a song of foxes and flowers ( peaky blinders )

dissection and discussion

notes: hey guys! sorry about the wait again, i had this outline a while ago and then impulsively decided to pick it up again (and then posted this chapter to ao3 a month ago and forgot to update it here). alice is my baby i couldnt leave her hanging like that

"What the fuck are you doing?"

The sudden words cut through her safety of silence, stunning her on the spot. Alice is frozen where she stood, unable to turn and face the figure. It's not a question to her who the voice belongs to. Lily's behind her, whisper-shouting like she had caught Alice swimming in the cut after Polly told her not to.

It's hardly an hour after she woke from her dream with Finn, having spent those precious moments afterwards frantically (and as quietly as she could manage) stuffing her sparse items into a brown knapsack and creeping out of the Inn. A few shirts and trousers. Enough food for a day. A few pounds Stag took off from one of the gangsters he had killed. And her gun and knife, of course, which felt unnatural to not have tucked into her waistband.

Perhaps she was making a mistake, creeping out into the night like an adult. But she knows it's necessary deep down. She needed to be brave and take this for herself, to act like an adult like Finn. There's no way her own mind made up the dream; there wasn't a doubt in her mind that Arthur was close, ready to save her like a knight in shining armor.

Apparently, she wasn't as sneaky as she thought she was. Previously being rather proud of herself and her quiet maneuvering; now, it felt like a bad joke. Lily must've woke right as she crept out the door.

"I can't go to London and Oxford, Lily. You know I can't." It felt like she was confessing her sins. Like Aunt Pol did at the church. She was not seeking forgiveness, but Lily still deserved an explanation for Alice's unexpected abandonment.

"So you're just gone then? Leavin' us in the night?" For the first time, Lily sounds like a frightened little girl. It makes Alice feel like less than dirt. Lily was the stronger one.

"That was the idea." She said trying her hardest to be cruel and strong in the way she needed to be. That was the only way she would get home now. She couldn't run around with a drunkard and some lost children anymore, no matter how badly it made her feel. Alice stuck up her chin and made her face stone like Tommy did.

Tommy. She had to be like Tommy. He did cruel things all the time for the sake of his family. She had to be like Tommy. She thinks, maybe, Finn was thinking the same thing back home. They both had to pretend to be Tom. Tommy was the strongest person in the world, they were both so sure. If they were like him, maybe things would come easier.

"What changed your mind? You've said yourself you wouldn't be able to make it back to your family without Stag. You said you would've died without him." Lily's furious with her, and Alice understands that she has every right to be. What she was doing was immoral, abandoning her friends halfway through their journey to risk herself in an action she previously viewed as unthinkable.

But she already changed her mind once, she couldn't do it again. She can't go with them, and force Arthur to continue following her trail. She was forcing him to track breadcrumbs and chase after dust, only two days or so out of each other's reach. Scaring the life out of her family, driving them mad. If she stayed with Stag, she was betraying them.