We have defining moments in our lives, but what leads up to those moments are the insignificant ones. A multitude of moments that seemingly mean nothing, but are what shape us or place us into those defining ones. So 7 days ending on Christmas Eve where overlooked events change and therefore change the entirety of the Butler family.
Each story will have 3 similar features. The altered moment, the final evening within the novel and a year after the novel.
7. Scarlett misses the train in Marietta.
October 25th 1873
"Mother please," Ella pleaded up at her mother.
"Ella, I told you, we're returning to the hotel for an early dinner. You can wait to eat."
"But I'm hungry now."
Scarlett sighed, "I told you to eat more at breakfast."
"I wasn't hungry at breakfast; it was too early."
It had been early. They had sat down for the meal an hour before they were normally served at home. She hadn't been able to sleep so she had forced the children up with her. "Fine, you may both have a pastry. But I expect you to eat your dinner."
"Thank you, Mother," Ella smiled brightly and ran back towards the direction of the bakery.
o-o-o
She took desperate gasps of air as she paused running to the station as she realized that the train was departing. She had taken one look at the clock after reading the message the clerk had handed her, yelled quickly at Prissy and handed money to Wade before taking off.
Long hours passed until the next train. It wasn't worth it to rent a wagon, any time being saved would be negligible. She was hardly an excellent rider, she was a passable rider, she had been more than a fair rider when she was young, but so many years had passed and after Bonnieā¦No she wouldn't go racing off on horseback.
Dusk was starting to settle as they got off the train in Atlanta. She saw his darkened form, could catch just hint of his face with harsh shadows from the gas lights.
She knew instantly.
She knew Melly was gone.
o-o-o
It struck her as they rode home in the buggy, a grieving Ella on Rhett's lap, Scarlett's arm around Wade, desperately trying to recall how to comfort someone. She wanted arms around her, so that seemed like the right thing to do.
She wanted Rhett's arms around her. Her husband, so broken, but so strong. He'd been so horrifically battered this summer, but still he held the grieving child in his arms.
She could have never asked for a better father for her children.
Why was it so hard to tell him that?
Why was it so hard to tell him that she'd been just as proud of Bonnie on her horse?
She never thought those jumps would lead to anything aside that velvet habit getting dirtier.
She wanted Rhett's arms around her.
She wanted to ease his pain.
She wanted babies because she wanted him to be happy again, to be alive again.
She loved him.
She realized it as she watched him carry Ella up the stairs having cried herself to sleep.
She loved him.
She had likely always loved him in some form, but now though.
It was only him.
He was everything.
o-o-o
She sat brushing her hair after having been helped out of her dress by Prissy, who had yet to stop crying for longer than five minutes. The children were in bed and the house was quiet.
She was overwhelmed by all she would have to do in the next two days.
She just wanted to feel Rhett's arms around her as Ella had.
o-o-o
She knocked softly at his door.
He hadn't made it as far as her in disrobing. He still had his shirt and pants on, she smiled seeing his slippers. How rarely she saw him in any type of undress.
"What do you want Scarlett?"
You. "I don't want to be alone."
"Do wait until her body is cold before you make a move on her husband." His words were mocking, unable to be indifferent.
His words cut into her, a reminder of how many wasted years and moments. "I have no interest in Ashley Wilkes."
"What exactly do you have an interest in then Scarlett?"
"You." There was a quiet bravado to her words. So much stripped away pride, leaving simple truth, "I don't want to be alone and I don't think you do either. Can we stop being so alone? We're married."
He needed her away, far from him, "Excellent time for a divorce-"
"Please don't. Not again. We're both so alone Rhett," she placed her hands on his chest. "Can we fight tomorrow? I'm so tired. I know you are too."
"You want a warm body to lay next to?" There was a hardness in his voice.
Hers, only softness, "No, I want you to lay next to."
"Fine Scarlett," he shook his head. "You're right I'm exhausted sleep wherever you'd like. We'll fight in the morning."
He didn't watch her as she took off the dark purple dressing robe, he didn't watch her as she sat at the side of the bed and toed off her slippers, he didn't watch her as she slipped her legs under the covers and pulled them up around her body.
He changed without care into a nightshirt and climbed into bed.
She was alongside him in minutes. Just as she had once been. Pressed along his side, so her hair rested just below his head. Ever so softly she confessed, "I miss you. I've missed you for so long."
"Go to sleep Scarlett," was the entirety of his response.
o-o-o
He awoke in the middle of the night to her body pressed along his. Caught in between a dream and a memory. He couldn't help moving his hands along the softness of her skin.
Her gasping whispers, words of love urged him on.
o-o-o
He woke before her, desperation filling him this time. The desperately clawing need to run, to escape. He couldn't bear this again.
Perhaps if he were younger, he could open himself up to the pain again.
She stirred despite his best efforts to make a stealthily escape, "Don't go," she murmured and held on to him tighter.
He took a breath and held the sheet clenched in one hand. He didn't expect the next words to come out of her mouth after several seconds of her bare body nuzzling in deeper to how it was pressed against his own. Her lips placed a small kiss on his chest, "Make love to me."
He felt the shift in his body, the resignation. The urge to flee overtaken by something much stronger. Years of love. Years of wanting to be wanted.
He knew what he had to do. He'd known what he had to do for months. That wouldn't change. That couldn't change.
-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-
Tears filled her eyes as she was doing Kennedy's books three weeks later. As she realized the dates and realized her time of the month was several days late. She placed her hands on her stomach and closed her eyes, tears blinked down onto her cheeks, "Thank you," she whispered.
-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-
The tentative truce in their house continued. The quiet life they had been leading in the months before Melly's death. Only now she slept in her husband's bed every night. He never came to hers. He never kissed her outside of the bedroom. He never held her hand.
He made it through Thanksgiving. The Hamilton-Wilkes for once taking the meal with Ashley's sisters.
It was as the Christmas decorations started to go up that he started to feel the weight of it all, the burden of it all crashing down upon him. Suffocating him. He had to get out.
"What are you doing?" Scarlett questioned with her head half in a pillow as she was awoken by her husband moving around the room.
"Packing."
She almost wanted to smile, the tiny part of her that hoped he was packing to move into her room. The rest of her though, it knew that indifferent tone. "To go where?" She sat up quickly, she was still in her nightgown, she had fallen into a deep sleep the moment her head hit the pillow. She could feel the changes their baby made within her so much quicker than the other children, she accepted, embraced and treasured every change.
Sleep had not come to him. No instead he'd lain awake all night beside the woman he'd loved so desperately for years. "Does it matter?"
"Of course, it matters, for how long?"
"It's time we divorced. You have all the evidence you need to divorce me. You no longer have the reputation for a divorce to hurt. You haven't any religion left-"
"I love you," she cried.
"I believe you," he coldly informed her, "but it no longer matters."
"How can that not matter?" She could feel the hysteria rising through her, a hand went to her stomach.
"Mine wore out."
She looked down at the bed they had shared for over a month.
"Obviously not the baser-"
She looked up at him with a tint of anger paired with the overwhelming pain and desperation. "Love can't wear out," she cried at him.
"Yours for Ashley did."
"I never loved him!"
"Regardless," there were a great many things he could say about her infatuation with Ashley, words that felt as if they should be in a letter or even a novel. Oh there were a great many on how her 'love' for Ashley had woven through every aspect of her life, of theirs. That 'love' that had broken him down for over a decade, worn him down. That often slipped away in bed, his mind let it go as his body took over, got caught up in the moment. It was harder to find the words now. Find the words in this room. A room that did not belong in their past, a room that he had moved into after Bonnie. There were no haunting memories in this room, simply memories of them, together. Outside of the first night, those few moments at his door the night of Melly's death, she wasn't the woman she was outside of this room, the broken and damaged woman. Even now in her desperate moments, she wasn't quite that woman. No with her hair loose in soft waves and white of her nightgown. So at odds with the prim and stark appearance of her mourning garb, of the constant reminder of all that they had lost. No, the white of her gown made it appear as if there was still hope, but there wasn't any. "Perhaps if I were younger-"
"We can be happy Rhett, we'll have more children, they won't be Bonnie, but-"
"I'll not risk my heart a third time-" the words caught in his throat as his heart leapt to it as he noticed the way her hands protectively covered her stomach. "No."
"Please don't say that."
"You can't be," they had only been sharing a bed for six weeks. Dr. Meade during her miscarriage and illness had informed him, he wasn't sure if she'd be able to have more children in the future.
"Dr. Meade confirmed it last week. I didn't want to tell you until I was further along."
"I can't," he said collapsing in an armchair.
She hurried out of bed and ran to him, dropped into his lap. "You can. I promise you can. I know it's hard, I'm sorry I made it so hard." She forced his hand to her stomach, "You can love this baby and Wade and Ella and maybe even me. We'll love you back. We just need you here with us. You can't leave us."
"It would be better for the baby if I left," he said trying to keep the flood of love from reaching his heart.
"No it wouldn't. You're such a wonderful father. What happened with Bonnie was a horrible accident. It wasn't you, it was never you. I was just as proud of her as you were, I never, no one thought that something like that could happen. We need you. We've always needed you."
"I can't," he could feel the weight of his age upon him, weary, old and broken.
She was so young still and in this moment that shone through her, there was an effervescent hope as well. She was broken and damaged, but her youth, it still allowed for the hope. "I love you. Please don't leave."
He closed his eyes. He couldn't. He knew he couldn't. He should, but he couldn't.
-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-
He didn't dare risk his heart. He kept everyone at bay. He stayed in the house just as he had. He spent time with the children. He spent quiet hours alone with Scarlett in the evenings. He did his best to avoid thinking about what the thickening of her waist meant.
It was hard to do as her body began to swell and change nearly as soon as she said the words to him.
It was oddly easier while they were in bed than out. To treat her body with reverence and adapt to her wants and needs. There it wasn't a baby, it was Scarlett, it was the manner in which he had always treated her while they were intimate.
It was even harder when Dr. Meade attributed the rapid changes to the likelihood she was carrying twins. As her face filled and her eyes sparkled even in her stark mourning uniform.
When that likelihood turned into a definitive and intimacies were forbidden.
As he couldn't abandon her at night in case he was needed.
As he had to be constantly aware and reminded as he helped her with nearly everything as her time grew near.
As he saw the hope and love in Mammy's eyes as she returned for Scarlett's final months.
As his mother and her aunts descended on them.
As he had to banish his mother and her aunts from the birthing room on that swelteringly hot, mid-July day, when he could hear Scarlett screaming at them from the hallway he paced. As he took their place as Mammy and Dilcey worked together to bring the babies into the world, while Dr. Meade tended to the casualties of an accident at the mill.
As he watched the wonder of it, he knew he was lost. His heart was lost. It had been lost from the very first moment she laid her hands on her stomach.
It had been lost for every subtle change. For every swift kick he felt when he was near her. For every ripple he could spot across the room.
He had been lost.
He had no idea when tears began to stream down his face, but he wasn't surprised when he had to wipe them away before he leaned over the little boy in Scarlett's arms. The tears had passed by the time he greeted their second son.
There was a lightness in his heart as he joined her in bed holding one baby while she held the other. The heaviness and the pain remained, but the joy far outweighed them. The hope.
Laughter, true laughter for the first time in so long as she spoke, "I imagine this is the first time I'm so exhausted, I'm not even hungry," as she looked at the tray Mammy had sent up for her.
October 25th 1874
She laid flowers on Melly's grave. "I miss you so. We all do. There are so many things I regret never saying to you. I wonder how many times I'll need to say them here to make sure you've heard me. I know you're watching out for us. I think I knew the moment I realized I was carrying, certainly when Dr. Meade said it would be twins. Rhett and I needed to find our way back to each other for so long, I don't know why it was so hard. Just like telling you how much I loved and needed you was so hard. It was like I couldn't see either of you until I was losing you."
She closed her eyes.
"I wish so much I could do it again. I would do it all so differently, I wouldn't have wasted so much precious time."
She shook her head refusing to wallow in the past. She had wasted far too long on that as she clung to Ashley.
"I'm pregnant. Dr. Meade says I've done my duty and Rhett is fine now. He's forbidden me from getting with child for at least a year after this one. Rhett says he received a very stern talking to about getting me pregnant while the babies are so young." She laughed.
Scarlett picked a flower out of the bouquet, a bright yellow marigold, she twirled it in her fingers. "The children are all doing so wonderfully. The twins are so beautiful, they'll be such handsome men. Wade and Beau are nearly always together, I suspect people would think they were twins if not for their age. We're talking of taking them to Athens next fall, letting them see the university. Wade's getting so close to going off to school. Ella's doing well. Somehow, I think she's the most popular girl in school. I don't quite understand what they giggle about all the time, but she seems happy."
"Dilcey came by with Beau this morning. Rhett took all three to town earlier. Prissy's always certainly more than happy to have someone to help with the babies, they are nearly impossible to manage at the same time. Mammy for some absolutely unknown reason went back to Tara last month. Rhett says we'll have to hire someone else for all the children. I'm quite frankly about to steal Dilcey, Aunt Pitty has been trying to get Ashley and Beau to move in with her, if Uncle Peter could raise you and Charles, I'm sure he could handle Beau and Beau spends half his time with Wade anyway."
Scarlett plucked out a petal, "We haven't seen much of Ashley. We've truthfully barely seen anyone because of the twins. Not that anyone is doing much of anything these days. Rhett says it'll likely last for years. Building's slowed, but Ashley says the mills are doing fine. Of course, he used to say that to me when I was his manager," she sighed.
"I'm sure he's doing fine," she shook away the thought. "He misses you dreadfully just as I do." She felt the tears begin to well up in her eyes, she pushed that away. "Dr. Meade's ordered me to rest before dinner, if I don't get home Rhett will hunt me down and likely send me to bed until tomorrow. He's so very wonderful now. I can hardly believe that man was hiding under the man who said so many cruel and nasty things. You did, I'm sure you did. You saw the best in us. I'm so grateful he had you after Bonnie. I wish-" Scarlett paused to say she wished she could have been there for Ashley, but she could hardly want to be there for Ashley knowing what it would do to Rhett.
"I hope you're proud of us Melly. We're all trying to be worthy of your faith in us."
Scarlett left the cemetery smiling. Thinking of the life that awaited her at home. The weather was nice so Wade, Ella and Beau would likely be outside. She and Rhett would check on the twins in the nursery before he would retire with her to the bedroom for the rest Dr. Meade demanded she take. She certainly didn't mind the extra hour she spent laying in her husband's arms.
That wasn't the life that would await her today. Today would have Dilcey returning to the Peachtree house with stricken red eyes. Prissy's wide eyes as she knocked on their bedroom door. Rhett would tell her he had urgent business to take care of before dropping a kiss on her head and telling her to rest.
It wouldn't be until the middle of dinner that she would see Rhett's dark face in the doorway. Her giving the children a reassuring smile and excusing herself to follow him out into the hall.
He would tell her what Dilcey had found upon her return to the Wilkes' home, why Ashley had sent his son out of the house on the anniversary of his mother's death.
Rhett would watch her and wait. Wait for her to fall apart, wait for the tears and the screams.
Instead, she would say, "Oh." That would be all she would say for several moments. She thought of how hard life had been for Ashley. How very hard when it shouldn't have been. He had once thanked for her dragging him along behind her and she had. She had done everything to make his life better. Melanie had done everything to make his life better. They likely should have let him give up at Tara. Sometimes that was the kindness, to let things go easily.
There was an odd sense of relief for a few moments, to have it finally be done. That would pass when she recalled the children, but for just a few moments there was relief.
AN: Um I acknowledge that was an odd one to begin with, but I wanted them to go backward in time.
