Business and dates
summary | when grace leaves, it leaves the shelbys with a heartbroken thomas. polly takes this as an opportunity to get him with the girl she's always wanted him with
pairing | thomas shelby x fem!reader
word count | 2.30k
genre | fluff! with just a tad of angst!
requested? | yes! thank you so much for your request! i had so much writing it, and i am kind of proud of this one, lol.
warnings! | mentions of bullying, and the reader not eating from being worried! and, i have not proof read this yet!
author’s note! | Hi! Thank you all for being so patient as I worked on this! Requests are open for drabbles, and headcanons only at the moment for these characters! And as always, I do I have really bad OCD that causes me to write in some random capitalization, and punctuation, But I think that we don't have to worry about that in this fic lol. And let me know if there are any mistakes, but please be kind!
No one knew what had happened that day. All anyone knew was that Grace was suddenly gone, and that she had left the Shelby family with a heartbroken Thomas. And the person left to pick up the pieces was his lifelong best friend, who has been in love with Thomas since the day they met back when they were just small kids.
Thomas was having a decent day, school had just let out and he was walking back home (alone because his older brother Aurther thought that it would be funny to run off before Thomas got out of class) when he saw a young girl getting picked on.
“Stop it! This is my favorite skirt!” Thomas heard her yell to the kids that had her on the ground, kicking dirt onto her clothes while laughing and taunting her. Thomas knew that these kids were practically afraid of him, so he knew he could get them to leave the girl alone. He also knew that his mother would scold him if she found out that he didn’t do anything to help her.
“Oi! Leave her alone, or I'll put a curse on you!” Thomas called out as he made his way up to the group, and pulled a razor blade out of his pocket. The kids practically scattered the moment they heard Thomas’ voice. Leaving just him, and the girl with dirt on her clothes.
“Thank you” He heard the girl say in a quiet voice as he put his hand out to help her back up.
“What caused that?” He asked, curious as to what the girl could have done to anger the other kids so much.
“I-I told them that I wouldn’t do their homework.” She said back to him, as she tried to get the dirt off of her skirt. Thomas told himself that he should have known it was something like that. There wasn’t anything serious that this girl could have done to upset them so much.
“Come on, I’ll walk you home, you live on Watery lane, right?” He said as he started walking, with the girl running a bit to catch up with him. He knew her name, he recognized her from school. She lived right across from him, but they never said anything to each other. She had been over to play with Ada sometimes, but they never spoke.
Neither one of them said anything as they walked, it wasn’t until they got to her home that Thomas spoke up.
“They shouldn’t bother you again, no one should.” He said as he stood outside her doorstep, seeming almost sorry since he knew his reputation, and how kids would stay away from him in fear of getting cursed.
“It’s alright, I don’t really have any friends anyways.” The small girl said, while rocking back and forth on her heels.
“Why don’t you come play at my house? I know my family won’t mind.” He said to her with a small smile. Truth be told, Thomas didn’t really have many friends either, and he saw an opportunity to make one.
Ever since then, the two were inseparable. They did everything together, they were even each other's first kiss. Her family was weary at first, but soon saw how protective the Shelby boys (and the rest of the Shelby family) were over her, and grew to like them. The two were like this up until Thomas was called to war
“Tommy, this has to be a mistake.” The girl cried into Thomas’ shoulder as he held her. “All three of you at the same time? What kind of cruel joke is this”
“The universe has a funny way of doing things.” He mumbled into her hair, his hand resting on the back of her head. “I’ll come back, sweetheart.”
“You don’t know that, Tommy” The girl said as she pulled her head out of his shoulder, and looked up at him, eyes red and puffy.
“You really think I'm leaving you yet? You think I'm going to leave you before you get married? Please, your future husband doesn’t get off that easily.” He said with a small laugh while trying to lighten the mood as he held her face with his hand. “Nothings taking me from you, not yet.”
“You better come back, Shelby.” She said as she looked up at him with glossy eyes. “Or, I’ll bring you back just to kill you myself.”
Thomas laughed and kissed her head, as the air in the room changed. He didn’t know why, but he leaned down and kissed her lips softly, all he knew was that he couldn’t leave without giving her a kiss, even just a light one. “You’ve got nothing to worry about” He said as he pulled away.
She believed him, she tried not to worry. She didn’t worry until his letters stopped coming. After a month of not hearing from him she worried so much she got sick. She wrote him everyday, sent him a letter at least once a week, if not twice. No word of his death ever came.
The day Thomas arrived home, she was sitting at the kitchen table with Polly. His heart broke when he saw her, she was paler, and her face was skinny, all signs to her not eating properly. Neither one of them said a word to each other for a week. It wasn’t until (Y/n) decided that she had enough, and stormed into his room.
“What the hell is wrong with you?!” she shouted, growing red in the face.
“What are you talking about?” He asked, not meeting her eyes, already knowing what she was talking about,
“You! You come back, and are completely different! You’re cold, and mean to everyone, which maybe you were that way to some people before, but never to me! Never to your family!” As she yelled at him, she started to sway as if she was about to faint. Before she could hit the floor, Thomas grabbed her and set her down on the bed beside him.
“You need to eat something.” He mumbled, not looking at her which infuriated her more.
“I thought you were dead.” This caught his attention as he heard her start to cry. He finally turned to her. “You stopped writing.”
“I didn’t know how to write to you, you would ask me how I was, and I couldn’t find it in myself to tell you about how I had just watched a man die. I thought it better to not write.” He said, pulling her into his chest. “Why are you not eating?”
“You worried me, anything I ate just came back up.” She mumbled into his chest.
“I told you not to worry.” He said with a small laugh coming from his chest, the first in a long time.
“Tough shit, Shelby.” She mumbled back, while pulling her head out of his chest.
They sat in silence for a few minutes, just staring at the other, until Thomas finally spoke up. “I’m trying to get back to normal.” He mumbled, barely loud enough for her to hear, she wouldn’t have if they hadn’t been so close.
“I know, it will just take some time.” She said while she caressed his cheek. “And, I’ll be here to help you heal.”
After that day, nothing ever really went back to how it was before the war. But it was like that for everyone. Thomas had gone back to normal as much as he could. He had his moments, but everyone did. And, (Y/n) didn’t lie, she was there every step of the way, even in the bad times she never left.
The two never fought again until the day Grace left. She had tried telling Thomas before that something was up with her, but he just wouldn’t listen. The only other person that seemed to notice it was Polly.
“He’ll never go for it.” John pipped into the conversation. Polly was currently trying to figure out a way to cheer Thomas up, and the idea she had was to put Thomas with (Y/n). She already considered the girl a daughter, and she always wanted her with Thomas. To her, it was the perfect plan.
“That's why we don’t tell him! All we tell him is that he has a business meeting at the new restaurant, he’ll show up, expecting some business man to be there, but instead (Y/n) will come in wearing the most beautiful thing I can find, that he’ll just have to stay.” Polly explained to the boys and Ada.
“Alright, but how are you going to get (Y/n) there, dressed up, without suspecting anything?” Ada chimed in.
“We’ll tell her a boy stopped by and asked to take her out.” Polly said, as if it was obvious.
“Please, she’s not going to just agree to go out with someone, especially if she doesn’t even know who it is.” Arthur muttered.
"Actually she might.” John announced to everyone. “Just to make Thomas jealous, she mentioned it back when Grace was around.”
The Shelby’s set everything into motion that night. Polly told Thomas he had a meeting, then she told (Y/n) about the secret man that wanted to take her out.
So Thomas sat in his suit, waiting for this man to show, when he saw (Y/n) walk through the door, dressed like a vision in her red, drop waist, beaded dress, with an old pearl necklace to match. She looked around the room, until her eyes landed on Thomas.
“What are you doing here?” She asked him, as she walked up to his table.
“Business meeting, what are you doing here?” He asked, suddenly growing jealous at the thought of her being here for another man.
“A date, and what business meeting? I know your schedule, there wasn’t one planned, did you make one?” She asked, wondering who on earth Thomas could be meeting for business at this hour.
“No, Polly told me I had one, who’s the date?” He asked, his jealousy rising.
“Not sure, Polly told me-” A look of realization crossed both their faces “Polly” The two said in unison.
She decided to sit down, now laughing to herself. “You’re the date.”
“You’re the business.” Thomas responded, a small smile growing to his face.
The two sat there for a minute, before Thomas spoke up. “You do look stunning.”
“Polly picked it.” She said, with a small laugh.
“I bet she did.” Thomas said with a laugh, and a sigh. “She’s wanted us together for ages.” He mumbled.
“And what do you want?” The girl asked. Thomas had always had a feeling that (Y/n) liked him, he was just never sure how much, until he looked up and met her eyes that were filled with nothing but love and want.
“You in my life.” He said, keeping his eyes on her. “I thought a relationship between us would mess everything up. I couldn’t risk losing you.”
“Thomas.” The girl said, grabbing his hand across the table. “You could never lose me, even if we did have a relationship and it failed, I would still love you. But, I don’t want you to feel like you have to do this.”
“I have distracted myself from you for as long as I can remember. I wouldn’t let myself fall for you.” Thomas said, standing up from the table, (Y/n) following.
“It’s okay to fall, Thomas, who knows, maybe it won’t hurt.” She said, as she placed a hand to his face. Without thinking, Thomas leaned in and kissed her with everything in him, causing her to hit the table, his hands on the side of her face being the only thing to keep them from falling. The pair kissed until they needed air. When they pulled away, he rested his forehead on hers.
“Let’s give this a try.” He whispered, looking into her eyes.
The girl smiled and gave Thomas a quick peck, before they left the restaurant, her holding his arm. The walk back to the Shelby home was mostly quiet, until she spoke up. “Thank god for Polly.”
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