Work Text:
Of all the Thomases in all the world, why did it have to be Wolsey?
You know it is all water under the bridge now.
A history.
You knew he must have one everyone does. And he's...well, he's Crumb. He's his own man. No man could demand everything of him. No man. Not even a king.
The evidence was undeniable though. Cromwell's rapid first rise in the world was deliberately constructed in a way that was too deliberate in retrospect to class it as anything but...premeditated on Wolsey's part.
You see the facts and you know it would be logical - it would be prudent - to simply move on.
But.
It's him.
You can accept this and somehow still move on. Everyone has a past.
Even Thomas Cromwell.
-----------------
You know he'll never understand.
Someone like Henry, who has been born with every advantage, whose life is draped in an intangible wealth you could never discover in the darkened corners of your family home... how could he ever understand the desperate need inside of you? To succeed. To be acknowledged. To be somebody.
And Wolsey could offer you everything. He was the second most important man in England and he could do anything. Every decision he made was met with a muttered agreement and a hasty attempt to please him, and you were among the masses wanting to be noticed. To have that sort of influence, the influence you have now... what would you do?
Wolsey favoured you above all others, even Gardiner who sent sullen glances your way when Wolsey invites you to his rooms alone. But whilst Gardiner imagines you are talking business, you are indulging in an act far more personal...
He will never understand this part of you, edged with shame but also with a realisation you would do the same again. Because you are with Henry now, and everything else is secondary, everything else means nothing as long as you are by his side.
You know everything about him, have seen him vulnerable and miserable and intensely open, and you want to expose yourself in the same intimate fashion.
He will understand. He must.
...........
You like to pretend sometimes that you were his first.
In your darkest moments it is easier to pretend a new life began the moment your two's eyes met than that there is any baggage.
You justify your own history too quickly. Make believe and playing pretend should be the hardest things in the world for a mind as firm as yours but you wear them like a second skin (that only crawls and inches a little now). You are too quick to wish away two wives and twenty-fours years of now inconsequential marriage.
Cromwell - Thomas - Crumb - freed you both times from those false marriages and you simply accepted it as a fact. He would always be there and nothing could ever come between the two of you for too long.
It should pain you more that these women officially permeate your relationship and weave themselves as the central pieces in a play where they are simply stragglers. You are perhaps to blame in a way, not as much as Cromwell, but enough to find fault in your own actions. One wife can be forgiven, two perhaps crosses a line.
You should forgive him.
(There's nothing to forgive.)
You remember last night when you asked. You actually stopped, looked into his calculating eyes and simply asked.
He answers you in the vaguest terms with the most problematic topic changes. Reminders of a bill that needs to come through. He asks you for a signature on a new law about customs taxes. He says every word you would expect but his eyes say something different:
This is a moment. This is something the rest of court can't touch.
Well. Wolsey then. You can accept that.
You don't care.
Except, of course, you do.
-----------
You can see in his eyes that everything has changed.
He asked you, bluntly and openly, free from his affected airs that he uses in company. That he even used with Catherine, with Anne, with all the girls that pass you with lust in their light eyes and purpose in their gait. They're only fucks, you tell yourself. Only fucks but they linger between you, shadowy barriers that sway and dart their eyes and purse their lips at the door.
But Wolsey is different; you have both loved him, in different ways, and his life and his death are constant sticking points; his shade hovers and disapproves, his sorrowful eyes boring into you; you are making a mistake.
You are, of course, but you continue to make it anyway.
Henry will never understand the desperation lacing your every choice, that thrums in your veins and urges you to claim more power and influence. You always want more, but you need him in a way that makes you vulnerable, in a way that is dangerous.
You're not his, and he isn't yours, but somehow you both are here now, staring at each other across a room filled with sadness and possession. You are mine, but you never can be and that is what you have to live with. It's enough; it has to be.
Please forgive me, you want to say, but instead you nod curtly and tell him, "If that's all..."
But how can it be?
-------
"No," you say, and then the word is there between you like a key to something you're both unsure of but cannot resist.
The differences between you are more paramount than ever now and for a moment you consider wishing it all away and imagining last night never happened. That you never saw those unwavering eyes widen and consider the possibility of the undiscovered.
For a moment you wish he was still only your right hand and nothing more but then - the hurt that crushes your chest for a moment and then the silence as you realise he still hasn't spoken.
Then he is on one knee.
"Your grace, let me help," he begs.
Begs.
You lean down and your lips meet his. No more words.
Tomorrow you will consider the past.
Tomorrow is another world.
For tonight, you're living in the present.
----------