Dearest Delia,
Look, new stationary! I picked yellow over the pink, it seemed to be the right choice. It
Patsy takes a drag from her cigarette, long enough that the ash falls on the paper. Cursing under her breath, the nurse hastily stubs out the cigarette and tries to wipe away the soot, only to smear it and the ink across the page. Staring at what was left of the beautiful stationary, a gift from one of the many new mothers in her care, Patsy could feel her stomach begin to tie itself in the most intricate of sailor's knots. The bright, sunny paper was now bruised, smudged, beyond repair. It was a lost cause. Why should such a simple thing upset her so much?
The mask Pasty Mount wore most days slowly began to slide away. It was as if the curtain has been drawn across her face, the light fading from her eyes, like the street lamps outside her window fading as the cold brightness of dawn crept upon them. Patsy had grown very familiar with sunrises. Sometimes the comfort of sleep, of forgetting for a few hours, wasn't enough. She often lay in bed, watching the skies grow brighter, listening as Popular sleepily came to life outside her room as the pit of her stomach sinks lower, remembering what had happened.
Patsy often wondered if Delia did the same, if she watched the dark blues and blacks of the night wash away from her walls inch by inch, growing grey, then pink, then orange. She wondered if sunrise would have looked a bit brighter in that small apartment they were to share, if the two of them would lay together and greet the morning, if that quiet light would hold less steel and more sunshine.
The midwife felt silly being so utterly wrapped up in this way, but the truth was she was alone. She had never met anyone with the same… preferences as herself, and to be bitterly honest, she wasn't sure she would want to meet others. It wasn't that Delia preferred what she did, it was that Delia understood and preferred her, no one else ever has. Patsy was so unsure that she could trust anyone as she did her dear sweet Delia that she chose to close herself off. It is the ultimate cruelness when the one person you trust falls away from you. It wasn't Delia's fault, in fact Patsy had begun to blame herself more and more.
I love you
Patsy sighed as she scribbled these words through the smudges on the page. There would be no letter writing tonight and she would have to be careful to dispose of this attempt should prying eyes see her true feelings.
"I can't live like this" Patsy whispered to herself "I mustn't".