Nothing Will Change

Chapter 43

Ada had gone home in the morning, which she didn't inform Rose as she woke up in Tommy's bed. She reached over to the clock on his side table, the clock stating it was well into the morning, Rose groaning as she rolled onto her back. Buried in blankets Rose could just shut her eyes there and then and go back to sleep, but she wasn't a teenager she couldn't stay in all morning. Though it seemed that was what Tommy left her to do, but also knowing Tommy he probably woke early in the morning and left before the sun rose. He didn't wake her, so he set her fate to miss the train with Ada, which likely meant he didn't want her to leave as of yet.

Pushing herself up, she brushed her hair from her face. She pulled the covers up as the room felt cold, squinting at the near pile of clothes on his chair. Chuckling, she stepped out of the covers and stretched, then seeing her shoes collected under the chair. Tommy was so domestic when he wanted to be, Rose wanted to tease him. Dressing silently she wobbled as the effects of the previous night hit her, opting to put her hair in a ponytail when she couldn't retrieve the energy to brush it.

She could hear conversation downstairs, but not voices she recognised. Creaking down each step, she flattened her palms over head to make herself appear put together, but she knew her makeup was still remaining from the previous night. Mostly just eyeshadow. The conversation died down as she entered the kitchen, and Rose felt like she was John when he walked in on her conversation with Polly. The older woman sat at the table with a very young boy in a sweet brown suit. He politely smiled up at her, Polly gazing at him with so much admiration.

"Good morning Polly," Rose tilted her head down as she collected a mug for tea. Tommy had left her a faint red skirt and white blouse from her suitcase, what she would have worn on the travel back to London. He could have just left her suitcase, but he went through the trouble of going to the hotel she was staying in to retrieve it, and then setting her things to the side. Suppose she could have spent longer to get ready, but she wanted tea more than she wanted to put on makeup.

"Morning Rose," Polly was sat close to the young boy, waiting for Rose to ask who he was. She wanted to say who he was, Rose could tell as she sat on the edge of her seat, eyeing her expectedly.

"Who is this?"

Polly put a hand on his shoulder, "this is Micheal Gray. My son."

Rose remembered when she first told her about her two children, and how she shook her head when Rose asked more. She wasn't forlorn as she spoke about them, knowing they were gone and there was nothing she could do about it. But they weren't gone, at least not Micheal. Smiling, Rose sat with the pair of them, Micheal looking so much like his mum but also whoever his father must have been.

"It's nice to meet you Micheal. I'm Rose, Tommy's um..." She didn't know what to call it, she felt the same as she did two years ago. She was his, that much was concrete, but the labels like boyfriend sounded so childish. He seemed to understand though, nodding politely with a shy smile that was so unlike Polly. She wondered if he was just being nice, or he had a hidden fire like Polly.

"You and Tommy officially back together then?" Polly raised a brow as she put her arm around Micheal's chair. She was in the same dress as the previous night, which made it clear her activities, one's Rose wouldn't mention.

"He gets what he wants."

Polly chuckled, "yes, especially when it comes to you."

Michael was watching them like they were a stage play. Perhaps he still taking it all in, such a contrast from what must have been his every day. His suit was simple, it was brown all over. He was from a village too, she could tell those things from how tentatively he sat with them. Someone from a village could tell when you were also from one, there was a particular look on your face.