Chapter Text
May-December 1850
James had always been the sort of patient who made a nuisance of himself, trying to be up and about before he was fully recovered—the only doctor who’d ever been able to bully James into submitting to rest had been Stanley—but Tom? Tom was another beast entirely. It didn’t seem to be that he didn’t want to rest, but rather he didn’t feel like he could, perhaps feeling the need to put his work before his health. When James had gone to bring Tom tea the morning following his arrival, Tom had asked what James needed doing, since Tom was ostensibly here to serve as steward to James. James had told him that he wasn’t going to expect Tom to do anything until he was well.
It was clear that Tom wasn’t used to being the one cared for, but James did his best to make it easier for him. He got a sewing station set up for Tom in one corner of his bedroom, and he and Peglar hauled the old garden furniture out of the shed to set up an area where Tom could sit outside and sew or knit or write or whatever he felt up to doing. James would often join him, particularly in the endeavor of writing, as he was supposed to be writing up an account of the expedition. Crozier was working on an account as well, one that he promised would be as perfunctory as possible, so James rather thought his should have more detail, be more of a voyage narrative, but it was hard to make it feel like a good story.
“Why do you have to write one at all?” Tom asked, one afternoon. He was lounging back in the wheeled chair that he’d finally allowed James to get for him, because walking all the way through the garden was an effort that his leg, the scar on which had not healed well following its reopening, and his chest, often tight and leaving Tom short of breath, did not take to well. James had managed to get Tom to agree to the chair on the condition that it would only be something he used outside in the garden, so it had more or less become Tom’s outside chaise lounge.
James sighed. “I don’t have to. There’s never been a requirement for it—the Admiralty has our reports—but it’s expected, and, well, it will be a nice source of income if it sells well. I’d thought to make it more… robust than Francis’ account, which he assures me will be as short as possible.”
Tom snorted. “That does sound like him.” He had to pause to cough, lightly, into a handkerchief. “Maybe you could wait to see what his covers before trying to write your own.”
It was a good idea, one that saw James putting away his unfinished drafts for the time and leaving him with one less worry.
Another worry that was slowly lessening was Tom’s illness. His health had improved steadily since he’d arrived. His hands and arms had healed, being no longer subject to constant exposure to chemicals, though they remained scarred and pocked. While the consumption was a lingering condition that caused James much more concern, it seemed to be improving too, the fresh country air working its magic. Tom’s coughs were no longer accompanied by bloody sputum, and honey—taken in tea or by the spoonful—helped minimize the coughing itself.
The doctor James had first summoned had prescribed a laudanum concoction along with bed rest, but James had resolutely ignored that suggestion and had instead asked the woman who ran the apothecary in town with her husband if there were remedies that she could recommend for a consumptive cough that weren’t laudanum based. It had been her who had put him onto the honey, after giving him what seemed to be a long, pent-up lecture about how people didn’t know how to use laudanum correctly and wound up addicted, which had James biting his tongue.
Tom had told him more about what had happened to his mother, how she had become lost to laudanum: the nature of the accident; how truly draining it had been to care for her, especially when she had hated him for it; and how it had been the process of trying to wean her off it that had ultimately led to her death. It all sounded so frightful to James, and he’d thought in that moment that it must have taken unbelievable strength for Tom to do that and work such a difficult job as he’d had then. Tom had demurred when James said that, so James hadn’t pressed it, but that didn’t change what he thought.
That was not the only topic they revisited from that first night. Tom had been so bleary and exhausted and ill then that his memory of that evening was rather blurred. When Tom had not mentioned what James had told Tom about how he loved him—a declaration that neither of them had ever made before—James had assumed that it had been one of those things that had gotten blurred out, particularly as weeks turned into months and summer took its turn toward fall.
They were out in the garden, and James was trying not fret over the fact that Tom was up the apple tree in the center of the garden. James hadn’t thought that the apples were any good, but Peglar and Tom had both agreed that they were ripe, if tart, and as such, merited picking to be canned, cooked, and otherwise eaten. James was glad that Tom was feeling well enough to be taking to the garden, but given the state of Tom’s leg, he hadn’t imagined the other man would go quite this far. It was James’ thoughts to his own leg and back, that had kept him firmly on the ground while Tom tossed apples down to him.
He needn’t have worried, however, because Tom was smiling as he finally climbed down the ladder and he looked flushed, but not in any pain and not like he was trying to hide pain either.
“A good haul?” James asked, glancing to the several baskets on the ground.
Tom nodded, taking a moment to catch his breath. For all his health was improved, that shortness of breath hadn’t quite gone away. “Will you come sit with me?” Tom asked.
Something skipped in his chest at the look on Tom’s face. It was playful in a way that he hadn’t seem from Tom since they’d been back from the Arctic.
Tom settled down against the trunk of the tree, and when James was close enough, Tom reached for his hand to pull him down. James stumbled, minutely, and ended up slumping heavily against Tom has he hit the ground.
“Sorry,” Tom murmured.
James pressed a kiss haphazardly to the side of Tom’s face. “It’s all right. I’m glad you’re feeling well enough to do things like pull me over and send me out of my mind with worry by climbing a tree.”
Tom laughed, though it did peter out into coughs, and smiled at James. “I’m glad too. I’ve…” he swallowed. “I haven’t been able to stop thinking about what you said.”
“What I said when?” James asked, brow furrowing as he tried to think of something he might have said recently that would linger in Tom’s mind.
“When you said you loved me,” Tom replied gently, and James’ breath caught. “I’m sorry it’s taken me so long to respond properly. It’s only… it’s only that I spent a very long time convincing myself that what we had wasn’t the sort of relationship that involved love, and perhaps even longer refusing to admit that I loved you too.”
“Loved…?” James hated how choked he sounded, but he had to know if Tom was speaking in past tense because he was simply referring to their time in the Arctic or if things had actually changed since them.
Then Tom’s hand came up to cup James’ cheek and all the worry rushed out of him. “Love. Do love currently, very much.”
Tom kissed him lightly and then withdrew. “It’s just been rather hard for me to come to calling it that,” he admitted. “I think I’d gotten it into my head that saying it would be too much and would shatter what we had, what we have…”
“It didn’t though,” James said, catching Tom’s hand as it left his cheek. “And it won’t. You have my complete and utter devotion.”
Tom flushed and ducked his head. “It’s not going to be so easy for me to wrap my mind around that.”
James ran his thumb gently over the scars on the back of Tom’s hand. “That’s all right, we have time—and I’ll be right here to remind you.”
Life with James was as strange as it was wonderful. At first, Thomas had somewhat assumed that accepting James’ offer would mean that his work would start immediately, because that was what he was used to: working when there was work to be done, regardless of whether he was feeling particularly well. However, that was hardly the case at all. Even as Thomas’ health improved to the point that he was no longer bed-ridden, James still maintained that Thomas should only do what he felt well enough to, and that there was no need to assume full responsibility of the household until he wanted to.
By the end of the summer, Thomas had a little sewing corner in his bedroom—though he did most of his sewing and mending out in the garden with James—had mostly taken over running the household finances from Bridgens, and did whatever light work he could manage in the garden with Peglar. All the while, James was there being his dear self and taking care of him when he really was too unwell to do much more than lie in bed.
Furthermore, James’ every action only confirmed to Thomas that James did, in fact, want him here in a lasting and permanent way. It was a matter he’d broached with Bridgens, seeking his advice as a man who had many years of experience in a committed relationship. Bridgens’ advice was mostly to talk to James and to avoid falling prey to assumptions based on preconceived notions of how relationships between two men ought to work, but it also helped that they shared a similar class background. There were times when Thomas still found himself frustrated and confused by the disconnects that reared their heads as a result of their wildly different upbringings and understanding of the world. If there had been a way to have conversations like this during the expedition, Thomas wondered if he might not have felt the need to pull away from James as he had.
Of course, there was no point dwelling on that, not when he had James here and now. There had been a shift, following their conversation under the apple tree. James had become much more openly and freely affectionate with Thomas—only about the house and garden, naturally—and it was such a rush. Coming from years of being on a ship, furtively bumping shoulders and brushing hands in tight hallways, it made him feel giddy to have James catch his hand and stop him just to kiss him for the sake of kissing him.
James had also begun enthusiastically discussing various ways Thomas could make the house more comfortable and homey for himself.
“Many of the furnishings were here already,” James said, drumming his fingers on the back of one of the armchairs in drawing room, “and I’m… I haven’t been particularly sure what to do to make it… better or more fitting.”
According to James, the styles were dated, but they were still quite nice and sturdy. “I don’t see much wrong with them,” Thomas admitted, running his hand over the back of the sofa he was seated on. “I suppose I could try my hand at reupholstering the ones that have faded noticeably.”
“Oh!” James lit up like he hadn’t thought about that. “That sounds like a much better idea than trying to replace them. You are right there’s very little wrong with them otherwise. We could get them professionally done…” James trailed off looking to Thomas.
While they had discussed alterations to the house, it had not occurred to Thomas to change anything in any substantial way beyond repairs and cleaning, but for James, redecoration was a priority of its own and he’d already accomplished a variety of goals to that regard. The idea of spending so much money to replace perfectly good furniture or fixtures was wholly foreign to Thomas. James, in his particular fashion and concern for Thomas’ comfort, had suggested that they try to find comfortable compromises, as they were doing now.
“I think between myself and Peglar we could sort it out,” Thomas said, smiling. “Let’s figure out which ones need reupholstering and go from there.”
Beyond taking having his input about the house—and finances—being taken seriously, Thomas was encouraged by James to make space for his hobbies. Hobbies. Thomas wasn’t sure he’d ever really had time for anything he would call a hobby—not in the way wealthy people seemed to have hobbies at any rate.
He enjoyed sewing, and creating the sample garments and setting up the small details in his shop had been his favorites parts of that whole process. With Thomas’ health improved, and the weather turning colder than was comfortable for sitting outside to sew, he took it upon himself to clear out one of the spare rooms—an old office maybe—to become a sewing room. Thomas had gone to ask James first, thinking to defer to him since it was his house, but James had only asked if Thomas wanted help clearing the unnecessary furniture out of the room and then surprised him a few weeks later with a parcel of fabric following a trip to London.
“Cast offs and scraps that were being sold in a marked-down bundle,” James said, standing off to the side as Thomas sat at the table in his sewing room with the parcel half unwrapped in front of him. His hands were clasped behind his back, like a boy looking for approval from a parent or teacher. “I thought you might prefer that to a bolt of anything new.”
Thomas couldn’t disguise the grin that spread across his face at that. He had been worrying about whether he should sink money—the “salary” he was receiving from James—into large pieces of new fabric, and he ultimately hadn’t been able to justify it. The fact that James had had the same thought and come to the exact same conclusion made Thomas’ chest flutter. “I do,” he said, finally looking up from the fabric to James. “It’s perfect.” He was already thinking about what he could make from it for James to thank him.
“I’ve also, er, placed an order for something a bit… bigger… as well,” James added sheepishly. “But it will be some time before it arrives.”
Thomas frowned. James’ vagueness was concerning, but he let James continue without saying anything.
“I’ve justified it as a Christmas gift,” James said. “And I promise not to do this every time I walk by a shop with things I think you’ll like. This was simply… a very compelling instance.”
Thomas raised an eyebrow—a gesture he’d most certainly picked up from Captain Crozier. “I’ll forgive you your desire to spoil me, since you are making an effort to only spoil me in moderation, but you do realize how worrying that sounds.”
“It’s nothing to worry over,” James assured him, his mouth continuing to twitch in a grin. “I’m just… I’m excited. I know you’ll like it, but it is a rather big thing, so I wanted to warn you that it was coming, so it wouldn’t be such a shock when it did arrive.”
It was hard to maintain even a facade of irritation when James was being that earnest, and Thomas smiled. “Thank you. I’ll try not to let my worries about what it might be get the better of me.”
It was hard to stop thinking about James’ mysterious gift, particularly as parcels from various orders for things began arriving. Thomas kept waiting to see if there were any packages that James was going to squirrel away, but he didn’t manage to catch anything, and the largest parcels that arrived were the fabric for the two chairs and the one sofa that Thomas and Peglar were reupholstering—it all turned out very well considering neither of them had done anything like it before.
Thomas did have a mild relapse of illness at the beginning of December, but he recovered in time for the planned visit of James’ family prior to Christmas. It was certainly interesting to meet the Coninghams, who, previously, he’d only known through James’ stories and the one single letter. James had warned him beforehand that Will and Elizabeth knew about James’ preference for men, and that Thomas didn’t need to present the illusion of service to James. It had been nerve-wracking, but he had been easily welcomed into the family by Will, and the most uncomfortable part was managing what felt to Thomas like excess leisure—something he knew James understood—in the form of lingering drawing room conversations. Only twice did Thomas bow out early to hide in the kitchen and help Bridgens bake.
Before the Coninghams left, Will presented Thomas with an early Christmas gift: two books, both by Louisa Capper—one poetry collection and a copy of “A Poetical History of England,” the poem James had sent him an excerpt of before Carnivale. The name had been familiar then, but now Thomas finally connected the dots that Capper was simply the maiden name of James and Will’s mother, and it threw the whole situation leading up to Carnivale into much sweeter relief.
Christmas, when it finally arrived, was a quiet affair for just their household. Following a simple but delicious Christmas dinner that heavily featured preserved vegetables and fruits from their garden, the four of them gathered in the drawing room to exchange gifts. Thomas had made everyone clothing of some sort—gloves for Peglar for his outdoor work, a nice scarf for Bridgens, and a patchwork banyan for James made from the scrap materials he’d gifted Thomas.
James had gotten Peglar a new journal and pens and Bridgens a new translation of some Greek philosophical text that Thomas had never heard of, while Bridgens had made socks for James and Thomas, and Peglar had crafted a book of poetry and pressed flowers from the garden, which he presented rather sheepishly, but James had, of course, adored. Their gifts for each other would be exchanged privately—Thomas had helped Peglar find a place to acquire his gift for Bridgens and knew it to be a carved piece of wood of a… particular shape.
Once Bridgens and Peglar had retired to their room, James rose from his seat on the sofa. “I had Bridgens help me bring it up to your sewing room earlier in the day,” he said offering a hand to Thomas to help him up.
Thomas took the offered hand—it was easier to stand with aid, as his leg had been irritable because of the cold recently, though James’ own leg wasn’t fairing much better, and he’d taken to using a cane after some bullying and a near fall down the stairs. Biting his lip to try and hold back a grin, Thomas let the worry he’d felt about James “big purchase” for him bleed away into excitement now that the presentation of that purchase was imminent. “Lead the way.”
“I’m glad you weren’t mad at me for making a large expensive purchase back when I first told you,” James admitted as they walked down the hallway. “I worked myself into such a state in the shop worrying about whether it was the right thing. I’m sure the girl at the counter thought I was either mad or a lovestruck fool.”
“Well, she wouldn’t have been wrong,” Thomas said, and James snorted.
“I suppose I can’t argue with that,” James replied with a smile. “I have done many foolish things out of love for you.” He pushed the door to Thomas’ sewing room open. “Now come on.”
Inside the room, there was a large crate seated on the table and Thomas let out a long slow breath. The crate was stamped with the name “Singer,” which didn’t mean anything to him, and Thomas looked to James as he rested his hand on the top of the crate.
“Open it,” James said, smiling impossibly bigger.
Thomas took another deep breath and lifted the lid of the crate. Inside, nestled in straw padding, was a machine—sleek and black with gold patterning on it. “James… what…?” Thomas had a feeling he knew what it was, but he’d not seen anything quite like it.
“It’s a new sort of sewing machine,” James said. “It’s supposed to be easier to use than any of the previous models. The woman who owned the shop had just got two in for her girls and was absolutely thrilled with how well they worked, and after about an hour or so of agonizing I purchased the fabric I got you and asked if it would be possible for me to place an order for one through the shop.”
Thomas eyes were watering. “James…” He couldn’t think of anything more sensible to say and he started a bit when he realized that James had come over to stand next to him.
James looked nervous, Thomas thought. “Do you like it?”
Thomas nodded, wiping at his eyes. “It’s so much, but I…” he ran his hand along the top of the machine. “It’s gorgeous.”
“Would you like help assembling it?” James asked, resting a hand on Thomas’ arm.
“No, I…” Thomas sniffed and wiped at his eyes. “Tomorrow,” he said, smiling at James. “I’ll set it up tomorrow. For now I think I just want to kiss you.”