Chapter 8 Scarlett's Resistance

Scarlett's POV: Every piece shimmered under the soft lamplight; I neatly arranged the antique silver tea set. The sweet sound of delicate clinking porcelain is so distant to the storm brewing inside me. Across the elegant mahogany table, Sebastian stared at me with an intensity that sent a shiver down my spine: a respect for the unworldly night. He had been softening; his eyes had begun to show a depth and vulnerability that I had not considered before, thus both intriguing me and unsettling. Sipping my tea again slowly, bitterly. It is the fire in my heart. As he had coldly lied to me in the beginning, I reminded myself of the look of his eyes at that time when he had proposed to me for a marriage of convenience. His talking had an appearance of being very deliberate, very willing to keep all other forms of emotion out. A strategic alliance, a mutually beneficial arrangement. It was an agreement that was forged in the dream of ambition, not love. And revenge, sweet and meticulously planned, was my intended payoff. But the difference was fast approaching between carefully devised revenge and deep feeling. The walls around my composure have been built over the years so carefully, brick by brick, and here they are crumbling; I could feel that wave of emotion creep slowly but surely around my heart. I could feel the slow, insidious creep of affection, a dangerous vine entwining itself around my heart. His overtures are missed; instead, those fingertips remind me of certain moments. Eyeing the past times discreetly in a crowded room might not be very calculative, but they tend to be acts of sincere concern. He knows that I only take Earl Grey tea, and yet it is so very insignificant in the whole scenario, but so very personal. And, at the same time, totally 'understood' without even saying a word, he was already in conformity in understanding the things that I needed before expressing them. He had even started reading the same books I favored, finding common ground in shared intellectual pursuits. A very small flicker of warmth, though dangerously breaking through my carefully formed facade of ice. It was his strength, his ruthless efficiency in business, which made him appear attractive to me at first. Now, I like something softer, kinder, that side which he trained himself not to show, a vulnerability that has accidentally been discovered. The same man that I beheld as being cold and calculating has started revealing, little by little, other sides of himself, a man more complex and much more human than I truly thought in the first place. It was some inner turmoil that went on with me. One part of me, a more logical part, was screaming at me to keep it cool, to remember the original betrayal, the carefully arranged timetable for revenge; the other part, one of more vulnerable and unpredictable dimensions, was softly murmuring about stolen moments, lingering touches, and the warmth of that affection which was decidedly threatening to melt the icy barricade erected around my heart. "You seem distant," Sebastian said at last, shattering the fragile void that had settled between us. His voice was soft, filled with concern. He reached across the table, fingering near mine. I drew my hand away abruptly, a movement that belied the tumult within. "Really, I'm tired," I muttered. The words were a mere whisper. The lie tasted of ash on my tongue. Tired wasn't the word. In fact, I was drained from the ceaseless barrage that raged within me: a war between my calculated plans and the impossible tide of feelings that suddenly stormed into the life of this man who first sought me out as a mere pawn in his game. Hours spent on revenge; intricate details, calculated moves; picturing his downfall, his disgrace, satisfaction in seeing every single one of my plans come to fruition. And now, all I felt was an intruding shadow of tenderness that clouded my vision. The thought of hurting him or seeing him hurt made me uncomfortable for some conflicting reasons I cannot even articulate. The charade couldn't last much longer. The facade of indifference had begun to stretch ever so thin, barely able to bear the weight of my emotions. Any pretensions were weak beside the subtleties of shifting attitudes towards me. Sebastian would soon realize; he was already picking up on the change, from something to his understanding. Defenses were slowly starting to weaken; the anger was gradually yielding to a mix of resentment and perhaps... concern? That night, glancing in my bohemian apartment mirror, I pondered the reflection looking back at me. The woman staring back was a stranger whose eyes were crying havoc within. The very idea was on the verge of breaking down with credibility. I was aware of the visible cracks in my armor, realizing that it was the chance of being vulnerable that had been very well shielded in the earlier days. I found a little antique silver locket on which my grandmother's name was inscribed. It was the last link to the time before the betrayal, a time that seemed so uncomplicated and easy. There were a few fading pictures put in, along with the tiny dried forget-me-not. I remembered my grandmother's voice softly warning me from ages before: "The heart, my dear, is a fickle thing. Oftentimes it leads us down paths we never intended." These words swam through my mind and struck a chord-the power that emotions carry and the whims of the human heart. I had so underestimated myself and my own heart open to love and vulnerability. In the same breath, I had underestimated Sebastian. To begin with, he was nothing but my cold-hearted calculating opponent. And now somehow, an inkling of something deeper seemed to shine through, something far beyond the immaculate facade, an ocean of emotions within himself that I was just beginning to touch. Days had turned into weeks and weeks into months, but still, the agony of reason being battered by emotion tore my interior apart each time. I was a conspicuous choice around him: lingering around him, stealing moments to laugh and share silences. I found myself gazing at every angle of his face, deciphering every clue, every hint of the man lurking behind the veil of ambition. One night, late into the morning hours of some work in his study, surrounded by the thick air of financial documents, he turned and looked at me. Those dark eyes peered into my heart with that kind of tenderness that left me breathless. He touched my hand, just barely grazing it, a touch that seemed to burn with mingled heat and linger far beyond what was needed. With that touch came a far deeper sighing, one that resonated to the depths of the soul, an acknowledgment that words failed to describe the walk we shared, leading into uncharted territory of emotion. I managed to die away as my heart pounded in my rib cage, and my brain raced. No longer could I maintain this charade and this war between the carefully constructed front of my plan versus the inundating tide of feelings I had never anticipated. The revenge that was so simple and easily seen now seemed petty and insignificant against a background of love I had never planned to endure. The seed of love sowed in the ground of deception had begun to bloom into something more powerful beyond my wildest imagination, something that threatened to change everything. The game had once so carefully fallen into my hands and now spun wildly out of my grip, opening up avenues that left me wary of where it might lead. Revenge was no longer the only motive; it was at the crossroads between walking down a future paved out carefully or a future I had yet to dream up, sculpted by the power of love unknown. The future, I suddenly realized, was left in a state of uncertainty. The future was blind and stretched out before me in a great, vast, uncharted territory where rigged revenge might have to surrender its place to the chaotic, unpredictable beauty of love.