Page 61 of The Words Beneath the Noise

Tom looked wrong. That was my first thought, immediate and alarming. His face was pale beneath the weathering, eyes red-rimmed in a way that suggested he hadn't slept since France. And there was something shattered in his expression that I'd never seen before. Something broken open and bleeding.

“Art.” His voice came out rough. Scraped raw. “What are you?—”

“I wanted to see if you were alright.” The words tumbled out before I could polish them. “I've been thinking about it all day, about what you had to do, and I needed to see you properly.”

He stared at me for a long moment. Then he stepped back, wordlessly, leaving the door open.

An invitation.

I stepped inside and closed the door behind me.

His room was small and sparse, regulation army quarters with nothing personal except a few photographs pinned above the narrow bed and a battered book on the nightstand. The lamp was on, casting weak yellow light that did nothing to soften the stark angles of the space. His rifle case sat in the corner, cleaned and closed, but somehow still radiating presence.

Tom had moved to the window, standing with his back to me, shoulders hunched in a way that made him look smaller than he was.

“You shouldn't be here,” he said quietly. “Finch's new rules. Essential movements only.”

“Checking on you seems essential to me.”

A sound that might have been a laugh if it had any humour in it. “You said that this morning. With your eyes. Across the drive. I could tell you wanted to say something.”

“There wasn't time. There were people everywhere.”

“There's always people everywhere.” He turned his head slightly, not quite looking at me. “That's the hell of it, isn't it? We're surrounded by people and still completely alone.”

“You're not alone right now.”

Silence stretched between us, thick and uncomfortable. I could see his reflection in the darkened window, could see the way his jaw worked as he struggled with something internal.

Then his shoulders started shaking.

At first I thought he was laughing, some kind of delayed reaction to my awkward presence. But the sound that escaped him wasn't laughter. It was something rawer, something torn from deep inside his chest, and I realised with a jolt of alarm that Tom Hale was crying.

Not sobbing. Not breaking down dramatically. Just standing there at the window with tears sliding down his face and his hands clenched at his sides, crying with the silent intensity of a man who'd forgotten how to make noise when he hurt.

I didn't know what to do.

Touch wasn't my strength. Comfort wasn't my language. I spent my life translating other people's words and still couldn't find the right ones for moments like this.

But I moved anyway. Crossed the small room until I was standing beside him, close enough that our shoulders almost touched.

“Tom.”

“Don't.” His voice cracked. “Don't ask me what happened. You already know what happened.”

“I know. That's why I'm here.”

“He looked surprised.” Tom's words came out broken, jagged-edged. “Brandt. When the bullet hit him. He looked surprised, like he couldn't believe it. Like dying was something that happened to other people.” A shuddering breath. “He was stretching his legs. Just. Stretching his legs at a crossroads. And I killed him for it.”

“You killed him because he was helping the Germans win the war. Because his signals intelligence was sending U-boats after convoys and bombers after cities.”

“I know why I killed him. Knowing why doesn't make it easier.” He turned to look at me, and the raw pain in his eyes made my chest ache. “Your coordinates were perfect, Art. Perfect. Position, timing, escape routes. Everything exactly where it needed to be. And I keep thinking about how many hours you must have spent cracking that code, translating those messages, turning German words into a map that led straight to a bullet in a man's chest.”

“Is that. Do you blame me?”

“No.” The word came out fierce, almost angry. “God, no. I blame myself. I blame the war. I blame every single decision that led to me being the one behind that rifle.” His voice broke. “But I can't stop seeing his face. Can't stop wondering if he had someone waiting for him. Can't stop thinking about how your intelligence and my trigger finger added up to one more dead man in a war full of them.”

I reached out. Slowly, carefully, giving him time to pull away. My hand found his arm, fingers wrapping around his wrist where the pulse hammered fast and desperate beneath the skin.