Thomas’ shoulder, “in times of hardship, I seem to see that men like fantasy and beauty, even if it is not as it appears. The truth can be ugly, and I find there is so much that is ugly in the world. Maybe it is easier to believe a dream of beauty than the terrible truth.”

Thomas’ little expressions were rather darling, if the Captain was honest, but he didn’t know why. It was madness, and strangeness that made no sense to such a proper fellow. What a peculiar night this had become! All thanks to Alison. Still, he couldn’t find it in himself to be too mad. He’d learned that Thomas wasn’t all pomp and poetry as well.

“She used to call me her little Evie, when I was quite small.” The Captain didn’t sound nearly as upset by it as he thought he ought to be. His lips stayed up in that smallest of smiles, the vague memories he had of his mother very fond. “You would like her. She was quite scandalous for her time! Marrying my father who was younger than her by five years, a fact she never let him forget!” He laughed, warmly.

“That’s lovely verse; is it your own? Or a fellow poet?” He was clueless on the literary arts, and he didn’t mind admitting it. “I am sure your father was quite proud of you, even if he had not the words to say so.”

“I can hardly imagine you as a child!”  Slowly, Thomas made himself more comfortable again, curling onto his side, unconsciously just a bit closer to the Captain.  Erasing some of the polite space that they’d been keeping between themselves.  

“You’re right, I think I should have liked her very much.  Do you think you have much of her in you?  I think perhaps you do, deep down.”  Maybe so deep that even the Captain had forgotten it was there.  That could happen, in war.  And in death.

And God knew the Captain had had more than enough of both.

“My sister’s called me Tommy, which I rather liked.  Even my nieces and nephews picked it up from them; of course, that might be because it was easier than calling me Uncle Thomas.”  

“Tommy is quite nice, a bit softer than Thomas,” The Captain either didn’t notice, or didn’t react when Thomas moved a bit closer, it was maybe more true to say that he didn’t mind; the contact was comforting even as strange as it was, when one could not touch the living or the living things.

“ I wonder at times if my father did not choose my name out of spite… ah.” The Captain quirked a smile at the corner of his lips, and cast a look at Thomas, “Leonard Evelyn. If you must know. My mother was quite sure she would not have a second child, and so they burdened me with the name that she wished a daughter to have.” He didn’t mind it as much as he should have, not as much as he was saying he did, at any rate. “If you tell my secret, Thomas, I shall not forgive you so easily.” the Captain did not think he needed to say who /they/ were.

If only he could understand why Thomas kept looking at him with that strange face. It was curious and he didn’t understand, but the Captain would not ask! He would not; that would be too silly. He was imagining it.

“It rolls off the tongue well, I think,” it did - and it strangely suited Thomas. “All very sensible choices, those names of yours, your father sounds like a sensible fellow.”

“My father was infinitely sensible.  It’s probably why we didn’t get on; what he knew of art, and literature and beauty could fit in a thimble and still have space to spare.”  Thomas rolled his eyes with the sort of long-suffering sigh that doesn’t really have any heat in it, not anymore.  More of a familiar old track of exasperation.  

Sometimes he missed his father.  But most the time Thomas didn’t think about him at all.

“But Evelyn, that’s a lovely name!  One of the former occupants of the house– just a little before your time, in fact– used to read an author by that name!”  Thomas shuffled up the bed a bit, half propping himself on an elbow, as he tried to remember a bit of the elegant prose.  “I used to read over his shoulder, and he was so very slow!  And half the time he’d get bored and leave the book unfinished.  It was truly maddening!”

Oh, but for a little better memory!  Death should have come with one.

“She used to call me her little Evie, when I was quite small.” The Captain didn’t sound nearly as upset by it as he thought he ought to be. His lips stayed up in that smallest of smiles, the vague memories he had of his mother very fond. “You would like her. She was quite scandalous for her time! Marrying my father who was younger than her by five years, a fact she never let him forget!” He laughed, warmly.

“I think that without the two of you as you are at times, we would all be very bored,” The Captain could not think of a time without Thomas and Kitty in his afterlife, and he didn’t wish to know what it might be like. Selfishly, he hoped they would not get ‘sucked off’ before he himself did - if that ever happened to happen at all.

The war had meant that soldiers often had to sleep in close arrangements, and if the Captain had not himself dealt with some of the poorer situations, he had had it drilled to his brain that he must not complain, that he must accept whatever circumstance fell to him. Even if he would never say the words, sharing a bed with Thomas Thorne was not as terrible as the idea had first appeared.

It was odd, very odd, to have Thomas defending his name, but it was a good odd, the Captain decided, a small smile on his lips. “I am flattered that you find my name of such high praise; I was named for my grandfather also, I have his middle name.”

“Lord Thorne does not suit you, if you’ll mind me saying so.” It was too stuffy a name for one like Thomas, who was too alive in death to ever seat upon a stuffy title. “I much prefer Thomas. Just Thomas.”

“Names are a strange thing…”  Thomas trailed off thoughtfully, pulling the cuff of his voluminous sleeve straight.  They’d constantly come unbuttoned in life, and it seemed like in death they had the same irksome habit.  “One of the few things we take with us to the grave with us unchanged.”

“You must indulge my curiousity, then!  What is your middle name?”

From the corner of his eye, he watched the Captain’s small smile, tracing the shallow curve of it with a quiet pang of longing.  He didn’t want it!  This urge to reach over and touch his hand, or to rest his head against the broad plane of his chest… But the longer they lay there, the more difficult it became to ignore the temptation.

Foolish heart.  It was only going to get itself hurt.

If only he could understand why Thomas kept looking at him with that strange face. It was curious and he didn’t understand, but the Captain would not ask! He would not; that would be too silly. He was imagining it.

The Captain didn’t mind the fussing or fiddling. There was much stillness in death, and Thomas’ restlessness was refreshing. “Kitty is a wonder, as is her endless joy,” and she knew how to make them feel alive again, to find the small joys in their afterlives. The Captain was quite fond of her, truly.

“Fanny could never lose her fire if she tried,” The Captain smiled; he found her to be a charming, if not fierce, lady, and he was protective of her, though he wouldn’t dare say so. “She can get quite uppity when she puts her mind to it, as you well know.”

“You better not. Can’t have them yelling it about like any old tosh. A man has a reputation! I thought it a dull thing when I was alive, but I would like to think that it’s quite a respectable name now.” It was odd how death had changed his thoughts, but maybe not too odd, if he thought over it hard enough.

“Having her about the house is a great comfort– she’s a little older than I am, but she understands the world I lived in.  Perhaps it’s why she feels so much like a sister after all these years.”  They both seemed a bit too enthusiastic by modern standards, a bit too dramatic and fond of their flourishes.  But that had been the norm, once upon a time.  Once upon their time.

Part of Thomas (most of him, really) was grateful that the Captain hadn’t decided to put a bolster down the middle of the bed.  It was unexpectedly nice to have him there, the warmth of his foot resting against Thomas’, like an innocent and unacknowledged point of human contact.

It was easy to miss such things when you were dead, and couldn’t touch the world.

“Far from dull, sir!”  Thomas’ voice pitched a little, teasing, as he defended his name against him, “Matthew was the most important of the Gospels.  It’s a book of hope, and new beginnings, and faith… Not such a bad thing to be named for.”

The war had meant that soldiers often had to sleep in close arrangements, and if the Captain had not himself dealt with some of the poorer situations, he had had it drilled to his brain that he must not complain, that he must accept whatever circumstance fell to him. Even if he would never say the words, sharing a bed with Thomas Thorne was not as terrible as the idea had first appeared.

It was odd, very odd, to have Thomas defending his name, but it was a good odd, the Captain decided, a small smile on his lips. “I am flattered that you find my name of such high praise; I was named for my grandfather also, I have his middle name.”

“You may well be correct,” The Captain watched as Thomas’ eyebrows disappeared, and fleetingly wondered how it might feel to brush aside his fringe, before thinking better of the thought altogether. “Now you have me curious,” he could not help but tease, “who else you find beautiful in the house… dear Fanny, maybe? Or Kitty? I seem to see you two whispering together.” He didn’t, often, but it felt fun to tease, and it brought about a light-hearted note to a thought that could grow and fester into a dark thing if they let it.

He gently poked at Thomas’ foot with his own. “I think you are made of sterner stuff than that, Thomas,” for some unnamed reason, being called /Captain/ didn’t sit well, not in these circumstances. It was not, perhaps, quite right of him, but, “you may call me Matthew,” he allowed, the name slipping from his lips for the first time since his death. “It was my name, before my death.”

Even comfortably stretched out on the bed, Thomas didn’t lie particularly still.  He shifted, curling onto his side and then onto his back, hands folded over his stomach, or arm pillowed under his head.  He didn’t seem uncomfortable, or tense beside the Captain, either–

Just someone quietly and perpetually fidgeting.  Restless hands, and all that.

“I find many people beautiful!”  Maybe the dead weren’t supposed to flush, but Thomas’ cheeks turned pink all the same.  “One may find beauty in many things, without being attracted to them.. well, romantically!”  But he didn’t get up, or try to put any space between them– in fact, he looked like he was trying not to smile.

“Kitty is beautiful, of course.  I love as her as dearly as I did my own sisters!  When she’s happy, she’s so completely abandoned to her joy, and wishes nothing more than to share it with all of us.  We could learn a few wise lessons from her example.”

“I wish you could have seen Fanny before she married that lout.  She was incandescently brilliant– but marriage dulled much of her fire.  Still!  It seems like she’s rediscovering some of it.  Being around Alison and her modern sensibilities has been quite eye-opening.”

And there’s you.  There was you from the moment you walked into the house, desperate to be of service, and respected for it.

For a heartbeat (or as long as he remembered a heartbeat to be) Thomas looked up at the Captain, his mouth soft and caught between words, and a funny little flip in his chest.

“Fanny could never lose her fire if she tried,” The Captain smiled; he found her to be a charming, if not fierce, lady, and he was protective of her, though he wouldn’t dare say so. “She can get quite uppity when she puts her mind to it, as you well know.”