A/N 12/31/2020

Happy New Year! Chapter 20 of this story is in the works. The good news is that nearly 3000 words are written - the bad news is, I'm not even halfway through the dinner yet. There was a slight detour, as always with me. Perhaps by Monday the 4th, but not promising. That gets me in hot water.

Peace and joy to you all tonight :) My big celebration plans are a rotisserie chicken, a bottle of wine, and making s'mores with my daughter, who got an indoor s'more maker for Christmas and can't wait to try it out. We are healthy, for now. It's the little things.

Take care of yourselves, 'kay?

A/N Merry Christmas! I rushed to get this to you, no lie. I'm just not writing hot right now, it happens. Too much real life. It skews the muse. At least it's on the bigger side - 5200 words! I'm still plugging along, only a few words some days, but never stopping. This turtle intends to finish the race. Eventually :) Also, I didn't have Covid. Thank you for all the reviews and messages expressing concern and well wishes. They were much appreciated!

OOOOooooOOOOoooo

A few examples of my inspiration for this chapter … .

"I hate to hear you talk about all women as if they were fine ladies instead of rational creatures. None of us want to be in calm waters all our lives."

— Jane Austen

I sense something divine in you … .

- Dazz Band

Chapter 19

Not a morning person. Definitely not a morning person after the night she'd had before.

Eight o'clock? In the morning? Why did she ever agree?

Prissy woke Scarlett at the crack of dawn, which felt insulting in itself, not to mention getting bathed and ready. The children hopped out of bed with no problem, eager for the day.

As Scarlett reflected on the night before her face burned with mortification. She had revealed bedroom details. To practical strangers. To men, for the love of all that is holy. Well, she wouldn't have to worry about facing her parents in the afterlife, as surely she was going to hell.

But she couldn't feel too bad about it. She might have picked a more discreet audience, but honestly, who would that be? Anyone else she knew would have been shocked, or at the very least feigned shock. And then the entire town would know. Tate and Leif weren't gossipy peahens and they knew very few people and virtually none of her circle. She had said nothing too prurient, just that her husband acted like a polite stranger when they were naked together. Dear God.

Not one to dwell on the past - what's done is done, after all. She'd always gotten along better with men anyway. Probably because she was flirting with the women's beaux and husbands, but it went farther back than that, to childhood. She merely liked active boy things better than staid girl things and always had.

After she bathed she stood in front of the mirror in her chemise, wondering if she should go without a corset; if she dared, rather. She eyed said object, currently draped across her dressing table chair, as if it were the enemy. They would be outside, playing games. Her vanity and cursed sense of propriety said of course she should wear it, but she didn't want to faint or appear weak. You have to run when flying a kite; can't really run in a corset. And she'd be wearing a jacket that's not so very fitted. It wouldn't really show.

Finally she called Prissy and requested to be laced up in as slack a manner as possible and still get in the loose - or at least looser - day dress she'd chosen, an older one in a flattering shade of blush with a white floral print, and a modest scoop neck that wouldn't make her throat feel confined. Her hair she had pinned firmly in a low bun.

Scarlett instructed Prissy to dress Ella in an older play dress and thick stockings. Wade had planned to wear his Tate-inspired work clothes (she wondered if he slept in them) which was fairly appropriate. They were going to be out in the middle of nowhere, after all.

As she descended the stairs for breakfast she spied the voodoo packet on the entryway table and grabbed it on her way to the kitchen. Dilcey appeared to be putting the finishing touches on a huge picnic basket for the day. Scarlett handed her the pralines to pack with the rest of the meal, sneaking a peek inside the basket to see her favorite dessert - Dilcey's caramel cake, the smell of which took her straight back to childhood, cushioned by rose bush leaves and covered with a dampened tea towel. Oh my.

"Would you care to explain this?" Scarlett asked in the most casual tone she could manage as she held up the voodoo parcel.

Dilcey looked down at the package swiftly. "Yes, Miss Scarlett, I need to talk to you about that. I want to do a cleanse on the old house property, the hotel. I want to do it while you all are gone, today, before the goin's on tonight."

She continued in a rush of words; at least, a rush for Dilcey.

"There's bad memories there, Miss Scarlett. You and Mr. Rhett were too strong and too proud to be good to one another, and your bad feelings burned too bright. All the hatefulness, meanness, and sorrow," Dilcey put her hand on Scarlett's arm when she saw her words hit their mark.

"We got to clear it all out. The construction did good, I know it did, all the tearing out. I can feel the fog clear some; but the walls are still there, the floors and ceilings and we got to, we just got to send all that badness away."

Scarlett rubbed her head, trying not to yell at Dilcey. "I will not abide by witchcraft, Dilcey. You know this family is Catholic and my mother provided all the house servants with a proper religious education," she looked pointedly at her. "Which included you."

"There's no witchcraft Miss Scarlett," Dilcey stood proud. "This is hoodoo, which is a mix of spiritual traditions from Africans and the native Indians they met here in America. When it came together like that from the two peoples it became much more powerful.

"It will help the house to let go of the bad things. And the baby, and little miss," she whispered. "So much pain, and you carry your pain with you, Miss Scarlett, everyone don't see it, but I do."

Scarlett opened her mouth to protest - to say it was heathenism, paganism, against the church, blasphemy - but she had a sudden memory of a cotton field at Tara, and Dilcey working beside her all day long, hours upon hours upon end when no one else would, never asking to quit. Dilcey nursing Beau when Melanie had no milk. Staying beside her. Starving with her, giving her food to the children when no one was watching, just like Scarlett with Wade. Never complaining, never asking for anything, really, other than what she had to have to survive.

And now she'd shored up her nerve to ask a white man to bring her this, and may have even paid for it out of her own wages, although Scarlett doubted that Leif took her money.

"What exactly is in this," Scarlett indicated the package, "and what exactly are you going to do with it?"

Dilcey's posture relaxed a bit. "This here is gris-gris and herbs, maybe a hoodoo doll or two," she skittered across the words, not wanting to linger on them. "I have most everything I need. I have been gatherin' what I can from the park across the street and I grew some things in the kitchen garden, and last time I went to Tara I got all the pine needles I needed. There was just a few other items I asked Mr. Leif to pick up."

Scarlett rubbed her temple again. "Nothing scary or evil-seeming, no body parts of an animal or anything like that," she paused, trying to remember what she had ever heard of these traditions. "Or any type of blood?" Overheard conversations, hushed whispers between slaves passed through her mind.

"No ma'am. No bodies or blood. Just some herbs and roots and pine needles. I make a little pile of them according to the tradition and set it on fire."

"And," Scarlett felt silly here but she had to ask. "It won't hurt Bonnie's spirit, or the baby's? If a little part of them is still around? It won't run them off, too?" Her throat tried to close on the last words.

Dilcey's eyes softened. "No, Miss Scarlett, it won't hurt them babies. It might make them happier even, more peaceful like, to see the bad stuff gone.

"Children are light, Miss Scarlett, nothing but light, Miss Bonnie 'specially. You got nothing to worry about there. I promise you. It only does away with the dark."

"And what are the dolls for?"

"For in case we need them sometime," Dilcey's expression became guarded. "For just in case."

"You know, Miss Scarlett, you don' want your hotel guests feelin' that darkness,'' a mere whisper of slyness laced Dilcey's voice. "This is just good business."

Scarlett looked at her, eye to eye, for a moment. Suddenly she was done with the subject.

"All right. Just, do it after the construction workers leave at noon, I don't need them gaggling on like geese about it. Don't burn the house down, and clean it up after. Because I'm having company tonight and the last thing I need is my guests finding little piles of ashen sacrilege all over the place," she rolled her eyes here.

"And don't take all day about it, because you'll need to be helping Babette as soon as it's done."

"Well, it'll be fittin', Miss Scarlett, won't it?" Dilcey's brownish gold eyes were dancing as she spoke to lighten the mood. "You did want to bring a little New Orleans to Atlanta, after all."

"Hmmph," Scarlett said. She knew Dilcey wouldn't purposefully hurt her or her family. They had a bond, born of their suffering together. And hadn't that house always been dark, even before the tragedies? How could lightening it up hurt?

Precisely at 8 a.m. Leif and Tate arrived in a roomier conveyance than they'd had the night before, a large carriage with a driver. Scarlett, the children and Prissy all piled in, the magnificent picnic basket in tow.

"The drive is a bit lengthy and it's cool outside still so I thought this would be better," Leif said, his eyes shining brightly and a wide grin on his face. He was a morning person, evidently.

Scarlett thanked him, then laid back and closed her eyes. She was tired, but grateful that the extremely expensive wine did not produce the hangover she deserved.

Apparently it wasn't enough alcohol to affect Leif or Tate either, both of whom immediately set to teasing the children and laughing back and forth. Wade began chattering with Tate about some book and Leif and Ella were having what appeared to be an in-depth discussion over her favorite doll Uduwella, a rag of a thing she'd carried around for years.

"What kind of a name is Uduwella?" Leif asked, smoothing down the doll's hair as he smiled at Ella.

She giggled. "It's not Uduwella, it's 'you too, Ella,' " she said as she kicked her feet. "But I didn't know that either, for forever."

"That's what she thought her name was for the longest time," Wade explained. "After Bonnie," he looked quickly at Scarlett. "Well, after our little sister was born."

Scarlett's eyes flew open as she glanced from Wade to Ella, who was quite busy basking in Leif's undivided attention. 'You too, Ella?' Is that how the child had felt, an afterthought to her more gregarious, prettier little sister who demanded most all of her parents' attention? Would Ella have turned out like Suellen, bitter and jealous, if her sister had lived?

And now did she still compete with her older brother, a male, who commanded more attention merely due to his gender, and then with his accomplishments, his family name, his work with Tate and Leif, and the general's visits? An unsettling feeling of conflicted guilt settled in her gut. Did she not owe her daughter more?

Always one to live in the moment, Scarlett filed the thoughts away for later. The residual bad feelings faded quickly amid the party atmosphere inside the carriage, and Scarlett gave up resting and joined in the camaraderie. In about an hour they arrived at the flat, grass and wildflower-covered spot Leif had decided upon.

Scarlett stepped down from the carriage and all but gasped. The meadow stretched into a field of loamy sandy soil near a fairly wide creek at the base of a green, grassy hill leading up the mountain. The sky was bright blue with only the occasional cloud. It was the most gorgeous spot she'd seen in quite a while.

"You approve?" Leif asked as he busied himself unloading the carriage. Beside the kites she saw quiots, croquet mallets and balls, and bows and arrows. "I wanted us to have a choice of activities if the wind wouldn't cooperate."

"It's perfect," Scarlett agreed. Tate quickly built a small campfire for warmth and to heat up the coffee he carried in a tin pot, then helped Leif set up the games. Wade and Ella were too excited to do anything but jump from one part of the field to the next, chattering away.

After a few minutes the kites were set up. Tate and Wade headed up the hill with theirs while Scarlett opted to have a cup of coffee first, Leif joining her for the only still moments of the day. She handed him a cup, gesturing to the cream and sugar cubes, but he shook his head and took it wordlessly. She noticed that comfortable quiet again, the one that somehow existed between them, as cool and soothing as the mountain stream nearby - but with an undercurrent of something warmer, something voltaic that she could not yet name.

"You ready?" Leif looked down at Ella, that crescent dimpling in his cheek as he smiled at her, holding out his hand. She nodded with all the eagerness of a new puppy. Leif lifted Ella up with one hand and swung her legs across his shoulders. She grabbed onto his shoulders, squealing. "Are you settled?" he asked and when she nodded he instructed Prissy to hold the reel, then grabbed the yellow and green kite and started jogging up the hill, Ella holding on for dear life the entire way.

He got about two hundred feet up before stopping.

"Mother, I'm in the sky!" Ella called, waving one arm wildly, holding onto Leif with the other. "I'm way up in the sky!"

When Leif told her to, she let go of the kite. The wind caught it and it soared. Leif ran back down the hill to Prissy, holding Ella's legs tight, who handed the reel to Ella. Scarlett thought he would put her down then, but no, he let her remain on his shoulders, as he trotted along with the wind through the field.

Ella's kite soon evened up with Tate and Wade's, and Ella bubbled over with laughter and happiness, and Scarlett laughed too, following slowly behind, enchanted by the picture and sounds of her joyful daughter.

Leif glanced over at her and gave her a look. You could join us, it said.

Of course the boys were allowed to play, and Ella for a couple more years. Even Prissy was allowed. But no; Scarlett, as a member of her class, as a lady, must watch with a parasol from the shade.

She looked at Tate and Leif, worrying not, just enjoying themselves, and Wade, even with the awkwardness of his age, free. Ella, still held back by shyness, but still, allowed to play, run, for a year or two more. And then no more.

There were no southern ladies or gentlemen here to stop her. Her children would love it. She couldn't imagine Tate or Leif judging her. These men - her friends, her business partners - would forgive her temporary lapse in decorum. She could hope so, anyway.

Something inside her, be it reticence or good sense, snapped. Because something about all their faces called to her. And she answered.

"I am not a coward," she said out loud. Her voice was lost in the wind and distance, but not her resolve.

She spied a copse of trees where she could tug off her corset and half her petticoats, motioning to Prissy to cover for her.

Without another thought, she played, as a child, just as if it were with the boys of Clayton County - Cade and Brent and Stu and the Fontaine brothers - even Ashley, who was a different person back then.

She played. Like a girl, like she had been before she went to Fayetteville. She joined in flying kites for a while, then played quiots and croquet. She grabbed her skirts in one hand and ran and laughed and yelled with abandon. She even lifted her skirts halfway up her calves and waded in the creek with Ella while looking for pebbles and marveling at tiny fish and tadpoles. Spring filled the air, rife with hope and beginnings. It made everything feel just right.

She played tag with both children and Prissy while the men set up the archery, her hair coming out of its pins immediately, but she didn't care. Right in the middle of the game she thought of Bonnie and a moment of sadness overtook her. She never got to play with her like this, not much, anyway. Rhett was always taking over with her, and she'd let him, because she always had work to do. Is this one of the reasons why he enjoyed it so much, getting on the floor with the children? Made him feel young again, a child again? She'd like to ask him if they ever were to have a civil conversation.

At a break in the games Scarlett dusted off a stump and sat down near the fire, resting.

"Call me when it's my turn," she hollered to the men.

Wade, who had been regarding her rather carefully during the playtime, now stared at her as if she were suddenly feeble-minded.

"Are you all right, Mother?" he asked.

"Yes, Wade. I'm going to beat you at shooting arrows in a moment, and you'll see how all right I am."

"You are? You can shoot the bow and arrows?"

"Yes, and I was pretty good back in the day so I hope you have boned up," she teased.

He grinned. "But how did you learn?"

"Well, Brent and Stu taught me a little when they were learning. And I had to hunt during the war at Tara. Bullets cost money. Arrows were homemade and free."

"I don't recall that," Wade wrinkled his brow.

"I didn't take you because I didn't want to have to dig an arrow out of your tender skin."

"You took me some places, though," he recalled. "I remember playing on a blanket in a cotton field."

Yes, she'd dragged him along in a cotton sack, like a field hand's child. "Some days when Melly wasn't feeling well I would take you."

Most of the time not, she thought to herself. I worked like a man and let others raise you. Because I was the man.

Leif signaled for them to step up. In spite of her bragging, Scarlett felt very rusty but Wade helped her. She hadn't realized how tall he had become - nearly her height - until he stepped up beside her, close enough to help position the bow. His jaw - hers and her pa's - was more pronounced, making him look that much more grownup, masculine.

She thought of the frightened little boy playing on the cotton sack while his exhausted and emaciated mother picked cotton, all the while hungry, hurting her hands, becoming impatient with him. He was just a little boy. And now nearly grown.

She made a decent showing but Wade and Tate quickly outshot her and Leif both, so they sat out the next round on the grass nearby. The wind had blown Leif's hair wild around his head like a mane and he looked positively leonine, which was only that much more accentuated when he lowered himself to the ground with the slow assurance of a large jungle cat.

"He's very good," Leif commented, watching Wade. "He's an accomplished young man."

"I'm proud of him. After the war he was shy, scared, timid. But not anymore."

"What was his father like?"

A lot like him, she realized, watching Wade as he paused his shot to help his sister with a croquet mallet that had fallen apart. So sweet with his sister, with women in general, always polite.

"Kind, studious. Self-sacrificing, intelligent, well-mannered. And devoted to me, in the short time we had together."

Scarlett recollected the look on Charles' face as he proposed, and how she had been so eaten up with Ashley's hubris she had scarcely paid any attention at all. She became suddenly startled as an unpleasant vision entered her mind of a girl like her treating Wade with such disinterest and shrewd calculation.

'If any girl mistreats his kindness like I did his father's - I'll snatch her bald-headed,' she fumed inwardly. 'Why, I won't put up with it for a minute! I'll run her down like a criminal!' Scarlett's eyes flashed and her color heightened as she pondered such a debacle. She had no idea how beguiling she appeared, her hair tousled and falling down her back.

Leif cleared his throat and raised an eyebrow. "What's going on in that head of yours?" he asked. "You lit up like a firecracker just now."

Scarlett shook her head. "Nothing," she replied, still a little shook up by her inner turmoil. "Just thinking about what I would do to a girl who was unkind to my boy."

"I feel sorry for her in advance," Leif deadpanned. "So he is just like his father, then?"

"Yes, all the good parts of his father, but also enough of me and my pa, and enough of my husband, who was the only father figure he ever knew, just enough, to keep him from being pushed around," Scarlett added. "For which I am eternally grateful." As she said this she realized it was true; she was grateful to Rhett for teaching Wade how to stick up for himself. "The general taking an interest now is helping his social life and self-confidence."

Leif's brow wrinkled for just a moment at the mention of the general but then cleared.

"And Ella? Is she like her father?"

"Well, I used to think so. He was a sweet man, and she is a sweet child, and that didn't come from me. And she's always been a little flighty. She sure looked like him as a baby. That hair is his.

"But now she's looking more like my mother's side, the French half. As far as her personality, I think she's coming into her own."

"And she has your eyes. They'll be a valuable currency when the beaux start calling," Leif said. "I enjoy spending time with her. I always wanted a little girl."

"You're so good with her. You could have a daughter of your own, you're still young."

Pain flickered across his face. He opened his mouth to say something, then closed it.

"Have you ever been around much snow?" The change of subject seemed rather abrupt.

"No, not really, a few times we got three or four inches which was really exciting."

"I mean a proper snow, at least two feet?"

"No, never. I'm a Georgian, not much for the bitter cold."

"You like to play though," he looked at her appraisingly. "Snow is about play, lots of it. I'd like to play with you in Norway after a big snow."

He said it matter of factly, but still she could feel her cheeks warm.

"When I get to a good place I'd like to travel. I've been waiting for a while. After the hotel is off the ground, perhaps." She gazed around the meadow. "This place reminds me of Tara, the place I call home."

'It reminds me of my home, too," Leif said, and then described fjords in Norway in such colorful terms she felt she was actually there.

Then they sat in that comfortable silence again, listening to Tate and Wade argue over a close shot, and Prissy and Ella chatter on about this and that. The last two days had been the most content she'd been in a while. Life had been so hard for so long. Starving and poor, to plenty of money but so much heartache. And all she had done, for so very long, was work, even after she had money, after her marriage and social life dwindled to nothing. It was the only way she knew to keep both the wolf from the door and the demons at bay.

The wolves and demons, however, could do without her for one Saturday morning, she thought as she lay back on the grass next to Leif and watched the clouds roll by.

OOOOooooOOOOoo

Soon it became time for lunch. Scarlett went back to the tree grove to freshen her toilette and wash her hands in the stream with Prissy. They then went about setting out the meal while everyone else packed up the games. While Prissy spread the tablecloth on the ground Scarlett started to unpack the basket.

"I asked for a simple picnic, not this," she said, somewhat dismayed as she viewed the spread. An entire boiled ham and a whole fried chicken, cucumber and butter sandwiches, tomato slices with carrots and watercress salad, pickled okra, spiced peaches, and boiled potatoes with vinegar dressing; the caramel cake and pralines for dessert and a fruit tart, a jug of lemonade and makings for tea.

What had Dilcey been thinking? This was a feast! And they had Babette's special meal planned for tonight as well!

Then she remembered the look in Dilcey's eyes as she handed the basket to her. Could she be jealous of Babette cooking for her family? Scarlett had filled her schedule with putting in a garden at Inman Park, not to mention all the extra work what with arranging the household from the move. But apparently Dilcey did feel slightly put out - although she had certainly proven her worth here. God Almighty, if these two get in a pissing contest I'm going to be as wide as the side of a barn.

They all sat down and dined. Thankfully everyone had worked up an appetite, and made good progress on doing justice to Dilcey's efforts. Prissy made sure to take a plate to the driver. As they ate a little business was discussed. Tate and Leif agreed that it was time to hire and train staff, as well as start daily progress meetings in the evenings as well as the mornings.

"We're coming down to the wire," Leif said, just as Scarlett started to serve dessert. She put a slice of mixed fruit tart on each plate, and then eyed the pralines and the caramel cake, with its rich, moist center, and the decadent, butter-sugar icing. There was something similar, complementary about them. She cut a slice, then took a praline and crumbled it over the cake's icing making sure to mix it in before taking a bite - and then slowly dying from the buttery sugary nutty goodness of it all.

"Oh lord," she moaned. "Oh," she groaned again. "Um, so good." She stuck her thumb in her mouth and sucked off the icing before she could stop herself.

Leif, drowsy from food and sun, regarded her languorously with a predatory gleam in his narrowed eyes. Tate appeared mesmerized as well, his own blue eyes wide and what appeared to be a blush rising on his cheeks.

"Try it," she pushed her cake toward them on compulsion. "You two need to try it. Make sure to get the praline in with the icing."

Both men picked up a fork, took a bite, and groaned. Simultaneously.

"I'm going to curse,'' Tate said. 'It's that good."

Leif nodded. "It's incredible." He wiped a crumb from his lip and winked.

"It's going on the menu," Scarlett proclaimed. She served up pieces for Wade and Ella and Prissy, watching their faces carefully as they ate. Oh yes! A signature dessert was born. Now she just had to get Dilcey and Babette to combine forces … .

Scarlett slept in the carriage on the way home, Tate playing jacks on the bench seat with Ella, Wade speaking with Leif. Not one to stand on ceremony, Prissy slunk to the floor and rolled under Ella's legs, snoring lightly almost immediately. Normally Scarlett would have scolded, but it gave her some space to stretch out a bit.

She woke up sometime later with her head against Leif's shoulder. Confused for a moment, she apologized profusely.

"It hurt nothing," he said, gazing at her for a moment before looking away. His voice sounded a little stiff, stilted. "We're almost to your house. Would you like me to carry you in?"

Scarlett sat up straighter. "No, I'm fine." She tried not to be obvious as she breathed in his lingering scent. No whiskey or cigars here, although she could detect a hint of the wine from last night; mostly though, he smelled of the outdoors, and man, mixed with a little something - intriguing, a tad dangerous. Compelling.

A minute or two later they arrived at Inman Park. Tate helped the ladies out while Leif swung a dozing Ella up into his arms. Scarlett directed him to the upstairs bedrooms.

Prissy and Wade followed, the latter grumbling because he was too old for a nap and wanted to go with the menfolk.

"I'm going to take a nap myself and then I'll be at the hotel early,'' Scarlett promised Tate and Leif as they took their leave.

She watched the carriage as it rode away, a sleepy smile on her face that she just couldn't seem to wipe off.

OOOOooooOOOOoooo

Ok, so it is still Saturday in the story. Next chapter is the practice supper and then Belle's Sunday reading lessons. I will try to combine in one chapter but cannot promise that will happen. Then it's time for you-know-who to grace us with his presence, some light espionage with the General, (for now), the grand opening, and a surprise! Haha. This one's a doozy … .

You all know I love to hear from you. Merry Christmas again, and don't be a stranger! Peace and love to my little family here, misscyn

FUN FACT

Quoits (/ˈkɔɪts/ or /ˈkwɔɪts/) is a traditional game which involves the throwing of metal, rope or rubber rings over a set distance, usually to land over or near a spike (sometimes called a hob, mott or pin). The sport of quoits encompasses several distinct variations.

So I guess this is where horseshoes came from?