TROUBLE - peaky blinders

27. lamentable london

"That'll be the bloody day!"

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CLARA HADN'T EXPECTED TO BE BUNDLED INTO A CAR the morning after. Her eyes were drooped tiredly, her hands rubbed together to create and muster up any heat. She sat in the front of the car, Tommy on her right as he drove. There was a silence between them. It was a heavy, uncuttable silence, one that Clara could almost physically feel. The book she'd brought lay unopened on her lap, her jacket wrapped tightly around her.

They were going to see London. That's what Tommy had told her anyway. Clara had only been listening to snippets of what the man had told her the day before.

A worn-out Clara stood in front of Thomas Shelby, her hands nonchalantly shoved into her pockets. Her mind was still reeling from the night before and the guilt of her actions was beginning to weigh heavy on her shoulders. She should've never gone to Penny's. She shouldn't have answered the blonde's questions so bluntly and honestly. Clara regretted a lot of her actions from the night before but she couldn't bring herself to regret consuming the tokyo she'd stolen from Finn.

"Clara," Tommy began, taking a drag of his cigarette. "Sit down."

Clara did not budge from her position, as she leaned against the wall in pure exhaustion. She did not care to obey. She knew that even Tommy wouldn't shake the shame and guilt from her conscience, so why bother to listen to him?

Upon seeing his sister's stationary stance, the man let out a sigh. Against his better judgement, he ignored her actions and passed her a glass of whiskey, one that had been untouched by the family gathered previously.

Cautiously, the girl had taken it. Clara raised her eyebrow at Tommy. He nodded his head slightly. She sniffed the drink slightly before she took a sip. It was good, she'd admit. She handed the glass back to her brother, wondering if her silence would lead to a quick escape.

"Like it?" He asked, taking the glass back and placing it onto the mantelpiece.

"Yeah, it's alright," Clara spoke, her hoarse and strained voice barely loud enough to be heard.

"Sending it over to America," Tommy stated. She didn't know why he had told her this. She didn't really care all that much for it. "Now, I wanted to talk to you about a few things."

Clara nodded half-heartedly, her eyes glazed as she stared into space. She felt haunted. Every time she blinked she saw the hurt she caused Penny, she saw the welling tears and the look of defeat and it hurt that Clara was the reason behind it. She heard the faint noise of Tommy speaking but it was more of a buzzing than coherent words.

"—Secondly, I'm going up to London tomorrow, you will be coming with me," Tommy spoke, his eyes narrowed at the girl as she snapped back into reality. "We leave bright and early, so be ready. That means no late-night adventures and sleeping in the Yard, got it?"

Clara hummed in acknowledgement, her mind spinning as her brother stopped talking and left her standing in the living room alone.

Clara probably should've properly listened to what he had said, because, by the time a loud knock rang through her room at the crack of dawn, Clara had forgotten all about leaving for London. She had hurried to change, carefully leaving the blue cylinder half full of blue powder hidden beneath the loose floorboard in her room.

That had been almost three hours ago. Clara and Tommy had arrived in London, the silence lingering over them as they drove. She didn't know how long the silence had lasted but it somehow felt better this way. If there was one thing both siblings understood and could relate to was that, to some extent, they both enjoyed the solitude of quietness.