Page 103 of The Words Beneath the Noise

She looked tired. That was my first thought. Tired in a way that went deeper than sleepless nights, that spoke of years of worry and rationing and wondering if the people she loved would survive to see tomorrow. Her hair had gone fully grey since I'd last seen her, swept back in its usual neat style but thinner somehow. Smaller.

But her eyes, when they found mine, were exactly as I remembered. Soft and searching and full of a love that had never wavered, even when I'd been at my most difficult.

“Arthur.” She crossed the hall in three quick steps and pulled me into her arms. She smelled of lavender and flour and home, and I had to close my eyes against the sudden sting of tears. “My boy. Let me look at you.”

She pulled back, hands on my face, studying me the way she always did. Checking for damage. Looking for signs of the son she'd raised beneath whatever the war had made of him.

“You're too thin,” she pronounced. “Are they feeding you properly at that place?”

“They're feeding me fine, Mum.”

“Hmm.” She didn't sound convinced. Then her gaze slid past me to Tom, and something shifted in her expression. Curiosity. Assessment. A mother's protective instinct engaging.

“And this must be your friend.”

Friend. The word sat between us, heavy with everything it wasn't saying.

“Mum.” I took a breath. My heart was pounding so hard I could feel it in my throat. “This is Tom. Thomas Hale. He's not my friend.”

The hallway went very quiet.

My mother's hands were still on my face. I could feel them trembling slightly, could see the question forming in her eyes. Behind her, Bea had gone still, watching. And somewhere further in the house, I heard my father's footsteps pause.

“He's my partner,” I said. The words came out clear and steady, steadier than I'd thought possible. “In every way that matters. I wanted you to meet him properly. To know him the way I know him.”

Silence.

My mother's expression was impossible to read. I braced myself for the recoil, the horror, the we don't speak of such things that had haunted my nightmares for twenty years.

Instead, she let out a breath that seemed to come from somewhere very deep. Her hands slid from my face to my shoulders, gripping tight.

“Oh, Arthur,” she said softly. “Did you think I didn't know?”

The world tilted.

“What?”

“You're my son. I've watched you your whole life. Did you really think I couldn't see?” Her eyes were bright with unshed tears, but she was smiling. Actually smiling. “The way you never looked at girls the way Henry did. The way you'd go quiet whenever someone mentioned marriage. That friend of yours at Cambridge, Julian. The way you looked at him when you thought no one was watching.”

“Mum—”

“I never said anything because I didn't want to push. Didn't want to make you feel cornered or afraid. I thought... I hoped... when you were ready, you'd tell me.” Her grip on my shoulderstightened. “And now you have. And you've brought someone home. Someone you love.”

She released me and turned to Tom, who was standing very still, face carefully blank in a way I recognised as his combat expression. Braced for impact.

My mother walked up to him, barely reaching his shoulder, and looked up into his face with the same searching gaze she'd turned on me.

“Thomas,” she said. “Will you take care of him? As much as he'll let you, which I know from experience isn't always much?”

Something cracked in Tom's expression. The careful blankness shifting into something raw and real. “I'll try. Every day. For as long as he'll have me.”

My mother nodded once. Then she reached up, took his face in her hands the same way she'd taken mine, and pulled him down to press a kiss to his forehead.

“Welcome to the family,” she said.

I don't remember muchof the next few minutes clearly.

Bea was crying and laughing at the same time, hugging me, hugging Tom, demanding to know everything immediately. My mother was ushering us into the sitting room, calling for tea, fussing over Tom's coat and whether he'd had enough to eat on the train. And I was standing in the middle of it all, stunned into silence, trying to process what had just happened.