Thank you to all of you who continue to read this story. Guest, long time member, I value you all!

To my bestest friend. Thank for listening to me winge about how awful this was to write. You are fabulous!

Her body was worse than it had been before. She had tubes coming out of every place imaginable and the bruising and swelling had worsened. Elsie had taken one look at herself and had to fight the urge to run away. Her friends hadn't arrived yet, Elsie had left them arguing with the nurse on duty and had gone to take a look for herself, preparing herself for their reactions.

She imagined Isobel would be quite calm about it, having been trained to deal with this sort of thing. It was something she saw every day. Beryl would have a small meltdown before pulling herself together.

Charles would... well she didn't exactly know what Charles might do.

Elsie stood next to her head as her two best friends came around the corner. To her surprise it was Isobel's eyes that immediately filled with tears. She clamped a hand to her mouth to stop a sob from escaping before sinking down in a chair next to her and laying a hand over Elsie's.

"Oh Elsie." She whispered "how can you possibly recover from this?"

Beryl silently took a seat on the opposite side of her. She had gone pale, but no tears came as she reached for Elsie's hand.

"You say she might be able to hear us?" She asked Isobel who nodded. Beryl took a deep breath and started to talk

"Elsie. Isobel says you can hear me. I suppose if you can hear me you already know this. Elsie, I'll be honest, I've never seen you look this bad. But you're a fighter my girl and I need you to pull out what ever fight you have left and use it. Isobel and I need you." She broke off to look at Isobel, who was crying quietly "Charles needs you. He's here you know? He must have set off any number of speeding traps to get here so fast. He's waiting outside as they'd only let two of us in at a time and he said he needed time to prepare himself. I can see why. He's a good man you know, despite his faults that I've pointed out so many times. I don't know why you argued, you never told me. But he loves you Elsie. Come back for him and make it right. Because I don't think he can survive without you, and I know that neither can I or Isobel."

Beryl finished, for the first time that Elsie could remember she had run out of things to say.

Elsie frantically wiped away the tears that were building up again before suddenly Isobel began to speak.

"Every day I see families torn apart due to the loss of a loved one." She said, her voice high and grating. She sounded stuffy, and Elsie knew that if she stopped again she would break down. "so often the one that they lose is the one that holds them together, the one that breaks up the family arguments and fixes everyone's mistakes. Elsie, I know that none of us are blood related, and I know that nothing will ever be the same again. But you're our glue Elsie, and we need you. I know that you can pull through this, because every day, I see miracles happen. And if anyone is capable of a miracle it's you."

(())(())

"What's wrong?" Charles asked, looking away from the road for a moment to watch her face. She shrugged

"Just nervous , I suppose"

They were on their way to Grantham manor, a place just outside of town that had been in the Crawley's family for years. These days it was inhabited by Mary Crawley Talbot , Charles's goddaughter, and her husband Henry. Charles they had asked Charles to lunch and he had immediately asked if he could bring a guest, wanting the two people he loved most in life to get to know one another. Ever cautious, Mary had been hesitant, but after spending an hour on the phone to him, listening to the warmth that crept into his voice when he talked about her, she had grown curious and had extended a warm invitation to Elsie as well.

"Don't be. Mary is lovely. " Charles said, reaching over and patting her knee. Elsie nodded and was silent for the rest of the trip, choosing to stare out of the window instead talk. Charles didn't understand. It was clear that Mary meant a lot to him and he valued her opinion on everything. It was natural to feel apprehensive about meeting her.

They eventually turned into a long driveway, that after a few turns revealed a beautiful Tuscany Villa, sounded by a few oak trees that must have been a century old at very least. Waiting by the front door was Mary, her husband and her son George. Charles carefully parked the car, helped Elsie out and wrapped Mary up in a large bear hug.

"There's my girl, looking as lovely as ever." He exclaimed

"Uncle Charles, how wonderful it is to see you again. " Mary said once Charles had let her go and patted her hair to make sure it was still tidy. As Charles to shake Henry's hand Elsie took a moment to observe her. She had seen photos of the Crawley family in the papers before, they were after all quite well known, but she had never paid much attention to which was which. Whenever Charles had spoken of her she had always imagined that she was the one with friendly smile and the mischievous twinkle in her eyes that was apparent even in a black and white photo. She never imagined that it would be the taller one, with cold eyes who rarely smiled.

"And you must be Ms. Hughes." Mary said, once they had finished exclaiming over how well Charles was looking.

"Elsie, please" Elsie stepping forward and offering her hand. Mary shook it and inclined her head "Uncle Charles tells me you're an artist. You must allow me to show you some of the pieces we have in this house, I'm sure many people would kill to see them."

Her husband cleared his throat and she looked round with a smile "Henry is reminding me again that I am being a snob. My apologies, it's one of my many faults."

"Not at all." Elsie said graciously "and I would love to see some of your pieces."

Mary smiled and they all followed her inside.

"Isn't she wonderful?" Charles asked in the car ride home. The radio was on softly and he was tapping along to the beat on the steering wheel. Elsie thought for awhile before answering carefully. It would be easy to lie, and tell him that she was the best thing ever. But that wasn't Elsie.

"I can see why you like her; you have a lot in common."

"But you didn't like her?" Charles asked, correctly guessing the reason of her careful answer.

"I didn't say that." Elsie protested "I don't really have much in common with her except for you, and I'm constantly surprised that you find me remotely interesting. "

"What on earth makes you say that?" Charles asked, slightly affronted.

"Well let's face it" Elsie said "I really don't care what region the wine was made in, or under which King which battle took place under. You like the show of the upper class Charles, and I'm just fine with the underlings."

"Like Thomas." He said. Elsie narrowed her eyes at his disappointed tone

'Why do you have such an issue with Thomas?" she asked angrily.

"Well as you just said. We have nothing in common. He's a wild one, no order or discipline. He sponges off you."

"Sponges off me?" Elsie spluttered "what on earth gives you that impression? He pays half the rent, goes shopping once a week and never complains if I ask him to watch Becky. I hardly call that sponging."

Charles was silent

"Oh my god. It's because he's gay isn't it?" he shifted uncomfortably in his chair and muttered something under his breath. Elsie caught the word 'unnatural' and lost her temper

"Charles Carson! That is positively medieval of you! The poor boy has been through enough in his short miserable life and I will not have making it worse for him. What has ever done to you? I can't actually believe it."

"Yes well I'm sorry but that's my opinion. I don't understand why you prefer him over someone like Mary."

Thankfully they had just driven into her drive way because was going to say things she would regret if she stayed in this car. She found Mary cold and spoiled. She was genuine in anything she seemed to do, including bringing up her son. However, she bit her tongue and clambered out of the car.

"I don't know Charles, maybe I like the broken and down trodden. After all that's all I am right?"

With that she slammed the door and stalked into the house, not bothering to look over her shoulder as Charles reversed the car out at quite a speed.

When she had told Thomas what had happened he had laughed

"Oh Elsie." He had said "he doesn't need to like me. I don't like him either."

"But why can't you like one another?" Elsie had asked "you both mean so much to me."

"and that's why we're civil to one another. We have one thing in common. Our love for you Elsie. But I'm sorry, that is as far as it goes."

Elsie had phoned him later that evening and had apologized profusely. He had arrived the next morning with a beautiful silver bracelet in his jacket pocket.

))(())((

Her friends sat next to her for a good half hour before someone cleared their throat. Elsie looked up to find Charles standing there, his hands clenched at his sides, posture as straight as ever. But she could see he had been crying, his eyes were red rimmed and puffy and his nose was red. He wasn't looking at her friends but rather at her, her broken form lying in a hospital bed.

Her friends stood up and left. Isobel was leaning on Beryl and Beryl was trying to look brave. She patted Charles's arm as she past him. He waited until they had left before he sat down next to her and held her hand. It looked so small, wrapped up in his bear like paw. She had always laughed about it, but seeing it like this made her realize how incredibly small she was compared to him and how gentle he had always been with her in every aspect of their lives. Charles took a deep breath and began.

"Elsie.."

Please review and let me know your thoughts! Means the world to me! I apologize if there's any mistakes here, its nearly midnight and I'm avoiding caffeine.