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XII

BORN TO LOSE

May 5th, 1931.

This morning I was going to take a train back to London. I was lying on my bed while Ada finished packing my bags, and the tea, in its cup, cooled on the nightstand.

"Eat something", Ada ordered, folding a dress. "The travel will be almost four hours long".

"I don't want to go back to London", I said. The dejection caused by the laudanum had prived me of the vehemence necessary to argue.

"It's for your good". Ada had been repeating the same to me since last night, when she told me she had bought a train ticket. "The best thing you can do is stay away from my brother, at least for a while".

"A 'while' that will be forever" I curled up on my bed and closed my eyes. I had slept for more than ten hours but nightmares had haunted my sleep. Oswald Mosley was in all of them.

Ada said nothing and just answered with a defeated sigh. She was fed up and it was to be expected. Since I met Thomas last month, I only had been giving her headaches. Even Karl, who is already a teenager, is not that troublesome, and even though Ada has always considered me her little sister, I'm sure she never imagined that adopting a sibling would imply such a burden. Had she known, she would have refused, because Ada is the kind of person who detests problems and tend to get rid of them.

So, at that time, I thought she was getting rid of me.

"Did you call your mother last night?", my friend asked me suddenly.

"No".

"Who will be waiting for you at the station, then?"

"No one", I replied, feigning anger even though I was falling asleep.

I heard Ada drop the suitcase abruptly but I didn't open my eyes. This scene was closer to the fight a mother and her disobedient daughter would have, and to be honest, it seemed pathetic. Those attitudes weren't typical of me, although I have to admit that I was becoming more stubborn lately. Perhaps what bothered me the most was the fact that my friend was right.

"Yesterday a bastard almost raped you in your secretariat and you almost witnessed a murder", Ada said and at the simple memory of Mosley's breathing in my ear, the skin on my arms prickled. "Wasn't all that enough to make you realize that this is not your place?".

"What's not my place, Ada?" I questioned, forcing myself to open my eyes and sat up a bit in my bed. "Birmingham? Your house? Thomas?" My friend was sighing again. "You've been telling me since last night that I have to go, taking advantage of the state I'm in because you know that I wouldn't give in if I wasn't medicated, as if getting on a train would prevent me from returning later on my own".

"I'm saving your life", my friend snapped. Exhaustion showed on her face. "I'm tired of telling you this: you don't know Thomas. You don't know the Shelbys. You have no idea what they… we have done".

"You know everything about me", I snapped. I wanted to cry. "We have known each other for years. We ate together, drank, laughed and cried. We share clothes and even a bed. All this time you had the opportunity to tell me your story, the story of your family, and you didn't, and you are the offended one?"

I saw Ada swallow hard and lower her eyes. My words had hurt her and God only knows how much I hated hurting Ada. Never, until that moment, had I been so cruel to her. I was sincere, yes, but sincerity is not always an option when it is linked to a truth that the other party already knows and tries to forget.

"If I told you my story, you would have walked away from me as if I were a leper." Her eyes were full of tears but she struggled not to let any of them escape. "Freddie died a couple of months before I met you, you know that, and in life he always wanted us to stay away from the Shelbys. After his death, I was alone in London with a baby, but going back to Birmingham was not an option. I'd put that past behind me, I told myself. I wasn't Ada Shelby anymore, I was Ada Thorne".She began to cry.
"Everyone here knows who I am. Who we are. You know I came back to Birmingham after giving birth to Beth; I did it to feel more secure. Yes, I hate my family's legacy but they are the only ones who can protect me when the going gets tough, and you can imagine how tough the goings are when a fascist leader hangs around my brother's office and somebody blows up Ben's".

The memory of Ben caused Ada to escape an anguished sob. I remembered what Thomas had told me a couple of weeks ago: 'Ben Younger died because of me'.

"I wouldn't have walked away from you", I said, wanting to calm her down. I tried to stand up but was too dizzy. "I know the woman you are and the story of your family would never have changed that concept".

"Well, I wish it does now". Ada shrugged dejectedly. "Only then can I get you far enough away to make sure you're not in danger. I'm tired of losing people I love because of the Peaky Blinders". It was the first time I had heard the name of the band although, since I arrived in Birmingham, I had always heard someone mutter those two words when I was walking down the street with Ada. "All the Shelbys have lost someone, without exception, either physically or because sooner or later, they get fed up: Polly lost who would be her husband. Arthur, to his wife, who divorced him. Thomas was widowed, I lost Ben, John was murdered ..."

"John was murdered?" I interrupted, disturbed by what I had suddenly heard.

"Yes, Olivia, he was murdered. He didn't die when he fell off the horse as I told you at the time. The fucking New York mafia killed him". Ada confessed in anger and pain. "They shot him in his own house, in front of his wife and without thinking about it, as if he were a simple piece of meat".

I didn't know what to say when my friend started crying again. I understood why Ada had been so reluctant to accompany her to John's funeral when this had happened. I was aware that her motives transcended me and that I would never fully understand how murky life could be in such an environment.

I gulped and wanted to stand up once more. I needed to hug her and ask her forgiveness, but my numb legs did not allow it and I fell to the floor.

"Olivia!" My friend, alarmed, came over and led me to bed again. As I did so, I hugged her tightly and she responded to the hug. "Okay, okay", she comforted me as I too had started crying. "You're right. If I had told you the truth from the beginning, we would be saving all this but it is that by bringing you to Birmingham to help you with your career, I never imagined that you would end up falling in love with my brother. Thomas is the complete opposite of what always attracted you in a man, why him?". Ada pulled away from me and searched my face for an answer.

"He's the complete opposite of what Andrew was and that's enough for me", I admitted. "Thomas is sincere, and I know that if he falls in love with me, I see him incapable of hurting me".

"Tom can hurt you in other ways", Ada said. "You see what happened before yesterday. The trouble he gets into and the people he surrounds himself with make him more dangerous than a cheating man".

"I can help him".

"Help him with what?" My friend scrutinized me with her eyes.

"I can help him to change".

My friend gave a laugh that, in conjunction with her watery eyes, made her look strange.

"He's forty years old, Olivia. Tommy has been behaving like this for a long time and has a character that is degenerating more and more. Even Grace couldn't change him, and you intend to do it?" Ada asked.

"You say he's been behaving like this for a long time. That means it wasn't born being what he is now, I observed.

"No, he wasn't born being what he is now. Before France, Tom was someone else". I watched her raise the corners in a sad smile. "Before France, we were all different".

"Let me try, Ada." For some reason, I was asking her permission. "Let me make him the man he was before the war. In his eyes I still see humanity, he is not completely lost, and something tells me that he hates what he has become. I know you don't understand". I felt faint and lay back on the bed. "... but for me it's as if he's crying out for help".

"God". My friend was surprised. "You love him. At what point did you start loving him so much?"

I did not know what to answer. Until that moment, I had not been fully aware that what I felt was love. I believed that my capacity to love had succumbed the day that Andrew had broke with me for the second time, but apparently my heart had been hibernating, immersed in a state of healing, waiting for someone to be worthy of it. That someone had been Thomas: the true interest he had shown in my art, the empathy that his broken soul generated in me and the way he kissed me, as if he were so in need of affection, had made me a woman with a disposition to feel again.

The doorbell made us both jump.

"It must be Polly", said Ada. "She's going to stay with Beth while I drive you to the station".

I remembered the confrontation I had had with Elizabeth Gray in the company archive and regretted that Ada had fired the babysitter after she verified her complicity with me.

"Oi!" Ada exclaimed, downstairs. "Tommy!"

Lying on my bed I tried to assimilate what was happening as I heard footsteps going up the stairs. When I saw Thomas at the entrance to my room, I couldn't help but smile a little. I had really missed him those two days of sheer torture.

"Olivia," he greeted, taking off his cap. "How are you feeling?"

"Tom, what the fuck are you doing here?" Ada appeared behind her brother and looked angry.

"I came to visit her", Thomas said, walking over to my bed. "I suppose today you're going to let me talk to her, aren't you?"

I knew then that Thomas had tried to contact me since that dire situation had occurred in his office. I had a hard time understanding why Ada would forbid him to call or see me, since there was nothing wrong with it.

Thomas sat on the edge of the mattress next to me and gently stroked my head.

"Olivia will be catching a train in less than an hour," Ada said grumpily. "She will return to London".

"I knew that, that's why I'm here", Thomas said, practically ignoring his sister. He was absentmindedly combing through some strands of my hair with his fingers.

"How did you know?" Asked my friend, a victim of confusion.

"Ada, I spend about the same time in London as I do in Birmingham. Do you really think you can achieve something by sending her back to her house?", Thomas questioned. "The only thing you do by taking her away from me is face her in greater danger. Would you leave me alone with her?" Thomas asked Ada.

"No".

"Well then, I'll say what I have to say in front of you", Thomas resolved, looking back at me. "I'm sorry for what you had to live the day before yesterday, Ollie".

" 'Ollie'!" Ada was scandalized when hearing the diminutive and I, although I tried to contain myself, I expressed my happiness in a smile. When my friend saw me smile, she massaged her temples.

"It's fine… Mr. Shelby". I wasn't brave enough to call him 'Thomas' for the first time in front of Ada. "It wasn't your fault. I should have been in the archive. How would you know that I was going to return so soon ...?"

"Actually, I should have guessed or at least handled the possibility", he said. "I shouldn't have left that office but I did it. Again, I apologize".

"Okay" I said, and his presence by my side soothed me so much that it made me close my eyes.

"What did they give her?" I heard Thomas ask Ada. There was concern in his voice.

"Laudanum".

"Why did they give her that shit?"

"Because she's been having panic attacks ever since she got back from the Company, Tom", Ada snapped, and even though I wasn't looking at her, I knew she crossed her arms. "Olivia is an ordinary woman. She is not used to leading a life like ours but she doesn't seem to want to understand it. Maybe if you tell her, she'll accept that it's best for everyone if she goes back to London and forgets about us".

"The best for everyone? Even you?" I intervened waking up, hurt by my friend's words.

"Even me", said Ada.

I brought my eyes to Thomas and saw that he was sympathetic. In a way, he felt guilty and I knew it when he couldn't meet my gaze. For my part, I did not consider that he was to blame for the breakdown of my friendship with Ada, but rather that it had been the consequence of a succession of errors that could have been avoided. Now, it was late: Ada was fed up with me and I had already fallen in love with her brother.

"What did you tell her?" Thomas asked Ada.

"The slightest thing", Ada replied. "The rest is up to you".

My friend, who at first had refused to leave me alone with her brother, left the room convinced that given the outlook, Thomas was on her side and would also consider sending me to London as the best option.

After a few seconds of silence in which Thomas was thoughtful, he finally got ready to speak:

"Do you remember what I told you when I kissed you, here, in this room?" He asked, still somewhat abstracted. "What did I answer you when you asked me who I was?"

"You told me you were a monster."

"Exactly", Thomas agreed. For some reason, he couldn't look me in the eye. "I'm a monster, Olivia. The worst of them all. I have done things that others would consider atrocious but that for me, are nothing more than actions that are part of everyday life".

"What do you mean?" I asked, even though I already knew the answer. I wanted Thomas to be honest with me. I needed to stop knowing him based on assumptions.

"I could start with the worst and confess that I have murdered but you must already imagine that", he said and looked at his hands as if they were stained with invisible blood. "I've killed so many people I've already lost count. At first, I counted them. I stopped counting when I passed two dozen".

Compassion, fear, and anguish found themselves in my heart, causing my chest to begin to ache. I had told Ada that I still sensed humanity in Thomas and that was true; for this reason, seeing him responsible for so many deaths and knowing that the guilt was eating away at his conscience, broke my heart. He was a tormented man, haunted by a thousand demons. A victim of his own nefarious acts.

Thomas took my silence as an invitation to keep talking.

"My family and I have always done everything needed to survive, even before the war", he said. "The fraudulent gambling business was already our business before France. We were looking for a life of dignity in a way that most people would find questionable, because as much as bastards fill their mouths talking about merit, I have found that such a thing only applies to the rich and criminals. That's why I admire people like you, Olivia; people who are born into poverty and find a decent way to live with shit around their necks, without muddying others in the process. We Shelbys couldn't stand that pit, we wanted to get out of it and the only way to do it was by being the Peaky Blinders.
Being the Peaky Blinders, people respected us and stopped insulting us. Being the Peaky Blinders, we commanded a respect that would otherwise have been mockery.
My mother committed suicide and my father abandoned us when I was nineteen. I fell in love with a woman shortly after and she died holding my hand. I went to France believing that there was still a chance to acquire a decent life and what I found there convinced me that the world is more shitty than I already thought it was".

I brought my hands to his, which he twisted with anxiety and somewhat unsettled by the touch, he looked at me.

"The world sucks, yes, but it is up to us to avoid it to consume us", I tried to cheer him up.

"It has already consumed me", he confessed. "I've lost everything, Olivia. Since I was born, I have only known how to give losses. I'm a gambling man. I've spent my entire life wanting to make myself a winner, trying to ignore the fact that I was born to lose".

"You have to keep gambling, Mr. Shelby". I worried about the way Thomas talked to me. He spoke those words as if he had no reason to live.

"Gambling on this life is like knowingly gambling on the horse that's losing". The comparison seemed to amuse him, but as he smiled I saw his grief. "It's like putting all your fucking money on the horse you know has a wounded leg".

"Horses with wounded legs are shot in the head", I observed.

"Yes".

"But we are the ones who determine when to put the bullet in the horse's head. We are the ones who determine when it can no longer run". I took his hand tightly and he laced his fingers through mine. "Mr. Shelby, do you really think you can't run this race anymore?"

Thomas watched me for a couple of seconds. In his opaque eyes I saw a reflection of vitality pacing. I did not know for sure if I had managed to motivate him with my words since he was much more broken than I initially thought, but I had led him to question certain decisions that already seemed taken.

"I can still run", he concluded in a whisper. "My leg is wounded, but I can still run". He looked at my knuckles and caressed my phalanges. "Will you bet on me, Olivia?"

"Yes, Thomas. I will bet on you".

The hope that the simple pronunciation of his name gave him touched my heart. He took those beautiful blue pools that he had for eyes and placed them on me, thanking me without using words. I never imagined that he had been waiting for this moment with such anxiety and that a detail as insignificant as calling him by his first name could transform his expression and restore his vigor.

Thomas Shelby was a man surrounded by luxury but in need of simple gestures.

"Ada will be upset with you when she knows your resolution", Thomas said, as if suddenly aware of his behavior and trying to change the subject, "and she will slap me for failing to convince you to return to London."

"There is no God capable of making me return to that city", I launched, and everything that had lived there it came to my memory. "I hate it".

"Birmingham isn't better", Thomas observed. "A couple of days ago, I spoke with my acquaintance, the one who is training your mare, remember?" I was somewhat surprised that he had actually bought me a mare. "Well, she told me that in a few weeks you can ride it. What do you think if we go to her estate? It has several hectares of country and there is good air".

"Are you asking me out on a date, Mr. Shelby?" I teased him and that made him smile.

"Drugged and all, you still have the mood to joke. Yes, I am asking you on a date. Likewise, the best thing is that you don't go to the Company for a while. I want you to recover well and forget… all that shit", Thomas concluded, standing up. "Have you managed to write something?" He asked suddenly.

"No," I confessed. "I haven't been able to concentrate".

"Try to write because when we go to the estate, I want you to read me a new poem."

"I don't think I can write…" I hesitated. Inspiration had left my soul as well as stability, my mind.

"You can", he said, motivating me. "Write about me if you want. You have my permission" and before leaving, he kissed my forehead gently.

I smiled as I watched him leave the room and, once I was alone, I made my way to my desk. I sat down and took the pen; the smell of ink invaded my lungs. I stroked the pristine page of my book of poems and laughed a little at the curious naivety owned by Thomas Shelby: I had been writing about him since I had met him and would do so until the pen broke apart in my hand.