Author's Note:
I put Thomas and Sybil together this chapter! There will definitely be a chapter between her and Thomas again, possibly with Courtenay? Please review!
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It had been a week since they released Thomas from Downton and sent him instead to work at the hospital. He conversed with Lady Sybil often and tended to wounded soldiers day and night.
The wind blew fiercely outside the building. The windows rattled in the afternoon. Doctor Clarkson was called out to attend a conference out of town so it was just Thomas and a few other nurses.
"Major Clarkson wanted us to mix some new solutions to use in the new medicine."
Thomas nodded as he pulled out the cabinet keys from his belt.
"I think Sergeant Thomas and I can handle it, thank you," Lady Sybil responded to the other nurses.
She politely closed the curtain so the other patients couldn't see them. Thomas sat down at the desk with the different vials. She followed suite with measuring cups and a paper with the written instructions. Lightly, she put her hand on his right shoulder, leaning slightly over him. He could smell her hibiscus perfume, her white cap falling gently over the nape of her neck. Thomas' head turned slightly, acknowledging the proximity. She seemed oblivious, or teasing him on purpose. Sniffing, Thomas turned back to the instructions. Carefully, he poured a teaspoon of the purple liquid in a beaker. She used a miniature pipette to measure out two milliliters into the same beaker.
They worked together for fifteen minutes before coming upon a particularly difficult step. The next ingredient needed to be added one drop at a time and stirred so as the reaction would not occur as viciously.
Thomas held the beaker with both hands firmly on the table. She squeezed one drop out, stirred, and squeezed another drop, until both of them heard a loud yell and the she squeezed the rest of the liquid in with one squirt.
The mixture started to bubble and foam over. Thomas quickly removed his hands before the chemicals could spill onto them.
Lady Sybil peered behind the curtain, seeing an unconscious soldier who had fallen to the floor. She rushed over to him trying to lift him.
"Thomas, help me!"
"But the medicine-"
"That can wait!"
Thomas trailed behind her, picking up the other man with relative ease and placing him back on the bed. The man groaned, his head wound and one of his eyes covered in thick gauzes.
"What do you think is wrong with him?"
Thomas shook his head, "with a head injury? It could be anything."
They looked at his chart before Sybil stuck her nose in the air.
"Do you smell that?"
With a sinking feeling, Thomas pulled back the curtain to see the chemical mess still on the hot plate, an average size flame protruding from the top of the beaker now. Sybil went over the flame, trying to turn the burner off while Thomas went to get the fire blanket. The flames grew hot near her hands and her face as she turned the dial down.
"Get away from there Sybil!"
Thomas shouted as the flames blazed higher. The hot plate malfunctioned as a spark emitted. Sybil screamed as the fire caught on her hands. Thomas flung the fire blanket almost immediately on her hands. The flames licked at the white curtain as the wall caught fire. He lifted the extinguisher from the wall and sprayed it all over until all that was left was a black stained wall and ashes. Sybil was crying on the floor. Her face dug into the wool. Beads of sweat rolled down Thomas' back, the curtain was only slightly tinged black with soot.
"M'Lady, are you okay?"
Tear stained cheeks looked up at him. Her eyes glistened softly under the electric light. Cautiously, he crouched down to meet her.
"Let me see?"
With a tenderness she never thought Thomas was capable of, he removed the blanket to see first degree burns. True, they had caught fire, but Thomas reacted with such quickness that the fire didn't have time to burn longer. He filled a bowl with cool water, placing her delicate hands in the water. She choked back a cry as Thomas watched her. After a few minutes she took her hands out as Thomas got sterile gauzes and ointment.
"How could you forget to turn off the burner?"
"I thought I did. Maybe it malfunctioned."
He was blatantly lying, and Sybil could tell. Her eyes bore into him.
"The servants used to talk about you."
He turned back to her, only his left half of his face visible.
"And what did they say?"
"They said you stole and that-that you were mean to the other footman."
A cruel smile turned on his lips.
"Do you believe them?"
She looked down at her red hands.
"I don't know." She said. Thomas kept his left ear inclined toward her.
Sometimes I watch you and you seem so cruel. Like when you talk to those below you-as if you need to have control over them, as if talking down to them makes you feel better about yourself."
"Permission to speak freely ma'am?"
She nodded once.
"All my life I have been in the lower class, being talked to as if I was a piece of dirt. So forgive me if I tend to enjoy my short time of power." He said matter of factly, turning his head back toward the table.
He walked back over to her, gently massaging the lotion on her hands.
"You can change your position if you try hard enough."
He scoffed, "Oh really? Because the last time I was in line to be a valet someone new came in and took the position while I had worked at Downton for over ten years and have been a perfect footman."
She pulled her hands away.
"How dare you! You were lucky to have that you wicked man!"
He looked at her as if burned.
"I understand why my father wouldn't want you dressing him. Anyone with that attitude will certainly fail at life."
"Because you know so much about life?"
"Well yes I would like to think so!"
"Too bad M'Lady, because, quite honestly, you don't have a clue."
She recoiled, unused to be spoken to in such harsh tones.
"I have been working in service since I was fifteen. And before that I did back breaking jobs on a farm. Tell me Lady Sybil, have you ever worked so hard that the next day you could barely move? Or have to choose between new shoes or dinner for a week?"
He started wrapping the gauze, and even though his tone was firm, his hands were careful and soothing.
"I have been bred my whole life to think that I'm a lower being merely because I don't have a lot of money and because of my different interests in other people. If I make a mistake, I can't turn around from it, and I don't have Daddy's money to help me."
She visibly winced, but whether from his words or her wounds he knew not. She argued back with him, as if hitting back a tennis ball.
"I admit, it must be hard but that doesn't mean my life is easy. I'm expected to marry young, and settle down with kids. I can never seem to please my father, and I always have to stop the quarreling between my two sisters. While all this time I haven't had a darn thing to do until nursing. Do you know what it's like to feel useless? To know that my physical appearance rather than my intelligence is what my future husband will most likely be after? I cannot tell you how many nights I lie awake and wish of a life where I am well and truly needed, where I know my place, where I don't have to obey my father at every turn and where I can marry whoever I want."
She sighed loudly, clearly frustrated. Her hands were now covered in a delicate dressing. Her lips thinned, but she started helping Thomas put away the chemicals and clean the equipment.
"What are we going to tell Major Clarkson?"
"The truth, I suppose. I don't envy you the scolding Clarkson will give you."
His face flushed red for a second thinking of the upbraiding by the head doctor.
"You're an odd one Thomas. Other times, I see such tenderness and raw emotion that I can't believe you are the same man."
Their hands touched as she handed him a flask.
"I-I-"
But their conversation was interrupted as Tom Branson entered the room and saw them, their hands overlapping, their bodies mere centimeters from each other. Tom opened his mouth in shock before telling her that her mother wanted her home for dinner by eight that night. Without waiting for an answer, he fled down the hospital steps.
"Tom, wait! We were just cleaning!"
He pushed open the door and stepped into his car pulling away.
Her white cap had nearly fallen off now.
"I can try to talk to him for you if you leave out my blunder with the hot plate."
She huffed but agreed nonetheless.
The wind howled as the day grew later.
