I am starting to sense your location
In an old abandoned mansion
In the country side of England
Spirits trapped inside the linens
And you're feeling quite at home there
Also feeling somewhat lonely
No one sees you in your pixelated fishnets
And your black and orange barrettes
Location - Freelance Whales
Philip keeps up three residences in three very different places. One is in New York, where he stays when he has business to attend to in the States. Thomas hasn't actually been to that one, but he's Skyped with Philip while they've had the pond between them and had been given an unofficial tour. It was all clean, stark lines and the neutrality of a penthouse suite. He has a big, king sized bed with a gray duvet and Thomas wishes more than anything he could be there too, burrowed beneath the thick blankets, tucked into Philip's side as he taps away at his laptop late into the night. He's never been to New York.
The second – and Thomas' favorite – is the flat in central London, the place Thomas has come to know as Philip's Place. Out of the three, it was used most often. This one actually has pictures on the walls of his sisters and mom; his bass in the corner; and countless bookshelves filled with textbooks and business manuals. Thomas loves this place best because it's the most suited to the real Philip: quiet and thoughtful. Thomas thinks the New York penthouse is perhaps more like the face he puts on for business ventures.
Thomas didn't even know about the third place until Philip decided one day to up and sell the two flats. Philip, with tight lines around his eyes and a forced smile on his face, tells Thomas that he needs to get more in touch with his natural side for a bit, but Thomas has heard enough muffled phone conversations through the walls to know that Philip is out of money.
So he moves out to the country and Thomas, who has more or less given up his own place to live exclusively in the flat (or, now, this estate that is not quite an estate) follows. The house is a solid forty-five minute drive out into the country, leaving Thomas to steadfastly not think about how far away help is if he needs it. It's a scary thought, but at least the neighbors are about two and a half kilometers apart. Thomas isn't a recluse in any sense of the word, but he's never been much of a borrow-some-sugar type of guy.
The Estate – that's what Philip calls it at least, but to Thomas it's acres of overgrown weeds and grass with what's supposed to be a mansion in the center, but which more resembles a large house – is not quite what Thomas had been expecting. He had become too comfortable with Philip's lavish lifestyle, and the sudden realization that his boyfriend is poor weighs down heavily on his shoulders.
"Ugh," he says as he and Philip drag their bags out of the car.
"Hush, you," Philip replies. Thomas knows that voice – Philip is thinking the same exact thing, but he's not going to admit it. Thomas rolls his eyes at the back of Philip's head and follows him up to the porch. It's rickety and splintery and Thomas makes a mental note to never ever walk barefoot beyond the threshold. (Or anywhere, depending on how long it's been since the house has been inhabited.)
"Remind me again why you own this house." Thomas looks out over the fields, shielding his eyes against the sun, and Philip fiddles with the lock and key.
"A good friend of my dad's inherited it from his grandfather, but they didn't want to keep it. I think they said it was used as a convalescent home or something of that sort. They say it's haunted." The door clicks open, finally, and Philip turns to Thomas, his eyes comically wide. "Ooh, spooky."
Thomas snorts and follows him into the great front hall. He suspects this may be the largest room in the house – the ceiling is tall and the long railing of a catwalk is visible about two thirds of the way up. He whistles and the sound echoes around the room.
"Our room is up through here," Philip says, and goes straight forward and up the grand staircase. The carpet seems to have been red at some point, but now it's thick with dust. Thomas grimaces.
"Couldn't you have called up a cleaning crew before we got here?"
"Oh, don't boo-hoo over your trousers," Philip says. He leads Thomas to the immediate left and into the master bedroom, which is a little bit bigger than the bedroom they'd had in central London. Thomas thinks longingly of their up-to-date plumbing and non-cobwebby cabinets. The bed – which has a massive frame – is covered in a sheet, as is all of the other furniture in the room.
Thomas groans.
"Oh, you big baby," Philip says. He puts his luggage down on the floor and crosses defiantly to the bed. He rips off the sheet in one swoop, as if to show Thomas that there isn't asbestos hiding underneath, but he disturbs all of the dust and is caught in a coughing fit. Thomas sighs overdramatically to show his complete disinterest in staying out in the middle of nowhere, but he knows that it's paid for by the man who inherited it, so maybe this is a blessing in disguise.
The bed sheets underneath are holey and torn and Thomas doesn't even want to think about what's hiding inside the mattress. He shudders involuntarily and clings a little more tightly to his bags.
"They're bringing our mattress later today," Philip says. He rolls his eyes at Thomas. "We can sleep down in the living room if you really want to. There's a fireplace down there if it gets too cold."
"No," Thomas says as Philip walks past him and back downstairs. "You are not implying that there is no central heating. Oh my God! What do you think I am? Amish?"
Philip just sighs back at him and Thomas wonders how much of their communication is exchanged through heavy sighing. Probably a lot of it. He follows Philip down the stairs and into the kitchen (which, outdated or not, it's the only thing so far that hasn't made Thomas consider sleeping in the Volvo instead), still carrying his things.
Philip goes to open the rusty old fridge, then seems to think better of it, and Thomas wails, "We're going to starve, too?"
"There's a little town ten kilometers down the road. You're being a drama queen."
"One time!" Thomas says, just because he kind of wants to pick a fight. He's still hoping Philip will throw up his arms and yell 'surprise!' but that doesn't seem like it's going to happen anytime soon so they might as well go down in flames. "You don't get to call me a queen for life because you thought it would be kinky to have me dress as a woman."
"I wasn't referring," Philip starts, but then he sighs again and presses a hand against his face. "Christ, Thomas, fine. Go down the road and spend the night in the hotel, for all I care. I, for one, am going to start cleaning up a bit, since this is where we're going to live from now on."
Thomas almost drops his bags on the floor and storms away for dramatic effect, but he's still a little bit scared that the second he puts his things down, thousands of small insects will come out from hiding and immediately devour everything he owns. Instead, he turns on his heel and goes across the hall into the living room where there is indeed a fireplace. There's also a table that doesn't look like it's been there for two hundred years, so he places his luggage gently on top of it and relaxes when nothing crawls out from the walls.
The room is slightly smaller than the master bedroom, but it has two massive windows facing out towards the road, and it makes the room seem much smaller and much larger all at once. There's a stack of cleaning supplies in the corner, so he peels off his jacket and grabs a mop.
Thomas doesn't like cleaning. He had worked his way up in the hotel business for some time (which is how he met Philip in the first place) and had spent years sweeping and dusting and vacuuming. It did, however, sour him to any sort of cleaning for the rest of his life. On the flip side, he was very good at cleaning quickly and efficiently.
He makes quick work of the floor with the little Swiffer Sweeper, then goes ahead and peels the sheets off of the furniture. There are three couches, a very dusty rug, and a baby grand piano in the corner. He can hear Philip moving around upstairs, the floorboards creaking beneath his weight, but he ignores it and starts wiping everything down.
Most of the wood beside the fireplace is, thankfully, not mummified or fossilized, so he doesn't have to go out into the great wilderness of The Estate to find some. He moves some of the furniture around and does not, by some miracle, find anything that even he is too afraid to kill. Soon, there is a black rubbish bag full of used Swiffer pads and rags and Thomas goes out onto the porch to pour out the dirty mop water.
The living room looks a great deal cleaner than it did before, but Thomas can still see dust mites floating in the air and he really does not want to sleep here or anywhere in the general vicinity anytime soon. He's just thinking about maybe taking Philip up on that offer of going down to the hotel when he hears the rumble of the truck signaling the arrival of the rest of their stuff.
Philip makes it to the door before he does and they give each other awkward cease-fire smiles. Then they spend the next two hours directing the moving men. Thomas still steadfastly refuses to sleep upstairs in the dusty master bedroom, so a mattress is stacked on top of a box spring in the newly cleaned living room.
Once they're gone, Philip takes the car down to the little town to pick up something for dinner, leaving Thomas to continue cleaning and unpacking. He crosses the hall into the kitchen and tries to scrub off some of the grime on the countertops. He still wants to tear them all out and install granite, but this will have to do for now, even if the oven is a black grated gas stove from the late 1920s.
Thomas wonders what happened to the house after the convalescent home packed up and left. It doesn't look like anyone has lived here in decades, but he wonders why they wouldn't use such a beautiful home as a small hotel or something of that sort.
He cleans with his iPod plugged into the radio, which is plugged into the wall. The one thing that is very much up to date, thankfully, is the electricity. The lamps and lights might be dusty and outdated, but at least he can flick them on with a switch.
It's barely ten minutes after Philip leaves when Thomas hears one of the doors open and close. He waits for the sound of Philip's footsteps, but they don't come, so he ventures out into the hallway and calls, over the sound of Mariah Carey (she's a guilty pleasure, okay, don't judge him), "Babe? Is that you?"
He walks through the cavernous front hall and pokes his head into the living room, then goes behind the stairs and looks in the library and two of the several guest bedrooms. He cranes his neck to look up on the catwalk to see if maybe Philip has gone up to the master bedroom, but doesn't hear any other noises.
"You're psyching yourself out," Thomas tells himself, shaking his head, and goes back into the kitchen.
He's just picked up his sponge and is scrubbing out the massive sink when he hears, "Thomas?"
He freezes immediately and strains his ears to hear over the music. It's not Philip's voice. This is younger, lighter – and he apparently knows Thomas' name, and that is scary as hell. He turns slowly, hoping that maybe it's one of the movers.
There's nobody behind him, so he crosses the kitchen and shuts off his iPod. The house is suddenly, crushingly silent, and all Thomas can hear is the hurried pump of his heart in his chest. He hates being startled and afraid. He berates himself on being such a scaredy-cat and is just about to turn the music back on when the voice is back, this time sounding broken.
"Thomas?" it calls distantly. "Thomas, where are you?"
He begins to shake, ignoring the part of his brain that tells him to stop being such a baby. He prowls silently back out into the hall and glances around, and he's just about to head into the living room when the front door opens.
He jumps out of his skin and swears loudly when Philip smiles at him, confused.
"Didn't mean to scare you," he says.
"I thought I heard a noise," Thomas replies, cringing at the way his voice shakes. He changes the subject before Philip can tease him for it. "What's for supper?"
"There's this little Italian place," Philip says, going over into the living room. He sets the bag on one of the chairs and moved Thomas' bags onto the floor. "I got pasta."
It occurs to Thomas as they're eating that there's no television in the new house, so when Philip conks out at nine, Thomas has to lie awake staring at the ceiling for another three or four hours. He thinks maybe he can scrub down the loo and have a bath.
Thomas listens with a detached disinterest as Philip goes on about some business venture of his. The two of them don't have a lot in common, not at all, and Thomas wonders sometimes if they only put up with each other so they don't have to put up with other people.
Philip cleans up after them once they've finished. He throws everything away in the rubbish bag that Thomas had set up, then turns and starts to dig around in one of the boxes stacked up against the wall.
"What are you looking for?" Thomas feels so full he could burst.
"Sheets," Philip says absently, pulling out a blanket. Once he finds what he's looking for, he makes the bed up while Thomas sits, feet up on the chair opposite him, and watches. When Philip is done, he collapses back onto the bed. "You wanna break the new house in?"
Thomas groans because his stomach is too full of pasta for any vigorous movement, but he drags himself over to the mattress anyway and falls down next to Philip. They kiss lazily for a while until Philip builds up a steady rhythm with his hips.
Philip falls asleep almost as soon as they pull off the sheets again, leaving Thomas to stare quietly at the ceiling. He listens to the grandfather clock tick loudly from the top of the stairs and it's not until the clock strikes midnight does he drag himself off the mattress, careful not to wake Philip.
As soon as he makes it into the hall, however, he hears deep, echoing sobs. He freezes, heart pounding in his chest, and strains his ears to listen. With a start, he remembers the voice earlier and wonders if someone really is in the house.
Half of him wants to run back into the living room and get back under the blankets with Philip, but the other half – the half that strives to prove to his father, who isn't here to see any of it – that just because he's a gay man doesn't mean he shakes in his bedazzled boots at something that goes bump in the night.
He tries to follow the noise, but every time he thinks he's right on top of it, it moves away. That's the scariest part about it, maybe. He wanders around the dark house, jumping out of his skin at any noise other than the weeping. He flicks on the lights as soon as he enters a room and doesn't shut them off when he leaves.
Soon enough, all of the lights in the house are on, with the exception of the living room, and Thomas still hasn't found whoever is crying. He's just starting to wonder if maybe it's coming from outside – which doesn't make sense, because it's clear as day inside – when he hears footsteps behind him.
"What the fuck are you doing?" Philip asks, shielding his eyes against the bright lights. Thomas turns guiltily and wonders how he's going to get out of this one.
"I thought I heard something," Thomas says, even though he knows he did. He feels stupid for admitting this and the look Philip gives him doesn't ease that feeling. He realizes belatedly that the crying has ceased.
"Come back to bed." Philip is on the verge of irritation so Thomas has no choice but to follow him back to the living room, shutting off the lights as they go. Philip falls asleep again almost immediately, but now Thomas' heart is pounding in his chest.
It's too quiet. There's no sound of cars and people outside, just the occasional and distant hoot from an owl or some other noise from another creature. Thomas strains his ears, wondering where the man who had called his name and cried had gone. The sounds have stopped entirely.
Just before five, he finally falls asleep.
Philip is gone when Thomas finally rouses himself from sleep, but there's a box of donuts on the table and a note that says he'll be back later with dinner. Thomas sighs, eats a Boston cream, and finishes cleaning up the kitchen.
He wonders if Philip would kill him if he express ordered a new refrigerator and oven, but he decides they probably need to talk about that later tonight.
He tackles the downstairs toilet next, scrubbing out the grimy bathtub and mopping up the stone floor. It doesn't take him more than an hour and a half, and by that time, his stomach is starting to rumble. There's no food in the house other than the donuts and some leftover crisps from the drive, so he sits on the bed in the living room and eats while staring out the window at the fields beyond.
When he gets up to throw out the crisp bag, he hears the voice again. This time, it's right behind him. He jumps out of his skin at the sound of his own name and stumbles into a turn, falling back against the cherry doorframe when he sees a figure in front of him. He clasps a hand over his own mouth and chokes off a scream.
It is indeed a man, but there's something off about him. The sunlight goes right through his body and he doesn't cast a shadow on the floor. Thomas doesn't look, but he has a strong feeling that if he did, he wouldn't see feet.
The man is about the same height as him, maybe a little bit taller, and has curly brown hair and a long, thin nose. He's dressed smartly in a military uniform and the skin around his eyes is blistered and bubbled. But his wrists are what have Thomas' rapt attention: they're both slit open and they're dripping blood onto the wood floor. His hands are hanging and there's a thick red trail running down his palm and in between his fingers.
"Thomas," the man says, and he suddenly smiles, bright and open. Thomas is frozen in shock and fear. What he's seeing cannot be real, because he can hear the steady drip drip drip of blood falling from his fingertips, and yet the man is standing there, smiling at him, and Thomas doesn't –
Thomas doesn't think he's alive.
The soldier takes a step forward and Thomas throws a shaking hand out to stop him. The man does stop, but the smile disappears immediately from his face.
"What's wrong?" he asks. "Is it because I can't see?"
Thomas has no idea what is going on, but he knows for certain that the soldier is looking straight at him, and he's up against the wall shaking. It's only now that he recalls Philip, the morning before, telling him, "They say it's haunted."
"They're going to move me away," the soldier continues, dropping his voice to a whisper. "I can't be without you, Thomas, please…"
"I'm not the Thomas you're looking for," he says clumsily, cursing himself for stumbling over his tongue.
"Don't be silly," he says, but he's smiling again. To Thomas' horror, he comes forward and stands close; if he was breathing, they would be sharing air. He lowers his voice: "Don't be afraid. We're going to be together. Nobody can hurt us. We've talked about this before, remember?"
For a wild moment, Thomas is frightened into action by the thought that maybe the soldier is going to kill him. He makes a break for it and runs, runs, runs, out the front door and onto the dirt pathway. It's not until he turns back, cursing that Philip has taken their only car, that he realizes he's barefoot.
"Shit," he says, because there is no way in hell he's going back into the house. He looks down the long driveway and wonders if he could make it down into town.
He's just about to start walking when a truck comes into view and starts backing up to the house. Thomas goes to stand on the porch, ignoring the splintering wood beneath him, and watches.
"You look like you've seen a ghost," the mover says when he comes around to unload their things. Thomas laughs nervously and notes in relief that there is, in fact, a television in the truck. His bicycle is also there, and he vows to take it out just as soon as the truck leaves.
He spends the next two hours looking over his shoulder as he directs the movers. He doesn't hear or see the soldier, but he's still afraid that he's going to die before Philip gets home. And then he starts to wonder what Philip could possibly do for him if a murderous ghost started to tear out his insides and shudders.
He gets his boots and follows the truck out of the driveway, but turns right and heads into town.
It's actually a little bit more than he was expecting. He had anticipated it being a stop light and a petrol station, but it's a tiny village with neighborhoods and family owned businesses and restaurants. Thomas passes the Italian place Philip had gone to last night and careens past, stopping his bike in front of a small café instead.
He heads inside, trying to compose himself a little bit, both from the numbing fear of being faced with a dead soldier and from the ride there. The café is small and cramped, full of mismatched chairs and the smell of something burning.
"Ivy!" he hears a woman shout from the back. "Stop your flirting and take the biscuits out of the oven!"
There's some commotion in the back and Thomas tunes it out while he scans over the menu. A blond man comes out of the back room and gives Thomas a bit of a bored smile. Thomas thinks he's hot as all hell.
"What can I get for you?"
"I, uh," Thomas says. "Chicken sandwich and a packet of crisps."
"To drink?"
"Coffee. Black."
He punches a few buttons on the cash register and says, "Seven eighteen."
Thomas pays with the little allowance that Philip gives him, then watches as Jimmy – as his nametag says – turns to prepare his order. He's probably being borderline creepy with his blatant staring, but god almighty if Philip wasn't around Thomas would want this one wrapped up with a bow on top.
Jimmy hands over his food and their fingers slide together briefly. Thomas thinks he might have imagined it though because the blond turns away into the kitchen with a stoic expression on his face.
Thomas sits at one of the tables and eats quietly, looking out the window at the people passing by. It's a nice day – that is, the overcast isn't promising rain and it's warm without being muggy – and it seems most of the village is milling about outside. When he's finished, he throws away his rubbish and tries unsuccessfully to see what the ruckus is in the kitchen before heading outside.
He rides down to the library because the ghost has brought up a few questions. Thomas barely wants to accept that it was a ghost – but when they'd brought the television into the living room, there was no blood on the floor, so either the soldier knew some sort of magic trick to clean it up without leaving a stain or he hadn't bled there at all.
Between hearing his name being called, the sobbing, and the confrontation in the living room that morning, Thomas is starting to accept that maybe his dubiousness concerning the paranormal is something to be revisited.
There's a young man behind the desk at the library, probably about the same age as Thomas, and his chubby face lights up when he walks in.
"Hello!" he says. "I haven't seen you around here before."
Great. One of those small towns.
Thomas wants to ignore him and walk past, but he might need his help later, so he says, "Just moved here. Where are your historical records?"
"Welcome to Downton!" He is incredibly cheerful and Thomas sort of hates people like that. "I'm William Mason. Where did you move from?"
Thomas is vaguely annoyed that William steamrolled right over his question in favor of bonding time, but he answers anyway. "Thomas Barrow. Came from London."
"Whereabouts do you live?"
And here's an opening. He approaches the desk and places his hands on the countertop. "That's what I'm here about, actually. I was wondering if you have any records about the house that used to be for soldier convalescence."
"Which one?" William asks. "Most of the estates housed soldiers at one time or another." He's about to launch into a story about something called The Abbey when Thomas cuts him off.
"415 Grantham. Do you have anything about that?"
William looks thoughtful for a moment, then comes out behind the desk and leads Thomas down the stacks to a small corner. The shelves are full of binders and William looks for a moment before pulling one off the shelf.
"I think most of the records survived," he says, setting the binder down one of the low-slung tables. He flips through a few pages. "415 Grantham was a convalescent home during both World Wars, as well as many smaller ones. Which war are you thinking of?"
Thomas tries to think back to the soldier's uniform but all he can remember is the blood. "I don't know. Can I just look through?"
"Of course. Shout if you need, yeah?"
Thomas sits down on the little wooden chair and begins to flip through the pages. Some of the records take a while to decipher, but others are straightforward. There aren't any pictures, but Thomas finds a list of soldiers who died at the home and their causes of death.
There are three soldiers who bled out from the wrists from the first World War and six from the second. The next few pages list the doctors, and Thomas finds who he's looking for very quickly. He sits in shock for a long moment before tracing over the letters with his fingertips.
Dr. Thomas Maxwell Barrow.
His great-grandfather.
Thomas the First had only served as medic during The Great War, so the soldier's identity is narrowed down suddenly to three instead of nine. He looks over the list thoughtfully and wonders if it's Private Clinton Brant of Derby; Officer Charles Aubrey from Bedford; or Lieutenant Edward Courtenay from London. There are still no photographs, so he digs deeper into the binder to find medical records.
At five, William wanders back over and tells him that they're closing. He says it so genuinely and regretfully that Thomas doesn't even snap at him. He even offers to let Thomas borrow the binder, but he refuses steadfastly, wondering what Philip might say if he saw it.
"I'll probably be back tomorrow," he says, following William to the front doors. "Thanks for your help."
William waves cheerfully and stands in the doorway as Thomas rides away.
The house was built in 1889 by Peter Labhrainn, a wealthy Scottish immigrant, to be used as a farmhouse. He died at war during the Boxer Rebellion and left the property to his nephew, Archibald Carver, who was the driving force behind the establishment of the convalescent home. He named the property the Rose Carver Memorial Center for Wounded Soldiers in honor of his mother.
There isn't a lot of information in the library about Thomas Barrow the First specifically, but Thomas suspects that most of the photographs and letters he had accumulated are holed up in his father's closet somewhere. Thomas knows little about his great-grandfather other than the fact that he died before Thomas' father was even born.
The soldier – who Thomas still doesn't know the name of – seems to come out at night the most. Thomas can hear him crying sometimes; other times, he sings old war songs or calls Thomas' name. Thomas startles awake one night to find the soldier sitting on the floor next to the mattress and running his fingers through Thomas' hair. At first, Thomas can feel a light pressure, but then it fades with the apparition and his heart rate slows.
The soldier doesn't like Philip. Thomas doesn't know if it's because of his inexplicably intense bond to Thomas (or whoever he thinks Thomas is) or if Philip just gives off some sort of negative energy that isn't compatible to whatever higher power or blah blah blah – Thomas thinks too much about the ghost soldier for someone who doesn't want to believe he exists.
The soldier glares at Philip even though Thomas can hear him having one-sided conversations in the middle of the night about being blind and thus probably can't see him (also, he's a ghost, so Thomas has to wonder why that even matters), and Thomas is almost afraid the soldier might attack one of these days. He dissipates into thin air when Philip walks into a room and reappears later on, watching Philip go before turning to Thomas and saying, "Are we alone now?"
Thomas doesn't get the feeling that the soldier ghost is ever going to hurt him. According to the paranormal documentaries he's started watching after Philip falls asleep, this is both good and bad. Good, because he probably isn't in any sort of immediate danger. Bad, because it means the energy might like him a little bit too much.
He doesn't mention anything about the soldier to Philip and he's under the probable assumption that Philip probably doesn't even notice anything's up. Even though sometimes Thomas stares past him at the soldier when he paces out in the front hall and wonders idly what Philip would be like as a ghost.
Philip leaves early for work one morning and the soldier wakes Thomas up by pulling the blankets clean off the bed. The adrenaline shoots quick through his veins at the suddenness of being woken up by someone who is not actually there, but he's learned to calm himself down when the soldier starts to move things around, so he's breathing normally again in a moment.
The soldier crouches near the end of the bed, the bunched up blankets pooled in his feet. "Come with me," he says. "I want to show you something."
Most of the time, the soldier seems like he's lost in some far away memory or consciously believes the war is still on, though now Thomas can see clearly on his semi-transparent face that he is well aware that the times have changed.
"What?" Thomas says, clambering off the mattress. He yawns into his hand and follows the soldier into the kitchen, where Philip's briefcase is lying on the countertop. "Oh bollocks, he's forgotten his papers."
"Open it," the soldier urges. He paces up close to it then backs off quickly. "Open it now."
"It's an utter invasion of privacy," Thomas says, because apparently his life has come to trying to reason logically with ghosts. "I'm not going to open it."
"Open it."
"No!"
"Thomas."
"No."
The soldier looks enraged and a dirty plate flies off of the counter from next to the sink and smashes against the opposite wall. For the first time, Thomas feels vaguely frightened, and reaches out to flip open the briefcase. Thomas doesn't ever remember a time that Philip has left it unlocked, but, sure enough, it clicks right open.
"What am I looking at?" he asks tiredly. The soldier, seeming much calmer, points.
"Look at the papers on the bottom."
Thomas does, then needs to go sit down.
Philip has sheet after sheet of Thomas' bank account information. Passwords and pin codes are scribbled in the margins of the papers. There are arrows and notes and it takes Thomas a full ten minutes to wrap his head around what he's seeing right in front of him.
"He was going to steal everything," the soldier says unnecessarily.
"How did you," Thomas starts, head in his hand, when the front door opens.
Philip comes through the kitchen doorway and stops in his tracks when he sees Thomas at the kitchen table, papers spread out in front of him. Thomas turns his head slightly and looks at Philip out of the corner of his eye.
"What are you doing?" Philip asks in a strained voice. He takes a step towards Thomas.
"You were going to take everything," Thomas replies quietly. "Holy shit, you were going to wipe me out."
"Why were you going through my things?" Philip approaches the table and begins to roughly gather up the papers and stuff them back into the bag. "What do you think you're doing?"
"What do I–? Oh, fuck you, Philip. Fuck you."
"It's no secret that I'm broke," Philip yells. "I was trying to help us."
"Help us? You were trying to help yourself, you piece of shit. Do you really think I would go quietly?" Thomas shoves out his chair and stands up. He puffs out his chest and stands his own ground, eyeing Philip reproachfully. "I've got three years of your fucking secrets to choose from. I've got pictures and letters and emails that tell an entire fucking story, and you thought for a second you could clean me out without any repercussions?"
"I was going to pay you off when I had enough money."
Thomas laughs wildly and runs a hand through his hair. "Your business is more important than our relationship."
"Your first thought was to blackmail me," Philip shouts back.
"Don't you dare think for a moment that you know what's going on inside my head Philip. Don't you fucking dare. I need to protect myself from your greed and if blackmail is the only way, then so be it."
Philip makes a grab for Thomas and Thomas takes a step back. Now his adrenaline is pumping. He thinks about all of the secrets he knows about Philip: him being a bully in school; him pushing people around to get what he wants; him killing some guy in a scuffle during university. Never getting caught. Thomas knows he feels remorse but he doesn't doubt that Philip could hurt someone else if he wanted to.
The walls begin to shake, the plates rattling around in cabinets, as Philip lunges again. Thomas doesn't see the soldier anywhere, but he's not really looking anyway. He dodges a punch and has to duck twice – once to avoid Philip's fist again and again to avoid the bowl that's hurdling across the room. Philip sees it and gets out of the way fast enough for it to crash against the wall.
He obviously doesn't heed the soldier's warning – doesn't realize it was a warning probably – because he goes after Thomas again. This time, when the cabinet door swings open and the ancient cookery spills out, it topples down against his shoulder. He cries out in pain and Thomas takes that moment to get out of the way. He races towards the doorway between the kitchen and dining room and shouts, "Get the fuck out of my house."
Philip, clutching his shoulder, lifts himself off of the countertop and takes another step forward. A pair of wineglasses soar out of the cabinet and smash against his chest. He grunts and jumps away from the broken glass. Now, he seems to get the picture; he starts backing away towards the door, one hand massaging against his chest.
"I don't know what the fuck you're doing," he says. "But you can fucking rot in here for all I care."
"Good," Thomas says. "I get the house. Paid for. For as long as I want."
Philip looks like he's about to protest when a bowl of apples spills off the island and advances towards him.
"Fine!" he shouts, and for the first time, Thomas sees genuine fear in his eyes. "Live in your haunted fucking mansion." He turns and races out of the house; a moment later, he hears the car peal out of the driveway.
The walls stop vibrating and everything seems suddenly and eerily quiet. Thomas leans heavily against the doorframe, shaking like a leaf and willing himself not to cry. He looks up to see the soldier standing a few feet away. He looks different. The skin around his eyes is smooth instead of puckered and there isn't any blood dripping from his wrists. He's not wearing his uniform anymore, but a pair of trousers and a jacket. Thomas looks up at him, straight through a pair of eyes that look whole and healed.
"Thank you," he says, and begins to cry.
When he and Philip started going out, Thomas was coerced into quitting his job. For the past three years, it was nice to get a weekly allowance and to spend the day as he pleased. Now, however, he does actually need to feed himself.
Philip had come back later that week to collect some of his belongings and they talked (yelled) out the terms of Thomas staying in the house. It was simple: Philip would pay the bills or else Thomas would sic his ghost friend on him again. Philip looked a little bit reproachful at that, like he almost didn't believe Thomas could control the soldier, but he also didn't want to take any chances.
Thomas rides his bike into town the first chance he gets and heads straight for Patmore's, the café he went to the day he saw the soldier. He parks and locks his bicycle out front and pushes through the doors into the overly air-conditioned restaurant.
William from the library is at the counter talking to a small brown haired girl, and they both look up when he walks in. William beams at him.
"Thomas!" he says. "Fancy seeing you here! This is Daisy."
Daisy waves at him. "Can I get you something?"
"Actually," Thomas says, stepping up to the counter and trying not to think about just how much he hates doing this. "I was wondering if you're hiring or not."
"I can get you an application," she says. "Our baker Gwen just quit to go back to Scotland. Do you have any kitchen experience?"
"Loads," he lies, thinking back to the few times he'd covered wait shifts at the hotel.
"Great!" Daisy ducks down under the counter and reappears with a piece of paper. "Just fill this out and bring it back to me. Mrs. Patmore will be in touch."
"Actually," Thomas says, picking up the paper between two fingers. In the back of his mind, he wonders where the blond cashier is. A face like that is not something he'd forget. "Do you have a pen I could borrow, by any chance? I biked here, so it'll be easier to just give it to you now. Do you need a resume?"
As he's talking, Daisy slides a hand down her leg into what Thomas can only presume (and hope) is a pocket. Her hand reappears with a pen and she hands it to him across the counter.
"No," William answers instead. "I don't think this is the type of town you need a resume for. You're thinking big, city boy." He turns to Daisy and says, "He's from London, he is."
"London," she says delightedly. Thomas tries to awkwardly shuffle towards one of the tables without being rude. Normally, it wouldn't be a problem, but it sort of defeats the purpose of applying if he's going to be rude straight off the bat. He might need a favor later, after all. "I've never been to London. What's it like?"
"You've never been to London?" Thomas doesn't want to start a whole discussion, but holy crap. Who hasn't been to London? "You live forty-five minutes out of the city and you've never gone?"
"I've never thought about it," Daisy admits. She turns around, grabs a rag off the backboard, and begins wiping down the cash register.
"When we get married, I'll take you there," William says in a voice that suggests maybe he's dreaming a bit too much. Judging by the look on Daisy's face, this assumption probably isn't far off. "We can live there if you want."
"No," Daisy says kind of awkwardly. Thomas uses this tension as an excuse to wander off to the closest table. "I like Downton, you know? It's home to me. I don't ever want to leave."
"Never?" William says incredulously. Thomas thinks that maybe they should have discussed this before William decided they were going to be married. Maybe he should have discussed with her the idea of getting married in the first place before he decided that they were going to be wed. Judging by the lack of ring on her finger and the discomfort evident on her face, she probably hasn't been asked at all.
Thomas tunes out their teenage-awkward conversation and begins filling out the application. All of the questions are very simple and cut-and-dry: full name, birth date, address, emergency contact information. Prior work experience. There's no request for recommendations, so Thomas doesn't push it. He doesn't doubt that Mr. Carson would probably write him a nice letter – purely for the fact that he had bailed the hotel out of serious problems more than a couple of times – but it's been three years since Thomas last worked under the man and he's not sure he wants to bring it all up again. Especially if it means admitting that he's relocated to the hick down of Downton, England.
He's finished with the application in a matter of minutes and he hands it back to Daisy over the counter. William's disappeared somewhere, leaving Daisy to hover awkwardly at the counter.
She smiles somewhat shyly at him as if William had taken her confidence with him and says, "Mrs. Patmore won't be in until tonight, but she'll probably give you a call tomorrow morning. Or you can stop by and have your interview then. If you'd like to, that is."
"Of course," Thomas says.
"Do you want anything before you go?" she asks quickly as he starts towards the door. He turns slightly and regards her quietly over his shoulder.
"No, thank you."
"Okay." She hiccups and presses a mouth against her mouth nervously. "I'll see you tomorrow then, yeah?"
He just nods at her and goes outside to unlock his bike.
"I've applied for a job," he calls to the empty house when he walks through the doors. He sets the backpack he's taken to carrying around with him on the floor and toes off his shoes. "There's a café in town called Patmore's and I dropped in while I was in town."
"You're not going to leave though, are you?" The soldier appears in the doorway of the living room. He's looked healthier since Philip left. He smiles now and doesn't cry. Now, though, he looks worried. Thomas can feel a tangible tension in the air and he wonders why the soldier is so worried.
"No," Thomas says. "It's just for a few hours a day. It takes me ten minutes to bike down there."
"Why don't you just take one of the cars?" The soldier glides past him into the living room. "I'm sure Harrison would be glad to take you. I know Hillary and Atkins went out earlier, but there's still daylight left."
"Hey," Thomas says. They're standing together in front of the big windows facing out at the fields. The soldier has his hands clasped behind his back. The sunlight streams through him. "What's your name?"
Something washes over the soldier's face and, in a monotone voice, he says, "Lieutenant Edward James Courtenay. April 26, 1893."
"Edward James Courtenay," Thomas repeats. He stares out the window at the road beyond and watches a car crawl down the pavement. "Well, I'm Thomas Leslie-Not-Maxwell Barrow. It's a pleasure to meet you."
He gets the job at Patmore's without an interview. He shows up the next morning to find the place almost full to bursting with customers (Thomas didn't think that they could ever be this busy, let alone the fact that this town had this many people). Daisy sees him through the crowd and calls out, "Mrs. Patmore, Thomas is here!"
Thomas would be fine and dandy to wait outside until the crowd dies down, but a large woman with almost radioactively red hair appears from the back and shouts out, "Back over here, boy!"
He slips behind the counter and gives the blond cashier a flirtatious smile. He flushes and drops the coins he's holding, so Thomas counts it as a win.
Mrs. Patmore leads him into the incredibly small kitchen and straight to the back, where she thrusts an apron into his hands. "Daisy said you can cook?"
"I'm halfway decent," he says, which is a little bit humble. Philip had told him constantly that he should be a chef or a food personality or something. That didn't mean he was about to be stuck in the kitchens all day back at the hotel.
"Good," she says. "I need seven loaves of sourdough made. We've only got three loaves left and it'll all be gone by the time lunch rush is over. You think you can do that?"
Thomas looks around at the kitchen which is very small (Thomas can't get over how tiny it is – it reminds him of the claustrophobia of sharing a bedroom with his brothers for the first half of his life) and wonders how he's ever going to find anything. On top of being a matchbox, the place is dusted in a fine layer of flour and is stacked high with pots and pans. Thomas doesn't even see a bread oven.
"Definitely can," he says, and is just about to ask where the hell he's supposed to bake the bread when she gives him a firm nod and disappears through one of the three doors on the back wall.
Though the kitchen is only separated from the main part of the café by a truly hideous piece of fabric, the bustle is somewhat distant. Thomas rolls up the sleeves of the deep blue dress shirt he wore for the interview (Philip's of course; Armani) and takes a moment to get in the zone.
Finding ingredients is surprisingly easy once he figures out the half-assed organization system they've thought up. The spices are in the cabinet near the door; the flour and sugar have their own cupboard and are stacked to bursting; and the pans are hidden underneath the countertops. He gets to work using a sourdough recipe he saw once on Food Network. Or maybe he remembers it because his mom made it; it's one of those two, whatever.
He's finishing up putting the fourth loaf into the oven (which he finally did find – it was behind one of the other two doors) when he becomes aware that there's someone in the kitchen with him.
He turns to find Blond Cashier watching him and he smiles open and easy.
"You've got a real talent for making bread," the guy says conversationally. "I burn everything I touch. That's why she put me up front."
"That's why?" Thomas teases. He crosses back over to the counter and starts to knead into some of the dough he's left to set. He angles his face down so he can't see the man's expression. "I thought it was because of your pretty face."
He doesn't say anything for a while. Then, suddenly: "I'm Jimmy, by the way. You're Thomas?"
"Yeah."
"You got hired quick."
"Yeah?"
"Yeah."
Jimmy comes over and watches him work the bread. He can hear Daisy puttering around in the café, probably cleaning up from the lunch rush.
"You want to try?" he asks, which is stupid, because there's no way Jimmy can work in a café where bread is such a staple and have never kneaded dough. But Jimmy kind of straightens up, clears his throat, and says, "Yeah. Just let me wash my hands."
He goes through one of the doors on the back wall (not the one Mrs. Patmore went through and not the one with the oven – so that one must be the toilet) and Thomas listens to the water run shortly before clicking off. He emerges again with his hands held up, palms facing himself, like he's just scrubbed in for surgery.
Thomas passes the dough over to him. In the small space, they're close together, but not quite as close as Thomas would like to be. He stares, smiling, at Jimmy's face as the boy begins to knead.
"You've got to flip it around," Thomas says. "You can't just knead in one direction. That's probably why your bread comes out wrong."
He sidles up behind Jimmy and reaches out tentatively, then locks his fingers around Jimmy's and shows him. He can hear the breath catch in Jimmy's throat and it's all he can do not to lean against him more, press their bodies flush and kiss at his neck.
He doesn't do any of this, though, because Mrs. Patmore's door opens and Thomas steps away.
"It smells nice," Mrs. Patmore says, emerging from the great unknown with a cake balanced in her hands. "What did you do? Look up a recipe on your smart phone?"
"It was my mum's," Thomas says, because he's pretty sure that's where it came from. "I've got it all up here." He gestures to his head and gives her a tight smile. "That's four in the oven. Three left to go. One right here, two sitting."
Mrs. Patmore eyes him and nods. "We'll see what I think when the loaves come out." Thomas watches her go into the kitchen with the cake, then laughs out a breath.
"You're going to stay," Jimmy says.
"Why? Because I can bake a mean bread?"
"No," Jimmy says. "Because I've never seen her turn down anyone. We had this guy, Molesley. Jesus, he was a walking terror. Everything he touched basically turned into dust. And then he did too, I guess. Electric short-circuited at his house. Fried him to bits."
"Lovely," Thomas says. "I'll make sure not to go up in pyres."
"You make sure of that," Jimmy says. He begins to back away towards the front room . "If you go, it's just me left to bake the bread. Daisy has an irrational fear of ovens and I'm bollocks at anything that involves combining things to make other things."
"One step at a time," Thomas says. "Let's see if she likes the bread first."
She does. A lot.
Jimmy is fantastic and snotty and lovely and the snarkiest person Thomas has ever met. He flirts with the other cashier, Ivy, out in the open, and flirts with Thomas when he comes back to check how the bread-making is going. Thomas gives him tastes of things – the crème brulee Mrs. Patmore so desperately wants to sell; a batch of sugar cookies dyed red and green for Christmas; the new sandwich he'd put together, reminiscing about how much Philip had liked his paninis.
"God," Jimmy always said between bites. "You are – you are Chef Ramsay, except way hotter and less crazy."
Thomas steadfastly doesn't think of the fact that he'd woken up in the middle of the night to find Edward the soldier ghost lying with him on the mattress on the living room floor, his fingers just barely leaving enough of an impression that Thomas could feel his touch. He doesn't tell Jimmy that sometimes, when he's not thinking of Jimmy's hands on him, he's thinking of Edward the dead soldier ghost pressing him up against the shower stall and kissing him blind. He thinks that maybe Edward plays peeping tom a little bit, but Thomas doesn't think he can bring himself to mind. Not when he's bringing himself off, anyway, thinking of Edward's long fingers wrapped around him or Jimmy falling apart beneath him. Or both, god, himself sandwiched between them.
He doesn't kiss Jimmy until March, and when he does, they're both covered in flour as a result of a minor explosion. Jimmy barely kisses him back and at first Thomas is scared.
"Let me take you out tonight," he says anyway.
Jimmy's fingers tighten against his wrist. "Let's stay in."
Thomas wakes up before Jimmy and goes into the kitchen to make breakfast. There's bread and cinnamon and eggs and he makes them French toast and thinks about Jimmy's fingers in his mouth.
Jimmy stumbles in from the living room just as he's putting the French toast on a plate. He's all bleary-eyed and his hair is a mess and Thomas can't help but kiss the taste of sleep out of his mouth.
They sit down at the table and it's not until Thomas is halfway done eating that he realizes Jimmy is picking at his food.
"Something wrong?" he asks.
Jimmy is silent for a long time before he says, "I've enlisted in the military."
"Oh," Thomas says, and thinks he must have a thing for soldiers.
"I haven't told anyone yet," he continues. "But I'm leaving next week."
Thomas feels his stomach bottom out. He knows there's more to this than what Jimmy's saying straight out. He sets down his fork and says, "What else?"
"My parents," he says, and shakes his head. "I'm not gay, Thomas. Last night… it was this thing, okay? It was just a thing."
"But it was good," Thomas says. "It was a good thing. The two of us together."
"The two of us together," Jimmy repeats slowly. "But not in that way. Not anymore."
Thomas rubs a hand across his face and leans back in the chair. He can see Edward sitting on the counter out of the corner of his eye and sighs. He can feel the house begin to shift, but it's not angry like it was when Philip left. It's slow and sad and Thomas almost wants to tell Edward to stop. God, his life isn't a movie. He doesn't need a sad soundtrack to go with it.
"I think you'd better leave, then," Thomas says quietly. He hopes that Jimmy takes Thomas' bicycle out of the back of his car before he goes.
It sort of breaks his heart when Jimmy nods and stands up.
"Keep the job at Patmore's," Jimmy says quietly. "She loves you."
Thomas listens to his engine rumble until it fades.
"Are you happy?" Edward asks him. They're both lying on the mattress on the floor in the living room and staring up at the ceiling. Edward isn't warm because he's dead and Thomas wishes he could feel some sort of heat coming off of him.
"I'm not not happy." Thomas says seriously. He has one hand tucked behind his head and he turns his face, resting his cheek on his bicep, to look at Edward. "Are you happy?"
"We should run away," Edward says suddenly.
Thomas laughs, half because he's taken by surprise, and half because he's imagining telling people he's uprooted his life to follow a ghost. A literal ghost, not even a memory.
"Where would we go?"
"I don't know. Somewhere no one could find us."
Thomas doesn't reply, but he smiles and drifts off into a daydream of him, Edward, and a farmhouse in the middle of nowhere.
The next time Edward speaks, there's something off about his voice. It's less conscious. "General Lang won't stand for this," Edward says. Thomas can feel the faint sensation of fingers rubbing against the back of his hand. "Let's do it. Let's kill ourselves."
There's a quick jolt of fear that threads itself through Thomas' heart, but he breathes through it. Maybe this is what Edward needs. To move on, or whatever it is that ghosts do.
"Okay," he says.
Edward is suddenly up off the mattress and is drifting around the couch in front of the fireplace. He looks like he's staring down at something, but Thomas just watches, his heart beating too calmly, as Edward drags a fingernail over his own wrist.
He fades quietly and without anything else left to say. It's the most anticlimactic thing Thomas has seen from Edward and it feels like there are thread still hanging in the air, untied and left frayed. Thomas stares at the space where he had been for a few moments, then gets up to go to work.
Edward doesn't come back.
Two weeks after Edward kills himself again in Thomas' living room, there's a knock on the door. Thomas puts the book he's reading face-down on the mattress and pulls himself up.
"I'm coming, I'm coming," he mutters when the knocking starts again. He thinks vaguely that maybe he should answer the door in something nicer than track pants and a tee shirt, but nobody ever comes to visit, so it's their fault for stopping by unannounced. If they wanted a suit and tie, they could've called.
He opens the door and finds Edward standing on the other side.
"Hi," Edward says. Thomas drags his eyes over the man's body and notes that the sunlight isn't streaming straight through him. "My name is Ed Courtenay. I heard from a good friend that you've been looking into the history of this house. I was wondering if we could… I don't even know, swap information or whatnot. My great-granddad lived and died here during the war and I don't know if you've found any letters or evidence that he was here, but I'd love to sit and chat with you."
Ed Courtenay says this all so quickly that it takes Thomas a very long time to process what's been said.
"Huh?" he says dumbly. He comes to the sudden realization that this is not Lieutenant Edward James Courtenay. This man's legs are longer and his eyes are brown, not green. But most importantly, Thomas can't walk through him accidentally.
"Sorry," he says. "I'm excited to meet you. You're Thomas Barrow, right? William – he works down at the library – he said you'd moved into this house. We, uhm. I'm really into genealogy, sorry, and the name Thomas Barrow comes up quite a bit. I wasn't expecting you, actually; I was expecting an old man who might have some memories of my granddad… not that you look old, no, not at all. I'm just a little surprised – a lot, actually, because you're, well. I'm going to stop talking now."
Thomas steps out of the doorway and gestures Ed into the house. Ed smiles a little bit, ducks his head, and passes over the threshold. Thomas waits until the door is shut before talking.
"Sorry," he says, leading Ed into the kitchen. "You just took me by surprise is all. You… you look like him, you know."
"Oh," Ed says, his mouth quirking into a bit of a smile. "You are him. Plastic surgery, then. You don't look a day over thirty-two."
"No," he says, but he smiles right back. "I'm going to sound crazy, but he – he was here. A lot. He was rather attached to me. I wondered…"
"He was here?" Ed repeats. "As in, as a ghost?"
"Spirit, apparition," Thomas supplies. He looks down and traces the grain of the wooden table with his fingernail. "Crazy, I know."
"No, not at all," Ed says earnestly. "I saw my grandmum after she died." Thomas smiles a little bit and Edward goes on. "She was at my high school graduation. Standing right behind my parents like it was nothing. I didn't think twice about it until I went to hug her and… couldn't. She just smiled at me and said 'I love you,' and when I blinked she was gone."
"Your great-grandfather was much more persistent than that," Thomas says. He smiles a little bit and thinks of Edward trying to rouse him into song. "He, uh. He was… a presence. He thought I was my great-grandfather."
"They were lovers," Ed says abruptly. "That's what we think anyway. He got my great-grandmum pregnant before he went off to war, but then he was blinded with mustard gas. He ended up here. It's strange, isn't it? To think that they probably sat right where we are right now. Our relatives. Lovers. And we're strangers."
They sit in silence for a while, letting the overwhelming history sink into their bones. Thomas has been in this house for almost a year, now, and he's never considered that maybe Thomas Maxwell Barrow had existed in the same space, breathed the same stale air, that he is breathing now. Maybe Edward's bed had been in the living room. Maybe he had died right there in front of the fireplace.
"My family never talked about him," Thomas says. "I guess that's probably why."
"What?" Ed asks.
"He was in love with a soldier." Thomas smiles a little bit. "Edward thought I was his Thomas. I think they were going to kill themselves together. Thomas didn't, anyway. I haven't seen Edward in weeks. The last thing he said to me was, 'Let's kill ourselves.' And then he did."
Ed chews on his bottom lip for a while and Thomas tries not to find it so endearing. He fails.
"I moved here with my boyfriend Philip," he says unnecessarily. Ed looks up at him. "Edward scared him off."
"Sorry about that," Ed says, but he's smiling a little bit.
"No," Thomas says. "Edward saved me. Philip was going to take everything I had."
"We should have dinner," Ed says quickly, and then flushes. "This isn't me asking you out. This – we should talk more. Over dinner. You said your family doesn't talk about your great-granddad? I brought – I've got letters in my car. They were stuck in the lining of Edward's suitcase. I found them while I was going through his things. Nobody ever got rid of anything, but nobody wanted to look at them, either. I'd be glad to share them with you. They're love letters from Thomas."
"Yeah," Thomas says. "There's an Italian place in town."
"I'll drive," Ed offers.
They're seated in the back corner booth and spread the letters out in front of them. Thomas orders two beers and an antipasto platter and tries not to lean too far into Ed's space. (He can feel the warmth of Ed's skin when their shoulders press together briefly as they get comfortable, and Thomas half wishes that he had had this luxury with Edward.)
The letters are old and fragile, and Thomas wipes his hands off on his napkin every time he reaches for one. The majority of the letters are from Thomas to Edward, but some of them are half-written to him, words scratched out and self-deprecating comments written along the bottom.
"'I'm a fool,'" Ed reads out loud after the waiter's walked away with their orders. "'I do not fancy myself a man of treasure, not like you, my love, so the thought that someone more than Florence could love me is almost too much to bear. Do I deserve your love? No. I cannot offer you anything and it pains me that you love me anyway.'"
"Aww," Thomas says. He tilts his bottle towards Ed and they toast. "To our very, very gay relatives."
"To our very, very in love relatives." Ed smiles at him. "May we someday find the same true love that they did."
At some point, halfway two shared plates of tiramisu, Ed says, "Maybe this is me asking you on a date."
Thomas looks down and thinks that perhaps borders were crossed when they started eating off each other's plates, even though they had the same exact desserts. He pokes his fork half-heartedly at the remaining bits of Ed's cake and asks, "If I ask you back to my place, would it seem like I think you're easy?"
"If I say 'fuck no, I'll drive,' would that make me easy?"
They lock eyes for a moment and Thomas' brain begins to short circuit a little bit. Ed is pink high on his cheeks and he's got a smudge of cinnamon above his lip. Thomas smiles at him, tongue pressed against the back of his teeth, and wipes his hands on his jeans so he can gather up the letters.
"Come on," he says.
Ed has long, fantastic legs, and Thomas is so, so glad that even once they're finished, Ed keeps them wrapped around Thomas. It's a little bit weird to rest his cheek against Ed's chest while the heels of Edward's long, delicious legs rest against his calves and lower back, respectively, but it's mostly because his brain is still going Edward Edward Edward Edward even though he never actually got to touch Edward.
He feels dumb and a little bit unappreciative, even though he wants to write sonnets about the face Ed makes when Thomas gets his sweet spot.
"I promise that I didn't drive all this way just to seduce you," Ed says.
"Riiiiiiiiight." Thomas yawns against his chest, breath ghosting across Ed's nipple. He turns his head and blows on the other one just to watch it harden. "You drove up in your little Tic Tac green Ford Fiesta and your trunk full of old love letters from your great-grandfather to my great-grandfather. Then you took me to an Italian restaurant and ate all of my tiramisu, then said yes when I asked if you wanted to have sex. Which we had, and which was nice, but I fail to see where your plan to not seduce me failed. What's not to like?"
"Hey," Ed laughs. He squeezed Thomas with his legs and Thomas thinks, oh, maybe it's time to go again. "Don't make fun of my incomparable flirting skills."
"Don't get me wrong," Thomas says, pushing himself up on his elbows to look down at Ed's face, "I like rambling as much as the next bloke. But you have no flirting skills whatsoever."
"Oh, yeah?" Ed's eyebrow shoots up and he tightens his legs again, one heel sliding down to rub across Thomas' bare bottom. "How'd I manage to get you into bed, then?"
"I needed to shut you up," Thomas says, but he's grinning, and Ed laughs loud and sudden and rolls them over.
"I'll shut you up," he says, and presses a bruising kiss against Thomas' open mouth.
Thomas feels an almost sick satisfaction when Ed puts the clothes he'd worn the night before back on. There's a big stain on the stomach that Thomas wishes he could see Ed explain away. He knows he should offer Ed another shirt but he likes to watch him look down at it in concern every few minutes.
They sit in the attic and eat cereal cross-legged on the creaky wooden floor, going through boxes and laughing at the things they find. They find a big stack of dusty photographs and spend the next hour and a half searching the crowds of half-blurry faces for Thomas Maxwell Barrow and Edward James Courtenay.
Ed has a scar on the right side of his jaw and his second toes are longer than the big ones and he puts the milk in the bowl before his Fruity Pebbles. These are all things Thomas checks off the list of the differences between Edward and his great-grandson.
By the time the sun starts begin its descent, Ed announces regretfully that he needs to be getting back to London and his job. Thomas follows him downstairs and they stand in the foyer for a moment, staring at the floor.
"I'd like to take you out," Ed says. "To a real restaurant. Where the waitress doesn't call you sweetheart and the napkins are cloth and where I can kiss you and not worry that you'll be drowning in gossip."
"Yeah," Thomas says nonexplicitly.
Ed touches his wrist lightly before pulling him against his chest.
"This isn't me offering up a pity date," he whispers against Thomas' temple. "This isn't, 'thanks for the shag, have a nice life.' I want to search through boxes of old photographs with you and then not worry that you won't kiss me goodnight."
Thomas thinks that there a lot of things he should say, like, "I'm not good at relationships," or, "We met yesterday, I'm not uprooting my life back to London to sleep in your bed," or, "Stay here," but instead he says, "I'm keeping my job."
Ed stares at him for a moment before his face breaks out into a smile. "Of course."
"Philip made me quit my job when we started out," Thomas says. "I'm a grown man, I don't want an allowance anymore."
"I don't want to give you an allowance," Ed laughs. "God, you're brilliant."
"You can't make fun of what's on my iTunes."
"Wouldn't dream of it."
"You take me with you when you fly to New York to business,"
"I'm an office rat," Ed says, "but I promise that if there's ever a need for a typey typer in the States, you'll be the first thing I put in my suitcase."
When Thomas doesn't say anything else, Ed angles his head to the side and slides their mouths together.
"I've got to go," Ed says when Thomas' arm tightens around his waist. "I'm coming to pick you up on Friday night at six o'clock and I'm taking you to this fantastic sushi bar down in London. If you're not working, of course. I'd hate to interfere."
"I hate raw fish. And no, not working."
"Fine. We'll go get steaks and I'll kiss you in front of the old, stuffy men that sit in the lobby of my building."
"It's a date, then."
They separate and Ed smiles at him widely.
"If you see my great-granddad again, tell him I say hello," he says. "Though if he thinks he's in love with you, maybe you should tell him you've got your eyes on another Courtenay."
"This is getting too sappy," Thomas says, but he can't stop smiling. He reaches out and gives Ed a push towards the front door. "Go on. Get out of here. Go wash your clothes."
Ed looks down at his shirt and says, "Oh, God, I'm so glad I'm not having dinner at my mother's tonight."
Thomas leans forward and kisses him once more on the mouth, then opens the door and pushes Ed out onto the porch.
"I need to write in my diary now," he says. "Mr. Thomas Leslie Courtenay, xoxoxo."
"Don't mention the part where I cried." Ed backs down the stairs and towards his car, never taking his eyes off of Thomas. Thomas is kind of scared he's going to trip. "That's something I don't want your girlfriends to read when they steal your journal away."
"I'll see you Friday," Thomas yells, and shuts the door before he says something stupid.
He keeps his back pressed against the door and sighs, looking around at the house he had never wanted to live in in the first place. So much has changed since then.
"Thank you," he says to the house at large, and hopes Edward and Thomas have found each other, wherever they ended up. He reaches behind him blindly and pulls the lock on the door, then goes into the living room to drag the mattress up to the master bedroom.
It's a start.