Archive of Our Own ^beta

William Schofield had always been a tidy person, a proper Englishman, and that had never changed. But of course, when one is crawling around in the mud of the trenches and through disgusting craters full of dirt water, one must come to terms with getting their hands mucked up. When the war was won and he was sent home with honors, he bounced right back to his neat, clean, tidy self.

There was just one issue. Okay, there were many more than just one, but there was one prominent issue that he could not fix.

No matter how many times he skipped off to the bathroom, he could still feel that mud clinging to his hands; drying, flaking, and it never came off. He was worrying his wife, he knew, but he couldn’t stop.

There were many nights, when Will sat up ramrod straight in bed with a wet face—wet with either sweat or tears, he could never decide—that he scrubbed his hands raw. But it never fucking came off, and the mud was only the half of it.

There was blood.

German’s blood, comrades’ blood, his own blood. Lance Corporal Blake’s blood.

Every night, when he doused his hands in soap water and dug underneath his fingernails, Mary would urge him away by the door of the washroom. She took his hands, he couldn’t tell which of their hands were shaking, if they both were, and pulled him away from the sink. Will didn’t want to get the mud on her, but she insisted.

He scrubbed for every moment that he got his hands dirty. For every life he could remember being taken. For the baby and the poor French girl that blessed him, to make up for even touching them with his cursed, muddy, bloodstained hands. For the young German soldier who he had to strangle with his bare hands. The boy couldn’t have been any older than Blake. He had to strangle him. Oh God, oh God no.

Will scrubbed harder.

He could remember one night in particular, around 2:35 in the morning, when his mind wandered farther than usual—that was quite, quite far.

He distantly heard Mary’s horrified shriek. Will looked down at the sink. Blood covered his raw hands—real blood this time, not the phantom blood that usually coated them. He apologized weakly, profusely, for getting blood everywhere. For bringing the war back into their home with his incessant scrubbing.

Mary rushed to pull him away from the sink, to bandage his hands, to kiss his face and cry for him, even though he did not deserve it.

Will got blood on her hands, on her nightgown, he soiled her. He promised it wouldn’t happen again, that he would try to be better for her.

He started back up in less than a week.

It all came to a head on the night of February 18th, 1919. Will’s hands had become less raw and aching, but his nightmares hadn’t subsided. He wandered the house like a ghost, just a memory of a husband and a father.

He hardly showed affection to his wife in private anymore, though he was better at keeping up appearances in front of the children and out in public, when he managed to leave the house. Mary stayed dutifully by his side, and Will wanted to get on his knees and beg her to find somebody better. Somebody that deserves her and the kids.

They don’t deserve a man so broken as he is.

He suffered another bout of sleeplessness that night, and he sat silently on the edge of the bed, Mary curled up beside him, resting on his shoulder.

“There was someone else… wasn’t there…?” She whispered eventually, her voice small and broken. Will flinched as if he’d been physically struck. “It’s okay, I-I understand—I mean, you were alone for so long in a foreign country and—and I know that French women are very beautiful,” She stuttered and choked on her words. “It’s okay, I promise, I just—I just want my husband back, Will…”

Will turned his head to stare at her in shock, his eyes glazed over and dead.

He sobbed.

Mary immediately wrapped her arms around him, buried her face in his hair and pulled him to her chest to hide his face as he was wont to do once upon a time.

“No, no,” Will repeated over and over again, his hands shaking violently and he held her waist. “No,” if he said it enough, he hoped he’d believe it.

“No—no woman, Mary, no woman,” He cried, unable to come out with it. “No woman at all, no woman.” Mary had always known him very well. He hoped she could read between the lines one last time.

Mary was silent apart from the sobs wracking her own body. “A…?” She sucked in a breath from between her teeth. She couldn’t say it either. Will nodded, cried harder.

She held him tighter, more motherly than romantic, and kissed the top of his head. “I love you, Will, no matter what. I love you so much.”