I DO NOT OWN HATFIELDS AND MCCOYS. I FEEL SO BAD ABOUT ABANDONING MY PREVIOUS H STORY, BUT I ULTIMATELY LOST INTEREST IN IT BECAUSE THE POINT WAS ULTIMATELY TO GIVE ALIFAIR MCCOY A HUSBAND. THIS HERE IS A STORY THAT I FIND TO HAVE GREAT POTENTIAL. I FELT THAT IF THEY COULD HAVE GOTTEN AWAY FROM THE FEUD, THE LOVE BETWEEN JOHNSE AND ROSEANNA COULD HAVE SURVIVED. THE MAIN ORIGINAL CHARACTERS IN THIS STORY ARE BASED ON PEOPLE THAT I MET DURING MY COLLEGE DAYS.
Tug River. West Virginia/Kentucky border. November 8, 1880
Roseanna McCoy was oddly quiet as she rode on the back of the horse. She was hanging on tightly to the man that she had fallen for; the man who had taken her virginity. Johnse Hatfield was beyond handsome and seemed like the husband of her dreams. He was kind and carefree and he made Roseanna feel like life wasn't all fire and brimstone like her poppy made it out to be. But still, Roseanna couldn't help but be a bit nervous.
What if he'd just wanted to sleep with her and then drop her like dead apple; like he had done to so many other girls? Johnse did have a reputation on both sides of the Tug for being a man who worked hard to get women in bed and then avoided them once his pleasure had been achieved.
"Oh, and on our honeymoon we're gonna take a real train ride all across the country till we can't go no more." Johnse said with excitement as he planned their future. "I read they got this great blue ocean up in Oregon; I mean, this thing is so big and wide, you can't even see the other side."
"Sounds lovely..." Roseanna whispered as she tried and failed to hide her tears.
"Are you crying?" Johnse asked, his voice filled with worry. "Well, what on earth for?"
"Just wondering where I fit in on this long list of conquests." Roseanna remarked as Johnse dismounted his horse and looked up at her.
"My beautiful sweet darling, you think I'm toying with you?" Johnse asked. It pained him that Roseanna though that she was just another notch on his belt.
"I don't know what to think." Roseanna admitted in tears. "This is my first time. I was saving myself for a husband, just like God told me to."
"I ain't fooling here, Roseanna. I intend to marry you." He assured her as he gently got her off of his horse and set her down on her feet. "If I hadn't promised my pa...Hell, I'd ride on across that river right now and on bended knee I'd ask your daddy myself."
"You mean it?" She asked gently as he caressed her cheek.
"Come here, i'd go up against the whole world to make you my wife and I can't change my past or our kin, but I tell you true I ain't never felt like this before about nobody else but you." Johnse assured Roseanna as she looked deep into his eyes. She could feel in her heart that he was telling the truth. Roseanna had seen that same look in her poppy's eyes when he looked at her mama. It was love; pure and simple.
"I ain't ever felt like this before either." She assured him as the star crossed lovers shared a tender kiss.
"Now, get over there; you tell them." Johnse said as he knew that the news of their desire to marry would be better received from her ears than his.
"Okay, bye." Roseanna said gleefully.
"Bye." Johnse replied as ha for back on his steed as Roseanna got to the bridge and quickly turned back to her love.
"I don't wanna cross that bridge." She said with a smirk.
"I'll be here when you get back." Johnse assured her as he was suddenly propelled back as a cloud of red burst from his gut. Roseanna gasped in horror as Johnse let out a groan of pain. As Johnse struggled to stay on his horse, the McCoy boys came riding out in full force.
"You ain't getting away, Johnse." Jim called out as Roseanna looked at the posse in fear.
"Oh, my God, Johnse! Johnse, it's my brothers; go!" She screamed in fear.
"I love you, Roseanna!" Johnse exclaimed as he snapped the reins and took off galloping.
"You ain't going nowhere!" Pharmer said as the McCoy's fired off shots in Johnse's direction.
"Wait, Stop! Don't hurt him! He didn't do nothing!" Roseanna begged as her youngest brother rode up alongside her. "Bud, Bud, you gotta stop them!"
"We gotta get you to Poppy!" Bud said with a shake of his head as Roseanna quickly got on the horse, hopeful that once she explained things, her poppy would understand.
"I didn't do nothing!" Johnse protested as he tried to outrun the McCoy boys.
"Get him! Go!" Calvin cried out as they kept letting off shots. Johnse kept ducking to avoid bullets when he ran face first into a branch and fell from his horse.
"Go get him!" Tolbert shouted as the boys rode up to him.
"Goddamn it, Tolbert. What you so hot about?" Johnse asked as he quickly pulled his gun while the McCoys pulled theirs. "You're the one that left Roseanna with no way home. All I did was give her shelter feed her dinner, keep her safe from harm."
"You try to have your way with her?" Jim asked point blank.
"No sir, she spent the night with my sisters." Johnse insisted as he teared up from the pain. "You saw her, safe and sound. You think she'd be kissing on me if I violated her in any way?"
"I did hear Roseanna say Johnse..." Calvin started to say.
"Shut up, Calvin!" Tolbert growled as he kept his rifle on Johnse. "Now, I say we kill him and get on across the river before anyone knows."
"Yeah, your sister will know. She loves me." Johnse pointed out.
"That's a load of bull manure." Pharmer argued.
No it ain't, and I love her too, goddamn it." Johnse shot back as he tossed his gun aside to endear himself. "Since I gotta prove it to you."
"How bad is you shot, Johnse?" Jim asked with genuine concern.
"Well, I'll live. I think the bullet tore straight through me." Johnse replied as he struggled not to cry.
"Tolbert, let's go, Come on." Jim commanded as the boys began to trot away.
"You tell your pa...I wanna ask Roseanna's hand in marriage!" Johnse called out after them, only to get a glob of spit from Tolbert McCoy in return.
"Hey, Pa, we found her, we found her. I got Roseanna!" Bud called out as he rode up to the McCoy house with his sister in tow. The entire family came out on the front porch with Randall carrying a belt in his hand; ready to strap some sense into his eldest girl.
"You spent the night under a Hatfield roof?" He asked angrily.
"With Johnse's sisters, sir." Roseanna clarified, trying to make it sound better. "Mr. Hatfield kindly gave permission. Johnse...he wants to marry me." Roseanna smiled as she was hoping it would clear things up, but everyone looked at her as if she had lost her shit.
"I beg your damn pardon?" Randall asked in disbelief.
"He loves me, Poppy. He wants to ask you proper, you know?" Roseanna insisted as she tried her best to stand up to her old man. "He wants to make sure it's right."
"He touch you, Roseanna?" Randall asked, with fear dripping into his voice.
"No." she swore, even though it was a lie. She had been intimate with Johnse, but even Roseanna that it was not the time or place to say that.
"Then go on...do whatever you want." Randall said quietly as all the anger went out of him, replaced by grief. "You like the Hatfields so much, why don't you go stay with them forever?"
"Poppy please..." Roseanna pleaded as Randall turned his back.
"You're not my daughter anymore." He said as he and the rest of the family went back inside the house; except for Bud who got her back up on the horse and walked her back to the Tug fork. As Roseanna let silent tears fall, she could only pray that her brothers hadn't killed Johnse; because he was all she had now.
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