Monday was soon upon them and Marilla soon realised Gilbert hasn't came to call on Anne all weekend.

" is everything alright with Gilbert?" Marilla asked. " he hasn't been here in a couple of days." Marilla asked Anne who was reading a book on the porch that warm summers day.

" hasn't he?" Anne asked trying to act as nonchalant as possible. Still reading her book. Of course she of all people had felt it, he hadn't attending church claiming to his mother he felt a headache coming on. Anne had a suspicion Friday night had freaked him out a little and was avoiding the confrontation of his own musings on the subject.

" Anne don't act like you haven't noticed." Marilla said warningly.

Anne looked up to Marilla " alright then, I was going to head over there in the morning to check he's alright will that do you?" she smiled to Marilla.

" yes that will do." She laughed. "oh what must he think!" Marilla sighed.

" he won't think ill of you I guarantee it." She told Marilla. " he doesn't think like that." She sighed. " he's probably mulling over what he thinks he's done wrong and making himself ill over it, knowing him." She said. " I'll go and see him in the morning."

Anne knocked on the Blythe's door bright and early at 9am.

" Anne dear!" Mrs Blythe exclaimed. " how are you dear?" she asked.

" I'm fine Mrs Blythe, but I was more worried about Gilbert." She said.

" yes he didn't breath a word at breakfast then shut himself away in his room immediately after the same the last few days."

" is he dressed? May I go and talk to him?" she asked.

" of course you can." She said. " you might be able to talk some sense into him." She said letting Anne past.

She knocked on his door. " I'm fine ma." He called out, "just leave me alone." She opened the door and saw him lying on his bed he looked and saw it was Anne. " Anne!" He said, " sorry I thought you were ma." He jumped up walked over to the door where upon he grasped Anne's lips with his and pulled her into him. He moved them over to the bed stand with her in his arms their still intertwined.

" Gil," she said as they drew for breath.

"i love you Anne" He said kissing into her again.

She smiled against him "I love you" she swayed in his arms " I've missed you." She said. "Tell me what's wrong" she whispered before he could kiss her again

"What must they all think Anne?" he said snuggling into her. She played with the curls in his hair as he hugged in.

" who?" Anne asked.

" my parents, Marilla, they must hate me."

Poor Gilbert she thought. Always quietly worried about what others are thinking. It would drive her mad to be as sensitive as he was in this way. " Gilbert Blythe." She said bring his face out of her shoulder looking in his eyes. " they all love you, they are worried you have shut yourself away to worry and so am I. Gilbert this isn't the way to deal with it, your parents love you. Marilla loves you, she wanted to know why you weren't at green gables."

"I can't face them. I won't face them, how horrible must it have been for them?" he asked sitting on his bed and running his hands through his hair.

" not as horrible as watching you blame yourself for a circumstance which was out if your control." She said sitting with him and she placed her hand on his knee. " come downstairs Gil, it's just your mama, isn't she innocent in all this too?" she asked him. She stood up. " together?" she confirmed bring out her hand. He looked sheepishly at her. "I'll protect you." She smiled. He smiled and took her hand letting her pull him up.

She led him down the stairs through the parlour into the kitchen. " Anne I don't know how you did it." His mother said rushing to get son and stroking his cheek. " are you feeling better?" she asked him. He closed his eyes for a second.

" ma." He started. " I'm sorry." He said hugging her.

His mother was confused, " what on earth for?" she asked.

" Friday," he said pulling away, "I made everyone so uncomfortable, first by suggesting it then by walking out on everyone." He worried.

"Oh Gilbert! Is that what all this has been about?" she asked him. " what a thing to worry over!" she exclaimed. " Gilbert you have nothing to be sorry for!" she reassured him. " are you saying you'd rather it happen in front of Mrs Lynde or someone else?" she asked. " and you know, Marilla is simply a lovely women under her cool exterior, well who better to raise your future wife, short of her own parents, would you rather she went somewhere else?" He shook his head " well then... see nothing to worry over. And Marilla had a lot of stories about Anne, reminded me of you when you were little, she just had a compacted childhood, here in Avonlea, it's no wonder you were fascinated with Anne since she came!" she laughed " Oh Gil!" He exclaimed." My lovely baby boy! Sit down I'll make you both some tea."

"pa?" Gilbert asked on entering the barn a little later in the day.

" Gilbert?" John asked "where's Anne?"

" in the house with ma making banana bread." Gilbert answered

"not forgotten how to bale hay have you?" John asked him.

" no of course not." He said.

" good come and help your old man." John smiled.

Gilbert started with the hay fork. " hey pa." Gilbert asked.

He chuckled " hey" he laughed. " yes son."

Gilbert gave a hollow laugh on the pun. " why didn't you tell me?" he said straight.

" would it have changed anything?" John asked him.

Gilbert thought for a minute, " no" he eventually said. "I would of remained head over heels for Anne, I love her, but a warning would have been nice." He said.

" well maybe I did handle it wrong." John admitted.

Gilbert stopped hauling the hay for a moment. " what was she like?" Gilbert wondered out loud.

" Marilla?" John asked, Gilbert nodded. " smart, hard working, she should have gone to queens but her papa wouldn't let her, determined, strong minded, and has a wicked sense of humour on her... you can tell when she is joking by the glint she gets in her eye, it's almost as if..." he trailed

Gilbert thought for a moment, you could read Anne's eyes, it wasn't exactly what his father was describing but it was almost... " we really do have a type don't we?" he laughed.

" there's more to Anne than that though isn't there? She lets you take care of her." John said.

" it wasn't always like that, even when we were friends it was on her terms, but once she realised she loved me she let me in." Gilbert said

" Marilla didn't." John admitted. " it made it emotionally draining, then we argued, I can't even remember what over, something petty and it just broke everything we had. I couldn't handle being rejected anymore."

" that's how I felt when Anne rejected me, when I proposed back in college." He sighed " then I'd see her again and again and I'd fall more in love, every time I couldn't help it, I tried, stupid Blythe stubbornness wouldn't let me stop loving her." He sighed "I didn't know she was falling in love with me too."

" Anne isn't like Marilla in one way, she let you love her, eventually," he said with a grin. " plus she seems to have a sweeter and more sensitive nature."

" yes, though sometime I think Marilla might have developed those traits, or at least has learnt to tolerate them... living with Anne."

"Marilla was always practical. Is that going to be a problem with Anne?"

" no, Anne is surprisingly practical, you never would know it being friends but I think Marilla has given her a practical side without taking away the hopeless romantic Anne who loves all things pretty and lovely. " he paused. " and ma?"

"I know you must think you could never love again if you had lost Anne, maybe you wouldn't recover, I certainly didn't think I would until by chance I met your ma. I found myself..." he sighed. " you know what it is to be a Blythe we are stubborn as hell once we make up our minds about something..." he said with a knowing smile. " but your ma was something special I found myself... you have to know how much I love her." Gilbert looked to his father. He'd never doubted it not for a single second, of course his papa loved his mama . He all of a sudden felt really guilty over even asking his pa anything.

" of course I know it." He said putting down his fork. "papa, I'm sorry." Gilbert said.

" for what?"

" Friday, and questioning you today." He said.

" you worry too much Gilbert, Friday was nice. it was nice talking to Marilla after so long, we were good friends once upon a time you know and I always wondered if your ma and Marilla would get along, when you and Anne were outside they were firing jokes across the table at each other like they'd been friends all their lives... well one good thing came out of all this." John said.

" Oh?" Gilbert asked.

" no in laws from hell." He said with a cheeky grin to his son. Gilbert laughed with his father.

" you find under the ice with Marilla, you'll find a very sensitive soul, she just never learnt to trust." Gilbert listened carefully and felt a jolt of sympathy for Marilla.

"I love Anne." Gilbert said to him.

"I know you do, you have since you came home with that bump on your head." He smiled " you had your heart set on Anne from the start didn't you?" Gilbert nodded. " it's good you got what you wanted. I really like Anne, she's a pretty little thing too."

Gilbert smiled, " she is isn't she?" he said proudly.

Hand in hand Anne and Gilbert headed over to green gables. Gilbert froze at the door Anne saw the dread on his eyes. " Gil, you're okay, were your mamma and papa mad with you?" Anne asked. He shook his head. " then neither will Marilla you'll see, she's not ice and prickles she's concerned for you. Remember on Friday she said she wasn't mad." She gently led him through to the parlour where she found Marilla.

" Gilbert, there you are, are you feeling better?" she asked him.

" yes miss..." he started. He remembered what they said on Friday " Marilla."

Marilla smiled and for the first time Gilbert saw a light play behind her eyes twinkling as she said " good boy, you remembered." She picked up something flat in front of her. "I forgot I had this but I thought you two would be interested." She showed them the item showing them the picture Anne handled it. It was a picture of Avonlea school in the background with a class and a teacher standing in front if the school.

"papa!" Gilbert exclaimed finding his own imagine in the crowd. He pointed to him for Anne.

" Gil! He looks just like you, exactly! Except the curl in your hair."

Gilbert smiled. " yes I get my curl from ma." He looked at Anne " and I look like pa, he came first remember?" he said to Anne.

" you're a lot like him. Makes me remember the boy he once was, but you've grown into quite a different sort of man. Intellectual, bounds of patience... but anyway do you recognise anyone else on there?" she asked them.

" Marilla is that you?" Anne asked a few seconds later. " Marilla you were beautiful!" Anne exclaimed.

" no need to sound so surprised." Marilla said dryly.

Gilbert bit his lip not to laugh, at what Marilla had said, that was quite funny he thought to himself, then thought on what his father had said about her sensitivity. "I don't know." He started. "I think grace has been kind to you, wouldn't you say Anne?"

Anne smiled " yes I quite agree. Nothing a new hairstyle wouldn't fix, oh Marilla can I...?" Anne started.

" stuff and nonsense!" Marilla exclaimed. " my hairstyle has done me just fine since I was 18 years old, no point in changing it now."

Gilbert could see it, in her eyes, the playfulness behind the words. How had he not seen it there before? Was he starting to understand?

He looked to the faces on the picture " is that a Pye?" he asked pointing at a with the same pointed nose and defiant look on his face as Josie.

" and a Sloane!" Anne exclaimed seeing a familiar set of goggle eyes staring.

"Marilla this is extraordinary!" Gilbert proclaimed. "I would imagine if AVIS had got hold of this it would be displayed somewhere."

" such a shame, it's not what it used to be." Anne admitted.

" well the imagination was sucked out of it as soon as you left Anne." Gilbert said admiring his fiancée again,

" we... we left." Anne smiled. " you are just as imaginative as me, though you don't credit yourself enough." Anne said back. " do you fancy some tea?" Anne asked Gilbert.

" yes please." He replied.

"Marilla?" she asked, Marilla shook her head, Anne gave the photograph to Gilbert and went to the kitchen.

" this is amazing." Gilbert said to Marilla. " thank you for sharing it."

" that's quite alright, I'd forgotten I had it to be honest, I found it quite by chance." She looked to Gilbert who again sported a quiet look as he did on Friday. " you worry too much Gilbert." She told him. " Anne seemed to think you would be worrying over Friday still, is that why you shut yourself away for the three days?"

Gilbert smiled. " she knows me better than anyone. I'm so lucky to have her. I know you said it was okay on Friday..."

" and it's still okay today. You look like your pa Gil, you share a lot of traits with him. I was so scared when I realised Anne was falling in love with you, that she would make the same mistake I did with another Blythe. And I shouldn't have but I hated that Gardner boy for coming between you, for keeping her away from home. I thought history would repeat itself."

" I'm not my pa Marilla, I think if Anne had married Gardner I wouldn't... She didn't though and she does love me."

"I know. I think that ability you have not to hold a grudge..," Marilla started.

" comes from ma. Yes I know."

" lets just start from there shall we, no grudges, no judgement?"

" thank you Marilla." He said plainly add Anne walked back through the door.