šš šššššš ā an independant, private and selective portrayal of thomas barrow, of downton abbey. 18+, oc and crossover friendly, est. 2024. written by jae (he/they).
š¶ šššš¹š š¾š ... self-preservation, bitterness worn as a suit of armour, a cruel facade hiding a soft heart, the trappings of the class system, loneliness, ambition, bravery, cowardice, one man vs the world, the 'reformed bully', period-typical homophobia, forbidden love, queer longing, defiance.
001. standard roleplay ettiquette applies ā be nice, no god-modding, try to match my length & I'll try to match yours, etc, etc. I won't tolerate any form of sexism, racism, homophobia or transphobia here. I will not rp r#pe, non-con or dub-con.
002. this blog is 18+, minors dni. mun is over 25
003. format and style my posts with icons, small text, and additional italics, bold, and some strikethroughs to show character thought process. you do not need to match my styalisation. if any of my formatting is difficult to read then let me know and I will adjust for our threads.
004. there will likely be some triggering content on this blog (including, but not limited to, mentions of alcohol, self harm, suicide, death, violence and injury). these will be tagged as cw: content. I am okay with writing darker themes with partners that I trust, but there has to be an open dialogue about the thread first. I will not rp r#pe or s/a, although am fine with it being a part of a character's backstory.
005. along that same train of thought, there will be mentions of period-typical homophobia on this blog. thomas is gay in a time when that was not an acceptable thing to be and, as such, I will occasionally be using some outdated terminology when refering to the idea of queerness in the early 20th century. (i.e deviancy, sexual inversion, etc).
see this post for some more info.
006. if nsfw content appears on this blog, it will be tagged as such, and anything graphic will be placed under a 'read more'.I will not rp graphic smut with anyone under the age of 21.
007. ć ¤this blog is multi-ship, although thomas is quite guarded due to past experiences, and tends to hold people at an arms length. he is a difficult person to get close to, although it's not impossible - he just requires a lot of care and patience when it comes to emotions. ships won't be forced and rely on plotting & building things organically. chemistry is important between both the muses and the writers.
DISCLAIMERS. mun =/= muse. there are aspects of thomas that are rather unsavory, he is a complicated person and has done some questionable things in his life, for a plethora of reasons. mun does not excuse his bitterness, his attitude, or condone some of his more problematic actions, but it is this complexity that makes him such a compelling character in my opinion.
in regards to that kiss scene; it was incredibly stupid of him and, even if jimmy kent had returned his feelings, kissing someone while they are sleeping is extremely inappropriate. thomas deeply regrets these actions. even though he had been led on and tricked into believing that jimmy liked him in that way, he wasn't thinking clearly and acted out of desperation, and acknowledges that it was not okay.
CREDITS. I do not claim the rights to the character of thomas barrow or to downton abbey. this blog is just for personal entertainment purposes. faceclaim is robert james-collier, whom I have no affilication with, nor represent. all icons and graphics used were made by me unless otherwise stated. psd used is "hunter" by anniexoxos.
thomas barrow's arc in relation to wwi is actually like. I really like it. it makes sense. yeah war is horrifying and it's completely understandable why he wanted out, and I love that he got away with it, because personally I'm on the side of a working class man who got in over his head because he didn't really know what he was getting himself into, versus the literal british army. also yay thomas getting away with a plan! more of his plans should have succeeded <3
With the transition of Downton hosting a wedding reception and getting used to life as a mother to a newborn, Anna was relieved to finally catch Thomas alone in his pantry. Knocking on his door before stepping inside, Anna greeted him with a warm smile. āIāve been meaning to catch you without anyone around, especially Mr Bates.ā Knowing how Thomas and her husband felt about each other, it was a relief not to have to deal with any tension, even though much of it seemed to have de-escalated. āI know we struggled getting on in the past, but I could see a change in you even before you left to work for Sir Mark. I see it now ever since you took over for Mr Carsonā¦ but I donāt believe anyone has told you that weāre happy how youāre runninā things here. Iām proud of you, truly."
in honor of the final movie and official end to the series that has spanned over a decade, here are some of my favorite unhinged moments from downton abbey
the family is terrified one of their servants is planning to poison a visiting noble but when they intervene they discover he only intended to pour soup on his lap
a character arrives claiming to be the main characterās cousin who supposedly died on the titantic, but has heavy facial scarring so no one is 100% sure if itās him or not. he leaves and is never mentioned again.
a character is accused of a different crime and must prove his innocence every season for three seasons straight. one season later, his wife is accused of a crime.
two seasons of a characterās story are dedicated to her weighing they benefits of three different suitors vying for her hand in marriage. she ends up with none of them and they drop from the story entirely.
a servant attempts to make himself look good by kidnapping his employerās dog and then being the one to find the āmissingā dog. the plan fails when he LOSES the dog but still ends up getting a promotion.
a character is almost sent to australia but is rescued at the last second because heās good at cricket
at one point, a character is about to be fired for blackmailing another servant, but regains his job security by saving his employerās daughter from a fire
(the above three are all the same guy, who two seasons later loses his job because the family wants to downsize the house staff)
three different servants at the same house attempt a bed and breakfast side hustle and no one ever comments on the fact that they may be infringing on each otherās business
the same character is peer pressured into accepting a proposal from a guy she does not particularly like not once but TWICE because everyone around her thinks heās nice. she has no family connections that would make this advantageous.
a noble calls one of the servants stupid and he responds by forging a letter inviting the nobleās mistress and illegitimate son to an important gathering. he gets away with this.
a duke dies in the bedroom of one of the main characters and to avoid a scandal they drag is corpse through the hall in the middle of the night back to his designated bedroom
in order to make his valet look bad, a character hides every shirt the family patriarch owns in the laundry shoot before a party
a characterās first husband dies in a car crash, and one of her subsequent love interests (and eventual second husband) is a race car driver that frequently engages in reckless driving behaviors. the characterās concerns about this is treated as something she is being unreasonable about and needs to get over and the option that either he could give up racing cars or that they might just not be suited to each other are dismissed entirely
thomas' war wound should have, would have, absolutely affected his work when he was back in service.
the bullet that struck his hand left more than just a nasty scar. he was shot through the palm, and even though it was a relatively clean shot, the bullet would have still torn through several important muscle groups, shattered the small bones and completely obliterated his nerves. that hand would have been nigh-on-useless for a long time.
even taking into account the fact that he's incredibly lucky and it heals well, and he's given good physio treatment and excerises to employ to rebuild the strength, I highly doubt that he would have gained full mobility of all of his fingers again.
his pinky and ring finger are the most affected. he can still very much do his job, but he has to adapt the way he holds things with the left hand, gripping mainly with his index, pointer finger and thumb. the nerves in that hand are forever damaged, and he probably ends up developing a tremor, particularly when the muscles are overworked. the glove he wears doesn't just hide the scarring from prying eyes, but it serves a function too. it's made of hard leather, reinforced, acting like a brace or a longstanding compression bandage to help him manage with the strain.
I doubt that an older Thomas Barrow (S4-S6) would have voluntarily told anyone about his sexuality after all that has happened.
But the idea of a young Thomas Barrow, arriving at Downton Abbey, kicked out of his parents house for his sexuality, being in dire need of a friend, would have probably one day told Ms. oāBrien.
And the idea of a young Thomas putting this very dark and dangerous secret into the hands of a woman he trusted only for her to use it against him and almost getting him kicked out and into prison is so deeply horrible and disgusting to me.
Because a young Thomas Barrow would not have been so careful around people. Because a young Thomas Barrow probably still had trust in others.
Only for him to have this trust shattered into pieces from a person he thought was kind of his friend.
I canāt imagine how this must have felt for him.
Truthfully Javert had wanted to find somethingā or perhaps expected was more accurate, given what he'd heard about the man. In passing the torch Mr. Carson had shared only irritatingly vague but definitely less than complimentary snippets about Barrow, leaving the new butler suspicious but without cause. He should have pressed harder, he supposed, but the man had been his superior then.
Still, he doesn't intend this to be an interrogation. He'll observe, of course, equally silver gaze falling on Barrow; but that could cut any direction for now. In asking permission at all, Javert perhaps has revealed a brief glimpse of his underbelly. He has been installed by the proper process and in that sense he belongs, but he has been in service long enough to know that a successful butler is either a tyrant or a leader. In spite of his demeanor, he believes in the latter, though he is never going to be everyone's friendā he has never been anyone's, so he's not about to start now.
That's what he tells himself. The look they share, the gesture of a light; Javert feels he is crossing some invisible boundary from which there will be no coming back. Will this destroy any respect the staff may feel for him? If so, will it be replaced with something just as valuable? He doesn't know yet as he props himself stiffly against the brick wall and takes smoke into his lungs. And as if that's not already enough of a departure, Barrow asks a question that he answers first with a sharp look.
"It's a fine house and better run than many." He assumes that is due to the earl; if a fish rots from the head down, the opposite is also true. "Full of life, too." Not just a dead set piece. "Open to new ideas..." That he's less pleased by. "You were here. Why not promote you?" He asks as newly formed smoke curls in front of them. If there's some dark reason he doesn't expect Barrow to tell him, but the reaction could still be instructive.
the corners of the underbutler's lips twitch slightly, curling upwards into a small smile at the other's recollection. it was true ā back when the two had first met thomas was a lost soul, wounded, bitter and resentful. but, while the servant still possessed a sharp tongue and a fierce attitude, there was something softer about him these days.
it was emmanuel's persistent kindness, that same care that the gardener put into tending the earth, that had helped to reshape thomas. like clay, warmed under a constant touch, becomes pliable, so to has thomas allowed himself to change. it was emmanuel's infectious warmth, that has coaxed this gentleness from the other. still, that cold facade thomas wears so well is presented to the rest of the world like a shining suit of armour, but to emmanuel it is peeled back willingly.
the other has seen the worst of him ā broken and crumbling, angry and wounded ā has seen the glimmer of hope, the potential, restrained kindness. now, this part of thomas is offered up willingly, unfiltered in their private moment, sheltered and hidden from the rest of the world. fragile, gentle, romantic.
a shiver works its way down servant's spine as his name passes through emmanuel's lips, a whispered breath that draws him in. magnetic, alluring. he wants to hear it again, he's desperate for it to mean what he thinks it means...
because thomas has been wrong before. he remembers jimmy kent, and the way that his feelings for the man had run rampent, clouding his judgement, leading him astray, into believing they were the same. the disgust in the young footman's eyes was a sight still burned into the back of thomas' mind... he had been so careful not to make the same mistake again.
but this was no mistake. there had never, ever been any judgement, any revulsion in emmanuel, the man seemed to accept everything about him with open arms ā nothing seemed to phase the other... not thomas' anger, his bitterness, not his hopelessness nor dispair. not even this, this deviance of nature. that alone was enough to encourage a spark of hope in the servant.
a hand cups his face and thomas leans into it, sighing out the breath he hadn't realised he was holding as he relaxed into the touch ā emmanuel seemed to constantly have that affect on him, calming, grounding. although, his frantic hummingbird beat of a heart continues, fluttering wildly in his chest. grey hues flicker closed briefly and, turning his head slightly, daring to press another gentle kiss to the other's palm.
em's touch only prompts thomas further. his own hand mirrors the action, reaching out to the other's cheek. a thumb gently caresses his cheek bone, sweeping away the beads of raindrops that have collected on em's skin. leaning ever closer, the underbutler presses his forehead against the other's as the lingering space between them seems to dwindle ever smaller.
god he wants to kiss him, he yearns for it, but thomas hesitates. even after all of this, a flash of fear strikes through the under butler. the world is a dangerous place for men like him, he needs to be sure.
ā ...please... ā the word is barely uttered, the sound carried on a whispered, shaking exhale. a murmured request of permission. heavy lidded eyes take one final sweep over the other's features before thomas slowly moves to close the distance between them...
he will break his heart. emmanuel knows that much. one day, tomorrow, or in a year, or ten, he will skip out of this role he took on, for being a gardener has to be but a role, and go back to how things used to be. the trees will heal, he will no longer be needed by something selfless and overwhelming, and there will be no reason to stay. none that he could defend in face of the great ineffable. the realisation chokes him up and flashes in his eyes, the eyes that slip downwards as not to overwhelm the other, already so frail in his vulnerability. he doesn't want him to see. he doesn't want him to doubt. this once, he wants him to have something pure, something warm. show him that he can have that much. not to put his own doubts and anxieties on him now that he's bared his yearning for proximity.
it's a small forever for his lips to travel to his. it's plenty of time to make up his mind, to disappear right then and there, to stop him, to say something, to pause. he doesn't, though. he stays. and finds that it is that much easier to stay and go along, than it would have been to make any other choice. and when thomas does come to kiss him, there is a breath of relief, a hand settling on the other's nape to hold him there, the other curling into his jacket, staining it with remnants of soil. it's so easy to come forth and hold him and kiss him and let the moment alone erase the sorrow of what is to come. isn't that just what humans do, day by day? living with the prospect of losing, of dying, of forgetting. living here and now and not so desperately tangled up in the past and the future. drinking in the moment, drinking in the other they choose to share that moment with.
it's a chaste kiss, for a start, and emmanuel breaks away from it fairly soon to catch his breath, but still he holds the other close, still he longs to make sure thomas does not pull away. breathing in now feels different. he can taste him on his lips, he can feel the rainwater stained by them, together, as it evaporates from his skin, and greets the air. and his hand clasps the tighter on the other's clothes. not threatening, desperate. his eyes then do dare to find thomas's once more, as if to reassure that this is all still okay, before he can kiss him again. is it not better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all? is it not better to give him this, let him feel this overwhelming love and grace, than to let him for always go through life half-awake?
who knows what tomorrow will bring, or any other day? well, emmanuel does, to an extent, but willingly does he close the door on that knowledge. this matters. this, now. thomas, here. lips soft upon his, thirsty for what they have been denied by this world. love, understanding. tenderness.
ā yes, and no, I suppose. ā thomas hums non-commitally at the other's words, broad shoulders shrugging slightly in response. he pockets the packet of smokes, cheeks hollowing around his own cigarette as he takes another deep drag, savouring the familiar taste on his tongue. there were always places to be, choices to make ā that maybe so, but sometimes it was nice to just take the time to be. a short break from duty and decisions, a stolen moment of nothingness, or a space to think. it would end soon, once the tobacco had burnt out.
cool grey eyes watch with idle curiosity as emmanuel's careful fingers turn over the cigarette in his hand, studying it. thomas found himself almost enraptured. the gardener seemed to treat it with such care, as he did with anything else he touched, and in emmanuel's gentle grasp the small roll of dried leaves and paper seemed to transform into something almost precious.
it wasn't, though. it was just a smoke, nothing special. the under-butler had inhaled countless of them in his life, the evidence lay bare at their feet ā disgarded ends trodden into the ground, or stubbed out on the wall, indicated thomas' favourite smoking spots.
but his gaze continues, intense and unwavering, following the leaf of tobacco as it flew from the other's palm, carried away in the winter wind. it's that same bitter breeze that snaps him out of the almost-trance, and thomas shudders slightly against it.
ā mm, I can't say I have... ā a soft snort of amusement, though there was nothing of the malicious in his tone. no, it was fondness that now warmed his chest and swelled up to fall from his lips. the gardener used to annoy him, but now? right now thomas found that he could listen to the man talk about his plants with a slight intrigue ā the cracks in the facade were widening, lengthening, as a genuine smile breaks through the marble mask of his features. it's small, but it almost meets his eyes, a rare sight on the under-butler's face these days.
he shakes his head slightly, almost in astonishment.
ā you're a strange one, aren't you? ā and there's that fondness again. it's not a question, but an observation, an affectionate teasing. thomas finally turns his gaze to emmanuel's own, icy grey stormclouds flickering to meet the rich hues of the sun, but there is some warmth in the servant's eyes as he looks the other up and down. there's a comforting energy to him, a softness that exudes, and even extends to his words ā waxing poetic and philosophy as if it were easier than breathing... nothing could be so simple, and yet everything was so simple.
thomas' gaze flickers to the cigarette still held so lightly between the other's fingers, a dark brow quirking slightly in a silent question, as he leans in to light it for the other man.
a gentle smile for a moment breaks the solemn contemplation clouding his face. yes and no indeed. humans, given free choice and free government of their own lives, invented societies, money, religion, all to take that freedom away. he understand they need it, to a degree. he understands how overwhelming the act of choice may get, and how easy it is then to find comfort in voluntarily ridding oneself of choice, whether following somebody else's order or just choosing not to do anything at all. he understand, but he may never comprehend. a tool of god, even in moments of leisurely vacancy drawn like a bow, moments of calm only on the surface, while a mission reverberates through him. there is nothing calm in his core ever burning with duty, and yet calm is nothing if not what he exudes, moving slowly, speaking quietly. the clay so cool, so merciful.
eyes turn shut when for a moment he becomes much too aware of the strain of existing the way he does. no more than a moment, though. never more than a moment.
he draws a shaky breath, taking the opportunity, to drown in the singsong existence of the tobacco in its hand. it calls for home, a living being uprooted, now and it will call for home when it turns to smoke and moves freely towards the sky. soft thing, he can almost see the specks of pink though he knows they are not there, only a memory from leaves, yellowed and old, recalling their familiars. "they look like pink stars," he says, and wonders if he took to long. if the connection is already lost. "green, then white, then pink. a long tube with a bloom at the end." inadvertently, fingers gesture to evoke the size of such blossom, while the cigarette lay in his open palm. not that dissimilar in its dimensions.
he allows himself to get lost in the moment, and such genuine vulnerability is met with the other calling him strange. still, even as thomas says it, his voice bears no weight of disdain or judgement. it soars. it is fond, it is gentle, it is accepting. how wonderful that he feels safe to be just that, now. even now, emmanuel thinks only of the other and little of himself. how naturally does that come to him!
when the other reaches out with a lighter, he withdraws however. hesitant, apologetic almost, worrying he stepped over the worried line. "i ā would like to hold onto it a little longer. if that is alright with you. i, um, a lot to think about." the truth of the matter is, they just met. the dried leaf and him. he is in no rush to turn it into dust, though he is also very unsure what he is to do with it, other than smoke it. exist, maybe. embody it with thought, like prayer. anything to make the oncoming days of cold a little more bearable.
