Thomas and Richard went ahead of Chris and David into the kitchen to get breakfast ready. Chris hung back in the hallway, purposely waiting for David to come downstairs again after going up to put some socks on. Chris was feeling strange, he really did expect David to be angry with him for his reaction earlier, or at the very least, a bit annoyed. Thing is, unless Chris was reading him all wrong, David wasn't. He seemed fine with it and his remarks earlier, genuine. "There we are, properly dressed now," David said cheerfully as he descended the stairs quickly towards Chris. How is he like this? So cheerful and carefree. Is he? Or is it an act? Chris thought to himself. "You didn't need to wait Mr Webster," David said. "Or Chris? Can I call you that or would that be too much for only having known you for a few minutes?" David asked.

"Um, no. Sorry, I mean yes, Chris is fine," Chris said, stumbling over his words again. This was odd, he thought. Can't bloody speak properly now. I must be having an off day.

"Good, well obviously you can call me David," David said.

"Obviously," Chris answered. He didn't look at David as he spoke and David thought it was as though he was saying that to himself rather than to him. "Look, I'm not loitering here for no reason. I just wanted to get something clear."

"Okay."

"I'm sorry about my reaction earlier, I don't normally go around attacking people," Chris said.

"Well that's good to hear. But it's okay really Chris. No harm done, perhaps my dignity is a little dented but nothing much wrong. You were protecting your friends, nothing wrong with that, quite the opposite. I could have been anyone since we weren't introduced before," David said reassuringly.

"You don't think I overreacted then?" Chris asked.

"No, you did good. Some people would stoop so low as to invade people's homes to get them into trouble, so your reaction was spot on. I hope if I was in your shoes then I would have done the same," David said. His words seemed to have worked at reassuring Chris. He couldn't explain it but he had found himself wanting to remove the worried look off Chris's face for a while now and he felt a lot better now that his new friend was looking more relaxed. New friend? Hmm interesting. I was never one to make friends that easily. Oh well, every rule has to have an exception, he thought.

"We should probably go and join them. Thomas can't be here for too long as he has to get to Downton," Chris said.

"Okay, I'll follow you," David said. He saw it again in Chris's eyes now. The same look or feeling he thought he saw earlier. When he spoke about Thomas or when he looked at him earlier, there was a sadness in his eyes.

…

"How long do we have until you need to leave Tommy?" David asked over breakfast not long later. It was a bit of a squeeze, the kitchen was small and the table could really only fit two comfortably, three at a pinch so to allow room for the four of them they had to bring the chair from the office, which David initially mistook for a cupboard. Easy mistake to make as it was tiny.

"Half an hour if I walk quickly," Thomas answered.

"I said I'd tell you everything so I'll try in half an hour," David said. "You and Richard deserve a bit more of an explanation. As do you Chris, since you're part of all this too clearly," he added, flicking his eyes up over his tea cup he was drinking out of at Chris opposite him adding a smile for good measure. "I suppose though I should start from the beginning, or more likely we should Tommy. It's our story at the beginning after all, if that's alright with you?"

"I've never spoken much about my childhood to anyone," Thomas said. It was true, even Richard only knew snippets. "Maybe now's the time." Chris looked between Thomas and David, never heard anyone call Thomas Tommy before? he thought. "You start David."

"Well in case it wasn't obvious by now Tommy and I grew up together. I'm older than him by a month and twelve days and lived a few doors down from him. We always played together as children and have been friends longer than I can remember. As any boys did we got into our fair share of trouble as children, Tommy more than me I reckon-"

Thomas cut him off. "-If I did it was only because I was too stupid and kept on following your so called 'master plans' as you called them that usually ended worse for me than for you."

David laughed and his unruly blonde hair fell onto his forehead again, which once again Chris found mesmerising, though he wasn't sure why. "I didn't get away with everything did I?"

"No but you got off lighter than me," Thomas said. "Although maybe the time you thought it would be a good idea to mess with your brother's work boots was an exception. From what I remember you weren't allowed out of the house except for school for a week." Richard and Chris smiled as they watched two old friends exchanging memories.

"I'm intrigued David. What did you do?" Chris asked.

David, encouraged by Chris's roguish smile across the table from him, explained. "It wasn't too bad really. I have two older brothers, the incident Tommy is referring to happened when we were probably nine or ten I reckon. Anyway, I was inspired by having trouble with untying a knot in my shoelaces. I was sitting on the doorstep and next to me were my brother's boots. Tommy was with me and together we tied the laces of their shoes together in a jumbled mess so that it took ages to undo."

"It was a bit more than that wasn't it David?" Thomas prompted, Richard seeing that mischievous grin that Thomas wears so well on his face.

"Um yeah. We hid them too. Tommy thought of the hiding place, under a rhubarb forcer in my mother's vegetable patch. Unfortunately it rained that night so by morning they were wet, muddy and my brothers were not happy and they knew it was us. We had a reputation by then for pranks you see," David said.

"It wasn't all bad back then," Thomas said. "I think before we both started to grow up that I was happy. David had to clean his brother's shoes for a week as punishment and I was given a long lecture on respecting other people's belongings by my father. I still remember that. I was sitting on the counter of his clock shop. I had just started helping out there sometimes." Thomas never thought of his father very fondly, or any of his family for that matter. If they were kind to him once it was only because he was who they wanted him to be back then and they didn't know who he really was. At that time, Thomas hadn't figured out the latter for himself either. His father had been very keen for him to join him in the shop as his apprentice when he left school, although that never happened. Richard smiled encouragingly at Thomas from his end of the table. He had not heard much about Thomas's childhood. He vaguely knew how it ended for him and had assumed that the rest of his youth had been just as bad. He was, in a way, relieved to know it wasn't all bad.

"I suppose things started to change for us around then," David said. "As children, no one cared if we only hung around boys and not girls. That was quite common. But as we got older and boys our age started to show interest in girls we-" David stopped.

"-We didn't," Thomas finished.

"I joined the boys cricket team for instance. I didn't really have any interest in the sport but I liked being around the guys, least I know now that's the reason. And probably because I wanted to be around you," David said to Thomas.

"We always stuck together, and maybe people started to notice," Thomas said grimly.

David nodded in agreement. "I remember one Sunday afternoon my aunt and her husband, who was a vicar, came to visit. They were the type that thought that just because they were part of the church that they were above everyone else, both in morals and in status. I think they thought it gave them the right to judge. I overheard them say something along the lines of 'you should be careful who your David spends his time with. Too much of that sort of company will condemn him in the eyes of God'. The next day I was about to go out to meet Tommy as I often did after dinner when my mother said I couldn't and that I should spend time with someone other than him. When I asked why, she changed the subject."

"I didn't see David so much after that. It was hard to get the opportunity as there was always his family or mine who would get in the way and stop us. Funny in a way though, because it made us more determined," Thomas said. He looked up, he had been speaking down towards the table and he didn't even realise. Richard had a frown on his face and Chris looked a perfect mixture of anger and disappointment.

"We started to sneak out to see each other. We agreed on a meeting place in the woods that were on the edge of town. It was a bit of a distance but that was helpful. It was fine when the weather was good, but not when it rained so we built a shelter in the woods also. It was our place," David said fondly but with a hint of sadness. "It went on like this for ages, our parents stopped bothering us and it seemed we were okay."

"We'd talk out there for ages each time we met up, about loads of things. David sometimes sat up in a tree and I sat at the base of it. I wasn't keen on tree climbing," Thomas explained. Richard and Chris exchanged a look. Richard was reminded of the time last month where he had found Thomas up a tree on the lawns outside Downton after trying to rescue their troublesome cat, Wilde from the tree. He had told Chris this and so Chris got the reference too. "I suppose, it was only natural that we grew even closer then, when it really was just each other we could be ourselves around."

"There was one December, at Christmas it was where we found a tree and decorated it with whatever we could find as Tommy's family didn't think a Christmas tree was a necessary thing to have in the home and Tommy was disappointed. I found a robin feather," David said.

Thomas and David's eyes met. "Yeah you did, you put in my hair. I thought it looked wonderful. My father didn't and took it from me."

"I remember you telling me that story," Richard said to Thomas.

"I did. Although I left something out," Thomas said. Chris had a feeling he knew what Thomas was going to say.

"I did put the feather in Tommy's hair," David said. "Right before I kissed him." Richard nodded.

"I didn't know what to do. I just left and went home," Thomas said.

"I thought I had screwed up big time," David said. "That I'd misread everything and lost my only friend in the process."

"But I came back the next day. Was wondering if David would even be there, but he was," Thomas took a deep breath. "So I did something I had wanted to do for a long time before then. I kissed him too. I suppose that was the beginning of the end."

"It was good for a while though, right Tommy?" David asked. Richard felt like this was a conversation between David and Thomas only and that he and Chris weren't even there.

"Yeah. I don't regret any of it. Despite what happened after," Thomas said firmly.

"What happened after?" Chris asked.

"Well not immediately after. Despite our naivety, we were careful at first and things developed between us over several months after that moment," David said. "But the problem was, we got too comfortable. Too confident that we were okay. And so we started meeting closer to home, in my father's workshop to be exact."

"Your father caught you both?" Richard asked.

"No, my oldest brother did. Tommy was just about to leave, and if it had been a minute later that he had walked in, then we would have been fine," David said.

"I scarpered, and I felt bad about leaving David then but I was scared, terrified," Thomas added. All these memories had been buried in a dark corner of his mind for a long time now, almost like they were just dreams and they weren't actually real. This was a wake up call.

"You should have left. It was better that way. My brother said he wouldn't tell, as long as it never happened again. We tried to stay away but of course my brother's request was impossible," David explained. "A few weeks later he saw us again and then he didn't hesitate, no matter how much I begged."

"He went to my father and told him what he had seen so when I came home that day he dragged me inside and he-" Thomas stopped.

"You don't have to say anything more," Richard said.

"No, I do. It's fine. I need to," Thomas said. He looked at the clock. He was going to be late but this was important. "He beat me up good and proper so that apparently, I would never forget how foul mistakes like me would rot in hell." Chris, sitting to one side of Thomas was looking down at the table, biting his lip as though it deserved to be punished. Richard knew Thomas's parents were cruel to him but he still found it hard to imagine, since his parents have never been anything but good to him. To Thomas those words were made worse by how Mr Carson had almost echoed his fathers own words years ago. "They then told me to get out or they would report me." Thomas spoke with no emotion. "I hid out in the woods. I didn't know what to do. Everyone was beginning to hear about us now."

"I stayed at home but I couldn't stay there much longer," David said. "I then one evening heard my brothers and his mates saying how they were gonna, and I quote, 'Teach the faggots a lesson'. I couldn't believe my own brothers would do that. But they would have, at least if I hadn't warned Tommy that they were coming. There was no debating it then. We both ran. We left and never looked back. We thought maybe we could stay together and figure out a way to make it work, but we had no money and no friends. We both agreed one night that we had to go our separate ways. We were risking too much."

"So as you know Richard, I decided to look for work in service," Thomas said.

"And I, not really thinking waiting on rich people would be something I'd be suited too, decided to go to the coast, the docks in Liverpool offered opportunities so I ended up there and I've been there ever since, give or that the years I was in the navy during the war," David said. "I found work as a laborer at first. Hard work and low pay but I was in charge of my life for once. After the war I came back, lost my job and built up some debts as a result. I found another job, but paying off the loan I took was tricky. That is where the trouble started. You see, the loan I took was one that was a bit 'under the counter' so to speak, 'off the books'. I thought it sounded like a good deal, but the man I owed money too was powerful in the criminal world. One day, out of the blue, he called my loan in. All of it. Of course I couldn't pay, but he knew that. He said that if I agreed to do a few tasks for him that the loan would be written off piece by piece."

Chris frowned. He had known people like that. "What sort of 'tasks' exactly?"

"Not much that my conscience wouldn't allow at first. Keeping a watch on places where he kept stolen goods down at the docks. Warning him about the coppers. Creating distractions. Telling him which ships will be coming in with valuable cargo and when. Now I didn't feel good about doing this but it was necessary at the time," David said. "Since I wasn't actually hurting anyone, I obeyed. But then he started to ask more of me. I started to get more directly involved in his underhand operations. I found myself smuggling goods down the river at night, not just alcohol, but drugs and then weapons and I was less comfortable with that and who they were being supplied to. He kept his word at first, my debts were slowly written off, but very slowly. He had a hold of me and it was harder and harder to escape. But the final straw came when one dark evening he came to me, handed me a gun and told me to 'silence' someone. A member of his gang that had been secretly informing the police. When I refused he told me that if the man in question was not dead by sunrise then he would come for me. I couldn't do it so I ran and here I am."

"He's why you turned up last night?" Thomas asked.

"Yeah. I thought somewhere out of the way would be the last place he'd look. I hoped that if I disappeared then he would turn his attention to more important things than chasing me down. I thought of you and so I hoped to try and find you and as you know, I was intent on looking at every large country house until I found you. I hoped that finding you might help me find a new start," David said. "I won't impose on you two much longer. I can put myself up at the pub for a while until I find something. If I can stay."

"You can stay here until then," Richard said. "Although it can't be too long term. I don't want to sound rude but people around here might talk."

"Exactly what I was thinking Richard, hence why I will get out of your hair as soon as I can," David said.

"Hate to interrupt this, but I really must be going," Thomas said, nodding in the direction of the clock. "I've pushed my luck enough already."

"Of course, we can't keep the posh folks waiting for their breakfast can we? It might force them to get it themselves!" David joked. Chris laughed.

Thomas rolled his eyes. "I'll see you later?"

"Yeah I guess you will. Bye Tommy," David said.

"I'll see you later," Thomas said to Richard as he bent over to kiss him. David noticed Chris looked like he had been staring at the sun too long when he watched their simple good bye kiss, he had to look aware as the brightness was too painful. Oh that must make things complicated, he thought as his suspicions that Chris had feelings for Thomas were confirmed. "Bye Chris."

"Bye Thomas," Chris said.

...

A little while later and David was just about to head out. Richard was in the shop and Chris was in the office, but came out as he heard David pulling his shoes on by the door. "So you're staying then?" Chris asked him.

"Would you like me too?" David asked. It was not what he expected, but getting Chris's approval was vital to him.

"What I want isn't important," Chris said.

"Well it might be actually," David said. Chris looked at him curiously. "I mean I can't stick around if you don't like me. So do you want me to stay?"

"I would," Chris said.

David smoothed down his hair and put on his hat. "Excellent!" he said happily before he left, leaving Chris standing in the hallway.

...

It was approaching lunchtime and Richard had gone to buy more bread, leaving Chris alone in the shop, or in the office to be more accurate. Chris was sitting at the desk, pen in one hand and an open accounts ledger on the desk in front of him. The page for today and yesterday, empty. He had been sitting there for almost an hour now and it was still empty. He had never felt so unproductive in his life, ignoring his years in prison of course. This sort of work came easy to him, working out calculations in his head was not had for him. He was good with numbers but today, every time he thought of what he was going to write down or add up, he forgot it again because a certain blonde haired friend of Thomas's kept getting in the way. He wasn't really sure why he was thinking about him to be honest. When they met this morning, Chris hated him. But finding out that he really was no threat and in fact Thomas's oldest friend, made him forget that. He wasn't the kind of person to trust someone so quickly after knowing them for so little time. He literally has only known David for a few hours but yet he found himself wanting to tell him all his secrets. And when he dismissed those thoughts from his mind in an effort to concentrate on his work, he found himself thinking about how David felt as he had him pushed up against that wall and about how he looked close up. Little lines on his face, the smile around his eyes and his boyish grin when he said he needed to get his socks on. Chris couldn't help but think how it would be nice to be in a similar position with him again. -Oh no you don't! He's handsome, yes, but surely Thomas and Richard see that too? Thomas especially right? It's not just you. Don't be so silly. He's not even here for you. He's only here for Thomas and to avoid being killed by some crazy person from Liverpool. Shut up and grow up! He isn't interested, okay! Chris told himself as he shook his head with frustration. But the more Chris thought about him the more he questioned that last thought. Maybe he is. Could he be? He had asked if I wanted him to stay, like my opinion mattered. And was he flirting when he asked me to let him go so he could get his socks? I don't know. Chris shook his head again. No, couldn't be. Why would he be interested in me? Plenty better than me surely?

"Chris!"

Chris jumped. Richard was standing right behind him. "What?" he asked, bewildered for a moment.

"You're in a world of your own aren't you?" Richard smirked. He had come back from the errands he was running and had forgotten to go to the post office and pick up some more envelopes. He was intending on checking in the desk drawer to see if they still had any, but had called Chris's name twice now so he could move aside so he could get to the drawer.

"Sorry. What is it?"

"Envelopes. Just checking to see if we have any so I know whether I need to go back out and fetch some," Richard said.

Chris opened the draw. "Um, yep got a few here. Do you want one now?"

"No, thanks." Richard could see Chris was distracted by something. "Penny for your thoughts?"

"You'll think its stupid but I can't stop thinking about earlier. About David," Chris confessed.

"Oh? Oh really!" Richard remarked with a suggestive grin.

"No! Not like that!" Chris insisted. "I mean, he's here for Thomas, not me."

"He is, but he likes you I reckon," Richard said.

"He likes you too," Chris said.

"Yeah maybe."

"He doesn't even know me and I don't really know him. I mean how long have I known him? Six hours? Can't draw any conclusions from that," Chris said.

"Maybe you should talk to him more?" Richard suggested. He wasn't sure if he should be dropping heavy hints like this. After all, Chris was technically right. It had literally been only hours and David was friendly with all of them, not just Chris. But still, what harm could a little conversation do? Even if it comes to nothing.

"Why?" Chris asked. Richard noted his suspicion.

"Well, you said you two don't really know each other, and if he's going to be staying here then nothing wrong with getting to know him more and the best way to get to know anyone is to talk to them. Otherwise in months time, you'll still not know him much more than you do now," Richard said, all matter of fact.

"What are you getting at Richard?"

Richard smiled. "I'm not saying anything. Only this- when Thomas and I first met, we talked and it didn't take long before we both realised how much we had in common, and I don't just mean the obvious. And it also didn't take us long to realise how much we liked each other." Richard reached over and took an envelope from the draw anyway. He made to leave, but turned around again at the last moment. "Talk to him okay?"