Yellow Roses // Thomas Shelby

Chapter Sixteen

November 20 1918

Four years, three months and twenty days he has been gone. I've lost hope.

Calongero sits across from me as he draws on a price of paper. He's drawing Thomas, just really poorly.

His fists curl up on the pencil as my cigarette burns in the ashtray. I listened to Thomas and stopped the morphine and the cocaine. It's just the nicotine from the cigarettes that keeps me going.

I stare at the letter that was written on July 28, 1918. It's been almost four months since he's written to me. He's gone, and I can't accept that.

I look at the kid in front of me, brown eyes, curly hair and tan skin. He has Thomas's lips and hair. He has my eyes, but the rest of him is purely himself. He talks like John. He cracks jokes like Arthur. He keeps to himself like Thomas.

I don't see any of my traits in him.

"Momma?" He asks me, looking up from the paper, staring into my teary eyes. I pushed the tears back, looking at my son with a smile.

"Yes?" I asked him. A picture of Thomas was right next to him, looking at me. I hated how he never smiled in photos. He always kept that cold look on his face, acting all tough. When he was with me, he was anything but tough. He was himself.

"Where's my daddy? Florence talks about hers all the time." He said, looking up at me. I pushed even more tears back into my eyes. I couldn't tell him that his father was dead. I didn't believe it.

"You're Daddy, and your uncle John and Arthur are still in France, C." I told him. He frowned, setting his pencil down softly on his paper.

"Does daddy not love me?" He asked, tears almost coming out of his eyes. My heart broke for the millionth time.

"Your daddy loves you very much, Calongero." I leaned forward, swallowing the lump in my throat. "He's just away for now."

He grabbed the picture frame off my desk with his short hands, setting it down, looking at it. It was one of the pictures in the newspaper with Thomas and I in it. It was the one where we were looking into each other's eyes while he held my bags and I held my roses.

"Who are they?" He asked, pointing to the two of us. I smiled, leaning over my desk and pointing to Thomas.

"This is your father in 1905. He and I were 15 in this photo. I'm right across from him." His brown eyes followed my fingers on the photograph, taking in each detail the one of us had.

"Daddy," he pointed to Thomas in a different picture. I smiled, nodded.

"Yes," I told him, looking at the photographs with him. I hate how he's not here looking at the pictures with me. I hate how every time I look at his face in ink I want to slap it for not being here with me. It's not his fault he got drafted.

Calongero looked over to my glossy eyes, then attempted to put his arms around my neck. The tears dropped as I hugged him back. At such a young fucking she he knew what to do. He had so much sympathy for everything.

At two and a half years old he was pretty tall. He was about three feet tall. He gets that from my side of the family. Hell, I'm taller than Thomas by a half inch. It's why I never wore heels around him.

"I'm sorry Momma." Calongero told me against my ear, his hands pushing away from me. It made me smile with glossy eyes and a broken heart.

"You have nothing to be sorry for, you hear me? Your daddy will be back. I promise." I pinched his cheeks, making him squirm out of my grip. He sat back onto the chair with a giggle, grabbing my fingers with his small hands. It brought a genuine smile to my face.