Scarlett had never been one to wake instantly, or cheerfully. Her sleep-muddled brain cleared slowly in the mornings. And New Orleans was so warm, indolently drowsy, and she was wrapped in Rhett's embrace and she had never wanted to be anywhere else. Something about those feelings wasn't quite right, but what was it? She remembered thinking about New Orleans as she fell asleep - thinking about it, because she wasn't there. This wasn't her honeymoon - Aunt Eulalie -
Her eyes flew open. Charleston, Aunt Eulalie's death, and Rhett. Not New Orleans, not their honeymoon, but Rhett's embrace all the same. Oh, Lord! What had they done?
To make her complicated situation even stickier, there was a knock at the door.
"Miss Scarlett?" called Prissy's high voice.
"Oh, God," she whispered out loud.
"Miss Scarlett, your breakfast's here. Miss Scarlett?"
"Yes!" she fairly yelped, then cleared her throat and continued more calmly. "Thank you, Prissy. Just leave it in the parlor - I'll come eat when I'm ready."
At least Prissy did not feel familiar enough with her mistress to come into the room and bully her out of bed, as Mammy would have done. Instead, the younger woman mumbled something unintelligible - probably a sullen, "Yes, ma'am" - and left her well alone, so that Scarlett could face her next dilemma.
Rhett. He slept still, more soundly than she had ever known him to sleep. He had stirred when she called out to the servant, flinging one arm wide and turning his head toward her. The golden glow of the morning sun limned him like a god. His profile was clear again, the cheeks hard and angular. He still looked tired, though - there were faint dark circles in the too-hollow spaces under his eyes. He looked healthy, but not well-rested. Touching his cheekbone with one fingertip, she wondered if they were new - if he had not slept well after seeing her. Or were they habitual, the marks of a man too busy to keep decent hours. Or too debauched, a serpentine whisper hissed in her brain. Was there another Belle here in Charleston?
Many things she had forcefully pushed out of her mind the night before were now all trying to crowd back in. What had he been doing for three years - who had he been seeing? Why did he come back to the hotel to see her? Why did he come upstairs (oh, why had she invited him!), and why - what did it mean? What would come next? She could stand anything from him - his jeers, his mockery, his disinterest, his anger - but not a divorce. If he asked that of her - if this had only been goodbye-
So far had she gone down the unhappy road of her own thoughts, Scarlett did not realize at first that Rhett's eyes had opened, and he had spent several minutes watching the tumultuous cycle of emotions writ clearly across her face. Scarlett jumped when his hand reached up to cover hers and press it down against his cheek.
"Good morning," Rhett murmured, turning his head to kiss the inside of her wrist. His mustache was feather-light against the delicate skin.
"Good morning," Scarlett echoed stiltedly, and reclaimed her hand.
"Was that Prissy I heard?"
"Yes."
"You know we are married, my dear. It's not scandalous to share a room with your own husband."
Though he said it lightly, his remark cut her with a double edge, slicing into the still-raw pain of her uncertainty about his actions, and through the much older, calcified wound of the years they had spent in separate bedrooms - at her misguided request. Scarlett glared at him.
"Be serious," she snapped. Without bothering to cover herself, she stood up from the bed and walked the short distance to the settee where Prissy had lain out her nightgown the night before. Who cared if he saw? But she hoped he cared, if his mind wasn't set - if it wasn't too late. She pulled the voluminous white gown over her head and used both hands to drag her heavy black hair up from underneath it. Crossing her arms over her breasts, she turned back to face Rhett, lifting her chin defiantly, daring him to say something about her wanton display in such contrast to the prudery of her behavior when they had lived together.
Rhett had sat up against the headboard and, thankfully, behaved more modestly than she had, drawing the sheet up and draping it across his lower abdomen. Scarlett carefully kept her eyes locked on his, determined not to stare at him, though there was so much more to see in the daylight. Despite her focus, she could see enough in her peripheral vision - the ridge of his old scar, the mat of black hair - she knew just how those crisp curls felt under her fingertips, fresh in her mind - and strikingly, the firmness of his abdomen, thicker than it had been when they had married, but no longer ruined with drink and dissipation. If Rhett noticed the flicker in her green glare, he at least did not remark on it.
"If you'll come back to bed," Rhett said quietly, "I will be very serious."
"No," Scarlett responded stoutly, sure that it was only a ploy to - to do that again, some sort of trick to distract her.
"I promise, Scarlett." Rhett's voice was somber, almost stern. "Please, come sit with me?"
Scarlett hovered in the middle of the room, torn between the desire to be close to him, and an irrational fear of doing anything at all. Any move she made would advance this discussion, and she was still terrified of its outcome.
"I won't leave until we resolve this, and you can't leave as long as I'm in here. You might tell Prissy not to come in your room, and not care too much about what she thinks of that, but how will you explain the presence of a naked man in your bedroom to the hotel maids? You don't think they might talk to your maid about such an unexpected event? That is, if they keep their heads long enough to talk to Prissy. They may just start screaming."
"Always the gentleman, aren't you," Scarlett retorted, though she did return to the bed and perch primly on the side of the mattress.
"As much as you are a lady," Rhett winked. Scarlett huffed, but the irritation didn't stick. He was grinning at her openly, his eyes warm, with none of the mockery or coldness that had turned these teasing exchanges so bitter in the past.
With a sigh, Scarlett scooted onto the bed and rested her back against the headboard next to Rhett.
"You're still a varmint, Rhett Butler."
"And you like me because I am a varmint."
Scarlett turned her head away, unwilling to agree with him and confirm even a small amount of the power he held over her now. She did not just like him; she loved him, utterly and completely, and her whole heart was in his hands this morning.
"Rhett, I don't think you ever really told me why you were here last night."
"I told you I wanted to see you, to buy you a brandy, and to talk to you."
"But that doesn't explain it - not really. You could have seen me anytime in Atlanta - you could have wired me to come to Charleston on my own. You know I would have. You knew I was in town, but it was only by chance that you saw me at all."
Rhett opened his hands, palms up, the backs resting against his thighs. "I don't know how to make you understand, Scarlett."
Instantly, the fear she had been battling all morning surged to the forefront.
"Do you want a divorce? Was this just some despicable way of saying goodbye? Because I won't -"
"No."
Scarlett swallowed and tried to will her heart to slow its frantic beat.
"Perhaps this was hello," Rhett continued cryptically.
"What?"
"A new beginning, not an end. And one that is long overdue. I know it. I've been missing you for some time now. I didn't quite realize it at first. That first year, after I tried to leave but you refused to offer a divorce, I almost hated you. That is, when I felt anything at all. When you agreed to relinquish some hold on me, and I no longer had to return to Atlanta to - as I thought - appease your vanity, I was still so numb I didn't even feel freed by the release. I was so utterly convinced in the rightness of my own actions that I ignored all evidence to the contrary, until one day - more than a year ago now - I ran into a young woman on the street. I don't know who she was, I didn't care to find out. I only got a glimpse of her - at first, just her back. In a green dress, with black hair tucked under the most absurdly embellished little hat. And suddenly, I wanted more than anything else for it to be you. For you to be here in Charleston, shopping with me, in a ridiculous hat with too many ribbons on your dress. But she turned around and the spell was broken."
Missing her! How - how dare he! went the first thoughts through Scarlett's whirling brain. A man who misses you doesn't ignore you for even one year, nevermind three!
"I did not know how to reach out to you, by then. More than a year had gone by since we last saw each other, and not on the best of terms, even for us. It was facile to just go on, day by day, but every day I put off doing something made it even harder to begin. What would you have done with a telegram out of the blue, or a letter? I feared you would burn either one, and my own cowardice would prevent me from trying again. I could have just shown up on your doorstep in Atlanta, but the complexity of that approach made it easy to avoid. I loved you long enough once before, without you knowing. I'm afraid I might have gone on loving you, letting history repeat itself. But you, as always, have a way of muddling things up."
"Muddling!" she spluttered, over the moon with rage and hope and rendered nearly dumb by the battle they were waging over her heart.
"A delightful muddle, to be sure. Yes, I knew you were in town. And I hoped I would run into you - having had a little too much whisky the day your train arrived, I even wondered if we might recreate that encounter. I would run into you on the street - and this time, it really would be you. Perhaps that had been just the dress rehearsal, and now you were here for the final performance."
Oh, could he ever just talk simple sense!
"But I was still too paralysed to come forward. I thought it would be more respectful to you in your grief, or so I told myself. My mother has spoken of nothing but you for these last few days, you know. Although she won't be so unladylike to tell me directly, I know she is beyond disappointed at our separation. She has been singing your praises since you arrived."
Scarlett touched cold fingers to her own flushed cheek. She had been so mistrustful of Eleanor Butler - was her mother-in-law on her side?
"I knew you were in this hotel," Rhett went on, though he spoke more quietly now. "I arranged to meet my business partner here. And I told myself, that if I saw you I would act, though it may already have been too late."
"What if you hadn't seen me?" Scarlett asked in a whisper.
"I think I would have been on your doorstep in Atlanta soon enough," Rhett confessed. "I never could stay away from you. All through the war - and after, when you were married to Frank - I could never forget you. I always had to come back. It took me quite a bit longer this time, but I don't think I could have stayed away much longer."
Scarlett sagged against the headboard, her hand now cupping her cheek, the other limp in her lap. It was so much to take in, all of it; too much.
"You let me be miserable for years, because it was easier for you?"
She was shocked when Rhett slid abruptly off the bed. Kneeling on the ground, he stretched his hand across the tumbled sheets to claim hers.
"I was a fool."
Scarlett stared down at their loosely clasped hands.
"And now what?"
"I'm sorry. Can you forgive me?"
With her free hand, Scarlett dashed away the tears that were clouding her vision.
"You mean, show you the same consideration you gave me that day?" she asked, giving voice to the sharp ends of her bitterness. Letting it go.
Rhett hung his head, dropping his forehead against the mattress.
"I understand," he said evenly, letting go of her hand. "If you don't want Prissy to see me, you had better concoct an errand to send her away. I will leave as soon as I'm dressed."
Letting the tears fall, Scarlett drew up on her knees and reached for her husband with both hands.
"No, Rhett, no. I do forgive you. I do. Only -" she sniffled, "do you forgive me, too? Everything you said that day - oh, God, I remember it all, and I'm sorry, I'm so sorry my darling-"
She did not get to finish. Rhett had pounced back on the bed, braced on one hand while his other arm went firmly around her waist. His kiss swallowed the last of her forgiveness, cut off the rest of her plea, as he bore her back down against the bedding. She swept her arms around his neck, and when his mustache tickled her skin, she laughed.
Some time later, she was cradled with her back against Rhett's chest, one of his strong arms draped over her side. She cupped his hand in both of hers, measuring her fingers against his, examining the tough, swarthy skin and comparing it to her own. As the glow of satiation faded, worry that they had not truly resolved everything gnawed at her again.
"This will never work. We've been apart so long," she said, with a quaver in her voice that betrayed the statement as a confession of fear, not a certainty.
"Maybe that's why it will work," Rhett answered, turning his hand to thread his fingers through hers. "We don't know each other anymore. I have to get to know you again, you have to get to know me -"
"For the first time?"
Rhett's face was buried in her hair such that she could actually feel his smile in the way his muscles shifted. "Perhaps. But you know - knew - me better than you think. If I wasn't always trying to throw you off the scent, so to speak, you would have realized just how well you knew me." He lifted her hand to his lips and kissed her knuckles. "And this time, I will let you see it."
Scarlett rolled over so that she could see his eyes, and cupped his cheek in her palm for a moment before letting her hand drop. "But, Rhett, what if it doesn't work out? You said -"
"Does it matter what I said? No, really, Scarlett, does it matter to you what I said so many years ago? Shouldn't it matter more what I'm saying now?" Talk like this still confused her. Was there a right answer? What did Rhett expect?
"But-"
Rhett made an impatient gesture. "But if it doesn't, well, we both survived that once before, didn't we? I love you, Scarlett."
Scarlett shifted uncomfortably. Yes, she had - but perhaps just barely. There were so many dark months, emotionally and literally, absent of memories that she had wiped away with drink. The few stilted visits, before he had given up on his promise. But she had never given up on hers, never granted him a divorce. If this didn't work, would she have the courage to take that step now? Could she live through that without losing herself in a bottle again?
Perhaps not, but however she may have changed over the years, Scarlett Butler had not become a coward. She would not turn Rhett out of her life again just because she was afraid.
Emerging again from her introspective thoughts, Scarlett saw the shadows beginning to dim the flame in Rhett's dark eyes. But, she realized, she knew why. "I love you too, Rhett," she said, holding his gaze as she did so. The shadows departed. Rhett lowered his head to kiss her again, and just before his lips touched hers, Scarlett blurted:
"But where will we live!?"
When my eyes are open and I look at you, I see a woman that I have loved for a long time, who entranced me all over again when I came to her rooms...who gives me such genuine pleasure that, in spite of myself, I came here for the sheer delight of being with her again. The woman who could rescue me? Of course. - A Little Night Music, Stephen Sondheim
A/N: Y'all I'm real sorry this took so long. This little piece was never strong enough to stand up to such a sparse update schedule. Life's been coming at me fast since I moved in September. I'm hoping I'm a little more centered now and things are under control. I won't have to spend as much time making my new house a livable home and can get back into writing - and I have, though it's still slow going. I don't have anything in the hopper that's ready to go or near it, but I haven't given up on writing.
This was rather rushing little story, but this satisfied me at the time. There's so much to untangle with these two and it's delicious to disappear into a long story that tries to unravel those threads and reconnect them, but I think it's fine sometimes to just want something lighter, something that skims the surface a bit more - and as such, probably asks more suspension of disbelief, thank you for attempting it! A little story snack, instead of a five-course meal. Thank you for all the reviews, I hope you did enjoy this as well.
I do like to post smut on Valentine's Day. I'm working on uploading a new story to AO3 as I'm uncomfortable hosting it here, but it keeps stalling out on preview. If you want to check for it, my name there is the same as here.