Accidental Love

Guilt

"Oh, Darling, you have NOTHING to feel guilty about.  I know that's easy for me to say, but it's true.  Honestly." her eyes and her heart were filled with tears.  Her arms, with a man who felt nothing but guilt and shame for just being alive.

They had walked along the beach and back at least five times, hand in hand as Tom poured out the whole grisly tale. They had cried, sometimes separately, sometimes together, holding on like the survivors reunited that they were. Tom had shouted angrily. He had raged and flailed at the unfairness of it all.  He had sobbed at the darkest depths he'd sunk to.  Everything came spilling out again to the very woman he had tried to shield it from.  Simon, his therapist, had told him to speak to her when he was ready.  Not before and not after.  At the moment, he needed to.  This was that moment. Therapy had done wonders; allowed him to function.  Now, he wanted to live.

"But they didn't deserve to die, Pingu.  They were just in the wrong place at the wrong time.  Poor Bo, he never stood and chance, they- they shot him where he stood.  Right in front of us. I see it every night, the look of terror in his eyes as they raised the... gun " Tom sat on the bench cuddled in beside her, speaking into her shoulder. He couldn't look at her, not and say what he needed to.  It was too painful.

"I know sweetheart, I know." she rubbed his back and waited patiently for him to speak again.  She too had spoken to Simon, and he'd said this day would - hopefully - come. 

"Alistair died FOR me.  He saved me.  How do I get past that?"

"You don't." she said calmly and felt him stiffen a little. "You don't get past it. You celebrate your life to honour him.  If you hide away, if you punish yourself - and dare I say it everyone around you - then they win.  His sacrifice was for nothing.  If you live and I mean REALLY live, you stick two fingers up to them.  That they wasted not a life, but their own time. "

She paused. "Darling, no one will ever ask you to forgive, no one has the right to ask you to forget, but what I AM asking - what Billy would ask if he could - is that you take this second chance and run with it. Embrace it and us, make a life that Colin, Bo, Alistair, and all the others would be proud of."  Now she pulled back, and he looked at her, haunted and pale but hopeful. Like a child emerging from a nightmare.

She smiled at him and kissed him very, very gently, like he was made of spun glass and might break.

"You, my love, are stronger, braver, and more of an amazing human being than ANYONE I have ever met. The world can not lose that to them.  I can NOT lose that to them, and Billy needs a father just like that. He needs YOU. I love you, Tom. I love you like I love the air around me, I cannot survive without you.  I could not, still cannot, imagine a world in which you are not with me.  It kept me going all the time you were gone, through daily life, every night, and even bringing Billy into the world.  That, I can tell you, was the hardest day of my life." she smiled wryly, and he nodded sadly.

"I'm sorry, I let you go through that alone."

"NO, YOU did not.  THEY forced you to.  It's NOT your fault.  But Tom I won, I won the lottery for a second time - I got you back and I'm damned if I'm going to lose you now. We will get through this together.  Nightmares? Terrors? Guilt?  Nothing to us.  We are unstoppable.  We will work through it.  Heads held high."

For a moment, he sat and looked at her.  Just looked. There was nothing, NOTHING in this world he wouldn't do for this woman.  This wonderful, patient, amazing , beautiful woman that fate had thrown in his way. He had what they call, a moment of clarity.  She was right.  Life was for living.  Not wasting.  He would always be changed by his experience, to ignore it was to do those who didn't come back a disservice.  That second life, as he had once famously said as a callow younger man, started when you realised you only had one.  And this was his one.

He stood up, a smile beginning to spread over his face, the old smile she recognised, and her heart began to hope. "Let me make a call, love. Wait there." was all he said, and she watched as he walked away, dialling a number then speaking animatedly. He paused, nodded, and then smiled as he hung up.

Almost stalking back to her, he grabbed her hands and pulled her to stand up.  "Come on Pingu. We're going on a little adventure." he laughed as she frowned and scrunched up her nose. 

"What? Where?  HOW?  Are you mad?" she began to laugh as he nodded enthusiastically.

"Quite possibly, but as someone once said ... all the best people are! Come on, ice cream, then we're off.  Race you!" he darted off towards the little snack stall, and she took to her heels.

"Not FAIR Hiddleston, your legs are TOO long! Not fair!"