It isn't a weakness to accept kindness. It isn't a weakness to allow yourself to be cared for.
He leaned in for a sniff. 'Smells like a horse's arse! I've got Ian!' -'No sniffing allowed! We never discussed sniffing! I cry foul!' Ian was outraged. 'I'm not giving you a shilling!' -'Give him a shilling! It's not his fault you smell like a horse...
Of course you're sorry. The first words out of the mouths of men who are caught doing something they're only too happy to continue until they're caught.
but the pain was old to him, and somehow it had become a part of him. He could bear it and speak of it. It had shaped him; he had accomodated it. He had loved abd he had lost and it had made him who he was.
He would ask nothing else from life if he would be allowed to protect and cherish her for the rest of his.
I suppose we all tend to want the impossible. And sometimes in attempting it we achieve something near enough to the impossible to elicit satisfaction.
