Okayyyyyyy, so some of you were hoping for some things in this chapter that may not happen. Right now I have this story scheduled to end with a total of 11-12 chapters, so we still have a lot of time for shenanigans to go down. All that to say, buckle up now because this is where the story takes a crazy turn and you won't even believe what else is coming ;) Let me know what you think, my lovelies!
Anne woke to the sounds of home.
Marilla in her old, blue pinstriped slippers shuffling down the hall.
Dora and Davy bustling about the kitchen and whipping up a meal vaguely resembling breakfast.
Just below her window, the sprinkler rattling rhythmically, watering the garden in the backyard.
And after months of blaring alarms startling her awake, Anne almost let the very sounds which awakened her lull her back into her dreams.
One thought, however, sparked Anne's energy like normally only coffee would: Gil should be strolling over to Green Gables at some point this morning.
And it would be quite embarrassing and disappointing if she overslept that.
So Anne dressed and readied herself quickly, searching her haphazardly-packed suitcase for her toothbrush, her mascara and, hopefully, her peace-of-mind.
But as she pulled open the door by its old brass knob, Anne knew she was as nervous as she had always been when Gilbert Blythe was concerned.
Nervous like the evening after Miss Lavendar's wedding.
Nervous like the cozy afternoons spent studying (or trying to, under Gil's gaze) at his apartment.
Nervous like the night he pulled her into the backyard of Patty's place and….
The especially-creaky bottom step and smell of pancakes interrupted Anne's thoughts, and she shoved her nervousness into the corner of her mind and focused on breakfast with her family.
After, as she and Marilla scrubbed room-temperature syrup off butter-yellow plates, Anne felt her anxiety creeping back into her mind.
Gil still hadn't shown up.
Her eyes lingered out the casement window above the farmhouse sink, and her conversation with Marilla petered out.
The sprinkler had stopped, and in the 10 o'clock sun, the garden glittered with diamond droplets of water.
"I'm going to check on the herbs, Marilla," Anne stated absently, pulling the sink's drain and tossing the sponge in its little dish. "They probably need some calmer love than perhaps Davy and Dora give them."
"Of course, Anne-girl," smiled Marilla, as she wiped the last golden plate dry. "Bring me some flowers for the dinner table, too, would you?"
"Yes, ma'am," Anne said, saluting her mother and backing out the door.
Marilla sensed her daughter's distraction and wondered what could've happened to knock her into this state of mind.
"Oh, well," she murmured and set about refilling the sink and grabbing the cups, forks, and frying pan Anne had completely missed.
Once outside, Anne felt the cool, midmorning air inject some peace into her blood.
"I worry and worry and worry, but I've always ended up well enough," Anne whispered to herself as she plucked some rosemary and smelled it. "There's still two hours of morning left! And he said morning, so I've only got two more hours to worry about this at all."
So Anne patched together all the confidence she could find in herself and wandered about the garden as cheerfully as possible.
Soon, she settled in the mossy, iron bench next to a tree in the garden, and she began to pick through potential candidates for the Marilla's flower vase.
Humming, Anne clipped the peony stems diagonally and started to arrange them against clusters of violet hydrangeas.
With the uncomplicated, beautiful work before her, her mind un-muddled itself more than it had in ages.
And in the soft, breezy stillness, Anne continued working until her arrangement was almost complete, and she turned the bouquet over in her hands.
It was missing something….
"Don't I feel foolish! I walk all the way over here, bring you lilies of the valley, and you've already got a gorgeous bunch of flowers yourself!"
Anne turned her flushed face, and her eyes landed a tall figure in a plaid shirt smugly leaning against the tree behind her. He held a wild bunch of creamy lilies in one hand, and when Anne giggled, Gil pushed off from the tree and held out the flowers to her.
"These are perfect," Anne began, her cheeks as pink as the peonies in her hand. "I needed something tall and thin to balance out the short bunches of the hydrangeas."
She grabbed the lilies and began filling out her bouquet with the little, bell-like blooms.
"Then I'm glad to be of service," Gil laughed as he jumped over the bench and sat down next to her. "How was your night? Did you and Di have any good talks?"
"Actually," Anne said, her eyes pointedly fixed on the flowers in her hands. "Yesterday, when I arrived to help her set up for the rehearsal, she—out of the blue and with almost no prompting from me—told me how much she would always love me and how her marriage to Fred wasn't going to change our status as kindred spirits."
"Really?" Gil smirked. "It's almost as if what I said would happen… actually happened."
Anne rolled her eyes at his words and smug expression of false surprise.
"It's like you could say," Gil continued, his eyes growing wide. "That I was correct. That I wasn't wrong. That you could say I was…."
Dramatically, he turned his head and stared at Anne meaningfully and playfully.
"You were right," Anne conceded, but not before elbowing him roughly in the side. "You were right that she understood more than I thought and that she was probably feeling the same way I did."
"Hold on!" Gil said, recovering from his attack quickly and pulling an invisible recorder from his breast pocket. "Can you say it one more time for the record, Ms. Shirley?"
"Oh hush," Anne giggled, swatting away his hand. "You were right. This once. But don't get used to it. Especially not from me."
Gil laughed and took the bouquet from her hands.
"I would never presume to be in the right where it concerns you, Queen Anne," Gil answered lightly but with an edge of truth. "But of course, Di was on the same page as you! You two are practically mind readers with each other. Which is a gift I quite wish Di would pass onto me now that she's getting married. Maybe I could avoid more elbow-shaped bruises on my ribcage."
"You could avoid them if you didn't talk so much!" Anne exclaimed, before snatching her flowers back and standing up. "Help me pick some daisies from the front yard? We can head down the lane after."
"Of course, Anne," Gil said, but he didn't stand up for a moment. "There are a some…things we need to discuss."
Their eyes—almost on the same plane with Anne standing and Gil seated—locked for a few seconds, and if time had afforded them a minute more, perhaps Anne would've stepped an inch forward or Gil would've reached out for more than just the bouquet this time.
Perhaps.
If not for the sprinkler unexpectedly restarting and showering the moment.
Laughingly, the pair sprinted away from the garden and up the three steps to the wraparound porch.
"What time is it?" Anne grinned, smoothing her water-glazed hair out of her eyes.
"Uh, 11:15," Gil answered, checking his phone and wiping water droplets off the screen with his tartan sleeve.
"Oh, then perhaps," Anne began as the pair rounded the corner of the house. "Once we put these flowers inside and head down the Lane, it'll be nearly lunchtime—"
"And we can go to Lawson's for lunch?" Gil finished, grinning from ear to ear.
And Anne grinned back, her eyes sparkling like the water caught in her hair.
But as the breathless pair reached the front porch, they were met with a surprise decidedly more unexpected than the explosive sprinkler.
There, on the white-washed steps of Green Gables, stood Roy Gardner, making conversation with Marilla.
And Anne wasn't sure exactly how many more surprises her heart could handle in one day.
"Oh, Anne!" Marilla croaked, her eyes nervously settling on the damp, startled, inexplicably-guilty pair. "I was just about to come and find you! Roy is here…."
Marilla's sentence petered off lamely, and Anne felt her mother shifting the action and handling of the situation to her.
Her mind whirred back into action, and she took charge as well as one might in such a situation.
"Oh, Roy," Anne began, handing the bouquet to her mother and walking towards her boyfriend. "What in the world are you doing here?"
Her tone was as airy as she could make it, but she could feel tension permeating her being as she approached Roy.
His fancy, out-of-place clothes contrasted against the dusty, wooden porch, and behind him, his shiny, out-of-place car loomed strangely in Green Gables' dirt-paved driveway.
"Well, after our last phone call," Roy said, emphasizing last so only Anne would understand. "I realized I must come see you this weekend. I was quite idiotic to decline attending this wedding in the first place. Of course, I should meet your family and friends at some point, and what better way than at the marriage of your best friend, Diana!"
Anne's face paled at the mention of the phone call under the cherry blossoms; she had hardly listened to a word he said, but what she did hear, she contradicted and fought, and she eventually hung up without so much as a "Goodbye."
She had been much too preoccupied with something else….
But never would she had expected Roy to drive down—all the way to Avonlea—to amend their quarrel in person.
And even though she was caught in a peculiarly awkward situation, Anne felt her heart soften at the man standing before her.
"You are much too good for me," Anne smiled sadly, smoothing her hand along his cheek.
"Don't be silly, Anne," Roy said, catching her hand and pulling her to his side. "I'm quite excited to meet everyone, especially Davy and Dora. Might we go in now?"
Roy gestured to the front door, and Anne's eyes fell first on Marilla, who nodded and shifted slightly toward the door.
Then, Anne's eyes fell on Gil, whose cast his eyes on the sun-bleached planks of wood at his feet.
"Oh, but Gil and I—"Anne began, desperate to diffuse this situation.
"I was just about to leave," Gil interrupted brightly and artificially. "I just had to run some things by Anne for the big day tomorrow, but my mother has me reserved for the rest of the afternoon, I believe. She wants me to move the couch to the other side of our living room!"
Anne sighed in relief, and a quick glance at Roy proved he believed Gil's story without a doubt.
"Leave it to Gil to completely transform this situation into something so simple," she thought to herself, her eyes following Gil's sturdy figure as he crossed the porch.
"Good to see you, Roy," Gil said, shaking Roy's free hand and glancing at Anne for one split-second. "And lovely as usual, Mrs. Cuthbert!"
Marilla nodded, and Gil hopped down the stairs and walked steadily across the yard.
Roy's arm tightened around Anne as he guided her toward the door, and Anne vaguely heard a trifling conversation pass between him and her mother.
Her full attention, however, focused on the figure nearing the Lane, and Anne could've sworn that the figure—just at the edge of disappearing in the cluster of trees—turned back one last time.