Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The bell hadn’t even finished ringing when Thomas slipped into the breakfast room.

He was early. Just enough to pick a seat at the far end of the table; two places down from Bates and four from Carson’s chair at the head of the table. The others filed in behind him, speaking in quiet pairs, low and measured. No one said his name. That was the worst part. He could weather an insult. He could counter a glare. Silence, though, it buried itself deeper.

He kept his gaze down as he ate. Toast, buttered too cold. Porridge, heavier than it should have been. He barely tasted it, yet chewed each bite carefully. Having something to focus on helped keep the attention away from him. A rhythm, at least, to keep himself from sneering or snapping. He didn’t speak. No one spoke to him. The room moved around him as if he weren’t there at all.

It had been over a week since the Jimmy thing. Everyone knew by now. It had passed in whispers, half-formed accusations, and looks he was well-practised in ignoring. Officially, it had been a misunderstanding. Unofficially, it confirmed everything they’d always suspected about him. He even didn’t bother denying it anymore. Let them talk.

From the hallway Carson’s voice carried through the walls. Unmistakeable, steady. Thomas froze with his spoon halfway to his mouth. He didn’t catch the words, just the shape of them. That clipped precision like footsteps on polished tile. The room held its breath with him for a moment. Then the voice moved past the door. Footsteps carried on. Thomas exhaled slowly and forced himself to swallow. He scraped the bowl clean just to hear the sound of it. Anything to fill the quiet.

He hadn’t spoken more than five words to Carson since – well. How, exactly, do you speak to someone after they tell you directly to your face that you should be horsewhipped for the mere act of loving another man?

You don’t. Not if you can help it. You endure it. Then you avoid their eyes. Keep your answers short. You wait for the floor to open and swallow you whole, and when it doesn’t, you keep going anyway.

Carson had looked so sure, so certain. And Thomas hadn’t argued. It took everything in him to stay quiet, not bite back. But the fear of losing his job without a reference – or worse, being handed over to the police – was greater than any urge to bite back. And later, when the rage came, it was cold. He was still waiting for it to fade. Some part of him still thought the anger might pass. The rest knew better. It always found a way to stay.

When he stood, the scrape of his chair echoed louder than it should have. A few heads turned. He nodded stiffly to no one in particular, murmured something about checking the silver, and left without waiting to be acknowledged.

Miss O’Brien’s voice called out for Anna in the distance. He leaned against the wall beside the stairs and tried not to think of how long he’d lasted here. Fourteen years? More? It didn’t matter. He was still the wrong shape to fit into the house. Always had been.

Out in the hall, the morning post had arrived.

Mrs Hughes was sorting it with practiced efficiency, lips pursed. “Anna, this one’s yours. Alfred, two today.”

Thomas hovered a few feet off, hands behind his back, pretending to study the wallpaper. He never got anything. Not anymore.

“And one for you, Mr Barrow.”

He looked up.

She was holding it out already. Cream-coloured. Thick paper. The name written across it in a careful hand. The ink deep and clean. Too many stamps. Not English, at least not this part of England. He didn’t recognise it.

He stepped forward, took it without comment.

No return address. Just his name. His full name.

Thomas Barrow.

“Well,” he whispered, too quietly for anyone to hear, “that’s new.”

He turned it over in his hands once, then tucked it inside his jacket. His fingers lingered at the seam of the pocket before he let them fall. Then he straightened his back and walked away, steady as anything.

Behind him, the corridor swallowed the sound of Mrs Patmore complaining about the jam delivery, and Daisy asking twice if she’d mislaid a spoon. Normal things. Morning things. Comfortable, if you belonged in it. Thomas didn’t.

By the time he reached the scullery stairs, he heard Carson again. Closer this time, asking after tray arrangements and luncheon service. The sound pressed sharp against the side of his head. He didn’t stop to listen.

There was nothing urgent to be done. Nothing he’d be missed from. He headed out to the small courtyard beside the laundry door, where the sun hadn’t yet cleared the east wing and the air still smelled of ash and wet stone.

He lit a cigarette with the same hands he used to polish silver. Smooth, precise, practiced. One drag, then two, before he let his mind circle back to the letter.

His thoughts pulled back to the envelope, still tucked against his chest. Not recognising the handwriting had unsettled him more than he cared to admit.

It wasn’t a name from his past, at least not one he could summon on sight. People didn’t write to him unless they had reason, and no one did these days. It wouldn’t be from a friend; he hadn’t kept any. Definitely not an old schoolmate or anyone from his past life. He wasn’t popular. Wasn’t loved. That much he’d made peace with.

For half a second, he thought of his father. Then realised just how ridiculous that sentiment was. Hope, even the foolish kind, had a funny way of resurfacing when you weren’t watching.

He stood there until the cigarette burned low. Then he flicked the stub down the drain and glanced toward the door.

He’d read it later.

———

He read the letter in the boot room. It was the only place he could think of where no one would come looking for him. No one ever needed boots once the midday lull had settled in. The sun cut through the narrow window above the shelf, catching on the dust and the dull polish of unlaced boots. It was too bright in here, really, but at least it was empty.

Thomas took the letter from his pocket and laid it flat on his knee, smoothing it out with his palms. The return address was to Boston, United States.

Then it clicked.

The handwriting wasn’t as unfamiliar as he’d initially thought. It was, however, neater than he’d remembered. It looked like it was trying not to sound too formal but couldn’t quite help itself.

Thomas,

I hope this isn’t unwelcome. Anna wrote to me recently. Said there’d been… trouble. I won’t pretend to know the details, but I can guess. You don’t have to talk about it. Not to me, not to anyone.

I can’t pretend our situations have been remotely the same, but Downton wasn’t always kind to me either. I understand what it’s like to need a new beginning.

So I thought you should know that if you’re thinking about leaving, I’ve a place here. It’s small, but there’s an extra bed. Me and Sybbie are getting by, but just about. Could use another pair of hands. And I figure, well, you could use a change of air.

No expectations. But the offer is there.

Tom Branson.

A crooked little drawing of what might have been a horse or a very unfortunate-looking dog. Presumably from Sybbie.

He read it again. Slower this time.

Then again.

Each time, the words sat heavier in his chest. From suspicion, rather than sentiment. Thomas didn’t trust people who changed their minds about him. Branson and he had never directly had any conflict with each other, but it was well known even amongst the other servants that they never saw eye to eye.

Thomas resented Branson in many ways. How everything came so easily to him. He hated how a grubby little chauffeur could fall in love with the earl’s daughter and then suddenly he was dining with her grandmother and he was the one being driven around. And the feeling was mutual. Branson didn’t resent him – at least he didn’t think so – but he’d always had something against him. He didn’t know what. Maybe it was because he was cruel when bored and clever when cornered. Maybe it was just because he put extra emphasis on the Mr before the Branson once he and Lady Sybil were married. Or maybe it was just because Thomas was English.

He folded the letter sharply and shoved it back in his pocket.

The walk to the servants’ hall was short. The indignation carried him the whole way. Anna was sitting at the table, attending to some darning. Polite of her not to look surprised when he appeared.

“Anna,” he said. “You wrote to Branson?”

She looked up. “Yes. Is that a problem?”

“You might’ve mentioned that you were sending him reports on my private life.”

Her cloth slowed, then stopped. “It wasn’t a report, Thomas.”

Thomas waved the letter in her face, tone sharpening. “Then what is this?”

“He asked how you were. I told him the truth.”

“And that gives you the right to–”

“I was worried about you.”

He cut her with a look. “Don’t make me laugh.”

She sighed, stood properly, placed the cloth down with slow precision. “I’m not trying to. And I didn’t tell him anything that wasn’t already known.”

“That I tried to kiss another man?” he hissed, voice dangerously low. “That I got caught? That I’ve been sleeping with one eye open in case Carson decides to set me alight?”

Anna’s gaze hardened. “I told him you’d been treated like dirt for something that shouldn’t be anyone’s business and that I thought you deserved better. That’s all.”

Thomas looked away. "I didn’t ask for charity."

"It’s not charity," she said evenly. “What did he say?”

“He said he’s got a place. In Boston. Wants me to come stay with him.”

“Then why are you shouting at me?”

“I’m not shouting.”

“Yes you are.”

He looked at her. “It’s insulting. He thinks I’m so pathetic, so ruined, he’s offering me a bed out of pity.”

“That’s not how he meant it.”

“You should be grateful someone even thought of you," Anna added, softer now. "Because most people wouldn’t have.”

He looked up at that. “Grateful? Grateful that the Irish socialist who abandoned his beliefs the minute he got in with the family now wants me to babysit his daughter and split his rent?”

“Grateful that someone sees you in trouble and thinks you deserve a second chance.”

She didn’t blink. “Not everyone’s trying to humiliate you, Thomas. And people care more than you realise.”

He laughed. “Do they? That’s news to me. Funny how they only find their kindness after I’ve been made a spectacle.”

Anna didn’t flinch. “You know, sometimes it’s hard to tell whether you want kindness at all. Or whether you’d rather be miserable because it proves you’re right.”

He went very still. “Excuse me?”

“You are your own worst enemy, Thomas,” she said quietly. “You always have been.”

His voice dropped. “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

"I think I do."

Thomas straightened. Cold again, sharp around the edges. “I wish you were right. If my only problem was myself, that would be a lot easier. My worst enemy’s the entire bloody country. The law. The church. Every single man who can say whatever he likes without ever having to be afraid."

“You think it’s easy for me?” His voice was even lower now, edged with something brittle. “To smile and nod and carry on as if I’m not one wrong glance from being dragged into the street and beaten for it?”

“No. I don’t think it’s easy. I think it’s awful. I also think you have more strength than anyone here gives you credit for. But it’s being spent on proving everyone wrong instead of letting someone be on your side.”

He hated how much that got to him. Hated how calm she was when she said it. Like it didn’t matter that he had built himself brick by brick out of spite and shame and self-preservation, and she could tear it down with a few well-placed words.

She sighed, quietly. “Do what you want with the letter. Burn it. Pretend it never came. But don’t stand here pretending you don’t need help.”

He didn’t answer. Instead, he nodded once, sharply, and left the room. Back in the corridor, his hands were shaking again. He shoved them in his pockets and walked, not sure where to.

But the letter was still there, tucked against his chest. For the first time, he wondered what it would be like to say yes.

He didn’t want to owe her. Or Branson. Or anyone, really. Gratitude was a slippery thing. Much easier to give than to carry. People liked you more when they wanted to help, and then less once you actually needed it. And anyway, he’d never been good at saying thank you. It always stuck somewhere in his throat. Made his skin itch.

Maybe he would go. Maybe he’d even mean it. But not because of pity. Not because Anna had decided to take it upon herself to fix him. Not because Branson suddenly wanted to play the saviour from across the Atlantic. If he left, it would be for himself. To stop waking up in a house where every closed door might hide a whisper with his name in it. To stop pretending that survival meant anything close to living.

Still, the offer was there. Real. Uninvited, but not unconsidered. And that was the part he didn’t know what to do with. It was that part that made it feel worse than kindness, worse than cruelty. It felt like someone had looked at him and not turned away. Not yet, anyway.

———

He read it again that night, once the house had quieted down and he was finally alone.

The boot room had been far too bright for Thomas’s liking earlier. Now, in the stillness of his own quarters, the words landed differently. By the dull light of the lamp near the window, knees drawn up on the small cot he never quite fit, the letter sat open in his lap. The creases were a little softer now from where he’d folded and unfolded it throughout the day.

“Thomas,” he said aloud. “I hope this isn’t unwelcome.”

He glanced toward the empty room as if waiting for someone to confirm it was. Then, wryly: “It is.”

But he didn’t stop. The sentences stretched out this time, slower. He read some more of it aloud under his breath, as if saying it in someone else’s voice would dull the edges. It didn’t; it just made it real.

“‘Downton wasn’t always kind to me either.’”

His voice was low, dry, barely more than breath. “‘‘If you’re thinking about leaving.’”

“‘Could use another pair of hands,’” he repeated, dragging the words. “‘And I figure, well, you could use a change of air.’” He snorted once. “That’s one way to put it.”

He paused on the drawing. The not-a-horse. That stupid scribble from Sybbie, lopsided and enthusiastic. It really was dreadful. Unmistakably affectionate, but dreadful. Thomas tilted the page, eyeing it with exaggerated scepticism. “Brilliant. Kid’s a genius.”

But he didn’t stop reading.

Each time he went through it, something pinched at him. It didn’t strike a feeling of hope in him, but gave him a memory of what it used to feel like. That feeling that used to look like freedom, back when he didn’t yet understand what men like him had to lose.

Eventually, he folded the letter, slower this time. He didn’t tuck it away just yet. Instead, he set it beside him on the bed, and took in his surroundings.

He looked around the room – the small box of it, the uneven drawer, the dent in the wall behind the coat hook. It was quiet; the whole house was. Maybe because he was finally letting himself picture what it would mean to leave. Not just Downton, but England. His entire life.

Fourteen years spent climbing his way from junior footman to under-butler, clawing for every inch of dignity he could claim. And what had it earned him? A cold seat at a quiet table. A few coats that still fit well enough. A reputation that would never shake free.

Once, he’d thought staying long enough would earn him a kind of safety. By being useful, that would outweigh everything else. But it seemed not even Downton cared about that. Not when it came to men like Thomas who couldn't even be quiet in the right way.

So now what? Pack up, move across the ocean, and start again in some cramped Boston flat with a man he’d barely spoken to and a child who probably wouldn’t like him?

Or worse: one who did. He didn’t know which would be harder. A child who cried when he looked at her, or one who clung to him. Thomas wasn’t cruel enough to wish himself on someone that young.

Branson probably thought he was being kind. Maybe he was. But kindness was something Thomas had never trusted on its own. It always came with far too many strings.

He stood suddenly. Couldn’t sit with it anymore.

The suitcase was already half-full, out of practicality more than anything. He wasn’t planning on leaving. Not tonight, anyway. But a man like him always had to be prepared. Always had to be ready to go, just in case

He opened the wardrobe and reached for a shirt. Folded it once, then set it on the narrow bed. A tie next. Something dark. Something plain. Then stopped. He stood there a while, one hand resting on the wardrobe’s edge, the other at his side.

He ran a hand down the back of his neck. He couldn’t leave tomorrow. That would be reckless. Ill-planned. The journey alone would take days. He didn’t have a ticket. Or references. Or anything more than a half-packed suitcase and a letter signed by someone he barely trusted.

He was being impulsive. And Thomas Barrow was many things, but impulsive was not one of them.

He couldn’t just walk out like that.

But he could. That was the thing.

He could picture it now. Walking down the stairs in the early hours. Slipping out through the side door. Making it to the station with no one the wiser. He could be gone before the house even noticed. O’Brien had floated the idea once, back when he was younger. It’d be a lie to say it didn’t have an appeal to it. Who would stop him? Carson? The law? Anna, if she had her way, would probably help him pack.

But Thomas had too much pride for that. Too much need to be seen, even when he was leaving. He had never been a coward. If he went, they’d know about it. He’d see to that.

Maybe he wouldn’t leave tomorrow. Maybe not even the day after. But for the first time in years, one thing had settled in his chest.

He was going.

Chapter Text

Most of the house was asleep. That was the point.

Thomas stood in the centre of his room, half-lit by the spill of hallway light through the open door. The suitcase on the bed was mostly packed. He didn’t have much. But his shirts were folded with military precision, socks rolled tightly, a battered tin of collar stiffeners tucked into the corner. He held another shirt in his hands, something pale and worn, and stared at it blankly, before folding it, smoothening the edges. He didn’t put it in the case. Just held it for a moment longer and then set it aside on the chair.

His notice had gone in three weeks ago, one week after he’d received the letter. It was polite, professional, and absolutely not open to negotiation. He hadn’t expected anyone to argue. Carson hadn’t even tried to hide his relief, just gave a single nod and said, “Very well.” Like it was the weather. As if Thomas hadn’t been here since the day after his seventeenth birthday.

Some of the staff had looked sorry to see him go. Daisy, maybe. Anna, obviously. Weirdly enough, even Alfred, in that awkward, too-tall way of his. But Thomas knew what was underneath it. A quiet gladness. A shared breath of air after holding it for too long. The queer under-butler, finally out the door.

He picked up his jacket from the hook and shrugged it on, before stepping into the corridor. The collar folded the wrong way at first. He didn’t fix it.

Down the corridor, the staff quarters were still and dark. A few doors cracked open to let the heat in, but there was no sound. He passed by O’Brien’s old room and paused, just for a second. He’d outlasted her. He wasn’t sure what to make of that.

The narrow stairs creaked under his feet as he slowly made his way to the main floor. It was colder down here. The dark cut in from angles it didn’t during the day. Dim moonlight reached in through the high windows, catching on dust and bannisters, ones he used to polish every Friday morning. Still could tell you where the grain changed, where someone had knocked a candlestick twenty years back and left a barely visible dent.

Downstairs, he passed the drawing room, the grand hall, all the places that had shaped him more than he’d admit. The floorboards here were older. He knew where they dipped, where the varnish wore thin.

In the dining room, the long table stretched out like a ship’s hull. Thomas hovered by the door and looked in. He could see himself. First, younger, hopeful, and so much more certain of what he wanted from the world. Then himself, sharper and meaner and always trying to stay three steps ahead just to stay afloat. He recalled polishing it in silence the week after Sybil died. Remembered breaking a glass once when he was nineteen and lying about it so convincingly even Carson believed him. He remembered standing at that end of the table one evening with a tray in hand, listening to Lord Grantham talk about politics as if the room weren’t full of other people.

He moved on. Out the back and through the door that led to the stables. There was only one horse still kept on, and it looked at him like it expected him to say something. He didn’t approach it, just watched it for a moment as it breathed slowly in the dark.

He hadn’t worked this wing since before the war, but some things stayed with you. The scent of hay and saddle soap. The chill that settled in the bones of the stone floor. The quiet of animals who didn’t care what people whispered behind your back.

Thomas didn’t know exactly what he’d expected from the walk. The point wasn’t for it to be sentimental. But there was something about walking through the rooms in silence, the quiet press of old wood and limestone and years that didn’t quite belong to him. No matter how much he wanted to close it off, fourteen years couldn’t just be boxed and put away. Fourteen years, almost half his life, spent trying to fit in and be useful. Spent trying to be whatever they needed him to be, as long as it meant they wouldn’t throw him out.

Leaving meant letting go of all he’d tried to earn. That, or admitting he had never earned it in the first place.

Back upstairs, the shaving brush sat where it always had. He picked it up, turned it over. The initials had mostly smudged into the handle now, yet still visible if you squinted. T. B. It was his father’s, then his. Not that Thomas ever held any nostalgia or great love for his father, but something about carrying the same object through two lifetimes had made it feel… earned. Like keeping a scar. He ran his thumb along the edge and thought about packing it. Then didn’t. Left it by the basin.

Let someone find it. Let them wonder.

He sat down on the bed, elbows to knees, hands loose. His throat felt tight, but with pressure, rather than grief. The suitcase stared back at him from the blankets. Half-full. Half-done. The room was too small. Always had been. But his whole adult life, it had been his.

As he lay back and closed his eyes, the mattress dipped in the same place it always did. The house breathed quietly around him. Walls settling, pipes ticking. Everything as it had always been. Until morning.

———

Too soon, light crept in through the gap in the curtain, pale and cold. Thomas hadn’t told anyone what time he planned to leave. He meant to slip out before anyone stirred. Early enough that the noise of deliveries and breakfast trays might cover the sound of the door clicking shut behind him.

He was mostly dressed. Hadn’t really undressed, not properly. Instead, he lay on top of the blankets until his back ached too much to pretend any longer. The suitcase sat ready at the foot of the bed. He’d been over it twice already, checked every pocket. Just one shirt was left out, the one folded from the night before. He buttoned it slowly, then threw his coat over it. His hands found their way into the pockets and clamped around his leather gloves. A gift from an older gentleman, back when he was nineteen. Everything else he owned was either inside or staying behind.

He sat for a while on the narrow edge of the mattress, staring at the walls. Some nights he counted the bricks in the windowsill to keep from thinking. The paint had always been slightly uneven round that area. The wardrobe door clicked if you opened it too quickly. The second drawer always stuck. There was a hairline crack above it that never spread further, no matter how many winters passed. The floor dipped a little right by the basin

The shaving brush sat there, just where he’d left it. He didn’t know if he was leaving it behind out of spite or sentiment. He walked over, picked it up again. The bristles had gone stiff with age. He turned it once in his hand and then left it on the table beside the bed.

Running a hand through his hair, Thomas stood up, and gave the room one last look before the door clicked shut behind him. The corridor was quiet. He walked with soft steps out of habit more than necessity, shoulders squared, mouth tight. One floorboard creaked beneath his heel near the stairwell, the same one that always did.

He’d barely made it down the stairs when he realised slipping out wasn’t going to happen.

There was noise. More than there should’ve been at this hour. A low murmur of voices, a cough, the unmistakable shuffle of gathered shoes on stone. And then Mrs Hughes appeared from the archway by the kitchen, arms crossed but not unkind.

“There you are,” she said. “Come on, then.”

“What?”

But she was already making her way back to the hall, without giving him an answer.

It wasn’t everyone, but it felt like it. The staff were standing in a neat line near the main entrance. It was the sort of arrangement reserved for weddings or funerals. No one spoke, but everyone seemed to know their place. That was Downton, all over.

Alfred and Ivy looked like they weren’t sure where to put their hands. Mrs Patmore stood beside them. Daisy alongside her, eyes wide but warm. Even Jimmy had shown his face. Thomas felt oddly grateful to see him, despite everything. Anna smiled gently when she caught his eye. O’Brien wasn’t there, to no shock. And standing just beyond them, by the wide door between the servants’ hall and the kitchen, were Lady Mary, Lady Edith, and, God help him, Lord Grantham.

He froze, then smoothed his expression. Stepped forward, slow and measured, as though he’d planned this all along. His coat was buttoned, his posture straight. He looked, at least, the part of a man who wasn’t quietly panicking.

“Barrow! We thought we’d see you off,” Lord Grantham said, stepping forward. “After all, fourteen years is no small thing.”

He held out a hand.

Thomas took it. Firmly. Politely. He didn’t flinch.

“We’re grateful,” Lord Grantham continued. “For your service. You’ve… always been exceptionally thorough. Even when that wasn’t easy.”

It was the kind of compliment that meant everything and nothing all at once. A polished sentence shaped like gratitude. Thomas gave a short nod in return. “Thank you, my lord.”

Lady Mary offered a ghost of a smile. “I’m sure Boston will be a change of pace.”

“I expect it will, my lady.”

Lady Edith stepped closer. “You’re getting the train this morning?”

Thomas nodded. “Yes. To Liverpool. Ship sails this evening.”

“That’s a brave thing, you know,” She smiled, almost warmly. “Starting over.”

He bit back the first four things that rose to mind. “A change of scenery should be interesting, my lady.”

There was a polite pause. Their eyes lingered, intrusive in a way that wasn’t quite rude but wasn’t welcome either. His cheeks were burning the entire time. None of this was for him. It was for the idea of him.

He wasn’t sure who had asked them to be here – Mrs Hughes, maybe – but he could see it, clear as crystal, in their expressions: kindness dressed up as farewell. A public gesture to smooth over a private relief. They weren’t really saying goodbye to him. They were saying goodbye to the problem. To the tension at the breakfast table. To the thing no one wanted to name but everyone had already judged.

He kept his face smooth.

Mrs Patmore stepped forward and handed him a parcel. “Sandwiches for the journey, in case the train’s late,” she said. Her voice was brisk. “You’ll get there and find no time to eat, I expect.”

He almost smiled. “Thank you.”

And then, at last, Mrs Hughes herself.

She moved closer, tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, and lowered her voice so only he could hear it. “I hope you find what you’re looking for,” she said, quietly.

“I’m not looking for anything.”

“No one ever is,” she gave the faintest huff of a laugh. “Truth be told, you deserved better than what this place gave you, Mr Barrow.”

That nearly undid him. He nodded and said nothing.

The whole thing lasted less than ten minutes. But by the end of it, he felt scrubbed raw. As though his skin had been taken off politely, without fuss. There was no proper conclusion. Just a pause, a silence, and the sense that if he didn’t leave now, he never would.

He stepped back, shifted the case in his grip, and gave a curt nod to the group. “I’d best be going.”

No one tried to stop him. He couldn’t tell if that made it easier or harder.

He’d nearly made it out the door when he realised he’d left the train ticket in his room. Of all the things to leave behind. Muttering under his breath, Thomas turned back.

The corridor was emptier now, most of the staff scattered or returned to their duties as the house was shifted back into its usual rhythm. There was the distant clatter from the kitchen, the hum of running water, someone’s footsteps overhead. He kept his head down, moving quickly through the hall and up the servants’ stairs.

But rounding the corner at the first landing, he nearly collided with Carson. They both stopped dead.

He exhaled through his nose. “Forgot something.”

Carson didn’t move. “So I gathered.”

They both stood awkwardly for half a moment too long.

“Don’t worry,” Thomas added, dry. “I’m still leaving.”

“No one’s stopping you.”

“Good.”

He brushed past, shoulder deliberately catching Carson’s as he did. He didn’t look back.

In his room, he found the ticket on the table, tucked beneath the corner of a folded note he hadn’t bothered to read.

He grabbed it and didn’t linger.

On the way back down, he slowed as voices carried up through the stairwell. He hadn’t meant to stop. But his name landed, sharp and clear, and froze him mid-step.

“…I still don’t understand why he wasn’t dismissed outright,” Carson was saying. “After everything. You know what he did.”

Thomas stood still.

Jimmy’s voice followed, quieter. “I know, Mr Carson. I just… I thought it was done with.”

“You were too soft on him,” Carson huffed. “That’s what made it worse.”

“I didn’t ask for him to kiss me,” Jimmy snapped.

The words landed jagged and uncertain. Thomas couldn’t see his face from here, but he didn’t need to. He knew that voice. He recognised the flicker of fear in it, still trying to pass for pride.

Carson ignored the crudeness and continued speaking.

“There’s no place here for a man like that. And don’t think for a second that just because he’s going, it makes it right. Ordeals like these stain a house. And a man like that doesn’t change, not really. He just learns to hide it better. If it had been up to me…”

Thomas didn’t breathe. Just stared at the grain in the bannister post, heart pounding slow and steady.

“I didn’t mean to say it like that,” Jimmy said after a beat. “I just– well. It’s complicated, that’s all.”

Carson gave a low, humourless grunt. “It’s not. It’s very simple. You should be glad he’s gone. He should have done it before causing us the embarrassment of cleaning up after him.”

Thomas turned before he heard the rest. His foot caught the edge of the step, but he caught himself on the rail.

There it was, no surprises. The kind of confirmation you never really needed but always found, eventually. He’d known it in his gut. Felt it in every clipped word and averted glance since the night it all came out. But hearing said out loud hit, just that little bit more.

He wasn’t angry. Anger took energy, and this morning he didn’t have any left. Besides, it wasn’t like he hadn’t known exactly how they saw him.

So that was that.

He reached the bottom of the stairs and adjusted the strap on his case. Stepped out into the corridor without so much as a glance back. If Carson heard the footsteps, he didn’t come after him.

The door loomed in front of him again, this time with nothing left behind. His gloves were in his pocket. The ticket was in his coat. The goodbye had been said. And upstairs, the house ticked on, steady and unchanged. A machine he’d once fit into, now resetting itself without him.

He pulled it open, stepped out into the morning light, and let it shut behind him.

Carson was right about one thing: Thomas was right to leave, and he should’ve done it a long time ago.

Outside, it was bitter. Too raw, even for February. Dew clung to the stone steps, and a patch of frost held on in the corner where the sun hadn’t yet reached. Thomas stood just beyond the side entrance, near the edge of the servants’ yard, hands fumbling with a cigarette.

He lit it slowly. Inhaled. He wasn’t rushing. The train was an hour away. The walk, half an hour.

The scrape of a shoe behind him broke the quiet. He didn’t turn. Just narrowed his eyes at the pale edge of sky above the courtyard wall.

“Thought you’d be gone already,” came a voice.

“Not your concern,” he said, voice dry.

O’Brien stepped closer. He could hear the way she shifted her weight from foot to foot, the soft drag of her skirt hem on the stone.

“Never thought you’d actually go through with it,” she said, voice low. Dry. “I’ll say that much.”

Thomas didn’t look at her. “Didn’t realise you’d been keeping score.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

He flicked ash to the side. “No. I expect not.”

“It’s a big step.”

“Not really. Just a train. Then a boat.”

Silence stretched. He could feel her watching him.

“I didn’t think it’d end like this,” she said eventually.

“You mean with me leaving?” He turned, just enough to glance at her over one shoulder. “Or with you standing out here pretending we’re still friends?”

She winced, just barely, but didn’t back down. “It wasn’t meant to happen the way it did.”

He gave a dry laugh. “Oh, I know. It was meant to happen a lot quieter, wasn’t it? Just enough damage to keep me in my place.”

“I didn’t–”

“Don’t bother, I’ll be gone in a minute.”

His tone wasn’t cruel. Whatever fight had been in him was long gone and everything important had already been said.

She glanced around the yard before looking back at him. “You made it hard for yourself, you know.”

He inhaled once, then looked at her fully. “Yeah,” he said, low. “I’ve been told.”

The cigarette burned between his fingers. He didn’t speak again.

After a moment, O’Brien looked down at the ground, then out at the far gate. “Well. You got what you wanted, anyway.”

“No,” Thomas said. “I got what I needed.”

He stubbed the cigarette out against the stone, deliberately slow. Then turned to face her properly for the first time.

“All I ever wanted was someone on my side.”

She opened her mouth, closed it again; whatever she'd meant to say was lost. Good.

He picked up his case. The morning had fully broken now. No more grey, just weak gold light stretching across the gravel.

He didn’t look at her as he walked away.

And she didn’t follow.

———

The train pulled in just after nine. He stepped off with his case in hand and his collar turned up against the wind. Liverpool hit him all at once – the noise, the chill, the wet press of river air rising up through the streets.

A damp urgency buzzed around the station. A porter barked something across the tracks. A vendor unrolled paper cones for roasted nuts, the scent sharp and slightly burnt. Down the way, a boy of about twelve hawked papers near the platform entrance, shouting headlines through cracked lips. Seagulls shrieked above the awning, mockingly. He hadn’t been here in years, but Thomas had always liked Liverpool. It was sharper than the countryside, more lived-in than London.

The city hadn’t changed much. He moved steadily, ignoring the ache already blooming in his shoulder. The case was heavier than it should’ve been, and every step forward dragged a little harder than it ought to.

As he walked, the streets leaned downward, sloping toward the docks like the whole place had been built to carry you to the sea. He followed the curve, past men unloading carts and a butcher hosing down his tiles, past girls with milk pails and steam rising in ribbons from cellar grates. He kept his head down.

Outside a newsagent’s, yesterday’s paper was still clipped to the stand. It screamed CHAMBERS AND FORSHAW SEND REDS THROUGH IN FA CUP TIE, edges damp and curling. A boy beside him kicked a pebble with too much force and muttered something about an upcoming trip to Newcastle. He barely glanced at the headline. He’d read it already, the day before, while pretending to consider a train schedule. You didn’t have to care about football in Liverpool; it soaked into the walls anyway.

It had never been his thing, not really. Thomas had always preferred cricket. But he had vague memories of standing on the edge of a pitch in a scratchy scarf, his brother yelling next to him as City fumbled a penalty. That had been another city, another version of him. Funny, what surfaced when you thought you were done remembering.

It would’ve been easy for him to stop walking. To find a cheap room somewhere and vanish into the side streets. To work at a dockside bar, say nothing about where he’d come from, and start over here. It was far enough from Downton to breathe, but not so far as to be unreachable.

But that was the danger of it.

As long as he stayed in this country, someone could recognise him. Someone could say the wrong thing, or say the right thing with the wrong look, and it would all start over again. At least across the ocean, his name might mean nothing.

He passed a corner he half-remembered. A tobacconist, once. Now, seemingly, a betting office. The front window was plastered with last week’s football results. A brief image flashed across his mind: a visit to an aunt when he was seven, the feel of a different coat buttoned up to his chin, the sticky weight of jam on his fingers. He hadn’t thought of that in years. Strange, the things that caught hold just when you thought you’d forgotten them.

Outside the shop, three older men clustered round the window, arguing over fixtures and goal differences like they mattered more than wages. Thomas kept walking. There was comfort in the familiarity of it, but familiarity wasn’t what he wanted. Not in a place where someone might know his face. Or even worse, his name.

The docks emerged ahead like a great metal beast. Cranes towered above the shipyard, and the ship itself loomed behind them.

The wind picked up as he crossed the last stretch of stone toward the departure gates. His coat flapped at the hem. A man in uniform checked names from a list. A small crowd had begun to gather, murmuring among themselves in different accents, different cadences.

Thomas joined the queue and boarded without a word.

Chapter Text

The noise changed as Boston came into view slowly. People on board began to speak quicker, move more sharply. Footsteps now rang more definite on the deck. He hadn’t boarded in any dramatic fashion. Just another body in the queue, case in hand, ticket tucked inside a coat pocket. No glance over the shoulder then, and none now.

At the rail, Thomas stayed longer than he needed to, fingers curled stiff around the metal. The salt in the air stung, though he wasn’t sure whether it was from the breeze or if it was the last seven nights catching up with him.

A sleeve brushed his arm once, twice. Someone coughed behind him. No one asked him to move. Third class didn’t work like that. It was crowd and push and carry what you could. Families pressed forward in twos and threes. A girl with her hair in ribbons clutched a suitcase twice her size. A man nearby clung to his hat with one hand and a sleeping child with the other. Someone else muttered in Italian and crossed themselves, eyes fixed on the harbour ahead.

Thomas kept his shoulders square, chin lifted just slightly. He didn't speak.

The journey hadn’t been terrible. It hadn’t been anything, really. Just annoyingly long. The dormitories were loud and overrun with too many people and not enough space. Children cried, men argued, women tried to keep them quiet. A man got caught stealing bread and no one spoke to him after that. Someone played a tune on a tin whistle until it was taken off them. A baby wailed three nights without stopping and no one said a word. Thomas wanted to smack him by the second night, but stayed quiet, like everyone else. He supposed the silence was meant to spare the mother some dignity.

The bunk across from his had belonged to a boy, maybe sixteen, who’d been seasick before the boat even left the Mersey. He hadn’t spoken a full sentence the whole time. Just moaned and turned green. Thomas had ignored him. No one else did and that made him feel worse, somehow.

The food was bearable, if you got to it early. The queue was worse than the meals. The smell lingered long after the soup cooled and made everything taste of cabbage and brine. He’d stayed out of the way as much as he could. Read a few pages of a book he didn’t care about, then gave up. Slept in fits. Walked the lower deck when it emptied out.

Thomas didn’t belong down with the third class, that much was clear. And it wasn’t out of pretentiousness either. Technically, he was one of them. Always had been, always would be. He’d always felt seen by the working class label that described lads like him. But the truth was that Downton had scrubbed a lot of the rough edges off him, and what was left didn’t fit cleanly anymore. It wasn’t just his accent that had been altered. It was his way of holding a fork, of folding a napkin without thinking, of speaking only when spoken to and always watching for the next move. He didn’t belong among the gentry, and now he didn’t belong here either. Somewhere in between, like always.

Now here he was. The ship slowed, steel groaning beneath them as they inched toward the berth. Men began to gather luggage from where it had been stored. Instructions were shouted, whistles blown. A woman nearby began praying aloud, low and steady, one hand clutching her shawl.

The skyline settled into focus. Despite what he’d imagined, it was still taller than he’d expected. It reminded him of his first time in Liverpool as a child. Brought back memories of his mother holding tight to his hand, his brother teasing him about the gulls. And then, of course, Manchester. Flat roofs, factories, fog hanging in sheets over the streets. Chimneys like broken fingers poking the sky.

He hadn’t thought of Manchester in years.

There was a rustle of bodies behind him as the ship’s horn gave one deep, final blare. People gathered their things, adjusted their coats, called for children. Thomas stayed still, closed his eyes. Shoulder to shoulder with strangers, and not one of them knew who he was.

No one knew his name. No one would stop him in the street or call him Barrow like it was an insult. Not one person on this boat, or in this city, had any knowledge of the man who’d nearly lost everything in a house that wasn’t his. Not the one who’d kissed another man and nearly gotten himself a death sentence for it. Not the one who’d packed in silence and left without saying goodbye.

When he next opened his eyes, the dock was waiting. He gripped the railing for a moment and then let go. And when the call came to disembark, he moved with the crowd like he’d always known where he was going.

The air had shifted again by the bottom of the gangway. Colder, sharper, threaded with oil and salt and something sour from the crates stacked nearby. People were already peeling off in different directions. Some headed towards signs, others drifted towards voices or waving hands. A woman ahead of him broke into a run. Somewhere off to the left, a child squealed, "Papa!" and collided with a man in uniform.

Thomas didn’t move.

For a moment, he hovered just past the last post, unsure of where to place himself. Everyone else seemed to know exactly where to go and what to do. They were being gathered into arms, into language, into the easy weight of familiarity. He had none of that waiting. He didn’t know where to look. Didn’t want to appear lost. Thomas Barrow was never lost.

He scanned the crowd without really seeing it until a familiar voice cut through the noise.

“Thomas?”

He turned and saw a coat he recognised. A shape. A familiar lean, one hip slightly forward to balance the child on it.

“Branson,” he gave a nod and started walking.

Tom Branson stood a few paces off, Sybbie perched neatly and fiddling with the buttons of his collar. She looked up briefly when she heard her father’s voice, then returned her attention to a crumb on her sleeve. Her cheeks were pink with cold. She looked deeply unimpressed with all of it.

She had no interest in the ship, in him, or in the people disembarking. She yawned, rubbed her eye, then muttered something Thomas couldn’t hear. Her father answered softly. She gave a grunt in reply. She had his eyes. Sybil’s mouth.

“You made it,” Branson said, stepping forward.

He didn’t reply at first. Instead, he took in the man in front of him. Branson hadn’t changed much. Not in the ways that showed. The same practical coat. Same firm grip. His hair was shorter than Thomas remembered, and his collar slightly askew. But he looked older now. There was something in his face that three months couldn’t account for. He looked like someone who’d had to grow up again, even after already doing it once.

“I suppose I did,” Thomas said eventually.

“Long journey?”

“It was a boat, not a pilgrimage.”

Branson didn’t bite at the tone. “Still,” he said, shifting Sybbie’s weight to his other arm, “glad you’re here.”

That earned a pause. Thomas looked down at the child again, then at the gangway behind him. “Are you?”

“Of course,” Branson’s smile flickered.

“Because I’m very aware you could’ve changed your mind about me coming.”

“I didn’t.”

“No,” Thomas said, coolly. “You didn’t.”

Branson smiled again, less certain now. “It’s good to see you, Thomas. I mean that.”

Thomas didn’t know what to say to that. He adjusted his coat. It didn’t need adjusting.

Sybbie twisted her head to look. She was smaller than he expected, all dark curls and soft limbs. She blinked at him, unimpressed, and pointed vaguely in the direction of his suitcase. “Is that your bag?”

“It is,” he said.

“What’s inside it?”

“Not much. Just clothes and a book.”

She considered that. “I’m hungry.”

Branson chuckled, rubbed her back. “We’ll get something soon.”

Thomas studied the girl for a moment before turning back to him. “So this is Miss Sybbie.”

“This is Sybbie,” he confirmed. “No Miss. Not here.”

“She doesn’t look much like you.”

“She’s like her mother in all the right ways. But wait ‘til she frowns,” he huffed a laugh. “Then she’s the spit of me.”

Sybbie laid her head back down and stuck a thumb in her mouth, already tuning out.

Thomas cleared his throat. “She always this chatty?”

“She’s tired,” Branson said. “It’s early, and she didn’t want to wear her coat.”

“I can see that.”

Branson shifted Sybbie to his other arm and nodded at the suitcase. “Want a hand?”

“No,” Thomas said, too quickly. “It’s fine.”

“Alright.” He let it go. “The flat’s about an hour’s walk away if we take the side streets. It’s not much, but it’s warm.”

Behind them, another group passed with crates and shouted instructions. A girl began crying, loud and inconsolable. Sybbie reached for a biscuit in Branson’s coat pocket. He handed it over without missing a step.

Thomas watched them for a few seconds longer than he’d meant to.

It was ordinary in a way he hadn’t expected. The quiet competence in the way Branson balanced child and conversation, the way Sybbie nibbled at the biscuit as she took everything in her stride. Thomas hadn’t realised how foreign that would feel.

He adjusted his grip on the case. “Lead on, then.”

They started walking. Not side by side exactly, but close enough that their steps began to match. The wind pulled at the hem of Thomas’s coat. He kept his eyes forward, jaw set.

After a minute, Branson spoke again. “You really don’t owe me anything, you know.”

Thomas didn’t answer. He wasn’t sure how.

Another step, and then another, the city rising ahead of them in unfamiliar shapes. He let the silence stretch. It was easier than gratitude.

———

The city changed as they walked. Wide streets gave way to narrower ones, the pavement growing more uneven, the buildings pressing closer. They passed shops with painted signs, tram lines overhead, and men in hats reading newspapers on stoops. Grocery crates spilled out onto the pavement, stacked with onions, cabbages, and bruised apples left from yesterday.

Children ran between doorways, shouting to each other in voices that blurred between English and something else. Definitely some Italian and something that sounded Russian. Women leaned out of windows with laundry baskets propped on the sill. A few blocks back, Thomas had seen a boy spit into the road and a priest smack the back of his head in passing.

He followed Branson left down a narrower street lined with tenements stacked three high, all red brick and crooked blinds. Sybbie had gone half-slack in her father’s arms now, thumb in her mouth again. She mumbled something that sounded like ‘bickie’ but didn’t lift her head.

Overhead, someone was shouting in a thick Boston drawl; sharp and full of Rs and rhythm. Down below, an old man fed crumbs to pigeons from a paper sack. The accents changed too. Some that sounded vaguely European. Lots of Irish ones. Some proper, like Branson’s, and others worn blunt by years of distance.

It was louder here than the city. More tangled. The noise wasn’t harsh but it had a constant lull to it. Horses still clattered past, even as motorcars sputtered around corners. Music drifted out of an open upstairs window. A child was counting aloud with painful determination. Seven. Eight. Eight again.

Thomas glanced sideways as a woman greeted them on the corner. She nodded with a smile, then said something he didn’t understand. Definitely not English. Branson answered back in kind, and Thomas blinked. He initially thought it might’ve been Italian, but the rhythm was wrong. And surely Branson couldn’t have learned Italian in three months of living in Boston – even if it was the North End.

When they were a few steps past, Thomas spoke.

“That wasn’t English.”

“No,” Branson said.

“And it wasn’t American, either.”

“Well, no, Thomas. It wasn’t American.”

He narrowed his eyes. “So, what was it?”

Branson smiled, not looking at him. “Irish.”

He raised a brow. “You speak Irish?”

That earned a shrug. “Enough to get by. Comes in handy round here.”

“You kept that quiet back home.”

Branson just gave a shrug. “Didn’t want Robert thinking I was about to start a revolution at the dinner table.”

It took Thomas a moment to figure out who Robert was. His Lordship. Lord Grantham. Never Robert, not to him.

They were nearly at the flat now. He could feel it in the way Branson’s steps grew more certain and familiar. A shortcut turned into a back alley. A low garden wall. A cracked window with lace curtains.

A gust of wind ruffled Sybbie’s curls and she squirmed closer to Branson, mumbling into his coat. He adjusted her without thinking, murmuring something Thomas didn’t catch. She blinked up again, this time watching him with quiet curiosity, like she hadn’t yet made up her mind about him. Her thumb slipped out of her mouth. “I’m not cold,” she announced with a stubborn look of defiance. Branson gave a soft huff that might have been a laugh. Thomas looked away before she caught him smiling.

The neighbourhood was loud, alive, pressed close together in ways Thomas wasn’t used to. Downton had never been like this. Even the servants’ hall had walls. Here, everything spilled into everything else. Oddly, Branson had never looked more at home.

Thomas didn’t know if that type of comfort came from time or choice, but he hoped that maybe someday, he would feel it too.

They crossed the last street and turned in under a low archway. The brick was darker here, older. A door sat crooked in its frame, the number three painted on in uneven strokes. Branson stopped at it.

“Here’s home,” he said, shifting Sybbie slightly as she reached for the doorframe.

Thomas glanced up. The building wasn’t impressive. Paint flaked from the windowsills, and someone had scribbled chalk numbers on the bottom stair. A dog barked from somewhere inside. Another floorboard groaned above them.

Inside, the stairwell had a distinct smell that weirdly enough, may have been fried onions. The walls were scuffed, the handrail loose in places. A radio played some crackling tune faintly through a half-shut door on the second floor. Somewhere else, someone was arguing in clipped New England tones. The building wasn’t falling apart, but it had lived a full life and didn’t hide it.

“Up here,” Branson said over his shoulder.

He took the stairs steadily, used to the climb. Thomas followed, suitcase in hand, the weight of it sharper with every step. The wood creaked underfoot. On the second landing, Sybbie muttered something about biscuits again and was met with a quiet, “Soon, love,” as they went up another flight of stairs.

At the top, Branson set Sybbie down and fished a key from his pocket. Then found the second door on the left, with another number three on it.

Thomas raised an eyebrow. “The third door on the third floor of flat number three?”

Branson shrugged before giving a humourless grin and pushed the door open. It stuck slightly before it opened. He nudged it with his shoulder and stepped back to let Thomas in first.

The flat was small. That was the first thing Thomas noticed. Narrow hallway, low ceiling, heat rising uneven from the stove in the corner. But it was clean. One wall bore the marks of old frames, long since taken down. A cracked lamp sat on a table beside the couch. Crayons were scattered across the floor beside a sheet of paper with what looked to be some sort of attempt of a house. It looked more like a boot with windows.

He took a proper look around him. The living area was a single open space. A battered old settee took up one side, low cushions worn thin in the middle. A rickety table stood near the wall with two chairs pulled close. One leg had been propped with a folded scrap of card. Beside the stove, a line of children’s books leaned sideways on the floor, half-sliding against each other. The cracked lamp in the corner gave off a low, steady glow.

Sybbie beelined for the blanket on the settee and flopped down dramatically. “My feet hurt,” she announced to no one in particular.

Branson stepped past her and into the kitchen, flicking on the light. “You didn’t even walk. You’ll live.” He looked back at Thomas. “You want tea? Or something stronger?”

“Bit early for that,” Thomas meant it as a joke, but it came out drier than he’d intended. “Tea’s fine.”

Branson nodded and got to work.

He looked down toward the hallway.

“Your room’s the first one,” Branson said, from the other side of the room. “It’s not much, but it’s got a window that opens and a proper lock. Double bed, even.”

“Double?”

“Was there when I got the lease. Got clean sheets and everything.”

He nodded, awkwardly. “Right.”

“I’m in the other room. Sybbie’s cot’s in there too.”

Thomas didn’t say anything. He stood for a moment, still holding his coat closed with one hand.

“I cleared a drawer for you,” Branson added. “And there’s space in the cupboard. Towels are on the hook behind the bathroom door. It’s the door across from yours. Other door is the hot press.”

Thomas raised an eyebrow.

“Airing cupboard,” he quickly clarified.

Thomas looked toward the hallway again. The door to his room stood slightly ajar, the light catching the corner of the bedframe. It looked untouched. Prepared just for him. He wasn’t used to that. The hallway wasn’t long, but it felt like a border he hadn’t crossed yet. There was something final about stepping into a space meant for him.

He appreciated the effort Branson had put in for him, but that didn’t make it any easier to stomach. He hated feeling like charity.

He pushed the door to his new room open gently.

It was smaller than his at Downton but it was different. This time, it was his. One small dresser. A single lamp. Clean sheets already on the bed, a second pillow stacked beside the first. A curtain hung half-closed over the window, letting in a stripe of light that cut across the floor. The bedspread had been pulled tight. There was space in the drawer.

He stood in the doorway a moment, clutching his case with a much tighter grip than necessary. Then turned as he heard footsteps from behind him.

Sybbie had stood up, wandered over to where he was, frozen in the doorway. She didn’t say anything at first. Just reached out and patted the side of his coat like she was checking he was real. She looked up at him.

“Do you want to see my new shoes?”

Thomas blinked down at her. “Pardon?”

“My new shoes,” she repeated. “They squeak.”

Without waiting, she lifted one foot and pointed at it. There was no sound.

He nodded once. “Very smart.”

She beamed.

Branson glanced over from the stove, smiling slightly. “She’s convinced they squeak. I wouldn’t argue if I were you.”

Thomas surprised himself by laughing. Sybbie dropped her foot again and sat down with exaggerated force.

He stepped back into the room and set the case on the bed. The mattress didn’t shift under its weight. A folded towel rested at the foot, and just beyond it, a second pillow, neatly placed. There was something quietly jarring about the softness of it all. Trust didn’t come easy, it never had. Yet still, he didn’t move away.

“Tea’s up,” a voice called over the whistle of the kettle.

Thomas stood there a moment longer, coat still buttoned, gaze tracing the quiet corners of the room.

“We can eat in a bit, if you’re hungry,” Branson added, pouring. “Or later. Do you want to rest first?”

His eyes swept the small space again. His own room. A shared space to live. His own bed, complete with not one, but two pillows. He hadn’t known it would feel this strange to be offered comfort without being expected to serve in return.

He returned the question with one of his own. “You’re sure I’m not putting you out?”

Branson shrugged. “You’re not.”

Thomas nodded, not convinced. He picked up his cup of tea and held it in both hands, more for the warmth than the taste.

Eventually he spoke. “I think I need a rest for now.”

———

By late afternoon, the light in the flat was softer as it drifted through the front windows in slanted beams. It was calm enough that Thomas could hear the faint click of dishes from the kitchen below, the rumble of voices through the ceiling, and Sybbie’s tuneless hum.

Across the room, she lay on her stomach with her legs kicking slightly in the air, a waxy fistful of crayons strewn around her. She had a sheet of scrap paper in front of her. It was clear she’d started with careful intent, but now scribbled in quick strokes of blue and purple, head resting lazily in her free hand.

Thomas sat on the settee, a book balanced on his knee, spine uncracked. He wasn’t reading. The pages might as well have been blank. Earlier, he’d managed a nap. It was longer than intended, though he felt no better for it now. Still, it was more restful than any sleep he’d tried to endure back on the ship.

Branson stood at the counter, sorting something quietly into a drawer. Thomas heard him open and close a cupboard, then fill a kettle with water. “Mind your elbows, Sybbie,” he called gently. “You’ll knock the lamp again.”

She raised her head slightly, as if considering it, before returning to her scribbles without a word. Thomas turned back to his book and ran his thumb absently down the spine. He should read, probably, but the thought of taking in anything new made him tired again.

He’d just decided he’d give the first page a try, when he felt eyes on him. Sybbie had paused mid-stroke, watching him with open curiosity. He looked at her fully.

“Yes?” he said.

She dropped the crayon and sat up properly. “Daddy said you were sleeping.”

“I was. Earlier.”

Without any hesitation, she pushed herself to her feet and marched directly toward him, a fresh page of paper clutched firmly in her hand. She stopped just shy of the settee and tilted her head slightly, appraising him with something remarkably close to sympathy.

“You still look tired,” she said.

Branson turned from the stove quickly, a look of gentle mortification already forming. “Sybbie–”

But Thomas got there first. “Do I?”

She nodded, serious. “Your face looks like it wants to lie down again.”

“Alright Sybbie,” Branson stepped forward slightly. “Maybe give Thomas some spa–”

“It’s alright,” Thomas said.

And to his own surprise, he meant it. He set the book aside. It landed face-down on the cushion beside him.

Sybbie tilted her head and held up a crayon. “You wanna help?”

Thomas hesitated. “With what?”

“Drawing my dragon,” she said simply.

“I’m not very good.”

“That’s okay. I’m very good.”

That was debatable, but Thomas didn’t correct her.

Something about the certainty in her tone made him smile. He hesitated, glancing toward Branson, whose expression had softened into surprise. Then, carefully, he reached out and took the offered page.

“Thanks,” he said quietly, feeling ridiculous and awkward, and something else he couldn’t quite name.

She offered him the blue crayon. “Do the sky.”

“I thought this was a dragon.”

“It is. But he’s outside.”

He accepted the crayon without argument and added a line of sky above what he presumed was the wings. His grip was awkward at first, more used to pen nibs and silver polish than colouring wax. But the repeated motion of it eased something tight in his shoulders. Every so often, she leaned against his arm like it was a normal thing to do.

Then she gave him a blank page and told him to draw his own picture. So he did.

He drew a careful line, then another. Gradually, the shape of something appeared. A square first, then a roof. It wasn’t anything impressive, but still recognisable enough. A small house. Not Downton. Just something ordinary, simple. Sybbie watched, fascinated, head tilted close.

“That’s good,” she said approvingly. “What is it?”

“A house,” Thomas said. “Sort of.”

“Does someone live there?”

Thomas paused, looking at her. “Not sure yet,” he said after a moment.

She nodded as though that answer satisfied her, then leaned forward to add a scribble of green beside his careful lines. “Grass,” she announced.

“Grass,” Thomas echoed, softly amused. “Perfect.”

The flat was quiet around them. The stove gave off a low heat. Somewhere down the hall, a radio had been switched on, barely loud enough to register. They worked in quiet earnest together.

When he glanced up, Branson had moved closer. He was still quiet, but there was a gentleness to his expression Thomas hadn’t expected. He set the crayon aside, suddenly self-conscious. Then he stood and brushed his hands off on his trousers. His back ached a little from sitting like that.

“You’d think she’d be tired of me by now,” he said quietly, walking across to the counter.

“She likes you,” Branson replied, voice just as quiet.

He nodded, then added, “I’m grateful. For all this. I hope you know that. The room and the towels and… the pillow. Everything.”

Branson didn’t make a fuss of it. Just gave a short nod and leaned against the kitchen doorway. “You don’t owe me anything.”

Thomas looked away, eyes settling again on Sybbie’s drawing, scattered crayons and scribbles like small islands on the floor. “Still, I appreciate it. Even if it’s… strange, to get used to.”

“It is strange. But trust me, it gets easier. Just remember, I was in your shoes three months ago. Different reasons, but the same look on my face.”

“You had Sybbie.”

“So do you.”

Thomas looked sharply toward him, unsure he’d heard correctly. Branson didn’t flinch, holding the look calmly. Thomas searched for a flicker of hesitation or for some hint that the words hadn’t come easy. But there was nothing other than stead sincerity.

It wasn’t the same thing, but he didn’t say that. It was more generous than he deserved and so for once, he didn’t argue.

Before he could respond, Sybbie’s voice broke the quiet, suddenly impatient. “Daddy, I’m hungry again.”

Branson laughed softly, shaking his head. “You’re always hungry, love. Give us a minute.”

She puffed out her cheeks in an exaggerated sigh, but returned to her colouring, the scribbles growing bolder, filling the page edge-to-edge.

Clearing his throat quietly, Thomas found himself still thrown by the words from earlier. “I wasn’t expecting any of this, you know. When I got on that boat, I didn’t know what was on the other side.”

 “That was the hardest part for me, too. The… not knowing.” Branson’s voice stayed gentle as he studied him. “But you’ll find your feet sooner than you think.”

Thomas nodded, half-believing him, half-afraid to. “Well. We’ll see.”

With an easy push away from the doorframe, Branson moved towards the sink, gathering up cups.

“Come on,” he said lightly. “Let’s get some food into her before she tries eating those crayons.”

That drew a laugh from Thomas, quiet but genuine, surprising even himself. He set the mug back down and rolled up his sleeves, ready to help.

———

Once dinner had passed, Thomas retreated to his room, leaving Branson and Sybbie some time for themselves. It wasn’t that he felt unwelcome; he simply needed space to breathe.

Their voices faded into murmurs, turning domestic as he closed the door. In the silence, he stood still for a moment, his suitcase resting at his feet, the handle worn smooth beneath his palm.

Taking a slow breath, he lifted the case onto the bed, feeling the springs give faintly beneath its weight. The latches clicked softly, familiar and unchanging. He hesitated just briefly before lifting the lid.

Inside, the same shirts were folded exactly as he'd left them, with each crease still sharp despite the journey. Thomas took them out carefully, one by one, placing them into the drawer Branson had cleared. The fabric was soft beneath his touch. His fingers brushed a collar, lingering a moment, remembering the feel of stiff starch beneath his fingertips, the scent of Downton’s laundry room. He hadn't intended to draw comparisons, but fourteen years left their mark. Even now, three thousand miles away, Downton’s routines were etched under his skin.

He opened the dresser drawer wider to fit another shirt and stopped abruptly, noticing something on the wood. He peered closer. There was writing there, faint and smudged, done in pencil. He squinted, tracing the letters lightly with his fingertip. A name and a date.

Richard Byrne, 12th June 1919.

Thomas stared at it for a long moment, wondering about this person he would never know. A previous life briefly recorded. Without fully understanding why, he reached into his coat pocket and took out a pencil stub. He hesitated, then below the faded writing, he carefully wrote his own name, the letters steady and deliberate:

Thomas Barrow, 12th March 1924.

Something settled in him as he pulled his hand back. He closed the drawer softly, suddenly conscious of the quiet of the room. He looked around again, aware of the space in a way he hadn't been before.

His bedroom. His.

That thought went over and over in his head. The room wasn't a space he occupied out of duty or necessity. It wasn’t exclusion masquerading as privacy. It was… something new.

The weight of that thought made him sit slowly on the edge of the bed, hands clasped loosely in his lap. He felt something prick at the back of his eyes, and blinked it away quickly. No point in crying, it wouldn’t fix anything. But the feeling that settled in his chest came close. He’d spent so long trying to keep his head above water, surviving each day by building walls around himself and his name, that now the absence of those walls left him vulnerable in a way he didn’t quite understand yet.

He stared at the floorboards for a long time, not thinking about anything in particular, just letting the feeling wash over him.

Eventually, he stood, pulling himself back into the present. He scanned the room one last time, then reached for his coat. The walls felt too close now, the quiet too loud. Without quite knowing where he was going, he decided to take a walk.

Evening had begun to settle properly over the North End now, the light dimming behind the buildings. Thomas tugged his coat tighter and started walking without any particular direction, letting his feet find the route for him.

The streets were livelier than he would’ve expected for this hour. A group of boys chased each other past, shouting something indecipherable as a tin can clattered across the cobblestones. From an open window above, a woman yelled at them to quiet down, then turned her attention back to pegging wet shirts on a sagging line. Somewhere nearby, someone was playing a fiddle. It wasn’t loud, just a faint scrape, barely rising over the hum of the neighbourhood. Further ahead, the smell of freshly baked bread drifted through a bakery’s open door, flour-dusted windows glowing warm.

Thomas tucked his chin against the wind and kept walking. He turned out into the street, hands deep in his coat pockets.

The streets were narrower here, each corner turning into a small scene of ordinary chaos. Tenements rose high and close, strings of washing hung across balconies, shirts and dresses swaying softly above the street. He glanced upwards, following the gentle movement, then dropped his eyes again. Downton had been quiet in a way Boston never was, and he wasn’t yet sure if he liked the difference.

He went left at the end of the street, following the distant sound of music. A church stood halfway along, its doors propped open slightly, letting faint chords drift out. He paused, catching the tail end of something solemn and vaguely familiar. For a moment, he considered stepping inside. But his hand stayed firmly in his pocket, the memory of church services back home still too fresh. All that forced politeness and uneasy silence, watching Carson nod solemnly to every sermon, the pews neatly separated by class, as if even God had favourites. The thought alone was enough to move him along.

Further on, a butcher’s shop, the smell of it sharp in the air. Then a grocer with baskets of turnips and potatoes spilling onto the pavement. A short distance further, a newsstand caught his eye outside another shopfront. Thomas stopped long enough to glance at the headlines. One caught his eye:

TENSIONS CONTINUE IN ULSTER – VIOLENCE ESCALATES IN TYRONE

He felt the tension creep back into his shoulders. He turned away sharply before anyone could notice his interest.

“You alright there?”

Thomas started slightly. A man stood behind the newsstand, an older fellow with grey hair and a neatly trimmed moustache, sleeves rolled up despite the chill.

“Fine,” Thomas said stiffly. “Just looking.”

“You’ve a way of looking that’d turn milk sour,” the man remarked, not unkindly, accent thickly Irish, though it didn’t sound like Branson’s. More old-country than the refined soft-spoken cadence he was used to. He pulled out a stack of papers from the bottom, setting them down more neatly with a huff. “Looking for news from home, are you?”

Thomas hesitated, realising how English he must’ve sounded, even in those few words. He shook his head. “Just passing through.”

The vendor regarded him quietly, then nodded. “Well, you wouldn’t be the first.” He tilted his head slightly. “You’d be English, though.”

Thomas tensed. “I would.”

“Thought so. Hard to miss it round here.” The man’s expression wasn’t hostile, exactly, but it wasn’t entirely welcoming either. “Not many of your lot in these parts. Might find a warmer welcome down Beacon Hill way.”

“I’m staying with a friend. He’s from Longford.”

Truthfully Thomas had no idea where Branson was from. He had never cared to ask, but Dublin was too obvious so Longford sounded believable enough.

“Well, you’re brave, I’ll give you that. Any background goes here, but this part of town’s not always fond of your lot.”

The man watched him a moment longer, then shrugged slightly. “I don’t mean to pry. It’s just that accents matter more here than most places.”

“So I gather,” Thomas replied dryly.

The vendor smiled then, clearly amused rather than offended, and Thomas gave a short nod before continuing along the street. His footsteps quickened just slightly, embarrassment colouring his face even as the cold nipped at his skin. He hadn’t considered how his accent would mark him out here; it had always set him apart, but as an indicator of his Manchester upbringing during his months in London with the Crawley family. He’d never been grouped as English. He’d spent his whole life too poor to be considered English in the way it counted. Here, it seemed to be about nation, not class.

Eventually, he found himself on a quieter stretch. The buildings thinned a little, the street widening just enough to give the illusion of space. A group of boys played football in the road, their coats marking goalposts at either end. Thomas slowed his pace again, catching sight of an empty bench nearby. He sat down heavily, hands still deep in his pockets, eyes drifting towards the casual game.

The lads were maybe thirteen or fourteen, laughing breathlessly as they chased the ball. One took a wild kick and missed, stumbling slightly as his friend snatched the ball away. He went sprawling, landed awkwardly, but laughed anyway. The other stopped instantly, pulling him upright. They exchanged a few quick, breathless words, slapping each other’s shoulders before continuing as if nothing had happened.

Thomas reached into his coat pocket and drew out a cigarette, lighting it carefully, cupping his hands against the wind. The familiar warmth of smoke filled his lungs, and he breathed out slowly, watching as the cloud drifted upwards.

He sat quietly, eyes tracing the game as shadows lengthened and the lamplight deepened from gold to amber. Watching the easy camaraderie of the lads, he was briefly, vividly reminded of his own boyhood. It brought back memories of kicking a worn ball around with friends whose names he couldn’t quite remember, of scraped knees and torn trousers. A lifetime ago, now.

Thomas took another slow drag, the heat calming something restless in his chest. The realisation settled quietly around him like the gathering dark:

This was his life now.

Boston. The flat, the unfamiliar streets, the uncomfortable awareness of his accent. A space shared freely with someone who’d chosen to offer it, rather than forced to tolerate him. A child who saw him simply as another person, not a threat or a disappointment. Thomas didn’t yet know if this would become home, but it was something, at least.

He flicked ash from the cigarette and watched as the lads retrieved their ball again. They jogged slowly away, their voices carrying softly through the evening air, leaving Thomas alone with his thoughts.

Nobody here knew his name. Nobody would pull him into a side corridor to whisper accusations. Nobody would spit the word invert like it was something scraped from the bottom of a boot. Here, he was a stranger. And for now, that felt close enough to freedom.

Chapter Text

Thomas woke to the low creak of movement and the quiet clatter of crockery. The room was that sort of cold that settled into your joints if you let it. He didn’t, not yet. He curled his toes against the chill and counted three slow breaths before moving.

Sleep had been hard-won the night before, but something about the unfamiliar quietness of the room, the feel of a blanket that didn’t belong to him, made it difficult to stay under for long. He stayed still for a few more minutes, watching the shadow of light shifting faintly across the edge of the curtain. Then he pushed back the blanket and dressed without hurrying.

Out in the main room, Branson was already up. He stood at the stove, sleeves rolled to the elbows, one hand on the pan, the other holding a folded scrap of paper he kept glancing at between flipping the eggs. On a tall chair beside him, Sybbie sat perched, one foot tucked beneath her, thumb in her mouth. She didn’t look fully awake yet, but her eyes followed her father’s movements with the fixed loyalty of someone who didn’t yet know how to doubt.

There were small rhythms to it all. A kind of choreography. The pan scraped, the kettle hissed. Thomas made his way over, and wordlessly cut himself some bread from the loaf sitting on the counter. Branson set a slice of toast on the counter without looking, reached for a pencil, and jotted something quickly on the back of the paper. His handwriting was angular and tight, all corners and flicks. It looked like shorthand. He rubbed at his eyes, blinked a few times, then muttered something Thomas didn’t understand. Probably in Irish, which evidently, he could speak now. It was tangled and fast, like a conversation that had started before he walked in.

Thomas didn’t ask what it meant. If Branson was speaking Irish, it likely wasn’t something he’d want translated. Or at the very least, not something meant for his ears.

Sybbie slid off her chair with a heavy grunt and came to stand beside him, arms loose at her sides. She didn’t say anything, just bumped into his leg and stayed there. He reached down instinctively and brushed her curls back from her forehead.

She nodded, eyes half-closed.

Branson looked over. “She’s not a morning person,” he said.

“You don’t say,” Thomas raised an eyebrow, then looked down at Sybbie. “I don’t like mornings either.”

“You’re warm though,” Sybbie murmured, resting her cheek against Thomas’s leg like it was a cushion.

He let her stay there, unsure what the rules were but reluctant to interrupt.

“What time do you go to work?” he asked, glancing at the folded paper again.

Branson shrugged, not looking up. “Started already.”

He went back to writing, pencil still moving in short, angular strokes.

“What is it you do?” Thomas prompted, careful not to sound too interested.

“Journalism.”

“Right. For whom?”

“Local paper. Got a piece due by midweek. I’ll finish the draft while she’s napping.”

That explained the shorthand. And the muttering. And the articles Thomas had seen folded messily on the counter last night. “They let you work from here?”

“They’re a local paper for Irish immigrants,” Branson finally lifted his head, nodding toward Sybbie. “They know I have her, so they let me work from here and then I don’t have to worry.”

“That helps,” Thomas said.

“It does,” he agreed. “Pay for my usual column’s not great. But they give a penny a word for freelance stuff. A bit more if I give them something for the front page.”

Reaching for a plate, he set it beside the pan. “But not many places make room for a child in the picture and not everyone wants to take on someone who can’t work flexible hours. It’s decent of them, really.”

There was a small pause, filled only by the sound of the stove ticking and Sybbie’s soft hum as she leaned into his side.

“You’re getting by, then?” Thomas asked.

“Barely,” Branson said, but there was no shame in it. “Usually just enough to get through the week, but it’s tough.”

“I’m not saying that to make you feel like a burden,” he added when he noticed the look on Thomas’s face. “Once you find work, it’ll be easier but I know better than anyone that it’s not as easy as it sounds.”

Thomas nodded, but didn’t quite believe himself. It was difficult to remember a time in his life when he wasn’t a burden. Reaching for the little wire rack over the stove, he nudged the bread out carefully with the blunt end of a knife. It had browned just enough under the heat. He lifted it with two fingers and shook off the crumbs before setting it aside.

Branson closed the notebook and slid two slices of something unidentifiable onto a plate, setting it on the table. Then, almost as an afterthought, he crouched briefly to check Sybbie’s shoes where she’d kicked them off under the bench.

She groaned and slid off the chair to hunt them down.

“This one’s wet again,” he muttered, when she handed them to him.

“The puddles are too wet,” she protested.

“It’s that hole. Here, look,” Branson turned the shoe upside down to show her. “I’ll mend them tonight for you.”

He stood and looked toward the window, as though confirming the weather hadn’t changed in the last few minutes. Then turned back with a quiet sigh.

“I’ve got to go to the office later,” he said, folding the note and tucking it into his back pocket. “Printer’s running a new typeface and they need someone to proof headlines before they go to press. May as well sort out next week’s column while I’m there. I’ll only be there an hour or two.”

Thomas nodded, still watching Sybbie, who had now sunk to the floor and was wrapping herself dramatically in the edge of the curtain.

“You’re welcome to come for the walk,” Branson offered.

Thomas didn’t answer right away. He looked at the half-mug of tea on the table, the cluttered corners, the folded jumper on the back of a chair. He wasn’t sure what held him back. Pride, maybe. Or the quiet voice in his head that always whispered don’t overstay.

“Alright,” he said, after a moment.

Branson gave a faint grunt of acknowledgement and turned back to the stove.

Sybbie was now playing dead, sprawled across the floor with one hand over her eyes.

“Is she okay?” Thomas asked.

“She’s trying to get a rise out of me,” Branson shrugged, gesturing towards the bowl of porridge on the table, where her chair was. “When she decides she doesn’t want to eat, she’ll do anything other than actually eat.”

Thomas crouched down beside her, lifting the curtain off her face. “Come on,” he said quietly. “Breakfast.”

“I’m already dead,” she said.

“Don’t tell Daddy, but I’ll put jam on it.”

She peeked up at him with one eye, and then gave in with a sigh. “Okay.”

She didn’t resist when he hooked an arm under hers and guided her gently upright. Her feet padded across the floor without fuss, and she climbed back onto the chair like it was routine. Thomas crossed to the icebox, took out the jar of jam, and stirred a spoonful into her porridge without saying anything.

“How the bloody hell did you do that?” Branson said, under his breath, when Thomas walked back over to the counter to grab his toast.

He shrugged. “Everyone’s got their price.”

Branson raised an eyebrow but didn’t say anything else.

“Tea?” he asked, already reaching for the kettle.

“Yes, please.”

“Strong?”

“Please.”

They moved around each other, quietly, while Sybbie watched them with sleepy eyes.

———

The walk to the office took them through the narrower streets just past North Washington, where the brickwork changed colour every few blocks and the shopfronts leaned slightly inward, conspiring amongst themselves. Branson walked ahead with a steady pace, Sybbie’s coat folded under one arm. She’d been dropped off at a neighbour’s on the way; a woman with two boys and a loose sense of schedule, who barely paused to say hello before ushering the child inside with a biscuit and a nod.

They reached the office just after eleven.

It wasn’t what Thomas expected.

There was a small sign on the door, reading “An Éire Nua”. Further ahead, a narrow stairwell and a scuffed bell pull. Branson knocked twice instead, then opened the door with a casualness Thomas had never seen back home, but was fast becoming familiar here. Another quiet reminder that they were no longer in Yorkshire.

The smell hit first. Ink and paper, and something faintly metallic beneath it. The noise upstairs could immediately be heard from the bottom. Typewriters clacked. Footsteps rang against the uneven floorboards. Someone shouted, somewhere else someone cursed. A phone rang without being answered, and a second voice shouted over the first. It had none of the polite hush he’d once glimpsed inside the newspaper office back in Ripon.

“This way,” Branson said, nodding over his shoulder as he took the steps two at a time.

Thomas followed, slower. The stairs opened onto a single open room, long and uneven, with desks crammed in along both sides. There was no real division between them. A man in shirtsleeves was arguing with a woman at the far end. Both of them waved proofs in the other’s face. Nobody looked up. As he looked around, papers were scattered across desks, walls plastered with headlines printed boldly in Irish. He didn't understand the words, but the starkness of their print suggested urgency.

Branson didn’t pause. He nodded at a few people, exchanged a greeting in Irish that was met with a smile and a reply, then crossed to a small table where a man with dark hair was going over galleys with a red pencil.

Thomas stayed near the doorway.

After a moment, someone at a desk nearby leaned back in his chair and glanced up. An older man, late fifties, maybe. “You lost, mate?”

“Following orders, more or less.”

“You’re not from round here,” he said, clocking his accent immediately.

“Does it show?” Thomas replied, evenly.

“Yeah. Sticks out like a sore thumb.”

He froze, until the man clapped him on the shoulder with a laugh. “Don’t worry, lad. I’ve cousins in Manchester. Good people there.”

Thomas gave a thin smile, unsure whether he’d passed some sort of test or just been spared the joke.

“Don't let the fellas here frighten you off. We're noisy, but we're harmless enough,” The man winked, took another drag from his cigarette, then moved off to shout something to someone at the other end of the room.

Thomas glanced toward Branson, who was now bent over a desk with another man, jabbing a finger emphatically at something on a sheet of paper. As if on cue, he looked over in their direction.

“Go easy on him,” he called from across the room. “He’s still adjusting.”

Then turned to Thomas. “Have a look around. Won’t be long.”

So he took a slow walk around the room. The desks were cluttered, overflowing with stacks of paper and half-empty cups of tea, pencils left to roll off surfaces and onto the floor. A few curious glances followed him, but nobody spoke. Eventually, he stopped by a pile of freshly printed newspapers stacked in neat bundles on a side table.

At the far end of the room, a young woman with ink on her face was carefully lining up type for a small hand press. Headlines were tacked on the wall beside him, all in large bold font, some in English, others not. One read: Free State Betrayal. Letters from Armagh. Another: REMEMBER APRIL 1916. A smaller sheet in the middle had been half-torn, but Thomas could still make out the word ULSTER in thick, black type.

He walked further, until eventually, he stopped by a pile of freshly printed newspapers stacked in neat bundles on a side table and picked up the top copy. The headline read LOCAL UNION THREATENS STRIKE OVER CONDITIONS. Beneath it, a different article caught his eye, something about immigration quotas and the arrest of two men at the docks last week. He didn’t read fully, but skimmed over it. Then someone behind him said, “Next page is your friend’s column.”

Thomas looked over his shoulder, startled, as he turned the page. A man with red hair and a deep voice nodded toward the bottom of it.

There it was. A slim column, wedged between two ads for laundry services and a notice about dock repair. The byline read: T. Mac Giolla.

Thomas stared at it for a moment, then looked back up. “Branson wrote this?”

“He did. Goes by a pen name here, though. Safer.”

Nodding idly, Thomas glanced down and read carefully.

It wasn’t about family recipes, or raising children in a strange city, or homesickness in Boston’s cold. Branson’s words were sharp, critical, filled with quiet outrage and veiled accusation. Thomas’s pulse quickened slightly as he read. It was about rights, about dignity, about action, the tone veering dangerously close to something more inciting than merely informative. The language wasn’t overt, but the intent was sharp. Each sentence cut a little deeper than the last. It read like someone walking a knife-edge between caution and defiance.

Thomas read the final lines of the article twice.

“Remember, the hand that feeds you today was the one that starved your fathers yesterday. And peace built on English terms will never be anything but another kind of occupation.”

He hadn’t thought much about what Branson actually wrote. He assumed it was opinion pieces, maybe personal anecdotes with a nationalist tint. Nothing dangerous. Nothing that might get the paper pulled off a newsstand or flagged by someone in uniform.

But reading it now, he could feel the tension beneath the type. He could feel the risk. Looking over at Branson again, still deep in conversation, Thomas struggled to connect how the same man who sat with the Crawleys for the past four or five years had also written this.

He set the paper down again, carefully. “I didn't realise he wrote this sort of thing.”

“Aye,” the man said gently. “Not many do, until they see it. He's careful that way.”

“It’s risky,” Thomas murmured.

“It is. But that’s how it’s always been.”

He nodded slowly, eyes drifting back to the paper. He vaguely remembered hearing that Branson had gotten a job with a newspaper back when he moved back to Ireland with Lady Sybil. Did he write like this back then, too? Slip away to meetings in smoky basements during the day then settle for the night with the Earl of Grantham’s youngest daughter. Thomas supposed it was a balancing act. He recognised that all too well, having practised it himself for years. Though the stakes here weren’t like the ones he faced. No more or no less, but definitely different.

He felt suddenly exposed, standing there, holding evidence of something quietly incendiary. It was clear that this man understood far more than he was saying. Thomas wanted to ask more but knew instinctively that it wasn't his place. Not yet, at least. He set the paper back down, stepping away quietly.

Across the room, Branson straightened and caught his eye. The fierceness melted quickly into something calmer, more familiar, and he nodded briefly, as if checking that Thomas was still alright.

Thomas nodded back, still trying to untangle the man he'd thought he'd known from the one who had just been revealed.

———

It took a few days and more doors shut in his face than he cared to count before Thomas finally found someone who didn’t dismiss him immediately. The place smelled of beer and something sour, and somewhere behind the bar, a radio murmured low commentary about a baseball score he didn’t understand. In the corner, someone swept broken glass into a dustpan with long, slow strokes.

The man behind the bar – Martin, he’d said his name was – had hardly glanced at him for more than a second since they’d sat down, eyes constantly tracking the progress of the man mopping up broken glass near the door.

“So,” he said. “You’ve worked in service before.”

It wasn’t really a question.

Thomas nodded. “Yes. A few private events. Bit of bar service and waiting tables.”

He tried to keep his voice clipped, the way it used to sound. He didn’t mention Downton. Not by name. There was no point.

Martin gave him a look over the rim of the glass he was drying.

“Private events,” he repeated, like it tasted odd in his mouth. “Like weddings and such?”

“Yes, but I have… more practical experience too.”

“You talk like you’ve had elocution lessons.” It wasn’t quite a compliment, from the tone of it. “Where’d you say you were from?”

Thomas hesitated for the smallest fraction of a second. “Manchester,” he said eventually. “But I’ve been away awhile.”

“Huh,” Martin said. Then, louder, over his shoulder, “What d’you reckon, Louie?”

A second man, older, emerged from the shadows by the stockroom door. He glanced up and down. “Bit posh, ain’t he?”

A low chuckle rippled through the room, half-muffled but clear enough. Thomas felt his jaw tighten, something reflexive. He wondered when exactly he’d become the punchline. But he kept still. That was always the safest thing.

“Manchester, is it?” Martin echoed again, suspiciously. “And you’ve come all the way here?”

Louie leaned forward slightly, squinting as though trying to see something hidden. “Not pulling our leg, are you?”

Then he turned back to nobody in particular. “Looks like he’s been ironed.”

Thomas’s temper flared inwardly, but he held it in check. He had spent the past week getting used to this, being half-in and half-out wherever he went. Too common for Downton, too posh for here. Back home, it didn’t mean to matter so much as many other working-class folk were in the same position as him. But here, it was a different story. Here, people decided who you were the moment you opened your mouth.

He hadn’t meant to look too neat either. He’d just worn what he had. Clean shirt, sleeves rolled, collar flat. He hadn’t thought it would come across as deliberate. But he should’ve. He knew better than most that presentation could be a trap.

“I’m not pulling anything,” he said evenly, meeting the man’s gaze. “I just need the work.”

Louie finally looked away, studying the glass in his hand again. “We don’t get a lot of your sort in here. And by that, I mean fellas who sound like they drink tea out of cups with handles.”

Thomas’s reply was dry, “I can drink it straight from the pot, if you need me too.”

There was a small silence, then Martin snorted softly, almost amused.

“Smart mouth. You’ll need that.” His eyes dropped briefly to Thomas’s hands, something in his expression shifting. “Tell me what you know about bar work.”

“Pouring pints. Spotting who’s too far gone. Making sure no one does anything stupid with a broken bottle.”

It wasn’t everything, but it wasn’t entirely true either. If you pretended pouring wine was the same as pouring pints.

“Handled money before?”

“Yes.”

The man looked at his hands, which Thomas had folded neatly in front of him.

“You a fighter?”

“Not lately,” Thomas said. “But I’ll break up a row if I have to.”

The man nodded like that was acceptable. “Had any jobs here in Boston?”

“Not yet.”

“You legal?”

“I am.”

“Good.” He rubbed at the side of his neck, squinting. “You know your way around drunks?”

“I do.”

“‘Cause they’ll push you. Especially if they think you won’t push back.”

He couldn’t tell them about how he’d once carried a lord out of the dining room at Downton with vomit on his collar and a fist still clenched. Said nothing, cleaned the mess, didn’t flinch when the punch landed sideways a minute later. Or about the time he was fifteen and a visiting older cousin had once gotten drunk and handsy with his younger sister. Thomas had grabbed the man by the collar and shoved him down the stairs before his father got home.

Instead, he just said, “I’ll hold my own.”

Louie muttered something too low to hear. Martin laughed at it, then shook his head.

“You ever lived in London?”

“No.”

“You’ve got the same air as they do.”

Thomas didn’t reply.

After a pause, Martin sighed and reached behind the bar for a stub of pencil and a receipt slip. He jotted something quickly, then looked back up. “You need this job?”

“Yes.”

“Alright.” He flicked the slip away. “You’ll do.”

Thomas blinked, not quite sure what had changed. “Right,” he said slowly. “Good.”

“You start Friday night,” Martin added. “Nine until two. Wear a black shirt.”

“Friday,” he echoed. It felt abrupt. He’d expected more of a fight after those questions, thought they’d need more than just yes or no.

“No rings, no bracelets, no showing off. If someone touches you, tell me. If someone tries to get clever, tell Louie.”

Louie nodded once, but didn’t say anything else.

“That alright?”

“Yes,” Thomas said again. “Thank you.”

Martin waved him off. “Don’t thank me. Just don’t be useless.”

Thomas rose from the stool slowly, conscious of eyes still drifting in his direction. He was vaguely aware of the peculiar stiffness in his spine – parade rest, still embedded in his muscles from his army days – and quickly corrected it. There was no place for that here, either. He reckoned if anyone here found out he’d fought for the British army, he’d find himself drinking through a split lip by the end of the night.

At the door, he hesitated, glanced back. The man with the mop had paused again, watching him with faint curiosity.

“See you Friday, then,” he said, awkwardly.

“Friday,” the man agreed, before returning to his work, the broken glass tinkling quietly into the dustpan.

Outside, he pulled his coat tighter around him, the cold biting into the back of his neck. He walked quickly, head down, trying to shake off the feeling of being seen through. He didn’t want to look like he was escaping. But it was hard to shake the feeling that he’d passed some kind of test, even if he wasn’t quite sure what the questions had been.

He had the job. That was the important thing. No uniforms, no footman’s gloves, no polished silver trays. Just serving drinks, pulling pints, and listening to men who’d never hear anything odd in his voice once it was drowned out by the noise and the dark.

He couldn’t afford to be proud about the work. Not when rent was due at the end of each week and Branson was already feeding him out of his own money. It twisted something sharp in Thomas every time he reached for a second slice of bread. Taking anything from someone who had almost nothing himself stung worse than anything. He refused to be seen as charity.

Back when he was sixteen, he’d have walked into a room like that and made himself invisible. At Downton, he’d learned how to do the opposite. He’d figured out how to enter quietly and still be noticed, but only in the background.

Now, neither approach seemed to fit.

He reached the corner before realising he’d shoved his hands deep into his pockets, stiff with tension. His boots scuffed against the pavement. A man passed him smoking and nodded once. Thomas nodded back. Shoving his hands deeper into his pockets, he hurried on.

The only thing that mattered now was Friday, the black shirt, and not being useless. It was his first time being hired as himself. Not as a servant, not as a soldier. From here onwards, he was just a barman with frighteningly good posture. If he could just make it through thar first shift, he could fake the rest – he was good at doing that. Friday would come soon enough, and he could lose himself in the rhythm of the work. Maybe then, nobody would notice the frayed edges where he no longer quite matched up.

———

Thursday evening settled over the building with the same slow inevitability as the cold that crept through the floorboards after sunset. It had been nearly a week since Thomas arrived in Boston, and four days since he’d been offered the job at the bar. Not long by any measure, but time passed differently when you had nothing to do and nowhere to be.

Branson had gone to the newsroom an hour ago, saying it wouldn’t take long. Something about a missed correction in the morning edition and a last-minute column reshuffle. Sybbie had been tired, curled up on the settee with one of her picture books, and Thomas had offered to stay back. It was becoming a pattern. Whenever Branson was needed out, Thomas was quietly drafted in.  He didn’t mind, not really. Sybbie seemed to like him well enough, and it was better than sitting in silence.

He was growing restless, though. He was used to days being carved up into tasks, shifts, and instructions. And there was only so much sitting still he could take before he found himself pacing the same patch of floor like a prisoner. Work would begin tomorrow night, and until then he felt stranded in the flat, his impatience slowly tightening.

He stood at the window now, arms folded, watching the building across the alley glow faintly with kitchen light. The tenants here were a rotating cast, all with names he was still piecing together. Mr. Hernandez below them owned a shoe repair stall by the T station and smoked on the fire escape every evening like it was a religious duty. Mrs Ricci next door worked nights. Thomas had only seen her twice, both times at strange hours, hair up and coat buttoned high. He supposed that would be his routine soon enough A boy with a paper route lived with his grandmother on the first floor. He hadn’t yet figured out which one paid the bills.

Down on the corner, the newsagent was propping his door open for the last of the evening customers. A Dublin man, always humming something under his breath and never without a remark. The other morning, Thomas had gone in for matches and been greeted with: “Didn’t think the Queen’s men bought their own smokes.” The wink had softened the jab. It was easier to take, somehow, when it came from someone who didn’t really mean it.

Not that he would’ve really blamed anyone who did. It was jarring, people pointing out his background everywhere he went. His accent said more about him than he ever meant to reveal. But when he considered what the majority of immigrants in this community suffered at the hands of the British Crown, he had little to complain about, really. It wasn’t personal. It never was.

He turned from the window. The light in the room was yellow and dim. Sybbie had fallen asleep with the book still in her lap. He crossed to her quietly, slid it away, and tugged the blanket up to her chin.

The newspaper he’d gotten earlier sat untouched on the table in front of him, beside a half-empty cup of tea. He should read it. He should do anything that was at all thought-provoking. If he kept his hands busy, maybe his mind would follow. And then he wouldn’t have to sit with his own thoughts. But instead, he found himself simply waiting, watching the streetlights flicker to life through the smeared window glass, and listening for the sound of footsteps climbing back up the stairs.

———

By the time the dishes were done and Sybbie had finally gone down, the flat was quiet. Properly quiet this time. Thomas had a book in his lap, though he wasn’t reading it. The clock on the mantel clicked softly every thirty seconds. Outside, something rattled faintly in the alley, but it passed.

Sybbie was in bed. They’d both checked on her. Twice. She hadn’t stirred.

The radio was off. The stove was off. There wasn’t much left to do and Branson had already patched the hole in her shoe earlier that evening. Now he had taken out the little box of thread he kept in the kitchen drawer, and sat cross-legged on the end of the settee, hemming the torn seam of her blue dress.

“She caught it on the fence near the bakery,” he said, by way of explanation.

Thomas nodded, but didn’t reply.

The room was quiet except for the occasional tick of the clock and the soft swish of thread being pulled through cloth.

Thomas glanced over. Then looked away, turning a page he hadn’t read.

“You’re meant to turn the edge in,” he said. “Or it’ll fray.”

 “I know.” Branson didn’t look up.

“You didn’t turn it in.”

Still nothing, except the needle moving. “It’s only for rough wear. She’ll outgrow it in a few months.”

“You’ll have to throw it out after the next wash,” Thomas added, not quite able to keep the criticism out of his voice.

Branson’s mouth pulled tight. “She’s got three others. It’ll be fine.”

“That’s not the point. It should be done properly.”

At that, Branson looked up, slowly. “You think I don’t know proper?”

Thomas closed the book and rested it on the arm of the settee. “I think you know proper. I think you’re on the wrong side of it now.”

The room went silent for a moment as Branson set the needle down. He gave a short laugh, but it didn’t reach his eyes. “You know, I went to school barefoot most winters. You don’t have to tell me about patchwork.”

“I wasn’t–”

“You, of all people, know I wasn’t brought up like that.”

“I didn’t say you were.” He said, shrugging and turning a page. “But it’s how you ended up.”

“Funny,” Branson said, under his breath. “Coming from someone who spent years polishing silver for people who didn’t know his name.”

Thomas set his book down. “They knew my name.”

“Oh, well. That makes all the difference.”

He didn’t answer. Just sat there, one leg tucked under the other, eyes back on the page like it might shield him from whatever came next. The worst thing was, Branson was right. Thomas had spent half his life looking after the Crawleys and they didn’t even care when he’d upped and left. They had waved him off with a smile on their faces.

Branson ran a hand down his face, then through his hair, the thread still caught between his fingers.

“You know,” he said finally, “you act like you’ve settled in. Like you’re enjoying it. But I see how you look at things here. You think you’re above it all.”

“That’s not fair.”

“Isn’t it?”

“I grew up like this,” Thomas said. “I scrubbed my own school boots until they fell apart.”

“I didn’t even have school boots.”

“My deepest apologies for losing the poverty competition. Though, I think you ended up pretty alright.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Branson glared at him.

“I’m just saying, we both grew up rough.”

That earned him a dry look. “And here you are trying to tell me how to sew my daughter’s dress.”

“Forgive me for trying to help. I was a footman, then a valet, then an under-butler. You were a chauffeur, then Lord Grantham’s son-in-law.”

Branson sighed and leaned back. “Jesus. Is that what this is about?”

“What?”

“You’re still jealous.”

Thomas nearly choked on his drink. “Jealous? Of you?”

“You had that chip on your shoulder back home. Clearly it hasn’t left.”

“Oh, come off it,” Thomas snapped. “You think I wanted to marry into that family?”

Branson shrugged. “No, but you wouldn’t have said no to being hired as a valet and letting the right fancy man play mistress.”

That part hit like a slap, and Thomas went still. It wasn’t the first time someone had said something like that, and it wasn't even the worst. But coming from Branson, it was different. It wasn’t just something pejorative flung out of ignorance, it was a dig. And it was close to the mark.

At nineteen, he hadn’t even known what to call it. Definitely not a relationship. More like a series of visits with some buggery, closed doors, and lots of being told to “keep your head down, lad, you’ll go far.” And Thomas, clever as he was, had let himself believe that being chosen meant something. He had kept his head down, even when the letters stopped and the whispers started. Even when Crowborough had moved on to someone else, younger and safer.

And now here was Branson, saying it like it was a punchline.

“You think that’s funny? You think that’s a joke to me?”

Thomas’s voice was dangerously low, now. “The difference is I wouldn’t have played house with a pack of aristocrats.”

“You didn’t exactly mind living under their roof,” Branson didn’t back down. “You wore the livery. Took their orders.”

“I was working,” he said sharply. “That’s what we all did. You’re acting like I had a choice.”

Branson didn’t answer. He stood up, waited a moment longer, then turned and crossed to the sink, running the tap just long enough to fill a glass. When he turned back, he picked up the needle and thread again and sat back down, closer to the table this time. Away from Thomas. The sound of the needle pulling through fabric filled the space that might otherwise have carried another comment.

He didn’t know whether to be angry or humiliated. Likely both. It had all been quiet until now. That was the trouble. No orders, no footfalls overhead. No bells ringing from three floors up. It was unnatural. Thomas had never lived in an environment where life was… easy, and he wasn’t quite sure it suited him.

He rubbed his thumb across the spine of the book, still on the arm of the settee.

“You know what’s funny?” he said, finally. “You always act like you were the only one who saw through them. The only one who had to bite your tongue and swallow your pride. But you got out. You got the girl, and then you got to walk away.”

“And you think that made it easy?”

“I think it made it easier than it was for the rest of us.” His voice wasn’t raised, but it was sharp enough to cut. “You were the rebel. You had a reason. The rest of us had to earn our keep.”

“I was never going to belong with them,” Branson said. “And I knew it. But she tried. She believed we could make it work. And then she died. And I had to raise her child in a house where her name echoed in every room.”

“You don’t still live there.”

“No,” he agreed. “Now I’m raising her child in a room in the slums of a foreign country, praying to God I can make ends meet.”

That, Thomas didn’t answer. Because what could he say to that?

Standing up a minute later, he picked up his empty cup and crossed to the sink, placed it gently down beside the one Branson had left.

“I’m going to bed,” he said.

He didn’t slam the door behind him, careful not to wake up Sybbie, but he closed it with more force than was needed. A few minutes passed. Long enough for him to take off his shoes and sit on the edge of the narrow bed, hands resting on his knees.

He heard the floor creak. The quiet tiptoe down the hall. Then Branson, finally going to bed in the next room.

“Are you still mad?” Sybbie asked, her voice sleepy and small.

If he answered her, Thomas didn’t hear it.

He hadn’t meant to stay up as late as he did, but the light under the door had taken a long time to fade. When it finally did, he lay back, one arm over his eyes, and stared at the ceiling until sleep took him.

Morning came too soon, the sound of the boiler clunking faintly through the walls. Thomas padded into the kitchen, half-expecting to find things distant, cooler. Instead, Branson was already up, kettle half-full and steaming on the stove. There was a dishcloth over his shoulder and flour on the edge of his sleeve, like he’d been up for a while.

He looked over his shoulder. “Toast or porridge?”

Thomas blinked. “Toast’s fine.”

“Alright,” Branson said, and turned back to the bread without further comment.

Nothing else. It was disorienting; no pause or stiff silence like he’d learned to expect after a row. Thomas stood there for a moment, then moved to fill the mugs with tea.

He kept waiting for something more, but it didn’t come. Branson didn’t seem angry. Didn’t even seem particularly tense. He asked if they were out of butter, rummaged in the cupboard, and made a comment about the milk here not being as nice as back home. That was it; no acknowledgement of raised voices or old wounds rubbed raw.

That, more than anything, set Thomas on edge.

At Downton, a quarrel stayed in the walls for days. It lingered in glances and in the way teacups were placed too carefully on trays. Branson had been all too happy to let things simmer for days. Apparently, here it disappeared with the washing up.

Sybbie wandered in ten minutes later, hair mussed and dragging her blanket. She gave Thomas a sleepy grin when he offered her toast and climbed into the chair beside him without a word. Then she nudged his arm until he passed her the jam.

Whatever had passed between the two men the night before, she didn’t notice it. Or didn’t care.

Thomas buttered her toast and tried not to look like he was watching Branson too closely. He kept expecting the mood to shift again, but it didn’t happen.

Later, while rinsing out the mugs, Branson dried his hands on a tea towel and said, almost absently, “I’ve to run into the office around two. Can you watch over Sybbie for an hour or so? Maybe two?”

Thomas nodded. “Course.”

“That alright?”

“It’s fine.”

Branson gave a faint smile. “Cheers.”

Then he went back to drying the dishes, like that was that. Like nothing had been broken.

———

He showed up to work fifteen minutes early, though no one seemed to notice. He didn’t mean to, exactly, but there hadn’t been much to do at the flat once Branson came back. It was either sit there pretending not to be nervous or get up and move. So he moved.

It was louder than he’d expected. There was no overdramatic shouting or whooping, but the whole place felt warmer. Voices overlapped with each other while the jazz band in the corner strained to be heard. A woman headlined the band, singing a slow, drawling version of a Marion Harris song. The floor was sticky near the door, and a man at the end of the bar was already laughing too loudly for the hour.

Behind the counter, a lean man with rolled sleeves and a pencil behind one ear was unpacking lemons with a face that said he’d rather be anywhere else. He had a long scar running up one forearm and hair pushed back with far too much oil.

He looked up as Thomas came in.

“You the new guy?” He spoke like someone who’d learned English in a kitchen full of cousins. It sounded unpolished, but natural.

Thomas nodded. “Yeah.”

“Sergio,” the man said. No handshake, just a tilt of the chin. “Martin said you done this kinda thing. Coat and bag go under the bar. No locker till next week.”

Thomas did as he was told. When he came back up, Sergio was halfway through slicing the lemons.

“We’re out one floor runner tonight,” he said, not looking up. “So you’re shadowing Neil at table six, then picking up overflow at the bar if it gets bad. Don’t drop nothin’, don’t mess the order, don’t shoot the breeze with the regulars unless they start it.”

“Right,” Thomas said slowly, nodding.

Sergio continued. “You don’t touch the taps till I say you can. You’re on clear-up, stock-check, and back bar for now. Anyone too drunk to stand, tell Martin. Anyone causing trouble, tell Louie. If you answer back, be ready to take one on the chin. And don’t let anyone leave with glass in their hands.”

He said it all in a single breath, like a ritual, while scraping the knife across the chopping board.

“You wash your hands before clocking in?”

“Yes.”

“Good. Any questions?”

Thomas hesitated, but shook his head. It was easier not to ask anything. Better to learn by watching, or get told off once than have them think he was useless. Sergio didn’t seem the sort to sugar-coat things anyway. His hands itched, he just wanted to get started. Still, he couldn’t help the feeling that he’d missed some crucial instruction. He was used to polishing, ironing, fetching, standing. But there was never a better time like the present to start learning.

Sergio then turned him over to Neil; a younger man with sleeves too short for his arms and a constant look of mild panic behind his eyes.

“Don’t worry,” he said, with a vague attempt at a smile. “They’re always harsh on the newbies.”

Thomas nodded. “I can see that.”

“If you can survive tonight, you’ll be fine.” he grinned.

The work was straightforward in theory. Pick up orders, carry trays, wipe down tables, restock napkins. He understood the principle. But nothing moved slowly. The floor was uneven in places, the lights above the bar buzzed when they flickered on, and one of the taps stuck so badly it took two hands and a hip to get it going.

By ten-thirty, the place had started to fill and Thomas was pulled away from Neil and behind the bar. He kept up alright, mostly. But it was much faster than he was used to. Loud, too. Nobody waited their turn. They shouted over each other, waved bills in his face, snapped fingers.

He miscounted change twice. Called a beer the wrong name. Used a wine glass for something that should have gone in a tumbler. By the end of the first hour, it had become increasingly obvious he’d lied. Not about his experience, exactly, but the type of experience he had. Sergio caught him just as he was rinsing it out in the sink.

“You’ve not done this before.”

Thomas glanced over. “I said I’d done service work. I know how to serve.”

Sergio raised an eyebrow.

“Just not like this,” he shrugged.

“Oh?” Sergio gave a knowing look as he wiped his hands on a rag. “Where was it, then? Private club? Some rich guappo’s house?”

“Something like that.”

The look didn’t budge.

Thomas sighed. “I worked at a country estate. For years. As a footman, then a valet. Ended up under-butler by the end.”

“Ain’t that a picture.” Sergio gave a low whistle. “Proper silver trays, white gloves, all that?”

“Yes.”

He tossed the rag over his shoulder. “Well, that explains it.”

“Explains what?”

“The way you stand. Like somebody’s nonna about to give a scolding.”

Thomas didn’t know what to say to that. They stood in silence for a moment as a new order came through and Sergio moved to pull another pint. Then he glanced sideways.

“Still. You’ll want to learn to keep with our rhythm, or you’ll be dead meat.”

He nodded. “I know.”

And he did. But it felt like learning to walk backwards. If he walked into this job at sixteen, it would have come natural to him. But he’d spent so long learning to disappear into the wallpaper, that a bar full of noise felt now like enemy territory. But he needed this job. Needed to show Branson that he wasn’t just a freeloader.

He kept up, just about. Whether the place would keep him was another matter.

The place had thinned out after midnight. The jazz band had finished up hours ago and most of the regulars had drifted off after last call. One man near the jukebox lingered over a pint, muttering occasionally to the empty stool beside him.

Thomas wiped the bar with a damp cloth, slower now, his shoulder aching in a familiar, unwelcome way. Someone had spilled a shandy hours ago and not bothered to say so. It had dried into a sticky halo, and he had to scrub at it in circles to get it off.

“Oi,” said a voice, too loudly. “I was just talking to the lads. You sound like one of those chaps on the wireless. The news ones. You posh, then?”

Thomas didn’t turn around. He was from bloody Manchester, for crying out loud.

He didn’t look up. “Not particularly.”

“Could’ve fooled me. I could picture you polishing silver in Buckingham Palace. What are you doing here?”

He had pale eyes and a patchy beard. His Boston drawl turned ‘posh’ into two syllables.

“Serving you drinks, apparently.”

That got a laugh from the others nearby. Thomas kept wiping the table. There was a patch of dried stout near the edge that would need soaking. The man chuckled and moved on. He didn’t seem hostile.

Later, when most had gone and only the jukebox was still humming faintly under the noise of chairs being stacked, another man leaned across the bar. Young, good coat, and an easy grin.

“You got plans tonight?” he asked.

Thomas gave him a flat look. “Yes. Going home.”

“That a hint?”

“It’s a fact.”

The man chuckled. “You seeing anyone?”

That earned a dry look from Thomas.

The man’s grin widened. “Thought I’d ask. You’ve got that look.”

He didn’t answer. His cheeks burned as he looked down, unsure of what gave him away.

Eventually, he replied. “Not interested.”

The man raised both hands in mock surrender and slid away.

Thomas looked over to Sergio, mouth hanging slightly open, eyebrows raised.

He just laughed, “You get all sorts in here. Could be flattery. Could be bait. I’ve learned to just pour the drink and carry on.”

When the last customer had gone and the door was bolted, he started collecting empty glasses from the far end. Sergio lit a cigarette behind the bar, pushed the pack across without saying anything.

“No, thank you,” Thomas said, quietly.

Sergio shrugged and didn’t press. “You didn’t do bad.”

He gave a small nod, though he didn’t quite believe it. He tipped a half-full glass into the bucket and stacked it neatly with the others.

“You’re green. But you’ll get there, you learn quick,” he added. “Bit stiff, maybe. But you’ll loosen up.”

“Was I meant to?” Thomas asked, rinsing a cloth under the tap.

Sergio grinned, flicked ash into the sink. “Only if you want tips.”

There wasn’t much to say to that. Thomas wrung the cloth out and went back to wiping the sticky ring someone had left behind near the far end of the bar.

He left a few minutes later. The walk home felt longer than it had earlier in the evening. His legs ached. His shirt was damp at the collar. But he’d survived his first night and that’s all that mattered.

———

When Thomas let himself into the flat, he was met with silence. The sort that made him think he’d walked into the middle of something. He closed the door gently behind him and slipped off his shoes. The lights were off, save for a faint glow in the corner, coming from the gas hob. His eyes followed it, his footsteps soundless on the old linoleum.

Branson was at the counter, back turned, toasting slices of bread directly over the open flame. There was no kettle on, a plate sitting left beside the sink. He hadn’t turned when Thomas entered, though he must’ve heard him.

He hovered near the door, not knowing if he should speak or wait. The quiet felt brittle, and something in him didn’t want to touch it. He let his bag slide to the floor and stood there for a moment. His shoulders ached from the shift, his shirt clung damply to his spine, and the skin on his hands still smelled of lemons and beer.

“Couldn’t sleep?” he eventually asked.

Branson glanced over. “Didn’t try yet.”

He turned back and flipped the toast.

Thomas wasn’t sure how long he could stand there, just watching.

“Are you–” he began, then stopped. “You’re not going to say anything?”

Branson looked at him again, this time with a frown. “About what?”

“You’re acting like nothing happened.”

It sounded childish when he said it aloud. Petulant, even. But the longer Branson stayed quiet, the harder it was to ignore the old instinct curling behind his ribs, saying that if someone wasn’t shouting yet, they were only holding it in.

“What are you talking about?”

“After last night?” Thomas let out a short breath and crossed his arms, his voice low and tight. “You’re acting like it didn’t happen. Aren’t you cross with me?”

That made Branson laugh, once, but it died as quickly as it came. He turned the flame off and looked at Thomas properly, realising he was serious.

“God,” he said, not unkindly. “You really thought I was sitting here stewing all night?”

He shook his head and slid the toast onto two chipped plates. “If people held onto every time they bickered, the world’d be an even bigger mess than it already is. I said what I needed to say. You said what you needed. End of.”

Thomas didn’t answer. He wasn’t sure he knew how to. Something in his chest had curled tighter. He stood there, unmoving, as Branson added butter to one slice, then shoved a plate across the table with a nod.

Then he picked up his own and disappeared down the hall without another word. The hallway light clicked on for a moment, then off again, followed by a soft creak of a door.

Thomas sat down slowly. He didn’t eat straight away. He sat in the quiet, listening to the faint tick of the oven cooling and Branson moving about in the next room.

He’d spent years learning how to brace for silence used as a weapon. Not this strange absence where something should have been. It had never occurred to him that someone could just… let a fight end.

He picked up the toast and took a small bite. His eyes fixed on the darkened kitchen window, his own reflection looking back at him faintly in the glass.

Chapter Text

“…no, not like that. You hold it wrong and the head’s gonna foam everywhere.”

Sergio didn’t say it unkindly as he reached over Thomas’s shoulder and repositioned the pint glass in his hand. His fingers were cold, damp with condensation, and his voice low enough not to carry.

“You’re too careful,” he said, taking the glass and tilting it sharply beneath the flow. Foam rose, thickened, then settled neatly at the brim. “See?”

He set the glass on the bar, sliding it smoothly forward with two fingers. The man opposite grabbed it without looking up from his paper.

Thomas nodded, silently running through the motions again in his head, feeling foolishly like he was taking notes. Sergio leaned a hip against the counter, wiping foam off his knuckles with a cloth that had seen better days.

“You’re watchin’ the wrong people,” Sergio added casually, nodding toward the far end of the bar. “Look at Jakob. That man pours pints in his sleep. You copy him, you might actually get somewhere.”

Thomas followed Sergio’s gaze, eyes settling on the figure moving swiftly and fluidly behind the taps. Jakob looked a few years older than him, maybe mid-forties, with a thick-set frame and the kind of casual strength that came from years of physical work. His beard was salted heavily with grey, the same as the streaks running through his dark hair, and his sleeves were rolled back carelessly to the elbows, revealing faded scars Thomas recognised as burn marks.

Jakob moved with neat efficiency, rolling his shoulders once before lifting two pint glasses and sliding them beneath separate taps. There was a rhythm to it, something almost hypnotic. Watching him felt oddly reassuring.

“Russian?” Thomas asked quietly, nodding in Jakob’s direction.

Sergio hummed in confirmation. “Petrograd, before the whole thing went belly-up. Came here some time in 1917, far as I know. After the revolution. Don’t talk much about it. But whatever he did there, it must’ve involved a lot of beer.”

Thomas watched Jakob set the pints down, smoothly take payment, and turn toward another customer without missing a beat. It was almost elegant, how he never wasted movement or hesitated between tasks.

“That,” Sergio said, pushing off the bar, “is how you do it.”

It had been a week since Thomas started behind the bar, and though his knuckles still ached by the end of every shift, things weren’t quite so foreign anymore. He still wasn’t there, but he wasn’t far off. He knew the floor patterns now, the clatter of glassware, the rush that came after ten. He’d learned when to move, when to hold back, and which customers not to ask too many questions. Each day felt a little less like putting on a show.

He reached for another glass, determined not to fumble it this time. He knew Sergio was right. He was being too careful, too precise. He was still serving drinks like he was carrying silver trays. But he couldn’t help it. Old habits had sunk deep, stubborn things that refused to fade.

“Relax, Tommy,” Sergio called over his shoulder. “You keep looking like you’re about to salute someone, customers are gonna start thinking we’re running a military club back here.”

Thomas felt his cheeks heat slightly. He hadn’t been called Tommy in years. He hated it. Hated how it always made his spine go rigid. But he couldn’t tell Sergio why he hated it, so now he was stuck with it. Besides, with his luck, he’d probably end up with something worse if he said anything.

He focused his gaze firmly on the glass, tilted it under the tap exactly as Sergio had demonstrated, and held his breath as the beer rose, foamed, and stopped carefully below the rim. For once, the drink settled clean, obediently, without a drop spilled. A wave of satisfaction rolled through him as he watched the foam recede. After setting it down without spilling a drop, he received a grudging nod from down the bar. That would have to do.

He began stacking the bar mats along the rail. His hands moved without thinking now, at least for this part. Some of it was starting to come back. He fell easily back into the sense of pacing and the muscle memory of surface-level ease. It wasn’t the same as footman work. But it wasn’t as far removed as he’d feared either. A lot louder and messier, but the rhythm was the same.

“Not bad,” came a low voice beside him. Thomas turned and found Jakob leaning against the bar, arms folded, eyes faintly amused. His accent was thick but clear, his vowels round and clipped. “Another ten thousand times, maybe you will be passable.”

He let out a short laugh, caught off guard. “Is that how many it took you?”

“Maybe twice as many,” Jakob admitted, shrugging easily. “But my choices were fewer.”

Thomas looked at him curiously, expecting more, but the older man simply inclined his head and moved away, summoned by another impatient customer waving a bill. Sergio chuckled softly from behind.

“That’s Jakob,” he said. “Ask him something, you’re lucky if you get half an answer.”

“What does he mean, he had less choice?” asked Thomas, after a brief hesitation.

Sergio glanced sideways at him, hands busy with another pint. “When Jakob first started here, he hardly spoke English. But he was good, even then. Kept his mouth shut, poured fast, didn’t get himself in trouble.”

Thomas nodded slowly, glancing toward Jakob again. He found himself wondering, not for the first time, how he had ended up here, in Boston. How he’d wound up serving pints to strangers who would see his name written on a receipt and call him Jacob. Then again, he supposed someone might wonder the same about him. Boston seemed to have a way of drawing in strays and Jakob, like himself, was one more piece of driftwood pulled in by the current.

There was something familiar in the way Jakob moved. Thomas recognised the same flinty kind of precision that had once earned him promotions he hadn’t asked for. Back rooms, titles, respect he didn’t quite trust. He just wasn’t sure if the same rules applied here.

As the evening wore on, Thomas tried to move as Jakob did. He mirrored his easy stance, the casual economy of his gestures. It felt awkward at first, unnatural, but soon enough, he felt himself begin to relax into it. The grip on the tap became less tense, his shoulders eased slightly, and the stiffness in his back softened just enough that his posture no longer marked him out as sharply.

By the end of the shift, Sergio passed behind him again, nodding approvingly at the growing line of empty glasses on Thomas’s side of the bar.

“See?” he said. “Told ya your first day you weren’t as stiff as you looked.”

Thomas gave him a dry look, but there was no real bite to it. He knew he was getting the hang of it. He didn’t move quite the way he had on that first awkward night. Still a little too uptight. Still too careful in how he spoke to customers or wiped down the counter. It would take him a long time to realise that a dropped town under the bar rail wouldn’t result in a clipped insult from Carson, delivered loud enough for everyone to hear. But he’d stopped tensing when orders were barked too close to his ear and learned to raise his voice just enough to be heard. At times, he’d even found himself moving on instinct rather than calculation. That was something.

He glanced once more at Jakob, intensely absorbed in polishing a tumbler, a cigarette tucked behind his ear. As he studied his lack-of-posture, Thomas wondered briefly if he’d ever look that comfortable here. Surely he would, in time, but ease never came naturally to him and it was hard to let go of old instincts.

He still wasn’t sure who he was supposed to become, or if he’d ever get there. But for tonight, imitation felt like enough. The music had shifted tempo, some slow jazz number wafting faintly under the clatter of bottles. The crowd had thickened near the back wall. Thomas rinsed a glass at the sink, blinked against the heat, and kept moving.

“You ever gonna loosen up?” Sergio asked him at one point. “You take everything so serious. Looks like you’re waiting to get the sack every time someone orders a pint.”

Thomas raised an eyebrow, fighting down a flush. “I’m trying not to scare people off.”

Sergio gave a low chuckle. “Take it easy. Ain’t nobody in here for your etiquette.” He moved away again, shaking his head.

Thomas returned his attention to the pint he was pouring, but the interruption had thrown him, his timing off. Foam spilled over the rim, trickling down his wrist.

“Here, let me,” Neil appeared out of nowhere, smoothly swapping the overflowing glass for a fresh one. “Tap acts up sometimes. Gotta give it a good tilt.”

He stepped back gratefully, wiping foam from his knuckles. Neil’s posture was anxious, like he expected to be told off at any moment. But he’d somehow appointed himself as Thomas’s unofficial ally anyway, despite always looking like he’d barely figured out the job himself. But he helped in small ways. Never made a fuss when he had to swap glasses or apologise on his behalf. Just stepped in and moved on.

“You’re fine,” he said. “The first month’s always rough. I spilled whiskey on a customer my first week, nearly got myself fired.”

“You? You look like you’ve never broken a glass in your life.”

“Oh, I’ve broken plenty,” Neil admitted, grinning. “I’m just quick at hiding the evidence.”

“How do you manage it?” Thomas asked, genuinely curious. “You don’t seem the type to get away with much.”

“Mostly just apologise till Sergio laughs and forgets he's supposed to yell at me.”

“I’ll keep that in mind,” he chuckled.

“Stick with me long enough, you'll pick up all my bad habits,” Neil’s smile widened. “And don’t worry. Sergio yells, but he’s mostly talk. Just duck quick if he throws a towel at you.”

Thomas laughed softly, feeling some of the tension ease from his shoulders. Stepping back in, he took the freshly poured pint Neil handed him and passed it across the counter to a grey-haired man with a lined face who’d been quietly observing them.

“Thanks,” the man said, raising the glass in mock-salute. “Wasn’t sure I’d get a drink tonight, what with all the fuss over there.”

“Sorry,” Thomas muttered, embarrassed.

“No harm done. Declan, by the way,” the man added conversationally. He had a soft Irish accent, worn smooth at the edges by years spent in America.

“Thomas.” He nodded, unsure. Sergio had told him to loosen up but he wasn’t sure where the line was.

“You’re new here, aren’t you?”

“Second week,” he said, carefully wiping the counter. “Is it that obvious?”

Declan chuckled warmly. “Ah, just a bit. Still, you’ve landed well enough. There’s plenty worse places round here.”

Thomas hesitated, glancing around the dimly lit pub. “You a regular, then?”

“Stepped off the boat just shy of the century mark,” he nodded. “Twenty-six, I was. Been drinking here ever since. If you ever need tips on surviving Boston, I’m your man.”

“Go on, then.” Thomas tilted his head, intrigued despite himself. “How do you survive it?”

“By being drunker than the man next to you. And never look anyone in the eye.”

Thomas blinked.

Declan’s eyes twinkled as he sipped his pint. “Nah, I’m having you on. The trick, lad, is finding your own crowd and knowing when it’s best to keep the head down. Helps too, to never look too surprised. People here can spot fresh meat from a mile away.”

“I think it’s already too late for me.”

“Ah, you’ll be fine,” Declan said. “Just keep frowning like that and everyone’ll assume you belong.”

Surprising even himself, Thomas let out a laugh. For a moment, he felt a little less out of place. He knew better than to trust it, but part of him was willing to risk it for tonight. He didn’t know how to respond, but Declan didn’t seem to need a reply. He just nodded amicably and turned back to the drink in his hand.

The rest of the evening passed quickly. By closing, Thomas had found a rhythm, smoother and more natural than before. He was stacking glasses when he overheard Sergio speaking in a hushed tone to Neil nearby.

“Your friend’s getting better,” Sergio remarked. “Almost passes for normal now.”

Thomas didn’t look up, but the words settled warmly into his chest.

Friend.

Almost normal.

For tonight, it felt like progress.

———

Back at the flat the next afternoon, things felt subdued. Thomas had expected the tension to ease with time, but instead, it just seemed to flatten into something quiet, uncertain. It wasn’t necessarily anyone’s fault either. He and Branson moved around each other cautiously, saying little more than necessary. Neither seemed sure how to break the pattern.

It wasn’t unpleasant exactly, just off-balance. He’d followed that same pattern of entertaining Sybbie most mornings while Branson either worked at the kitchen table, or headed down to the newsroom. Then dinner would be around four-thirty – Branson usually cooked. Thomas wouldn’t have minded cooking, but they’d started off this way so there was no point changing things now.

Thomas headed out for work shortly after dinner. Most evenings, he wasn’t in until after eight, but it was easier to take a walk with plenty of detours than to sit in the flat watching the clock. Being around Branson too long made him second-guess everything. Better to be on his feet, in motion. He liked walking here anyway. There was something calming about losing himself in unfamiliar roads; each turn reminding him how easily people could fade into the background.

Sound crept back into the room when Sybbie wandered into the sitting room, clutching paper and pencils. She paused beside Thomas, looking up expectantly.

“Will you draw with me?” she asked, not waiting for an answer before grabbing his hand and pulling him down to the floor beside her. She thrust a sheet of paper into his hand. “I’m drawing flowers. You draw a bird.”

“A bird?” Thomas repeated uncertainly, eyeing the blank page. “I'm not very good at birds.”

“That’s alright,” Sybbie said confidently. “I’m very good, see?”

She gestured to a scribble on her own sheet of paper. It might have resembled a bird if you closed your eyes and really used your imagination.

“You can copy my one.”

No one could argue with that. So he took the pencil and began sketching something that vaguely resembled a robin. Beside him, Sybbie hummed softly to herself, colouring purple petals with careful, precise strokes. The tune was unfamiliar, lilting softly in the air.

He listened absently as he drew, until eventually, curiosity got the better of him.

“What’s that song?”

Sybbie looked up, startled. “Oh. Daddy sings it sometimes.”

She went back to colouring, humming under her breath until she stopped again. “About the lady on the streets, with cockles and mussels. Alive, alive-o. She dies at the end.”

Thomas raised an eyebrow. “Cheerful.”

She kept humming. “Alive, alive oh,” she sang, then trailed off suddenly. “What’s a cockle?”

“A shellfish,” he said. “Sort of like a clam.”

“Oh.” She wrinkled her nose. “Why would anyone want to eat that?”

“Because they didn’t have biscuits, probably.”

She made a face. “That sounds horrid.”

Thomas smiled faintly. “Most things were, back then.”

Considering this carefully, she asked him, “did we have clams in England?”

“Sometimes,” he answered softly, eyes on his sketch. “Not often.”

She hummed thoughtfully, scratching at the paper with her pencil again. “I miss England.”

The words were soft, and a bit unexpected. They made Thomas pause. He looked at her, unsure. “Do you?”

Sybbie nodded seriously. “I miss George. And Marigold. And Donk, especially. He tells very good stories.”

Thomas swallowed carefully. He was no good at this. Comforting was beyond him, and always had been. It was hard to get the tone right. Hard to know what comfort was meant to sound like when you’d never heard much of it yourself.

“I saw them all the time before. Now I only see Seánie and Brídie.”

“Your cousins?”

“Yes. I like Brídie but Seánie bites me sometimes.”

He set down his pencil awkwardly. “You’ll see the rest of your family again. Your daddy won’t let you forget them.”

He didn’t know if that was true. But it came out of his mouth before he’d time to think about what he was saying.

“I know,” she said quietly. “But sometimes I forget their faces.” She looked up suddenly. “Do you ever forget people?”

Thomas felt a sharp, unexpected ache in his chest. He thought of Downton, of faces he knew he'd likely never see again. Some he'd gladly leave behind, others whose absence had quietly grown sharper over the weeks.

“Not usually,” he lied gently. “But if you do, it doesn’t mean you don’t care. Sometimes our memories just... get tired.”

She considered this. “Papa says it’s alright to miss people. Even if it makes you sad.”

“He’s right.”

Sybbie went silent for a moment, then asked softly, “Do you miss people, Mr Barrow?”

Thomas hesitated, pencil hovering above his sketch. “Sometimes. More than I thought I would.”

“Who?”

“People from back home,” he paused again, choosing his words carefully. “Friends, I suppose. Do you remember Anna?”

She shook her head no.

“Do you miss your cousins?”

“I haven’t seen my cousins since I was very little, like you.”

“I’m not little,” she stuck her chin up. “I’m four now. Nearly four and a half.”

The laugh escaped him before he could stop it. “My mistake.”

“Auntie Edith tried to braid my hair once.” Sybbie leaned on her elbow, sighing. “It was too short but it’s longer now. But I can’t do it right.”

“You’ll get better at it.”

She eyed him suspiciously. “Do you know how to braid?”

He snorted. “Not a clue.”

That got a grin out of her. She bent back over the page, humming again.

From the doorway came the faintest sound, a soft clearing of a throat. Thomas turned slightly, realising Branson had been standing there, watching quietly. Their eyes met briefly. He tensed, waiting for him to speak, but Branson only lingered a moment more, then silently slipped away.

Thomas felt a brief, uneasy tightening in his chest. Something about the silence, about Branson's careful retreat, unsettled him more than open confrontation ever had. It wasn't his place to fill gaps he hadn't created, yet here he was anyway, colouring birds and talking about braids, playing at being someone he could never truly be. He wasn't her father, or an uncle, or even a family friend. He was just Thomas; or Mr Barrow, as she still called him.

He looked back at Sybbie, who was humming again as if nothing had happened, and felt suddenly grateful for the simplicity of her expectations.

She didn't seem to notice. Leaning closer, she tapped her pencil gently against his page. “You didn’t finish your bird.”

“Oh. Right,” he murmured, blinking away from the empty doorway. He returned his attention to the sketch, resuming careful lines that somehow felt easier now.

They worked calmly side-by-side for a little while longer, the tension in the room softer now. Still there, but gentler, muted by Sybbie’s peaceful chatter and humming. Thomas didn’t speak again, but every now and then he’d glance down at her small, determined movements, and feel oddly relieved.

———

The next evening, clouds pressed low over Boston, and the kitchen light decided to flicker even more than usual. Branson hadn’t said much at dinner, though he’d stirred the pot twice as often as needed. Across the table, Sybbie was chattering aimlessly. She hadn’t stopped talking since she got in from the park earlier.

“Brídie’s dog ate one of her socks,” she said through a mouthful of potato. “And Seánie’s got a new train. It makes real steam.”

“Real steam?” Thomas glanced at Branson. “That’ll end well.”

Sybbie nodded seriously. “He said he’ll show me later. But Brídie said it nearly set fire to the table.”

“Tell him not to try it near the tablecloth… or the curtains,” her father remarked.

Thomas watched them both for a moment. Branson calmly refilling the water, Sybbie talking like the world belonged to her. It struck him, not for the first time, how easily Branson moved through this kind of fatherhood. How Sybbie’s world already had more warmth in it than his ever had.

Branson reached for the jug of water, then looked in Thomas’s direction, “He may be my nephew but some days it seems he’s got more mischief in him than sense.”

Thomas lowered his eyes to his plate, lips twitching just slightly, though he wasn’t sure if it was at the boy’s antics or at Branson.

Sybbie beamed. “I hope Brídie lets me sleep in her room. She cuts things out of magazines and sticks them up on her wall.”

“Of course she will,” Branson said, cutting into his carrots. “You’ll see them both tonight, sweetheart. Just eat those first.”

“Brídie,” Thomas echoed. “That the older one?”

“She’s nearly seven,” Sybbie declared, full of authority. “Seánie’s three. He bit me last time but it’s fine.”

The conversation drifted, replaced by the quiet scrape of cutlery and the rustle of napkins.

“You’re alright to come, with me if you want,” Branson said mildly, turning to Thomas. “Just the few fellas from the paper. The ones I meet now and then.”

Thomas hesitated. “You mean after you drop her off?”

“Aye. It’s not far.”

Sybbie looked up from her plate. “Brídie has a dress with flowers on it. She says she’ll let me wear it.”

“Very generous of her,” said Thomas.

“Seánie will be there too, won’t he?” she asked Branson.

He nodded. “Yes, but you don’t have to play with him if he bites.”

That settled it. She finished her carrots.

The flat emptied shortly after. Branson returned alone just past seven, shrugging off his coat. He didn’t mention the meeting directly, but stood still a moment, fiddling with his cuff before looking back at Thomas.

“Ready?”

Thomas rose from the armchair. “Am I allowed to ask where we’re going, or is that need-to-know?”

Branson didn’t answer straight away. Just pulled on his coat again and stepped into his boots.

“Somewhere quiet.”

They walked the back way towards Battery Street, down damp streets Thomas didn’t recognise. It was narrower here. The buildings were older, patched with paint and soot. It was a different side of the city altogether. People lingered outside newsagents and bakeries, smoke curling from cigarettes and the occasional lifted pipe. He walked half a step behind, watching the back of Branson’s collar.

After a few minutes, he spoke. “So what do you lot do? Sit round sharpening pitchforks and drawing maps of Downing Street?”

Branson gave a short laugh. “More like stale beer and chatter. But you need talk in order to have action.”

“Well, the backdoor routes and the looking over your shoulder is a giveaway,” Thomas found himself laughing faintly. “If I didn’t know better, I’d say you were in the IRA.”

Branson didn’t laugh that time. He didn’t even appear amused, just kept walking. His silence lasted long enough for Thomas to feel foolish.

“…Jesus Christ,” he muttered eventually, straightening. “You’re not joking.”

Branson said nothing, just led with easy familiarity, his hands shoved deep in his pockets, eyes forward. Thomas kept pace beside him, trying to quiet the noise in his head.

Of course he knew Branson’s politics. Anyone with ears did. He talked about Ireland the way some men talked about old wounds. But it always sounded like it was chalked up to principle, not practice. There was a difference between belief and action, and he’d always assumed Branson knew the line. But this felt like a risk, and not the kind you took by accident. Then again, Thomas knew all too well what it was to be punished just for being himself.

They reached a narrow pub set between a butcher’s and a side alley with a closed tailor’s shop on the other side. It looked ordinary from the street, its front windows amber-lit and half-fogged from the inside. But Branson didn’t head for the main bar. He skirted down the alley instead, rapped twice on a battered door, and waited.

It opened a moment later. There was no greeting, but Branson stepped through, regardless. Thomas followed. The back room was quiet and low-lit, a far cry from the warmth of the pub outside. About eight or nine men were already there, gathered around a narrow table. One had tattoos all over his arms. Another looked barely twenty and sat with a notebook open on his knee. There were some subtle nods of acknowledgement, but no introductions.

Branson sat like he’d done it a hundred times. Thomas stayed standing for a beat longer before easing down beside him. The table held a few scattered pint glasses, some half-empty. The men talked in a way Thomas recognised from downstairs corridors at Downton. Their voices were pitched low, all the weight carried within their words. Various names were mentioned once, then left behind. They spoke of printers. Trade routes. Wages. Of landlords in the north raising rates while wages were ‘piss poor’. One man spoke plainly of the hunger in Chicago, and no one interrupted. Branson spoke carefully.

Thomas sat very still. His hands stayed folded, coat buttoned. After a while someone passed him a glass, and he nodded thanks.

At one point, someone handed out a folded leaflet. Thomas read it in silence. He wasn’t shocked by the content but it sharpened his awareness of what he’d walked himself into – or what Branson had walked him into.

It bore the crest of a local printers’ union, but its real message was clearer in the bolded line beneath: Support the Republic. Do not print Crown propaganda. A list of newspapers and supply houses followed, half of them circled.

He folded the leaflet once, then again, and set it gently on the table beside his untouched glass. He didn’t look at Branson. A man across the table with thick brows and sun-creased skin looked at him for a moment too long. Thomas met his gaze, but didn’t speak.

The man looked to Branson and something in Irish. Branson answered him in kind, giving a short nod as he glanced between them. Whatever he said, it seemed to satisfy the man, who in turn, gave a small nod back and a short laugh. He then turned to the younger lad beside him and murmured something under his breath.

Thomas shifted his attention to the table again. Papers were being passed between hands, cuttings rather than leaflets. Headlines trimmed down and marked in pencil. Columns. Stories. Most were Irish. Some were American. One bore the words State Propaganda and the Free Press scrawled across the top.

It was Ireland they spoke of now. Not in nostalgia or reverie, but in numbers and names and recent blood. There was talk of civil war. Thomas had known there’d been fighting. He'd seen it somewhere in the background of headlines and in whispers at Downton. But he’d never been certain whether it had ended or was still going. Listening now, he realised he hadn’t really known anything at all, despite it happening far closer to him than he’d ever bothered to notice.

“Those English brutes have a lot to answer for,” someone muttered. “Turning us all against each other like that.”

Thomas saw Branson’s jaw move, just slightly.

“They’re still at it,” someone else replied. “You think partition was the end of it? They’ve got half the North sewn up with soldiers and spies. They want them quiet and the rest of us grateful we got out.”

A man with a harsh voice and a deep accent Thomas struggled to understand began to speak. He talked about a pub in Dublin, about how a group of officers from the National Army had barricaded themselves in, taken weapons with them, and sent the government an ultimatum.

Thomas blinked, not entirely following. A mutiny? In Dublin? Branson hadn’t mentioned anything like that. It was definitely recent, took place since Thomas had moved in with him.

“They were Free State lads,” the man went on. “Loyal, supposedly. Then came demobilisation orders, and what does the government do? Strip them out like bad wallpaper. Blacklist them. Fire ‘em on the spot.”

Someone else muttered, “After everything they did for us. For our freedom.”

“That’s not mutiny,” another said, bitterly. “They remembered what side they were promised would win.”

There was a short pause.

“It’s not over,” the first man said. “They’ll say the war’s done, but only if we lie down and shut up. That’s surrender to the empire, not peace. Don’t talk to me about peace while six counties are still under the boot.”

There was a short pause.

Branson hadn’t spoken yet, but now he did, low and deliberate. “That treaty carved a line through the island and now we’re expected to just live with it. We’re supposed to be grateful but it was never a fair deal.”

Thomas said nothing. He didn’t know what he’d expected. Local grievances, maybe, some broad-strokes talk about Britain. Not this. Not this simmer of betrayal and unfinished fight, sitting across from men who’d once worn the same uniform and now looked at their own country like a door that had slammed on them. He stayed quiet, hoping it wouldn’t show how little he knew.

Then a red-haired man near the end of the table who’d been quiet until now leaned forward. “Sure look at Ballyseedy. That’s what came of letting them divide us. They made neighbours into jailors, brothers into executioners.”

No one interrupted. Thomas felt Branson tense up beside him.

“They took nine lads from the barracks in Tralee, lads already battered half to death – hammers to the bones, some of them. Tied the lot to a mine at the crossroads and lit the fuse. Then the ones who survived the blast were machine-gunned where they lay.”

He reached for a glass, not to drink, just to steady his hand.

“When the bodies came back, families rioted. Broke the coffins open with their bare hands, trying to see who was who. Couldn’t even tell.”

The man who was cautious about Thomas muttered something about Killarney. Another said, “Cahersiveen, too.”

The red-haired man nodded grimly. “Same thing. Landmines. One after the other. Tralee just happened to go first.”

“Government called it an ambush,” someone else said, flatly. “They lied. Said the lads tripped a mine of their own. But they’d already tied their boots together behind their backs.”

Nobody spoke for a moment. Thomas gripped his knee under the table, aware of the way the mood had shifted. A chair scraped against the floor and made him jump. He didn’t realise how tense he’d gone until the noise snapped him back to the room. Beside him, Branson was still motionless. The grip around his glass tightened slightly. When Thomas turned to get a better look at him, his eyes were fixed on the table. Then he sat forward, steadied himself against the table.

“They’re trying to bury the truth because it’s too bloody,” he said softly, “Easier for them to wash their hands of it and then call it mutiny when men don’t fall in line.”

His voice was low, but the others went quiet as soon as he spoke. He sounded practiced. Thomas watched him, unsure what to do with the small lurch of feeling in his chest.

The conversation moved on, but the tone had shifted. Less ruminative, more substantiated. Someone mentioned unions in Cork refusing British contracts. Another talked about anonymous pamphlets going out next week. No one mentioned the word rebellion, but it hovered near enough to hear.

Thomas stayed silent. Listened to every word. Not because he understood it, but because he knew better than to react to anything. Each voice offered something different, but they all carried messages of betrayal, loss, unfinished business. He couldn’t follow every detail, but he knew all too well what it meant to be told your suffering was inconvenient.

It wasn’t the same wounds, nor was it the same silence. But it was near enough to leave a mark.

The whole meeting, Branson didn’t look at him once.

But Thomas didn’t stop looking at him.

———

They walked home quietly. The streets were mostly empty now, the lamplight softened by mist, footsteps echoing faintly on the wet pavement. Thomas didn’t speak until they were nearly back to the flat.

“What did that man say?” he asked, glancing sideways. “When he was looking at me. Something with… muck?”

Branson gave a short laugh under his breath. “He called you a mucachán Breataine.”

Thomas raised an eyebrow. “Which means?”

“British pig.”

He stopped walking for half a second, put his hands in his pockets. “Charming.”

“Don’t take it personal. It’s instinctive.”

“What did you say back?”

Branson hesitated a moment, then said, “Sea, ach is mucachán Breataine maith é.”

“Well, I got the British pig part,” Thomas frowned.

That earned a faint smile. “It means ‘Yes, but he’s a good British pig.’”

Thomas stared at him. “You defended me?”

“Sort of.”

“By agreeing I’m a pig.”

“Aye, but good one, Thomas.”

He almost took offence. Almost. But something about Branson’s barely concealed grin and familiar half-shrug made it impossible. Besides, it had been a long night. He didn’t have the energy to stay insulted.

So instead, he gave a slow shake of his head and muttered, “Bastard.”

Branson chuckled.

They walked another few paces before Thomas spoke again. “I never paid much attention to Ireland back home,” he said. “It was always just… something in the newspapers. Something happening elsewhere.”

“Aye,” Branson replied, his voice quieter now. “It’s always just something, isn’t it? Until it’s your street full of soldiers. Or your mother gets searched on the way to mass. Then it gets personal.”

Thomas glanced over again but didn’t interrupt.

“Partition’s the big wound,” he went on. “But it’s more than that. We’re still in the Commonwealth, not directly under British rule but still a dominion. There are still British naval bases and our politicians have to swear an oath of allegiance to the Crown.”

He paused to take a breath. “Anyway, the damage was already there before that treaty. And now the country still hasn’t figured out how to live with itself since the Civil War. It split into the Free-Staters, who were for the treaty, and the Irregulars, who opposed it. Now they’re all supposed to live together in harmony.”

“So that part has ended,” Thomas said. “The Civil War. I wasn’t sure.”

“Officially, it’s over. But all the damage is still there, and more. Half the country’s still in ruins and the other half’s too poor to fix it. There’s no money, no jobs, and no trust left in the streets. And on top of that, the country isn’t free, despite what the English would like everyone to believe.”

There was a quiet anger to him now. It didn’t show in his tone, but in the rhythm of his walk, the way his hands flexed and his jaw held still. And when he paused, it felt more because he was out of breath, rather than finished.

Thomas didn’t push. Instead, he said carefully, “That story. At the meeting. Ballyseedy.”

Branson’s mouth tightened. His posture stiffened slightly and his steps slowed slightly.

“I didn’t know about that,” he said carefully. “Not until tonight. I gathered it was the… Free Staters attacking the Irregulars?”

“That’s still a sore point.” His response was sharp. “My brother was involved.”

“They blew him up?”

There was a pause.

“No,” Branson said, voice clipped. “He caused it.”

Thomas slowed without meaning to. A few steps later, they stopped under the hazy flicker of a streetlamp. Branson stood still, his hands flexing slightly at his sides, like they weren’t sure what to do. For a second, Thomas thought he might ask him for a cigarette, but he didn’t.

“Jack was stationed with the National Army.” His voice was steady, but the edges had sharpened. “Mid-Kerry. Everyone said he followed orders. That was the line. That he was loyal. Disciplined.”

A faint breeze moved through the street. Thomas watched him in the half-light, unsure if he should say something or let it unfold. He knew this wasn’t something he spoke of often.

“He wasn’t there that night, not at the crossroads,” Branson continued, almost to himself. “But he organised it. He helped drag lads from their cells the week before. Tied them up as well. Said it was to make them talk. Said the Irregulars were letting Ireland die and threatening peace. Called them traitors.”

The word ‘peace’ sounded ruined in his mouth.

“But aren’t you…” Thomas started, then faltered. “I mean weren’t you… Irregular?”

“Aye. Still am, in theory.”

“Have you spoken? Since?”

Branson didn’t answer right away. His face was still. Eyes fixed on something Thomas couldn’t see.

“He sent a letter,” he said eventually.  “Sent it before it happened, I received it after. He said he hoped I was safe. That he hoped I understood. I didn’t write back. Still haven’t.”

Thomas didn’t know what to do with the tightness building in his chest. He looked down at the pavement, then back up.

“Everything the empire did to us... it tried to tear us apart, but we stuck together,” Branson said. “The Civil War was different. It turned us against each other, split families. Every house had to pick. Mine was no different. Six of us siblings. Kieran’s in Liverpool. Mary’s here. The other three are back home. But one won’t answer my letters and the other two won’t answer his.”

Thomas looked at him properly then, trying to imagine what that must’ve felt like. Knowing your brother was still breathing but gone all the same. He’d lost contact with his own brothers and sister years ago, but it wasn’t malicious, just the kind of distance that grows when no one reaches first. It was different when it happened out of conflict.

He thought about the table earlier. The way Branson had sat, composed but clenched. How he hadn’t spoken until the tension had shifted, until it stopped being theory and started becoming personal.

“Did you know?” Thomas asked quietly. “At the time, I mean. What side he was on?”

“No.” Branson shook his head. “Not until I read his letter. I saw the report in the newspaper. It was awful. But getting that letter two days later was like swallowing glass.”

“John’s the eldest, I’m the youngest. Nine years between us.” He exhaled slowly.  “I learned everything from him when I was a young boy.”

“He fought in the Rising in 1916. He was at the GPO, that was the main… base, so to speak. Told me he was doing it for me while I was ‘busy chauffeuring the British aristocracy from one bloody fox hunt to the next’.”

His mouth pulled into something that might have been a smile, but didn’t stay long.

“When Sybil and I moved back to Dublin, he brought me to meetings, helped me get involved during our war for independence. We were both meant to be fighting for the same future. Turns out we had different ideas of what that looked like.”

Thomas hesitated. “Do you think he regrets it?”

“I don’t know if he even sees it as a mistake.”

Thomas studied his profile in the dim light. The tension had settled in Branson’s shoulders again, that familiar bracing he’d noticed on him when something scraped too close to the bone.

“Do you miss it?” Thomas asked, after a moment. “Ireland.”

“Every day,” Branson said. “Even when I’m furious with it. Even when it makes me sick. Still miss the people, the language, even the arguments in pubs. I miss the music in the street, the neighbours who know your name. God, I love it with everything I have in me. But it’s changed. Or maybe I have.”

After that, there was nothing more to say. Nothing else passed between them until the front door clicked shut behind them. And even then, it took a moment for either of them to move.

When Branson finally did, he paused halfway toward his room, fingers resting on the doorframe as if uncertain whether to step forward or linger. He turned slightly, looking back at Thomas.

“You don’t have to come again, you know,” he said. His voice was gentle, careful. “To the meetings, I mean. I forgot how heavy they might be for someone who is...”

He didn’t finish his sentence, but he didn’t have to. The missing word could have been a stranger, or naive, or English. All conveyed what he was trying to say.

Thomas met his eye. “I’d like to,” he said softly, and was surprised at how much he meant it.

Branson gave a small nod, gaze steady on him. Thomas hesitated a moment longer, something about the earlier conversation still pulling at him. He spoke before he fully realised what he was saying.

“You called yourself an Irregular earlier,” he began carefully, eyes not quite meeting Branson’s. “Seems a strange word for it.”

“Strange how?”

Thomas shifted his weight, searching for words.

“Just that it’s the sort of thing people call themselves when they're…” he trailed off briefly, voice almost a whisper by the end. “…like me. Queer.”

It wasn’t meant as a joke, but Branson’s face lit unexpectedly with quiet amusement. He laughed, softly at first, then louder, shoulders shaking gently as the tension from earlier seemed to loosen just a bit.

“What?” Thomas asked, defensive and embarrassed all at once.

Branson shook his head, the smile lingering warmly at the corners of his mouth. “Sorry, I just didn’t know you had a funny side.”

“I don’t,” he bristled mildly, but found himself smiling despite his irritation.

Branson’s expression softened again, eyes flicking downward briefly as if considering something new. It lasted just a heartbeat too long before he inclined his head, warmth still lingering in his eyes.

“Goodnight, Thomas.”

“Night.”

When Thomas closed his door, he exhaled softly, releasing a breath he hadn't realised he'd been holding. Undressing slowly, he moved as though he might disturb something fragile. When he lay down, sleep stayed stubbornly out of reach. His mind returned, inevitably, to the back of the pub. To the quiet intensity of the men gathered around that narrow table. He could still feel the tension, the sense of purpose laced with quiet anger.

He’d always had a keen sense of who belonged in a room and who didn’t, an instinct honed over years spent navigating the rigid hierarchy of Downton’s corridors. But tonight, he hadn’t been able to place anyone clearly. Branson’s presence there had been quietly assured yet somehow out of step. He understood these people, felt their pain deep inside himself. But this was a far cry from the polished servant’s halls and family drawing rooms he’d once inhabited, or even the familiar streets of Dublin he’d known. Thomas understood that placelessness more than he’d realised.

Since he’d arrived in Boston, he’d found himself too shaped by Downton’s etiquette to relax properly around working men. Everything in him was still wired to stand straight, speak softly, and disappear before he could be noticed. Those habits he’d developed only made him stand out more here. He realised, now, that Branson carried a similar weight. Not just a former chauffeur, but a man who had dined with the Granthams, slept under their roof, become something neither guest nor servant.

“Mucachán Breataine,” he murmured softly to himself.

He stared up at the ceiling, allowing it to curl quietly through his mind. He couldn’t even begin to spell it, but he repeated it silently. Let it echo for a while.

It wasn’t the worst he’d ever heard; he’d faced harsher words without flinching. But this one had landed differently, settling deep in him. He could see the funny side of it. Of course he could, and it really didn’t offend him. But it was still another sign of being marked as different, an outsider no matter how quietly he moved.

He turned restlessly in bed, thoughts circling until they blurred at the edges. Eventually, his eyelids grew heavy, the repeated phrase losing meaning as sleep found him.

———

The next night found Thomas back behind the bar, falling more comfortably into the rhythm he'd begun to learn. Saturdays were always busy but the shift moved swiftly enough, punctuated by the familiar sounds of clinking glasses and scattered conversation. At one point, Neil knocked over an entire tray trying to impress a girl from the jazz band who kept winking at him from the far table. Thomas had ended up helping him tidy up to avoid much scrutiny from Sergio – or worse, Louie. By the time he stepped out into the narrow alley for a break, his back ached from too much leaning and the noise was still ringing in his ears.

Jakob was already there, perched on an old wooden crate with his sleeves rolled to the elbows. The late light caught in the grey threading his beard and the curve of an old scar just along his cheekbone. He was rolling a cigarette with practiced fingers, eyes fixed downward. Thomas hovered a few feet away, not wanting to intrude but finding no better place to stand. Jakob glanced up briefly, acknowledging him silently, before returning his attention to the thin paper.

He watched the careful, practiced motion of his hands, finding himself transfixed by the slight twist of fingers and the pinch of tobacco. It reminded him of that same quiet devotion that came with polishing cutlery. He hadn't intended to say anything, content enough with silence, but Jakob shifted slightly and extended a second rolled cigarette in his direction without looking up.

He hesitated only briefly before accepting it.

“Thanks,” he murmured quietly.

Jakob struck a match on the wall beside him, lighting first his own cigarette and then Thomas’s, the glow flaring warm and brief between them. They smoked quietly for a minute or two, shoulders not quite touching. Oddly enough, the silence more companionable than he had expected.

When the older man finally spoke, his voice was low, nearly lost beneath the muted hum from inside.

“In Petrograd, I had shop,” he said abruptly, eyes focused on a distant point. “Not fancy. But it was what I had.”

Thomas glanced at him, surprised by the suddenness of the admission. Jakob didn't elaborate, just tapped ash lightly into a rusted tin can beside his feet. His expression didn’t change, but his shoulders slumped slightly. Thomas waited, uncertain if he was meant to speak or if this was a quiet confession that didn’t need an answer. Eventually, curiosity got the better of him.

“What happened to it?” he asked carefully.

Jakob shrugged, the gesture small but heavy. He examined his hands thoughtfully, then raised them with a dry smile.

“Shop went. Then the street. Then Russia. But my hands are still mine. Still good for lifting boxes.”

The cigarette was forgotten between his fingers as he observed Jakob for a long moment. His voice had carried no bitterness, only a quiet acceptance that spoke louder than any anger could have. He took a slow breath, exhaling smoke into the cool air.

“Used to polish silver,” Thomas said softly, “and serve some of the richest men in England.”

Jakob chuckled softly, warmth creeping into the low rumble of his voice. “Now you look tired all the time.”

He huffed out a laugh, surprised and a little relieved by the easy bluntness.

“Been perfecting that for years,” he admitted, smiling faintly.

Jakob’s eyes creased at the corners. “You hide it, but you’re still soft. Give it time. Boston wears everyone down.”

The words, although blunt, weren't cruel. Thomas nodded once, feeling oddly understood. For all Jakob’s quiet, he had a way of cutting through things. It wasn’t much, but it felt like a hand held out, even if no one said as much. He found himself leaning slightly against the rough brick wall, shoulders easing into a posture less rigid than his usual careful bearing allowed.

When the break ended, Jakob stood first, stretching his arms with a faint grimace. He glanced briefly at Thomas, then reached out, clapping a broad, firm hand on his shoulder.

“Back to it,” he said simply, and stepped inside without waiting for a reply.

Thomas lingered a moment longer, taking one last draw on the cigarette before crushing the end beneath his heel. He exhaled slowly, feeling the warmth of Jakob’s hand lingering on his shoulder like a quiet reassurance. When he followed him back inside, the noise and heat that greeted him felt somehow less like chaos and more like a rhythm he was learning to follow.

———

The days continued to slip by in a blur of familiar rhythms. Mornings with Sybbie, afternoons spent avoiding the kitchen area while Branson wrote at the table. Evenings were spent navigating the steady noise and heat of the bar. Neil’s clumsy attempts at charm and Sergio’s grumbled half-smiles began to feel like patterns rather than exceptions.

One night, long past closing and still smelling faintly of beer and smoke, Thomas found a folded map resting forgotten on the windowsill. Maybe a leftover from one of Branson’s errands, or something Sybbie had pulled from a drawer during one of her games. He unfolded it carefully on the kitchen table, smoothing out the creases with his palm until the North End of Boston lay flat beneath his fingertips.

The flat was quiet; Branson and Sybbie had long gone to bed. Thomas sat silently, the soft rustle of the city filtering in through the windows as he leaned over the unfolded map. His eyes drifted across the tiny print, revealing the narrow weave of streets. It wasn’t like back home where every lane eventually led to a main road and you could trace your way blindfolded. This was different. A muddle of lanes and alleys, sharp turns that led into courtyards and dead ends, streets that changed names halfway through.

He tried to orient himself. Somewhere near the bottom corner, he marked where he thought the flat was. Close to the edge of Hanover Street; he walked through there each evening to work. He knew North Street and Salem Street were either side of their one– which wasn’t marked. Sheafe Street didn’t appear at all, but he remembered it ran just off Tileston. That was enough. He placed a quiet mark for the bar, tucked somewhere close to the playground behind the Paul Revere School, just beside where he imagined the curve of Sheafe might land.

It had taken him days to figure out which church was which, but he thought he recognised Christ Church now and marked it, too, just in case. Behind it was the meeting spot. The back entrance to a pub near Battery Street, he thought. He couldn’t remember exactly, if it was the end closer to Charter or Henchman, but he remembered some of the signs he saw on the way. Frowning, he traced the line between these points with the pencil, watching it jump awkwardly over the maze of buildings and unmarked alleys. Nothing connected cleanly, but it made sense in his head.

He rubbed the back of his neck and leaned in again, squinting at the names. Some streets were Italian, some Irish, though it was never clear where one ended and the other began. Prince Street, he’d overheard, belonged to the Italians now. He passed by it some days, always filled with shouting, food smells, and boys playing in the gutters. Salem and Endicott were a safer bet, depending on the hour. Then there were the pockets around Fleet and Moon that Branson had warned him off, not for any specific reason. Just “not our crowd.”

Thomas still wasn’t sure he and Branson had the same crowd. He wasn’t sure he’d ever been someone else’s kind of person. Besides, Branson had ideas, while he just wanted to be left alone. He sighed, the pencil resting against his lip. It was almost impossible to remember which streets were truly safe, which were welcoming, and which only tolerated him.

The sound of footsteps, muffled and sleepy, drew his attention. Sybbie wandered into the room, dragging her blanket behind her with one hand, eyes half-closed against the dim kitchen light.

“You supposed to be out of bed?” he asked mildly, tilting his head slightly to look at the time as she approached the table. Half-past two.

She ignored him, peering instead at the map spread out in front of him. After a moment, she raised a small finger to the page, tapping a corner he’d overlooked entirely.

“That’s the bakery,” she said, voice soft and slightly dreamy. “The one with buns that have raisins in.”

Thomas felt his mouth twitch into a small smile. “Is it, now?”

She nodded gravely, certain of her geography. “Daddy takes me there. The lady always gives me extra raisins.”

“Sounds nice,” he murmured, obediently drawing a gentle pencil line at the spot she had pointed to and quietly writing bakery.

She watched him mark the spot, then nodded again with quiet satisfaction. After a pause, she yawned, tugging her blanket up around her shoulders.

“Night, Mr Barrow.”

“Goodnight, Miss Sybbie,” he said softly.

She trotted silently back to her room, trailing her blanket like a cape. He listened to her steps fading away, then looked back down at the map.

He traced the line he’d made between the flat and the bar, then slowly moved his pencil toward the bakery Sybbie had shown him, connecting each place quietly. From there, without thinking, he drew another careful line toward the docks, where the ship had first docked. As he studied the lines, it dawned on him that he'd begun mapping something deeper than mere geography. He was marking the boundaries of a life. This brand new life he’d never imagined or sought out. Yet here it was, unfolding in pencil marks and odd comforts he hadn’t planned to let in.

The pattern he’d created looked more like one of Sybbie’s drawings than a map. It wasn't neat or ordered, but something about its uncertainty suited him. These streets were beginning to feel more familiar beneath his feet, slowly surrendering their strangeness with every new connection he drew. He didn’t know if he’d even marked anything in the right place, but at least now he had places to mark.

After a long moment, he set down the pencil. He didn't fold the map away, just left it spread open on the table. Rising slowly, he turned toward his room, pausing briefly at the window. Outside, the hiss of trolley wheels and the occasional clatter from God-knows-where settled gently around him. For the first time in weeks, the sound felt less alien and more like something he was learning to name, street by street.

When he finally lay his head on his pillow, it was the first time he didn’t feel like a guest in his own life.

The map was still lying open on the table when he came in to the kitchen the next morning, sunlight catching in its worn creases and pencil marks. Branson was already up, kettle steaming quietly behind him. He didn't say anything, just glanced at Thomas with a small nod and carefully moved the map aside to make room for two mugs of tea. As he moved it, he studied it briefly, his thumb brushing lightly over one area.

As he set the mugs down, Thomas saw that one of the pencil lines he'd drawn the night before had smudged faintly beneath Branson’s thumb. It blurred the already uncertain route between the bakery and the docks, softening the edge of a connection he’d only just begun to form.

He paused, looking at the smudge without moving to fix it. It felt better that way. Not everything needed to be perfect; that was something he was trying to learn. Thomas reached silently for his tea, letting his fingers wrap around the mug’s warmth. Branson looked down but didn’t comment, either on the map or the smudge. Instead, he settled at the opposite chair, taking a long, slow sip as the steam rose gently between them, curling around silence.

Neither of them spoke, but it didn’t feel awkward. For once, Thomas allowed himself to simply sit, the map lying left quietly between them, marking a life he didn’t feel the need to explain.

Chapter Text

The letter was waiting for Thomas on the hall table at the end of a shift that led into the early hours of the morning. It was addressed in Anna’s careful hand, the same looping script he’d seen back home when he would peer over her shoulder to try and find out Lady Mary’s latest qualms. He stood with his coat still on, turning the envelope over in his hands, thumb pressed tight against the crease.

He didn’t open it straight away. Instead, he finished his usual routines; boots set to dry by the stove, hands scrubbed clean at the sink, kettle rattled onto the hob. He told himself he was just being sensible, but he knew he was only giving himself time to gather up the courage for whatever she might have written. He opened it finally with the blunt edge of a bread knife, careful not to tear the paper. Anna’s words spilled out in tidy rows, practical and kind as ever:

“Dear Thomas,” it began, and for a moment he almost smiled.

We are all well here, for the most part. Mr Bates says you would barely know we’d ever had an under-butler, though of course that isn’t true. Mrs Hughes has taken to managing the staff herself most mornings, which means we all keep twice as busy as before. You know, she asks after you, especially on cold mornings. The house feels smaller, I think, and quieter – at least in the corridors. Branson says you are settling in Boston, I hope the city is treating you as well as you deserve.

Lady Edith has taken to spending more time in London again, so things are rather subdued when she’s away. Lady Mary, of course, manages to keep the house lively enough. Mr Bates and I are both in good health. Daisy and Mrs Patmore still conspire in the kitchen, which means we’re never short of something sweet, even when there’s little in the larder.

There’s talk, too, of the trial in Germany. Lord Grantham brought it up at dinner. He called the leader of those Brownshirts “a menace,” and said the world will come to regret ignoring men like that. I’m not sure what I think, only that I’m glad you’re far away from any of it. Mrs Hughes says you’re probably safer in America these days, though she did wink when she said it, so perhaps there’s a story she’s not telling.

Do write and tell me about Boston. The house isn’t quite the same without your quick wit (though Mrs Patmore might not agree). I hope you’ve found kind people and good work. I think of you often, and hope you are finding your place there.

With love,

Anna

He read it through twice, the words drawing him in and sending him reeling at the same time. It was strange, being missed. Stranger, still, to hear it set down so plainly, with no expectation that he answer in kind. Anna had always had a way of making things sound simple, as if the world might settle itself with a little kindness and a fresh pot of tea. He set the letter down, smoothing it out with his palm, and allowed himself to miss the place, just for a moment.

He took out paper from the drawer and set it on the table, the pen fitting awkwardly in his fingers. He started in his best hand, as if the neatness would make the words sound truer.

Dear Anna,

Thank you for your letter. I’m glad to hear all is well at Downton. Boston is–

He hesitated.

busy. The streets are always crowded and there’s music in the pubs nearly every night. I’ve found work behind the bar at a place near the docks. It’s not so different to what I did before, in a way. I know how to keep busy and I’ve picked things up quickly. It’s all falling into place now, bit by bit. The city is starting to feel more familiar every day.

He paused again, the nib hovering. The words felt stilted already, slipping into the kind of polite optimism that Anna might expect but wouldn’t quite believe. He crossed out the last line, tried again.

People are friendly enough, though it’s not the same. It takes getting used to.

He stopped for a third time, realising it was too close to honest, then veered back.

There’s a bakery just down the road that makes bread nearly as good as Mrs Patmore’s, and the air in the mornings always smells warm and yeasty, even before the sun comes up. I suppose I’m settling in well enough.

He sat back, reading what he’d written. It all sounded true in a way, but it wasn’t the truth he felt. He wanted to say he was well, that Boston suited him, that he had settled in with no trouble at all. He wanted to say the right things: The work is good. I have friends here. I’m happy. The lies stacked easily, ready to be written, but he caught himself before putting them to paper. None of it felt true. He couldn’t tell Anna the truth either, not as it actually was. Not about the loneliness that pressed in at the edges of his days, or the way he still measured his steps by other people’s routines, never quite sure how to fill the empty space he’d fought so hard to carve out. He couldn’t write about the nights when he missed hearing the bells, or the way conversation sometimes stuttered to a halt the moment he spoke. He tapped the pen on the paper, then dropped it altogether. What was there to say? Boston wasn’t awful. He’d survived worse, and would again. But he was tired of trying to convince himself he belonged, because he clearly didn’t.

Downton was clear in his mind’s eye. He could see Mr Bates nodding gravely in the servants’ hall, Jimmy laughing at his own jokes, Mrs Patmore bellowing across the kitchen at Daisy. He could almost smell the bread baking, feel the scuffed wood of the table under his hand.

Eventually, he set the pen down and folded Anna’s letter, along with his half-finished one, into the pocket of his coat. He washed his mug, dried his hands, and turned off the light in the kitchen. Maybe later, he’d try again.

But for now, he let the unfinished sentences drift, and sat in the sunlight until the light faded from the window and he became too tired to stay upright.

———

The night started slow, but not the kind of slow Thomas liked, which usually allowed him to ease in. It was restless, with too much space between customers and nothing to do but polish the same row of glasses. There was a draught along the floorboards, and the absence of Jakob and Sergio had stripped the place of its usual rhythm.

Usually there was a minimum of three of them at any time, but it was Jakob’s day off. Sergio hadn’t left a note, but there was word from one of the regulars that he was off chasing a plumber down Endicott after a burst pipe in his building. Thomas found himself counting bottles, tracking the drip from a leaky tap, anything to fill the silence that lingered after the early crowd filtered out.

Neil, for his part, filled the void by humming along to the crackling radio set above the till. He’d switched it to a baseball game no one was listening to, half for the background noise and half for the way the commentary made it sound as if something exciting might happen at any moment. The effect was mostly lost on Thomas, but he appreciated the effort.

The city had settled into a damp spring that made everyone irritable. The regulars came in, hung up their coats, and watched their drinks with the wariness of men who’d seen too many paydays come and go. Neil moved quietly around them, taking orders, topping up the till, humming under his breath. Thomas kept mostly to the far side, focused on keeping the taps running and the glasses clean, determined not to let the unfamiliarity show.

“Feels like we’re keepin’ watch out for ghost ships, Tommy,” Neil remarked as the place seemed to die down. “Reckon we’ll see a single soul before midnight?”

Thomas arched a brow, adjusting a stack of pint glasses by the sink. He really hated the nickname he’d seemed to earn himself here, just by existing.

“We’ll be lucky if we see anyone at all with the weather turning” he said, not looking up from the glasses. “Even the regulars must have something better to do.”

As if on cue, the front door let in a brief rush of cold, followed by the heavy step of a local patron, McKendrick. Thomas had only sever seen him from a distance, and had never spoken to directly. He took the same stool he always did, the one with the split vinyl and the leg that wobbled if you didn’t sit just right. He was a bear of a man, still in his work coat, reeking of oil. According to Sergio, he’d been coming here longer than the wallpaper.

Neil reached for a glass, glancing back at Thomas. “Duty calls.”

He poured McKendrick’s drink from memory, set it in front of him with the easy routine of long practice. The old man barely grunted in thanks, his attention on the horse racing results in the sports section of his paper. The radio cut to static, then back to the drone of a commentator, and Thomas wondered if this was all the excitement they’d see tonight.

For a while, it seemed that might be true. A young couple wandered in, ordered one round, then left, after a few minutes of the girl sipping her drink quickly and tugging at her companion’s sleeve. Thomas caught himself wishing he could have made it easier for her, then wondered if he’d ever stop noticing the people who didn’t quite fit in. The bar returned to its state of uneasy quiet. He stacked glasses while Neil wiped the taps with a worn rag. McKendrick’s slow turning of newspaper pages was the only break in the monotony.

It was just past eleven when things shifted. Neil had ducked into the back to fetch a crate of ginger ale, leaving Thomas alone behind the counter, with just McKendrick, and another man he didn’t recognise at the far end of the bar. McKendrick caught his eye, lips pulling into a smirk.

“So, Tommy,” he called out, voice carrying far too easily in the near-empty room. “How’d you end up here then? Couldn’t cut it with the ladies back home, or just prefer it amongst the boys?”

Thomas froze. The edge of the tap pressed against his palm, his knuckles whitening where they gripped the bar. He managed not to show it in his face – he’d had enough practice with that – but the cold sweat that prickled along the back of his neck betrayed him to himself. McKendrick’s eyes were fixed on him, too amused, too certain.

It wasn’t even the insult that got to him, he’d heard worse on the front. It was the certainty. How could McKendrick know? He’d spent his whole life hiding the part of himself that made him a target, learning to move carefully, let nothing show in a smile or a glance. Boston was supposed to be a blank slate, yet somehow, he’d let something slip.

He thought of the way he held himself, the clipped habits that never left him, the careful way he avoided talking about women, the softness he tried not to show when he let Sybbie take his hand. Had someone noticed him walking home late, or the way he’d looked at Jakob’s hands polishing a glass, or Neil’s shoulder brushing his as they reached for the same mug? He’d been careful. Hadn’t he?

McKendrick just grinned, clearly pleased with himself for drawing blood. “Don’t look so surprised, lad. I’m not blind.”

Before Thomas could find a retort or even a blank silence to hide behind, Neil reappeared, hauling the crate in with an exaggerated groan. He picked up on the tension at once. His sharpened, but his tone stayed light.

“Hey Mac, you keep on with that sorta talk and you’ll have us suffering through your courting stories again. God help us, nobody needs to picture you dancing with anybody.”

He dropped the crate behind the bar with a bang, loud enough to make McKendrick’s beer slosh in its glass.

“Besides,” he continued, before anyone else had a chance to speak, “we all know you only come in here because there’s no one else who’ll put up with you.”

That drew a laugh from the man Thomas didn’t recognise. McKendrick grunted, pretended to go back to his paper, but the bravado had been replaced by a sulky silence.. The threat in the words had been exposed as just a performance, a flex for his own benefit more than any real danger. Thomas caught Neil’s eye for half a second and found the smallest hint of a smile.

Still, as Thomas turned back to the taps, his mind caught on the moment. He couldn’t help but wonder, again, what had given him away. Surely it couldn’t have been the nervous laugh that escaped earlier when Neil teased him? He moved more stiffly for the rest of the shift, but forced himself to keep his voice steady, to carry on as if nothing had happened. That, too, was practice.

The rest of the night settled back into routine. McKendrick drank in silence, leaving his paper behind as he always did. Neil returned to humming along with the radio, stacking empty glasses and sweeping crumbs from the far end of the bar.

When the bar finally emptied, Thomas gathered the last handful of coasters, stacking them with deliberate care as the clock behind the counter ticked toward closing. He was hoping by now that no one else would come in. Neil wiped down the taps, slower now that there was no one left to watch. He flicked off the radio, letting the room settle into a softer quiet. There was a settled silence between them but the echo of McKendrick’s words still lingered.

It was Thomas who spoke first.

“You don’t need to say anything. he muttered, not quite meeting Neil’s eye. “People like him– they just want to get a rise.”

Neil leaned back, folding his arms. “Didn’t say a word.”

“Good,” he said, too quickly. “I’ve seen worse, if you’re worried. Back when I fought in the war, men got that sort of talk for any small thing… It’s easier to just ignore it.”

“I’m not worried. But Ma and Da taught me not to let anyone think they can walk over anyone else.”

Thomas hesitated, then forced a dry smile. “It’s fine. Wouldn’t be the first time someone’s taken me for– well, whatever he thinks I am.”

There was a pause, first. Then, Neil said, quiet but deliberate, “Would it be so bad if he was right?”

“Depends on who’s asking,” Thomas gripped the cloth a little tighter.

Neil’s mouth twisted in something that was almost a smile. “That’s true enough.”

He didn’t press the point, just went back to wiping down the taps, humming low in his throat. For the first time, Thomas felt the weight in his chest ease a little. Neil hadn’t tried to explain it away, hadn’t told him to just ignore it. They worked in companionable silence until the place was tidy, and when Neil was pulling on his coat to leave, he paused by the door and turned back.

“I’ll leave you to lock up. If you ever fancy a word, or just want out for a pint, you know where I’ll be.”

Thomas nodded, not looking up. “Cheers.”

The door shut behind him with a gentle click. Alone again, Thomas lingered at the bar, running a finger along the wood where Neil’s hand had just rested. For the first time since he’d arrived in Boston, the bar felt less like a test, and more like a place to stay.

———

The door stuck slightly as Thomas let himself in, the way it always did when he came back from his afternoon walk. He nudged it closed with his heel, balancing a paper bag in one hand and brushing the rain off his coat with the other. The flat seemed unusually quiet until a burst of childish laughter rang sharply from one of the bedrooms.

He reached into the bag and pulled out the chocolate bar; thick, dark, neatly wrapped in gold foil with a red paper band. A little too fancy for a four-year-old, probably, but it had caught his eye. Something about it felt like a treat worth giving, especially to a child whose world seemed too full of moving and saying goodbye.

“Sybbie?” he called.

Before she could answer, Branson stood up from the kitchen table, arms folded and an unreadable look on his face.

“You went out,” he said, not quite a question.

“I went for a walk, like I always do,” Thomas replied. “Just needed the air.”

Branson’s gaze flicked to the paper bag. “What’s that?”

“Chocolate,” he said simply, holding it up. “Saw it in the window. Thought Sybbie might like it.”

“You thought she might like it,” Branson echoed, flat.

“Is there an issue?”

“She didn’t eat her dinner.” His voice was calm, but it had a low edge of something just short of irritation. “Wouldn’t touch the carrots, barely touched the mash. And then you come home with sweets?”

“I didn’t know she hadn’t eaten. It’s just a bit of chocolate.”

“You didn’t ask either.”

Thomas sighed and set the bag down on the counter, the chocolate beside it. “I wasn’t trying to undermine you. I thought it would cheer her up.”

“That’s not the point,” Branson said. “You can’t just turn up with sweets whenever you feel like it. She’ll be climbing the walls.”

“She’s four, not a wild animal.”

He stepped past Thomas, took the chocolate from the counter and put it on the highest shelf.  “You don’t get to just do what you think feels right. You’re not her father.”

That hit Thomas harder than he’d expected. He opened his mouth to argue, then shut it again, refusing to let it show. He watched as Branson fussed with the dishes, stacking plates that didn’t need stacking, all the while keeping his back turned. From the next room, Sybbie hummed to herself, probably rearranging her dolls if Thomas knew her at all by now.

“I know,” he said, quietly. “I didn’t mean to step on your toes.”

Branson set the plates down with a bit more force than necessary. He rubbed the back of his neck, exhaling through his nose.

“I know you didn’t. But you do it anyway,” he said, eventually. “You give in every time she wants something, and then I’m the one left picking up the pieces when she doesn’t get her way. It’s not that I don’t appreciate you being kind, it’s just that kindness isn’t always the same as parenting.”

“I never said I was parenting her.”

“No, but sometimes it feels like you want to be.”

Thomas’s shoulders tensed. “She’s the only person in this country who looks at me like I belonged here.”

He knew that wasn’t quite true anymore but it still felt true, so he said it anyway.

“That’s not the same as her being your daughter.”

There was a raw silence then. Neither of them moved. Thomas lowered his eyes to the counter, jaw clenched.

He ran a hand over his face. “I’ll stay out of it.”

“I didn’t say that.”

“You may as well have.”

Branson stepped back slightly, the fight leaking out of him. “Look… I’m not mad you bought her chocolate. I just want to be the one setting the rules.”

He nodded once, tightly. “Understood.”

“Thomas–” Branson started, but didn’t finish. His mouth opened, then closed again.

“I’m going to change,” Thomas said, already turning toward his bedroom. “Tell her she can have the chocolate tomorrow. Or eat it yourself. Your call.”

Branson watched him go, arms still folded, the line between gratitude and frustration drawn fine across his brow.

In his room, Thomas shut the door behind him and sat on the edge of the bed. The sound of Sybbie’s play carried faintly through the wall. He let his shoulders drop. The paper bag with the groceries he’d picked up still sat on the counter in the kitchen, unopened. Branson could empty it if he really cared.

He hadn’t meant anything by it. He’d seen it in the window of the Italian grocer on Prince Street, nestled between oranges and imported biscuits, and bought it without thinking. It was just a small thing, really. But maybe that was the problem. He wasn’t sure anymore where the line was, or when he’d started thinking of Sybbie as more than just Tom’s daughter. She’d run to him that morning with a drawing, wrapped her arms around his waist without hesitation. He’d felt something tighten in his chest then, something he’d never felt before. It felt dangerously close to hope.

He peeled off his damp shirt, letting it drop to the chair in the corner. In the dim light, his reflection stared back at him. His skin was pale, stretched thin across collarbones and shoulders, old marks scattered along his side. He’d shed half a stone since leaving England, clothes hanging a little looser every week.

A knock came, gentle, at the door.

“You don’t have to sulk,” Branson said, voice low through the wood.

“I’m not sulking.”

“Good,” came the reply, but nothing else followed.

He dressed in careful stages, each movement deliberate. The shirt was a little stiff from drying too close to the stove, and hung looser on his shoulders than it used to. He straightened his cuffs, tucked the tails with unnecessary precision, tied his shoes. The familiar ritual was calming. Only when he reached for his wallet did his hands betray a small tremor. He dabbed at his neck with a towel, brushed his hair back, and checked his pockets by feel to make sure he’d emptied out his tips from yesterday. Finally, he took a moment to swap the old leather glove for a fresh one, covering the long-healed-over bullet mark.

Once he was ready to head out, he opened the door. Branson was still at the kitchen table, still standing. He looked at Thomas, something softer in his expression now.

“She’ll be happy tomorrow, you know. About the chocolate.”

Thomas shrugged. “That wasn’t the point.”

“I know.”

They both stood a moment longer than necessary.

“You’re good with her,” Branson said eventually. “Too good, sometimes. That’s what worries me.”

Thomas raised an eyebrow. “Worries you how?”

He looked away. “Because it’s not forever. And she’ll notice when people stop being there.”

The words sank in slowly. Thomas stared at him, not sure whether to be angry or ashamed. For a second, he couldn’t decide if he wanted to say something else or walk out.

“You think I don’t know that?” he said.

Branson’s gaze didn’t lift. “I think you forget.”

“Forget?” Thomas repeated, the word catching somewhere tight in his throat. “You think I’d just get up and walk out, leaving her wondering why? Because trust me, I’ve got more practice at dealing with that than you have.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

“It’s exactly what you meant.” His voice was quiet, but sharper now. “You think I’m overstepping. That I’ve gotten too comfortable, too close.”

Branson finally looked at him again. “I think you’re trying to build something here that she might not get to keep.”

Thomas laughed, once, hollow. “So what do you want me to do? Be cold with her? Pretend I don’t care?”

“I want you to be careful.”

“I am careful,” he said, jaw tight. “Every bloody day, I’m careful. About what I say, how I say it, where I stand in a room, who I look at, what I let show. You think I’d risk hurting her?”

“I think you don’t always know what you mean to her,” Branson said carefully, “but she’s young and her world is small. She trusts fast.”

Thomas stepped forward, the words finally pushing out. “She’s your daughter, you make the calls. But Sybbie is the first person in years who doesn’t look at me like I’m a danger or a mistake. I didn’t ask for that. It just happened.”

“When have I ever looked at you like you’re a danger?”

“You’re doing it right now, Branson.”

“I don’t think you’re a danger, Thomas,” he replied, frowning. “For goodness sake, I invited you here for a reason. But you haven’t exactly made it easy for me to trust that you’re staying and I don’t want Sybbie to end up disappointed if you decided not to stick it here.”

Thomas’s shoulders dropped, but he didn’t back down. “You think I’ll run the moment things get hard.”

Branson didn’t answer.

“Say it,” he said. “Go on.”

No answer. He let out a sharp huff. Branson looked like he wanted to say something else, but nothing came.

Thomas turned his head toward the sound of the ticking kitchen clock. “I’m not going anywhere. But I’ll keep my distance.”

“That’s not–” Branson stopped himself. “That’s not what I said either.”

“No,” Thomas said, already backing away. “Don’t worry, you didn’t need to say it.”

———

The bar closed up just shy of two. Just Thomas and Neil again. Sergio had the night off and Jakob left an hour earlier, after a phone call from his wife about his daughter being unwell. Rain came down hard enough that the gutter out front overflowed, sending a muddy stream toward the bar’s step. Neil slid the bolt across the door, then jerked his head at Thomas as he shrugged into his jacket.

“You bound for Hanover?” he asked, voice flat, rubbing at the back of his neck.

“That way, more or less,” Thomas said, tucking his hands in his pockets. His knuckles on his good hand were raw from scrubbing. He was tired enough that he’d rather walk than bother making conversation.

Neil hesitated, glancing out at the street. “It’s on my way, you know. Could see you as far as Hanover. If you don’t mind the company.”

His tone was light, but Thomas knew by now how to read between the lines. He looked at the younger man, trying to read the angle. Trying to figure out if maybe he was just being decent, or if he meant something else. Neil met his eyes and refused to look away. For a moment, neither of them moved.

For a split second, Thomas almost said yes. Maybe he’d have let Neil tag along. If even just for the company, maybe to see what else might happen. He let himself imagine it briefly – crossing into the darkness somewhere, finding a wall at his back, hands at his belt. He could almost feel Neil’s knuckles grazing his hip, breath warm against his neck. But then he caught himself. The fight back at the flat was still too fresh in his mind, Branson’s words still rattling around in his chest.

He shook his head, mouth twitching at the corner. “Nah, I’m alright. Bit of a headache on me tonight, think I need to walk it off.

His eyes lingered on Thomas’s face a moment longer, not quite smiling anymore. “Suit yourself, Tommy. Offer stands, any night.”

Thomas nodded, wishing for a second that he was a little braver.

“See you tomorrow,” he said, tone flat.

“Don’t get lost,” Neil called after him.

He stepped out into the night. The streets felt emptier after closing, rain battering the shopfronts and washing last night’s rubbish down the gutter. Thomas kept his head down, collar turned up, the air sharp and damp against his skin. Puddles caught the light from gas lamps, making everything look bent out of shape. The flat wasn’t far from Sheafe Street, but he preferred to take the longer way – easier to avoid being seen. Salem Street was probably better avoided since the Italians had taken it over but no one had ever bothered him so far, not even the gangs outside St Leonard’s. He passed shuttered bakeries, the window of a tailor’s dark but for a crack of light under the door, someone working late or drinking alone.

Halfway up a narrow lane, he slowed, hearing laughter. It was low, muffled, not the kind you hear in polite company. He glanced left. In a doorway tucked between a closed cobbler’s and an empty storefront, two men leaned together, coats pulled close. One reached for the other’s hand. They were older than him, rough-looking, nothing soft about them.

He didn’t mean to look. Didn’t mean to stare. But there was something bold in the way they stood, the way their shoulders pressed together and how their bodies were angled; there was no missing what that meant. The taller man’s hand lingered too long at the other’s hip, a private joke passing between them. For a second, Thomas froze. A flash of envy jabbed through him, followed by dread. Didn’t they know better than to risk it so publicly? Did they even care?

He kept walking, but not quick enough. The shorter man caught his eye, a flicker of something sharp in his look. For a split second, Thomas hesitated, feeling caught out. The man gave a nod, small, secretive, almost a challenge. Thomas nearly nodded back, then caught himself.

Looking away quickly, Thomas’s heart leapt into his throat. Still, he kept moving, not breaking stride. Behind him, the laughter started again, softer this time. A door closed with a scrape and a thud, and the alley emptied back into itself. He shoved his hands deeper in his pockets, pulse still jumping.

Thomas wasn’t stupid. He knew the risks. He’d seen men lose teeth, jobs, whole lives over less. Sure enough, hadn’t the same thing nearly happened to him back at Downton He remembered the look on Jimmy’s face, the way word spread. The entire house finding out about it the next day, words from Carson he would never forget. He came so close to losing everything back then. Boston wasn’t just a free haven for men like him, it was never going to be that easy. But he was starting to learn that sometimes the city felt too big to care, too crowded to notice a single pair of men in a doorway.

He turned onto a wider street, soft rain washing the last of the night’s heat off the pavement. For the first time in years, he felt something other than fear pulling at his ribs. Here, you could look and be looked at. Maybe it wasn’t any safer than England was, but at least here, he didn’t have a reputation to uphold. It wasn’t like Downton, or even in the village, where everyone knew who he was. Maybe here, anonymity was its own kind of safety.

By the time he reached his block, his head was clearer, but his heart was still thumping a little hard. The streetlight overhead was still flickering. According to Branson, it was supposed to have been fixed months before he’d even arrived in Boston. Thomas stood outside for a minute, breathing the cold night, one hand pressed against the brickwork. He stared down at the pavement, letting the rainwater drip from his coat. Only when his breath evened out did he finally fish his keys from his pocket, but he lingered another moment longer, the nod still warm in his chest.

He let himself into the building and climbed the narrow stairs to the third floor, boots squelching on each worn tread. The landing was quiet, save for the creak of pipes and the faint noise from a neighbour’s radio down the hall. Thomas unlocked his own door and stepped inside. The flat was mostly dark, save for the yellow glow coming from the kitchen area, where Branson sat at the table with a mug in his hand.

He looked up, nodded once, nothing in his posture suggesting he’d been waiting up, but Thomas knew he had. He hung his coat and ran a hand through his wet hair, glancing over as he crossed to the sink.

“Couldn’t sleep?” he asked, filling the silence.

“You know how it is,” Branson shrugged, eyes on his tea. He gestured at the kettle, half an offer, half habit.

Thomas shook his head. “I’ll be up all night if I do.”

It would have been easy to leave it there, both of them performing the script of men too tired to push. But Thomas was still raw from the walk home, from the fight earlier in the week, from whatever moment happened between him and Neil before that – if you could even call it a moment. He took a seat, resting his arms on the table.

“Branson,” he said. “I need to ask you something.”

Branson’s mouth pulled sideways, wary. “Should I be worried?”

Thomas hesitated. “Why do you always act like nothing happened? We go at it one minute, and then the next you’re… what? Fine again? Is that an Irish thing?”

There was a half-smile from Branson, but it didn’t reach his eyes. “You ever seen what happens if you hang onto every row? You’d spend your life mad at half the town, your own family included. That’s not living, that’s digging your own grave by inches.”

“Never seemed to bother me,” Thomas shrugged.

“I can see it bothering you every day.”

“It’s just– I don’t know,” he let out a breath, frustrated. Where I grew up, people don’t let things go so easy. If you’re angry, you stay angry for a bit. You say your piece.”

Branson studied him briefly, before speaking again.

“I say my piece. But let myself burn hot and then it’s out of my system. No sense holding a grudge. Trust me, there’s people at home I could’ve hated all my life if I really wanted to. But why put myself through that?”

“And you don’t find that strange?” Thomas asked.

Branson shook his head, matter-of-fact. “Never did. Life’s too short. Lost enough already.”

“So you just let things go? No grudges?”

“I guess so.”

“Until it comes to hating the British Empire,” Thomas pressed, half joking, half wanting the row.

“The British Empire always is the exception to the rule,” Branson grinned, seeing the funny side of it. Thomas wasn’t sure he wanted him to.

The clock on the wall ticked a steady beat, filling the space that would have normally felt awkward, but didn’t tonight. Branson tipped his chair back on two legs, his eyes still with that far-off look, the one that meant he was somewhere else. Thomas watched him, waiting, unsure if another fight was coming or if they’d worn themselves out for tonight. The world outside the window went on, indifferent.

“Sometimes I don’t know where I stand here,” Thomas said, voice quieter now. “Sometimes I feel like I’m always a guest.”

Branson snorted, but there was nothing mean in it. “You’re not a guest. I didn’t mean for you to feel like one.”

“I know I’m not Sybbie’s father.”

“You may as well be her second father,” Branson laughed. “She loves the bones of you, you know.”

Something in that caught in Thomas’s chest, warm and raw all at once. He didn’t answer, and for once, it didn’t feel like there was anything left to argue about. Branson took a long sip of tea, the mug hiding half his face. He set it down, looking at Thomas sidelong.

“You’re good for her, you know,” he said. “For both of us. I get wound up, I know I do. Doesn’t mean I want you gone. I’m just… protective of her.”

Thomas ran a thumb along the edge of the table, not trusting himself to speak for a moment.

“I get that,” he replied, eventually. “You make it all seem so easy, though.”

“It’s not,” Branson said. “But that doesn’t mean it has to be hard every minute either. And it’s always going to be harder if you’re not trying.”

“You sound like Anna,” Thomas huffed out a short, reluctant laugh.

“Not the worst comparison I’ve gotten.”

Thomas let his head drop forward, elbows on the table. “You know, back at Downton, I never thought I’d end up here. Didn’t think I’d make it this far, if I’m honest.”

Branson’s tone softened. “Well, you did. And I’m glad for it. And so is Sybbie.”

They sat for a while with nothing for company but the rain against the windows. The heat from the kitchen made Thomas’s eyelids heavy. He was struck with the realisation that here, he could stay put for a while, like there was space for him here, if only he kept his feet under the table.

Pushing his mug aside, Branson rose with a quiet stretch. “I’m for bed. Lock up, will you?”

“Already did,” Thomas said, voice steady.

Branson hesitated at the door. “Night, Thomas.”

“Night… Tom.”

The door clicked shut behind him, leaving Thomas alone in the soft half-light. He let himself sit there a little longer, until the warmth seeped out of the mug and the rain let up. When he finally got up, the flat felt less like a halfway house and more like somewhere a person might stay. He rinsed the mugs, then switched off the light and let himself drift down the hall to bed, lighter than he’d felt in weeks.

———

Dear Anna,

I meant to write you sooner, but things seem to run away with me here. Your last letter came at the perfect time, as always. But I had to read it at least three times before I could bring myself to try and answer. It felt strange to see your handwriting on this side of the Atlantic, but good too. I won’t lie and pretend I miss home, but I could never forget the faces of those who always showed me kindness.

Boston is… well, it’s not home. Not yet. Maybe it never will be, but I’m starting to see how a person could grow used to it. The city is bigger than I imagined. It’s loud and restless and always seems to be moving in a way that makes it easy to disappear. There are trams (they call them trolleys here) that rattle through the streets at all hours and ships unloading down at the docks so early it feels like the day starts before I’ve finished sleeping. It doesn’t help that I’m working night shifts into the early hours of the morning either. Sometimes I stand on the stoop outside our building in the morning and watch the bread carts go past, flour in the air, and it almost reminds me of home. Then someone speaks and the accents kick in, reminding me where I am.

Work is steady, which is something to be grateful for. I’ve landed at a bar on Sheafe Street, not far from Christ Church – you might know it, there’s a framed painting of it in the servants corridor back home. Most nights, I work with two others – Jakob, who’s Russian, quiet and never seems to miss anything, and Sergio, who is Italian and loud. There’s a younger lad too, Neil, who knows every regular by name and seems to have made it his business to figure me out. It isn’t Downton, but it keeps me occupied. The hours are long, but there’s comfort in knowing what’s expected of me. Though I think Mrs Patmore would have a fit if she saw the state I come home in.

The regulars are a mix – dockworkers, clerks, a few who I’m sure have never paid for a drink in their lives. Most keep to themselves. Some are friendlier than others, and there’s always someone ready to have a go if they sense you’re not quite like them. I’m learning not to take it personally – Mrs Hughes would be proud of that. Neil’s quick to change the subject if things turn sour. I don’t know if he does it for my sake or his own, but I’m grateful either way.

Branson and Sybbie are well. Sybbie’s growing faster than seems fair. She’s picked up the local accent already and corrects me if I say anything the ‘English’ way. She’s the only person here who’s never once looked at me sideways. Well, maybe her and Neil. I brought her home a chocolate bar last week and it caused more trouble than it was worth. Branson says I’m too soft on her, and he’s probably right. Sometimes I forget I’m not her father. The truth is, I don’t always know where I fit in this little flat, or what I’m meant to be, but most days it feels better to be useful, even if I put a foot wrong now and then.

Branson and I argue sometimes. nothing serious, just the way people do when they’re tired and not quite sure how to live together. Truth be told, we’re probably too similar. I reckon if we had to spend more time together back home, we would’ve clashed a lot more. One thing I’ve learned though, is that he lets things go quickly. I’m still getting used to that.

I won’t pretend I’ve settled in properly. There are days I wake up and wonder what I’m still doing here, or if I’m making a fool of myself trying to start over in a city where no one knows my name. Other times, I walk home from work and in the quiet night air, I realise there are places here where it’s possible to breathe a little easier. I’ll not weigh you down with the details, Anna, but I will say there are others who carry the same burdens as I do. It’s definitely not lost on me that there are lives here that don’t need hiding quite so fiercely, even if it’s only in the shadows.

Some nights, the loneliness catches up with me, but it’s different than before. At Downton, I was always watching myself, never letting anyone close, and it wore me down in a way I didn’t see until I left. Here, there’s space for something else. I’m not sure what, quite yet, but definitely something.

I don’t know if you remember all those years ago, when we both had been at Downton for less than a year and we got stuck in the cellar. We bickered, then sat in silence for a bit. Then we talked, you made me realise I didn’t need to always resort to bitterness. Of course, that only lasted while we were in the cellar. After Carson freed us, you said we were friends and I corrected you be saying we were allies. We probably didn’t speak one word to each other for about six months after that, but I knew there was at least one person in the house who didn’t hate me.

The reason I’m saying this is because you asked me if I’d found kind people and good work. The work is steady, nothing to complain about. The people… well I wouldn’t call them friends, but they’re certainly allies for now. I think I’m starting to see the outline of a life, if I let myself want it. I’m not there yet, but for the first time in a long while, I can see how it might be possible. I have you to thank for that.

I hope you’re keeping well. Give my best to Mr Bates, and to Daisy, Mrs Hughes, everyone. Tell Mrs Patmore I do miss her tea, and I don’t mind her knowing it. Thank you again for writing. It meant more than I expected, to know someone was thinking of me.

With best,

Thomas

Chapter Text

Thomas set the chipped mug on the drying rack and reached for the dishtowel, though the cup was already dry. Old habits Carson had beat into him. He reckoned he’d be in his seventies and still wiping things that didn’t need it and straightening the line of plates on the shelf. He caught himself listening for Sybbie’s footsteps on the hallway boards, or the uneven scrape of Branson’s shoes across the entryway – he knew they weren’t home but still expected it regardless. He’d never liked being alone at Downton, but here, he valued the silence more than ever. Now it belonged to him.

It had been just over a week since the last time he’d had the place to himself, since he’d written the letter to Anna. Bar shifts bleeding into the small hours, afternoons fractured by sleep, the city outside rumbling with early spring: streetcars, horse dung, distant shouting, always the smell of fish when he walked down Hanover Street. That was his life now. He briefly thought of writing another letter to Anna, but didn’t want to be a nuisance.

He wiped down the counter, pressing the cloth along the edge a little harder than was needed. The doorbell rang sharply in the hush of the flat, jolting him back to the present. For a moment, he almost ignored it. He wanted to leave it, but habit pulled him to the door.

He opened it, half-expecting a mistake, but instead found a woman he only recognised from a photograph he’d seen on the side table near the settee. She was taller than Branson, her hair pulled back in a way that made her face look younger than it probably was, coat collar turned up. Beside her stood a small boy in a battered cap, clutching something in both hands.

“Mary,” Thomas said, surprised by the steadiness in his own voice.

She smiled, a bit wary. “Thomas Barrow, isn’t it?”

The Irish in her accent wasn’t as strong as her brother’s, which made sense as she’d clearly been here a lot longer.

“That’s me,” he said, stepping back so they could see into the flat. The boy peered around his legs, wide-eyed.

“I was just passing, thought I’d best drop this over,” Mary said, holding up a package. “Kieran – our brother – sent it over, he still keeps sending Tom’s stuff to ours.”

He took it automatically. The boy continued to stare, first at Thomas, then at the flat behind him, as if trying to map out the whole flat without taking a single step.

“Come in,” Thomas said, almost startled by his own hospitality.

He stood aside and let them through, suddenly self-conscious about the still-damp mug on the rack and the newspaper folded crooked on the table. He almost apologised, then caught himself as he realised he had nothing to apologise for.

Mary stepped in first, glancing at the kitchen and then at the pile of boots by the door. The boy hovered, then darted after her, gaze fixed on everything. Thomas made for the kettle.

“Tea?” he asked.

“Please, if you’re making it,” Mary said, sliding her hands into her pockets.

She looked around the kitchen, trying not to make it obvious but he noticed how her eyes landed on details and moved on without making any comment. There was a short silence as Thomas filled the pot and set out mismatched cups. He caught Mary watching him and found himself standing a bit straighter, as if for inspection.

The boy was still watching him with a sharp focus that only children had. He was used to it from Sybbie, though it had been almost two months since she’d looked at him like that. He found himself searching the boy’s features for traces of Branson – his seriousness, the slightly wary set of his mouth. Sybbie had that too, sometimes.

“You must be Seánie,” he said, when their eyes finally met and neither of them let their gaze waver.

The boy nodded, serious. “You’re Thomas.”

“That’s me,” Thomas gave one nod.

“But that’s just Tom… with ‘iss’ at the end.”

“Very nearly,” he said, suppressing a smile. “But I’ve an ‘h’ in mine. Makes all the difference.”

“Sounds the same,” the boy shrugged. “Is that why you live together?”

Thomas couldn’t help but let his smile show fully.

“It’s just a coincidence,” he said, glancing at Mary for backup.

“He’s been waiting to ask since we left the house,” Mary laughed. “He thinks it’s very odd, the pair of you living together.”

Her smile softened the comment, and what could have been intrusive was diffused by the warmth in her voice, more amused than curious. Thomas slid the sugar bowl toward her and busied himself with spoons, the easy choreography of hosting coming as a familiar distraction.

“Well,” he said, “it’s a big city. Maybe there are lots more Toms and Thomases.”

Seánie wrinkled his nose, unconvinced. “I still think it’s funny.”

Mary accepted her tea, curling both hands around the mug. She nodded at the seat opposite. “Sit, won’t you? I’m not stopping long.”

Thomas sat, careful not to sprawl. The kitchen felt smaller with guests. Mary took up the space by the window, while Seánie sat perched at the table’s edges, shoes swinging above the floor. Thomas guessed he couldn’t be more than three, though his questions belonged to a five-year-old.

She offered a small smile. “So, how have you been finding it? Settling in all right?”

“Branson keeps things in order,” he managed a thin smile. “Makes it easier.”

“He’s always been good at that,” she said, almost to herself, as well as to him. “Keeping things ticking over. I used to think it was just stubbornness, but since Sybil… I think now it’s something closer to fear. The world moves too fast otherwise.”

“He does seem… steady,” he said. “I mean, he’s a great father and Sybbie always knows where he is.”

Seánie reached for the sugar bowl, only for Mary to intercept him with a practiced hand and a look that promised he’d get it back if he waited.

“He wants her to, anyway. That’s half of it. I think he’s making up for everything our own da never did.” She glanced at Seánie, then back to Thomas. “You can be in the room with him and still miss what’s going on.”

Thomas nodded, though he wasn’t sure he understood what she was saying. “He doesn’t say much about Ireland. Or about anything, really. He used to talk about it more.”

Mary shrugged, her shoulders tight.

“He’s grown up a lot since leaving Ireland. We both left at the same time, got the boat to Liverpool, then he went east while I came here. He’s a different man now.” She looked at Thomas more directly now. “I hope you don’t find him too… closed off. He’s not always good at letting people in, even when he means to.”

He tried to think of something generous to say, but all he managed was, “He’s been… patient. More than he needed to be.”

“He’s different with Sybbie, isn’t he?” she asked.

Thomas didn’t realise she was expecting an answer until she tilted her head slightly, keeping her eyes on his.

“They know how to keep each other going,” he managed, eventually.

“I worried, after Sybil died, that he’d go under completely,” Mary went on. “But he’s found a way to keep going. Even if he’s still stuck with a foot in both places, sometimes.”

Thomas turned his mug in his hands. “It’s not easy, starting over.”

“No,” she agreed quietly. “It isn’t. But you’re both lucky that you have each other. When I came here, I didn’t know a soul. If I managed to make a life here, then the both of you can.”

It was tempting, the idea that they could start over together, but he caught himself before he could believe it. You didn’t get things like that, not for long, and not with anyone like Tom Branson. He knew she didn’t mean it in that way, but the thought alone made him uneasy.

Seánie, bored with the grown-up talk, had taken to exploring the cupboard under the sink, narrating his discoveries in a low, conspiratorial voice to a row of mismatched pans.

Outside, the streetcar rumbled past, bell faint through glass. Thomas listened, the noise oddly comforting. He found himself watching Mary, as if she might produce some family news or accusation, but she only sipped her tea and looked around, taking in the corners, the oddments he’d gathered since moving in. Eventually, she set her tea down and let her gaze drift to the window, where sunlight tried to find a foothold through the dirt.

“This place suits you more than you think,” she said.

Thomas gave a quiet huff. “I still don’t know what I’m doing half the time.”

“None of us do,” Mary said, her tone softening. “But I can tell Sybbie’s happier. Last time she stayed over, she wouldn’t stop talking about ‘Daddy’s new friend’.”

Something in her tone made him uneasy, though it was hard to decide if it was hope or expectation. He didn’t know what to say back to that, so he simply nodded, looking past her to the half-lit wall. For a moment, he wanted to say something honest, or at least admit how lost he felt, but the words wouldn’t come.

Mary finished her tea and set the mug down. “Anyway, I won’t keep you. Tom’ll be home soon, I expect?”

“In an hour or so,” Thomas said, rising as she did. “Do you want me to let him know you called?”

She shook her head. “He’ll know. He always does.”

He nodded in response.

“Take care of yourself, Thomas,” she murmured, her expression soft. “And of them. They need you.”

He didn’t have time to respond to that because Seánie appeared at her elbow, reaching for her hand. “Can we go now?”

Mary smiled, smoothing his cap. “We’re going, pet. Say thank you to Thomas.”

“Thank you, Mr Thomas,” the boy intoned.

Thomas managed a smile. “Any time, Master Seánie.”

He watched them go, and then the flat was quiet, Mary’s words settling into the corners after the door closed.

———

The last regular had been gone an hour, the stools turned up on the tables and the floor damp underfoot. Thomas leaned on the bar with sleeves rolled, watching Neil sweep broken glass into a dustpan with more enthusiasm than the job deserved. The hour was too late to be night but too early for morning; outside, Sheafe Street lay empty, lamps burning sickly yellow through the window’s fog.

“We’ll make old men of ourselves, you know,” Neil grinned, nodding at the battered clock.

He half-smiled. “You might, but I’m not in any rush.”

Neil tossed the last shards into the bin, set broom and pan aside. “Louie’s got it in his head we’re fit for late shifts. Says it’s ‘cause we’re the kids round here.”

“Wish I was still a kid,” Thomas muttered. “Besides, Sergio’s only thirty-three and he could drink Louie under the table any day of the week.”

“Ah, but he’s a different animal, so he is,” Neil retorted, propping himself up against the bar.

He uncorked a bottle, sloshed a measure into two glasses, and nudged one towards Thomas, who took it without needing to be asked. This after-shift ritual was becoming familiar now – drink after work a little too warm, but it took the edge off. He sipped, grateful for something familiar in his mouth.

Neil yawned, long and exaggerated. “So, you used to all this yet, Tommy?”

“Used to the city?” Thomas shrugged, then gestured at the empty bar surrounding them. “Or used to running a bar that isn’t meant to exist?”

“Both, if you like.” Neil drained half his glass. “I grew up three blocks over and I still don’t know what the hell’s going on half the time. As for the job… figured you’d be used to all the secrets.”

Thomas froze for a second, before collecting himself.

“What’s that meant to mean?” he retorted, sharper than he’d meant to.

Neil didn’t flinch. He looked at Thomas over the rim of his glass, as if weighing how far to push it.

“Only that you don’t miss much, is all,” he finally said. “Don’t get jumpy on me.”

Thomas set his drink down, staring at the scratches in the bar top. He refused to meet the younger man’s stare.

“Sorry. Didn’t mean to,” he muttered, his leg bouncing as he tried to rest his foot on the ledge of the barstool.

Neil nodded, looking down at Thomas’s leg but choosing to pretend he didn’t notice it. A comfortable silence drifted between them as Thomas reached for the bottle and topped up their glasses.

“You meet many fellas like us back home?” Neil asked, too casually.

“Like us?”

“You know what I mean.”

Thomas kept his eyes on the bar, watching his own knuckles tighten and release. “No. Not openly, anyway.”

“Boston’s packed with them, if you keep your eyes peeled. Declan – surely you’ve seen him round here on Thursdays – he knows everyone. Every story, every shortcut, every door worth closing.”

Neil hesitated, then added, “It’s not all bad, you know. Some of us get by all right.”

“Why are you telling me this?”

“Because finding out I wasn’t the only queer Mick in Boston was what made it easier for me.”

Thomas nearly choked on his drink at that. He looked up at Neil then, half-expecting a smirk or some proof it was all a joke. Instead, he sat, sipping his drink and letting his arm rest on the bar as his fingers traced the condensation ring his glass had left behind.

“Easier?” Thomas said, the word sticking a bit in his throat.

He nodded, not looking away. “I grew up thinking it was only priests and ghosts who knew what I was. That was still mostly true, but finding a few like me… well, it helps.”

“How’d you know who to trust?”

“You don’t,” Neil said, quiet now. “But you find the ones who’s the same look about them. Sometimes that’s all you need.”

He slid the bottle a little closer, topping up Thomas’s glass with a hand that barely brushed his knuckles. The touch was accidental, but neither of them moved to apologise and Thomas didn’t pull away, counting the seconds before Neil moved on.

“Thursday, you said?” his voice came out lower than intended.

Neil’s eyes flicked to the door and back again. “Yeah. You know who I’m talking about, don’t you?”

Thomas nodded.

“Well on Thursdays, he holds court in the back. You go in and sit, don’t order anything. He’ll know what you’re after.”

“You always this helpful with new staff?” Thomas asked, his fingers curling around his glass for steadiness.

“You? You’re not new, lad,” Neil shrugged, grinning again at him. “You last this long, you’re one of us.”

Their knees touched under the bar, just enough to notice, but neither of them shifted away. Thomas studied Neil’s hand on the glass, half wanting to reach for it and half afraid to move. The city felt far off, the night holding them still.

Neil’s foot nudged his, deliberately now. “You’re all right, you know. For a lad who says nothing.”

“You say too much.”

He didn’t mean for it to be a joke, but he was grateful when Neil laughed instead of taking it negatively. Thomas let himself grin back, softer than he meant. When the silence fell again, it was broken only by the hush of water in the pipes nearby.

They finished their drinks and locked up, that same practiced ritual – stacking chairs, rinsing glasses, counting the register to ensure no one had nicked anything. Outside, the city air was damp and sharp, carrying the briny ghost of the harbour and something acrid from the market. Neil pulled the door shut, pausing on the step. He didn’t say anything right away, instead looking up and down the block, hands deep in his pockets, like he was deciding if he’d head north or south.

Last week he had floated the idea of them walking together, but Thomas had begged off, claiming a headache, too scared if he was being truthful. Tonight though, he felt braver. Their conversation from earlier lingered in his mind and he appreciated the way Neil hadn’t pushed. It made the city feel less foreign and more like this new home he so desperately wanted to allow himself to have.

“Which way you headed?” he asked, clearing his throat slightly as his voice caught.

“Up by Charter,” Neil’s eyebrows rose, just a little. “You’re Hanover?”

“Yeah. It’s up the same way, isn’t it?”

“It is.”

“Think I’ll walk with you, if that’s all right,” Thomas tested.

Neil gave a crooked half-smile, “Suit yourself.”

They stepped out into the street. The city was practically empty at this hour, the only sign of life was a rat or two scurrying into the shadows. The lamps burned through the fog, throwing their shadows together as they walked.

“Thought you said you weren’t the walking home type,” Neil teased gently.

Thomas managed a dry, almost sheepish grin. “That was last week. And I had a headache.”

“That so?” Neil shot him a sidelong glance, all warmth and teeth. “Well, you picked the right night. No coppers out, not even a dog on the loose.”

The urge to point out that it was four in the morning came up, but Thomas didn’t rise to it. They walked for a block in silence, shoes scuffing the slick pavement. He found himself watching Neil’s profile, the set of his jaw, the way he seemed at ease in the street, like he’d always belonged to it.

“Does it feel weird to you?” he asked. “When the place is all quiet like this?”

Neil shrugged. “When I first started working nights, yeah. Now I prefer it this way. Makes it easier to notice who’s about and who’s best avoided.”

Thomas nodded, taking that in. “London never slept, either, not really. Yorkshire was too much the other way – everyone lived in everyone’s business.”

“Sounds like a bit like my family,” Neil grinned. “Nine of us living in two rooms.”

“Nine!?” Thomas failed to keep the shock from his voice.

“Aye, nine. Five boys, two girls, Mam and Da. I’m the oldest.”

Thomas shook his head, half in disbelief, half in admiration. “There were five of us at home and that still felt crowded.”

“Crowded’s not so bad if you know you’re wanted.” Neil glanced at him, softer now. “Course, sometimes you just want quiet. That’s what these hours are for.”

They turned a corner. Somewhere a few blocks off, a bell clanged, God only knows what for. Thomas drew in a lungful of cold air, letting it settle the nervous flutter in his chest. Neil kicked a bit of gravel along the gutter.

“You know, you picked a good city to come to,” he began. “Boston’s a funny place in that most people here are from somewhere else and the rest of us still feel like outsiders half the time.”

Thomas almost smiled. “Guess that makes us in good company, then.”

“Best kind.”

Their shoulders brushed gently as they walked – once, twice, then stayed. Neither of them said anything about it. Passing a closed up newsstand, Thomas risked a glance at Neil’s hands, the way they swung loose and unhurried at his sides. He realised, suddenly, how long it had been since he’d let himself just be near someone without looking over his shoulder.

As they reached the far end of the block, Neil slowed his pace, turning solemnly to meet Thomas’s eyes. “You don’t have to… if you don’t want to, you know.”

“I know,” he answered quickly.

They walked on, the conversation thinning but the tension building. Thomas caught Neil’s gaze in the low lamplight and prayed to God that he wasn’t misreading the signs the way he did with Jimmy. Surely the world wouldn’t be so cruel as to play that same trick twice.

Neil stopped outside a narrow stoop, turning toward Thomas with a small, earnest shrug. “Here’s me.”

Thomas lingered a step behind, not quite ready to let the moment end.

“You need a few minutes before going in?” his words sounded braver than he felt.

“Wouldn’t say no.”

He took one more look around out of habit, rather than fear this time. Old instincts kept his eyes moving, but tonight he found himself watching for a chance, not an exit. Then he followed Neil down the alley, boots scraping on the wet brick.

The alley behind the tenement was barely wide enough for the two of them. The sharp brickwork dug into his back and the night air was cold, but Neil’s body radiated warmth as their thighs grazed together, both their breaths unsteady. His hands found the lapels of Thomas’s coat, clinging there as if afraid he might vanish.

“You sure?” he breathed, voice hoarse and low.

His eyes were wild with want, making Thomas ache in places he didn’t know was possible.

“Yeah,” he breathed, their mouths nearly touching, breath mingling warm in the cold air.

Neil let out a shaky laugh, but it was all relief. He surged up, catching Thomas’s mouth hard, hands fisting in the heavy wool at his waist. Thomas leaned forward slightly, pinning him against the wall. The kiss was rough, bruising, as his hands worked beneath Neil’s shirt, mapping every inch he could find.

His hand slid down, thumb slipping beneath Thomas’s trousers, his fingers tracing bare skin. It sent a jolt straight through Thomas, forcing him to bite down on a moan, and then he pushed Neil closer against the wall, grinding them together, suddenly greedy in a way he’d forgotten was possible.

Neil’s hand wrapped around him in a desperate grip that made him gasp – a raw, involuntary sound, probably too loud to be safe, but neither of them cared. Thomas’s hands gripped his hips as he pressed his mouth to the curve of Neil’s neck, stubble scratching his lips. Neil shuddered beneath him, still stroking with a clumsy, hungry rhythm.

Shame flared as his hips rolled forward, greedy for more than he should dare want. With his other hand, Neil fumbled for Thomas’s buttons, trying for finesse and failing, cursing under his breath until he abandoned the effort after struggling with the third one.

“Jesus–” Thomas choked out, breath shuddering.

“Quiet, Tommy– just a minute, come on–”

When it became too much to hold back, Thomas turned Neil to the wall, a hand braced at his waist, guiding him gently but firmly. Neil’s hands flattened against the brick, chest heaving, cheek pressed to cool stone. Thomas fumbled with his own trousers, then eased Neil’s down with trembling fingers, just past the hips.

“You sure?” he managed.

Neil only nodded, breath coming fast, his hips pushing back, eager.

Thomas spat into his hand, working himself slick and reaching between them, lining up. He pressed forward, slow and steady, giving time to adjust. Neil tensed, fingers white-knuckled on the wall, but then he let out a low, desperate moan that sent heat coursing through Thomas’s veins.

He pressed his chest to Neil’s back, mouth at his ear. “Tell me if it’s too much.”

“No,” Neil said, voice shaking. “Don’t stop.”

Neil’s hand found his own cock, stroking in time with Thomas’s thrusts, low, stuttering gasps slipping from his lips. Their bodies found a clumsy rhythm in the shadows. Neil bit down on his forearm to stifle a moan, and Thomas rocked into him, finding a rhythm built from urgency and relief.

It was quick, it had to be. Neither of them could risk more than a handful of minutes, every scrape of their boots or stifled moan a reminder of where they were. Thomas pressed harder, desperate to hold Neil up, desperate to make it last, but the closeness, the trust, the staggering, terrifying intimacy of being wanted like this; it was all too much.

Neil’s breath hitched. “I’m– Tommy, I’m gonna–”

“Go on, then,” Thomas urged, hand slipping round to stroke him, mouth pressed hot and shaking to Neil’s shoulder.

Neil’s hips jerked as he came, shuddering with relief. The sound and sight of it undid Thomas, who thrust once, twice more before he found his own release, muffling his gasp against the back of Neil’s neck.

For a moment, neither of them moved. Their hearts hammered against each other, sweat cooling fast in the alley’s chill. Thomas pulled out gently, pressing a shaky kiss to the back of Neil’s neck before straightening both their clothes with unsteady hands.

Neil turned to face him, cheeks flushed, eyes still wide with adrenaline. He wondered if he’d crossed a line, but the look on the face in front of him told him they’d both needed it too much to regret.

He wiped his hands on his coat, then tucked in his shirt, careful and brisk. Neil did the same, both of them silent, listening for footsteps or voices that never came.

“Didn’t think you had it in you,” Neil finally said.

Thomas huffed, half a laugh, half something else. “No one ever does.”

It didn’t need saying: this was what passed for comfort, quick and cold, and nothing either of them would talk about come daylight.

Neil pulled a crumpled handkerchief from his pocket, wiped his brow, then glanced back at the tenement’s door.

“You’ll be all right getting home?” he asked, not quite letting their eyes meet.

“Yeah. Fine.”

“Right, then,” he nodded, the corner of his mouth twisting up, “See you at work.”

“Yeah,” Thomas nodded. “See you.”

Neil slipped through the side door, not looking back. Thomas waited until the latch clicked, then let himself breathe. He stood a moment longer in the cold, heart still pounding, body ringing with the aftershocks of want and fear.

And that was it. No invitation, no lingering questions. That was how it worked, wasn’t it? Take what you could get, never ask for more, and forget it ever happened by sunrise.

Thomas walked out of the alley and didn’t look back.

It was supposed to be enough. It wasn’t, it never was. But for now, it would have to do.

———

The morning sun crept in beneath the faded curtains, throwing a lopsided patch of light across the kitchen table. Thomas stood by the sink, sleeves rolled, drying the last of the breakfast plates while Sybbie perched on a chair, swinging her legs and humming tunelessly. She watched him stack the plates, chin in her hands.

“Will Daddy be late again?”

“Not late,” Thomas answered, careful with his tone. “He’s on at the register all day, that’s all. He left a note, see?”

She hopped down and padded over in her socks, squinting at Branson’s tidy writing on the small piece of paper he was showing her.

“I can’t read that.”

“Right yes, you’re four,” Thomas reminded himself.

“Four and a half.”

He handed her the note anyway, letting her fold and unfold it with careful, practiced hands. “Well, when you’re five, you’ll be reading better than either of us.”

Sybbie grinned, happy to believe him. “Will you take me out?”

Thomas set the last plate on the rack and wiped his hands on a tea towel. “I suppose I could. If you’re not too much trouble.”

“I’m never trouble.”

“You say that now,” he raised an eyebrow. “Come on, let’s find your shoes. And a scarf.”

“It’s not cold, Mr Barrow,” she protested

“I know. But if you catch cold then your daddy won’t be happy with me.”

She giggled. “He’ll make you eat porridge for a week.”

 “Then we’d better wrap you up, just in case.”

He shot her a mock-glare, but her laughter loosened something in him. It was a relief, sometimes, to see how easily children could forgive the world its edges.

Getting Sybbie ready was its own little routine. She wriggled her feet into battered boots, declared her scarf “scratchy,” and finally let Thomas knot it loosely around her neck, rolling her eyes as only a small child could.

They made their way down the tenement stairs, each step echoing, the smell of boiled cabbage and coal smoke drifting up from the ground floor. Mrs Ricci’s door was open as they passed, the old woman sitting at her table peeling potatoes, radio turned just loud enough to make out the shape of an Italian song.

Sybbie offered a prim “Morning!” as she caught her eye and was rewarded with a wink.

Outside, Boston’s morning was wide awake. Vendors hosed down the pavement, carriages rattled through puddles, laundry had been strung up between windows catching the sun. The narrow street was crowded with voices – some clipped and Irish, some thick with New England, others in languages Thomas still hadn’t learned to name.

Somewhere above them, a woman leaned out a window, hollering at her boys in a rush of something that sounded like Russian or Yiddish. The same as his first days here, the city’s noise felt endless, and he still wasn’t sure if it meant home or simply not being left alone.

Sybbie skipped at his side, little boots clattering on the pavement as she pointed out the red trolley rattling past, or the newsstand where the vendor gave Thomas a nod. Sybbie reached up without asking, slipping her hand into his, and they turned onto Prince Street.

He let her set their course, trailing after her as she paused to inspect every dog, cart, and stray bit of coloured paper on the ground. She announced every dog and pigeon she saw, waving at children she recognized from the courtyard. The city was different at her pace. It was slower, and a little softer. He tried to imagine what it would be like to see the city through her eyes, everything unfamiliar made ordinary by curiosity and trust.

They stopped at that bakery Sybbie loved, the one where the scent of warm bread curled through the doorway. She pressed her nose to the glass, eyes wide.

“Go on, then,” Thomas nodded. “You know what to get.”

She marched in with the confidence of someone twice her age. The woman behind the counter, arms dusted with flour, greeted Sybbie by name and nodded at Thomas.

“Same as always?”

“Yes, please! The one with the raisins,” she beamed.

Thomas paid with a handful of coins, and Sybbie clutched the waxed paper bag to her chest like treasure. Outside, she held it out, offering the first sticky, torn piece. He shook his head, no. She grinned and took a generous bite.

The neighbourhood seemed to crowd in, but not in a way that pressed too hard. Children darted between stoops, calling out in a mix of languages. Old men sat on crates playing cards as always. They wound their way down a side street, past the small church with its doors propped open and music leaking out, today just organ practice, but still comforting in its own way. Thomas slowed his steps, letting Sybbie hop between cracks in the pavement, counting out her numbers with determined concentration.

Crossing into the quieter lanes, away from the main bustle, Sybbie hummed between bites, boots splashing in a shallow puddle, then tiptoeing along the edge of the kerb. The bell of a streetcar sounded from a few blocks off, mixing with distant church bells, the morning’s cacophony settling into a gentle lull.

“Thomas, look!” Sybbie called, waving at a small dog nosing at an old man’s feet.

The man smiled, offered Sybbie a bit of stale bread for the dog, and greeted Thomas with a smile and something that could only be in Italian. Thomas nodded and offered a small smile in return.

As they paused on a low stone wall, sunlight spilled over them and Sybbie leaned against him for a moment. He realised, almost with surprise, how still he felt. How the tension that usually followed him had slipped away.

“Can we stay out till lunch?” she asked.

“We’ll see,” Thomas said, watching a streetcar clang past at the end of the lane.

The city carried on, its noise unbothered by their little pause. Somewhere between the bakery and the quiet side street, Thomas found he wasn’t bracing himself anymore. The worry about fitting in, about being seen, had thinned without his noticing. Sybbie’s easy trust had shown him how even a stranger could become ordinary here, if you were willing to let it happen.

He watched Sybbie pick raisins from the bag, humming to herself, and wondered when simple things had last felt this gentle. They had nowhere particular to be, no instructions or expectations. The streets around them were full of other people’s noise and lives, but for a little while, Thomas let himself believe they belonged just as much as anyone else.

They stayed on the wall for a while, the city churning quietly in the background. Sybbie had grown restless, swinging her legs and counting each bump in the stone, but didn’t ask to leave. Thomas, for once, didn’t mind the pause.

She finished her bun, wiping sticky hands on the hem of her dress. Thomas almost moved to scold, but let it go. She watched the dog for a few minutes more, then turned her attention to him, chin tilted in the same stubborn way her father had.

“Are you lonely, Mr Barrow?”

The question caught him off guard. He could have laughed it off or lied, but Sybbie’s face was so open, so intent, he found himself answering honestly.

“Not so much as I used to be,” he admitted, surprised at how true it sounded. “It’s all very big here. Easy to feel lost at first.”

Sybbie nodded, as if this was something she understood completely. Knowing her, she probably did.

“Daddy says everyone’s lost when they come here,” she said, repeating the words exactly, as if she’d practiced them. “but if you wait, you find your own pot.”

“Pot?”

She shrugged. “That’s what he told me. He’s very clever.”

“That he is,” Thomas huffed a small laugh. “He’s a wise man.”

Sybbie grinned, wriggling closer until her shoulder pressed against his side. Thomas leaned back, letting the sun warm his face, feeling less like a guest and more like someone who actually belonged. He wanted to tell her how much that meant, but the words felt too big and dangerous to speak aloud, even to himself.

“I like it better when you’re here,” Sybbie said, sudden and without a hint of shyness.

He swallowed, unsure how to answer. All his old instincts – to keep a distance, to avoid being noticed – seemed silly now, with a child’s easy honesty cutting through them.

“I like it better too,” he finally said softly.

She smiled, then said in that clear, matter-of-fact way children have, “Daddy says you’re sad sometimes, but you try very hard not to be.”

Thomas didn’t answer right away, looking off as the clang of the streetcar bell echoed once again up the lane.

“Does he?” he said quietly, forcing a gentle tone.

Sybbie nodded, feet dangling. “He says you’re brave for moving here.”

Brave. He didn’t feel brave, ever. But he didn’t argue either. Staring at the street ahead, Thomas decided it was enough that someone thought so.

“Come on, then,” he said, hopping up from the wall. “Let’s get you home before Daddy gets there first.”

Sybbie grabbed his hand, squeezing tight. Thomas let himself hold on, letting her lead the way. And as they walked, he realised he was not afraid, not in this moment.

———

That evening, the kitchen was quiet save for the scrape of cutlery and the low tick of the clock above the stove. Evening light stretched across the table, cutting Branson’s face in half-shadow. They ate without much talk; Thomas, already changed for work, had one eye on the clock, the other on the cold plate in front of him. The man across from him looked tired. Not just from the long day at the register, but with something more settled in the lines of his face.

Sybbie had been settled with a book and a mug of milk, her quiet chatter a counterpoint to the silence between the men. Now she’d gone to bed, leaving the flat feeling oddly hollow.

Thomas finished his last bite and set his fork down, clearing his throat as he reached for the bread. “I’ll head a bit earlier this evening. Louie’s been complaining about staff turning up late again.”

Branson nodded but didn’t look up. “He’d complain if you came in on your day off.”

“Probably,” Thomas agreed. He tried to muster a smile but it didn’t quite make it across the table, “No good deed goes unpunished.”

Branson gave a vague sound of agreement, rubbing his eyes with the heel of his hand. “You’re on late tonight?”

“It’s me and Neil ‘til closing. Jakob’s there until midnight.”

Nodding, Branson let his gaze drift back to the table. “Listen, Thomas. Can I ask you something?”

A knot tightened in Thomas’s stomach. No one ever said that with positive intent.

He shrugged, trying for casual. “You can ask.”

Branson was silent for a moment, weighing his words out.

“When I first wrote to you, back in January,” he began. “I meant it when I said you didn’t have to talk about it. About Jimmy. I just–“

Thomas stiffened a little, eyes fixed on his plate.

“I just wanted you to know that if you do want to talk about it, that’s fine too.”

When he didn’t get an answer, he kept going. “Anna told me enough to know you needed out. That’s it, really. It’s not my business, but I’m glad you came.”

“You made it sound easy. The coming here. I think that’s the only reason I managed it,” Thomas said, carefully. “A few weeks ago, I was thinking that if I knew what it actually was going to be like, I would’ve stayed put.”

“And now?”

“I’m glad I came.”

A faint smile tugged at the edge of Branson’s mouth, but he didn’t say anything just yet. The quiet lingered between them and Thomas found himself resenting the heaviness for once, wishing the subject could change. But instead, Branson’s voice softened.

“I’m sorry for what happened,” he said quietly. “Truly. People can be bastards.”

Thomas’s jaw tightened. “It was my own fault. I got it into my head that Jimmy was… the same as me. I let my guard down and paid the price for it.”

“You didn’t deserve the way the rest of them turned on you,” Branson pointed out. “If Jimmy had any sense of decency, he would’ve sorted it between the two of you.”

“Doesn’t matter now,” Thomas shook his head, “You offered a way out. Not everyone would.”

Branson didn’t push, only nodded. The lines in his face deepened. “Still. I’ve seen the way you look over your shoulder sometimes, even now. Old habits, I suppose.”

Thomas snorted softly. “Some things are hard to shake.”

There was a pause between them before Branson leaned back in his chair, rubbing his knuckles along his jaw. “I’ve had my share of people talking behind my back, too. Different reasons, maybe, but it doesn’t make it easier.”

“Never seemed to bother you, not at Downton. You just… got on with it all.”

“It did bother me,” Branson said, with a faint smile. “Just learned to hide it better. Besides, I got an easy way out and still didn’t belong anywhere.”

Thomas let out a quiet laugh. “You’ve got a point there.”

“I just…” he hesitated, drumming his fingers once on the table. “I just… wanted you to know, if you ever want to talk – about any of it – You needn’t be ashamed. This is our house and you’re always safe here.”

That caught Thomas off guard. He looked away, suddenly uncomfortable with the kindness.

“I’ll keep that in mind,” he said, voice softening despite himself.

Branson looked down, fingers idly tracing a nick in the tabletop.

“You know, you were right earlier,” he said after a moment. “Coming here… it wasn’t easy. Not for me, either. But I’d already done it before. I left Ireland because I had to, not because I wanted to.”

“Why did you leave?”

“Ireland in those days… if you didn’t fit, if you had ideas above your station, you left. Or you made trouble.” He gave a thin smile. “I made a bit of both. The police knew my name. My da said I was going to get myself locked up, or worse. So when the job in England came up, I took it. Figured I’d come back one day, but you know how that goes.”

Thomas listened, quietly folding and unfolding his napkin. “What was it like, leaving?”

“Like cutting off your own hand.” Branson’s voice went quiet. “The country was changing. I wanted to fight but didn’t want to die. Maybe that makes me a coward–”

“You’re not a coward.”

The words escaped Thomas’s mouth before he could stop them. One hand instinctively rubbed over his leather glove, where his bullet injury was. He felt the dull sting flare up, summoned by memory alone.

Branson continued on. “If I’m honest, I didn’t know what I wanted. But I needed work and it was easier to find it with cars than in writing.”

“Funny thing is though,” he paused, rolling his shoulders while choosing his words. “You leave thinking you’ll come back whole, but nothing fits when you do. You’re just… changed. Even the things you used to want don’t look the same in the light.”

Thomas nodded, understanding more than he cared to admit. “Yorkshire never really felt like home either, not once I’d got there. But going back wasn’t an option. Not for me.”

Branson glanced at him, then let out a quiet breath. “You get used to starting over. Or you pretend you do.”

“You probably know a bit about that,” he shot him a look, measuring. “From France.”

“Yeah.” Thomas’s reply was flat. “That wasn’t heroism either. It was just… Well I was going to get called up one way or another so I joined the medical corps, thinking it’d be safer.”

He held up his bad hand. “Real brave I was.”

Branson’s mouth tightened. “Still, you went. I never fought anywhere. Not in the trenches, not in the Rising. My brothers did. Some friends, too. People at Downton used to think I was cowardly, for not fighting. But it wasn’t my war. England’s never been my side. I had enough of fighting in Ireland, even if it was mostly running my mouth.”

Thomas let that settle, glancing at the window, where the last of the evening’s light had faded. “Sometimes not fighting takes more out of you than the real thing. At least in France I wasn’t trying to prove myself to anyone.”

“Yeah. They all talk about loyalty but not about what to do when the flag you’re fighting for isn’t fighting for you.”

“That’s the writer in you, Tom,” Thomas laughed. “Did you rehearse that one?”

Branson didn’t laugh. Just looked at him.

“What?” Thomas frowned. “Did I say something wrong?”

“No,” he shook his head. “You’ve just always called me Branson, not Tom.”

Thomas blinked, caught off guard.

“Well it’s just… old habit. You’ve always been Branson to me. And besides, every third man I meet in Boston’s named Tom or Tommy – myself included, apparently. Gets confusing.”

Branson’s mouth twitched, almost a smile but not quite. “That’s true.”

“And besides,” he added, voice lighter now, “Downton tradition lives long, I suppose.”

“We’re not at Downton now.”

Thomas looked down at his hands.

“No, we’re not.”

The old rules ran deeper than he liked to admit. Names, manners, all that sort of thing. It was easier, sometimes, to stick to what you knew, even if it never quite fit. The small talk faded, the real weight still lingering in the room.

“Anyway. What I meant was… there’s always someone with a word for men like us,” he said, quietly. “Coward. Traitor. Wrong sort. You get used to people deciding you don’t belong.”

When Branson didn’t say anything back to that, Thomas let them both stay caught in their own histories. It was easier not to ask for understanding.

“I’d rather have stayed at Downton than go and come back a coward,” he shrugged, looking back down at his hand. “Not that anyone said anything, but everyone knows a Blighty when they see one.”

“It’s easy to judge what you don’t understand,” Branson gave a tired smile.

“War makes you ashamed of things you never thought twice about. Makes you afraid of what you are, what you’re not.”

“But we made it here.”

“That we did.”

“You, me, Sybbie,” Branson said. “We survived. That’s worth something, isn’t it?”

Thomas let out a long breath. “Maybe it is.”

The clock ticked on. Branson’s fingers drummed against the table once more, then stopped, as if finally letting himself rest. And Thomas, still perched at the edge of going, realised for the first time he didn’t want to leave just yet.

“Are you still in it?” he asked. “The republican work, I mean. I know there’s all the stuff with the papers, but the men at the meeting seemed to look to you for more.”

Branson  exhaled, then gave a short nod. “There’s always work to do. Mostly, it’s raising money. Sometimes it’s getting people out of trouble with the police. Keeping lads from the docks away from the worst trouble. Organising the union men when the bosses get bold. Printing things the government would rather stay quiet. It’s hard to do much with Sybbie though, she always comes first.”

He paused. “I write letters too, if that counts.”

Thomas looked at him sideways. “And that’s safe, is it?”

“Depends who you ask. Safer than back home, but Boston’s still Boston. No more dangerous than the work you’re doing in the bar.”

Thomas found he was drumming his fingers on the table, restless. “Why risk it? With Sybbie here, I mean.”

“You’re one to talk. Why risk any of it?”

“Habit, mostly,” he shrugged. “Or you end up with so little to call your own that you hold tight to whatever scraps you can find.”

The lamplight caught the lines around Branson’s eyes as he studied him. “That sounds about it. You stick your neck out because someone has to. And you get to a point where the danger’s less frightening than letting the wrong people win.”

Thomas didn’t know what he could possibly say to trump that. So he said nothing instead. They fell quiet, listening to the pipes groan as someone upstairs ran a bath. He flexed his gloved hand on the table, trying to find something true to fill the silence.

“I do worry, you know,” he said, just above a whisper. “About you. And about Sybbie. Sometimes it feels like the world’s set up to grind people down who don’t fit.”

Branson let the words hang, then looked over. “It is. That’s why we do what we can. I’m careful, I promise you that. I wouldn’t risk anything I couldn’t live with. Not anymore, with Sybbie around. Or… you.”

Thomas glanced at him, caught off guard by the quiet addition. Branson’s gaze stayed fixed on the grain of the table, but there was a softness to his words that didn’t go unnoticed. He felt the prickle of heat at his neck, embarrassed by the directness, even as he was grateful for it.

He cleared his throat, eyes falling to his own hands. “Well. You’re better at being careful than I am. I was never much good at keeping out of trouble.”

Branson gave a small huff of laughter. “Aye. Like the time I tried to pour a pot of slop over Lord Grantham’s uncle.”

Thomas laughed in kind. “I wish you’d managed to see it through.”

“Do you, now?” He grinned. “I would’ve been arrested there and then. But I suppose it would’ve been worth it.”

“No,” Thomas shook his head gently. “It wouldn’t.”

Branson looked up at that, meeting his eyes for the first time all evening. “Maybe sometimes a good story isn’t worth the risk.”

A hush between them settled again, but the tension from before had shifted, quieted. Outside, footsteps passed on the stair, and the old pipes continued to rattle overhead.

After a moment, Thomas reached for the bread, breaking off a small piece and rolling it between his fingers, not really hungry but needing something to do with his hands.

“How do you stand it?” he asked, quieter now. “Knowing there are things you’ll never get back.”

Branson considered this, eyes fixed on the worn wood of the table. “You don’t. You just… live through it. One day at a time. You keep the good bits close. Family. Friends. The parts of yourself that survived the worst of it.”

He looked up. “You’re part of that now, you know. Family. Whether you like it or not.”

Thomas let out a breath he didn’t know he’d been holding, unsure if he felt comforted or exposed. He stood, finally, tucking in his chair.

“I should get going before Louie has a fit.”

Branson – Tom – nodded, rising too. He reached for Thomas’s shoulder – just a brief, steady touch that said everything words couldn’t.

“Take care,” he said.

Thomas managed a real smile this time. “You too.”

He left the flat with a strange lightness in his chest and headed straight to work.

Chapter Text

Chapter 8:                           

It came on a yellow slip, pressed into their letterbox with a grim efficiency Thomas had come to resent. He found it on the mat as he came in from a morning walk, booted it inside, and left it face-down on the sideboard. It waited there until Branson – Tom, now – came home that evening, until after supper; until Sybbie was asleep, and neither of them could pretend not to see it any longer.

Now, he stood at the stove, heating up some milk for them to have before bed. It was a small comfort, this nightly making of warm milk. Thomas didn’t realise how attached he’d grown to it until he caught himself missing it on nights he worked late – which was most nights now. Tom leaned against the counter, arms folded, reading the slip again for the third time. It might as well have been a sentence.

“I told you they’d raise it,” he said finally, not looking up. “Doesn’t matter what they promised. They do whatever they like.”

Thomas wiped his hands, shrugged, as if it might slip off his shoulders. “I could take more hours at the bar. Start earlier if they let me.”

“You’re already gone up to six nights a week. There’s a limit.”

“Is there?” He tried to sound light, but it didn’t quite carry.

“Yes, of course there is.”

“I’ll manage. I’ve managed worse.”

Tom shook the slip at him. “They want twenty-seven dollars a month now. That’s five more than before. And for what? The pipes are still freezing. The stairs outside are still half rotted through. We’re paying for the gas.”

“That’s nearly a week’s pay gone, just to keep a roof over us,” Thomas said, trying to laugh, knowing it wasn’t working.

“Between us we bring in what, forty, forty-five dollars if we’re lucky?”

“Forty-three.”

Branson nodded. “That’s your wage gone entirely on rent, mine covering food, gas for the stove… And Sybbie’s after growing again. She needs new boots already and she’ll soon need new clothes.”

“I can take a look at some of her frocks,” Thomas suggested. “I might be able to let out the hems on the ones from last winter. She won’t notice the difference.”

“Doesn’t matter. By the end of each week, we’ll still have nothing.”

He couldn’t argue with that.

Thomas eyed the slip. “I thought they put it up just before you wrote to me back at the beginning of the year, and then again in March. Why a third time now?”

“Because they can,” Tom gave a dry laugh. “They know we’ll pay it or else be out on the street with the rest. That’s the game these bastards are playing.”

He always got like this whenever the subject turned to landlords or money. His voice rose and words spilled out faster and rougher, as if it would change anything. Thomas understood his frustrations – of course he did – but it was just the way of the world, wasn’t it? But for Tom, it wasn’t about the bills. It was the system, the way the odds were stacked against them before they’d even stepped foot on American soil. Thomas didn’t say anything because he knew it’d be wrong, no matter what.

“They’ll keep squeezing until there’s nothing left. And what are we meant to do? Lie down and thank them?” Tom snapped, voice tight.

“Fine, Karl Marx, I get the picture,” Thomas sighed.

“No, I’m sick of it, it’s always the same. Landlords bleeding us for every penny. Never mind we keep the place standing, never mind we make the street decent. It’s all just numbers to them, and we’re always on the losing side.”

“I know, but it’s not like we have much choice, do we?”

“That’s the point,” Branson – Tom! – stood up, scrubbing a hand across the face. He paced across the room as he pulled a chair out and pushed it back in, agitation showing in every small movement.

“They don’t want us owning anything, don’t want us to settle, not if it means we might grow strong or get wise to how they work things. They want us as cheap hands in their factories, bodies in their slums, invisible until it suits them. If we complain, there’s always someone poorer or newer off the boat to take our place. That’s what they count on.”

He leaned hard against the sink, knuckles white where he gripped the edge. “I didn’t come here for that, Thomas. I didn’t bring Sybbie over to watch her grow up scared we could be out on our ear if the rent suddenly goes up again.”

“I know,” Thomas tried to level with him. “But what alternative have you got? We move into a smaller flat and share the one bed?”

He winced when Tom didn’t laugh and instead, gave him a dry look. A draft slid under the kitchen door, making the flame on the stove shiver. Thomas watched it, trying not to notice how tired the man across from him looked in the lamplight.

“Really, Bran– Tom,” he tried again. “What else can we do? I can ask at the docks again. They’re always needing a pair of hands, and it’ll be early hours so it won’t interfere with the bar.”

“You’re not breaking your back for another penny an hour. You’re not killing yourself just to keep a roof over me and my daughter.” Tom’s voice was quiet, but final. “I won’t have it.”

Thomas looked up, something in him stung raw. “Well, if you’ve got a miracle in your pocket as well as your entire collected speeches for the workers’ revolution, I’d love to hear it.”

Tom hesitated, then leaned in, voice lower. “You ever think we could run something ourselves? Not just work for them, actually make something for us. For people like us.”

“What, a shop? I’m no merchant.”

“Not a shop,” he said, shaking his head. “A place. For the community. A place where folk can go and not worry who’s listening at the door.”

“What? Like a parish hall?”

“No. A bar. A proper one. Not like Martin’s or the ones out by the wharf. One for us. For immigrants, and for… men like you – and women too, if they’re comfortable. Anyone who needs it, really.”

Thomas paused, the idea sliding in like a joke at first, and then settling with a strange weight.

“A proper speakeasy,” he finally said.

“Word-of-mouth only, naturally,” Tom nodded. “Get your mate involved, that Neil chap. I can talk to a few lads at the register.”

“It’s against the law, Tom.”

“You work in one, let me remind you.”

“That’s different,” Thomas argued, though he couldn’t explain why. “Who do you reckon is going to bankroll this little revolution? Because last time I looked, we were skint.”

Tom didn’t back down. “We’re not opening the Ritz, are we? We’ve got enough to put a deposit down on a barrel and some glasses. The rest… well, if there’s one thing I know about the Irish in this city, it’s that nobody asks too many questions when there’s a drink to be had and no one watching.”

Thomas shook his head, half laughing. “So what, we just find a cellar somewhere and hope no one’s any the wiser?”

“Why not?”

“Are you mad?”

Tom pushed himself away from the counter, eyes alight, pacing as the idea took hold.

“I’m serious, Thomas,” he marched back to the stove. “That’s how half the places round here started since the ban came in. We’d need to be clever about it, but it’s not impossible. Surely you have a contact or something at Martin’s who can help us out?”

According to Neil, Declan had a finger in every pie and an ear in every back room. He never missed a trick, knew which police to avoid, which doors would open after dark. He could still hear the older man’s advice from his first week on the job. “The trick, lad, is finding your own crowd and knowing when it’s best to keep the head down.”

“There’s a regular at the bar. Declan Doyle,” he said, pausing again to gather his thoughts. “I’ve only spoken to him once but going by Neil’s opinion of him, he might be able to help us out.”

“Brilliant. Talk to him tomorrow.”

“Thursday. He’ll be there Thursday.”

“Then talk to him Thursday. Get the ball rolling,” Branson gave a sharp nod, all business now, and clapped Thomas on the shoulder.

“Jesus, Tom,” he said, rubbing his forehead, “you make it sound easy. You know this is going to take more money from us than what we’re currently spending.”

Tom grinned, his eyes shining with that wild, stubborn hope Thomas had learned to trust and fear in equal measure.

“At first. Then once we sustain ourselves, we’ll be answering to ourselves.” He gestured at the cramped, peeling room around them, the milk steaming gently on the stove. “Better than sitting here waiting for the next rent hike and praying none of us ever need a doctor.”

The idea crept in slowly as Thomas stared at the faded wallpaper. There was something about it. It was daft, absolutely reckless, but Tom made it seem… possible. He could picture it: a back room somewhere, faces he knew, laughter not tinged with nerves, the smell of whiskey and cigarettes. Maybe Neil would work there too.

“You think anyone would come?” he asked quietly.

Tom’s answer was immediate. “I know they would. All the secret bars out there, yet people are still desperate for something like this. Only no one’s been brave enough to actually go ahead and do it.”

“Or daft enough.”

“Lenin said it best,” he shrugged. “Without revolutionary theory there can be no revolutionary movement.”

“I don’t think that quite fits.”

“It’s close enough.”

Leave it to Tom to turn opening a backroom bar into the start of the revolution. For the first time all evening, Thomas let himself laugh. It surprised even him, spilling out before he could stop it, bright and genuine and more hopeful than he meant.

The milk started to bubble and rise. He lifted the saucepan and carefully tipped the contents into two mugs. He put a teaspoon of ginger into each one and stirred gently, before handing one mug to Tom and cupping his hands around the other.

His mind was still running through everything that could go wrong – raids, police, blackmail, neighbours who wouldn’t turn a blind eye. But the more Tom made it seem possible, the more Thomas let himself want it.

He risked a sideways glance in his direction, trying to find a crack in that certainty, but he only looked more determined. That same dogged look he’d worn the first day he walked into Downton, full of fire and pride, ready to challenge every tradition and stand his ground against the Crawleys, come what may.

“This is mental,” he said, when he couldn’t think of anything else.

Tom raised his mug, eyes bright. “To mad ideas.”

Thomas clinked their cups together, his laugh unguarded now. “Something like that.”

———

He didn’t get a chance to make his way to the back room until the later hours of the night. Thursdays were generally quiet, but Sergio had taken it upon himself to deep clean the entire bar and so naturally, Thomas got dragged in.

Neil had told him Declan would be in the back room – “go in and sit, don’t order anything” were his words. Now, standing outside the battered door, Thomas could hear laughter and the scrape of chairs on the wood floor. His palms felt a bit damp. He wiped them on his apron, reminded himself this was just a conversation and nothing to worry about.

Pushing the door open, he was met with a sight indeed. The back room was warm and crowded, smoke curling in lazy arcs above a table where Declan Doyle was holding court. A few men he recognised from the bar were scattered around the room, but all eyes shifted to Thomas as he stepped inside. Declan’s glance lingered the longest.

“Martin sent you to take my order?” Declan asked, a twitch at the edge of his mouth.

Thomas shook his head. “Not tonight. Neil said you’d be here.”

That earned him a grunt. “Neil talks too much.”

Declan spread his cards across the table – three queens – then flicked his gaze at the others. “Give us a minute, lads.”

The other men eyed Thomas, then took the hint and slipped out. Some gave a nod on their way, one muttered a joke about Irish luck, which made no sense as he surely would have heard the Manchester twang in Thomas’s accent.

“So, what’s on your mind?” Declan asked.

He sat back in his chair, arms folded. Thomas crossed to the edge of the table, suddenly aware of the smallness of the room.

“Well, the thing is,” he began, trying desperately not to stumble over his words. “I was told you’re the one to talk to, if someone’s looking to start something… off the books.”

“Oh you were told, were you?”

“See, not in so many words. I was told that– Well, I figured that–”

“Relax, bucko,” Declan laughed. “I don’t bite.”

Thomas let out the deep breath that had been stuck in his chest since before he entered the room. He ducked his head, hoping the shadows would hide the flush spreading across his face.

Declan continued on. “Lot of people looking to start something these days. What sort of ‘something’ are we talking? Murder’s off the cards.”

“Oh God, no,” Thomas tried to keep his voice steady. “A bar. Not like… here, or the ones out by the wharf. Well, not entirely different. Same idea but more… for people who need a secret place just for us– for them.”

He didn’t need to elaborate anymore, Declan got what he meant. He drummed his fingers on the table, weighing out options.

“And you reckon you’re up for that kind of risk?” he asked, after a long pause.

“I do. Or– I think I do.”

“Think’s not good enough.”

Thomas shrugged, trying to look braver than he felt. “There’s already dozens of places breaking the law every night, and half of them are still standing. Why not one more?”

“Most of those places have a backer,” Declan leaned forward, voice dropping. “Police, politicians, some bastard with money who likes to be in control. You’ve seen officers drink in here, that’s their payment for keeping quiet. You haven’t got that, have you?”

Thomas shook his head.

“Who have you got?” Declan asked.

“My… friend. Tom Branson.”

It sounded foolish, even to his own ears. What good would the power of friendship be in a city that ran on favours, cash, and secrets? Tom was brave, sure, but what did that matter against money and power?

Declan studied him a second longer, then said, “If you’re gonna do it, do it smart. Keep it quiet, keep it small, and don’t get greedy. You’ll have enough money to get by but it won’t make you rich.”

“That’s a fuck lot more than what I’ve got,” Thomas muttered.

“I’m serious, Tommy.” The older man paused for a moment. “It is Tommy, isn’t it?”

He nodded. Now wasn’t the time to make things awkward by insisting on Thomas instead.

“Well if you’re serious about it, keep your head on your shoulders. The minute you start thinking you’re untouchable, you’re done. That clear?”

Another nod. “Do you know anyone with a place? Or supplies?”

Declan pulled a battered matchbook from his pocket, thumbed it once, and tore out a page. He scribbled a name and address, then slid it across the table.

“Fede Romano,” he said quietly. “Runs a dry goods store on Beacon Hill and has a cellar up by Thornton’s Yard that doesn’t get counted by anyone who matters. Got no love for the coppers or the priests. If you mention my name, you’re already in the back door.”

Thomas picked up the paper and shoved it into his pocket without looking. “Thank you.”

Declan’s eyes narrowed, something between warning and reluctant approval flickering.

“One more thing. If you’re in, you’re in. Don’t half-arse it. You get caught, I don’t know you.”

“Understood,” Thomas said, feeling daft as he nodded for the third time since he sat down.

Declan’s mouth twitched, maybe a hint of something softer in it. “Good. Now piss off before someone thinks you’re here to deal cards.”

Thomas slipped out, a fizz of nerves and disbelief in his chest. Mad, he thought, heading back to the bar. Absolutely mad. None of it felt real. Yet still, as he traced the folded slip in his pocket, he couldn’t quite shake the feeling that maybe, just maybe, they’d pull it off.

———

By the time the last straggler was out and the chairs were up, only Thomas and Neil remained behind the bar. Thomas was rolling his shoulders, trying to work out the kinks, and watching Neil sweep the floor. When he was done, he leaned on his broom, humming something tuneless as he watched Louie stalk the premises with his clipboard.

Louie wasn’t Martin. He never made small talk, never lingered at the bar. He moved through the place like he was waiting to catch them out. Thomas busied himself at the taps, polishing the brass more than it needed, glancing up every time Louie’s steps circled closer. Martin usually made these nights easy, spinning stories and waving them off early – and it only happened once every two weeks. Since Louie took over, he’d been checking in every night and only ever seemed to notice what they’d missed.

“Relax,” Neil nudged him with the broom. “He’s only checking we haven’t been pinching gin.”

Thomas tried to smile, but it didn’t stick. “Last time he was here he counted the matches in the box. Who does that?”

“He’s probably just sore he’s not out getting a pint himself,” he grinned. “D’you think he’s counting the glasses again or just trying to catch me loafing?”

Thomas stifled a laugh, casting a wary eye at Louie as he emerged from the back room, scanning the bar with his usual flat stare. His gaze flicked between them, then settled.

“You’ve done a good job tonight,” he remarked, almost grudgingly. “Stock’s right, floor’s clean. Just don’t leave the back door on the latch, or you’ll be paying for anything that walks in.”

Thomas nodded, not trusting himself to say anything.

“Night Louie, love you,” Neil shot him a winning smile.

Louie grunted, then tucked his clipboard under his arm and headed out, the door banging shut behind him. The bell jangled once, then silence. Thomas finally let himself exhale.

Thomas poured out the dregs of a bottle for each of them and slid one across. “You’re a terror, you know that?”

“Wouldn’t be in the job if I wasn’t.”

Thomas tried to hide his smile behind a sip. The warmth of the whiskey pooled low in his chest, steadying him. Neil tapped the side of his own glass, a half-smirk playing at his mouth. Then he leaned back against the bar, close enough that their elbows almost touched.

“You closing again tomorrow?”

“Not tomorrow,” he shook his head. “Tom’s got a meeting so I asked off to mind Sybbie.”

“Great,” Neil snorted. “So it’s just me facing Louie then.”

“Sorry,” Thomas offered an apologetic smile.

“Nah, don’t worry. I owe you for last Friday anyway.”

“You mean when you vanished out the back with Sophie Hernandez and I was left to explain your ‘break’ to Martin?”

“She needed walking home.”

“Is that what they’re calling it now?”

Neil snorted, shaking his head. “Jealous?”

Thomas rolled his eyes but felt the flush creeping up his neck anyway. They lapsed into a comfortable silence, each lost in thought, glasses almost empty. It was always like this at the end of a shift; words ran out, replaced with a comforting lull. He wondered for a moment if he should break it or let the quiet sit between them.

“Come on,” Neil said eventually, tapping his glass on the bar, “let’s head.”

Thomas nodded as he drained the last of his drink, then stood. Their shoulders brushed as they moved around each other, strangely comfortable now.

There was nothing between him and Neil, not like that. Sure, they’d kept each other company now and then. There’d been nights they didn’t go straight home, slipping off to quiet corners to let off steam together. It wasn’t about affection, really. It never was when they were just two blokes making do with what was in front of them.

The truth was, Thomas had grown fond of Neil. But he was still at that stage where everything was a game – the thought of anything romantic felt ridiculous. The lad was brilliant in small doses, but as a partner? No, he’d be impossible to live with.

Neil went to the back to check the lock, and Thomas lingered at the window, watching the darkened street outside, feeling the strangeness of his own face looking back. They stepped out into the alley behind the bar, the air carrying a yeasty drift from the corner bakery mixed with someone’s cheap cigarillo burning nearby. He felt the whiskey’s warmth fade as soon as the door shut behind them.

Neil adjusted his cap, looking younger than ever in the dull glow from a lamplight above the fire escape. “You coming my way, or off home?”

“I’ll walk with you a bit,” Thomas muttered. “Need the air.”

He tried to sound casual, but it sounded more uncertain than he’d hoped. They set off, steps echoing across the wet cobbles, neither in a hurry to be the first to say goodnight. A stray cat darted out from under a bin, disappearing into the dark. Thomas watched it go, then risked a glance at Neil.

“You ever get tired of it all?” he ventured, voice low. “The bar, the same faces, same routine?”

Neil answered without hesitation. “Sure I do. Don’t much fancy the workhouse or the docks though, and my folk need the money… I figure here’ll do.”

He must have noticed the silence, because he slowed to match Thomas’s stride, and drew closer, the brush of his sleeve definitely deliberate this time round. He glanced over with a look that was equal parts concern and challenge.

“Why? You thinking of packing it in?”

“Not exactly.”

Neil tilted his head to look over.

“It’s just– Branson, my friend– the… chap I live with – Tom,” he paused, realising he really needed to figure out what to call him. “Well he’s had this idea in his head lately. Reckons we could set up a place of our own. Not your usual bar. More for… folk like us.”

Neil let out a low whistle, half mocking. “Folk like us, eh? You and Branson? Didn’t know you two were getting on like that. Didn’t peg you for settling down.”

Thomas felt his face heat, grateful for the shadows. “Nothing of the sort. Tom’s… well, he’s not that way. It’s just an idea for folk who don’t fit in elsewhere. People like us, he suggested some of the Irish crowd too. Anyone who doesn’t fit in.

“Well if it’s Irish queers you’re looking for…” Neil grinned, gesturing to himself.

“I’ll shove you in the river if you keep on,” Thomas said, shaking his head, trying to stifle a laugh.

They rounded the corner into quieter streets. The city had emptied hours ago. Streets were slick and echoing, every lamp throwing shadows in gold. At a crossing, Neil paused, half a step too close, and Thomas found himself aware of the other’s breath, the faint scent of tobacco lingering. Neil glanced over, eyes glinting in the dark.

“Can’t blame him, you know,” he admitted. “Lord knows half the crowd at Martin’s is always looking over their shoulder.”

Thomas shrugged.

“Are you two serious about it?”

“I think so. It’s daft, but… I went and talked to Declan tonight,” he clarified, rubbing at his neck.

Neil didn’t say anything, just kept watching him. He felt the urge to laugh, but found himself flustered instead, and continued explaining.

“He knows someone who can help us get started. There’s a chap who owns some sort of dry goods store with a cellar nobody cares about. Suppose that’s how half these places get by.”

“So you’re actually doing it.” Neil sounded half in awe, half delighted. “What’s next then? You need me to be the bouncer?”

“You as a bouncer? Neil, you’d snap in half if someone sneezed on you.”

“Aye, but I’d slip through the crowd before you even stood up.”

Thomas gave him a sideways look. “Forget bouncers. I’d settle for someone who knows when to duck if bottles start flying. And someone who can spot a grifter before I hand over the purse.”

“Ah, so that’s where I come in.” Neil’s grin brightened. “Let me guess, you’ve been stung before?”

He managed a wry laugh. “After the war, back in England. Bloke said he had connections. Took nearly everything I’d saved. I’m not keen to repeat it.”

“Don’t go alone then.”

“Tom’s working, haven’t got much choice.”

“No, thick-head,” Neil nudged his arm, brushing his wrist in the process. “I’ll come with. Besides, I like the idea of you owing me a favour.”

Thomas nodded, pulse a little quick. “Meet me at noon. It’s a bit away so I’ll meet you at Causeway Street to catch the trolley.”

“Your bar’s going to be outside the North End?”

“The bar will be here, down by the docks somewhere. But I’ve to meet this chap in Beacon Hill.”

It sounded ridiculous, even as he said it. He could hardly picture himself marching into Beacon Hill, asking favours in broad daylight. It felt more like a bad joke than a plan, but the alternative was sitting still, waiting for the next blow. Regardless, Neil appeared unfazed, still grinning with his hands tucked in his pockets.

They crossed under a flickering streetlamp, shadows scattering. For a moment, Thomas let himself imagine what it might feel like to for the first time, have a place of his own where he could drop his guard, just a little. Not his old room at Downton, not the back alleys with Neil, not even the cramped flat he shared with Tom that, admittedly, was starting to grow on him. This would be a place built on his terms, something he could claim without fear. He tried not to hope too much.

“It’s not settled yet. For all I know, it could be another dead end. Or a trap.”

“Then at least we’ll both get caught, yeah?” Neil winked, quick to shrug off the risk.

Neil always rushed at the world headlong, never pausing to look for the edge. Thomas envied that, he wished he had that ability to treat danger like another bit of mischief. But he’d seen how quickly things could go wrong and it had left a mark on him.

They reached the edge of the market district, empty carts stacked under tarps, the smells of fish and spilled beer lingering in the gutters. Thomas slowed, glancing sideways, reluctant for the quiet to end.

“You know,” Neil said, breaking the silence, “if it does work, you’ll need more than just muscle. You’ll need someone who knows how to keep their mouth shut. Not everyone’s cut out for that.”

Thomas managed a half-smile. “So you’re on board?”

“Maybe. Depends on the pay.”

“It’ll be less than what Martin’s giving us, but you’ll have a say in what happens and if it works, you’ll get a fair portion of the takings.”

“Sold.”

They turned onto Neil’s street, the lights growing sparser, windows shuttered. A stray dog barked from the next block.

“Who’s the fella? With the stuff?” Neil asked quietly.

“Fede Romano is the name I was given. Declan vouched for him. I’m meeting him tomorrow, supposed to ask for the cellar. Apparently, if you use Declan’s name, he knows your decent.”

Neil gave a low whistle, impressed.

“Jesus, Tommy. Sounds like a real operation.’

“So far, anyway.”

“You sure you’re ready for it?”

“Not really,” Thomas hesitated. “But I can’t stand the thought of doing nothing and watching everything fall apart.”

They walked in step, neither saying much, nor hurrying to break the quiet. The conversation had long drifted, but Thomas felt Neil’s presence beside him, a comfortable closeness that made the night feel less empty.

He realised, all at once, how little he knew of Neil’s world beyond these streets and after-hours pints. He could map out the lines of his body, could count the birthmark on his hip, but beyond the pub and these night walks, he knew next to nothing about the rest of his life. Even aside from the late nights and laughter, they’d managed to become friends in their own way. Thomas knew every twist of Neil’s humour, every stubborn streak, could predict a joke before it landed. But he had no idea who Neil met when he wasn’t here, who had ever got under his skin, what his heart looked like when it was given. He cleared his throat.

“You ever been… serious with someone?” The words sounded foolish, but it was too late to swallow them.

“Thought you weren’t the jealous type, Tommy,” Neil shot him a sidelong look.

“Just making conversation,” Thomas shrugged, trying to smile. “Didn’t we already clarify ‘mates, nothing else’? I figure I know more about you than most, but not much that actually matters.”

“There was someone. A while back. Jack.”

Thomas waited, letting the silence do the asking.

Neil went on, voice low but steady. “Jack wasn’t like anyone else. Bit older than me, hard to pin down, really. Born a lass – Jacqueline – but she always said it changed day to day. Some days a bloke so I called him ‘he’ instead. Then some days not either.”

“Was she… your girl, or…?”

“Just… Jack, y’know?”

For a second, Thomas felt the usual urge to laugh things off, but the honesty in Neil’s voice held him in place. He tried to picture it – someone feeling like a woman one minute and a man the next, neither one thing nor the other, and no need to apologise for it. It sounded braver than anything he’d ever heard of.

He shook his head, a little in awe. “And that didn’t bother you?”

“No. Suited me fine. World’s full of people pretending, so I liked someone honest about it. That was the thing about Jack. They never tried to fit where they didn’t belong. Could make me laugh, could knock my teeth out if I was cheeky.”

“And now?”

“Gone out west with some theatre folk. Something about,” Neil paused, then put on a dramatic voice. “‘Needing to find myself’ or whatnot. I’d have gone, but… well, my ma and da need the extra money.”

For a long stretch, all Thomas could hear was the hush of their steps and another dog barking somewhere down a side street. He was surprised to realise how much sense it made. Maybe the bravest thing was not bothering to fit at all.

He bumped Neil’s arm, lightly. “And I thought I’d heard all your stories.”

Neil snorted, but there was a quiet to it. “Can’t have everything, Tommy.”

His words hung between them, a mix of pride and old ache. Thomas tried to picture Jack – someone who shifted shapes to survive, who took what the world threw at them and refused to pick a side. It didn’t feel odd to him. In some ways, it sounded like freedom. He found himself, a little envious. Practically his entire life had been spent hiding pieces of himself, fitting into uniforms and quiet corners, trying to avoid trouble, yet always wanting more.

After a moment, Neil nudged him lightly with his shoulder. “What about you then, Tommy? Anyone worth mentioning?”

Thomas gave a dry laugh, caught off guard. “Oh, a handful of mistakes and a few near misses.”

There’d been the Duke, all those years ago, who’d left him with more scars than stories. Nineteen and stupid, thinking himself clever, thinking a little attention from a lord could mean something real. When, in reality, it was just another game to someone like that, and Thomas was the joke.

He’d learned to be careful after that. Careful, but never careful enough. There’d been others – affairs that started in doorways, ended in silence. Jimmy had been the worst of it; Thomas let himself believe, for a few long weeks, that he could be wanted, and all it won him was trouble, more suspicion, another place where he’d overstayed his welcome.

“Nothing I didn’t end up regretting,” he added, when the pause between them lingered on a little too long. “I‘ll say that much. Never did get the knack of choosing well.”

Neil made a sympathetic noise. A rueful smile flickered at the edge of his mouth. He kicked at a loose stone, gaze fixed ahead.

“What about your Tom, then?” He nudged his arm again.

“Me and Tom Branson?” Thomas snorted, warmth flushing his cheeks. “God, no. Tom’s got his own world to worry about, full of unions and politics and taking care of Sybbie. He’s got enough to carry without me adding to it. And anyway, we don’t even like the same books, let alone anything else. It’s not anything like that.”

Neil grinned, satisfied, and let it drop.

They turned down his street, the pavement narrowing, tenements stacked close. A sharp left past a butcher shop, and Thomas caught sight of the narrow alley, tucked between the buildings – the one that had become their half-kept secret after hours. One word, a look, and it would be easy to slip back there, bodies pressed between stone and shadow.

Neither of them mentioned it. At the stoop, Neil stopped, closer than was needed. He let his hand rest a moment on Thomas’s back.

“Alright then,” he said, smiling, not letting go until he had to.

Thomas managed a half-smile, nodding, and let himself stand there just a breath longer before turning for home.

———

Less than twelve hours later, Thomas stood with Neil in the shade of the awning at the corner of Beacon and Walnut, watching a horse-drawn wagon rattle past. He’d only ever seen Beacon Hill from the tram windows, never thought he’d have business here. It wasn’t like the crumbling alleys he’d barely been able to afford, nor like the tenements down by the docks. The street was smart, all well-kept brick fronts and polished stoops. He felt the prickle of sweat under his collar, more from nerves than the early summer heat.

“Which one’s the place?” Neil asked, sounding more like a schoolchild than a seasoned barman.

Thomas pointed to the tidy shopfront with “ROMANO & CO. DRY GOODS” painted in gold on the window. He tried to swallow the lump in his throat, glancing at the people passing. The ladies in broad hats, the pair of suited clerks, the trim shopfronts and polite bustle; it all put him in mind of old market days at Downton. For a moment, he could almost hear Carson’s voice in his ear, telling him not to dawdle on the way to the shops.

He could hesitate all he liked, but the rent was due the end of the month. If they couldn’t find something by then, Tom and Sybbie would be on the street, and Thomas… Well, he’d done worse, but he didn’t want to do it again.

“You sure about this?” Neil asked.

“No. But Declan said show up and mention him. That’s supposed to be enough.”

“It sounds too easy.”

“Well let’s find out,” he shrugged lightly. He was trying to sound confident, but it definitely wasn’t coming across.

Neil elbowed him, grinning. “After you, partner.”

“Shut it,” Thomas muttered, but he was grateful for the attempt at humour.

He pushed the door, the bell above giving a neat little chime. Inside, it was cool and smelled of coffee and old wood. The shelves were lined with tins and jars, a counter stretched along the back wall. Behind it, a woman about Sergio’s age was unloading boxes. She looked up with sharp eyes.

He hesitated a second. “Er– do you know where I can find Fede Romano?”

She didn’t answer right away, just finished stacking a crate and straightened, wiping her hands on her apron. “Who’s asking?”

Thomas faltered, trying to decide if he was meant to give a name. He remembered Declan’s advice to keep it small and quiet.

“We were sent by Declan Doyle,” he said, pitching his voice low. “Supposed to ask about a cellar. Do you know where I can find him?”

“You already have.”

He caught Neil’s eye, saw his confusion mirrored. Then, slowly, the penny dropped. Thomas blinked, feeling both stupid and oddly impressed. Neil mouthed a silent “oh,” as the woman’s mouth twitched, clearly used to this sort of reaction. Neither of them had expected to find themselves outfoxed before they’d even begun.

“Sorry, I… I thought–” Thomas cleared his throat, lost for words.

“That I’d be a man, yes? Happens all the time,” she gave a short laugh. “Federica. Not Federico.”

Neil tried to recover, fumbling. “Didn’t mean any offense, miss.”

“None taken.”

Thomas nodded, meeting her cool gaze. “Right, well. Declan said you might be able to help us.”

“Declan, huh?” she said. “Well, that and a nickel’ll buy you a cup of coffee, but at least you’ve got the name right. Why’d he send you here?”

“We’re thinking of opening a place,” he said carefully. “Something a bit more… secretive than the rest of them. Where people can have a drink without having to worry who’s in their company.”

“For Irish queers,” Neil blurted out, then went crimson.

Thomas glared at him. Fede’s mouth quirked slightly. He couldn’t tell if it was a smile, or just amusement at their nerves.

“And you think I’m the one to talk to?” she drawled, clearly entertained.

“That’s what I was told,” Thomas said, standing a little straighter. “Declan said you’d help with supplies. And you’ve a place down by the docks that needs using.”

She looked him up and down. “You want to go downstairs then and talk properly, or would you rather stand up here out in the open?”

Thomas’s heart thudded, but he nodded. Neil, for his part, looked as if he’d just been caught sneaking into a church.

They followed her through a narrow door at the back of the shop, down a creaking staircase to a low-ceilinged cellar.

“She’s not what I pictured,” Neil whispered, at one point. “Thought it’d be some old, fat fella with a stogie.”

“Keep your voice down,” Thomas hissed, but he was thinking the same. “Come on.”

The cellar smelled of damp stone and sawdust. Fede unlocked a side cupboard, revealing a rack of bottles and a row of kegs, some stamped with brewery names, others unmarked.

“I don’t run a charity,” she said, folding her arms. “And I don’t deal with fools. You want to buy, you pay. You keep quiet, I keep quiet. You get caught; you never met me.”

They both nodded. Thomas could see the way his eyes kept darting around the cellar, as if expecting a policemanto leap out of a barrel.

“You clean?” she asked.

“Wouldn’t risk coming if we weren’t.”

“You got money?”

“Not much,” he admitted. “But enough to show I’m true to my word.”

“Alright,” she said. “First question: how much you looking for?”

Thomas hesitated, wishing Tom were here. “Enough to keep a few dozen in drink, nothing that’ll make us rich. We’re starting small.”

She nodded. “Small is smart. Big gets you noticed. I got rum, gin, whiskey. Some Irish if you don’t mind the price, and I can do beer, but you’d better have a way to keep it cold.”

Neil blurted out, “How do you keep the police off your back?”

“I pay who needs paying,” she gave him a sidelong glance. “And I don’t trust anyone who comes in here acting like they own the place.”

Thomas couldn’t help but admire her poise; she was quick, but she listened more than she spoke. He liked that.

“How do we pay?” he asked, trying not to sound as green as Neil was acting.

“Half up front for the first batch. If you make trouble, if you bring heat, you’re done. But if you’re steady and you don’t make a mess, you’ll always have something to come back to.”

It all sounded fair enough, but that’s what he’d thought last time, before it all went sideways. Last time he heard those words, it cost him everything he had, and then some.

“I’ve…” he trailed off, choosing his words carefully. “I’ve been stung before. Similar situation, after the war.”

Fede didn’t answer him, moving instead to the shelf behind her. She sorted through receipts, selected a slip with yesterday’s date scrawled in one corner, and scribbled an address on the blank side. When she handed it over, Thomas glanced down and saw a timetable, coded and precise.

“You want your still, come back next Friday,” she instructed. “Bring your money and a crate to haul it in. Then each Thursday after that. If the blinds are up, you wait. If they’re down, you walk on and forget you ever knew me.”

They both nodded.

“And remember,” she continued. “Nobody asks for Fede, nobody talks about the cellar. I’ve got as much to lose as you do, and more. That’s how you know I’m good for my word.”

Thomas nodded, tucking the paper into his jacket. Neil looked as if he’d finally caught his breath. It was only after they’d said their goodbyes and stepped back into the sunlight that he realised his hands were shaking.

Neil let out a slow breath. “Jesus, Tommy. You think maybe we’re in over our heads?”

“Every second,” he muttered, tucking the slip into his jacket.

They started downhill, Beacon’s wide streets giving way to the city’s bustle. Thomas adjusted his collar, wary of every passing glance. Neil kept pace, hands in his pockets.

“Scary one, she is,” he tried for a grin. “Reckon she’s sharper than half the men in the trade.”

“I wouldn’t want to cross her,” Thomas agreed. “But she’ll keep us straight. At least as long as we don’t cock it up.”

Neil nodded. “Say we get this going, you ever think about… entertainment? Bit of music or something of the like.”

“You volunteering to dance on tables, then?”

“Jesus no,” he laughed, properly this time. “But I know someone. Anita. She works over at the print works, but on Fridays she sings at a little place off North Washington. Got a voice that could make you forget where you are. Only thing is, she… well, she’s like us, but for lasses. She’s darker skin as well, so for her, it’s twice as tough. Something like this’d be good for her.”

“Both Declan and Fede told us to keep it small. Too much noise, we’re finished before we start.”

Neil nodded. “She knows the risks better than you or I. And at least our lot wouldn’t give her trouble. Besides, it’s harder for women to find each other. Anita says there’s never anywhere safe. She says we’re lucky, compared to them.”

He saw Neil’s point. Thomas never given much thought to how different it was for women. They couldn’t always slip through the cracks the way men could. And especially not if their skin was darker. For women like this Anita, there was nowhere. He wanted to help, but there was still a lingering problem.

“We can’t afford to pay for entertainment, Neil.”

“Doesn’t have to be paid any more than a drink or two,” Neil shrugged. “We’d be doing each other a favour. She brings some friends in, maybe keeps the place gentler. Folk listen better to a voice than a sermon.”

Thomas was quiet for a moment, imagining it. The room fuller, laughter warming the walls, Anita’s voice cutting through the haze. It sounded good. Really good.

“Tell her to come by, then,” he said. “No promises, but we’ll see what happens.”

They cut across the street, neither saying much, both thinking it over as they made their way back to the North End.

———

The flat that evening was loud – louder than anything Thomas had dealt with outside of work in a long time. Mary and her two children were camped out on the settee, while Sybbie sat cross-legged on the threadbare rug, bits of paper and crayons scattered everywhere.

Tom stood by the stove, sleeves rolled up as he stirred something in an old pot. Thomas was next to him, chopping onions with a blunt kitchen knife that had seen better days.

“Careful Thomas,” Tom said, glancing over. “You’re meant to cut the onions, not your hand.”

He raised an eyebrow but kept at it, determined. “You know, it’s not me who’s picky about how small you want them diced.”

“Don’t start,” Tom warned, but there was a grin in it.

Mary called over from the far side of the room. “You two need any help in there?”

Tom shook his head, looking briefly over his shoulder. “Not unless you fancy settling a kitchen brawl.”

“I already have two children, thanks,” she scoffed.

He shrugged. “Ah, children are a dream, Mary. A house without them isn’t worth the rent, that’s what I say.”

“Then mine must be a palace,” she muttered. “Shame there’s no king to sweep up after them.”

Right on cue, Sybbie darted over, holding up her crayon drawing for Thomas. “Is this you, or is it Daddy?”

He pretended to squint. “Hard to say. Who has the sillier hair?”

“Daddy!” She giggled, running back to show her cousins.

The flat was stifling, the windows steamed. Thomas rinsed the onions, stacking the scraps for the soup pot, and let his mind drift. For all the bickering, there was a real rhythm to this life. None of it meant anything, none of it ever left a mark. He was beginning to understand why Tom never bothered holding grudges.

Tom’s voice dropped, once his sister had gone back out of earshot. “Portions are a bit small tonight, but we’re about a dollar away from not being able to pay this month’s rent.”

“We’ll manage,” Thomas muttered.

“That’s what you said last time.”

“I meant it last time too.”

“I know we’ll find a way,” Tom shook his head. “I just hate having her come over here, see us living like this.”

“She doesn’t care about that. She’s got her own hands full.”

He grunted, stirring harder. “It’s not right. Two grown men, both working, and it’s still a struggle to put food on the table.”

It wasn’t just the rent, money was tight. Thomas saw it in the way Tom scraped every last bit of food into the pot, the way he measured out flour like it was gold. Lately, there was less meat than there used to be, and a lot more beans than anyone would have liked. Still, no one complained, not even the children.

“Things’ll change,” he said quietly. “Today I went with Neil to–”

Before he got a chance to finish his story, Sybbie ran over again, followed by Seánie, both of them running from Brídie, who was shrieking with laughter, the wooden spoon held high like a sword.

Mary’s voice called after them, exasperated and fond. “Brídie! Seánie! Not near the stove, mind yourselves! Sybbie!”

Thomas caught Sybbie mid-run, swinging her onto his hip. “You lot planning on letting us eat in peace?”

She wriggled, all smiles. “We want pudding.”

“Well, help set the table, and you might earn it,” he said, passing her a stack of plates.

He scooped her up with one arm, making a game of letting her ‘fly’ over the battered table to drop the plates in place. Brídie was quick to snatch the cutlery from the drawer and start laying it out. Seánie made himself busy by banging two spoons on the table like drumsticks, completely oblivious to the chaos.

Thomas set the bread basket down, watching them. It was chaos, but a gentle kind, softened by the ease that settled between them after a long week. It was… nice?

Tom wiped his hands and ushered everyone to their seats, then took his own, looking exhausted. Mary was last to sit. Her skirt caught on the chair leg, hair escaping its pins. Thomas bent down, untangled it, and offered a hand as she settled herself. She offered him a quick, grateful look as she shifted Seánie to her lap.

“Sybbie’s grown an inch since last week,” she said, half to Tom, half to herself. “It’s torture when you can’t afford to keep them in shoes, isn’t it? You look up and suddenly nothing fits.”

Tom grunted in agreement, pouring the stew into bowls, but Thomas saw the lines around Mary’s eyes as she spoke. He handed her a spoon, trying to keep it light.

“You must be run ragged. Do you ever get a night to yourself?”

She paused, to smooth Seánie’s hair, her gaze slipping just past Thomas’s shoulder.

“Not lately,” she said, soft but certain. “But you manage, don’t you? You have to when you’re on your own.”

Thomas thought about asking after her husband, but something about the way Mary set her jaw made him let it be. He felt a flicker of guilt; he and Tom barely kept afloat with one child between them, and here she was managing two on her own. Better not to pry. He reached for the bread basket instead.

It wasn’t long until everyone was settled. The bowls of stew were set out on the table, sending up clouds of steam that mingled with the sounds of the children nudging bread at each other and whispering over who had the bigger piece.

Tom glanced around at the scene, then cleared his throat and caught Mary’s eye from across the table.

“There’s something we’re thinking of trying,” he said, keeping his voice steady.

She raised an eyebrow.

“Might sound a bit mad,” he continued on. “But… well, we’re planning to open a place. Something like a pub but… quieter.”

Mary paused mid-bite, clearly interested now. “Go on, tell me more.”

“It’s only in the planning, really,” Thomas stifled a smile, pretending to focus on buttering Sybbie’s bread. He looked over to Tom. “I didn’t even get a chance to fill you in on this yet, but we’ve found someone to help with supplies. It’d be a place for people who don’t fit in anywhere else. Just a handful to start.”

“You both know this could bankrupt you entirely?” she said, looking between them.

“It’s all a bit quick, I know,” he admitted, running a hand through his hair. “It’s barely a week since we got the rent notice.”

Tom shrugged. “It’s a gamble, but if it works, we’ll be able to sustain ourselves.”

“That’s much safer for us in the long run,” Thomas added.

“Well, I suppose it’s better than running off to join the circus.”

Tom grinned. “Between the two of us, we’d manage.”

Mary glanced at the two of them as she wiped Seánie’s mouth. “Suppose it’s a good thing you’ve got each other. Makes the hard bits less lonely.”

“Well, we keep each other in line,” he said, shooting a wry glance at Thomas, who only managed a nod as he focused on buttering his bread.

“And you’ll be needing someone to mind Sybbie when you’re off busy playing publican, won’t you?”

“We would,” Tom admitted. “But only if it’s not too much.”

“Ah, what’s one more?” She wiped Brídie’s face with a thumb. “She could do with learning a bit of rough and tumble anyway. Let her run riot with her cousins.”

“We’ll see you right, naturally,” Thomas added. “It’s hard to tell how much money we’ll have at first, but once it stabilises… heaven knows you’ve earned it.”

Mary waved off the talk of payment, her voice softer. “I’d be grateful for the company for the kids, never mind anything else. Besides, you two haven’t got it easy either. We’ll manage between us.”

“It’s the bloody landlords, that’s the trouble,” Tom bristled, half rising. “They’re bleeding us dry for a roof that leaks–”

Thomas, without thinking, reached across and laid a steady hand on his arm. Tom glanced at him, let out a slow breath, and sank back into his chair. The room quieted, but the tension eased, just a little, as the children’s chatter filled the space again.

———

By nightfall, the flat was quiet again, stripped of all its earlier noise. Sybbie had drifted off hours ago, a sticky hand still clinging to her favourite bit of cloth. The windows were open an inch, letting in city air thick with the distant hum of night traffic and summer’s muggy leftovers. Thomas wiped the table, half-listening as Tom leafed distractedly through the evening paper, then let out a low, frustrated blow.

“You notice how it’s always our lot told to count our blessings, never the landlords?”

Thomas wiped his hands, trying to keep his voice steady. “We don’t need to do this again, Branson.”

“Don’t call me that, for God’s sake.”

“Sorry.”

“Anyway, it’s the truth,” Tom didn’t back down. “They keep telling us to be grateful. ‘Roof over your head, steady job, what more do you want?’ As if gratitude pays the rent they keep hiking up.”

Thomas folded his arms, weighing his words. Before he could say anything, Tom barrelled on, voice rising with conviction.

“It’s all set up to keep us chasing our own tails. Connolly had it right. He said ‘the landlord who lives by owning land is no more a useful member of society than the highway robber who lives by levying toll on the traveller.’ That’s all this is, isn’t it? They raise the rent and call themselves respectable, but it’s robbery just the same. Keeps us worried enough about the next bill, so we never look past our own front doors.”

“No argument from me,” Thomas said, quietly. “It’s always the ones at the bottom who feel the pinch first. That’s how they like it.”

“That’s why we have to try something new,” Tom’s mouth twisted, but the fire didn’t go out. “Not just keep our heads down and hope the world goes gentle.”

He lifted the paper, jabbing a thumb at the headlines. “You see what’s happening in Chicago? Tenants on strike. Landlords getting nervous for the first time in years. Workers walking out. It’s starting to crack, all of it. Bit by bit.”

Thomas arched an eyebrow. “And you reckon our little place down by the docks is part of the great revolution, do you?”

That drew a tired laugh. “Maybe not. But it’s a start. Somewhere you don’t have to keep your coat on or watch your back. I’d rather risk it here than rot quietly in some house that was never really mine.”

Thomas settled on the sofa, stretching out his legs. “Funny to hear you say talk like this again, now your father-in-law’s a lord with half Yorkshire under his thumb.”

Tom grinned, shaking his head. “To think I almost stayed. God, can you picture it? ‘Branson of Downton Abbey, Esquire. Collector of rents, scolder of gardeners.’”

“You ever miss it? That life?” Thomas asked.

His answer was half a shrug. “Sometimes. Not the dinners or the uniforms, but the family, yes. I may not agree with them most of the time, but they’re good people. And despite it all, Robert – Lord Grantham – he’s a good man.”

Still, Thomas stayed quiet; he could tell Tom needed to say it.

Running a hand through his hair, he clenched his jaw in thought. “It’s Mary I miss, most days. Edith too, though she’d have me strung up if she heard me say it. There’s no one quite like them here – nobody to keep you honest or tell you when you’re being a fool. Some nights, I wonder if I was right to drag Sybbie across an ocean. There’s days I worry I’ve put her in harm’s way, brought her somewhere that can barely keep the rain out, let alone give her the life she deserves.”

He hesitated, letting his gaze fall to the quiet shapes in the next room.

“Would’ve been easy to stay, if I’d let myself. Sybbie safe in the nursery, me in a suit, bowing and scraping like the rest of them. All I had to do was keep my mouth shut. But that’s never been me.”

Thomas let his head tip back against the wall. “You know, I sometimes think about that myself. Not often. Just now and then, when things are quiet and I’m left with my own thoughts.”

Tom shot him a curious look. “You? Can’t say I ever pictured you as nostalgic.”

“It’s not nostalgia.” He twisted the cloth in his hands, staring at the worn patch on his trousers. “More the habit, I suppose. I hated it there, tried to get out plenty of times. But I knew where I stood. The worst time for me was after the war, when I wasn’t in the army, but didn’t work in Downton either.”

“Comforts a funny thing. Sometimes more habit than happiness.”

“Wasn’t a bad world for you though,” Thomas said, not quite accusing. “At least not by the end.”

Tom set the paper aside, leaning forward, elbows on his knees. “That’s the trick, though, isn’t it? No matter how good they are, they still let you think you’re in on it. And then at the end of it all, you’re still reminded you you’re only ever a visitor.”

“Is that what happened with you and the family?”

Tom didn’t answer. From the next room, Sybbie murmured in her sleep, then settled. Thomas let the silence sit, not bothered to find the right words to say.

“So, do you?” Tom asked, after a few minutes.

He raised an eyebrow. “Do I…?”

“Miss it? Downton.”

Thomas stayed quiet a moment, letting the question hang between them. He picked at the loose seam in the arm of the chair, weighing his answer. Tom sat back, legs sprawled, content to wait as long as it took.

“Sometimes. Not in the way you’d think, though. I don’t miss any one person, really. Maybe Anna, a bit, but that’s a strange one because we were never even close.” He huffed a laugh, half-shrugging. “It’s the security, I think. How everything had its place, everyone knew their part. Even when you hated it, there was a certainty to it.”

Tom sat forward, amused. “Listen to you, getting sentimental.”

“Oh, be quiet,” he muttered, but there was no bite in it. “It’s not that. It’s just… after the war, I thought I’d never want to set foot in a house like that again. But here I am, wondering what Mrs Patmore’s cooking for dinner, or who Lady Mary’s latest beau is.”

“You’re getting soft in your old age, Barrow.”

Thomas scowled at him. “You’re the one who started talking about missing your old bosses.”

“Not bosses. Family,” he corrected, quieter now.

“Same thing for you.”

Tom grinned, although Thomas didn’t know why, as it wasn’t entirely meant as a joke.

“They drove me mad, but they meant well. It was home, for a bit. But this?” he gestured around the tiny flat, a hand moving through the lamplight. “This is real, Thomas. Hard, but real. Maybe it’s less secure than Downton, but you can trust it to be what it is.”

Thomas looked away, hiding the twist of his mouth. “Sometimes I wonder if I only stayed at Downton because I didn’t belong anywhere else. I think that’s the real reason I left. I had to find out for myself.”

“Yeah, well. I used to think the same,” Tom replied. “But I reckon we’re doing alright here.”

They fell into another lull. Thomas stretched his legs, folding his arms across his chest.

“If I ever mention missing Carson’s voice, I’ll need you to put me out of my misery right on the spot.”

Tom let out a laugh then, one that was full and open and filled the room. Thomas found himself grinning back. The corner of his mouth twitched, and then, reluctantly, he let the warmth in.

Their laughter died down slowly, soon replaced a gentle seriousness. Both men fell quiet, one watching the shifting lamplight on the ceiling, while the other picked at a loose thread on his shirt. The hour was late and somewhere outside, a horn sounded somewhere down the block.

“So, you were saying earlier,” Tom sat forward, elbows on his knees as he looked to his side. “You’ve found someone to supply us? Or is this another one of Neil’s wild schemes?”

“Not Neil,” Thomas replied, shaking his head. “We went to see a woman who owns a dry goods shop up Beacon Hill. She knows her way round the trade, and she’s got a head on her. Keeps her own books, runs things tight, that sort of thing.”

 “Alright. We still need to make sure we don’t have any trouble.”

“I’m not looking to run a brawl, Tom,” he glanced over. “Neil’s on board and he can handle himself if it comes to that. I’m hoping it won’t. We pick the right crowd and then we should be okay.”

Tom nodded, considering. “Maybe I can manage that. There’s a couple of lads I know from the union meetings. Some of them have been looking for somewhere that’s not half-policed by the old crowd. They know how to spread the word quietly.

“I don’t want word to spread at all, not really,” Thomas said firmly. “Just enough to keep us afloat.”

“No flyers then?”

“I’m serious, Tom.”

Tom grinned. “Relax, I’m only winding you up. I’ll talk to the lads, get them on board.”

Thomas nodded in agreement, letting the quiet settle between them. He could picture it now – tables scattered with empty glasses, laughter under low light, Neil running the taps, Anita’s voice cutting through the fug of pipe smoke. It wasn’t a fantasy anymore. There were names and faces attached to it, real people who might come if they built it right.

“It could work, you know,” Tom broke the silence. “I’ve a friend, Sean O’Dwyer. He’s… your way inclined.”

Thomas snorted. Tom ignored him.

“He knows half the dockworkers and never says a word out of turn. He can help us spread the word to the right people.”

“Neil knows a woman, Anita something-or-other,” Thomas said. “He says she’s like us – like me and Neil, that is – and she’ll sing a few songs and the like for the price of a drink. She might know a few others.”

“And do we keep that the extent of our advertising?”

“I believe so.”

“Are you sure this isn’t moving a bit fast?”

“We’re not going to make next month’s rent if we don’t.”

“We’ll need to set rules,” Tom nodded, lips pressed in a determined line. “Quiet at closing, set a capacity limit, and if anyone brings trouble, that’s it for them.”

Thomas nodded back. “It’s a start. But maybe not the revolution you’re looking for.”

Tom didn’t answer straight away. He crossed to the window, cracked it a little wider, letting the city sounds in. Then he paced once to the stove and back to the settee. Sitting back down, he turned and caught Thomas’s eye with a crooked smile.

“It’s ours, though.”