Chapter Text
Casualty Clearing Station, France, January 1916
Thomas raised his head, blinking sleepily.
“Ah, there’s my Tom-kitten,” said Captain Hartley.
Thomas started to sit up and reach for his trousers. He didn’t usually let himself fall asleep in the Captain’s bed, after—being Hartley’s batman made a convenient excuse for being in and out of his quarters all the time, but the four other orderlies he was billeted with were bound to notice if he didn’t turn up all night.
“You don’t have to go just yet—it’s early.”
“Oh—all right.” He settled back down in Hartley’s arms.
Hartley brushed a kiss against his forehead. “I’ll miss you, you know.”
Thomas was startled for a moment, then remembered—his home leave, already delayed twice, was due to start in a few days. “It’s only a week.”
“Still.”
“Plenty of times more than a week goes by when we don’t have time to do—this.”
“It isn’t just about this.”
“You can get one of the other orderlies to clean your boots.”
Hartley laughed. “See—that’s why I’ll miss you. Any big plans? For your leave?”
“Paris, I think,” Thomas said. “I should be able to find something to do there.”
“Not home?”
Thomas hesitated. “Wouldn’t be much point. My mother’s dead.” He had thought, once or twice, about writing to O’Brien to ask if she could arrange for him to spend his leave at Downton, but in the ended had decided that was stupid. Even if they’d let him, why would he want to?
“Oh. I’m sorry.”
“It wasn’t recent,” Thomas said, and regretted it. If he hadn’t said that, he could have used it to wangle a bereavement leave, at some future date. Ah, well. He still had a father, on paper at least. “I thought about London,” he continued, “but I’ve been there. Never been to Paris.” Plenty of the shops were open, from what he’d heard. He’d bring back as much liquor, cigarettes, and foodstuff as he could carry, and make a tidy profit on the venture. Maybe he’d send O’Brien some French knickers, for a joke.
In fact, maybe he ought to start up a sideline in things like that—presents for the girl back home. He’d have to see about prices, when he got there.
“It’s a lovely city,” Hartley was saying. “Of course, it isn’t what it was before the war. The theatres all shut last year, and most of the better restaurants. But the architecture is splendid, and that won’t have gone anywhere.”
“As long as you can get food that’s never seen the inside of a tin, I’ll be happy,” Thomas said.
“I expect Paris can manage that much, even in wartime.”
Thomas sat up and reached for his cigarettes, offering one to Hartley.
“Thanks—Woodbines? Where’d you get these?”
“From a bloke who won’t be needing them anymore,” he said, holding out the lighter.
Hartley paused with his cigarette-end inches from the flame. “Thomas,” he said, clearly trying his best to sound stern. “We’ve spoken about this before.”
“He isn’t dead,” Thomas protested. “Or wasn’t. Last time I checked. He just doesn’t have a lower jaw anymore.” It was practically a miracle the whole packet hadn’t been drenched in blood; as it was, Thomas had only had to throw away two of them.
“Stealing from the wounded is not an improvement over stealing from the dead.” He did, however, at last light his.
“How’s he supposed to smoke them? Anyway, he said I could have them.”
“He was speaking to you, without a lower jaw?”
Thomas reminded himself that if Hartley was stupid enough to fall for that, they wouldn’t get on so well. “Well, he made a noise, when I asked if I could have them. I took it as a yes. Besides,” Thomas added. “He isn’t exactly in a position to complain.”
They both laughed. Even Thomas knew that it shouldn’t have been funny. The poor sod was probably dead by now, and if he wasn’t, he likely wished he was. But if he hadn’t laughed, Thomas would have had to think about how the man had looked, with his tongue hanging down where his chin ought to have been.