A/N: hello, if you're reading this and you have yet to read my fic Subject to Change I will warn you that there is quite a jump in storyline you may not understand nor even like. This was created for and dedicated to those wonderful readers who wanted to see Gill's side of the story.
Today is a landmark. In anticipation of the significance the sun is high and bright; but personally I would illustrate it as unruly. Today is the 2nd of winter, my birthday, and it has been cold and dark for weeks until this point.
The landmark isn't what you're expecting. I am not a person of such sentiment that I would raise point of any special importance to my own birth. It simply happened. And it was simple coincidence that the significance also fell on this day one year ago. The truth of the fact had actually been bypassed then, but I held no grudge. I had forgotten the day before it, the night before that, and all but the very concept of time. Such mundane daily processing had been driven out of me. Even so no moment so thoroughly put time to rest as that extraordinarily bright dawn.
The day she opened her eyes.
"You came because of the brochure?" another eager nod. "The island isn't really like that phony thing," I clipped, planning to end the conversation there, but I was intrigued. Despite clearly seeing the truth I had just unabashedly delivered she didn't seem deterred in the least. In fact her very existence held a kind of sparkle. So I continued.
"At least it may not look like that now but it has a lot of potential I hope to utilize." Her nod became a smile, openly sunny.
"And I'm going to farm here," she said.
My interest piqued then, and our relationship began from there. Impressed with her forward-barreling enthusiasm, I made small talk on occasion. I accepted her friendly gifts when she progressed as they were the fruits of her labor. Some liveliness returned to the town and I was staggered to tally it up to one girl's sudden appearance. The villagers were apprehensive of any visitor regardless of the new and much appreciated business, but she still seemed to carry a bounce in her step and an unending supply of optimism in her work ethic.
Somewhere along the way watching her efforts closely and accepting those small gifts began to develop my perception on her.
"…It's nothing special. It was just something I had." I stuttered; something I had never done before. I was unnerved. "I should go."
"Gill," she called, putting one hand on my shoulder and turning me back, a light rose dusted across her cheeks. She toyed with the geode I had given her, catching it in the light so that it shone back at her in a kaleidoscope of colors. "It's very beautiful, thank you."
After that I did little more than bob my head in farewell and skulk off. My heart was pounding. I felt hot and uncomfortable in my light summer clothes and found the idea of jumping from the dock into the rank smelling fishing bay bizarrely appealing, if not insane.
I arrived at the Town Hall at the exact hour, minute, and second I always did and dropped into my father's empty seat to discover how to breathe again. Her grateful image was trapped behind my eyelids. Ellie had apparently heard me panting.
"Are you alright, hon? Do you need me to fetch you a paper bag?" I shot her an harsh if unwarranted glower that caused her to shrink back a fraction. We were still fairly new colleagues but I had adjusted to her straight-forward benevolence about as much as she had adjusted to my occasional snappishness.
"I'm not hyperventilating Ellie, I'm just hot. I hate this weather." As the words left my mouth I began to consider it fact. My reaction was merely some sort of heat exhaustion that I had caught out before I developed fever. We left it at that. It was a rare workday of quiet that I used to reflect while trying to avoid the tiny edge of guilt that chewed each time I noticed Ellie's tactfully hidden upset through eye contact.
The next day that Angela appeared with shining eyes and ever-so-slightly tanned skin my pulse quickened but I maintained my cool, further proving my most recent theory.
"I'm growing honeydew this time." She presented me with the fruit; round and juicy-looking if a bit small. "I hope its okay. They were a little finicky." As I had no way of sampling the fruit I weighed it instead, buying time to form a reply. I finally settled on a rigid thank-you. Her eyes twinkled and a little snort of laughter escaped. "You don't have to be so shy, Gill. I've been here for three weeks already." And people would talk, I berated her wordlessly. But her gaze had already flicked away absently, her features still glowing with inner quiet. It was possibly that even if I had voiced the concern she would have waved it off as unnecessary or even taken insult that I worried at all.
She seemed to enjoy my bursts of awkward silence almost as much as my usual curtness. Her visits became teasing and playful no matter where she found me. My ears were often perked for her loud call as I walked to the church, and the days when my journey met little resistance I wondered at her whereabouts.
Then something strange occurred. My father, who was typically buoyant and vigorous to over-compensate for mother's absence, brought up something old and forgotten.
The fabric drifted through my fingers like foam; infinitely soft. Its colors had faded but only a little and it still felt as though it had been sewn together with spider's web. It was as though I was woken up from a long dream slow and groggy to realize it had all been carefully buried reality. Magic and fairies I thought I'd invented to avoid the truth of my mother's departure couldn't possibly exist; it was all just clever story-telling weaved around the base of our religion. And yet here it was: a piece of the past in clear and true substance within my hands.
I looked to my father for answers and his usual smile returned with abundance.
"Angela's met the Harvest Goddess. I'm going to ask her to bring the rainbows back and restore the Mother Tree, but I only have half the quilt," he said, letting his unspoken request trail after him. Too many questions swam. I had to sit down.
"What happened to the sprites?" I asked, sounding croaky to myself.
Angela met the Goddess.
"I was hoping you knew." He fumbled with the buttons on his jacket.
Angela could revive the Island.
"You've had the quilt the entire time?"
Angela saw the things I once had. Angela was special.
"I need a minute." I continued to sit on the arm of the sofa in a daze and Father flitted around me not knowing how to help.
I was allowed to hold on to the quilt for the evening. I sat in the study with the lamp on far into the early hours staring into its richly designed patches in hope that they might help me remember when it struck me; I began keeping journals a year before mom disappeared. She'd given me my first book after she'd left the clinic for the last time in hopes it might placate me during the times I was alone. I wrote everything in those journals, surely I would have written about the quilt.
A dusty box in the attic held all my secrets. My father had dared neither to read them nor throw any away, and after seeing the intrepidly bound cardboard I guessed I might have packed it myself years ago. I tore into it and uncovered dozens of books of all shapes and sizes. Eventually I had stuck to a design that was the most roadworthy and contemporary but as a child I had been happy to spend my pocket money on whichever caught my eye. It didn't take me long to find what I was looking for and to devour its contents, at the same time reliving it. The sun rose long after I'd read everything twice.
Within a week Angela was searching me out. I'd told my father that I would be able to assist her with clues from my memories and he'd obviously passed on the message successfully. Her eagerness was far too apparent. She caught me in the square early enough even that I had yet to unlock the Hall's doors. The flowers were still and the morning quiet. I put myself in a practiced state of relaxation.
"Yes, I used to be able to see the sprites as a child." Her brow puckered in skeptical interest; a suggestion that she had yet to meet one herself and even deeper than that she was still trying to come to grips with the situation. I couldn't blame her; I'd tried to bring myself up to speed in one evening.
She sat on the bench, eyes bright and thoughtful. "So you believe all this too."
"Don't you?" I crossed my arms. It wouldn't do to have a heroine who had no conviction in her task.
"It was only a dream, Gill." She said, with a cynical note gracing her melodic voice. When I gave her no response she tacked on carefully, "…it's just a lot to take in." As her uneasy smile reached me my stomach did a dizzy flip; the sudden intimacy of a shared secret made me stiffen. Once I had calmed the reaction I realized she was waiting for me to speak. I ran a hand through my hair habitually, sorting my thoughts.
"I can't see them anymore. I don't know when it stopped or why it did. But I know one thing for certain: the Harvest Goddess chose you. You are the only one who can do this."
Perhaps that had been too much; silence followed and my skin became heated despite the very confidence I had been hoping to impart. But we'd spoken many times about the future of the island. Wherever it was she had come from she seemed deeply intent to make this her new home. Her eyes drank me in, measuring every inch, and she must have come to a favorable conclusion because she nodded from the bench and the sunshine returned to her smile.
"Okay," she said, determination returning albeit weakly. "Tell me where I can find the other half of this quilt."
After that I found increasing difficulty in Angela's presence.
While my pulse would vibrate in my veins each time we casually met eyes or our knuckles might brush as she gifted me, I was also harboring an intensifying frustration that little was changing. Some old residents had returned to their board-up houses but the merchants still suffered poor trade, and the island had yet to see much rousing success in any other matters enough to draw any new money. Her favor seemed to both thrill and irk me; I'd hoped she had better ways to use her time. My father was also at the receiving end of my ire for ever filling me with such ridiculous false hopes.
The frustration came to a head when I ordered the carpenter boy to cut down the roots for her. His father less willing, it only took a few gentle words of direction before Luke thought the idea had been his own. She might have realized as she bewilderedly watched him work that it was wrong. I didn't know any better than she did that the roots were of no more use. I wanted something to happen. I wanted her to be moved. In the end there was only dead wood.
My journals returned to storage and I continued to make my own efforts as I always had; in a way I could plainly see working towards a conceivable goal. It was as though time had reverted and everything was the same as it had always been.
With that in mind, it was much later before I began to identify the evident changes in Angela that no one else could.
"Gill," she approached me, exuding gloom. "Here."
I was presented with a sorry looking ear of corn. It looked pale and unsavory but neither of us seemed to be able to voice opinion on its offensiveness. I didn't want it.
"Th-thanks." I blurted, once again stumbling over words and feeling my ears go hot.
A noisy sigh escaped her and her eyes looked dull. "What's next?" she asked no one in particular, especially not me. I felt tightly coiled waiting to snap.
"How are the rainbow recipes coming along?" I solicited hurriedly and instantly came to regret it. Her face darkened and a stone dropped into my stomach, but the reply and accompanying smile revealed nothing.
"Oh, as good as always."
She span on her heel, a swish of her short hair against the back of her neck drew my attention briefly. "See you later." She'd barely managed to finish her farewell before her back vanished from sight. I let out an angry breath. It wouldn't have mattered if I had followed after her; the dangling question of her unusual temperament a tempting force. But old impatience boiled and I dwelled on the certainty that she would impart little else to me today or any other day. I quashed my anxiety.
Women were fickle and I was better off without them.
The next day a ship came in. I avoided the bustle simply by being in the Hall early and going through father's latest collection of messy paperwork. I heaved a sigh which Ellie chose to ignore this time; his heart had always been in this vocation but he wasn't very good at the business end of it. Before it had been my mother's post to ground him, now the position fell to me.
The large doors swung on their hinges and gave a threatening creak as they did. I'd have to get that fixed.
"Ah, hey. It's Gill. Long time no see."
The new voice rang familiarly, and some shock registered but I refused to look it in the face. Instead I finished neatening the papers with a final tap against the desk-top. My initial surprise hadn't been out of turn at all. Simpering with the same practiced smile I remembered and a tattered looking bag over one shoulder was Chase: Yolanda's only established assistant and one of the last people I ever anticipated to return.
"You've lost some eloquence over the years." He said, his smile never faltering, and I realized I'd taken too long initializing my response to retain any measure of adult-like poise.
"And I see you've gained none," I drawled, averting my eyes disinterestedly.
"Touché."
I hoped he wasn't here for chitchat, but as the pause lingered and I grew more uncomfortable, his self-possession increased. He appeared to be waiting on me to extend the conversation. As I had already lost my usual flair for polite reception I reached for the next available option: guarded inference that he should tell me why he was present before I lost my patience.
"Thanks, I've been better." He responded to some idle small-talk we must have been proceeding at within his healthy imagination. "I've come back for one of two reasons; I'm broke or I'm stupid. Actually it could be both. Either way I'd like my keys. I'm on a schedule."
Completely unsurprised by this answer, I grumbled and signaled Ellie to move in with the paperwork as I went to fetch them. Chase, amongst other residents that could, saddled the Hall with the responsibility to advertise the selling; though not for free as I managed to convince my soft-hearted parent. The same as a few choice others preceding him, a homecoming was often made before a sale. The market was indeed still poor. I pushed the set of nondescript keys across the countertop.
"How long can we be expecting you to stay this time?"
"You're doing so well here…I was thinking maybe forever." He shot me a pretentious wink and the sarcasm failed to escape me. Rather than curse Chase's back as it swaggered out the way it came I thought of Angela. Until the clock struck closing time defensiveness and blame clashed noisily in the back of my head, distracting me, and finally driving me out the door on the back of Ellie's heels.
When I reached her farm I hesitated to announce myself. She was in the field, hoe in hand, leaning upon the tool rather precariously as the wind tousled her hair and she watched the day pass. I wasn't an expert on horticulture but it didn't seem like she'd accomplished much or been there long. Her unnamable plants looked exhausted as though simply staying upright was their greatest achievement, and a lonely cow grazed on thin grass. I wondered how this much even allowed her to make payments on the land let alone eat and prosper, but I guessed from the fatigue that bit at her features she was doing a large amount of foraging as well.
Finally I drew near her.
"Gill…" she appeared flustered, assuming a more active stance. Trying to deny the rush of heat that accompanied her lips around my name I smoothed my hair.
"It's getting late. I was thinking I'd eat at the inn today."
"Okay?" she blinked, evidently missing my meaning.
"I'm feeling quite generous today…" I clarified, and again there was a lull.
"O-oh right!" she said, nearly dropping her tool as she ran to me. "Yes please!"
My father would explain that I've never been much good at keeping friends. I would say it took someone exceptional to help me find the serenity. Angela had always been worthy of my respect, she only needed some direction.
Our meetings became more frequent, more drenched in secrecy although to watch us eat and speak casually most days one would never guess. The more I denied that delicate flicker of wistfulness as I contemplated Angela the more troubled I would become when she showed me any favor. I was delighted to be her confidant. And so I grew to recognize it. Slowly she began to shine again, and just as slowly I embraced the knowing that she would always have a place beside me should she choose to accept it.
I was so wrapped up in my brand new allegiance that I almost missed the most important piece come into play. Chase: whom I never thought I'd see again, and whom Angela had never met.
I wanted the blame to rest on him and I wanted to continue to despise him.
But she bequeathed me with his welfare. At the time I didn't realize it could be anyone other than Angela. Some magic had been done and she was in some great rush but seeing the small trickle of red from his lips combined with his raw compressed skin and clothes disheveled to the point of tearing my conscience left me with little other choice. I couldn't follow after her; I had to respect her wish. Once I had made the conscious decision of heft his deceptively light weight inelegantly over one shoulder she had already vanished.
Her empty rooms haunted me just as I haunted them. I shared the keys with Chase but we never ran into each other during our visits. I couldn't let him see my uncertainty. Hours passed and our search looked more hopeless by the day, but it was only here that I would pace and tug my hands through my hair in aggravation.
If things had been different I might have saved us some trial. Now I was finally facing up to the reality that no magic or even laborious hard work could give me what I truly wanted; naivety had left me floundering again.
"It really isn't her," I surrendered, divulging some of my weakness as I did. I was sat bones slack in a seat at Chase's cheap wooden table. He was at the stove, fully healed but for the deep shadows under his eyes. The blank white canvas of his shirted back revealing nothing as food began to sizzle under his ministration.
"No," Chase conceded with finality, and it sank in all the deeper.
Outside rain had begun to fall. The island was cool and it sounded like frozen little fingers tapping against the walls with fervor. The somber atmosphere and my resonating stupor stifled the air. I wasn't sure I would even eat but the smells reached me and it took little urging before I lifted my fork in accord. I still didn't sleep, but the empty sensation that had opened its yawning jaws wide inside of me seemed pacified somewhat.
Time spiraled further out of my grip. I could only half-heartedly dedicate myself to my daily schedule and I disregarded Ellie's insistent looks of concern. I'd lost my direction just as much as Angela had back then. Where was she to guide me in return? It was still too strange to fully admit that she was gone. I'd rather have a lifetime of thankless routine accompanied by the hope that I might look over my shoulder one day to see her that admit the end. With this small resolution I continued our work.
"Gill," she said, materializing from the darkness. The color of her eyes repulsed me but I was always distracted before I let it show. When Sephia asked of me she wore the same face in an expression that was honest and pleading; the expression was so very Angela that as a result I couldn't deny her.
"Chase is in trouble."
Rejection stabbed at me until I reminded myself that this wasn't her. My Angela was the one that clung to me desperately in the night hours crying him out of her heart and repeating my name. I listened to Sephia's account distantly until a sudden growing fury took me.
If he had won her and then given up on her I would erase him. There would be no gentleness when I stole her away.
The very same vehemence led me to the bar, tied my fingers to a handful of his clothes, and slammed my fist into his pure guileless cheekbone. Although I tried to catch him again on the upswing his balance was restored and we tumbled to the floor amongst shattered glass and communities of dust to continue our conflict. If he had truly been alone then I never would have finished the fight wrapped up in Jake's immovable hold and Yolanda's broom aimed threateningly at my forehead. That on its own might have been enough to shake him awake, but I still had the use of my tongue.
"You're pathetic," I said; meaning every syllable. I reviled the weakness in me that I allowed to trust him.
"What do you want from me?" bleeding hands went up in a show of supplication before falling back to his sides uselessly.
The eye that had taken my first blow was beginning to run but I didn't bother brushing the moisture aside. "I want her back," I countered swiftly, hoping he'd recognize my warning.
I won't hand her to you lying down.
A smattering of blood adorned his cheek and an angry split in his lip. But his eyes flickered and his stubborn lethargy waned. Despite my sincere yet subsiding rage I had one final sentiment to impart. She had entrusted his welfare to me, and now he needed a reminder of his own importance.
"And whether I like it or not you might be the key to getting that."
As a rival Chase did not disappoint. He climactically made his rescue of the girl ignorant of his own pain and indecision. His epiphany was lost on me; all I could do was watch in horrified awe. Sephia stood a ghost at my side until something drove her to assist him in the destruction. The tree never stood a chance. Axe and muscle, tooth and nail; they would have torn it down if even it took days. Their endurance exceeded their earthly means. While I might have studied the consequences the plan at great length, their rashness was exactly what she needed.
We brought Angela to the clinic in the height of springtime. Chase himself stayed for nearly a week until fatigue and frostbite ultimately healed- his obvious predisposition to treatment notwithstanding. Sephia disappeared just as surely as she came. I wasn't sad to see her go only perplexed over the vaguely guilty feeling that remained in her memory. It was as it should be, but even after months of her nearby existence it felt unfinished somehow. In the church the stained-glass pulled my eyes more than it ever had. And although our religion was now certainly nothing more than a fairytale waiting to become old, I prayed that she found peace.
At the clinic the sun fell warmly past the pale curtains to form shapes on the foot of Angela's bed. Chase was absent, performing some task for the inn to ensure his freedom for the next week, and the solitude presented itself before me pleasantly. Under the tightly folded coverlet she stirred, eyebrows pinching faintly before smoothing back to match the rest of her serene features. Although the paperback between my fingers had finally reached a point of interest my gaze lingered there at length.
She sighed, her lips parted appealingly, and suddenly there was a tug on my sleeve. The curtains fluttered strongly enough that they might have worried her awake. With her hand tangled in the open cuff of my shirt I closed some of the distance between us. Her chest rose and fell with steady even breaths that matched that of the breeze. Her skin was radiantly pale and unmarred, most noticeably at the pulse in her neck.
I felt no rush of unbidden shyness when I realized I wanted to kiss her. I sought to remember the exact moment she had come calling, her heartache heavy and unwieldy, to my door and into my arms. I wanted to be consumed and to recklessly capture what I desired and yet I was still.
It wasn't for Chase who was my venerable if not errant comrade. It wasn't for the memory of Sephia that troubled me in the quieter hours of the day. It was Angela herself. Her every breath, her minutest movement betrayed her; back then and just as surely now once she woke. She'd given her heart away long ago. Gently, so that my hand nearly shook with the effort to remain slight, I let my fingers drift through the hair at her forehead and she released my sleeve.
Her eyelashes fluttered. A moan-like sigh escaped. And eventually a honey-brown gaze fixed on me.
"Good morning," I said, two weeks since she'd last been awake. My voice was carefully balanced so as not to give away the huge relief I felt, though I still took her small hand in mine.
"Morning," she smiled, refreshed and new and a little bit hoarse. That hand gripped mine reassuringly and instead of the affected racing I was acquainted with my heart was soothed. After a moment she coughed at the dryness in her throat and grumbled, "Ugh, I feel awful- and hungry. Like I've only eaten dust for the last year."
Provoked, I returned the smile openly; glad to hear the characteristic response once more. She could cleverly avoid awkwardness even after weeks of absence. But that was just another one of the things I loved about her. I gave her hand one final squeeze and let it go.
"Don't worry; Chase will be here soon."
A/N: Future Chapter next...