In the middle of the night, the house on Peachtree Street was still. The air was humid and oppressive, and nowhere more so than in Scarlett's bedroom. Slinking in to the room with the guilty grace of a thief, Rhett knelt beside Scarlett's bed and smoothed the sweat-dampened hair away from her white face with one large brown hand. With his hand on her clammy cheek, his thumb swept slowly across her temple. Under the heat of his touch, she began to stir. Still apparently asleep, she turned her face against his palm with a sigh.

"Rhett... are you here? Is that really you? Oh, Rhett...no, why are you...would you be..." Her head tossed, pulling away from his palm.

A grip of ice banded his chest, squeezing, constricting his breathing. Of course, she didn't want him. Why would she? He had caused this pain. He had laid her low like this.

"You must be a dream," Scarlett murmured, feverish. "He wouldn't come...he hates me, the baby...oh, Rhett," she thrashed and began to flail. Worried she may hurt herself, Rhett gently pinned her arms and pressed his cheek to hers to whisper, "Hush, Scarlett. You must stay still."

He felt the flutter of an eyelash as her eyes drifted unevenly open.

"Rhett? Is it really you?"

His mouth opened but he couldn't speak. To say yes and feel her recoil, retreat. Her arms heaved again, but his grip had gone slack and they slipped from under his slick, sweaty palms.

He was surprised to feel her arms drape around his shoulders. There was no clutch or press; weakened, her thin limbs lay on him like so much silk, barely heavier than breath. His heart thudded painfully.

"Oh, Rhett, you're here. You're here."

He shifted, uncomfortable, waiting for the blow. "I...Scarlett," he began, the stammer foreign on his tongue.

Her voice was fading. He could feel her eyelashes fluttering fast against his cheek. A whisper of movement or maybe just the air disturbed. "Hold me, Rhett...sorry...don't go."

He stirred restlessly. She was delirious, but this was his fault. This was all his fault.

His arms were careful as he lifted her own from his shoulders and folded them down, gentle as he gathered her close. The bed dipped under his weight, sliding her closer as he shifted to lay alongside her. His own breathing was loud and harsh in his ears, and he muffled it in her hair. Her breath was barely a sigh across his clavicle. He wasn't sure if his neck was damp from her tears or his own guilty sweat.

…

Mammy came to check on Scarlett before dawn. Her face was heavy with the sorrow of the last few days but a broad grin briefly cracked it when she found Scarlett in the cradle of Rhett's broad chest. Leaving behind the metal tub of clean, coolly wet cloths for soothing her patient, she retreated swiftly, and plodded to the kitchen to send a maid up with breakfast for, optimistically, two. Scarlett had been turning away from all but cool, clear water for days but, perhaps...well. Cap'n Butler!

Rhett stirred as a disturbance gradually penetrated his sleep-fogged brain. There must be a damn bird at the window, he thought. He wanted to roll over, to get up and throw the sash and chase the unwelcome morning away. But he was trapped by slight arms, a black head on his chest. His eyes flew open. Scarlett.. The bird was his wife, making soft, pained chirps against his chest.

"Shh," he soothed, knowing no words to help her. He was afraid to touch her more than the arm draped lightly over her hip, unsure of where her hurts lay, feeling that - inside and out - she was a minefield for him. One of her hands on his waist clenched frantically at his shirt. He cupped it softly with his own, his arm bent awkwardly.

"Shh, Scarlett," he whispered again, his fingers stroking her hand and softening her grip. With a soft, gasping exhale, her fingers relaxed and she quieted down again. Rhett smoothed her opened palm on his waist. He shifted, raising his head to look around, and saw the breakfast tray set on a table. A lot of breakfast for a convalescent, infrequently conscious Scarlett. He quirked a sardonic brow. He had been caught.

Scarlett's breathing was regular again, deep in sleep. He slid slowly, carefully from the bed, placing her hand on the sheets, not letting it fall. With a quiet Indian stalk he crossed to the breakfast tray. The guilt still heavy in his gut roiled at the sight of food, so he poured himself a coffee only. He dropped into the watcher's chair placed next to Scarlett's bed, cupped the mug in both hands and stared over it at his wife. Mammy must have been in recently as a gentle, vague steam still wafted off the liquid to tickle his chin.

Scarlett.

What to do?

He tried to remember, to decipher her broken whispers from last night. His name, unmistakable. Not with hate or anger; but then her voice was hoarse and soft and too weak for any inflection at all, it seems. And no...but hold me. Could she want him here?

Unexpectedly, his gut tightened with a vicious clench, the guilt in his stomach a bitter acid. The guilt was deep, went beyond the fall which had left her broken in this bed. It went back over the last three months, whirling wildly, drunkenly through Charleston and New Orleans with his child, stolen from her mother. His Bonnie, who screamed with terror and called for him in the night, and looked up at him with her big blue eyes in her mother's face as she asked for that mother every morning. The guilt rolled back three months, carrying a frantic Scarlett up the wide stairs that she would later tumble back down, stifling her struggles with a punishing hold. But hadn't she kissed him back? Hadn't she turned to him with nearly forgotten passion, with fervor and - and presence, that had never been there before? And cowardly, he'd run away… He shoved these thoughts down. With her broken body before him he couldn't see anything but the accumulation of his own guilt. Scarlett didn't fall down the stairs. She fell down the mountain of Rhett Butler's sins.

The litany of sins went even deeper. Taunting her but never trusting her. Showering her with gifts, but no honesty for what he was trying to buy. Protecting himself, his own heart, like a coward again. In his own hateful stew, he was unaware of the tempest glowering in his black eyes. It's all his fault!

But Scarlett stirred then, her fist again clenching and releasing, empty. When her eyes fluttered open they met his hard, bitter gaze and she automatically recoiled.

With a bitten-off curse, Rhett leapt to his feet. Of course, it was just the night. Maybe a nightmare where any comfort would have done as well as his. This was his fault, and Scarlett - who hadn't wanted him for years, anyway - surely hated him now. He almost dropped the mug back on the breakfast tray before he headed to the door, his long legs carrying him there in swift strides. A whisper caressed his ears but his hand was on the knob before it slipped into his brain.

"No! Rhett...oh please...don't..."

She hadn't finished the sentence but it's unmistakable. Isn't it? He wanted it to be, wanted her to be asking him to stay. She shouldn't be. He shouldn't believe it, and almost couldn't, but he wanted to. The burning guilt in his gut cleared abruptly and he felt hollow. And empty. And most of all, tired. He was so tired, these years together have exhausted him. Playing the game every day with Scarlett. Watching and waiting but most tiring, keeping himself close to himself alone. Hiding from Scarlett. From his wife, damnit! She was still his wife.

He released the knob and turned back to the bed. Scarlett's eyes were open and clear, now. For now. They were dry, huge in her drawn face. He tried to read them but his usual sense of clarity regarding his wife's motives had left him in the confused morning. Wary? But what else? His cocky grin was ready, but he couldn't think of anything to say. He wasn't so far gone from a gentleman that he could mock her now, but he had no habit of level conversation with her. With his own wife.

How had they gotten so lost?

He merely shrugged, instead. Returned to the table for his mug of coffee and sat back down. The mug was a fragile, inadequate shield.

"Good morning, Scarlett." What else to say? They will have to talk. They will, finally, have to talk. Or not. They can go on, cocooning themselves in separate bitter shells, outsides prickly with self defense. Neither of them have been honest.

Scarlett was flushed, the color in her cheeks startling against her general pallor. Her eyes were pale, too, and light, and for a long time he thought he was lost in them. Lost without seeing, without comprehension. He wasn't looking for truth in them this morning - he was glad enough to see life in them. Her breathing was too fast, too shallow; her lips slightly parted and dry. She must be thirsty. He turned away, rose and moved back to the tray – did he imagine one sharper breath, a pained gasp? - and traded his mug of coffee for a glass of water. Returning to her side, Rhett lowered himself gingerly to the mattress.

"Can you drink this, Scarlett?" She nodded and he slid his arm gently under her shoulders. Her coarse black hair caught on his rough fingertips and dragged through the hair on his arms. A shiver passed between them. He lifted gently, raising her up as he brought the glass to her lips. Her hands came up to clasp it just under his grip but he did not relinquish. Her fingers felt cold and he doubted she could actually hold it on her own. Slowly, Scarlett drained the water. Rhett smiled with relief, and encouragement, and it was natural and unforced so feels almost strange on his face.

Her clear green eyes watched him like a wild animal.

He turned back to the tray. "Mammy brought breakfast. Do you think you can eat something?" No, they won't talk yet. Heal her, first, before they can - maybe - heal each other. Heal them. She didn't answer and he didn't check but grabbed a plate of eggs and a fork. Was this for him? Was this something Scarlett should or could eat? As had ever been the case with her, Scarlett had put him on unfamiliar ground.

What did one feed to one's estranged, bitter, beloved wife as she recovered from the loss of your child at your own hands?

He returned swiftly to the bedside chair. Scarlett's eyes had closed. Though her breathing was still too shallow, some of the flush had gone out of her cheeks. Asleep again. Rhett's forceful gaze lingered on her until he gave up, ducked his head and ate the eggs himself. Returning to the tray, he grazed on cold bacon and sipped his coffee, most of its warmth now gone.

A quiet flurry of sound from downstairs and he figured Melly had arrived for her daily vigil in the sick room. Nursing her best friend who, even more so conscious than not, wouldn't appreciate her or the effort. His mouth twisted scornfully before a surge of guilt wiped it off, and Scarlett broken at the foot of the stairs flashed in his brain. His head was pounding.

Guilty, uncomfortable, he didn't want Melly to find him in Scarlett's room. He slipped out to his own room before her gentle eyes could catch him. For the first time since Scarlett's fall, he closed his door.