Challenge Story "Suddenly"
May 23, 2021 19:24:27 GMT -8
Post by misslizj on May 23, 2021 19:24:27 GMT -8
I've been working on this story for a long time. I hoped to finish it for the December Challenge, but it's obviously way too late for that! Every time I tried to work on it, it just made me unhappy. I'm still not completely happy with it, so I'm open to fix-it suggestions, although I want to keep the basic plot the same. This is an ATC for the episode "The Foundling" and should be safe for most audiences.
Suddenly
On the evening of the day they took Mary out to hand her over to Mrs. Baines, Matt left the jail at the appointed hour and headed over to the Long Branch to have dinner with Kitty. He still felt guilty about his handling of the entire situation--going all the way back to having shot Eli Baines--but he mostly just felt relieved that the custody of Mary had been resolved. Despite her tearfulness when they left the Baines farm, Kitty seemed to have taken it fairly well the rest of the way back to Dodge. It was for this reason that Matt was looking forward to their evening together, even taking special care with his appearance and donning his courting jacket in an effort to make sure that Kitty understood how much he cared for her, even if they had disagreed about the matter. He was a little concerned, though, about what had made Kitty change her mind--she wasn’t one to give up so easily. She hadn’t wanted to talk about it before and during the ride out, and afterward he had hesitated to bring it up for fear of upsetting her. Perhaps she would be ready to talk about it over dinner and a brandy.
Whistling softly to himself, Matt avoided the front doors of the saloon and ducked down the alley past the livery stable in order to approach the Long Branch from the back. Festus and Newly knew where to find him in a real emergency, but if anyone else knew where he was--Burke, for instance--they would think nothing of interrupting his dinner with Kitty for the most trivial of reasons. He reached the back stairs and let himself in at the top, continuing down the hall to Kitty’s suite of rooms. He fumbled in his pocket again for the key when he found the door locked. Usually she left it unlocked when she expected him. Maybe she had decided to take a bath. He unlocked it and gave a quick knock before opening the door. “It’s me,” he announced quietly, only to be greeted with silence. It was then he noticed what he should have when he was out in the hall. No welcoming smells of pot roast or fish gumbo and some unpronounceable French dessert greeted him as they should have when Kitty cooked him dinner. After a quick look in her other rooms, Matt headed for the front stairs.
“No, Marshal, I haven’t seen her since she came in earlier...she went upstairs and came right back down and said she was going over to the Dodge House,” Floyd answered in response to Matt’s question of whether he’d seen Kitty.
“The Dodge House!” Matt thanked him and headed across the street. It made no sense until he remembered that Kitty had talked about getting a room there to live with Mary away from the saloon.
“Yes, she did come in earlier, to pay her bill and tell me she wouldn’t be needing the room after all,” Howie chattered nervously. “I’d forgotten all about it, I’ve been so busy. She must still be up there because the key is gone. There’s nothing wrong, is there Marshal?”
“I’ll know in a minute,” Matt growled, settling his hat firmly on his head and making his way to the stairs. He was more irritated with the man than usual and wanted to ask him why he hadn’t told him this several hours ago, even though he knew rationally that there was no reason he should have. He knocked softly on the door to room eight and got no response. He knocked again. “Kitty,” he said just loud enough to be heard by the occupant of the room. “Kitty, you in there? It’s me.” He decided to try the door and the knob turned easily in his hand.
Whistling softly to himself, Matt avoided the front doors of the saloon and ducked down the alley past the livery stable in order to approach the Long Branch from the back. Festus and Newly knew where to find him in a real emergency, but if anyone else knew where he was--Burke, for instance--they would think nothing of interrupting his dinner with Kitty for the most trivial of reasons. He reached the back stairs and let himself in at the top, continuing down the hall to Kitty’s suite of rooms. He fumbled in his pocket again for the key when he found the door locked. Usually she left it unlocked when she expected him. Maybe she had decided to take a bath. He unlocked it and gave a quick knock before opening the door. “It’s me,” he announced quietly, only to be greeted with silence. It was then he noticed what he should have when he was out in the hall. No welcoming smells of pot roast or fish gumbo and some unpronounceable French dessert greeted him as they should have when Kitty cooked him dinner. After a quick look in her other rooms, Matt headed for the front stairs.
“No, Marshal, I haven’t seen her since she came in earlier...she went upstairs and came right back down and said she was going over to the Dodge House,” Floyd answered in response to Matt’s question of whether he’d seen Kitty.
“The Dodge House!” Matt thanked him and headed across the street. It made no sense until he remembered that Kitty had talked about getting a room there to live with Mary away from the saloon.
“Yes, she did come in earlier, to pay her bill and tell me she wouldn’t be needing the room after all,” Howie chattered nervously. “I’d forgotten all about it, I’ve been so busy. She must still be up there because the key is gone. There’s nothing wrong, is there Marshal?”
“I’ll know in a minute,” Matt growled, settling his hat firmly on his head and making his way to the stairs. He was more irritated with the man than usual and wanted to ask him why he hadn’t told him this several hours ago, even though he knew rationally that there was no reason he should have. He knocked softly on the door to room eight and got no response. He knocked again. “Kitty,” he said just loud enough to be heard by the occupant of the room. “Kitty, you in there? It’s me.” He decided to try the door and the knob turned easily in his hand.
***
Kitty sat in the dark in the middle of the small sofa in the room that was to have become her home with Mary until she could find them a house to live in. She had been unable to face her empty room at the Long Branch, with the now-unused bassinet and baby carriage mocking her every time she looked at them. Why hadn’t she thought to take them along when she asked Matt to take them out to the Baines place? She was beginning to wish she hadn’t acted so impulsively and that Matt had tried to talk her out of it--not that he would have. When she tried to begin dinner preparations she couldn’t face that either and had decided to go over to the Dodge House and pack up the few things she’d already begun to move over there. Once in the room, she had packed up but had been unable to leave, or to make a decision on what to do at all, so she’d sat down and tried not to think of anything. Now Matt was at the door; she should have known he’d come looking for her eventually. She wasn’t at all sure she wanted to face him either, so she sat there doing and saying nothing, knowing he would either open the door and come in or go away and leave her alone, and she would deal with whichever of those things happened when it happened.
***
Matt stood in the doorway and let his eyes adjust to the dark. He spotted her on the sofa and let the door close behind him. “Kitty, honey, what are you doing sitting here in the dark?” She had no answer for that. “Can I turn on the lamp?”
“I’d rather you didn’t,” she said quietly.
He approached the sofa. “May I sit?” She moved to one end of the sofa and he sat next to her. In the little light from the window he could see that her face was streaked with tears. He looked away guiltily. Crying women, Kitty in particular, always made him feel helpless and inept, although he thought he could handle her tears a little better at night, behind closed doors, than in the middle of the day on a road where anyone might be driving by.
“Matt, I’m sorry,” she began, somewhat unexpectedly. “I know I said we’d have dinner in my room, but I wasn’t very hungry and then I didn’t really feel up to getting anything ready. I know I should have sent word to you, but I didn’t really think about it in time.”
“I'm not worried about that, Kitty. I just wanted to make sure you’re all right.” ‘All right’ was something she definitely didn’t seem to be at the moment, and she had him a little worried. His Kitty didn’t sit in the dark hiding from her problems, she went out and met them head on. And with the growing feeling that one of her problems was with him, she most likely would have been in her room when he got there, if not seeking him out in order to say her piece.
“Yeah, I’m all--” she began, and then shook her head. “No, I’m not all right. As a matter of fact, I’m pretty damn disappointed right now.”
Matt hadn’t the slightest idea what to say to that, or if he should say anything at all. He had a feeling there was more--a lot more. Finally he said the only thing that came to mind. “Do you want me to go tell Mrs. Baines you’ve changed your mind?” He knew it was the wrong thing to say when Kitty looked at him, aghast.
“No!” She shook her head. “That would be just plain cruel.” She turned her head away, but not before he saw a tear trickle from one eye.
To break the silence, Matt remembered what had been on his mind earlier. “Can I ask a question?”
“Sure,” she answered, sounding like she wasn’t at all sure.
“Why did you decide to let Mrs. Baines have Mary?”
“Well, it was partly what she said to me this morning--did you know she came to see me?”
“No, I didn’t. What did she say?”
Kitty let out a long sigh. “She seemed to think that because she’s wanted to be a mother all her life and because she lost her baby, that she had some claim on Mary that I had no right to--Matt, she doesn’t know a thing about me! She just assumed that I ‘suddenly wanted to be a mother.’ Well, it wasn’t really all that sudden, Matt.”
Matt nodded silently. He’d been aware of that for some time.
“I’ve made my peace, or I thought I had anyway, with the idea that I’ll probably never have your children. The only thing that was sudden was realizing that I could still be a mother even if--if we never--” Her voice broke and Matt wrapped his arm around her and pulled her next to him.
“I’m sorry, honey. I’ve been unfair to you.”
She shook her head. “I agreed to it,” she said into his chest.
“But why did that make you decide to--” he stopped abruptly, not wanting to keep saying the words and upset her again.
“I guess that’s what made me realize--it’s like I told you. Mary will be better off with Mrs. Baines. Not--not because I run a saloon, but because people can’t forget I run a saloon. I didn’t want her to suffer because of what I do for a living. People would be more apt to look at her kindly if she was raised by a widow woman, not a saloon woman.”
“People. I guess that includes me.”
“Matt, you’ve never held the way I earn my living against me before, but--” She sighed again and stayed silent for a minute. “But you put that baby in my arms, and then you as much as told me I couldn’t keep her. Do you have any idea how that makes me feel?”
“I’m beginning to, but--go on.”
“I felt like you didn’t think I’d be a good mother.”
“Oh, Kitty, no! I didn’t think--I never meant for you to feel that way. I was just worried--”
“Worried she might come between us?”
“Well, I was going to say I was worried about you raising a child alone, but, yeah, I guess, a little.”
“Just so you know, I did think about that. How she would have had to come first.”
“I wouldn’t expect anything different. I can take care of myself, you know.”
“Is that a fact?”
“That’s a fact, ma’am.” Matt pulled a clean handkerchief from his pocket and gently dabbed at the tears on Kitty’s face. He still didn’t know much about women, as Kitty was fond of saying, but after 19 years he had become proficient at drying Kitty’s tears without doing further damage to her face paint. "Are you ready to--" he began, only to be interrupted by a faint growl. He raised a brow at her. "Not hungry?"
Kitty's lips formed something resembling a smile. "Maybe I am a little, after all," she admitted. "It's been a long time since breakfast."
"How about I walk you to the Long Branch and then bring back something from Delmonico's? If you still want to eat supper with me, I mean," he added, somewhat abashed as he realized he wasn't sure whether things were settled between them.
"That sounds fine," she answered quietly, not giving much away either in voice or expression.
Matt picked up the valise Kitty had left sitting on the bed and held the door open for her, pulling the door closed behind him as they stepped into the hall. He took her upper arm gently as they walked down the stairs. They stopped at the desk just long enough to drop off the room key on their way out the door. Once out on the street, Kitty edged closer to Matt, and he let go of her arm and rested his hand at the back of her waist.
They reached the alley between the Long Branch and the General Store and Matt stopped them. Turning to face her, he set her valise on the ground and gently took her by the shoulders. Their eyes met, and he looked away briefly before speaking. “Kitty, I know this isn’t likely to happen, but if another baby turns up needing a mother, I want you to keep it. For good this time.”
Kitty shook her head ruefully. “You know I’m going to hold you to that, don’t you, Cowboy?” she said, laughing shakily. Covering her mouth with one hand to suppress the sob she felt rising in her throat, she buried her face in his chest.
Matt wrapped his arms around her, for once not caring that they were standing on Front Street and that there was some daylight left. “Yeah. I know,” he said softly.
Kitty looked back up at him, a long, loving look that told him he was forgiven, even if he wasn’t quite sure he should be.
End