i found you .. and you found me // Thomas Shelby

41- winter things

"It ain't even cold outside, not where I'm from.. feeling like it's mid-July, under the sun. My jacket don't get no love, no hats and no gloves, not even a chance of rain... but my baby's in town and we're gonna do some winter things..." Ariana Grande-Butera

Once the tension in the Shelby household had settled down, Charlie joined his parents in the living room as they prepared for Christmas morning. Isabel lay in her mother's arms whilst Charlie was handed a few tasks from his father. 

Filling a glass of whiskey that he was too tempted to neck in one, Tommy huffed lightly before handing the glass to his son. Taking it carefully in his hands, Gia watched her son's every move in awe. His small hands gripped the glass carefully, his baby blue eyes fixed on the brown liquid in case it spilt over the top onto the floor. With every little move, he was so determined to do it right by his parents and Gia could have cried at the sight. 

"Mum, can Issy help me?" Charlie asked, turning around to his mother who rocked a tired Isabel in her arms. 

Softening at her son's request, Giorgia placed her daughter on her stomach on the floor, who began to crawl over to her big brother, grabbing onto her father's leg to stop herself from toppling in the process. 

Crouching down to be with his kids, Tommy lightly smiled. "This is your job, Charlie. We're gonna give those to Santa and Rudolph, good boy. We put this out for Santa, for his whiskey."

"Does Santa like whiskey, dad? Like you?" Charlie asked innocently, a smile creeping onto Gia's face. 

Letting out a small chuckle, Tommy nodded. "He does, my boy. And when you're old enough, you can have some too."

"Thomas," Giorgia warned, unsure of his words. "Come on Charlie, time for bed baby." 

"Now, night night," Tommy spoke, giving his son a hug.

Walking over to his mother, he wrapped his little arms around her waist and gave her a hug. It was times like these that Giorgia forgot that he wasn't hers. She would often feel pangs of jealousy and hurt in her chest when looking at her son because she knew that he had nothing of her in him, and though Gia believed that blood isn't always thicker than water, she still longed for something that would take that deep-rooted pain away. 

Maybe it was because of Grace and everything that unfolded two years ago, or maybe it was the fact that she was jealous Tommy had fallen in love with someone else. It was ridiculous for Giorgia to think such a thing, given they only met after he had married Grace, but she was so sure she could never love anyone as much as she loved her husband, and if anything, she wanted Grace to disappear as a memory altogether. 

She, however, couldn't allow that to happen for the sake of her son. For her baby, Charlie. He knew about his mother and often asked about her, and Giorgia never liked the look on Tommy's face when he did. He had every right to know his birth mum, the one who carried him for nine months and inevitably loved him for all the years she was alive, but Charlie was hers. Gia felt that Charlie had always been hers, ever since the day she met him in the Garrison all those years ago. 

Giorgia had always longed for children and she had been blessed with three beautiful babies, two of her own and one not, but that hadn't changed anything. She was just scared that as he grew older, he may resent Gia, he may want to know more about Grace, and the thought of losing her baby blue-eyed boy scared her more than anything she had been faced with in her life, including the black hand that they had received earlier that morning. 

"Night baby," Gia smiled down at her son, running her hand over her son's hair. "I love you," she told him, bending down and giving him a big kiss before Frances took his hand and led him to bed.