Gene's perspective on the day his wife left as requested by Siggy and by Gally1 .

Gene/Missus (angst and reflection)

The day she left...

It isn't beta'd so please forgive the mistakes… they are all my own for I own nothing else!


The day she left it had been raining, Gene had called to say that he would be home late and not to bother saving a plate of dinner for him, as he would get something to eat at Nelsons pub. After he had hung up the phone, Gene had returned to celebrate with his team after their success at bringing down an infamous drug baron and his contacts.

When he had gotten home later that night he had found her gone and only a note to explain.

When they had married, she became Patricia Nancy Hunt, but everyone knew her as Nancy; she never liked her first name as it was the same as her mothers, a stupid family tradition she had made clear to Gene that she had no intention of carrying on for their child. Nancy had always said that if she had a little girl, she would call her Deborah Jeannette and if it was a boy, he would be called William Gene; a tradition she wanted to enforce all of her own.

Of course Gene hadn't made any comment on the subject, but deep down inside his heart swelled with pride and adoration for this woman, who made him feel like nothing else mattered in the world.

It had never been a marriage of convenience for him, despite what everyone else thought or said behind his back. His missus was everything to him and it didn't bother him that much that they had only gotten engaged after five months of courting all because she was carrying his child; secretly he had admired her for much longer.

She was the eldest girl in a family of five; and Gene had first set eyes on her one Sunday afternoon in autumn, as he and a few of the lads from the police station were playing football. Nancy had been heading past the field with a couple of her friends after Sunday school; her long brown hair was tied back with a blue bow and she had the cutest smile… or so Gene thought. The girls had stopped to chat; it turned out that Nancy's older brother Richard was one of Gene's newest friends from work.

From that point on Gene had fallen for Nancy but never told a soul until two weeks before the summer fete, when he asked Nancy if she wanted to go with him. Luckily for him she had turned eighteen that spring, so was allowed to start courting according to her fathers rules; a man Gene had never liked.

She had immediately said yes and from then on the pair had become inseparable.

Gene couldn't deny that there were many other girls who liked him, he was quite a handsome twenty-one year old lad; and although Nancy wasn't the prettiest of all the girls (she was only five foot five inches, a little curvy and had deep brown eyes that he often heard her father refer to as 'cow eyes') to Gene she was perfect.

The day Nancy told him she was pregnant with his child, Gene had immediately gone to her father and asked for her hand in marriage. Nancy never knew of their full conversation, all Gene ever told her was that her father would never lay another finger on her so long as he lived; and as far as Gene was concerned, Nancy was well and truly rid of that family especially her parents.

Their marriage was meant to be a reasonably quiet affair; except Gene had gotten so incredibly drunk at the pub he had beaten up his best man Samuel and another friend Jonathan; all because of their remarks about the baby not really being his.

He never told Nancy the real reason he had punched the pair of them.

Gene had always been a drinker from a young age; it was his fathers fault really. He had often forced the boys to drink a pint with him so that when it came to beatings later in the evening, the boys were unable to escape let alone stand on their own two feet.

He learned from then that drink could help numb the pain.

They lost the baby fairly soon after they had gotten married; Gene had heard the rumours that she had never been pregnant or that he had been lucky as the baby was probably never even his. No matter what was said he never once blamed Nancy and he grieved for his unborn child. He knew in his heart Nancy was waiting for him to walk out on her; but the truth was that he could never do that to her.

Gene never admitted how devastated he was by the loss, instead he had picked up the pieces and gotten on with his life and his job; turning to drink when he needed to forget. Not that it had been an easy time at work either for Gene, as he had soon learnt that his mentor, Harry Outhwaite, was on the take; this was a man Gene had idolised and aimed to become as decent a cop as him. However Gene had been the one who had to turn Harry in, and the one to carry the burden when Outhwaite committed suicide.

This was a major turning point in Gene's life and he was thankful that he had Nancy to help him through his darkest moments… along with his trusty hip flask.

From then on Gene had fallen into the footsteps of his mentor; taking backhanders, drinking heavily and sleeping with whatever women he could lay his hands on. But at the end of it all Gene knew he could go home and find a woman there who would wrap her arms around him and cuddle him into her warm, soothing and safe embrace.

Nancy made the horrors of the world melt away.

And she never once complained about his ways, or how he had changed from the man she had first met. Yet every time Gene set eyes on Nancy, he felt the guilt eating slowly away at his soul; consuming him with a hatred for himself that Gene only learnt to face when Sam Tyler arrived on his team.

Sam Tyler and his stupid, bloody modern, politically correct, by the rule book approach to policing; the same man who had called him 'an overweight, over-the-hill, nicotine-stained, borderline-alcoholic homophobe with a superiority complex and an unhealthy obsession with male bonding,' to which Gene still couldn't see the problem!

Gene knew that Nancy had put up with his late nights time and time again; but ever since Sam arrived he seemed to have brought out a new leash of life in Gene. He took a new and perhaps a more eager perspective on his job.

He also stopped taking backhanders.

The day she left it had been raining, Gene had called to say that he would be home late and not to bother saving a plate of dinner for him, as he would get something to eat at Nelsons pub. After he had hung up the phone, Gene had returned to celebrate with his team after their success at bringing down an infamous drug baron and his contacts.

When he had gotten home later that night he had found her gone, with a note listing things to be done around the house and a letter to explain why she had left.

She had clearly poured out her heart and soul into this letter; explaining how she longed for a family, that she hated being second best to his job, that his drinking was driving a wedge between them and that she knew about all the women, the lies and the cheating.

But it had been that new leash of life which finally made Nancy leave him; she said so in her letter. She said he had strength to him now that meant she wasn't needed anymore and that their marriage simply wasn't working out. Nancy had also written that she knew Sam would be a decent friend and help him through the worst of it.

But Gene couldn't believe he was a stronger man and didn't need his Nancy anymore.

She even admitted to having met someone else, but she didn't elaborate who this other person was.

But what really broke Gene's heart that evening was despite how badly he had treated her, had never said that he loved her enough or considered her feelings when he slept with other women… she forgave him.

He traced the curl of her letters and the way she always ended her letters with her name elaborately swirled; he crumpled the note up after re-reading it several times and slowly letting the words sink in.

Throwing the note into the bin, Gene slumped onto the sofa and held his head in his hands.

The clock ticked loudly in the corner of the room and the rain beat down against the window pane; pulling out his hip flask from his pocket Gene took a long swig and reached for his cigarettes.