"I told you I'd leave a light on

In case you ever wanted to come back home"

- Kent Robbins, "Every Light in the House"

Prologue

"I'll think of it all tomorrow, at Tara." CHAPTER LXIII

It was a week of tomorrows, and each worse than the day before, before Scarlett Butler boarded the train that would take her home. After Melanie Wilkes' death, there had been too much to do, too many people relying on her. Always relying on her. Scarlett looked in vain for other shoulders to bear this burden with her, and found herself standing alone. Rhett was gone. Melanie was gone, and Scarlett saw too late the quiet strength upon which she had relied, unknowing. The two people she loved best in the world were gone almost before she knew she loved them both.

Scarlett had promised Melanie she would take care of Beau, and Ashley, and so she would. But Ashley was just another weary, weary load. Would she always have to carry him? Weren't men supposed to be strong and shoulder the burdens? Ashley, she recognized now, had always preferred to turn away and not see the hard work of life, preferred to avoid the hard truths. And what could be harder than Melanie's death?

For Scarlett, there was never a choice, never that option to retreat from the world and bury herself in grief. It was not in her to succumb to grief, though surely this double blow was as bad as anything she had faced since the loss of Ellen. As she had at Tara, confronted by loss and dependency, she stiffened her shoulders and hardened her heart to do what must be done. By the end of the week, this steel shell had not succeeded in inuring her to grief. It made it possible to put one foot in front of the other, until at last those steps would put her on the road to Tara.

Alone on the train, for she had not recalled Prissy and the children from Marietta and Rhett, of course, had gone his own way, she watched the familiar landmarks pass by in a numbed daze. What would she do? The thought made her throat tight, made her stomach heave with nauseous tension. The question echoed in her mind with no response other than Rhett's passionless rejoinder: I don't give a damn.

Scarlett had found fear, again. She had thought it was left behind in the dust of the War; buried in the ground at Tara with her mother. She had faced hunger; deprivation; threats to her home and livelihood and safety and family; she had faced the worst and passed through it. And she had thought – that was it. The worst was gone, and she, Scarlett, was not.

She had lost a baby, and a child. Surely, there could be no worse from life. There could be no more surprises, no more hurts, and nothing – nothing – to fear.

But just like the miscarriage had stunned her; just like Bonnie's death had come from nowhere to rip the bottom out of her life – when she thought the worst had happened, she learned how she had been so wrong. She was afraid her children hated her. She was afraid to face the old dragons without a friend. She was afraid Rhett would never come back to her. She was afraid of living her whole life in love alone.

She couldn't think about it, not yet. She would be at Tara soon. At Tara, there would be strength, for she feared hers had at last worn out.

There was no love or warmth to be found in the house on Peachtree Street. In the empty rooms, her thoughts seemed to echo and rebound and she was inundated and she could not escape. She had to escape. Tara, she thought, and the green song of rebirth and renewal became her sustenance. Tara would get her through this. Roots that go deep - Rhett had said that. She wouldn't think about that. But he had been right, and her roots were in the red earth of Tara. There would be strength for her there; strength enough to prop her up while she gathered the frayed ends of her life back together.

She sent a telegram from the train station to Prissy in Marietta before boarding the Jonesboro train the night after Melanie's burial. She hadn't had the strength to send for them to come home to Atlanta. She couldn't deal with the strain of Melanie's passing and trouble with their pitiful, annoying, childish needs as well. So she put them off, delaying one difficult task while there had been so many others she could not refuse.

Wade and Ella could join her at Tara. What would she tell them? They might not ask, at first – Rhett had left before, he had disappeared for three months with Bonnie. Her timid children might wait it out, wait for Uncle Rhett rather than risk her too-sharp tongue. That would at least buy her the time to think of something – a story – an excuse for his absence –

No. She shied away again from the memories of Rhett. Not on the train, surrounded by people. These thoughts had to wait, she must wait for Tara. She would walk the lane under the cedars; she would visit Mother and Pa; she would see the red and green vistas, the strong and resilient earth that sustained them all. At Tara, she would be able to think about everything. From Tara, she would know where to go.

...

Under the cover of darkness, Rhett Butler left the house on Peachtree Street. He picked up the two suitcases by his bedroom door and stepped into the silent hall. He was leaving almost everything behind. His steps were muffled by the plush carpeting. He stopped outside his wife's bedroom door for a moment. He didn't care to say goodbye – he had said everything there was to say. Would he miss her? Should he look in? He asked himself these questions and no answer came to him, no impulse stirred. He shrugged and moved on. At the top of the stairs he paused again and looked down the dark hallway towards the nursery. He thought of Bonnie, but the thick fog of detachment held.

Rhett did not sleep that night. He lounged, a deceptive image of relaxation, on a train hurtling through the night towards Charleston. Sometimes a cigar made glowing tracks in the air. The black night wrapped around him and flowed through him and he felt they were one. He was still in the still air; empty in the darkness.

He thought he should be surprised that Scarlett had not sought him out again; or maybe grateful. He exhaled smoke, paused, and felt nothing.

The flask in his jacket pocket was full and untouched. For months, he had been drowning himself in liquor. Smooth whisky had seemed to spread throughout his body, a thick varnish that soothed away the jagged edges of his grief until finally – he didn't feel it anymore. Life felt strange, now, like he was looking at it through thick glass. It was distant, blurry, and uninteresting. He didn't need to drink, now that the numbness had become a seemingly permanent state. If he felt anything, it was relief.

In the humid midmorning, Rhett arrived in Charleston. He had thought to see his mother; but when his feet hit the solid, unmoving platform a sudden tide of restlessness threatened to drown him. The skin on his palm rippled with the sense memory of Bonnie's hand in his on this very platform. He clenched his fist around the cap of his flask and twisted it open with a violent movement. He took a swig, and booked the evening train to New York.

He stayed in the station, pacing it restlessly most of the day. If he stayed put, there were fewer people to see him who might tell his mother he'd been in town. He had to keep moving.

Another night, another sleeper car. Finally, he slept. The train had barely left his home city when his gritty eyelids had lost their strength and the heavy blanket of numbness in his chest had pulled over his head. He slept like the dead.

New York was brittle and bright, and the city surging around him left him cold. The restlessness had worn out; it seemed inertia, more than anything, bought his passage to France. He was an object in motion and could not stop until he reached the end.

Chapter 1

"A few more days for to tote the weary load

No matter, 'twill never be light"

- Stephen Foster, "My Old Kentucky Home"

Clayton County, Georgia, September 1873

Jonesboro was dark and quiet when the evening train pulled into the station. A familiar old wagon was waiting for Scarlett in the road. The green paint on the double-box sides was faded and scratched, and the seat was a simple board across the front. Will Benteen was slouched on that board, one foot planted firmly, and the wooden peg which served as his other leg rested at an angle along the edge of the footrest. Will's chin was on his chest, and she heard soft snores as she drew up to him. She touched his knee softly.

"Will."

He didn't startle, but lifted his head smoothly, moving easily out of sleep.

"Scarlett," he said slowly, politely removing his beaten, shapeless hat and revealing the pinkish, strawberry blond hair plastered to his forehead. At the sound of the first warm, caring voice she had heard since Melly's passing, she clenched her fist and dug it painfully under the bottom edge of her corset. I won't cry, she thought. No, not even in front of Will, who's the closest family I have left now. Will would understand; but he might pity me. I can't stand any more pity. Her closest family, and not even her own blood.

The wagon bounced as Will alighted. She handed him her small valise - she had left her things in Marietta after Rhett's telegram, and that luggage would come to Tara with the children. He helped her up into the rickety seat and climbed back up beside her. With a shake of the reins and a soft cluck, Will started them out of town.

They rode in silence until the wagon passed by pine trunks instead of wooden walls.

"To what do we owe the pleasure of this visit, Scarlett? We haven't seen you out here in quite some time."

Scarlett tossed her head, a movement from a lighthearted time that failed to lift her spirits but hopefully put on the right show for now. "Oh, Will, it's been too long. And - I'm sure you know—"

"We were right sorry to hear about Miss Melanie, Scarlett. We would have come for the funeral but I can't get away for that long while the pickin's bein' done, and, well, you'll see. Suellen can't travel just now."

Scarlett rolled her eyes, feeling no need to restrain herself as the wagon passed under the wide shadows of an old pine tree. Another baby? But swift on the heels of her contemptuous feelings for her sister's condition came a painful lack of breath as she thought of her own babies. Bonnie, dead. The baby who had never been born. The babies she might never have - and she would so want a baby now, but Rhett—

"It's a hard time," she answered him, and her voice was also hard and brittle. She blinked away the sting of tears forming in her eyes.

"Well you're always welcome at Tara, you know that, Scarlett."

"Wade and Ella should be here tomorrow, with Prissy. They've been in Marietta."

"The girls will be happy for the company. They get mighty tired of only fighting with themselves."

Scarlett smiled weakly. "Just like me and Suellen, I suppose?"

Will took a moment before he answered. "Now, Scarlett, I know the two of you haven't always gotten along, but like I said. You're always welcome at Tara."

"Thank you, Will," Scarlett said softly. She tucked her hand in around his elbow and they finished the drive in companionable silence.

Arrival at Tara was anything but silent. Will and Suellen's three daughters tugged at her skirts and competed loudly for attention and affection from the aunt they rarely saw. With her infrequent visits, Aunt Scarlett was exotic and exciting, not at all like their own dull parents, and best of all she usually brought them new toys and pretty new clothes. Suellen snapped at them from the porch; the moods of pregnancy did nothing for her character. Her waist was thick, but she had never been as small as her older sister; it was not yet obvious that she was again expecting. Suellen's hair was as washed-out as her husband's, a light and dirty brown that curled in the humidity where small tendrils had escaped from her elaborate coiffure. Despite her simple clothes and constrained circumstances, Suellen clung to the pretenses of her pampered upbringing wherever she could.

Scarlett kissed Suellen's cold cheek. "It's so good to see you, Sue," Scarlett lied, thinking instead of how home, Tara, was already lifting her spirits. The wind through the trees whispered a familiar song, and the rich smell of the earth overlaid with the fragrant notes of Ellen's cape jessamine bushes soothed her. As the peace of nighttime at Tara washed over her, she quickly became fatigued. Sleep had been ragged and uneasy since Melly died and Rhett—

Suellen was talking to her, but suddenly Scarlett couldn't stand anymore false sentiment. She was too drained to continue the farce of the happy reunion.

"Dearest, I'm just so tired. Do you mind terribly if I go up to bed now? We can visit in the morning - I'm sure there's so much to tell me," Scarlett said, and she carefully did not look down at her sister's rounded abdomen.

In the porchlight Scarlett could clearly see the ill-mannered roll of Suellen's eyes. "Of course, Scarlett. Your room is the same."

"Would you send Mammy up, please?" At Suellen's nod, Scarlett kissed her sister's cheek again and pressed her hand in real gratitude.

Her room was the same. In the weak lamplight, it was hard to tell that the cream walls were dingy. The blue curtains had been lost in the war, repurposed for who knew what, but the pale yellow shades that hung now were familiar from recent years. The bright rag rugs were so different from the plush carpet in her own home but their simplicity touched her. The whole room was plain, and simple, but sturdy and warm in a way her home was not. Not without her husband, not without their daughter - had that monument to Rhett's wealth, the emblem of her security and superiority to the judgement of Atlanta's respectable citizens, ever brought her happiness and comfort? It was an uncomfortable thought, so she passed it over.

And then Mammy was there, her kind old face burdened with sadness, but her bosom was still a familiar and comforting pillow and without knowing how it happened Scarlett was hugging her close and sobbing against the broad bosom as if she were a child again.

"Oh, Mammy! Everything's wrong, it's all gone wrong. I ruined everything, oh Melly!" and the thoughts she wailed out brokenly were disjointed and sometimes unintelligible, but Mammy rubbed her back with large soothing hands.

"There, there, lam', hesh now Miss Scarlett, nothin' ain't as bad as you say, I'z sure of it." Scarlett hiccoughed violently, her throat catching on the worst part, words she hadn't even said to herself, and she wasn't sure if she could say them out loud. She didn't know what to do about it - but maybe Mammy would.

Scarlett went so still, it gave Mammy an eerie chill. Scarlett lifted her head and her wet eyes glowed like a cat's, bright and unsettling.

"Rhett's left me, Mammy. No - not like any other time, not like when he took Bonnie. I - I'm afraid he's left for good."

In the silence that followed, with no words of comfort forthcoming, the floodgates burst again and Scarlett sobbed openly. "Oh, Mammy, I love him so much! And I didn't know - I didn't know and now he says it's too late, that he doesn't love me. But I never knew! Why didn't I know, oh why didn't anyone tell me?"

Mammy wrapped her arms around Scarlett and nestled her former charge gently against her bosom again.

"There, there, lam'," she murmured; comforting Ellen's daughter just as she had her broken-hearted mother so many years ago. Mammy didn't have any more answers than she had back then, but she had a broad bosom to soak up her mistress's tears, and large hands that could stroke her hair softly, and a deep voice to whisper reassuringly. "There now, chile, it cain't be as bad as all that. You iz home now, Miss Scarlett, an' Mammy's here. Shhh, now, shhh."

Scarlett sobbed out her grief until the expulsion left her feeling hollow, then meekly let Mammy undress her and tuck her into her old bed. The sheets felt rough compared to the finery on Peachtree Street, but Scarlett rubbed her cheek against the faintly scratchy pillow and, for the first time in over a week, fell asleep quickly.

...

Scarlett was physically as well as emotionally exhausted. A week of grief had drained her. In a matter of days she had lost weight from lack of appetite, and there were dark shadows under her eyes from lack of sleep. Every time she started that drowsy fall into comforting blackness, she had found herself instead staring down into a bottomless grave and the terror jerked her back to wakefulness. She didn't rise until past noon the next day. Mammy helped her dress, and the nostalgia threatened to overwhelm her none-too-steady composure as she gripped the worn old bedpost. Her stomach spasmed uncomfortably under the tight stays as Mammy helped her slip into a plain black dress. Would grief and mourning ever leave her?

Wade and Ella arrived with Prissy, and Scarlett knelt on the porch to take them, stiff and unwilling, in her arms.

"Wade, Ella, dearests," she began, and the words died in her throat. They knew something was the matter, for Scarlett had left them behind in their hotel in such a hurry, without any of her things, and even in their childish ignorance this seemed perhaps more telling than their own abandonment.

Scarlett kissed each of their temples in turn and led them to the porch steps. Prissy had gone back to the kitchens, and thankfully anyone else in the house had the good sense to stay away for the moment. Scarlett pulled her children close to her sides as she sat on the splintered wood. Their stiff, jutting elbows poked Scarlett's sides as she tried awkwardly to force the unaccustomed intimacy.

"I'm sorry I left you both in such a rush," Scarlett began. Uncle Rhett," and she stumbled over his name, wondering for a moment how she would ever tell them that part, and hoping she would not have to. "Uncle Rhett's message was very urgent. I - I'm afraid your Aunt Melly is gone."

"Gone, Mother?" asked Ella, her muddy, unremarkable eyes lifting curiously. "Did she go on a trip, like when Uncle Rhett goes away?"

Wade only looked at her with a silent, serious gaze. Wade was older, born at the beginning of war, survivor of those harsh days at Tara - funny, she had never thought of her son as kin in that way, a survivor's kinship, and now his large brown eyes were too old, too understanding. She did not feel equal to the task of her son, as she looked at him and saw for the first time that he was closer to being a man than a baby. Her heart turned over when she realized how much time had been lost. She had always meant, one day, to have time for her children, to sit with them and read, to play with them, but that day had come far too late. That ill-starred attempt to knit together a relationship during Rhett's extended absence with Bonnie had failed, and she had not tried again. Her grief and cold self-preservation after Bonnie's death had if anything widened the emotional distance between them. For months, she and Rhett had abandoned Wade and Ella to Melanie's care. Scarlett recalled abruptly, without reason, Wade following her around with a picture book of pirates, begging her to read it, and shooing him away from her skirts.

Had Melanie read him those stories?

She looked at Wade as she finally answered Ella's uncomprehending question.

"No, darling. Aunt Melly didn't go like - like on a trip. Aunt Melly's gone to heaven."

"Oh," said Ella, still faintly puzzled. Ella knew her daddy was in heaven, but she'd been just a baby when he died. She understood that her daddy lived there, but she did not understand how someone else would go there, too. Wasn't it better at home? Why would Aunt Melly want to leave home?

Scarlett ignored Ella's puzzlement and lifted a cautious hand to brush the fall of brown curls from Wade's high forehead. His lower lip trembled violently as he tried to force it into a scowl, and he pulled away from her. Scarlet's hand dropped uselessly into her lap as her heart twitched with an unfamiliar stirring.

"She - she got sick very suddenly. There was nothing anyone could do. I know she loved you very much."

Ella began to sniffle. She tugged at Scarlett's arm. "Mother, I want Aunt Melly!"

Scarlett's eyes rolled heavenward in an automatic plea for strength - from God, Melly, Ellen - anyone. "Ella, darling, I'm sorry. Aunt Melly's up in heaven - like your father. You won't, I mean, you can't see her now."

Ella's narrow face scrunched up and she began to cry in earnest. Scarlett, at a loss, ignored her, and turned her attention to Wade. She wrapped her hands around Wade's skinny arms. Her son was too pale, too quiet. His father's eyes were too large in his small face, which now seemed young again. The premonition of manhood she had seen was gone.

"Wade," she began, but could think of nothing more to say. She felt Ella's face hot against the back of her sleeve, the dampness of tears soaking through to her skin.

"Where's Uncle Rhett?" Wade asked abruptly. Surely, Scarlett thought frantically, surely he couldn't know anything about that?

"Wade, darling," she began, but he interrupted her.

"If Aunt Melly's dead, why wouldn't Uncle Rhett tell us?"

Scarlett was indignant and uncomprehending. "Because I'm your mother, Wade Hampton, and you don't need Rhett Bu-"

"I want Uncle Rhett!" he yelled, and when he shrugged away from her hand as she reached to stroke his hair soothingly, the brittle restraint she had been clinging to splintered.

"Uncle Rhett is gone," she snapped. The frightening white pallor that flooded her son's face reproved her somewhat. "Not - not like Melly, Wade," and now she was frantic, desperate to pretend that this was just another minor trip, like so many he had taken through the years. "He's just - he's gone to see his mother in Charleston, that's all. He couldn't stay."

But she saw, without clear understanding, that the years of watching her and Rhett's low simmering war had taught him more than she had ever realized, as Wade twisted out of her grasp. His eyes were bitter.

"Aunt Melly loved us. Uncle Rhett loves us. Why do we have to be here with you?"

"I love you, too, Wade Hampton. You're my son -"

"I wish it was you!" He yelled. "I wish you were dead!"

Scarlett felt shocked and numb as she watched Wade run off, out of sight behind the house. It was the most fire she'd ever seen in her son, and even as it knocked her back and stung her heart, she felt in a way pleased by his outburst. Certainly he didn't seem afraid of her if he could shout at her like that. Guilt, too, rose like bile in her throat. His outburst was too similar to her own uncharitable thoughts about Ella after Bonnie's death. Ella, who still clung to her, worming her way under her mother's arms and pressing her hot, damp face against Scarlett's shoulders. Automatically, with a maternal reflex arriving years too late, she wrapped her arms around her daughter and smoothed her coarse curls. Scarlett's chest prickled, the skin tingling with a feeling of numb sensation struggling to return.

She had no words of comfort for the child. She had no comfort left in her. As Ella sobbed, Scarlett felt the wet slide of tears down her own cheeks.

...

Ella had cried in Scarlett's arms until she fell asleep, nestling against her while Scarlett leaned against the porch rails. Will, coming up to the house for dinner, carried the little girl up to the nursery. Scarlett trailed behind him, twisting her hands, and tucked her daughter into bed. Conscious of Will's presence, she kissed her daughter's tear-stained cheek before Ella turned over and snuggled into the pillow.

Scarlett followed Will back downstairs. No one spoke, but he seemed to know, in his clear, intuitive way, that she needed to talk, and he went into her mother's old study. She followed and shut the door behind them, then sagged against it weakly.

Bonnie, Melly, Rhett. Wade. One sharp little pain after another, and each loss added its heavy weight to her shoulders. It seemed all the mistakes of her life were catching up to her at once. Mistakes she hadn't even known she was making, in her own blindness and stupidity and obstinate self-importance. She had done everything, or nearly everything wrong. With that history, how would she ever be able to set anything right? And so many things could not be fixed now; Bonnie, and Melly.

In the unlit gloom of Ellen's office, she remembered seeking refuge in the very same room after fleeing burning Atlanta. She was no longer hungry, mired in poverty, physically exhausted; but she felt a similar mental weariness dragging her down. Her will had not given out yet. She had found courage and strength she hadn't known she had in those dark days, and she marshalled them to her breast again.

Will sat on the sofa, the same sagging old piece of furniture that had been there since Scarlett's childhood. She did not trust herself not to fall apart if she joined him there, sitting together like old friends. To keep her distance, she perched on the edge of her mother's fragile writing chair. Will draped his arm over the back of the sofa and stretched out one long leg.

Scarlett clenched her hands into fists to keep from worrying them together. "Have you seen Wade, Will?"

"Saw him headin' down to the river. He looked mighty upset, Scarlett." Will paused, and she looked over her shoulder at the towering secretary, avoiding his eyes.

"I'm sure Miss Melly's death is hard for the boy, but I can't help but feel there's more you're not tellin'."

Scarlett wanted to tell him. Will was just like a brother, and he had always been a steady friend. But it was one thing to bury the words in Mammy's comforting bosom, under cover of darkness. It would be quite another to face it in the daylight.

"I feel so much stronger out here, Will. Tara is home - it's comfort. After...Melly's funeral... " Her chin trembled and she bit the inside of her cheek. "It's just like Pa said. The Irish get their strength from the land, and I guess I'm as Irish as anyone."

"You haven't told me the real reason you're here, Scarlett."

Will's mild eyes were calm and open, and they saw too clearly. But she looked at him, and squared her shoulders.

"Rhett left me. He wants a divorce." Scarlett's voice was flat and unemotional. Hot panic clawed up her throat in the wake of those words. She clenched her jaw against the threat of more tears.

Will's expression did not shift, but he blushed faintly at the bald, intimate admission.

"I refused, and so he left," she went on after a moment. "I'm not sure where he went. He said he'd come back - he'd come back some, but I don't know when. I don't even know if he really will."

"Do the children know?"

"I was telling them about Melanie, and Wade...he...of course they were close. It's hard for all of us. But he doesn't want to be here - with me. He asked for Rhett." She sighed and pressed damp palms into her skirts. "I shouldn't have let him rile me. I only told them Rhett is gone. I said it was just a visit to his mother."

Will did not ask what happened. It hurt for a moment; did he think her so harsh that he felt no surprise that Rhett would want to leave her? Peering at him she could find no condemnation in his face. He was just being a gentleman, and not prying into her life.

A hot flare of nostalgia threatened to spill into tears, and she leapt to her feet and crossed the room to stand staring at the shuttered window. Rhett had never hesitated to pry into her affairs, and suddenly she was in her wagon heading out Peachtree road to the mills and Rhett was beside her; she was on the steps of Aunt Pitty's porch with Rhett seated at her knees; his swarthy face filled her mind and he laughed and jeered and pried with questions no gentleman would have asked. He had had such a keen interest in her, and she hadn't seen the truth behind his mockery. Oh, she had been blind, but why hadn't he been honest? He knew her so well - he knew her even when she had wished desperately to hide from him, and she had never, ever known or understood him. He had taught her a harsh lesson, she thought, and her mouth turned down.

"I couldn't stay in Atlanta, Will." Scarlett spoke quietly, surprised at how level her voice was. "Yes, I do find strength out here. That is truth. I'm sure you know, because Suellen would have heard and been all too happy to share, that Atlanta doesn't think very much of me. They've only been nice to me - when they've suffered my presence at all - these last few years because of Melanie. I don't know what I'll do now, without her. And I don't know what I'll do about Rhett. Tara can't give me the answers, but it comforts me. Pa told me once that to the Irish, the land they live on is like their mother. I lived here, and it's the only mother I have left."

"You're always welcome at Tara," Will said, just as he had the night she arrived.

"Thank you," she answered. They were both silent a moment. "I just don't know what to do about Wade."

"He's had quite a blow, Scarlett. He was awfully close to his Aunt Melanie."

Scarlett sighed. Will didn't say it, but she knew Melly had been more than a second mother to her children; sometimes, she had been more like their only mother. A cat's a better mother than you are. She would just have to show him otherwise. She had always meant to be a good mother, one day, when there was time. She had time now, if it wasn't already too late.

"He told me he hates me."

"Well, I reckon he didn't really mean that. He's just a boy who's in a lot of pain, and he doesn't know what to do about it."

"I don't know what to do for him, Will!"

"Just give him some time, Scarlett." Her shoulders drooped. Time! If she gave him any more time, he'd be a man, away at college, with his own family, and then it truly would be too late. "I suppose I can talk to him some."

"Oh, Will, could you? It would be so helpful."

"Yes, Scarlett, I'll try and talk to him. I'll go and bring him in for dinner."

He touched her shoulder briefly before he left.

Scarlett was grateful to him for the simplicity of his response, indebted to him for his discretion - for she was sure this would never reach Suellen's ears. But he knew, now, how and why she needed this rest at Tara, and it seemed to make her burden just a little bit lighter.

Somehow, she would move forward. She would spend time with her children, and maybe Wade would soften.

And then somehow, she would get Rhett back. She had known she must since he had turned his back on her that night. There were so few people left in the world who loved her - who knew her, and loved her - Rhett must. She would not stand for any more losing.

I still have some time, she thought. It can't be too late. He said he would come back. I don't know when, so I must be ready. She dashed at the tears that had finally overwhelmed her efforts to hold them back. I'll pull myself together, and when we return to Atlanta I'll keep doing everything Melly made me do. I'll stay in their stupid sewing circles and fundraisers and I will show Rhett I can be a real lady. I always meant to be, and I just better do it now before it's too late. I'll show him he can have peace and grace in Atlanta. I'll make him see, somehow, how much I love him.

She had survived Yankees and poverty and hunger and the loss of her children. Surely getting one man, even one stubborn, hard, difficult man, to fall in love with her again couldn't be as arduous as all that. She had never failed to get a man in love with her. Those same old tricks wouldn't do for Rhett, at least not by themselves, for he had never fallen for her eyelashes and dimples; but she would manage it.

I can do it, though, she thought. I'll show Rhett Butler. He can't just walk out on Scarlett O'Hara.

"I'm his wife, damn him!" She exclaimed out loud, and clapped her hands over her mouth.

Enough of this foolishness. Nothing was going to happen hiding away in the dark. She stood and arranged her skirts carefully before going out to see if supper was ready.

Mrs. Butler would make him give a damn.

...

Will brought a sullen Wade in for dinner, and they went out again together when the meal was through. Ella and Suellen's girls ran off once the dishes were cleared away. Scarlett watched the four girls with a warmth born of her own memories of growing up at Tara. She giggled as she thought of showing Ella the best tree to climb. Maybe that wasn't such a bad idea - that would be spending time together, wouldn't it?

Scarlett was smiling at her sister with nostalgia, thinking with rosy inaccuracy about their own girlhood.

"Will you be staying long, Scarlett?"

"Oh, I don't know, Sue. It's so nice for Wade and Ella to spend time here. I didn't want to bring them back to Atlanta yet. It will be such a different place, without Melly."

Suellen look chastened. "Yes. We were very sorry to hear about Melanie. She was a good friend."

Hah, scoffed Scarlett to herself. When were you ever a friend to her? She was just as sick as you during the war but you never cared if she had to work more while you complained and quit.

"We loved her very much," she said out loud.

Suellen did not trouble herself to keep quiet as Scarlett had.

"Did you? Well it's nice of you to say it now."

"Of course I did! She was like a sister to me." And, she thought, a good sight better than my real sisters, too.

"Oh I know she was! You never did mind stealing a man even from your own sister."

"Suellen! How dare you...I never—"

"No, I suppose you didn't, after all. But I'm not blind Scarlett, and everyone can see how you've taken after Ashley all these years."

"Ashley is a dear friend," said Scarlett, stiffly.

"And a widower, now. Too bad you're still married. Knowing you, I'm sure you'll fix that soon enough."

That cut her too deeply. Scarlett was panting, now, as if struggling to breathe through some physical pain.

"How dare you—"

"No!" interrupted Suellen. "I don't want to hear a word from you about daring, you of all people. Don't think I've forgotten how you lit out of here and stole my beau, married Frank and left us all here to deal with the work and the poverty while you had fine new dresses and a carriage and the man who should have been my husband!"

"You don't know what you're talking about."

"Don't I? Are you trying to say you didn't steal my Frank -"

"If you couldn't keep him any better than that, you didn't deserve to have him. Do you think I married Frank because I wanted to? I married him to keep this roof over your head! For you, and Carreen, and Pa - and if you only knew, Suellen, what kind of husband Frank Kennedy turned out to be, why you'd be on your knees thanking me for what I did. You should be anyway, how do you think Tara was able to keep going? I didn't stop supporting Tara until Will married you. And he is a far sight better husband than Frank ever was."

"Don't expect me to thank you, Scarlett," spat Suellen. "Will's a good man but that doesn't change what you did."

"I did what I had to do."

"Yes, you just keeping telling yourself that," she sneered. "If it helps you sleep at night - only I don't see that it does, does it? I heard you, Scarlett, screaming in your sleep. Doesn't seem to me that you're resting easily at all."

Scarlett clenched her fists in the table cloth, her knuckles white with tension. She had no response for that. Her dreams were no one's business but hers. Who would understand? The old nightmare had come back, had disturbed her sleep almost every night since Melly had died and Rhett had left. It came with a vengeful regularity that kept her awake too late for fear of it. It felt so real again; running through fog, cold and alone, for where could she go? No one would take her in. Not even at Tara was she truly welcomed, despite Will's words. She remembered the revelation that had struck her the night of Melly's death - Rhett, the light and safety and strength she was seeking. And he was gone, and would provide no shelter, no love to warm her.

Suellen recoiled at the emptiness that flooded her sister's eyes. It seemed the dining room had suddenly gone dark. The sun that had shone in through the tall windows must have slipped behind a cloud. Then a clear, high scream cut through the heavy air.

"Mother! Owww!" Scarlett snapped back to life.

"Ella!" She pushed herself up from the table, ready to run to her daughter.

The moment passed and bitter spite clawed at Suellen again. She could not resist a parting jab, "Are you finally being a mother to your children? Too bad it's too late for Bonnie." But even as she said it she knew she had gone too far, and was thankful that Scarlett's hurried flight had carried her from the room before the words had left her lips.

Ella was clutching her knee in the worn dirt path that wound around the side of the house. An old tree root had started to push up through the ground across it, just high enough to catch at little feet and trip them. Ella's face was red as she screwed it up and wailed for her mother, but dry.

Scarlett felt a reflexive distaste as she crouched in the dirt and the dust settled on her skirts. Brusquely, she pulled Ella's hands away, checked the rip in the stocking beneath, and found just a scraped, reddened knee.

"Hush now, Ella, you've just scraped it. Stop carrying on so."

Ella sniveled and swiped at her nose, then threw her arms around her mother. Oh for heaven's sake, thought Scarlett as she awkwardly patted the narrow back, trying to soothe her with a patience that Scarlett did not truly possess.

"You're just fine, Ella. Stop this now."

Ella's back heaved under Scarlett's hands as she got her sniffling under control. Scarlett smiled down at her, a warm and motherly look with just a hint of her impatience showing in the tight corners of her eyes. As silly as it seemed, it was nice to be the one comforting her child, to be the parent Ella had called for. As mush as she loved - had loved Bonnie, she knew Rhett had been first in their daughter's heart. Ella's clinging, skinny arms gratified Scarlett. As she looked into Ella's watery eyes, and the tears now clearing streaks down her dirty face, Scarlett did feel a rush of tender feeling for her daughter. The only little girl Scarlett had, now, and she didn't have the beauty or spirit of Bonnie, but she was her daughter just the same.

Scarlett kissed her daughter's coarse curls awkwardly. "Good girl, Ella. You're fine. Go on back to the kitchen and get Mammy to clean you up. Go on, darling."

Ella nodded, and her mouth opened but closed without speaking. As Scarlett watched her turn behind the house for the kitchen door, her eyes caught Wade's. He was standing against a tree, his hands shoved deep in his pockets. As soon as their eyes met, he scowled, and turned away.

...

That night, Ella clung to Scarlett. She refused to sleep in the nursery with her cousins. Too tired for an argument, Scarlett relented, and Ella curled up like a puppy next to her mother. She slept with a smile on her face. Scarlett absently stroked her daughter's hair as she waited for her own sleep to come.

Some haven! She felt even more drained than when she had left Atlanta. It had been so difficult to tell Ella and Wade about their Aunt Melly. She felt like she had betrayed them herself, somehow, bringing them that news. Of course Wade would wish it was she, Scarlett, who had died. She couldn't blame him.

For one black moment, she felt like she was standing in the path of an oncoming train, as the weight of everything bore down on her with a rush. Melly, Rhett, Bonnie - oh, if only she had died!

But her selfish, stubborn mind shied away from such thoughts. She had worked too hard at living, these last ten years, to be defeated now by simple hurt. A broken heart would not succeed where war and hunger and poverty had failed. Tomorrow would be better. Tomorrow, she would walk the hills and grounds of home, and draw the strength of the earth into her bones and her heart.

Scarlett sighed into the darkness as her head grew heavy with sleep. She already missed Rhett so much. If only he hadn't left. If only Melly hadn't died!

She had never been intuitive, and the secretive hearts of others would never be an easy thing for her to grasp, but as she gnawed on her own pain at Melly's loss she also felt a debasing guilt over how she had treated Rhett after Bonnie's death. Wade's rejection cut her, and yet it was a shadow of the horrible things she had said to Rhett. She was hurt and alone, and this must be how Rhett had felt. She really had ruined everything.

She had drawn on her own strength in those dark days after Bonnie's death, and she would do so again. But how nice it would be, to be held in his strong arms, soothed and petted and kept safe. If only they had found comfort in each other then.

Scarlett tossed her head suddenly, frustrated. I have to stop this looking back. It just drags at me. I have to look forward. I can't get Rhett back if I keep turning over old times in my head, old mistakes, old foolishness, until they're all I can see. I have to face the future, and be ready for it.

I won't let you go, Rhett Butler.

z

Scarlett, crying out, woke herself in the middle of the night. Ella's tight, worried face loomed over her, and soft small hands patted her cheek frantically.

"Mother? Mother what's wrong? Oh, Mother, don't leave, don't die!"

Scarlett's heart was racing and she trembled all over. The nightmare, the same old dream. She grasped Ella's hands in her own and shushed her.

"Mother just had a bad dream. I'm fine, Ella. It's alright."

As she fell toward sleep again, her arms tight around her daughter, she thought how sweet a child's presence could be. No wonder Rhett hadn't minded having Bonnie in his room. And that was just another thing he'd taken from her.

...

To Scarlett's relief, the successive days at Tara unfurled peacefully, if tensely. Suellen was stiff, but they managed to remain polite - though they hardly spoke outside the unavoidable burden of mealtime conversation. Wade remained sullen and withdrawn. She tried to draw him out at table, but she did not know how to engage with even a happy, outgoing child; the secret of getting one sad and reticent little boy to open up to her was far beyond her. He spent the days walking the plantation with Will, to Scarlett's gratitude. Ella would not leave her side, but whatever mood had possessed the child, it had also left her more quiet and withdrawn than usual, and so Scarlett was rarely strained by the attachment. She felt gratified that at least one of her children did seem to love her.

Scarlett spent hours on the porch. Ella would play with her cousins, as long as she could see her mother when she turned around. Tara hummed with activity, a buzzing atmosphere that energized Scarlett. From the porch, the rhythms of the cotton harvest surrounded her.

The songs of the hired field hands carried clearly under the late summer sun. It could almost be like the war had never happened, with the bustle of harvest all around her, a busy kitchen providing food for all, black and white children playing in the yard around the house. Only her heart seemed changed. A decade ago, there would have been beaux on the porch steps, teasing and coquetry.

"Miss Scarlett, you is gon' get freckled an' brown as a fe'el han settin' out here wid no shawl on yo' shoulders." Mammy shuffled slowly across the floorboards to where Scarlett sat in the sunlight that curled around the edges of the sagging porch roof. No, it wasn't the same as before the war. Mammy was old and tired, and it was obvious in her slow movements and the lack of strength in her voice. She hounded Scarlett as carefully as ever, but there was no passion in the old admonishments. Tara was dingy and drooping at the edges. Paint peeled, the floor creaked; the small town of outbuildings had never been completely rebuilt. Will worked hard, and did the best he could. Tara was in better shape than many of their neighbors, sold and parceled out to small tenants, but it would never be the same again.

Well, none of them were the same.

Scarlett tugged at the worn shawl Mammy laid across her shoulders. "Thank you, Mammy." She heard the old feet scuffing the floorboards as Mammy walked back into the house, caught faint mumblings from under the old woman's breath.

"Ain't never had no sense...strangers runnin' all ovah...no manners roun' heah no more…"

Scarlett smiled to herself. She picked up a paper from the table beside her. Will had brought a week's worth of Daily Heralds back from Jonesboro. She skimmed them lazily, more interested in the ads of competing stores than the dry bits of news from Atlanta and the rest of the South. Certainly it was more important to know what the competition was doing with their prices so she could wire her own store to adapt!

But her eyes tripped on the large letters, standing alone at the top of a column. THE PANIC! What was this?

THE PANIC

AMONG OUR BANKERS YESTERDAY

How Atlanta Took the Shock of the Storm

Incidents of the "Run," and Notes on the Street.

Old fears swooped back, the dread of losing everything, and her hand flew to her throat. She pored over the papers, now, her sharp eyes searching for that dreadful word - panic - bank runs! Was there never an end to trouble? In the middle of all this wrenching loss, at least she had still had the security of the money that she had worked so hard to earn. Was that now to be lost, too? Her chest heaved against the constraints of her corset, the mad flutter of her heart forced hot, panicked blood through her veins. A bead of sweat formed at her temple. This could not happen.

The papers were full of reassurances of the strength and solvency of the Atlanta banks.They just don't want to scare people, she thought. I hardly believe them. Oh, if only Rhett were here! Or if I just knew where he was to ask him - I don't know what I'll do.

She would have to go back to Atlanta, now. She couldn't stay here, buried in the familiar rhythms of home, when everything she had struggled and scraped together might be vanishing even as the cotton bolls were being plucked from the red fields.

Her hands clenched and crumpled the fragile paper. Back to Atlanta; to a huge, empty house, to the disapproving stares of her neighbors, and there would be no Rhett with his overpoweringly large frame to fill the emptiness, no Melly to shield her with quiet, steely strength.

A sharp-edged sorrow settled in her, a feeling that seemed to sit just behind her heart, and an aching pain speared down her backbone. They were her new companions, now, a twin assault that robbed her of equilibrium and confidence. The ache lingered, sometimes gentle enough that she could forget the hurt, until a quiet moment would catch her sinking in it, and then her heart would sting as sorrow jabbed her deeply, momentarily stopping her breath.

The moment of acute pain passed, fading to a dull ache. Scarlett smoothed the paper across her knees. She wasn't ready for this, was not ready to leave the shelter of Tara for the brutal loneliness and judgement of the outside world. But a threat to her security - to the security she had thieved and connived and bought so that her children would never suffer as she had - was not a threat that could be borne hiding out.

It was time to face Atlanta.

Author's Note: There are a few chapters later on with M-rated content (for sexual situations). I have clearly labeled these so they can be avoided if you prefer. Since that content represents a minority of the complete work, I feel the T rating is accurate to the story as a whole. I do know that's not everyone's cup of tea, so please pay attention to the notes at the top of chapters. Thank you!