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The sun beamed through the window like an angelic visitor had come to Small Heath, Birmingham that fine autumn morning. Well, technically they had.
Tommy gazed at Rowan's sleeping face, her mouth slightly open and light snores coming from her mouth made him assure himself she was alive and that the night previous had really happened. Tommy noticed how silent his head was as he slumbered with the red head in his arms. It seemed she took all the attention he had to maintain enough distraction that his head was as quiet as the sound of a pin hitting the floor.
He pushed her lengthy mane from her face as she opened her eyes and realised the diagnosis of what she had done. She smiled up at Tommy and felt a liberation in her feelings, finally concluding that she had begun to fall as deeply in love with the gangster as the ocean, much like the colour of his eyes.
" 'ello Miss Lochwood. How are you this fine mornin'?" Rowan giggled and sat up with the sheets covering her. A pile of dirty bed sheets hanging from the basket alerted her as she placed her hand to the apex of her legs. There was no more blood thankfully but she did feel a little numbness on her legs. "I feel liberated Mr Shelby. Like when you find something you had lost for months and recovering it happily. I feel enthralled and rejuvenated and-... wow." He chuckled and pulled her to sit on his lap and grazed his lips to her shoulder before moving to her pillowy lips. "I'm glad to 'ear it Miss Lochwood."
He stroked her arms gently and ran his fingers over the multitude of bruises that littered them. "Why do you 'urt yourself Rowan?" She looked away towards the window and closed her eyes at the feel of the morning sun on her face. "I've felt very lonely for a long time..." Tommy saw her smile widely, but it didn't feel right. It was a painful smile. "Malachi tries... but he has his own life and can't watch me all the time. I felt so numb from emotion because nothing ever happened to me, I would sit and read and books, music, art and movies. They used to make me cry or smile but a few months ago I read a book called 'The Great Gatsby'. It's terribly sad... I cry every time I read it. But... a few months ago I didn't cry. I felt nothing." Tommy studied her face as she turned to face him again.
"I'm sensitive, but I became so immune to feeling that I began to rely on physical pain to make me feel real. I've lived my life imagining and saying 'what if' so I've always taken life as a big story that I could make. But I just couldn't do anything, I just felt alone and fictitious in my own house. Malachi caught me one day... he got angry because he wanted me to have told him. I didn't because... I thought he would think I was just trying to fill the void of my life (that I would usually fill with books and the arts) with self inflicted injuries." Tommy felt something in that moment, he wanted to tell her that life was just as good as a book and that with him she should never feel lonely again. But... he'd be a hypocrite to say those things, as he felt the exact same. Tommy allowed her to speak her feelings, it was as if she was writing a book. She could describe her feelings so well... he was right about her intelligence.
"So I read Gatsby again... and I dreamed of love. I would lay awake at night thinking of my knight in shining armour on a noble white steed coming to love me. But as F.Scott Fitzgerald said 'And in the end, we were all just humans... drunk on the idea that love, only love, could heal our brokenness'. Almost everyone I've ever met, I have fallen a little bit in love with them. I find myself making my life into a book, but it never works out. I'm just the girl who hides in her house."
Tommy wipes a little teardrop from the corner of her eyes just before it collapses. "And then this happens. I'm transported back in time and I meet-... well I meet you. I see so many things about you that others don't and I admire you. No book could make me feel like you have in two days. It's been two bloody days, how am I doing this to myself?"
She moved off of Tommy realising how little she really knew about him. How shallow their relationship was... and how she had allowed him to be the first ever man to make love to her. But she didn't regret it, not one bit. She felt that they needed to learn of each other, but then she was transported back into reality. A surfacing of the truth that she couldn't stay here. She had responsibilities, she had Malachi who she loved and care for more than anyone. Who knew her better than anyone ever.
"I'm sorry, I'm sorry I have burdened you with all this. I shouldn't have gone into such detail, I'm a fool. I'll leave, I'll go somewhere else..." "Rowan..." "Maybe if I go to the police..." "Rowan." "I just know that I can't stay here any longer-..." "Rowan! Shut up, you're not going anywhere... everything you just said... I identify with. I get it. Now please, if you're worried about us not lastin' nor stayin' together or knowin' each other... we can soon sort that out. Alright?"
"Okay." she got back into the bed and kept a little distance between her and Tommy. "Tommy... what if I fall in love with you? I can't stay here."
