A/N - Well another update from me - hope you will enjoy it
"Will you pass me the Salt, please Rhett" Eleanor interrupted her eldest son's train of thoughts with a hint of a smile on her lips. – She had enjoyed witnessing the physical transformation that her son had undergone over the last couple of months. Like a magician flicking his wand undoing an ugly dead, so Rhett had risen from the disgraceful state of bodily ruin that she had found him in on her doorstep when he had returned to Charleston - a broken man finally defeated by what life had thrown him. Like Phoenix from the flame along with their once beautiful plantation main house. It made her happy – though she knew that his hurt where far from healed and ran much deeper than the lines of his still careworn face. And it saddened her that she could do nothing to help him with his hurt, she wanted to pick him up and stroke his hair like she had done when he had been a little boy – she guessed that a mother could never truly put away this sense of urge to shield her offspring from hurt and harm – but now he was a grown man and his hurt would not be healed by a stroke of his her and a softly planted kiss, at least not from her. If he would confide in her she knew it would help him – but she wouldn't press him knowing how proud and self reliant he was and always had been.
In the rebuilding of the landing Rhett had truly found his saviour, with each stone that was resurrected of the old home a little bit of the strain on his mind had been relieved. With the physical and mental demands that were put on him from the large reconstruction job he had undertaken, Rhett did not have much time to reflect on his hurt and sorrow at least during the day and most nights he fell into an exhausted dreamless sleep.
"So how is the work progressing?" his mother asked – pushing her sombre thoughts aside.
"When will you take Rosemary and I to see the reconstruction work" She continued. And as Rhett didn't answer: "You know how much I'm looking forward to it"
"Yes Rhett – do let us come" Rosemary put in with a pleading voice and a mischievous smile on her lips.
"Well" Rhett put on a charming smile "I want it to be just right for you"
"Can't have my to favourite ladies sleeping on the bare floors now can I"
"But you know what" He continued on the spur of the moment – for some reason wanting the Landing to himself just a while longer, but also seeing the justness and the rightness in them wanting to see their old home again. They had after all both spend a lot more time there than he ever had and loved the place dearly. "We can revive an old tradition and have a New Years ball out there – Would you like that?"
"Just one condition – you cannot see the place before then" He added with a half smile, a sardonic glint in his eyes that luckily were missed by the two ladies present. How many of those New Years ball had he actually been present at – not many thanks to his Father's rigid rule.
"Oh how exiting Rhett, that would be lovely…."
"But are you quite sure that everything will be all right and ready to receive visitors so soon… a mere months away"
"Don't you worry your pretty heads about that – just start planning"
"I know that is something you will both enjoy very much" He chuckled.
"Just like old time" Rhett's mother said with a grimace somewhere in between a happy grin and a sad frown. She knew how much it hurt Rhett that he had been banished from his home for all those years, even if he had never mentioned it to her.
"It will be splendid" Rhett leaned over to pat his mothers hand, a small smile playing at the edge of his mouth "though not to splendid I promise" he added knowing full well how fragile a balance it was to restore and rebuild what had been destroyed without being stamped as vulgar and money on display types facing ostracism. Especially for someone like him, where all of Charleston knew – even if was never mentioned as the stories were not fitting in the parlours of polite society – that he had profited greatly from the demise of their beloved South. To top it up he had been blacklisted from the very society he now wished to join for almost two decades – no there definitely weren't any room for missteps. And if not for his own sake for his Mother and sister – he would do anything in the world not to do any thing that could reflect badly on those two ladies that he held close to his heart. Many things had changed in the years after the war, and though perhaps some rules had been relented a little, some were stuck to more rigidly – and it would benefit none if he rubbed the stench (or the stash more like it) of his betrayal into the noses of the Old Guard that were the pillars of Charleston Society. He knew how unforgiving they could be.
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With a sigh Rhett dropped into the high backed leather chair in his fathers old study – ironically this was where he felt most at home. He stretched leisurely and placed his feet on the matching foot rest. All the furniture in this room had been imported from England by his grandfather – and though the room was a bit more sparsely decorated than it had been before the war – the atmosphere had been retained. The chunky old leather furniture had been spared the plundering that even still inhabited house has been subjected to in the final days of the war, most likely not flashy or glinting enough to attract the eyes of a magpie Yankee soldier on a raid.
After their dinner he immediately had taken his chance and retreated to his hidden hub in here. He loved to take quite moments in the undisturbed atmosphere that reigned in this room. Walls covered by bookcases – that even if they didn't hold the valuable volumes that it had previously held still had enough to satisfy even the most dedicated book lovers appetite. Now in addition large plans of architectural sketches and reconstruction plans covered one wall, serving as a temporary head quarter for his effort to restore The Landing.
His mother and sister had already been fully engrossed in their elaborate – but not to elaborate – plans for the upcoming party. Though he loved his mother and sister dearly, an evening filled with chatter of whether to go with a silvery or burgundy theme and if it would be to out there to order a new dress for the occasion, where to much, even for him. So he had retired pledging fatigue and left them to their own devices.
He held up his glass and swirled the liquid within, admiring the golden and amber tones that changed and danced as the light of the fire burning in the finely decorated fireplace was caught in it.
He had cut back on his drinking to a more moderate level, not feeling the overwhelming urge to be numbed from head to toe every second of every hour of every day as strongly anymore. The physical effort of restoring the plantation and the gratification of seeing the old place revert to its former glory had helped with that, by giving his life some sort of of purpose and direction. However he still enjoyed his evening drinks, especially on an evening like this where he knew that the thoughts would not be held back.
He didn't fully understand why he had suggested the New Years party to Rosemary and his Mother. He didn't really feel like socialising a great deal at the moment and had spent most of his nights cooped up at Dunmore for this reason as well, where he didn't have to take into consideration anybody's needs but his own, and where he could be as quirky and moody as he liked without hurting anyone since the only people that were around was the workers he had hired for the reconstruction job, and those he always treated fairly no matter how much he felt like raging at the rest of the world. More to the point, they all went home to their temporary lodgings that had been put up close to where the old slave quarters had been – not that there was any connection to the situation of those who had resided there then and the situation of their liberated counterparts that now worked and lived at the place – and left him to his own devises. All that would hear any yelling he might have felt like doing would be the old owl that resided in one of the still abandoned rooms of the main building where the aggressive workers had not purged the place from unwanted residents.
Well now the party was going to be – even if it would be a dreadful night he would not dream of going back on his newly made promise. Heck it might even be good for him to be forced to act civilised to people outside his family. And it was still a while away, perhaps he would feel better then.
Even as he thought that, he knew it wasn't going to be. He would probably feel this dreadful and miserable for the rest of his life even if time would dull the pain. Even if his exterior had reverted to a state resembling more closely his formerly handsome self, with muscles, not a sagging growing belly, straining the fabric of his shirt and pants, his interior was still as messy as the day he had left Atlanta.
He hung his head.
Why couldn't he rid himself of the blasted thoughts of all the misery he had tried to leave behind?
A memory of another night flashed to his mind. A memory, of him standing behind his wife, squeezing her temples lightly yet unrelenting in a desperate attempt to purge her mind of unwanted thoughts of another man.
He downed the contents of the glass, in a desperate attempt to prove himself wrong, and force himself to forget. How easy it would be for him if he could just wipe blank his mental slate and start afresh.
He laughed mockingly – the self contempt clear in his eyes – as he caught his own reflection in the silver decanter. He had had this conversation with himself many times over the last months, again and again turning over the question in his mind – why couldn't he forget? Why couldn't he forget when that was what he so desperately wanted to do.
It was of no use, oblivion wasn't for him – and if he was completely honest would he really want to?
He carefully opened the lid to the box of dangerous memories that were hidden away in a corner of his mind normally well out of his reach. Now he let the memories spill over him. Flashing images of a dark haired girl, laughing up at him with bright blue eyes… Giving his stubbled cheek an innocent peck… Running wild in search for adventure in a secret garden he had brought her to on their lonesome travel… Eyes round and wide in anticipation of his next word as he would tell her a story of his years of roaming the world… A little girl sitting in her mothers lap in a preserved moment of rare family idyll and tranquillity… Other memories displaying other scenes from a life that somehow seemed to belong to someone else… Finally her lying in a broken heap twisted, as a rag doll, into an all too unnatural position that clearly stated that something was fundamentally wrong. Interwoven with these were images of another black haired girl – or woman were perhaps more fitting to call her… Glinting green eyes smiling at him… teasing him… Storming at him with uncontrolled hurt… A stolen dance with her smiling trustingly at him after he had let her to abandon the path of propriety she had formerly strived to adhere to(how sweet it had been to hold her in his arms)… A screaming face spewing anger and shattered dreams… A mischievous smile on a beautiful face, as she plotted her next scheme to reach richness or something else of her hearts desire… Her head resting on a pillow, dark her flowing around her, her face for once relaxed into an innocent expression, his finger slowly tracing the relaxed structures of her cheek and jaw… Emerald green eyes burning with passion begging him to release her, from what she knew not, a dark evening where he had been engrossed in jealousy… Dreamy eyes that looked not for him but for a golden knight in a far away time… And his normally ever so controlled facial expressions and annoyingly blank eyes, showed a multitude of feelings not only of misery and heartbreak, but also of joy and happiness if only for a fleeting second before he regained control.
He let out an audible sigh, and combed his hand through his unruly hair, as if straitening his outward appearance would calm his storming interior.
His little black box of dangerous memories did not only contain the heart wrenching images of hurt and loss, but also some that were beautiful and tender and called out to him, begging to be remembered more often. He didn't know which he were the most afraid of remembering or which had made him run the fastest out of Atlanta.
The few sleepless nights he had spent after starting the reconstruction of the landing had mostly been due to the odd memory that had slipped out of this little black box and crawled to the forefront of his mind where it would not be ignored. Trying desperately to get him to answer the question that had been present on his mind, when he had left Atlanta the day after Melanie's funeral and he still was reluctant to contemplate.
Did he or didn't he still harbour any feelings for his tempestuous wife in his poor scorched heart?
And even if he did, did he have the courage or the ability to open his heart to another tour de force with life at its fullest.
He therefore both feared any love he might have and at the same time hoped that something were still left, and because of this ambiguous emotion did not really care to find out.
Feared it because it meant that he again could be so easily enslaved by her eyes that always told him clearly what was going on in her fascinating little mind. And if she then suddenly lost this new found love she claimed to harbour for him where that would leave him he knew not. He was afraid that he would not be able to come out of it alive once more.
At the same time he hoped it, because he knew for certain that he would never again find a woman like her that could challenge him, drive him insanely mad but at the same time have the power to make him want to shower her with tender love and affection and loose himself in the passion that he had found himself able to ignite in her.
So admitting that he loved her again, or perhaps still loved her would either lead to blissful happiness or complete destruction, a cross road he didn't feel like exploring anytime soon.
In a way he knew, even if he weren't ready to put it into as much as a conscious thought let a lone an outspoken word, that he still loved her or at the very least still cared for her beyond disengaged friendship. His whole being called out to this amazing creature that had spell bound him a sunny afternoon a lifetime ago. But he didn't want it to be true… He didn't want it to be like that, and so he pleaded ignorance.
He got up with an angry jolt and refilled his glass.
He knew what he had to do, he had to see her again. It was as simple yet complicated as that.
To prove to himself that she did not mean anything to him, or that whatever she meant to him, was something that he could live quite happily without he had to see her again. It was the only way.
But he did not want her to know that he wanted to see her. No! That would just give her the wrong idea, and if she still held on to the notion that he was her new found love, it would be to hard to just see her and let her go – especially if she would profess this love for him in such sincere terms.
He suspected that in his less numbed and desolate state, it would be harder to turn away from her than it had been in Atlanta. And remembering his last goodbye to her he acknowledged that it had been hard enough then.
So he thought that the best idea were for him to see her under circumstances where he was in control, and could claim that she was the imposer.
That meant that going to Tara was definitely out of the question… and he had no intention of going back to Atlanta. The mere thought of that suffocating, monstrous, dark and gloomy house sent shivers down his spine. Though he would normally always claim that he did not have a superstitious bone in his body that place definitely haunted him… No Atlanta was definitely out of the question as he doubted very much that he could set up a chance encounter at Belle Watlings place – the only place in the Godforsaken city that didn't repulse him completely. He chuckled at the thought. What a fun absurd scene it would be, the abandoned wife meeting up with her estranged husband in the mistress' love nest by mere coincidence. Not likely!
That or Bonnie's grave – but his little girls resting place were his private alter of sorrow, and in no way a place he felt would benefit from a battle between himself and the girls mother.
No he would have to come up with something else. Preferably it would be right here on his own home turf in Charleston. Well a public meeting in Charleston would be just the thing, and his newly developed plan of a New Years party would be the perfect occasion. Why not find some way to include her in the guest list for the New Years ball?
Perhaps he could get his mother to in some round about way to get Scarlett's two sour faced aunts that as far as he knew still resided here in the city to invite her? He knew that his mother beneath her soft exterior had a mind of steel that could bend lesser creatures to her ideas. And he felt sure that she would be able to accomplish Scarlett being invited through her aunts without giving cause to more gossip about him and his strangely missing wife than were already going on. He felt very confident in his mother's manipulative abilities.
And knowing Scarlett she would never miss an opportunity to attend a grand party. Especially not when she knew it was hosted by his family.
That would definitely disguise any resemblance of him having any immediate want to ser her.
He smiled at himself, quite proud with his little scheme. He was sure that had this plot been directed at anybody else and had Scarlett been in on the joke, she would have been proud of him too.