False Southern Gentility

Christine breathed in the scent of him, afraid to open her eyes, she just breathed him in. What if she opened her eyes, and it would be like when she dreamed of Peter, what if he would be there for an instant, and then be gone?

She couldn't just lay there and not open her eyes, like her father had always said, do or die, well, it was time to find out which of the two she would have to make it through. She breathed in a deep breath, ready to face her impossible. "Oh, I'm sorry." she said as she leaned away from Christopher's chest, shedding his coat that sat over her.

"It's alright," he said with a smile, that same old smile... "I quite enjoyed seeing you like that, venerable for once, you know, even in your sleep, you still cry a little, like you did when we were first married." He brushed a stray hair out of her face; Christine raised her chin and pulled her hair back again.

"Yes, well, you should have woken me, I must have just dozed off." she stood, her legs shaking, her head spinning in a thousand different directions. She let her knees crumble. Just as her body began to slide, Christopher was there, his hands wrapping behind her back and shoulders, lifting her onto the chair again.

"Good Lord, Christine. You know, I think you're probably fifteen times slimmer than you were the last time that you and I were together. Have you been eating? No, of course you haven't been eating. Why would you? You never did do what doctors told you." he sighed as he leaned her back against the seat.

"I'm just a little under the weather, I have been that way for a while. But then again, why should you care? You ran off without a single word to me other than you were leaving and taking the--"

"Abigail." he said in a short stocky tone.

"What?" she asked.

"You were about to say, 'the girl,' or, 'the baby', just like you used to. Her name is Abigail." he said as he sat across from her and looked her dead level in the eyes.

"I wasn't about to say anything." Christine said, having noticed her mistake, she didn't think that it would have made Christopher that upset about saying, 'the baby' or, 'the girl', but then again, he was the most peculiar man.

"You liar." he said as he sat across from her, his long legs stretching out luxuriously in-front of him as he stroked Abigail's hair; she really was one of the most miraculous creatures.

"I am not. I've never lied to you a day in--" she stopped, his eyebrows were raised, the bit of his cigar clamped tightly between his teeth. "alright, I've lied a few times...but you can't tell me that you haven't lied to me before."

Christopher laughed and snapped off the end of his cigar with his fingers. "No, I guess we can't say that, I guess in some twisted way--" he laughed again, "I'm some kind of hypocrite." Christine glared. "Oh, come now Christine, you and I both know that neither you nor I have been technically faithful to each other." her mouth hung open.

"I can't keep my eyes off of women," he laughed again, but this time it was laced with something that Christine didn't understand. "and you, my charming wife, can't forget a dead husband. Why, you can't, I'm sure I'll never know."

Christine stood, enraged, "I have the right to remember a dead husband, damn you!" and then Christopher was beside her, quick as a panther, his hand on her forearm in a grip that hurt. "Let go of me!" she yelled as he pulled her into the other room of his cabin.

"I've held onto you for so many years! But damn it, I've never had you! If you weren't belonging to business you were belonging to a damned dead husband. I saw you before he had you, you remember, if you don't, I do!" Christine was silent.

"You were in a dark blue muslin gown, a large hoop was underneath it, you, and all your charming little trinkets weren't wearing sleeves like all of the other girls, but then again nothing about you said normal." still she said nothing.

"The way you smiled, the way you carried that chin. You held up your nose above all of those primped little puppets you called friends." he looked into her eyes, the wide Burgundy brown eyes brimming with tears.

"I remember you," she swallowed and put her head down; Christopher raised it again, slowly and gently. "You were laughing, your eyes dancing, I heard you arguing with my father, the war. That's what it had been over, you didn't believe in it, you thought it was a war made from foolishness, and Pa hated you for that."

Christopher laughed, small and quiet as he stepped close to her. "Isn't it strange, I saw you, you say you saw me, but you married that fool boy Peter. Oh, I know, you loved him. But haven't you ever thought that maybe you married him to get what you wanted. Your father didn't want you to marry, but you convinced him that you were your own woman and that you loved him. How do you know that what you've felt all of these years isn't guilt?"

Christine swallowed, "I don't feel guilt for Peter." She laid her head on his chest, so strong and unyielding. "Oh Christopher, I'm...I'm so scared." and she cried, he held her close to him, his arms around her waist, smoothing down her hair.

"Don't be a goose, Christine. You're never afraid," he kissed the top of her head, "and I'm not going to let you start now. Why should you be afraid? There's nothing for you to be afraid of, nothing in the world."

Christine looked up, "Oh, what a liar you are! There isn't anything in the world to be afraid of? Like Hell there isn't. There's war, and poverty, and tax collectors, and shanty-town livers, and pistols and sabers and--" he shushed her.

"Christine, if you spend your whole life looking around for things to be afraid of, you won't have a life. You'll end up like your father, or like your mother, skittish and afraid of...well of the world."

Christine snatched herself away, wiped her face with her hand, and breathed in a deep breath. "My mother wasn't...skittish. My mother was a realist. She took care of all of us, no matter the time or how she felt, I won't have you besmirch her name and her memory."

Christopher shook his head hard, "You've always been like that. Making up your mind before someone was done saying what they wanted to say. Well tonight I won't let you make up your mind." he swept him close to her and pressed his lips hot against hers.

Christine breathed in as his hands swerved over her. She lifted her hands to his shoulders, resisting the urge to give in. Who in the Hell did he think he was? To take her for some--some common piece of trash! He had left her, left her for an entire year, he'd never forgive her if he knew what she had done, he'd never forgive her and she'd never forgive him!

Oh, but she wanted to forgive him, she wanted so badly to forgive him now, but she couldn't, she wouldn't! His lips were rough on hers, bruising and warm, his hands were firm around her waist, pulling her body close to his.

He was fire, and she was water, two separate elements, two different pieces not meant to match, but in some strange, crazy way, they were one, he would burn her, and she would boil and scald him, there couldn't be one without the other, one could not, no, would not exist without the other, he was warm, and she was cold, and he brought life back into her at the touch of a finger.

She came alive at his touch, his hands brought feeling, evoked feelings that were never felt before. Anguish. Anger. Pain. Passion. He brought her to life, he gave her the elixir, the piece that she had been missing for so long. She didn't know how to live through it, to live through the waves of passion, resentment, anger. All she knew was that she had to live through it, he would make her live through it.

He was hers, and she was his. For years she had bent and broken people, bent people to the point of breaking. She had broken Peter to the point of death, she had broken so many people in her life, but for once, for once there was someone bigger than she, something stronger than her own will, for once, she was not in control.

And she ravished that feeling.