The train ride to Cornwall was particularly uneventful. The two women left Poplar on the Friday evening, hoping to be at the home in the countryside at midnight. Four hours on an overcrowded train sat next to a smelly snoring man was grating on Patsy by the hour mark. Delia got off lightly, sat opposite Patsy, with a gorgeous woman in her late twenties sat besides her smelling of lavender and chatting politely to the man next to her.
Delia hid giggles behind her hand as the man beside Patsy twitched and moved so his head was dangerously close to hers.
"Why didn't we sit together?" Patsy whispered, furious.
"Because you sat there after I had already sat here." Delia winked, smirking at Patsy's uncomfortableness.
Delia bit her lip as Patsy looked at the woman next to her with slight envy. The woman looked over at Patsy and smiled, causing Patsy to look away in alarm at being caught looking.
The train lurched slightly and the snoring mans head fell on Patsy's shoulder, mouth wide open and saliva seeping through Patsy's casual jacket.
"NO," Patsy yelled, loud enough to wake the man and have the booth stare at her, "I'm not sitting here for another three hours with you drooling on my shoulder, and snoring my ear off."
Delia bit her lip harder, trying not to burst out in hysteric laughter whilst the other inhabitants of the booth look on in shock, "don't mind her," Delia giggled, "she doesn't have patience at the best of time, quite ironic really."
"Ironic?" The beautiful woman asked.
"Her name is Patience." Delia replied, smiling at her.
Patsy felt a small ball of rage in the pit of her stomach, "this booth bonding session is over, and-" she pointed at the man next to her, "- if you touch me again I will kick you in the face."
Patsy spent the rest of the train ride silent, shooting jealous looks as Delia and the woman - after ten minutes they learned her name was Hermione - chatted idly. The man next to her fell asleep again and rested his head on the poor unsuspecting woman who also slept next to him.
x
Hours later and they finally arrived at the country home, dripping in sweat and completely drained. They never thought of a way to get from the train station to the house, as the doctor who offered it to Delia said it was only a short while away.
"Well, if we had a car, it would have been only a ten minute drive," Patsy started, "did you tell him that neither of us can drive?"
Delia opened the front door, "the patient he thinks I'm having an affair with can drive, so I couldn't exactly say that neither could drive."
"I forgot you were having an affair." Patsy raised her eyebrows and tossed her luggage on the floor.
"Oh, Pats, don't leave them there." Delia whined walking into the lounge.
Patsy ignored her and followed, grabbing Delia's waist from behind and holding her close, "I'll move them later, but for the time being I have something much more important to do." She whispered seductively into Delia's ear.
Goosebumps arose all over Delia as she leaned into Patsy's embrace, "oh? And what's that?"
"You'll see," Patsy smirked as she spun Delia around and placed a few soft kisses upon her lips, gradually getting more passionate and heated, "I've been itching to do that since we left Poplar." She whispered as they parted.
"Well, now that you've itched your scratch, you can take all our luggage upstairs, second door on the right."
"And whilst I take all the heavy stuff upstairs, what will you be doing?" Patsy asked as she grabbed the suitcase and bags Delia was once carrying.
"I'll pop the kettle on and make us a cup of tea." Delia grinned as she went into the kitchen.
Patsy watched on after her, smiling as she walked over to the bags she threw down when she entered. 'Now,' she thought to herself, 'do I take them all at once at the risk of injury, or do I take two trips?'
Two bags draped on her left arm with a suitcase in her left hand and a suitcase in her right hand with two more bags on her right arm and one last shopping bag held in her mouth, Patsy chuckled at her triumph as she opened the door to the bedroom, only a few small heart attacks had hit her as she nearly fell down the stairs three times but she made it.
With the dire need to kiss Delia being an overwhelming feeling, Patsy didn't take the time to survey her surroundings. The house was huge, Patsy assumed there were hundreds of bedrooms and possibly thousands of rooms overall.
The bedroom was huge, she had expected only a small cottage with small rooms, but this had exceeded her expectations. Putting the bags in the corner of the room, she quickly made her way down the stairs and into the kitchen.
"Have you ever had a tea at one in the morning?" Delia asked as they both sat down.
"I suppose on the subject of strange times to have tea, this is up there." They both chatted for another hour before sleep started to take them both over.
x
Patsy couldn't think of a time when she was happier than what she felt in this moment. Just the feeling of having Delia snuggled up to her fast asleep could make her do cartwheels on the moon.
Delia's head on Patsy's chest. This is what she's always wanted. To fall in love. She's always known she'd fall in love with a woman. She'd always preferred company from a girl when she was little, although she was frightfully terrified of them as well.
She was twelve when her camp got liberated. Three years of hell, two of them without her mother and sister. She attached herself to a Japanese girl of the same age, her father was a Shrine Priest who opposed the war. He was thrown into another camp, possibly the same one her father was in.
Patsy was always reluctant to talk about her friend, Minako, as instead of it ending with them being penpals and sending one another letters decorated with news, it ended in horror.
They had spent night after night together, holding hands as they fell asleep, helped out at the hut together and stole little pieces of food from guards together. Being of Japanese heritage, Minako actually got fed food of substance, instead of eating rats and bats and anything the others could get ahold of. She shared it with Patsy and they bonded.
Patsy had felt something for her, something deeper than what she felt for others. She didn't know if it was friendship or love. She was twelve, did love hit a person at twelve? She listened to the stories from a few Chinese women of how they met their husbands and how they had felt when they met them, Patsy always listened intently and Minako always held their hands together.
Just before the camp was liberated, the Japanese soliders began executing the prisoners. Minako was one of the first.
She's spent years perfecting her poker face, the thought of Minako breaks her internally, but you'd never guess it. Externally she was as calm as an untouched lake. Only one person knew about Minako, and even now that person doesn't remember.
Delia started to stir and Patsy snapped out of her memories.
"Rise and shine." She whispered.
"Oh, to be like Sleeping Beauty and just sleep for eternity without passing on." Delia whined.
"Well, you're defiantly my Beauty." Patsy giggled as she began to leave the warm embrace of Delia, "what's on the cards today?"
Delia watched Patsy dress, "I thought we could take the horses out and have a little ride."
Patsy laughed, "of course a house this big has horses."
x
Their ride with the horses came to an abrupt end when Delia's had thrown her into a large pond, soaking her completely. After making sure she was okay, Patsy broke down in hysteric laughter, clutching her sides as a frog leaped from Delia's head into the water.
She held her hand out for Delia to take. Delia on the other hand had a more wicked thing in mind and pulled her in with her. She landed face first into the pond.
"DEELS!" Patsy screeched when she picked herself up, "now that was horrible."
"And so was laughing at me when I fell in," Delia challenged, "anyway, you look quite fetching soaking wet."
Patsy raised her left eyebrow and stood up, "what? In dirty water? Get your head out of the gutter."
"Pats," Delia giggled, "your shirt."
Patsy looked down at herself, her shirt was completely see though and her beige bra was on show. She quickly wrapped her arms around herself and scolded Delia, "avert your eyes!"
x
Hours later and nightfall was upon them, as Delia bathed Patsy walked the grounds of the house. Delia loved baths, almost as much as she loved Patsy. Almost.
She began to attempt to remember her past, the blonde woman now has a face. A beautiful one at that. She tried to put the pieces back together.
She remembers meeting Patsy before she worked on Male Surgical, back when they both worked on the Female Surgical ward. She remembers it as a boring ward to be on, Patsy exceeded in nearly everything she did. After a year or two, Delia doesn't really remember, Patsy got offered the chance to work on Male Surgical, the busiest place in The London, every nurse wanted to be on that ward.
She remembers Patsy quitting, gaining a job as a florist and hating that even more. She remembers Patsy saying she's back working at The London after three months as a florist, but instead of being on Male Surgical, she was training to become a midwife.
She remembers the first time she saw Patsy's new dyed hair. She remembers how she nearly walked straight past her on the street because she didn't know it was her. She remembers the look of fake hurt on Patsy's face when she finally realised. She remembers loving the new colour and telling her how beautiful she looked.
She remembers. She remembers Patsy.
She dragged herself out of her bath and quickly dried herself. Making her way into the bedroom, she spotted a note from Patsy on the bed, 'meet me outside. The back door. Follow the trail. Pats.'
Delia grinned and quickly threw on her favourite dress. She made her way outside and spotted a trail of candles going up a hill, she followed until the end, coming to a stop at a large blanket covered in Rose petals.
"Oh, my." Delia gasped, covering her mouth with her hands, heart beating wildly.
"Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?" Patsy started, leaning on a nearly tree, "Thou art more lovely and more temperate: Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May, And summer's lease hath all too short a date," she slowly walked over to where Delia was stood, "Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines, And often is his gold complexion dimm'd; And every fair from fair sometime declines, By chance or nature's changing course untrimm'd; But thy eternal summer shall not fade, Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest; Nor shall Death brag thou wander'st in his shade, When in eternal lines to time thou growest: So long as men can breathe or eyes can see, So long lives this and this gives life to thee."
"Shakespeare." Delia acknowledged.
"I wanted to recite it to you for years, i memorised it in '59. I waited years for this chance," Patsy grabbed her hands, "do you like the surprise?"
"I love it." Delia replied, pulling Patsy closer and reuniting their lips.
