Scout woke up late the next day after an uneventful night. She got dressed and went downstairs to the sunny kitchen to find George giving what she believed was called, in old-fashioned parlance, a "dressing-down", to two boys, one a freckled red-head, one a dark-haired boy with chocolate brown eyes. Both looked dolefully at the floor as George told them, in no uncertain terms, how their carelessness when replacing the curtain rod in the library had nearly cost the new librarian her life.
Oh Jesus.
"You boys are so lucky that all she got was a good knock on the head. I had to have Dr. Chandler out here yesterday morning to check her over, she probably had a mild concussion. She bled, whacked her head on the sill, I'll have you know," he said to them sternly.
The two boys looked at each other in obvious agony. The redhead twisted his cap in his hands nervously.
"Oh god, Mr. Wilder, we're so sorry, we really are," said the dark-haired boy, whom Scout assumed was Sunil. "We're gormless gits, wouldn't blame you if you sacked us on the spot, we really wouldn't," he continued, looking at the equally contrite Alfred, who was nodding energetically in agreement, red hair flying.
"We'd like to apologize to her in person, like, before we go, though, if we could," Alfred said hopefully, blinking his watery blue eyes. "Is she up, or is she still bed-ridden?"
Did he actually say "bed-ridden"?
"I'm up, I'm up," Scout said, laughing, as she entered the kitchen. Jess and Bandit scampered toward her, tails wagging, and she greeted them first, before moving toward the boys. They stared with concern at the tiny band aid on her forehead as if it were a huge wound covered in a wartime bandage, eyes huge.
"You guys, I'm fine," she reassured them, giving George a look as she reached out a hand to them. George smirked at her. He'd obviously been enjoying the village boys' discomfort. She shook her head at him before turning back to the two teenagers.
"We're so sorry, Miss," Sunil said, exuding contrition and apology from every pore as he shook her hand. "Is there anything we can do to ease your discomfort, like?" he asked as he continued to hold her hand, which made Scout want to burst out laughing.
"Honestly, I feel fine," she said again, letting Sunil lead her to a chair. Alfred placed a cup of tea in front of her which was nearly undrinkable because he'd loaded it with so much sugar, but Scout did her level best because he looked so anxious as he stared at her.
"Well, we'll be off, then," Alfred said sadly, continuing to twist his cap. "It was really nice working for you, Mr. Wilder. We won't bother you for a reference or anything, not after this."
Scout put down her tea cup. "Hold on, boys!" She looked up at George. "Surely you're not going to fire them? Not for this?"
George looked back and forth between the two boys. They looked back at him, then at Scout, hopefully.
"George!" Scout said firmly. "Stop it. You don't even know if it was anything they did, for Christ's sake!" She looked at Alfred and Sunil. "You're not fired--sacked, whatever you call it over here, okay?" She nodded at them.
At their continued silence she sighed impatiently. "What were you two supposed to do today?" She looked back and forth between the two of them.
"Erm, we were supposed to clean up the front garden a bit?" Sunil looked to Alfred for confirmation. "Weed the beds, trim the shrubbery, neaten things up a bit?"
Scout took another sip of the very sweet tea, and nodded at the two appealing boys. "Okay, then, guys, the day's a wastin', as my nana used to say, you'd better get going, hm?" She swiveled her head toward the yard. "Scoot!"
The boys looked at Scout, George, then each other, and vacated the kitchen with alacrity, smiling at Scout and bobbing their heads at her as they left.
George narrowed his eyes at Scout as he poured himself a cup of tea and sat down across from her.
"I don't appreciate you challenging my authority in front of my employees on your third day here, I want you to know," he said with a smile as he sipped his tea.
"Oh brother," she responded, giving him a level look. "How can you possibly enjoy torturing those two adorable children?"
George snorted. "Adorable? You have questionable taste in children, I must say," he said, shaking his head. He looked out the window at the two boys, who were taking a moment before they began their work to chase each other around with a rake and a broom.
They made Scout smile, and she saw that George was smiling, too. She nudged his foot under the table, and they sat in companionable silence for a few minutes, drinking their tea.
"So, what would you like to do today?" George asked, looking across the table.
To him, she looked very, very good. She was wearing another T-shirt, Green Day this time, with overalls that had been haphazardly cut off. She certainly had stellar taste in music. He wondered if she'd actually seen these bands in concert. Surely not the Ramones? They hadn't performed live in over twenty years or something. The bruises on her legs had faded somewhat, and they no longer looked so obviously like handprints to George. He must have imagined that.
"George, I don't mean to sound like a broken record, but I really meant what I said yesterday about you not having to babysit me," Scout said. "You had a life before I came, right? Please feel free to get back to it," she said with a small smile. "You obviously wanted to be alone, or you wouldn't have set up your circumstances like you did..." she trailed off, not sure what else to say.
George took a deep breath. "Okay, look. I'm not going to say this again. You're right. After--after last year, I did want to be by myself. I believe 'pulled the hole in after myself' is the correct phrase," he said with a cynical smile. "But, like I said, you're very relaxing company. It's very, um, peaceful, being with you, you know?" He gave her a frank look. "Do I want to go back to London and step back into my old life? Fuck no. Do I want to go back out on tour again, perform in stadiums in front of millions of screaming mad fans and all that? Fuck no. Be on a movie set? No no no." He took a swallow of his tea.
"Do I want to walk along the cliffs and talk about things, let you kick my arse all around the room at Scrabble, maybe play a few holes of golf in the sun with a quiet and scary smart new friend? Fuck yeah. Listen to her read an amazing book in her beautiful voice at bedtime? Fuck yeah. Sit and watch her play the piano? Yes yes yes." He sat back and regarded her, a very intense, dark blue gaze. "Do you understand, Scout?"
She looked back, finally nodding. "Yes, okay."
She bit her lip and looked outside, where the boys from the village had finally begun working, it seemed. "And to answer your question, what I'd like to do today is go for a walk around the property, see what's outside, if that's okay? I feel like I haven't been outside in such a long time, and I've never been to this part of England before, only London, so I'd love to see it."
He nodded. "Sounds good. Let's eat, then go. Jess and Bandit would love a bit of a walk, too, wouldn't you guys?"
***************************
"You might want to change your clothes," George told Scout, looking doubtfully at her legs. "It can get quite windy."
"Okay," she said amiably, running up the stairs.
George watched her go, admiring the swing of her boyish hips, and deciding that she definitely wasn't wearing a bra. Christ, it had been a long time since he'd looked at a woman. He really needed to lock that shit down. He looked down at the polished floor and thought about music, admonishing the dogs to stop grinning at him as if they knew what he was thinking.
Scout came down minutes later, wearing jeans and a Yale hoodie, smiling in anticipation of the walk and looking absolutely beautiful to George.
"Come on, guys," she called to the dogs, who barked joyfully and ran to her side, leaving George to catch up.
"You guys! Have you forgotten who your master is?" he asked plaintively as he ran out the door.
Scout laughed as they waited for him. "Aww, feeling left out?" she asked, giving his arm a playful nudge. "Come on, look at what a beautiful day it is." She threw her arms wide.
It was, indeed, gorgeous. The ocean was sparkling with whitecaps farther out as gentle waves broke on the shore, and the grassy hills around them undulated in the gentle breeze. Cold, foggy Connecticut and Will Frye, with his comments about her non-child bearing hips and non-lactating breasts had never seemed so far away. Thank god.
Scout smiled at George, who couldn't help but smile back at her raspberry ice lips and merry, dark-lashed eyes.
"I'm going to get a lot of freckles today, I think," she said softly. "A lot more, I mean," she amended.
"Oh? Does that happen to you?" he asked softly, looking into her pale eyes.
She nodded, rolling her eyes. "Do you even have to ask?" she asked woefully. "Look at me. It's like I have a disease or something. I got called so many names when I was little." Scout wrinkled her nose as they walked along the path to the golf links that ran along the cliffs.
George turned to her in surprise. "You're joking! Who would do such a thing, especially to a little girl? And what kinds of names?" he asked curiously.
"Well, let's see." She thought for a moment. "There's Strawberry Cheeks, and Sprinkles, and plain old Frecks were a few," she said with a grin. "I used to really hate them." She shrugged. "They're actually not nearly as bad as they used to be, if you can believe it."
"Well, I think they're enchanting," George declared as they strode along.
"How very gallant of you," Scout said, looking up at him, tucking her hand into the crook of his proffered elbow. The dogs scampered to and fro, roaming from one interesting scent to the next.
"Wow, look at all these beautiful wildflowers," Scout said, kneeling down to look more closely. "They kind of look like gorse, and these guys look like buttercups, but I'm not sure."
She looked up at George, but he shook his head. "I'm sorry, I know fuckall about flowers," he admitted. "We could pick a few and take them somewhere?" he suggested, but she shook her head.
"No, you should never pick wildflowers," she said. "I'll just ask someone, next time I'm in your village or whatever." And she rose so they could continue walking.
They finally hit the golf links, which wound along the coast, following the steep cliffs. They could look over the side and see the rocky beach from time to time, and finally came around a bend and saw the house off in the distance.
"Wow, what a really beautiful property," Scout said in a dreamy voice. "Kinda how I imagined Manderley would look, you know? Only maybe less woodsy? You ever read Rebecca?" George shook his head as he looked at her, a smile hovering about his mouth. "Yeah, that's more a girl's book, I suppose. Manderley's this beautiful house near the sea in the book, this absolutely beautiful house. The first sentence in the book is 'Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again.' Isn't that just most gorgeous, luscious sentence you ever heard?" She looked at George, then blinked, embarrassed. "Okay, once again, I've been shooting off my mouth. You need to blow a whistle or something when I do that so I'll know to just shut the fuck up."
"I've told you and told you, I enjoy hearing you talk, it's quite soothing," George insisted. They were walking along a very narrow part of the path now, and the fog and mist had come up. He pointed out the hand rail, insisting she hold on to it.
"This part of the path is always wet," he informed her. "Please always hold on to the railing, okay? I must insist on this, Scout. The stairs down to the beach begin right here, see? They're quite easy to miss, and extremely slippery, so please use extreme care?" He looked at her anxiously, and she nodded.
They made their way safely back to the house, where they found that the boys had finished and left. They heated up leftovers for their tea, and George made a roaring fire to stave off the afternoon and evening chill.