Oceans [A.Shelby]

NINETEEN

THAT SAME DAY was strange, the strangest day Lillian had had in a long time, the hours just seemed to drag. Though Lillian wanted to ask her husband every question that was running headless in her mind, she just couldn't bring herself to utter one word.

She looked at him, her mouth opened and she was forced to swallow down the image in her mind and the 'what ifs' because the truth was; she very nearly lost her husband hours before.

Perhaps she already had, Arthur Shelby had already died once, as he liked to put it, and every day after that was just extra. Perhaps in Arthur's head that meant his life was nothing, Arthur Shelby didn't see that while he should very well be dead already like the hundreds of thousands of others, he wasn't, and he took that for granted.

Lillian knew Arthur Shelby didn't quite realise his own value, didn't realise his impact on those around him, to her. She had given up her life for that man, a raggedy man who often drank too much, sounded a little dim at times but his heart was overpowering, especially when it came to her. Of course, Lillian knew their marriage had been far from conventional and there were times where most women would have packed up and left and called her stupid for staying. As bad as it sounded, it was like Lillian was tied to a rope, one or the other would walk away, but they wouldn't get too far before they were pulled back in.

As she sat in the creaking chair in the corner of her cramped guest room, Theodore May couldn't quite understand this. He hadn't loved, and he hadn't been loved either, so it may not have been his place to say or to even think, but he knew his sisters resolve was much stronger then he.

A sigh passed Theo's lips as he leaned back against the headboard, his words leaving his lips along with it, "Lils you can't hide in here all day, the important thing is, you stopped him. He's still here, he's downstairs and he's alone."

"Do you think I shouldn't leave him alone?" Lillian asked, anxiousness on her lips as she looked to her nails, so wanting to bite them, Theo had never seen his sister act in such a nervous way.

"He's a grown man, Lilli," Theo responded softly, "if you follow him around it'll only make him angry. Let him to his silence, let him brood for a while, let him think and I'm sure he'll come around and realise."

"Christ, Theo," She scrunched her eyes closed as she ran a tired hand over her face, "what would I have done?"

"Don't mourn a loss, Lils, not when there's still blood in his veins and it was a cry for help. He will be okay, you both will. Now please, go and do something besides brooding in the corner of my room,"

Lillian's shoulders were slumped in a fashion far from Lillian-like as she exited her brothers room, hearing quiet talk downstairs down the dimly lit staircase. The voice she recognised as that belonging to her brother-in-law, John.

"Do you think she's disappointed in me? Angry?" She heard her husband speak quietly as she knelt beside the railing out of sight.

Lillian's lip trembled at his words, it had been an emotional day, she had shed more tears that day then she had in the past half a decade, she was determined to hold this back despite the intense emotion and guilt his words caused.

"Not this time, Arth, I don't think anybody could be," John told his brother truthfully.

"So why? Why can't my own fucking wife look me in the eye?"

What sounded like a laugh of disbelief escaped John's lips, "Arth she walked in on you try to k-, trying to end it all,"

John's words seemed pained as he spoke, and Arthur knew if it pained his brother to speak them then perhaps he was right, he never thought about it in that way, at least not deeply but now it made sense.

"If that was my Martha years ago, that would be the only thing I thought about. She probably blames herself, and then there's you surviving a war, her spending 4 years waiting for letters that didn't arrive for months, receiving missing in action telegrams, that pain she probably relived when she found you. Do you blame her, Arth?"

That was the moment Lillian chose to bite her lip and slip away sadly, closing her own bedroom door softly behind her and leaving the men to their conversation. Arthur however, heard the door shutting regardless of how quiet she strode to be.

"I didn't think, I thought she would be better without me. She was the only thing in my life I'd be leaving I thought it would be easy." Arthur admitted, his voice thick with warranted emotions.

"Arth, your wife is from London, from one of the richest families up there, she grew up with maids and butlers, never having to comb her hair herself. She gave all that up for you and you think she would be better without you? It's clear to me, it's clear to fuckin everybody who knows, she wouldn't be. There isn't a woman so fucking devoted, even though our shit, she's still here."

No, Arthur was most definitely not selfish for wanting to end his misery, however he realised that his decision was rash over some temporary unhappiness. He realised that could he have the capacity to do so, he would have regretted it the minute his heart stopped pumping the blood around his body.

Arthur would slip into bed the same night, his neck still red raw and hands still shaking, and he would pulled Lillian close to his chest before he muttered a soft apology to his wife who would reply that it was okay. That he was okay and he promised her that he wouldn't die for a third time. He wouldn't play death for a third time; if he did so, perhaps death would have a way of catching him out.