I'm having a case of the Mondays, figured someone else out there might be as well. Here's a little boost if ya are.
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Part Twelve
Late March 1872
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"I want another baby," Scarlett informed Rhett as he greeted Nicholas.
"You what?"
"I want us to have another baby."
"You are aware that I am currently holding a baby are you not?" It was still a very small baby at that.
"Yes, and I would like him to have a sibling close in age."
"I thought you didn't want more children."
"I didn't want more children, two children ago. You hardly seemed to listen then. Certainly not one child ago."
"But now you'd like more children?"
"Is this really so hard to understand Rhett?"
"Apparently so Scarlett." His brain and his heart were struggling to comprehend this.
"I didn't want children and now I do. I imagine this is what you felt up until you were nearly 40? I just turned 27 Rhett." She had just turned 27 the week prior with a small party that included dancing in the more intimate ballroom she had created on the third floor with a mix of people that she and Melly had spent weeks selecting, no one had turned down the invitation.
"You have four children Scarlett."
"It's not as if I ignore them. I would like to have a baby. I would like to plan to have a baby and then have one. Not be surprised by Dr. Meade when I think it's indigestion or nerves. I would like Nicky to have a sibling close in age."
"So, I imagine that you're asking for my participation in your project."
"I can hardly make a baby on my own."
"I heard a story once-"
"Rhett!" her eyes widened and looked around the room. She smiled then. He'd almost sounded like the man she had first been married to.
"I will visit your room this evening after the children are settled in bed," he said going to hand her back the baby.
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"You're behaving like a virginal school girl and not a mother of four."
His wife was in bed and under the covers, "I am awaiting you. In bed. Was I supposed to be splayed out across the bedsheets waiting for you to ravage me? You do recall that I am your wife Rhett."
"Why is Nicky in the corner of the room?"
"I didn't want to risk waking him."
"Why not put him in the nursery?"
"Because then he would wake Ella."
That was a fair enough point. "We have hardly ever been that loud Scarlett," Rhett said going to move the baby and the cradle back to its normal position before Scarlett struggled to reach the baby in the middle of the night. They needed to figure out how to make gas lighting more useful, particularly in the bedrooms.
"Not according to Suellen," Scarlett said going to close the oil lamp by her bed.
"I don't imagine your sister has ever found much joy in anything," he walked around the bed to his side as he took off his robe. "Should I remain in my nightshirt and plunge the room to total darkness so we copulate like most married couples whose sole purpose is reproduction?"
She shot him an annoyed look.
He removed his nightshirt in a single swift move; the man had no shame.
"Oh do close the light Rhett. I just had a baby," she said as he climbed into bed and headed towards her with no move to extinguish the flame.
"My baby Scarlett. Your body carried my baby. Trust me when I tell you that makes it even more beautiful than that untouched youth," his hand was already on her, sliding under her the nightgown.
He had been desperate to do this since August. Over seven long months. Seven long months of watching his wife's body change and not being able to be a part of it, not being able to witness it without yards of fabric between them.
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Mid-April
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'She's so tame now,' was all Rhett could think as he watched his wife in the Wilkes' small parlor. A once wild animal now caged too long, a carnival side show. They always made him want to weep, to see such beauty up close and to realize they had extinguished its spirit.
He couldn't recall the last time he had seen his wife truly be spirited outside of bed.
She was often so agreeable, so biddable. For any other man he imagined he'd be in a perfect marriage, but he had never wanted that. He had only ever wanted her and all the fire she carried.
She had started off tentative in bed, he had made it his mission once more to stoke the flames until she returned to the woman, she had been last year. The woman he'd had fleetingly at the start of their marriage. He imagined currently she was pouring all of her energy and anger into their nighttime activities. Saturday and Sunday nights had so far been the most exuberant likely due to her hatred of attending church with all of those judging eyes upon them.
Now though, watching his wife in her deep green silk, trimmed with the French lace he'd brought back from Charleston. The dress was demure and without her normal glitz, yet somehow more enticing than her old gowns.
His wife was still the talk of the town, only the talk this year centered on how she had disappeared during her own birthday when her youngest had awoken and wouldn't settle back down. He of course had to spread that along when she had made a discreet disappearance when Prissy had come up to tell her, knowing Scarlett would have her head if she'd let the baby cry it out. He was quite certain the entire party knew before Scarlett returned fifteen minutes later.
She was simply so polite now. She made conversation with everyone, nearly always remaining on a safe topic.
Melly practically beamed every time she looked at her.
Rhett wondered if his wife was truly happy, she certainly seemed to be. Perversely content, doing all the things she swore she wouldn't do, didn't want.
There was the added benefit that this year he wouldn't have to corner his wife and then stalk her down like prey. The civility of getting to change for bed and then comfortably join his wife in bed was certainly not a positive that he could overlook.
He had noticed a change in the atmosphere of the house and not simply because she'd had the horrific plum colored drapes replaced so there was finally enough light in the house to see details (many of which he often wished that he could unsee). Conditions had certainly improved with her pregnancy and then with Nicky's birth. However, since he'd been invited back into her bed, the entire house seemed lighter (and not simply because of the drapes), he knew he certainly felt lighter. Scarlett had even flirted a time or two, what had once been a basic form of communication.
He wasn't entirely sure what had happened to cause the change.
Had it been the public shaming his wife received, something that he had said the night of the party. Had she finally realized the foolishness of her infatuation with Ashley Wilkes?
The fear of losing her daughter for good if it happened again.
She did love Bonnie. He'd always known she'd loved Bonnie, although often, he hadn't been sure if she didn't love their daughter like she would love any pretty bauble.
He could see it now though; he could see the hurt in his wife's face that she wasn't the one Bonnie turned to for comfort. How quickly Bonnie would get bored with their activities together.
Bonnie was his child, she craved excitement. A sedate mother sitting on a sofa with a book or a doll seldomly occupied Bonnie for long.
It had taken too long for the maternal aspect of Scarlett to reappear. He doubted Nicky would ever have a problem sitting with his mother for long stretches, even now when he was placed on a thick carpet to play his eyes constantly tracked his mother.
His and her children.
Perhaps they would do better with the next.
Thanks for reading! Survive Monday!