Author Note: The Girl Who Fell Out of The Ocean is currently a first draft. 

Can the dead die again? 

That was the question that Charlie was asking himself as Lavinia's body hung in his arms like a dead thing.

He knew the room was about to erupt with noise, noise from Anna and his sister May the two loudest voices in the room. 

But he couldn't hear them, all he could hear, all he could see was Lavinia. Her frail body was nestled to him and was dripping with water, he thought she ought to be shaking, instead, drips hung from her dark lashes like tears. 

Tears that she wished she was weeping he thought. He held her tightly, thoughts ran through his mind, thoughts of Lavinia needing to be in dry clothes, Lavinia needing to go to bed, Lavinia needing to sleep, Lavinia needing to forget and Dolly.

Dolly.

Dolly.

Dolly.

What Charlie wanted and what Lavinia needed was put on a momentary paused, in fact, the world didn't seem to pause but play once more. 

Charlie tore his eyes away from his dripping friend and the world came back into motion and sound came back with it, the first thing he heard was his sister verbally attacking the mother of the girl who lay in his arms.

"Whoa, there lady," May took a step forward away from February and closer to Anna.

"Excuse me," If Anna could she would have looked down her nose at May but as luck would have it they were about the same height, May was about half an inch taller and to a short person that half an inch is everything.

"Ye heard me, clearly ye daughter is off her rocker, keeping her from March, is helping her how?"

Anna stepped forward, George attempted to pull her back by her elbow, but Anna just snatched it away.

"You think this is new?" Said Anna looked at Lavinia with anger in her eyes.

"It's just the next thing, and then there will be another after that,"

Anna was furious, she didn't know how angry she was until she let it all spill from her lips.

"Look at her, just look at her!" Anna's voice grew louder.

"Hanging from your brother, nearly drowning herself in the bathroom today."

George moved towards his wife and touched her shoulder and this time, she allowed him to leave it there.

"You know,"

Her eyes moved past May's and locked on Charlie's.

"You know it's always water, whenever she tries to..." Anna's voice broke, Charlie hadn't realised not until that very moment that the Gregory's had had years of Lavinia hurting, harming herself and... Even Charlie's mind didn't want to think the words. 

But it was a fact that needed to be addressed, Lavinia repeatedly has tried to end her own life and always via the means of water. George stepped in front of Anna protectively.

"Doctor Charlton, when Lavinia flooded our bathroom this afternoon Anna and I we made a promise to each other," Anna squeezed his hand tightly. 

She was looking for comfort and so was he, they needed one and other to get them through the latest trials of Lavinia and as the remaining water from the bathroom trickled down the stairs Charlie realised this was no different.

"We promised we would let go,"

"Excuse me?" Said Charlie suddenly stuck.

George gave him a half-hearted smile.

"Lavinia promised us she would go and see her brother and sister next week but when she gets back..." George just shrugged.

"We are not going to wrap her up in cotton wool, force her to be what she his not,"

Charlie's face fell, he was stunned, he couldn't help thinking that what they really meant was next time Lavinia tries to drown herself they were going to let her.

"Don't look at me like that," George's voice shook a little, Charlie could see this conversation was hurting him.

"We have tried everything there is to try and all roads always lead us back to here," George looked away from Charlie and back as his wife who was fighting back the tears. George lightly kisses Anna's soft forehead and without really separating from her he reached to the heavy oak kitchen table where sitting on it was the folder about Marxby Manor that Charlie had given him some weeks earlier.

"I don't think we should keep this," said George.

Placing it into Charlie's stunned hands.

"You absolutely should keep it," said Charlie.

He tried to force it back onto Geoge but he wouldn't keep the folder. 

"No," said George pushing the folder away and shaking his grey head.

"We just don't believe in it," said Anna her strong voice suddenly commanding the room.

And as Lavinia lay limp in his arms he couldn't be sure that that was true.

1915- France

I was standing in a line of other doctors and nurses we were waiting for lunch. When Will came up behind me I didn't need to turn to see his face I just felt him there his strong, alarming presence I knew it was him the air around me told me so.

His lips were close to my ear and I knew he was going to say something but what, I didn't know, I didn't much care either I was too focused on my heart furiously attacking my chest. Its need to beat it's way out was almost painful, I wanted to turn and face Will but I wouldn't, I couldn't.

"Meet me," he whispered.

I didn't say anything, I wanted to meet him, in that moment I would have done anything, the emotional charge from my brother leaving had amplified everything.

 But it wasn't just Jimmy, I had been around Will for weeks and the tension between us was getting worse by the day. Anger yes, there was anger, but it was mostly everything I had felt at Marxby, everything I had worked so hard to bury when I married Niall it was rushing up to the surface and here I was in a queue for lunch being suffocated by it.

"Alright," I said.

"I will meet you,"

Charlie's Cottage -Present Day

When Charlie got back to his cottage his was feeling deflated, he lay on his bed and held the brown folder in-between his fingertips as if by holding it there was something he could do for Lavinia. 

He let it fall open and saw his own notes looking back at him, notes about Marxby and the mystery that surrounded the manor house. As he got to the last page he saw that George had started to make his own notes.

Marxby Manor closed -1918

Marxby Manor reopened -1927

Why???

Charlie was as puzzled as George, they knew that there was an event that Charlie has always presumed was related to Dolly that caused the Marxby family to close the estate. But why reopen it nine years later? 

Did the Marxby's ever come home again?

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