sweet french. peaky blinders

12

"Fuck!" Lucille's screeched, the breath escaping her lungs.

She was stuck. The soldier was in the house, waiting for a meal that she wouldn't be able to prepare. They were done for. Her hand was slapped over her mouth as she realised how loud her voice had escaped.

"It's fine you can speak." Tommy said, and she looked to him, eyebrows dipped.

"The soldier is in the yard." He said, pointing the the small gap in the roof cladding.

She smiled, still whispering. "You found it."

Lucille motioned her hand, dragging them both to the same hole that Tommy had mentioned. She took the hole, hooking her fingers under it, lifting the roof. It pulled up with her hands, revealing a larger hole in the roof.

"We have the hole so we can drain the roof in the winter months when it rains a lot." She explained, pointing to the piles of tin buckets in the corner. "It's stops the damp from getting in and rotting the floors. We can't afford anything else."

"What will I do?" She asked.

Tommy chuckled, his head peering slightly down over the yard.

"I think you'll be fine." He said, nodding his head toward the edge of the garden, where her father was collecting eggs from the chicken coop.

"He will be worried." She said, but her face was sad. It was if she spoke the words to convince herself of the fact, wishing it to be true.

She forced a smile. "He hasn't cooked in years."

"I can't go down now." She said, after a while, closing the hole in the roof and moving back to her space.

"Why not?" Dawson asked.

"I left my bedroom door open. They'll know I've not been there." She explained, collecting her bag in one pile. "I'll wait until after eight, then I'm going to the market."

"Dawson. What do you eat?"

"Anything and everything." He shouted back as he plopped himself back on the floor, cringing as his body moved oddly.

"But what do you like, I'm asking?" She said, again with a smile.

He thought for a second, as if going through a list, twisting his lips indecisively. "Pastry."

Lucille laughed. "Good thing you ended up in France then."

She sighed, moving to shuffle through her bag. She pulled out a book, it's pages crumpled slightly at the edges and yellowed with age. There was plenty of time to pass, given that it was barely half past six. Lucille turned the first page, smoothing the paper tenderly under her fingers.

"Could you teach me?" Tommy spoke up, as he watched her gentle movements.

"Pardon?" She asked, turning her head as his inaudible words reached her ears.

"Could you help me to read?" He asked again, and Lucille beamed in response. She shuffled her body around, turning so her crossed legs faced him, the book in her lap.