Yes, I am late in getting anything uploaded this week, but I have one for all three this way! Which is very rare these days.
Thank you for your patience. Love you all Carrots x
Gilbert turned in his bed finding Anne beside him he chuckled wrapping his arms around her.
"Nan." He whispered cuddling her.
"Gil?" she said waking.
"Sorry, I didn't mean to wake you." He said to her softly.
"You didn't really." She told him. "We fell asleep." She said to him.
"Yeah, I think we did." He agreed. "But I missed you too much to leave." He said tickling her for a moment.
She giggle for a moment "Gil Stop!" she objected before he tickled her more. "Stop it, stop it now, you'll wake mama and pap and they'll take you home!" she objected.
He stopped then looking at her as she snuggled back into his chest. They were silent for a few moments so long Gilbert thought she might have gone to sleep.
"Did you really miss me today?" Anne whispered to him.
"Terribly." He told her "Your dad tried to get me to play with the other little boys." He said sighing. "I just, don't fit in."
He heard her sighing then said to him "You could fit in." she said to him.
"How?" he asked.
She swallowed and said quietly "we could stop being friends."
"No!" he objected his face screwing in anger, sitting up suddenly. "How could you say that!?"
"So you can fit in!" she told him sitting up next to him.
"If that what it takes to fit in then I don't want to." He objected.
"Gil, just enough so you can get along with the other little boys, play war with them."
"I want to play with you!" Gilbert told her "and a nurse would be better on the battlefield anyway."
"Then play ball!" she tried.
"No!" he objected.
"But you play with them before with me."
"with you." He told her "Exactly."
"Exactly!" Anne tried. "You need to play with them, you'll be with them two years before I come to school you have to get along with them!"
"I don't mind being alone." Gilbert told her.
"I do mind it!" Anne told him "Please Gilbert, please please. I don't want you the strange little boy who will only ever play with a girl, they'll call you a sissy."
"Then I guess that makes me a sissy." He told her calmly.
Anne looked at him her eyes going wide before she threw herself in to his arms. "You're no sissy, not to me."
"Thanks." He whispered. "Come on, we better get to sleep, I've got to go to school in the morning."
"Can we play together after?" she asked.
"Promise."
"Ô Canada!Terre de nos aïeux,Ton front est ceint de fleurons glorieux!" The boys sang in unison. Their football game was a victory against their rival university from the states. They came out of the football stadium at the university arms around each other.
"Oh only a great Canadian could write it!" one of the boys shouted.
"Ay!" the majority of them agreed.
"God Save the Queen!" another boy shouted.
"God save our gracious Queen long live our noble queen, God save the Queen!" They all sang in unison.
"We should go to the bar!" one boy suggested.
"Yes!" the majority called.
"Gil?" One boy asked his team captain, the one boy who had remained quietly smiling through the other boys exuberance.
"No thank you boys." He said with a smile. "I am going to head off."
One of the boys laughed "she has you whipped doesn't she?" he commented to which the other laughed "The old ball and chains!" which got a hearty laugh from the other boys.
"Leave her out of it." Gilbert said rolling his eyes turning back to them looking serious.
"Ohhhh!" the majority exclaimed one or two who were close to Gilbert stopped knowing the lad was overstepping an invisible mark.
"You have children don't you?" the lad continued "Is that how she tied you down?"
"Thats it!" Gilbert exclaimed confronting the lad "You don't talk about my Anne that way!" he told him. "You and me right here!"
"Gil, calm down." One of his friends came between the two men.
"Not Nan, you know her, James."
"I know I do." James said calmly.
"I won't have someone defaming my wife!" Gilbert said looking the boy straight in the eye.
"Gil, I know but he's not worth it." His friend reminded him. Gilbert looked to James, he then realised the way he was behaving he took a deep breath. "Go home Gil, go home to that beautiful wife and your gorgeous children and remember you have a family to protect..." before he whispered to Gilbert "he's a big enough idiot to never have one too."
Gilbert looked at the lad again before he told the group "I have a final in the morning, I'm going home to study for it." He said "and yes, I'd rather spend time with my wife and children building a relationship and a life with them then wasting hours of my life I will forget by morning." He turned and walked away from the group. "Goodnight gentlemen." With it the entire team watched him walk away.
When finally out of earshot the boy turned to James and said "What was his problem?"
James unable to contain himself turned and punched the lad to which the rest of the lads burst into a cheer "Don't you talk that way about a lady again."
Gilbert came in the door his jacket dropped on the back of the chair where he landed next to Anne he held her around her middle and pulled her in.
She smiled looking down at him as he continued to hug in pulling her closer.
"Where's your ma?" he asked her.
"She went to bed early." Anne admitted.
"The babies asleep?" he asked.
"Both in the land of nod, I took them to the park today and they really ran off some energy." She smiled. "How was your game?" she asked him.
"We won." He said flatly.
"Aren't you pleased?" she asked him.
"I'm exhausted." He sighed.
She smiled down at him as he hugged into her just under her bust. "Don't you enjoy playing?" she asked him. "You're the one who stayed on after you graduated."
He sighed heavily "I didn't want to get out of shape." She heard him mumble.
She paused and stroked into his curls. "Is this about your physical fitness?" she asked him, meaning the hug.
"No." He said quietly. "Some of the boys called me whipped." He sighed again looking up at his wife "I defended you, but the truth is I don't even care if its true."
"Oh Gil." She whispered looking into his eyes. "You've always been sensitive about this. Remember your first few weeks at school."
"I stayed with you every night over night." He remembered with a smile. "You're my home." He whispered.
"No matter what." She smiled at him. She took a deep breath and said to him "Do you enjoy the game?" she asked him.
He shrugged sitting up beside her "Not anymore, not really, just I've been captain throughout my whole time and I just can't seem to fade into the background."
"It is one of the things about being postgrad, especially in medical school, you need to prioritise what's important now."
"are you saying my physical health isn't important?"
"I'm saying half way through medical school, we're almost done and from now on its going to about what's most important and keeping those things in place, now I'm not saying your physical health isn't important but if you're really not enjoying it anymore is there any more effective ways of keeping fit? Something which will take less time? Unless you really are enjoying it..."
"No, I'm not really." He told her.
"Well this isn't school, its not something you have to do." She advised him.
He swallowed and nodded "I'll think about it." He told her.
She sighed in return and told him "The publisher wants to make more edits to my story." She admitted.
"Oh no!" he exclaimed his face dropping "Oh Nan, I'm sorry."
She sighed heavily "it feels like everything original is being edited out. I don't know if my book will ever get published, maybe I'm better off with short stories."
"If anyone can," he whispered "You can Nan." He smiled "I know you better then anyone, with you, anything is possible." He said with a smile. "and this, this is why those boys are so wrong." He continued "They called you a 'ball and chain' and they claimed I was 'tied down' by you, truth is, you set me free." He said with a smile "I could never have become who I am without you." He told her. She smiled back and they closed together kissing lightly. "Come to bed with me." He whispered to which she nodded.