I am sure you can all guess what inspired this. Spoilers for those who haven't started Series 3 yet. It's short and I am not all that convinced I have said what I meant to say. Reviews always welcome.
He knows it should make him kinder, he knows why it does not. He cannot allow it to soften him, to make him weaker. She had been by his side for years, decades and he had never really seen her, not properly, not wholly as more than his colleague. Yes, he acknowledged she was a good housekeeper, that he enjoyed her company in the evenings, that he trusted her and that the house would be worse off without her.
When he had discovered she might be dying it had frightened him and at first he had been so caught up in his worry that he had not stopped to examine why he felt so afraid of losing her. All he knew was that he wanted to take care of her, whether or not he had any right to and even if she could not know about it. The hour he had spent waiting for her and Mrs Patmore's return from the doctor's had felt like days but he could not remember the last time he had felt such sheer relief and joy as he had when Mrs Patmore told him the test results. He was not losing her, there was time yet.
Time for what, he wasn't sure. But things were different after that scare. He couldn't figure out if it was he who had changed somehow or if it was Mrs Hughes. She seemed softer somehow and yet at the same time bolder! She had never been afraid to voice her opinions but now sometimes it was as though she wished to challenge him. She looked him in the eye more than she used to, she stood closer.
She had come to him the night Lady Sybil died and held his hand to comfort him. Even in his sadness the novelty of this gesture registered with him. This was how things had changed. He could count on one hand the number of times he and Mrs Hughes had physical contact. Now their hands rested together and he stroked hers briefly, surprised at how soft it was. Surprised at how much this small gesture made him want to cradle her in his arms completely.
Over the next few days he kept himself busy with arrangements for the funeral but also equally busy with analysing this new situation with Mrs Hughes. He noted all the little smiles, every time she rolled her eyes at him, the slight way she cocked her head and raised an eyebrow whilst pretending to humour him. It should have angered him and yet it didn't, it made him want to smile too.
Mrs Hughes had seen his weakness that night that Lady Sybil died. She knew now that he needed her and it left him vulnerable. For all his bluster, and he knew he had been harsh when he had said she disappointed him, of course he had not meant it. It was not her attitude towards Ethel which had bothered him the most but fear that she had used his weakness to ignore decision. He would not, could not, forbid her anything.
It made him realise how much of her personality Mrs Hughes had in fact subdued all these years. He had been wrong in his assumption that she always spoke freely to him because he understood it was only now that she was truly beginning to do so. He hated the idea that he had been the one to supress her all those years. Her kindness was shining through now more than ever and it paradoxically it gave him a sense of freedom.
Yes, Mrs Hughes now knew how much he relied on her but he had seen a need in her too. She had come to him. Despite all the disagreements and no matter how much he angered her, she would come to him. She always would. And he would always be grateful.
But if this new arrangement were to work he would have to be more careful. He could not afford to allow himself any more moments of vulnerability, any more thoughts of yielding to this new need of his to be close to her. The only closeness they could acceptably enjoy was verbal. They could be as frank as they wished with one another but they could not risk slipping into improper behaviour such as that which he had almost let himself fall into the night of Lady Sybil's death.
And that was why he could not be kinder. His gruffness was now the only remaining border between them. He did not mean the grumpiness and he knew she did not believe it but he hoped she recognized it's necessity. It was this or… nothing.