𝑰𝑵𝑲 • 𝑻𝒆𝒘𝒌𝒆𝒔𝒃𝒖𝒓𝒚 / 𝑳𝒐𝒖𝒊𝒔 𝑷𝒂𝒓𝒕𝒓𝒊𝒅𝒈𝒆

Two Time

"I um, I wanted to talk to you about what happened, last week, with my uncle." It was clear he was waiting for an invitation, for her to welcome him into her home, or rather room, to sort things out. She hadn't spoken to him since and, even though it had been less than a week, he was restless.

Without skipping a beat, Florence hastily placed the messy pile of daisies in her grasp on the stool beside her door and pushed past him.

"We can talk on the go. I have things to do and they can't be delayed." He was hot on her tail and soon enough, the two of them had made their way round the back of the manor, to the farmland.

"I wanted to um-" He was cut off as she shoved a basket in his direction, taking it from her quickly before trying once more to keep up with her.

"I wanted to apologize." He said, and she held the gate to the chicken enclosure open for him.

"Start over there, and try to stay away from the roo-"

"Oi!" Tewkesbury cried out having been bitten by an unusually vicious creature.

"The rooster." She sighed. They worked silently on opposite ends of the coop, working their way inwards, towards one another. Once deciding that she was close enough to be in earshot, Tewkesbury began a second attempt at his apology.

"I shouldn't have shouted." He spoke solemnly, and she could tell that that day had been eating away at him ever since.

"No, you were unhappy with me. You had every right to yell." She didn't even look at him as she spoke. It baffled him. He was so torn up about the situation and yet, she didn't seem the slightest bit bothered, nor fazed.

"I wasn't so much frustrated with you, as I was about you."

"Elaborate." She said, still not taking her attention away from the task at hand. However, as this point, Tewkesbury had stopped helping entirely, too busy trying to articulate his next sentence.

"I wasn't angry at what you did. I understand why you did it Flo I just, I was angry about what I could have caused. It could have really messed things up and that would have killed me." Finally pausing her movements, she looked at him. He was consumed in himself, lost in his own thought and so she deemed it would be best, for the both of them, if she just moved on.

"But it didn't T. Nothing happened and everything okay. Plus, I'm pretty sure my mum loves you. Although, she's loved you for years." She chuckled to herself and began closing the cover of the final hen house.

Once delivering the eggs to the kitchen, Tewkesbury waited outside for her. It was time for her to prepare the sitting rooms, yes plural, for the lady and any company she would be entertaining on this particular day.

Understandably, it would have been highly inappropriate for Florence to be conversing so casually, so informally to someone of the boy's social standing so, naturally, he awaited her return from a safe distance.

Thinking back on it now, it must've looked rather odd. The lord of the house, stood outside, unreasonably early, simply leant up against a cold wall. Luckily for him, he brought his coat, otherwise he probably would have frozen solid in the approaching winter weather.

"Ready?" She asked.

At the sound of her voice, the boy pushed himself off the wall and dropped the stone he had been fiddling with to pass the time, letting it disappear into the sea of others, indistinguishable from one another.

"Where to now?" He held out a hand for her, helping her down the stairs.

"The pasture. The sheep need to be fed before breakfast."