47 Dougie's POV

By the end of the night, there was a fully fledged song written. Complete with lyrics and everything. And Danny was practically glowing with happiness. Even Tom seemed to have an extra spring in his step, whether it was from completing a song for the first time in ages, or from the company, I didn't know. But he was certainly in a better mood. It wasn't totally obvious, but underneath it all, it was there, I could tell.

He was still tense, and wasn't that talkative, and didn't join in with us that much, but there was a certain level of... I guess you could call it satisfaction. Like he knew he'd done a good job at something. It had been a very long while since he'd felt like he done anything well, despite our encouragements, so it must have felt incredible to have that back again.

"So I take it that things went well last night then?" Harry slid to sit next to Danny at the table, while Tom was safely off putting Buzz down for a nap. We weren't in any trouble of him overhearing, I had the baby monitor down here, so I could shut us up the minute Tom was nearing us again.

"It went really well. We got loads done, finished up all the lyrics, worked out a few other things that needed doing, it was great." Danny nodded, still grinning.

"I'm glad." Harry smiled too, squeezing our friends arm.

"Did he sing?" I asked as it occurred to me. If Tom thought he was useless at everything, did his wife destroy his confidence in his voice too? I couldn't remember him ever being shy about it before we knew what was going on behind closed doors, but maybe I hadn't been looking at things from the right angle at the time. I could have easily missed it, just like we missed everything else.

"Er, yeah, he was fine with that. Bit hesitant to wake Buzz up, but was fine after I reminded him that he hadn't woken up at the sound of a piano. He sang away just fine." Danny shrugged, "Why'd you ask?"

"Because, I was just thinking of all the other horrible things his wife had told him. Maybe she'd attacked him for his voice too, for whatever reason." I explained, I didn't know if it sounded stupid now or not. I mean, Tom had always been fine with singing, he'd never had a problem with it, even when he was in his darkest depression days. But I just didn't know how far his wife had gone with him and his supposed failures. I wanted to make sure that he wasn't harbouring something else inside that head of his.

"Ah, fair enough. No, that wasn't an issue at all with him. He's fine singing, and playing for that matter, if a little hesitant to show his ideas. But once we got going, he got into it quite well. We sort of fell back into our old routines again, it was almost like nothing had changed." Danny smiled distantly, like he was remembering those old times, thinking back to when things had been easy. There was no hesitancy, no stress, no need for perfection. Just Tom, happy, laughing, being himself, like he should have been.

"Well that's a good sign, at least something hasn't been ruined." Harry sighed with a bit of relief. At least that was something, at least Tom's musicality hadn't been taken from him like everything else had. Tom and music was everything, he embodied music and creativity, his entire world revolved around it. He used to sing everywhere, write constantly, there was always a new idea out of him, be it songs, books, musicals, all of it. Tom was creativity, and he was music, to have that taken from him would have just been too cruel for words.

"Yeah... Did you get another hug?" it had been bugging me, had Danny managed another hug? Or had he gotten another form of affection out of Tom? Please tell me he had, Tom needed it, more than anything. Danny did too, but Tom especially needed that affection. All he had was hugs from Buzz, it wasn't enough, that could never be enough.

"Er, no, not last night. Tom got a bit angsty when I got too near him, so I didn't force it. But we had fun, and he smiled, which is the main thing." Danny looked disappointed in that. But hey, he'd still managed to spend time with Tom, and gotten more out of him than anybody else had. And he'd gotten him to laugh, surely that was a good thing?