After an unexplainable accident Annabelle finds herself hundred years in the past. In the boom of the 1920s, the era of Jazz and bootleggers. But it's not just the 20s she now has to deal with, she also happens to find herself stumble right into the...
"So, this is Charlie's Yard, quite a good place if you need to hide some stuff from the coppers."
We just arrived in Birmingham and something just took over me. I was incredibly excited to show William around the town.
"God Belle, please shut up, it's six in the morning, I can not take your enthusiasm right now."
Well, unlike Maddie, I haven't slept all night, which is why I was currently in that state of overtiredness, where you become super hyper. For a second I actually made halt and looked at grumpy Maddie, who really rocked that zombie walk and under-eyebags deeper than Hermiones' purse, in my opinion.
"Well anyways, if you just walk down there, you'll eventually get to a foodmarket, but we're not going there today. First stop, the boutique!"
The hours went by, and I was still dragging Will across Birmingham. Until now I had shown him the boutique, my place, the betting shop, China town, the Garrison and Maddie's place.
Said girl had excused herself hours ago, mumbling something about having to prepare her guest room. Slowly but surely even my energy level dropped, which is why we were currently on our way back to the Garrison. I can't even put in words how much I missed Harry's coffee.
"Morning Harry. How you doing?"
The bartender was still organising tables and chairs when we walked in, which was understandable at 11 in the morning.
"Miss Lancom, long time no see. I started to believe you found somebody else to tend to your caffeine addiction."
Ok sure, just expose me like that, rude.
"Oh Harry, I'd never betray you. You're the only one allowed to serve me the holy liquid."
With that I sat down on one of the rather central round tables, he had already wiped off and patted next to me for Will to sit. Said young man, just looked rather lost in between Harry and me.
"There you go, I'll just leave the pot here. What can I get for you, son?"
"I think I'd also like to have a cup of coffee."
"Alright. You're such a bad influence Annabelle."
In that moment I felt a lot like Lorelei Gilmore, who just got lectured by Luke for making a coffein addict out of Rory aswell. Just that Luke is a million times hotter than Harry.
Like always, it took a bit of time to get William to talk and get out of his shell, but eventually, after a few cups of fluid energy, we were laughing over the most random things. I didn't even notice how the pub had started to fill, over the last hour or two and the factory workers on their lunch break took their usual spot at the corner tables.
After a while Grace showed up and we greeted each other with a hug, before she started serving the men beers and whiskey. And at some point Harry even brough us some rabbit stew, which lead to Will and I sitting at our table, even long after the workers had left the pub again.
In fact we were the only ones left. Harry had gone upstair to his flat and Grace was doing whatever in the back room. Yet neither of us felt the urge to leave anytime soon, being very comfortable sitting down, after walking several Kilometres that morning. William and I, were currently discussing the topic of potential professions for Will, when the door to the pub opened.
"I still think you could totally start working for the Westwoods. Another helping hand would- Arthur?"
The person entering the Garrison was no other than a tired looking Arthur, holding a bunch of papers in his hands.
Said man was apparently lost in thoughts, since he got quite startled by somebody calling his name. With a quick handmovement, he caught the paper he dropped, before it hit the floor and looked at me.
"Belle? Didn't expect you to be back this early? How are you doing?"
This early.. We were gone for almost 2 weeks.
"Would you have liked me to stay away longer, or what?"
I acted like I was offended by his statement, even though I couldn't quite contain the smile on my face. Without noticing, I had actually missed Small Heath. Arthur just rolled his eyes, before grabbing a chair and sitting down next to me.
"Mad woman, you know what I mean, now say, how's London? How's business?"
That's a very good question. To be fair, I didn't even know the answer myself? Was our mission a success? Did we get the information that we wanted? Or did we just cause a bunch of chaos and unwanted attention?
After thinking about the last few weeks a little bit, I gave Arthur a quick summary of what had happened at the Gala, mentioning how we met probably every rich person with potential influence and how we happend to have upset one of them.
Just like I didn't tell Madeline, that person's name, I also didn't tell Arthur.
What I told him on the other hand, was how Maddie got stabbed.
When I noticed how Arthur's face paled with each of my words, I quickly tried to save it, by telling him, how she's fine and the wound has almost healed, but I don't think he actually listened to me after the stabbing part.
"You were supposed to gather information, not almost get killed!"
Arthur jumped up and hit with his hands on the table. Of course I knew he only meant well, but we all know how Arthur tends to loose himself over the smallest things.
"Exactly. It was almost and not more. We're both fine, Arthur. Now sit back down."
Since I've never been a fan of screaming at people, I quietly tried to calm him down, and grabbed his hand to give it a squeeze.
Funnily enough, he seemed to almost be embarrassed about his previous outbreak and just plopped back down on his chair with crossed arms.
Suddenly it was quiet on our table and my eyes wandered to Will, who just sat on the opposite of me, with a helplessly confused look on his face.
The way he just quietly looked at each of us over and over again, slightly made me chuckle, which apperently ripped Arthur out of his own little pity party. He followed my gaze and seemingly just now, noticed William sitting there.
A few seconds passed, in which the elder man just looked at said younger one, who got visibly uncomfortable under his stern gaze.
After a few more seconds, I decided to help Will out of his misery.
"Arthur, meet William. William, this is Arthur Shelby."
"Uhm, it's a pleasure to meet you, sir."
The polite young man that he was, Will reached out his hand, for Arthur to shake, but last one only gave him a raise of the eyebrow, taking his time, before finally grabbing it.
