The house was deliciously silent as the first rays of light worked their way through the gap in her curtains. Clara tossed off her sheets and stretched, happy in the knowledge she was the first one awake. Staying with Margaret and the children had been quite a lot better than she thought it would be (thank god her exile from the Boardwalk occurred post-Lucy; she would have murdered her father's previous love if they had been forced to cohabitate, she thought).
She had never been so close to normal family life since she was a little girl. However, since age eight, home had mostly been a floor of a hotel she'd had mainly to herself. Spending almost all her time in a three-bedroom house with two children, another woman, often her father, and usually Richard was taking some adjustment. Writing all night and then sleeping until she had an engagement was impossible because there were so many other people and their schedules going on around her. Meals had to be eaten when they were prepared, and not when she thought to call down for something. It was never quiet. Some child was always making noise, her father was loudly playing happy families, or Margaret was cleaning.
Clara had never realized how much she relished silence.
What was saving her from slowly losing her mind, she knew, was having Richard around. He was as out of place in this happy tableau of her father's as she was. She was growing dependent on being able to catch his eye or talk to him when she got overwhelmed by the familial chaos of the house. Sometimes she thought she spent most of her time sitting somewhere near wherever he was. Partly because she could sense how the children and Margaret saw him-and for that she was less fond of them than she would have been otherwise-and she knew her presence offered him some protection. But mostly just because she liked being with him. It felt like she'd known him for years, not like she had just met him in June. Clara sighed thinking about it all. Laying in bed, she considered taking a full inventory of her feelings (which were confused at best) but instead decided to slip downstairs before anyone else got up.
As she pulled her kimono over her new pajamas (so modern, Madame Jeunet told her when she picked them out), she heard little feet going down the stairs. At first, she didn't think anything about it, and slowly exited her room on her way to the stairs.
Her foot was on the top stair when the screaming started, giving her a birds-eye view of the catastrophe as it unfolded. Emily, Margaret's four-year-old, walked up to Richard, who was asleep on the sofa. For a moment, Clara was distracted by what a boy Richard looked like while sleeping It touched her heart to see him curled up in his funny undershirt, and that moment of distraction came with a cost.
Emily began to scream. Richard woke and instinctively reached towards the screaming child to help her.
The moment when he realized he was the thing Emily was screaming at was so horrifying that Clara thought of it for years.
"It's okay, Emily," Clara said as she all but leapt off the bottom stair into the living room, but she purposefully stepped around the child. Her father and Margaret were behind her on the stairs, and Clara knew she only had one chance, one play, to try and spare Richard further pain.
"It's okay," Clara kept repeating in the most soothing voice she was capable of as she positioned herself between Richard, who was desperately trying to put his mask on, and her father, whom she didn't trust to be kind, and Margaret, who wouldn't look at Richard even when he had the mask on.
"What the hell happened?" Nucky thundered from the foyer.
"It's my fault," Clara said. "I was moving around in my room. I must have woken Emily up, and when she came downstairs, she forgot Richard was here."
Nucky rolled his eyes." That's certainly one interpretation."
"It's not comfortable to sleep with the mask on," Richard said, but his voice was both softer and more gravelly than usual.
"Look, we're all on edge here," Nucky said as he and Margaret took the still screaming child back upstairs.
"I'm sorry," Richard said softly. Clara didn't move until she heard her father shut the bedroom door upstairs.
Clara sat on the coffee table. Richard's hands were moving back and forth on his knees, and she placed her hands on top of his. He didn't look up at her.
"She's just a child with new people in her house. She doesn't understand," Clara said, rubbing her thumbs back and forth across the top of his hands, noticing the feel of skin under her fingers, while she tried to think of something that would make this better. "It's going to be okay."
Richard finally made eye contact with her. Her mouth went dry. Suddenly, she was aware of the fact her pajama-clad legs were touching his, that he had on some sort of funny old fashioned undershirt, and that the right side of his face was still warm from sleeping. It felt like the very air between them changed, and she felt her heart speed up. She opened her mouth to say something but couldn't find the words. Clara's teeth bit into her lower lip as she tried to think clearly, and without thinking she leaned forward slightly. It had been so long since she felt anything like this, and that had been in an even more fraught situation.
A door opened upstairs. "Clara, join us, please," Nucky called down the stairs.
She squeezed Richard's hands and started formulating a plan of attack as she walked up the stairs.
Downstairs, he stared straight ahead and heard Mr. Thompson say, "All right, now about your latest stray..." before the door shut again.
"He's not a stray. He's my friend. He's a war hero. Jimmy says Richard's the best shot he's ever seen," Clara said.
"You and Jimmy are no longer children. His friends are not your friends."
"I didn't say..."
"He scares the children," Margaret interjected.
"Because they sense how uncomfortable you are with his face. It's not his fault. It's not as if he did anything wrong. Imagine having to go through life with children screaming at the sight of you just because your country went to war. It's a nightmare." Clara decided to try appealing to her father's pride in being leader of Atlantic City. "The least we-as the family of the leader of Atlantic City-can do is set a good example of how to help injured veterans."
"We all know you spent the war doing War Work, but it's too early for you to start waving the flag and singing an anthem," her father (who thought her leaving college to work for the war effort was as pointless and wasted as Jimmy's leaving Princeton to join the Army, and managed to make the phrase "war work" sound like a joke) said dryly.
"I'm being practical. Richard is polite and soft-spoken. Let's compare that to some bodyguards I had as a child. Richard's here because we could be in danger. If something happens, the children's survival could depend on their willingness to go to him. I promise you, Margaret, Richard is the best-case scenario for a bodyguard you want for your children. If you'll try and find sympathy in your heart for a young veteran who needs it, I'll work out how to make the children accept him."
Neither Margaret nor her father answered, so she took it as a win. "I think one of the problems is the sleeping arrangement, but if it's all right with everyone, I'll sort that out today and then sort out the children."
Clara left the room, and Margaret turned to stare at Nucky. "What does she mean, sort out the children?"
"Don't worry, Clara wouldn't browbeat children."
"Are you certain?"
Later that day, when Nucky was informed that Eddie wasn't available to assist him because Clara had asked him to shop for Margaret's house, he decided he wasn't certain. While meeting with James about other (actually essential) issues, he brought it up. "Can you explain to me why Clara has decided that your Mr. Harrow is her newest project?"
Jimmy used his cigarette as a reason to delay answering. Nucky really didn't know Clara, he thought. He remembered suddenly when Clara was nine and wanted a chemical set. She was taken with the idea of blowing things up. Instead, Nucky bought her a dollhouse. It was beautiful and expensive, but Clara said it was boring. All she could do was arrange the little people in the rooms. He realized that's what Nuck thought of Clara, and maybe even he, Jimmy. They were small figurines to be arranged into scenes of Nucky's liking. He only saw what he wanted to see, the future Mrs. Darcy Blaine. The pretty blonde doll in the fancy house with the handsome husband. "Did you know that Blaine grabbed Clara's arm so hard he left marks?"
"All couples fight, James. Are you saying you've never left fingerprints on Angela?"
Clara knew Eddie would come through for her. He picked up the bed, bought linens, and brought things from her room at the Ritz. He even helped her set the bed up in the little storage area Margaret had left empty, and that Richard was already using to store his bag and what Clara assumed was his guns. Margaret and the children were in the yard, and she made quick work of making the bed and setting up the lamp.
"What's this?" a voice mumbled from behind her.
"Your room! No more early morning munchkin visits, and you can stretch out. That sofa is tragically small."
"Why?"
"You needed a better place to sleep-"
Richard shook his head. "Mmm. Why are. You. Being nice. Erm. To me?"
How sad, Clara thought. He's honestly shocked someone is kind to him. Clara thinks about all the possible answers to this question. Saying because, without you here, I don't think I could stay in this house seems to push the boundaries of propriety, so she chose her words. "Because you are my only friend in this house. We don't fit into my dad's imaginary new family. So us outsiders, we're in it together." Clara reached out and pressed her hand against his for a moment, and felt his fingers twitch into hers. Richard never looked up, but Clara felt her breath hitch at the contact and she stayed still for longer than absolutely necessary.
In the end, it wasn't Clara, but Margaret, who made the children love Richard. Clara had been on a date with Darcy, and the next day was working on a writing assignment at the dining room table while Emily and Teddy drew. She was not paying attention until Emily grabbed her arm.
"It's you and the Tin Woodsman!" Emily told her as Clara admired the brightly colored scribbles.
"Why am I with the Tin Woodsman?" Clara asked.
"You're always talking to him," Teddy told her as he picked up another colored pencil.
Margaret looked in from the kitchen. "Mr. Harrow explained to the children that he's directly from Oz."
Indeed, Clara thought, she was so happy she wasn't locked in this house with Lucy.
Author's Note: The next chapter has Richard showing off his sharpshooting skills, a streetside shootout, hurt/comfort. and a lot more action!
