"You'll take care of her won't you Gilbert?" Davy asked Gilbert as they stood outside of Green Gables as Anne loaded the last of her things into the truck.
That morning had be a combination of Davy refusing to acknowledge Anne's leaving to him dramatically whining then finally the floods of tears as Gilbert and his dad pulled up in the truck.
"Upon my honor." Gilbert said with a smile to Davy, his hand lifted in the hair, squared beside him as a sign of his code of honor and a hug.
"We'll Skype Davy its not as if you'll never see us again." Anne said reassuringly.
"Oh Anne!" Thea cried throwing her arms around Anne. "I'll miss you!"
Anne chuckled "I'm going to be back this weekend!" Anne exclaimed. "And I'll be sure to Skype every night you'll barely know that I've gone."
John watched as Anne cuddled into Marilla. "Take care Anne." Marilla managed, Marilla looked to John and said "take care of her make sure she's all settled in?" she asked of him.
John looked at Marilla with meaning and said "Like she was our own." They stood in silence for a moment everyone wondering what was going on before John said. "We better leave, if we're staying a head of the traffic."
It wasn't until they were clearing Avonlea that Gilbert looked over at Anne on the other side of the back seat.
"You are very quiet, Anne," said Gilbert at last.
"I'm afraid to speak or move for fear all this wonderful beauty will vanish just like a broken silence," breathed Anne.
Gilbert laid his hand over the slender white one lying on the seat between them. His hazel eyes deepened into darkness, he wanted to say something of the dream which he thought would maybe sooth her in the moment, but the words wouldn't come. Instead they sat in silence for a moment before they passed the sign for leaving Avonlea.
"Well, we're off," remarked Gilbert, Anne thought unsentimentally.
"Yes, I feel like Byron's 'Childe Harold'—only it isn't really my 'native shore' that I'm watching," said Anne, winking her gray eyes vigorously. "Nova Scotia is that, I suppose. But one's native shore is the land one loves the best, and that's good old P.E.I. for me. I can't believe I didn't always live here. Those seventeen years before I came seem like a bad dream. Some better then others, some —" she shivered "Oh, Gilbert, I do hope I'll like Redmond and Kingsport, but I'm sure I won't!"
"Where's all your philosophy gone, Anne?"
"It's all submerged under a great, swamping wave of loneliness and homesickness. I've longed for so long to go to University—and now I'm going—and I wish I weren't! Never mind! I shall be cheerful and philosophical again after I have just one good cry."
Gilbert sighed and looked seriously at her for a moment before he unbuckled himself from his seat and he moved to the middle seat right next to her, he buckled the seatbelts and put his arm around her. He soon felt his t-shirt becoming damp, he knew she would. She didn't have to go through this alone, he decided. She was used to leaving somewhere yes, but she wasn't used to leaving 'home'.
He soon pulled out his phone and shared his headphones with her as his father drove them to Kingsport.
The two friends headed up Block 4 to find their flats which were next door to each other. They smiled as entered their rooms "At least I know where to find you." Gilbert said with a wink to Anne. They opened their individual doors and went in.
To everyone else the room was nothing special, in fact for the most part they were identical. Anne would soon realise how similar they all were when she would visit Gilbert's room in the multiable room visits getting all of their stuff in, but as she looked round the small room she felt its freedom, it was hers.
The whole room as no bigger the 20 feet squared but to her it was amazing. On her left lay a bookshelf and desk with a set of draws against the left wall the bed just beyond the draws. There was a small bed side table then a sofa chair immediately in front of the window in front of her. To her right lay the small square bathroom (to Anne's relief a bath was in there. On the wall from the bathroom was a small kitchenette with her own fridge and an oven. Anne sat on the edge of the bed and sighed in a strange sort of relief.
She was here. She wanted to go to university for such a long time, she'd been told she was useless, unwanted, unloved, stupid and unimportant. She'd been through so much to get here. In a freak twist of fate she had been sent to Green Gables instead of a boy. She'd heard Matthew and Marilla arguing the night she arrived though it was unlike any argument she had ever seen before, there was no shouting just a difference in opinion.
"We can't keep her Matthew." Marilla had said.
"Maybe we can." He said quietly. "She's so set on it…"
"It doesn't mean she can
"She's never had a home…" he continued.
"That's a shame I'll give you that but we aren't equipped for a girl. We were ready for a boy." Marilla continued.
"She's sixteen." Matthew said. "We might be that girls last chance of a family."
Marilla had fell silent at this, she knew it was the case. "We were never meant to be her family."
"Well maybe fate is trying to tell us something by bringing her here." Matthew said to her. "Maybe we can give her a trial for a while, see how it goes."
"I don't want to get her hopes up of staying." Marilla told him.
"Just…" Matthew said to her, "see how it goes."
Marilla has sighed at the time agreeing to it.
Once Gilbert had left the night Matthew died Anne and Marilla went back to Green Gables.
"we'll need to go back in the morning, and start to sort things out." Marilla told her.
"Sure." Anne had managed softly.
"You…" Marilla continued "…you sure have some good friends Anne, Diana…" she said "and Gilbert."
"I know." Anne replied.
"He's like his father." Marilla said to her and Anne looked confused. "Gilbert he's like his father." She confirmed. "Not just in looks but he's very very kind."
"Yeah." Anne said tears still falling from her eyes.
Marilla nodded. "You should go to sleep."
"I can't." Anne squeaked.
Marilla came to her and put her arms around Anne. "I know you think I didn't want you, it wasn't that. I've never been good at showing my feelings, they've never been close to the surface." She said tears actually coming from her eyes. "I couldn't bear it if you thought, I really didn't care."
"You wanted to keep me?" Anne asked wide eyed.
Marilla gave a weak smile "I knew for certain the day I heard you broke that slate over Gilbert's head."
Anne burst a giggle "I thought the trial was over, I thought you'd send me back."
"You showed sass." She said. "I never could resist sass." Marilla shrugged "Plus I think from today, you've made up with Gilbert?" she asked.
"I…" Anne admitted. "I don't know." She said.
"Oh?" Marilla asked.
"I think he just felt sorry for me." She said quietly.
"Don't throw it away Anne, he's a good lad from a good family, has he not done enough to earn your forgiveness?"
"Yes, he has." Anne admitted "Probably a hundred times over." Anne sighed. "I'll try and make it up to him when I get… back to sch…" Anne started but couldn't finish the sentence. Marilla pulled her in for a hug.
"You don't have to go back straight away." She said quietly. "We'll see won't we?" Marilla asked her. "We'll make it through, won't we?" she asked. "Together?"
Anne smiled looking around the room, she heard a knock at the door.
"Come in." She said knowing it could only be Gilbert. He came in the room. "Room service!" Gilbert teased as he came through the door with a rug and one of her bags in tow. He looked around. "Nice!" he said with a smile. "mine is a mirror image." He told her.
"It's very efficient." Anne agreed. "I like the pine wood, but its not very pretty." She said.
"Well that's why you're here." He said putting the items down. "Put your stamp on the place, it has potential."
"You always see potential." She said with a grin to him.
"There usually is." He said he said putting his hand out "Do you want to come down and help unload?" he asked her.
"Sure." She smiled. "Lets get moved in."
They headed down together and then saw Charlie on the other side of the courtyard outside. "I'll go say 'hello'." Gilbert said to Anne before he jogged over to greet him. It was then Anne saw a group of girls come out of the door behind her, as she was loading up herself with bags she heard their conversation.
"Whose that?!" One exclaimed.
"Look at those curls." Another said. "Haven't you always wanted a boy with curls."
"He's hot." Another said. "Look at that body, do you think he works out?"
"Oh he would have to." The first one said.
"What do you think of his friend there?" the second said.
"He's might have been as handsome were it not for those goggley eyes." The first said.
"That's mean!" The third chirped in. "I wonder If they're single."
Anne rolled her eyes. Apparently coming to university did not mean getting away from girls like that. She took a load of her own items up then visited Gilbert in his room.
"They aren't too imaginative with the layout are they?" Anne laughed.
He chuckled back. "No I suppose not, but they are well-organized." He said, putting up a large multi picture frame. Anne looked at the pictures in it, several were from high school. One picture was his parents which she smiled at, he had centred them in the multi frame. A group picture with them Josie and Charlie, Fred and Diana, Ruby and Spencer, Moody and Jane and Gilbert and Anne, it had been a candid one so they had all been arm in arm in a semi-circle smiling at the camera. One of the football team and one of him and Charlie as they had celebrated Gilbert's offer of scholarship both Charlie and Gilbert fresh off the field in their football gear, sweat still on their faces but they both had smiled widely. The last in the five frames was one she knew must have been taken at prom though she knew they weren't posed, but she knew the moment from the picture. She had a smile on her face she was looking off centre to the left of the picture so it was possible neither one of them knew the picture was being taken. Her head was tilted towards Gilbert who was smiling after he just finished whispering a secret to her. She looked at it in amazement for a moment before he said "Moody sent it to me a couple of days ago, he said he thought I should have a copy, I like it so much I printed it, I thought it was…"
"…the picture of us together." She snapped out of her gaze… "I mean…"
"Yeah." He smiled in agreement.
"I have a digital photo frame, it changes from picture to picture." She smiled. "From my online account." She said then looked at the picture again "I like it." She confirmed.
"So do I." he smiled.
"Just you and me." She observed, "I mean the others all…"
"Because you're my best friend." He blurted and she looked at him then smiled.
"You too Blythe."
Two hours later Anne walked down the corridor to the common room. She was interested to see if anyone was hanging out there and Gilbert said he would be along in a minute. She walked in and the room was busy people bustling around each other. Anne felt as though she should turn and run it looked more like a party then a common room when she saw a very pretty girl with silky brown hair and deep brown eyes come towards her, the girl flash a lopsided but pretty smile at Anne before she could turn.
"Hi." Anne said tentatively.
"Hi." The girl said. "I'm Philippa Gordon." She introduced herself. "But all my friends call me Phil." She said. "So let's be friends from the off you look interesting."
"Anne." She said with a hesitant smile before the girl linked arms with her and brought her deeper into the room
"Flat 43." Phil told her.
"You're not too far from me, I'm flat 20." Anne said with a smile.
"We're practically neighbours then." She said with a smile. "I'm from Bolingbrook." Phil said "And you?"
"Bolingbrook?!" Anne exclaimed. "Well I was born there and I visited for a few hours last summer, but I'm an Islander."
"Oh I simply adore the red sands of PEI." Phil admitted. "and if you're from Bolingbrook then we might as well be sisters." She said with a laugh. She sighed and looked round the room. "There's not much talent is there?" Phil said in a way that Anne now knew she had been one of the girls from earlier. "There was one boy who was simply divine but he was talking to a friend whose eyes were out here." She said with a sigh and Anne tried her best not to let her eyes roll. "Oh I know I seem shallow." Phil told her "but I'm honestly not." She sighed "I have heaps of brains, I was valedictorian at high school its just I'm a crowd pleaser too and other girls like talking of boys."
"I'd rather not, if that's okay." Anne said to her.
"You are going to be interesting aren't…" She started then she spotted Gilbert as he came into the room. "That's him!" Phil whispered to Anne as she turned her back to the door.
Gilbert smiled their way and came over to Phil's complete astonishment.
"Someone down the hall said they would order in takeaways tonight, see which ones are best in town." Gilbert told Anne then looked to Phil, "Made a friend already?" Gilbert asked.
"You know each other?" Phil asked.
"Phil can I introduce you to my best friend Gilbert Blythe, Gil this is Philippa Gordon, she prefers to be called Phil and is a crowd pleaser."
"Pleased to meet you." Gilbert said his hand going out in front of him for a handshake. Phil laughed at the hand and he pulled it back.
"So you'll know goggle eyes too?" Phil asked.
"Charlie?" Gilbert whispered to Anne to which she nodded.
"He has a girlfriend." Anne said.
"You do?" She asked Gilbert.
"No Charlie does." Gilbert corrected.
"I see, and you…" she said with her best winning smile which charmed most boys.
"I…" he said suddenly stuttering. "Um…" he sighed "it's not like I'm not…"
"Gil is a very busy man." Anne said trying to get him out of the hole she knew he felt himself in. "In high school, he was captain of everything and student body president no doubt at first chance he'll build up his portfolio again." Anne tried for him.
"I see." Phil said with a look at Gilbert as if she was trying to work him out.
"Did you see the noticeboard?" Anne asked him. "There's a freshers fair on tomorrow and a freshers ball on Friday."
"That sounds good." Gilbert admitted. "Lets go to the ball together?" he asked her.
"Oh yes please!" Anne exclaimed. "Its always better when you're comfortable with at least one person." She turned to Phil "Don't you think?"
"Yes I do." Phil said as if she was still trying to work out the dynamic between the two. "I'm going with some girlfriends I met on our floor." She admitted.
"Should we head round there tomorrow?" he asked Anne, then looked to Phil before saying "You're welcome to join us."
"Sure, we can see which clubs we want to join." Anne said with an excited smile and she looked to Phil.
"Ah, why not, I think I shall like you two." She admitted.