Give my heart. | Thomas Shelby [english]

/2/ Hiding

~~~***~~~

1919, Birmingham

Walking into the church, Tommy felt as if the statues of the saints were watching him every move. There was a reason he never went to churches.

It was the same reason Aunt Polly liked to force him into churches to talk. He knew she came often to pray and light candles for people. She also did that when Tommy and his brothers were in France.

"I've not much time."

"That's what you always say when you're here." Polly slowly turned around to him. "Sit."

Knowing that fighting with her was a waste of effort, Tommy sat down at one of the wooden benches.

He was racking his brain about what secret she wanted to hear from him now. There was not much he knew that he didn't tell Polly. But maybe this time she was hiding something from him.

"Why am I here, Pol?"

"See these candles?" She gestured towards some little candles and Tommy raised a brow.

"In fact, I do see them."

Polly shot him a warning glance hearing his mocking tone.

"There are always three of them. Three candles and she places them in the last row, always." Tommy frowned. Who was his aunt talking about? And what did it have to do with him? "The first one's for your mother. The second is for her father. And I wonder myself what the third one is for, but she never tells me."

"Who are you talking about?" It didn't sit right with him that someone other than his aunt lit candles for his dead mother. Polly faced him again and smiled as if she liked to see him racking his brain about something she knew, and he didn't. She approached him with long, graceful steps and when she stood above him, she spoke the name as if she casted a spell.

"Leonora Shore."

His reaction did not disappoint her. He immediately got up from the bench, turning his back on her for a moment before facing her again and pinching the bridge of his nose.

"Who's that?"

Polly only smiled at his attempt to pretend that name did nothing to him. The truth was that she was glad to see such a reaction from her nephew. He grew so cold after the war, always inside his head, always reserved and monotone. But not when it came to Nora.

"Don't you even try to pretend you've forgotten about your first love." She put one of her hands on the back of a bench.

"We were friends."

"Of course."

"Why is she here?" Pulling out a little box, he tried to seem unfazed while lighting a cigarette.

"To light candles." Tommy blew out some smoke and looked at his aunt with a deadly expression. "She's started doing it for you while you were in France. Don't smoke in here, Tommy."

"She was here during the war?" Why would she light candles for him? After all this time?

"Every single month. She's grown into a charming woman. Knows how to twist everyone around her little finger. Even her father who had no choice but to travel back here occasionally if his favorite girl asked him to."

He nodded. "She was always good at that. Making people do what she wanted them to."

"And you were no exception."

A smile tugged at his lips, but he suppressed it.

"Perhaps I wasn't." He whispered more to himself.