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Lucille
Lucille felt betrayed. Not only had her husband cheated on her, but her father knew about. On top of that, she had no idea why. Maron had wanted Lucille to marry Adam ever since she had met him. They only reason she had gotten married at eighteen, was because of him.
When she walked into the house after the meeting, Tommy and Dawson were sat at the kitchen table, the pastries that she had baked that morning left to crumbs in the plate that she had set for them. They were reading the German Newspaper that was still being delivered from Lille.
"Where's my father?" She demanded, her bubbly presence instead filling the room with anger as she stood in the doorway, her fists clenched.
"He's in the sitting room." Dawson said, as he perked his head up, glancing to Tommy.
She marched passed them, advancing toward the sitting room, but Tommy held out his arm, catching her waist with his hand. He pulled her back slightly, looking up at her flushed face. He was worried, and it was evident on his face as he asked her.
"Lucille. Is everything alright?"
She sighed, shaking her head. "No. But it will be once I've talked to him."
Tommy released her waist and she nodded to him thankfully, before moving toward the sitting room, slower and calmer this time. Maron was sat on his rocking chair, sleeping by the fireside.
"Father I need to talk to you." She called out to him.
He blinked his eyes open, searching around, disorientated, until they landed on her. "Not now, that-"
"No. I need to talk to you now." She said, her fingers clenching in a fist again.
"Lucille-" he tried to say, but she shook her head firmly and interrupted him.
"Tell me you didn't know." She shouted at him, her chest heaving as she breathed heavily.
"Know what?"
"Don't ask me that. You recognise the letters in my hand." She said, shaking the papers in front of her manically. "You knew that your perfect son in law was having an affair from the day we were married!"
Maron didn't even try to feign ignorance. He shook his head, reaching to grab her wrist and stopping her from shaking the papers.
"Lucille, you have to understand." He pleaded with her, but she ripped her arm from his grasp and stepped backward.
"Understand what? That you let your daughter's husband see another woman? You let him have another family!" She accuses him of everything that she knew to be true.
"I didn't want to get between you two." He attempted to comfort her, but it made Lucille feel worse.
"You wouldn't have been getting between us. There was already miles between us. The only reason we married was because of you." She screamed, before whispering out her last sentence, tears streaming down her heated cheeks. "I was eighteen for Christ's sake."
"Think about this, Lucille-" her father tried to say as he stepped forward, but she shook her head, stepping back again.
"I am!" She said. "What did you get out of it?"
"Out of what?"
"Any of it!"
"His father. He owned the company that bought the lavender for the cosmetics." Maron said, his eyes closing as he finally revealed the truth.
"You used me!" She stuttered as she staggered back, her eyes widening in disbelief. "This couldn't get any worse!"
"Lucille!" Her father tried to grab her by the wrist once again, but she slipped away.
"No. Just stay away." She shouted at him, and he stopped dead in the middle of the room as she stalked away.
Lucille paused as she passed the kitchen, stopping in the dim doorway. The boys were still sat at the table. She could tell that they had heard everything. It would have been hard not to.
"Did you hear?" She asked, though the question was mainly to break the awkward silence.
"It was hard not to." Dawson admitted.
"I'm sorry." He said, after noticing the cringe that settled over her test stained face. "I'm not helping, I'll go and set up some snacks for when you feel like it."
Dawson gave her a tight lipped smile as he shuffled away and disappeared into the pantry. She called after him, through snuffles, "There's cake on the windowsill."
"Are you alright?" Tommy asked her, after a moment of silence.
Lucille sighed. She sat beside him on the kitchen table and smiled as he offered his cup of tea. She accepted it, taking a sip and handing it back.
"I suppose so. I thought confronting him would make me feel better but in a way it made me feel worse." She said.
Ignorance is bliss was a statement that everyone knew. It was only then that Lucille had realised how true it really was.
"Talk as much as you need. You'll be surprised by how good I am at listening." He said, and Lucille raised her eyebrows before diverting her glance from his.
"We were eighteen when we got married, Adam and I. We barely knew each other. He and his family were desperate for him to have children." She found herself confiding in him, telling him things that she had never thought fit to share. "I lost a baby. Then things just got colder from there. We wouldn't talk."
They were silent. Tommy let her find her words, as she kept opening her mouth to speak, then promptly shutting it again and sighing. Lucille couldn't find what to say.
"You know what?" She said suddenly, though her lip still quivered.
"No, I don't know what." Tommy said, his brow raised, unsure of what to expect.
"I'm not going to let this waste my time." She said, as she forced her chin into the air, wiping the tears away. "I've felt so guilty for being close to you when he had a whole family on the other side of France! We are going to bake."
Tommy caught her by the waist again as she stood up and moved toward the pantry.
"It's late. Why don't we do it tomorrow, make a day of it?" He suggested, nodding his head toward her, and pulling his arm closer to himself, bringing Lucille along with it.
"Really?" She asked, full of hope, as she gazed back down at him, eyes wide and lips curved in a soft smile.
"Yeah, really." He said, meeting her gaze and causing her to shy away, tucking a stray hair behind her ear. "If it'll make you feel better."
"Yeah, it will." She said absentmindedly.
"You've done so much for us, it's about time I return the favour." He said joyfully.
Tommy gasped suddenly, as she wrapped her arms around his torso, drawing her head in close to his chest. She was breathing heavily and her head shook as he brought his hand up to stroke her hair. She pulled back slightly.
"Thank you." She said with a nod. "For not judging me."
