Kind One

The news didn't seem real at first. Carson's words seemed to hang in the air, not making any sense to Thomas, not sinking in. His intellect, his wit, his ability to take undesirable news and turn it around to his advantage – all the weapons he used to protect himself against hurt all his life, none of it seemed to be doing him any good now, when he couldn't even begin to comprehend and accept the news he had just been given.

Lady Sybil. Dead.

The words didn't seem to belong together in the same sentence. The concept seemed so foreign that it shouldn't even be allowed to be real. Even stranger was the pain that seemed determined on assaulting him.

It shouldn't hurt this much. It shouldn't hurt at all.

They're just our employers, they're not our flesh and blood.

He said those words once, and had no regret for them, not even when William had slammed him against the table and nearly broke his jaw. He had been perfectly indifferent then.

So why did it hurt now? Why did these tears come so treacherously and unbidden? It wasn't as if she was even his friend.

But this wasn't like Her Ladyship's unborn baby, and this wasn't Lady Mary or Lady Edith. This was Lady Sybil, who had been more than just his employer. She wasn't of this house any longer, she hasn't been for a long time. More significant was the fact that they had once worked side by side, all those long shifts during the war, when she had been Nurse Crawley.

They started out cold and aloof. He was too pleased with his new appointment and the idea of being equals to an earl's daughter. She treated him, in the beginning, with something like barely concealed contempt, whether it was because she thought him a coward for clawing his way out of the frontline, or because she knew of his unpopularity downstairs, he wasn't sure. The family upstairs was often oblivious of the servants' politics downstairs, but Lady Sybil was downstairs more than most and had even then been friendly with Tom Branson.

Then along came Edward Courtenay. They were forced together more often in the care of the lieutenant. Thomas began to see a change in the way she looked at him, in that she looked at him at all when she spoke to him; before she always avoided looking anywhere in his direction. Thomas had even seen her smiling her approval of how he had been devoted in Edward's care. The warmth had bothered him, like an itch he couldn't get to. He had always been so used to digust from others when when his attention turned so to men that the sudden scrutiny was uncomfortable. It made him vulnerable, and he didn't like it, even though he knew it was unlikely that she understood what his attention really meant. Still he had taken it for granted that he was a non-identity to those like Lady Sybil. It shouldn't matter to Lady Sybil either way that he was being uncommonly kind to Edward, as long as he wasn't doing any harm. But he knew Lady Sybil noticed nonetheless because for she never again was cold to him after that.

It was she who found him after Edward died, slumped in an undignified heap against the wall. She had been there, when he fought with Dr Clarkson to keep Edward in the hospital, and she understood then, as much as it was possible for anyone to understand, why Edward's death devastated him so much, when men died around them everyday. She understood he blamed himself for being unable to help Edward as much as he blamed Dr Clarkson for ordering Edward away. In the darkness, she had wept with him, and for a moment, it was as if there wasn't a whole hidden ocean of class and privilege separating them.

Thomas didn't consider himself a particularly pleasant person to be around, and those callous words he once said of the unborn baby were proof enough. He had imagined death on others before: people who judged him, who bullied him, who hated him, because of what he was. They held him in contempt and he didn't think any more highly of them. They saw him as other and he saw them as simply, well, them – indistinguishable from each other, a blur of jeers and disgust. And yet among all that, Thomas remembered the rare kindness vividly, perhaps more than he desired, because it was those with kindness who haunted him in the rare moments his conscience visited.

Lady Sybil was one of the kind ones, even after the war, when they ceased being Corporal Barrow and Nurse Crawley. She always acknowledged his presence in little ways when they were in the same room, and he was no longer invisible to the entire family. But those times had been few, because soon after, she was married and away to Ireland, and then it didn't matter anymore, because by then, Lady Sybil became something of a taboo subject both up- and downstairs. Thomas sometimes wondered whether he scoffed at the marriage in the few moments they did speak of her downstairs because he genuinely felt she was wasted as the wife of a chauffeur or because she had been brave enough to follow the longings of her heart and he envied her for it.

It didn't matter now, whichever it was. It didn't matter now, because she was dead. She was dead, and he couldn't tell himself that it was okay, it didn't matter, that he didn't care.

His talisman had always been staying cold, not getting himself invested, because every time he did, it only ever ended in heartbreak. All his emotional investments before had been conscious choices, born of hopes that this time, this time it would work out. But she sneaked up on him, and it was only now, when his tears flowed against his will, that he realised he cared more than the wanted to. Thomas hated himself for caring, but hated her more for making him care, for making him shed these tears.

He resisted the urge to slump against the wall now, weeping this time for her. He rushed out of the servants' hall, to escape the sight of disbelief and grief on the faces of others. She was probably the only person upstairs who was capable of drawing out such grief from all the servants who knew her. Thomas didn't care who saw him go, he just couldn't let his tears be shown to them. It was bad enough that he could feel each sob tear through his chest against his will. Someone would interrrupt him soon enough, but he wanted these few seconds by himself, to make sure when the interruption came, he could at least stand on his feet without swaying.

It was Anna who followed him out to the foot of the staircase. He didn't turn around to look at her, but he knew it was her, because she was the only one close enough to have reached him so quickly.

Lately, he only thought of Anna in terms of Bates, so there was no little tension between them, what with Thomas taking Bates' job and Anna determined to free him. But right then, the only thought that occurred to Thomas was, of all the servants remaining, perhaps the one who was closest to Lady Sybil was Anna. She was Lady Mary's maid now, but before, she had dressed all three daugthers. She had dedicated most time to the three; she knew them best.

Maybe it was because of this that Thomas allowed himself to lean, for just an infinitesimal moment, into the comfort she offered. Her touch and soft words took him back to that moment he and Lady Sybil had shared in grief. The only difference was, now, it was Lady Sybil that they cried for.

The moment was short lived, for now that the relaying of the news was over, people would be leaving the servants' hall to return to bed soon. Mrs Hughes walked by; Thomas'self-preservation instinct kicked in and he pulled away from Anna, straightening his stance. But he couldn't hide the evidence of tears on his face. Perhaps it spoke of Lady Sybil's goodness that Mrs Hughes didn't seem surprised that even he could not help crying. In the end, though, he was just grateful Mrs Hughes moved with after just a few words. He could not stay there any longer, not even when his only company was Anna and Mrs Hughes, perhaps the two people least likely to judge him for anything in this house.

As soon as Mrs Hughes had turned, Thomas found himself fleeing too, up the staircase and hopefully soon into the privacy of his own dark, cold room. There, totally alone, the door protecting him from curious eyes, he could cry every bit as hard for Lady Sybil as he once did for Edward. Of the odd trio they had formed together in those war days, only he was left.