Small Heath is exactly as it was and yet so different. Smoke still fills the air, she still hears the workers trading jibes with each other, and The Garrison is still the hive of activity it always was. The only thing that is different, Daisy thinks, is her - she is not the little girl who left this place, even though her racing heart and sweaty palms say otherwise.

Thankfully, her hand - in all it's clammy glory - is grasped tightly in the palm of another hand, a stronger hand. The hand of the man she loves.

"Come on, Dais," Tommy mutters as he ushers her carefully along the road that was once as familiar to her as the back of her hand. The road he used to walk her down to get her home. The same one they'd first kissed on, first laughed on… It's the same, but the two of them are not.

They're better than they were.

Maybe not as naive, or as steady as they were… Daisy still isn't entirely sure Tommy isn't with her out of a misplaced sense of guilt and Tommy isn't sure he can create a life with Daisy after so much time apart. But what they do know is that a love like their's doesn't come around often. They won't waste it again.

No one will love me like you, he'd said once. For them both, it still rang true.

This is an experiment, she'd phrased it when he came to see her in London. To see if they could be together in Birmingham as they were once, to see if they could still be together. She'd not wanted to leave the home she'd built for herself and her girls' so they'd compromised: a month in Birmingham and then a month in London. Tommy always had business there, liaising with Alfie, so it was no trouble for him, and she'd relished in the idea of helping the girls in need up North as well as in London. People were always in need. She'd even suggested shyly to Tommy on the way up here that she might open up an orphanage, so that children - like her- could stay in a safe and loving home. Tommy had smiled so softly, so tenderly at her then that she'd kissed him chastely but passionately hard on the mouth. Neither of them had expected it, but he squeezed her hand harder afterwards as though it would pain him to let her go.

The few days they'd spent in London together had been slightly strained. They were still getting to know each other, still strangers in some ways, but deep down it was like their souls recognised that their other half was with them again… and it was the most relaxed Daisy had felt in years. They'd stayed in and talked, gone out and laughed, and it was like it was just the two of them in this wretched world and nobody else. Reality had hit eventually, of course, and they'd had the serious conversation that'd been brewing since Tommy knocked on Daisy's door. It had ended in the compromise of a month in Birmingham and a month in London, sharing each of their lives with the other until, hopefully, their lives became one instead of separate entities. It was the dream, Daisy thought, to have a life plan. And somehow, she'd forged one for herself.

The only true problems they have to face in the coming days are Polly and Ada. Ada is the easiest of the two, but her and Daisy's relationship is strange to say the least. The two used to be like sisters but after no contact for so many years… they, too, are strangers. Daisy hopes they can become friends again, maybe not like before, but Ada is not her main concern in the Shelby family. Not Arthur, who came to London with Tommy and came back with them, practically jovial with their reunion, not Finn, not Michael… Polly.

Daisy knows Polly is family and family is everything to Tommy. More than loyalty, more than honour, more than anything - family.

You were always my family, Dais.

She is hoping that one day Tommy will think of her as family once more, but for now Polly is his family. And Polly hates Daisy's guts, it would seem. Why else would the woman lie to her family to prevent the two of them being together? It's the reason behind her sweaty palms and clammy skin, the reason Tommy is having to usher her down the street: she's not looking forward to what's waiting for her at the end of the walk.

Tommy raises their joint hands and presses a kiss to the back of her knuckles, sensing her discomfort. "It'll be fine, Dais. Everyone's lookin' forward to seein' ya."

All she does is raise one indignant eyebrow at him. Not everyone, it says.

He sighs and pulls her closer to him. "Polly won't be any trouble. I promise."

Which means he has already spoken to her, threatened her, intends to make sure she is welcoming. She's not sure it matters… She doesn't want to see the woman who tore them apart and kept them apart, the woman who, a younger Daisy would say, ruined her life. Older Daisy knows that everything happens for a reason, and Tommy is alive and well and they are back with each other. But a small part of her hates Polly.

She will be kind to the woman only for Tommy's sake. Daisy wants to be Tommy's family, which means Polly will be her family also. They have to get along, for Tommy's sake and for the Peaky Blinders' sake.

She's nervous that the new Daisy, the one who has been Fleur, will not be able to find a place in the murky city of Birmingham. She's somehow become accustomed to the clean air that is only available in the nice part of London and the uptempo life of the capital. Birmingham is busy, a hive of activity for sure, but if it is not industrialisation it is criminal activity.

She smirks internally at that. She is now walking hand in hand with the mastermind behind the North's criminal scene, is trying to build a life with him. With any luck, she'll be the Mistress of the Peaky Blinders.

God, she thinks, she needs to get to grips with Small Heath again. Get to grips with racing, with trading, with betting, with gambling. She needs to be just as good, if not better, than the rest of them. She needs to be a partner to Tommy, not the little girl he used to keep so separate from his other life.

He'd once told her that he was the worst part about her, but now everything had changed. They had to be masterminds together. They had to be a team.

So as they approach the dark green door that Arthur walks through so confidently - a lion walking into his den - she puts her shoulders back and tilts her head up. She's played with the wolves of London for years, conquered the richest men in England and had them at her whim… Polly Shelby is nothing in comparison.

Tommy sees her change from the little girl he used to know and love to the woman he's coming to know better and love more. He smiles proudly at her, stopping just shy of the threshold to drop a soft kiss on her mouth.

"We're in this together, Daisy Smith. Just you and me."

He always was a mind reader.

Fluufy af epilogue to follow shortly...