Rose was carrying a basket on her hip. She was sweating. It was hot and now she was dragging the limpets she had been collecting up to her yard to join other women in preparing fishing lines. Rose knew town well and so she passed through different lanes and yards, instead of taking the main roads, as it was much quicker. But as she entered one of the narrow yards, she stopped in her tracks and wrinkled her nose. “Claude? What on earth do you think you’re doing?” She put her basket down just to be able to put her hands on her hips.

Claude often thought of himself as responsible. A man of twenty-four who still lived at home and helped kept the household together for his younger siblings. Yet with parents such as his, responsibilities didn’t always mean legal ways of obtaining money to live off. He shivered just thinking about what his father would do if he found out, and yet there was no other way.

He was looking through a small pouch counting the money within when Rose rounded the corner on him and a younger man of eighteen from the other side of the town. With a light curse Claude shoved a sack containing a couple of almost empty bottles of alcohol and a pouch of tobacco leafs into the young man’s arms, indicating his head for the boy to go as he pocketed the money and turned to leave.

But it couldn’t be that simple.

“Morning Miss Ward” He replied turning to look at her, unable to produce a smile. He could see too much of Simon in her.

It was no wonder Claude and Simon had been friends. They both had a catch for trouble. Rose had been a bit of a troublemaker as a child, bit she hadn't actually gone criminal.
She did not return the greeting but pursed her lips, hands still on her hips. "I didn't know you'd opened a shop," she said, voice thick with irony. The fact that Claude was older did not scare her off. Rose too believed herself to be a responsible adult, and she was determined to keep idiots like Claude out of prison.

"And it ain't any of your business" he replied sharply, very much telling her to back down and drop the topic. But as annoying as Rose was, she was still a Ward, and Claude could never truly be rude to her because of it. He moved forward and took hold of her basket before turning on his heel to head towards her family home. She wasn't the only one who knew the backstreets of their town. Claude probably even knew of a couple she didn't.

Rose did not thank him for carrying her basket for ahe wasn’t done with her lecture. “I would have expected at this stage you'd be a bit more…” It wasn’t her place to say it, Rose realised. She said it anyway: “mature, Claude. Think of what would happen to your family if they locked you up.”

Claude shot her a look, lifting the basket to rest on his shoulder. "And you think living on the street is better?"

"You can earn her money honestly. And you've got a home Claude." Admittedly, there were plenty of stories about Claudes mum being a bit of a drinker. "And younger siblings to look after."

"What do you think I am doing Miss Ward?" Claude stopped walking to look at her. "You know as well as me that there is little to no work in this town that isn't already being done by someone. If selling off almost empty bottles of alcohol and my lot of monthly tobacco keeps that roof over my siblings heads, then that's what I will do. So dam well mind yourself, I'm not Simon."

He turned and kept walking, switching shoulders the basket was on. Perhaps he went to far, but she needed to leave it alone.

Rose hadn't expected that. She felt her cheeks burn as she realised that she had been judging to quickly. The reference to Simon stung. Rose kept quiet for a moment, processing the blow. "Sorry..." she finally said quietly. "Let me take that basket." And she held out her hands to take it from him, partly because she wanted to get away from him.

Claude ignored her offer and kept walking. "I won't make a lady carry it, I have some manners" he replied, the closest to an apology she was going to get. "...Are you getting enough work?" he quietly added, not something one should ask, but Simon would kill him if Claude didn't look after his family like his own.