AN: Thanks for the review, Lacontreras! I really wonder the same things as well :) So yeah here's chapter six, I really loved writing this, so I hope you'll like this.
Charles had no idea for how many days he had been drinking. The passage of time was simply irrelevant when you were trying to escape reality. And yet it still kept fighting to come back to the surface. No amount of rum could keep it buried for long. The night came as it did and Charles was simply too drunk to even lift the bottle to his lips to drink some more. So he accepted his fate and laid his head down.
The dreams that came to him were almost a repeat of the opium hazed dream he had had after Eleanor had taken away his ship. In the dream she looked odd, polished, without any visible flaws on her face. She was unreal as people in dreams often are.
"I never really loved you," she kept whispering, stroking his chest as she spoke. "Did you really think we would last?" She said and then laughed coldly. "Did you think we'd be a family?" She just laughed and laughed, realizing every word he thought she had been thinking. She never really loved me. She never really loved me. Charles woke up with tears in his eyes.
A week had passed since that day on the beach. Eleanor had finally confronted him, and gotten exactly the reaction she had feared. He wanted nothing to do with her, nothing to do with her child. She had run back to the tavern and let all the tears out. She cried for a long time, crying for herself, and for the child who would grow up without a father. Just like she had. That thought brought even more tears to her eyes. All Eleanor had ever wanted was her father to love her, and he never did. He never truly cared, he had wanted a son, and she was never truly good enough. Eleanor did not believe there was a god, and yet she prayed the child would be a boy. She prayed it would not be a girl for she did not think she'd be able to watch her own child struggle in this world as she had struggled. First as an unwanted child, who did not receive love, and then as the woman she had grown up to be, where she was not respected, where she tried to take care of herself, relying on no one, and yet still often failing. This world was a cruel place for a girl, and she did not want that to be the fate of her own child.
Tears rolled down her cheeks. God how she fished for a boy, but at the same time she touched her stomach and promised: Even if you are a girl, I will love you more than I can ever show you. You are wanted. You are loved. I will always love you, and I will love you enough to make up for a father who you will never know. I promise. She let the tears dry when there simply were no more tears in her. At that moment, when the tears ran their course, she did what Eleanor Guthrie always did, she pulled herself together and told herself she could do this. If she had to raise this child, she would and she would be excellent at it. And even if she did not truly believe it, she told herself Charles Vane did not matter to her, but alas he mattered to her. He mattered so much it was hard to even comprehend.
After that night, she went on with the week as she had intended, sitting at meetings with Rogers and doing her best to appear helpful. She refused to think of the beach. She absolutely refused. And yet she could not help but to think of him, his questioning if he really was the father. It hurt. It hurt so fucking much, and yet she wasn't surprised. Their relationship had never actually been built on trust and what little trust they'd had built through the years; she had always seen to it that it would be ripped to shreds. She couldn't expect him to trust her word, but that did not make it hurt any less. She tried so very hard to push those feelings aside and carry on with her week, but that was far easier said than done.
After a week of drinking and after that dream that realized every doubt Charles had ever had, he was in shambles. Not that he would ever admit to it. Still, there was no end in sight to his drinking. Not until Anne did what she did.
"Get up you fucking miserable bastard," she cursed and kicked him in the ribs. The state he was in he could do little else than to groan in pain. Anne squatted down next to his face.
"You had your time to wallow in self-pity, now get a fucking handle of yourself, Charles. Be a fucking man. I don't give a shit what you do with her, or the baby, but for fuck's sake decide, so I don't have to keep seeing and smelling you like this every day," she griped and got up, delivering a final kick to his ribs. Had it been anyone else doing the kicking, they would have been missing a head by now. But it was Anne, and he finally managed to get into an upright position. She was right, it was time to collect himself, to be Charles Vane.
Another week, this one without a single tear. Eleanor chuckled. Since when had she been proud of such a thing? She could not remember crying like this ever in her life, not even when she was a child. Carrying the child must be at fault in some way. She was carrying on, she kept breathing, pushing forward. It was after another late night when she walked back to the tavern, thinking of how the child kept growing every day. It seemed so unreal to her. When she reached the staircase of the tavern, Max's voice called her from the office.
"Eleanor, could you come in for a moment?" Eleanor turned around to do as she asked, mildly curious. She and Max had barely talked during the weeks she had lived here. She cracked the door open, seeing Max sitting there in candle light, papers spread out on the table. That had been her not too long ago. It was an odd feeling, and yet Max looked like she belonged there.
"Yes?" she asked by the door to gain Max's attention. She stood up and extended her hand in which she was holding a piece of paper.
"From him," was all she needed to say for Eleanor to understand who she was talking about. Just the thought of him made her heart race and her palms sweat. She reached for the tiny note like it was her lifeline.
"Thank you," Eleanor murmured as she touched the paper. Max didn't let go at first. Eleanor looked up from the note to look into Max' eyes. A faint smile graced her lips.
"He's a good man, you know," she said solemnly. Eleanor was a bit taken aback by the words.
"I know. I just don't always bare to see that," Eleanor whispered, already fighting back tears. Max nodded and let go of the note. Eleanor got out of the office as fast as she could, but did not manage to reach her room before the need to open the note got the better of her. It was written in his hand, unsigned and all it read was "Meet me at where we both fell. Tonight." Eleanor swallowed and a mix of emotions rushed over her. She smiled, but the tears she had kept at bay for a week were unleashed once again. The note was unintelligible to anyone else but the two of them. To both of them it was clear as day.
Where they both fell... She remembered that day so vividly. She had been young and adventurous, and suggested they get out of the town and walk to the edge of the woods to have sex some place other than his bed. Even the thought of it brought a smile on her face. She had been so young. And trying to find a discreet enough place, she had fallen into a huge hole in the ground. Probably dug for hunting, but to this day she wasn't sure what that hole had been doing there. Charles had laughed so much, not helping her get out of the damned hole, so she had to climb out of it herself. A year later, he had confessed in the darkness of his camp on the beach, that it had been the day he had first realized that he loved her. "See, we both fell that day," he had whispered in her ear and then bit her ear lobe, his hands travelling down her body. That memory brought shivers across her skin. She wanted not to feel anything, but she did. For a moment she was that young woman, feeling the greatest feeling she had ever felt, love. She had loved him so much. No matter how much she had tried to fight it, she had loved him, and he had loved her. So she headed out the door in the darkness, to the place where they both fell.
As he waited for her, he cursed himself for choosing this place. Why had he chosen it? It had just come to him and here he was, standing on the edge of the woods, now in the darkness. Back then it had been a sunny day, when she fell and he had realized he had fallen as well. God, how he had loved that woman. Then it hadn't been painful yet. Now even the thought of her was like a stab in the back. He lit a cigar, it calmed him. Before long he could see her form approaching. The look on her face was hard, but he could see the curiosity in her features, shining though the mask she put on every day to fool everyone. And she did fool them, but not him, never him.
"Here I am, Charles. What do you want?" she asked in a cold tone. He knew she was trying to regain control of the last time they had met and she had been anything but calm and collected. He let the cigar drop to the ground and stepped on it, putting it out. He hadn't exactly thought of how this would go, and fuck he was nervous.
"I believe you," was what he said. Eleanor lifted her chin, giving him the look that made men feel like nothing when they stood next to her.
"And?" She asked, not giving anything away, she one again held all the cards and he had nothing.
"I want to be there. I don't want to know I have a child and then know nothing about it." There, he had said it. After Anne had kicked him out of the floor, he had sobered up. The most prominent thought in his mind had been how he didn't want to miss it. He never knew his parents, and he didn't want that to his child, never.
"Okay," was all she said, her voice small. Her posture slumped a bit and he was almost sure he saw a tear roll down her face, but that couldn't be true, for Eleanor Guthrie never cried.
"Okay?" She nodded.
"Yes, Charles. Okay. I can raise this child on my own, you know I can do fucking anything I set my mind on. But I don't want to," she cried. Now he was sure she was crying. In fact, she was sobbing, tears rolling down her cheeks. He was shocked, and simply did not know what to do or what to say. Had he ever even seen a woman cry? He wasn't sure.
"I really don't want to. My mother died when I was young and all I had was my father. And what kind of father was he... He never loved me, and all I ever wanted was for him to love and accept me for who I was. But that never happened. I want something better for this baby. I love it so much, Charles," she sobbed. "I love it more than myself, and I need it to be okay, and I think it will need its father to be okay. If you love it even a fraction of how much I love it, I know it will be alright. That's all I want. For you to love it," She was shielding her face with her hands, quiet sobs still escaping her lips.
This was not the woman Charles knew. Never, in all the years he had known her, had he seen such genuine emotion coming out of her. It baffled him and he didn't know what to do with this, so he acted on instinct. He reached to her hand and pulled it out of her face. The feel of her hand was so familiar, soft and small, hers.
"Eleanor, I promise, I will be there, and I will love it. I could never be your father. I could never not love something that is a part of you, you must know that." She looked into his eyes, her face wet with tears, a sparkle of hope lingering in her eyes.
"Charles," she sighed in relief and suddenly pulled him closer and wrapped her arms around his shoulders, resting her cheek against his shoulder. He pulled her even closer, his arms finding her waist, the place where they had been at home so long ago. The sobs shook her body and he stroked her hair.
"We'll be fine," he promised, even with so many unsaid things still between them. But now was not the time nor the place. What they both needed in that moment was to feel close to each other. That moment, in the place where they both fell was the beginning of the rest of rest of their lives. God knows it would not be easy, far from it. But they had taken that first step, and Charles would keep his promise. they would be fine. All three of them.