bakerstreet | Things We Lost in the Fire

Things We Lost in the Fire

Mutual Healing Shipping Meme

Healing doesn't come quickly, whether the need comes from physical or mental wounds. But you're trying regain your strength - and yourself.

People, as a general rule, are kind, or at least not outright inflammatory to you, it seems. Still, you just can't connect with them. No matter how nice, how caring, they don't understand. They've never experienced anything like what you've gone through, or they're not like you in a way that lets them see what you still go through; they have no frame of reference. Sure, they have sympathy, but it's not the same. So there's no real connection, despite any friendliness. It's so easy, then, to feel detached...

...until you meet them, in this place of both death and healing.

They may not have been through the exact same struggles, they may not be exactly the same as you, but they know what darkness is light. How they handle this fact may be better or worse than how you do, yet you can see yourself in their actions. And for once? There's connection; more than that, too. Slowly, you can feel yourself opening up towards them, and then, falling for them.

Is this something your used to? Will you fight your feelings, or will you jump at the opportunity to be with someone who can begin to get you? You may have little choice in the matter, as your instincts may just reach out to be with whatever compatible contact you can get. That's better, in the long run, though. Who else could have wounds like yours?

Essentially, it's what it says: a "romance," in the loose definition, or "shipping" meme for characters who have been through the wringer or have hangups.
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The lack of pressure, both literally and figuratively, settles her nerves a little bit. It lets her try kissing him again, a little more deeply, moving in a little bit closer to him. She traces her fingers over his jaw, very slowly, mapping his features out with her hands anew. Is he different? Is he the same?

His lips feel the same on hers, she thinks gratefully, even if there are differences now. She sighs softly, breath warm against them.

He is more scarred, now, and his hands are less calloused than they were before- softer when he takes one of her hands to stroke his fingertips over her knuckles. He kisses her bottom lip once, then pulls away, smiling.

"I love you," he says, with more certainty this time, needing her to understand.

"I know," she whispers, curling her fingers into his grasp, leaning in to rest her head beneath his. "How could I not?" When he'd written to her, waited for her, stayed for her. When from his first letter, she had seen the scratched-out marks of My dearest--

She thinks of something else from those early letters and smiles suddenly. "If I remember correctly, the real question is, do you like me?" she asks, a wry, teasing note creeping into her voice.

He tugs her over to the bed when she thinks, letting her lean against him properly- she must be tired from the trip, and he knows he's feeling shaky now that the adrenalin is fading a little.

The question makes him laugh and flush, remembering perfectly.

"I like you. Of all the people in the world, my darling Nina, I like you the most."

He's not wrong; it's been a tiring journey to begin with, and while she's ecstatically happy about their reunion, it hasn't exactly been a restful one. She sits for only a moment, then toes off her shoes and moves up to lie down on top of the covers, reaching out to draw him down next to her. She curls up into his side, slotting herself perfectly against him, her head on his shoulder and her hand over his heart.

"It sounds like your plan succeeded, then," she murmurs softly, closing her eyes, still smiling. "It doesn't hurt that you write very well. So charming in your letters."

He feels incredibly comfortable, comforted, loved. One hand can bury itself in her soft, long hair while the other traces patterns on her arm.

"I had to make up for being the opposite in life," he murmurs, smiling a little.

She tsks softly, teasingly chiding. She'd caught glimpses of some other version of him at times around his men -- someone both blunter and harder-edged -- but although he'd summoned up some of that coldness towards her on that day in the cell, he's never otherwise been anything but sweet and tender. Maybe a little awkward at times, but that had charmed her, too, in its own way. How else to explain how deeply she'd cared for him, long before his first letter?

She settles against him, going quiet for a while after that, basking in the warmth of his body, this bed -- their bed, for now -- and the freedom to do nothing more than lie here for however long they please. They've never even gotten to lie together in the light of day, she realizes, not without her having to slip out hastily before wake-up. They'd never gotten to do a hundred thousand things that they can easily do now.

Including at least one that they should talk about, she thinks, sobering a little after a long stretch of peace. "I got a letter," she murmurs, "right before I left the camp. I was right: nobody knows where my family has gone." She lifts her head a little to look up at him. "I don't think going back to Russia will do any good, but I want to try to find them -- with your contacts in the Bolsheviks, maybe...?" She sighs. "I have no currency in my own country anymore."

Edited 2015-12-04 22:41 (UTC)

"I'll ask Freddie, love, we'll get all the information you want." He has no way of knowing that, but he wants to give her hope.

"So where will you go?"

Because he doesn't want to presume, god, but he wants her to say with you so badly. He wants her to tell him let me come with you, and then come with me to look for my family. He wants to bring her home and then he wants to see the world with her, watch her embrace her family once more.

She twists to get a better look at him, puzzled. It hasn't even occurred to her that that wouldn't be the answer. Not anymore. The plans they'd made in the letters, the promises she'd made -- I don't care where we go after that -- are all still true for her; now more than ever, now that she really is a woman without a country.

Is there some chance she's misunderstood? she thinks, her heart murmuring nervously, but she can't imagine that could be so. "I am not coming with you?" she asks uncertainly.

"Oh," he breathes, shakily and somehow still surprised, even after everything they'd talked about. He keeps expecting to have the next bit of happiness taken away from him, but she keeps giving, and giving.

"Yes. Yes, if you still want to, yes."

"Why wouldn't I?" She sits up a little more and braces herself on one arm, lifting her other hand to brush her fingers against his lips. She smiles quizzically, if a little sadly. "Where else would I go?"

Which doesn't mean she doesn't want to. It's just made the where seem much, much simpler. Maybe not England forever, but right now, Russia would eat the both of them alive.

He presses a gentle kiss against her fingers, then smiles sadly up at her.

"I don't wish to presume. That's all. I- I'd like to have you. To show you the Birmingham I spoke of."

"Then that is where I am going."

She leans over him to replace her fingers with her lips, kissing him lightly, her smile warming as she draws back again. "To Birming'am," she murmurs, mimicking his accent.

He laughs at that, softly, completely endeared. "Have to teach you more of that before we go. Make you fit in." He leans up again for a soft kiss to her lips, then the tip of her nose.

It will take more than an accent, she knows -- her whole life is changing now -- but the rich sound of his laughter makes her smile all the more, so she purrs: "Aye, Tommy Shelby."

She folds her hands atop his chest and lays her chin atop them, so she can lie against him again while still looking at him. "Your family..." She hedges. They must know something, to know he's been staying here. Do they know he plans to show up with a woman -- an alien, a war prisoner, to say nothing of whatever else she's been -- in tow? If he hadn't been sure she would be coming along? "How much have you told them?"

Edited 2015-12-05 12:20 (UTC)

He cards his hands through her hair, getting his fingers tangled in her dark curls. He's not thinking of anything before she asks him that, just of the softness of her skin, the pretty flush of her cheeks.

"I told 'em we met in the first camp, that we fell in love there and continued doing so when I was transported to the next one. I've told them you're a nurse, and that you're brave and that I love you."

Her eyes flicker at nurse, but she can't blame him for saying it. It's certainly the easiest version of her story to tell, even if it's also the least true. It's not enough to make her smile falter.

"I want to see those letters," she half-teases. "When we get there. So I know what they're really expecting of me."

"We'll tell them later, together. Say it wasn't safe to write anything else." He tucks some hair behind her ear and presses a gentle kiss to her forehead.

"You won't have to lie. I promise."

This time, her smile does fade a little. "Tell them what?" she asks softly, sitting up.

"That I was a spy?" That would be one thing, but-- "That they made me spy on you and your friends?" She swallows, her throat tightening. She looks down, picking at the blanket. "Or should we all talk about what happened after you left?"

His own smile disappears completely, feeling slightly whiplashed. He sits up as well, puts a gentle hand on her jaw to get her to look back at him.

"I meant that you were a spy. The rest of it- that's our business, Nina. Please- trust me? I'm not trying to hurt you."

She shakes her head, though she leans into the touch, closing her eyes.

"You don't think they'll want to ask more once we tell them that? Spying -- so exciting, so interesting. That was why I chose it. Nursing is... typical. No one will ask about it." No one ever has before, anyway.

He bumps his forehead against hers. "We won't tell them if you don't want to. But I thought you'd like to be honest with them. They're family, now."

She blinks her eyes open and looks up into his at that, her own wide. That's a big jump to make -- she loves him absolutely, has every intention of going home with him, but there's still a lot between this and becoming a part of a family she's never met.

Like... meeting them, for one thing.

"I--" she stumbles, unusually, caught off-guard. "I'm not even sure what I'll tell my family yet," she manages.

"Would- Do you need to think about that, first?"

He draws back a little, frowning, his hand still on her jaw.

"Assuming they're alive?" Which she doesn't, not really, and although she keeps her tone relatively mild, there's a telltale waver at the end that belies her lack of faith.

But if they are... "Then-- yes, I don't think I should tell your family anything I wouldn't tell my own."

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!! this totally didn't make it into my dw inbox wth i am glad you edited

!! my pedantry saved the day

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