Thank you so much for continuing to read, not too much longer to go now.

Apologies for any spelling/ grammar mistakes


Thomas spent his days bewitched. By day he would be like he used to, using that same old method to block out his guilt and any conceptions that anyone might have that he was miserable. At night, when he went to bed, he succumbed to his feelings. He wouldn't cry, but his dull surroundings would absorb him and make him angry. It vanquished his sorrow until there was nothing left. Jimmy may have changed for the better, he may have grown up and moved on, but he would spend the rest of his life believing that he tried to assault his best friend and that he betrayed his ex-lo-… well, his frie-…. His Thomas. Their relationship couldn't be constrained by the usual social categories.

The time gave Thomas chance to think about exactly what he wants from Jimmy, and Alex was right; why did it matter so much to him? Victoria was right too, there was so much history between them that couldn't be erased, and Thomas knew he would ask Jimmy to return to Downton, he had to. Maybe, if Jimmy could forgive him for thinking so badly of him, they could talk again, perhaps even be friends. More? No, too much, too much. Thomas just had to accept that Jimmy had no feelings for him anymore and he did what Thomas wanted him to do; move on from them so they could both get on with their lives.

But when he wasn't working, even when he was working, Thomas thought about Jimmy all the time and wondered how he could find out where he was. There must be a way instead of waiting for some word from Victoria's brother. What if Jimmy never made contact? He could hardly put up signs, or an advertisement in the paper (not that he walked back and forth past the postal office eight or seventeen times contemplating this), nor could he make a phone call to every great house in the country, or make enquiries at every train station. It was a waiting game. It was the kind of game Thomas hated; there were no tricks, no schemes. He was powerless. It was that more than anything which made his blood simmer.


O'Brien made her mark over the two weeks following the announcement of the Duke's death (which of course had made the upstairs and downstairs' tables). Thomas was given varying looks off everybody. Very few people knew what the Duke had done to Thomas, but all were expecting some kind of reaction that never came. O'Brien was the only one who tried to deliberately encourage a reaction from him, but she was soon shot down by Mrs Hughes. Even Anna and Mr Bates were defending him! That did not compare to the awkwardness upstairs when Lord Grantham took Thomas off to the side and asked him how he was feeling after the news, arousing nothing but suspicion from Rose (who of course knew nothing about it), and Thomas gave a response of 'fine' like he didn't even know what Lord Grantham was talking about, all the moment needed was a vain toss of the head and a toothy dismissive smile, which the under butler would have given did he not suffer from a nervous twitch in his mouth which prevented him grinning properly and the weight of his guilt and worries keeping his head indefinitely un-tossed.

He wore the pocket watch Jimmy bought him when he could, his thumb would circle the gleaming surface, leaving his fingerprints then rubbing them off in the same motion. It turned the circle like the images in his mind; relief at the Duke's death, his guilt of Jimmy, his anger at himself, his loneliness with Alex gone, and he and Victoria secluding themselves in their own misery. He needed to talk about it, he was tired of pitying himself, but to find the words, the feelings he was at the mercy of, was the most difficult of all, as was put to the test when he went walking with Victoria that evening through the hardening snow, the last they should expect from this winter.

"Stop pretending that you don't care." The girl said in annoyance to the under butler scuffing his shoes in the snow. "You've been puffing relentlessly on cigarettes for the past two weeks, you don't eat properly, and I'm surprised if you're sleeping-"

"I'm fine." He cut her off, quickly throwing his freshly lit cigarette to the ground hoping she didn't see it….

…But she did. "Of course you are." She chuckled. After all Thomas had shared with her in the past months, and the two- no, three- times she had cried on his shoulder over Alex, she was disappointed at his silence, since she was the one person in the world Thomas could open up to (well, her and Mrs Hughes). "Just let me know when you're ready to stop kidding yourself."

After an exaggerated pause…. "Have a letter from Luke today-?"

"You know I did, you're just too stubborn for your own good to ask me about it." She leapt at the first indication of Jimmy he gave her. "And no, he hasn't heard from Jimmy yet, but don't worry, he will." And invariably; they will.

"How do you know that?" He asked her with frustration.

"Because did you ever know Jimmy to not be reliable?"

"Well-" He considered, forcing the maid to alter her question when she in fact knew that the ex-footman's recent track record left much to be desired.

"Reliable when he was good?"

"Oh, no." Thomas answered.

"Then he will write like he said he would." Victoria linked her arm through the under butler's, and this steadied him into a calmer tone of conversation.

"But he… he's an idiot." Victoria's expression balanced between laughter and confusion at this, but Thomas was being deadly serious. "He knows nothing about life; being different in a world that doesn't understand. He's already broken into a household and held an aristocrat hostage. That's with your 'brilliant' brother supervising. What now, now he's alone?"

"He can look after himself." Victoria said doubtfully with a grimace at the idea of the antics Jimmy would get up to alone.

"He never used to be able to look after himself." This, after all, was the Jimmy who got himself sacked twice, got people beaten up, couldn't hold a relationship, and struggled with the concept of honesty, could he really live on his own and look after another person in the young pianist whom he took from the Duke's, the reason for which was still not made clear. "I mean, this 'Christian' bloke he's travelling with. We know nothing about him, Luke knows nothing about him. What if he's a crook?"

"Thomas," Victoria crushed his arm to seal his lips, "you're very sweet, and he'll be fine."

"Maybe he's with Christian, maybe they're sleeping together and he's forgotten about everything else." He said with bitterness, but not in a way that he cared. Not that he didn't.

"You always have to put the worst spin on things, Mr Barrow."

"Why else would Jimmy take him with him?" Thomas asked, concealing the frantic feeling from his voice.

"I don't know. His employer's dead so he doesn't have a job." She thought aloud.

"Doesn't mean he had to go with him."

"I'll tell you what- why don't you ask Jimmy when you see him?" She said, partly wishing she had never brought up the subject if Thomas was going to go on about ifs and buts.

But….

"If I see him." Thomas said tediously.

"A ray of sunshine you are!" The girl released her grip on Thomas' arm and focussed on getting her hands warm by shoving them into her coat pockets. She knew that giving Thomas the effective brush off, physically and verbally, he would soon get the picture that he would have to change his entire attitude and approach to the subject of Jimmy. "Would it really matter to you if Jimmy was in a relationship with Christian, is that what's bothering you?"

"Just weird to think of him moving on." After everything, even after so long apart, Jimmy being with someone else, being happy when he believed he was a potential rapist, wasn't right for Thomas, and was almost an anti-climax.

"Didn't answer my question but…" Victoria mumbled. Thomas gave no sign that he was going to give a proper answer and decided to withdraw a cigarette (against his better judgement) and light it up, with his now free hands. Almost as a punishment for this Victoria decided to tell him something she had kept back for weeks, but felt it might be the right time to say, if it would help Thomas better arrange his thoughts about his feelings towards Jimmy. "When Jimmy first went to London he was with someone."

"What? Who?" Thomas practically choked on the cigarette dangling from his lower lip, frozen there by the cold wind.

"Luke said it was a guy from Cavour called Joe."

"Joe? As in the Joe who were completely obsessed with me and tried to bed me for about six months?"

"Possibly." She said slowly. "He must have improved his technique because Luke said he met him and was actually a nice guy. Even though when he met him he was naked on the sofa under Jimmy." The girl rolled her eyes, she never appreciated that when she said things she always saw them clearly in her head, but despite the warm feeling it stirred in her of two young attractive men together it was not appropriate, and shook her head of the image immediately.

Thomas meanwhile inhaled deeply on his cigarette, but didn't want to take it from his lips, so just held it there between his fingers and let the smoke pour from the corner of his mouth which turned up in a miniature twitch. "Things never work out how you think, do they?" He finally said, only removing the cigarette long enough from his mouth to say this.

Victoria sighed, infected by Thomas' downtrodden spirit, which had gone back to sleep after being awakened for so short a time. "Thomas… you turned him. You turned a stunning young lady- loving man into a raging homosexual, if that doesn't make you feel good then I don't know what does."

"You always know what to say." Thomas lips broke into a very small smile.

"Yes, I do. But you are right;" She said less confidently than before, with added sentiment, "things don't work out at all."

This jogged Thomas' memory to actually think beyond himself and ask the girl (but of course with a touch of selfish consideration); "Do you want Alex to be innocent?"

"What kind of question is that?" She exclaimed, "Of course I do. Why? Didn't you want Jimmy to be innocent of what he did?"

"I don't know. Of course I wanted to believe he were innocent…. It's just confusing I suppose. I got used to the idea of hating him, that I would never see him again, and now all those ideas have changed back to the time when I…."

"When you could have loved him?" The girl cut Thomas off, knowing his end to the sentence would probably have been a lie, in that it would differentiate from hers. Thomas did not deny it, in fact he was grateful he didn't have to say it himself, but he didn't stop walking, not wanting the maid to think it affected him. But it did.

"I want to see him, I know I have to, but I'm scared of… you know."

"Yes… I do. I understand. If Alex was found innocent and came back and asked me to marry him I don't know what I'd do. If I got to know him away from his 'crime' I'm scared I would love him, and that when he asked me I couldn't say no, but how can I take that risk? I don't feel I know him yet, he's Alex to me, not Monsieur le Comte de Chagny."

"You haven't seen every side, every mood, every everything." Thomas murmured, taken away by his recollections. "Jimmy told me once I'd seen all of him, I knew then he were lying, but I don't want that for me life, to expect lies over and over. I know the Duke's gone… but he'll always be there, making me doubt."

"I know it's hard, but you need to trust yourself, and when you find someone worth the risk, you won't necessarily know it, but you'll feel it. Life is all about risk, Thomas, you take a risk just by getting up in the morning. You of all people should know about risk, and I never thought you'd be afraid of it."

"I'm only human."

"Wow, I think I've just witnessed a breakthrough." She chirped, but it was short lived when she felt the touch of gloves against her fingers. She made to move away, knowing Thomas didn't like to be touched, but it was startling when in fact the under butler slid his fingers in between hers and squeezed her hand. When she looked at him, thinking he might give an explanation for this alien behaviour; letting them walk together, holding hands like a married couple, but he just kept his eyes straight ahead. "I suppose," Victoria continued, "the waiting game is like any game… you'll win at some point."

Thomas didn't take the watch out, but he slipped his hand into his pocket, where he felt the cold metallic feel of his pocket watch, chain detached from any buttonholes, just lying there like a dirty secret. The iciness of it sent an emotive shiver down his neck and made him inhale deeply, causing him to cough abruptly. Clearly his throat he then answered her; "My turn better hurry up then, or I might change the game."


A second fortnight had passed and by this time Thomas was becoming increasingly irate. Only in private of course. The longer he waited the more agitated he got over the anticipation of seeing Jimmy again. He was scared, and he was too afraid to admit it. He had no nightmares to trouble him, no urge for the drink had claimed him yet. However, the more time went on and letters from Luke came with no news and Thomas had to endure that emphatic look from Victoria and see her shake her head at him, and it got too much. He had to know, he didn't know why, but he had to. He built himself up every day, ready to see Jimmy, to hear that he had been located, but there was nothing but a great disappointment. By the fourth week of Jimmy's 'disappearance' he began to feel ill. He would have scoured the country if he had known how, if it would have kept him from opening a fresh bottle of whisky he would have done it. But the night always ended up coming, and it was never kind to him.


Mrs Hughes came into the pantry, investigating the loud clamour which came from within, and found the under butler inside, dressed for the day, but he was in such a state, and he was determined to make the pantry as chaotic as he felt. Food had crashed all over the floor, and the smell coming from Thomas of alcohol, meat, and cheese, was enough to intoxicate the housekeeper who had to wave the air in front of her clear with her hand. "Mr Barrow, what on earth are you doing?!" She cried.

Thomas stood erect and looking as innocent as possible in his surroundings, quite simply said; "I'm looking for the cheese."

Mrs Hughes pointed to a large wheel sitting directly between them and frowned. "It's right here, but god knows why you need it." She said. It was closing on six o'clock in the morning and there was no cheese planned for that morning's breakfast, so the under butler's business with it was a mystery which he soon made deliberately clear.

"Thank you, Mrs Hughes." The under butler prising a small morsel of the cheddar from the large wheel and popped it into his mouth smugly.

"Thomas… are you drunk?"

"It's me morning off." Thomas said defensively, if he wanted to get drunk then why couldn't he? He was a grown man after all. Mrs Hughes understood this, but this wasn't why she was angry, it was rather the mess he had made and the effect his anger had on everyone else and it was time for a bit of tough love, Mrs Hughes style.

"I know you've had a time of it lately, and we've been tolerant of you since," The housekeeper not needing to elaborate, she being the only one who had witnessed Thomas at his lowest point, when he contemplated taking his own life, but she had to put it from her mind if she could make the under butler see how foolish he was continuing to be (not that she knew everything) "but it's been over five months now and I think it's time for you to join the rest of us in the real world."

"I've been trying, but a man has his weaknesses."

"Oh I know that all too well…" The housekeeper folded her hands in front of her, "But you're not as alone as you always think you are. You were getting better, but suddenly it's gotten worse. Is it because of Alexander?"

OF COURSE IT IS! Thomas wanted to cry, but of course he couldn't, and it wasn't really Alex, it was the revelation he left behind him. The emotions and the truth. For a man of lies he relied so much on the truth, maybe that's why he never liked it, it was too complicated being honest; too demanding, yet completely essential (when he said so). "Alex lied to me, Mrs Hughes, everything I thought I knew were wrong. I were just starting to trust people again-"

"Do you trust me?" The housekeeper interrupted.

"Yes." The under butler whispered sheepishly, not used to being spoken to like a naughty school boy, but he played the part well when Mrs Hughes was playing the headmistress.

"Do you trust Victoria?"

"Yes." He said again.

"Then it seems that you are cured, Mr Barrow.. and don't you forget it."

Thomas squinted, for he was looking at something obscure, and yet it made perfect sense. All this time he believed he couldn't trust anyone and yet there were admittedly two people who he could tell anything to! The idea sparkled in his mind, but the clouds of his drunkenness were too overwhelming for such philosophising at that time of the morning, especially. His urge for cheese was also too nagging. He would have to think about it later, very carefully.

"Victoria's in the servant's hall, she can make you some tea, then get upstairs to bed so you'll be lively for luncheon." She dismissed the under butler, seeing he was in no fit state to clear up his mess.

"Thank you, Mrs Hughes." He apologised to her back as she left. She did not acknowledge it, but she heard it. Thomas took a moment or two to compose himself, smoothing back his hair and sucking in his breath (and a piece of cheese) before striding out into the servants' hall, where Victoria was among the first up with Mr Carson, Mr Bates, Anna and the odious O'Brien.

"Could you look any worse?" Victoria said in greeting when Thomas plonked himself down beside her.

"I don't think I could feel any worse either." He said groggily.

"Mrs Hughes has just told- or rather- whispered in my ear, that you have trashed the pantry." She said, unamused.

"It needed a sorting." Thomas replied coyly.

"I'm sure it does now you've been in there. What were you doing?"

"Looking for the cheese." He repeated the same line he gave Mrs Hughes.

"Well, you stink of it, and meat… oh, and whisky."

"Please tell me I am still asleep and Mr Barrow is not drunk at this table." Mr Carson interceded from the end of the table with added displeasure, clear he had just clocked onto Mr Barrow's dishevelled state.

"He's not drunk, Mr Carson," Victoria piped up, "he's…. devoted his half day to science and volunteered for drug experiments." Thomas' eyes widened, along with everyone else's, while the maid gave a painful wince at her own lack of believable wit.

"Drug experiments?" Mr Carson's terrified eyebrows retreated up his face.

"Yes… as you all know Thomas is allergic to nuts, and the doctor's given him something for it, a new drug, and it's had some terrible side effects." The maid's pitch rose with her lie, not sure if drunkenness was actually much worse than what she was saying.

"I see," Mr Carson took the bait like a true fish, "shouldn't he be in bed?"

"I'll take him when he's had some tea, Mr Carson."

"See that you do."

The girl poured some tea out for the under butler who drank it thirstily, licking his lips to savour the milky sweetness evaporating on his tongue.

"Better?" Victoria asked.

"Yes, thanks. You are the best liar ever." He leaned in to her, feeling more awake than before after that revitalising cup of tea and the pang of excitement at seeing his young friend lie to Mr Carson for him. For him! Thomas Barrow, the evil, scheming under butler! Of course he could trust her, why couldn't he? His feelings for the girl overwhelmed him so much he could have given her a kiss on the cheek, but he restrained himself like a proper servant in conservative surroundings. But Victoria was too riled at having to lie for Thomas to see the googly eyes he was making at her.

"'The best liar ever?' That's not even a compliment…." She groaned. "I know it's hard, Thomas-"

"No, you don't know. I need to find him. Now." Thomas whimpered.

The maid sighed, knowing that Thomas' state brought all this about, yes she had been waiting for it, but not first thing in the morning, not like this. "And you will find him, just as soon as-"

"If you were Jimmy, where would you go?" He pressed, opening himself up entirely, not concealing his desperation the maid he could trust, the alcohol pushing him on, question by question.

"Thomas, enough, you won't be able to figure out where he's gone. Just be patient." She tried to pacify him, squeezing his knee under the table.

"I can't, it's a nightmare, the whole bloody thing." He pushed his tea away and shrank back in his chair.

"All right, steady on."

"I can't, I need to find him, and sometimes I don't think you care." He snapped.

"Of course I do."

"Then help me, Vic, please. Do this for me. If you care about me, you'll help." The look of pity in her eyes only angered Thomas, "If you don't help I swear I'll-"

"Hey! Don't you dare threaten me. Don't you dare." She gritted her teeth, pleased at least that they were sat down the far end of the table away from any eavesdropping, not that Thomas had any idea what he would do if she didn't help him. Ignore her for maybe a whole thirty minutes?

"I'm sorry, Vic, I'm sorry." Thomas took her hand in his gloved ones, the leather caressed her skin and sent a tremor of comfort through her, it made his touch so gentle and it reminded her of the real him beneath all the hardness, that him that only she could see and was only ever revealed to her. "Please, just…. Please."

"Fine. How can I say no to those cold, drunken eyes?"

He gave up her hand and they formed a tiny huddle and began to theorise, Victoria may have been originally unwilling, but she liked a puzzle as much as the next person (maybe even more) and was secretly thrilled at this problem to solve. "The boy he's with, Christian, he's a piano player so maybe the theatre somewhere." Thomas began.

"I don't know, Luke always said Jimmy liked service life, and we don't know if he's still travelling with Christian-"

"He doesn't speak any foreign language except Latin, so I can't imagine he would have left the country-"

"Unless he's gone to America or Australia-"

Thomas' eyes shot up at the mention of that, if that were the case then all seemed lost, and Jimmy was the sort to go abroad on an adventure. "You don't think-"

"Would explain why we haven't heard anything for a while- letters would take a long time to get here." Victoria considered, but when she saw the look on Thomas' face it immediately quietened her, "We'll come back to that idea."

"If he were here, in England, he'd need a reference to work in a big house, but he didn't get one from here."

"He left too quickly from Luke's to get a reference from the Ritz, he only had Lady Anstruther's."

"That would be enough." Which meant Jimmy could be anywhere with a gleaming report like that.

"Oh, no, he doesn't, Luke said he left his reference at his house in his hurry to leave."

"What can he do without a reference?" Thomas' fears remained, imagining Jimmy on the street somewhere, stealing food to get by, jobless, his hair a mess, unwashed. The world was a cruel place.

"Well, Jimmy said Lady Anstruther's back in the country," Victoria remembered the footman had sent Her Ladyship a Valentine's Day card the year before to keep in her good books, "so he could have asked her for a new one."

"He could..." Thomas agreed.

"Or….."Victoria's mouth gaped in a state of revelation.

"What?"

"Come on, Thomas, think carefully." She urged him, wanting him to think of it for himself but the way his mind was corrupted it might take more time than her patience could stand.

"I don't know what you're trying to tell me but I suggest you do before you upset me."

"Thomas!"

"For goodness sake she's trying to tell you that Jimmy has gone to Lady Anstruther's!" O'Brien called down the table, blatantly having listened to every word the pair had been saying. So much for their circle of discretion.

"Thank you, Miss O'Brien, it's so refreshing to see you lend a helping hand." The blonde maid grinned sardonically.

"If it shuts the pair of you up I will."

With a dirty look being shot O'Brien's way, and her giving one back, if they were more immature there would have been tongues sticking out at each other until Thomas and Victoria had left the room to get away from her, and she wouldn't dare follow them. "That's brilliant, Vic," Thomas offered praise when they were out of earshot, "do you really think he's gone there?"

"Only one way to find out…" The maid nodded to Carson's empty office, where the downstairs phone was imprisoned. The under butler gave Victoria a wink and straightened himself out to make the call while Victoria kept watch for the butler who looked to be fixed to his seat for a while yet and the under butler went into the breach, Victoria bit her thumb skittishly, jogging about outside, waiting, watching Thomas' lips move indistinctly. He only spoke once before hanging up, without 'goodbye' leaving his lips. He stopped for a moment over the phone and put it on the desk, then went from the office towards Victoria, his expression giving nothing away. Seeing she was going to have to drag the answer out from him the girl said; "Well?"


Yes! I'm evil!