A/N: Just a note on process: sometimes I'll use GWTW details, sometimes It Happened One Night, sometimes my own whole-cloth. I'm working on keeping the essence of characters/relationships/dynamics the same, but some details will have to change. For example, I had to jink with their ages here: from the screenplay, Ellie is in her early twenties, which would make Rhett around forty, but Clark Gable was only 33 (and certainly looks no older) when they shot the movie. Hence, the jinking.

Chapter 3

A pretty young woman was in the seat nearest the window, looking intently—almost paranoidally—out of it. She was biting her lip, and her left hand was clutched tightly around the small valise on the seat next to her. She looked to be about twenty-four or twenty-five. Not really that young, come to think of it, compared to his thirty-two, but he'd been out on his own for half his life already. The delicate flower who had thefted his seat instead had a decidedly pampered air about her. He wondered if she'd attended any of the balls he'd covered back when he had a job. She was also, on further notice, not stunningly beautiful, something he doubted she'd ever heard in her life. But she had an interesting face—something about it made a person want to look at it more. He could see how such a statement would be unacceptable as a compliment, but if the society pages had taught him anything, it was that interesting was a price above rubies compared to beautiful.

"Excuse me, lady," he began. The woman started, and looked away from the window, up at him. "But that upon which you sit is mine."

She looked down at the seat, blushed, and raised flashing eyes at him. After a moment to master her temper, she raised one eyebrow imperiously at this odd, formal little speech. "I beg your pardon?" she asked, each syllable soaked with disdain.

Definitely a society belle.

"Listen," Rhett explained, "I put up a stiff fight for that seat. So if it's just the same to you—" He jerked his thumb over his shoulder. "Scram."

Scarlett had never been spoken to with so little diffidence by anyone in her life except her father. Even childhood playmates who teased her had been a little awestruck by her. It was one of many things in life that, until now, she had accepted without question.

Now this impudent little (oh fine, so he wasn't little, not little at all, he was marvelously tall, even stooped over in a bus aisle, if you must be a stickler about it!) man had told her to scram—oh, what a terribly uncouth word! Ellen would roll over in her grave if it ever crossed Scarlett's lips—and it sparkled through her like golden Champagne. The nerve! She longed to take him down a peg or two.

She hadn't paid attention to his conversation with the bus driver, except to know that Impudent had won, so Driver was sure to be on her side. She leaned forward in her seat, and called out, "Excuse me, driver." He turned around to her, and she smiled enough to show her dimple. Men liked that dimple. "Are these seats reserved?"

The driver smiled back at her, saw that Impudent was her antagonist, and smirked. "Naw, miss. First come, first serve."

"Thank you." She smiled again, deepening the dimple.

"Hey, driver." Impudent was talking again. "These seats accommodate two people, don't they?"

"Maybe they do, and maybe they don't," Driver answered as he walked away.

Impudent leaned into her seat, plucked up her valise with one large hand, and set it on the floor. "I beg your pardon," she insisted. Drat all! She had already said that; why couldn't she think of a better response? Not enough practice dealing with people of vulgar manners. Who would have thought that would be a problem? She frowned, her lips unconsciously pursed in a delicate moue.

Rhett was amused at the play of emotions across her expressive face. Delicate Flower was getting more and more interesting. "Scoot over," he motioned with his hand. "This is a 'maybe they do.'"

And to avoid nearly being sat on, Scarlett did. Three pegs, she counted to herself. Impudent lounged his long form into the cramped space, and immediately fished in his pockets for a cigarette and a match. She stared straight ahead, determined to be uninterested. She thought she could feel his eyes on her face.

"If you were to ask me real nice, I might put that bag of yours up in the bin." Scarlett turned back, her mouth set in a very straight line. The idea! That she would put herself in his debt for a suitcase—the nerve! Four pegs. A bell rang, and she knew she was running out of time. With quick jerking movements, she grabbed her valise, and squirmed out of the seat to do it herself.

She had just managed the task—a feat to be proud of, short as she was—when the bus pulled away. The swaying movement rocked her off-balance, and to her eternal humiliation she found herself unceremoniously dumped in Impudent's lap. To his credit, he reached out and caught her with his arms so that she did not totally fall. But she was in no mood to give him credit, especially when she saw how his eyes sparkled at her. He had such dark eyes, it seemed impossible that they could still sparkle, and yet—

Fuming once more, she wrenched herself off him and back into her seat. Five.

"Next time you drop in, bring your folks," he offered, before resuming lighting his cheroot. Six!

She angled herself away from him, resolutely looking out the window, even though it offered no interesting landscape. It was, after all, nighttime. New York suddenly seemed very far away from Miami. This was going to be a long trip.

~~nb~~

Rhett puffed on his cigarette for some time, and watched the flower out of the corner of his eye. There was no need to be sly, for sitting ramrod-straight and diagonally in the seat as she was, she wouldn't have noticed him even outright staring. Except that he sensed an undercurrent of shrewdness to her otherwise sheltered demeanor. Best not to risk any further ire quite yet.

Her shoulders twitched with tension, once. Twice. She was obviously uncomfortable, and stubborn enough to want to stay that way. Several minutes later, a third twitch. Finally, she relented, and relaxed against the back of the seat. Still angled away from him. Rhett felt a smile tug at the corners of his mouth, as if being physically spurned by her, a perfect stranger, would hurt him. Dear heart, how that cut me! Hardly. Well, if she was going to willingly give up part of her seat out of spite, he would take it. He shifted, his right leg sloping toward her and sighed as he felt the muscles stretch pleasantly. After several more minutes had passed, he dozed off into a light, but not altogether unpleasant, sleep.

Rest station, fifteen minutes! Rest station! Fifteen minutes!

He woke with a start, and saw that the flower had fallen asleep at last, too. She was waking up, and rolling her shoulders from where they had been uncomfortably jammed into the seat. She turned around, piercing him with very green eyes. She no longer looked furious. Caught at the back of the bus as they were, they had to wait for most of the passengers to stand up, stretch, and move down the aisle. There was nothing to do, really, except stare right back at her. He wondered what she would do.

To his satisfaction, she did blush, the faintest pink coloring her pale skin. But before she could do anything else, the bus was nearly empty. Always the gentleman, he moved his legs out into the aisle so she could get out first, and maybe so that she would fall into his lap again as she did so. The pink of her cheeks grew brighter. Without a word, she scooted over him, as gracefully as one can crawl over a person in a narrow seat. She did not fall this time.

She walked partway up the aisle and stopped. She looked back at him, then up at her suitcase, and back at him. She walked back, heaved her suitcase down, and took it with her. His laugh rang through the bus as she walked away.

He unfolded himself from the seat, and decided to use the ten or so minutes before they departed again to stretch his legs.

He found a nice tree to lean against, and took out a cigarette. The flower was standing right next to the door of the bus, as if to lose contact with it would make it disappear altogether. Her suitcase rested near her feet.

Rhett straightened as a man slowly came up behind her. He snatched the suitcase and darted away. Rhett gave chase, but as fast as his reflexes were, the thief had the advantage of prior knowledge and distance on him. He ran flat-out for a minute, but lost the rat in the darkness.

He made his way back to the bus, dejected that he had failed, and annoyed with the girl for not keeping a better watch on her belongings.

"He got away," he offered as he stopped in front of her, by way of an explanation. "I suddenly found myself in the middle of the brush and not a sign of the skunk." Was he wheezing? That was unacceptable.

The flower took a puff of her cigarette as she looked him up and down. "I don't know what you're raving about, young man, and furthermore, I'm not interested." She made to turn away. Why, of all the—

"Of all the—" he paused, studying her. "Perhaps it might interest you to know that your bag's gone."

She turned and looked behind her, then jumped. "God's nightgown! It's gone!"

Rhett chuckled. "I knew you'd catch on eventually."

The flower looked around her helplessly. "What am I going to do now?" she wondered, more for her benefit than his, he assumed.

"Don't tell me your ticket was in it." She looked at him, and seemed startled.

"No, no, I have that alright," she said, looking down at the small clutch in her hands. "But—my money… All I have here is four dollars."

She really did look distressed, and Rhett found himself wishing to alleviate it. Odd. "You can wire for some more money when you get to Jacksonville." A girl like her had to have a husband or father ready to send gold at the drop of a hat.

"No, I ca—" she started, before interrupting herself. Also odd. "Y- yes, yes, I will." she finished.

"I'll tell the driver about your bag," he offered, and made to walk away.

"No!" she cried, grabbing his arm and stopping him. "No, thank you, I'd rather you didn't." She actually seemed more distressed by having the theft reported than the theft itself. Curiouser and curiouser. Just who was she?

"Don't be a fool, you've lost your bag, the company ought to make good. What's your name?"

"I don't want it reported!"

Maybe she wasn't used to traveling—certainly not on her own. Maybe she didn't know how this kind of thing worked. "That's ridiculous, the company will take care of it."

"Do you understand English? Would you please keep out of my affairs! I want to be left alone." And with that, she turned and walked away.

The unmitigated gall— When she had practically accused him of potential theft— When he was actually trying to be a gentleman!

"Why, you ungrateful brat." he said to himself.

So much for atavism.

The announcer called for them to board, and Rhett walked back in. He half-hoped the flower would miss it.

No such luck, however, when he spied her making her way down the aisle as he settled into their seat. She stopped when she saw him (where did she expect him to be, exactly?) and quickly slid into the nearest available seat.

Rhett smirked, and put his feet up across the seat. Fine by him. He'd sleep better this way.