Thomgelica One-shots because not enough people write about them.

Twentieth Anniversary

Married for twenty years and half of them had been without Thomas. Gone for ten out of those twenty years, taken from her by a drunk man's reckless and selfish decision to drive. She hated the man and she didn’t even know him, but he deserved her hatred, he had taken the one thing she cherished away from her. Angelica hadn't even had the chance to say goodbye to Thomas. 

For ten years she had been alone, without her Thomas. She had closed herself off from her family, moved to a town in California she had never even heard of, and lived there in seclusion. She hadn’t spoken to her sisters in five years, her sisters who she had once held so close. 

She hadn’t meant to alienate herself from her family, but slowly twenty phone calls a month turned to ten, five, and then finally the calls had just stopped altogether. And it wasn’t even her family’s fault, she had been the one to stop answering the phone, had been the one to stop opening the Christmas cards, she had been the one to put an end to all of it. 

She had quit on life entirely, like a coward, but like a coward, she was afraid, afraid of something that had yet to be determined. Perhaps she was afraid of getting hurt again, of losing someone she held so dear to her heart. Or maybe she was afraid of forgetting Thomas, of forgetting her first love.

She didn’t know.

It wasn’t a happy life, wasn’t even enjoyable at moments, but it was tolerable and it was easy. 

She needed easy. 

Angelica Schuyler, the snarky quick-witted woman had never done easy, but she wasn't the woman she once was. No, she was Angelica Schuyler who rarely spoke, never laughed or smiled, and most importantly she didn’t love the way she used to. 

Couldn't love the way she used to.

Love led to pain and pain led to…. Well, it led to the life she was living now, she hadn’t seen it that way though. Because somehow the poor excuse of a life she was leading now was different.

What she was doing was protection, she was keeping herself safe. If that meant the worthless, miserable life she led now, well so be it.

“It's just protection,” she muttered to herself as she shuffled through her kitchen, opening cabinets and leaving them open as she went. She was in a bit of a frenzy searching for the object that helped her celebrate her marriage anniversary every year. It was crucial that she found it and in the next fifteen minutes too.

She stopped her panicked and rushed movements to take a deep breath and think.

Think, think, think.

Where had she left it last year? She had already searched the kitchen so it definitely wasn’t there, maybe her bedroom? No, that wasn’t the place, she hated having it so close to her all year round, brought too many memories, and memories meant tears. 

She sighed as she walked through her house and made it to her bedroom and searched for it despite the fact that it probably wasn’t there. But maybe she had been so drunk -- drunk with grief, she didn’t drink anymore -- last year she had stored it there and forgotten about it.

It was possible.

She searched her bedroom high and low, and still the item on her mind was nowhere to be found, she had found many other trinkets though, she would have to come back to those later.

Ten minutes left.

She exited her bedroom and roamed further into her house, going into the guest bedroom. It hadn’t been used since that Christmas seven years ago when her sisters had visited and tried desperately to bring some sort of cheer to her life. They had failed miserably but the memories made her lips twitch upwards. A sad attempt at a smile, though she wasn't entirely sure, she had forgotten what it felt like to smile.