Hi everyone!

Thanks so much for all the comments, PMs likes and follows! These chapters are hard to write I love that there's a genuine reaction from you all and it has been painful, but its time for mending!

I apologise if anyone is sitting with a stop watch, my little boy keeps being sick you have a very sick little carrot and a very tired mammy carrot but hopefully this time he won't be sick again! (I barely knew it was Thursday I was on auto pilot today!)

In this chapter there are bits which are from the original book between Anne and Leslie, I hope it slides in well.

love

Carrots x

Anne woke from her slumber, confused for a moment when she wasn't in Phil's spare bedroom and wondered what the weight was beside her. She opened her eyes her lips upturned as she realised it was Gilbert beside her. She turned and looked at the bedside clock which read 03:27 then turned back to watch as Gilbert slept.

Studying his face it was obvious he wasn't well. His normally pink hued face paled a grey tinge to it, there were even asleep bags under his eyes. A pang from Anne's heart went out to him, she even felt a little guilty for not being there when it was happening. The pain he was feeling on his own had buried him in bed, for two weeks. She swallowed a lump in her throat, at the idea of being away from him, it seemed so alien to her now, she felt how wrong it had been to go away, she knew of course how they had become so far from each other. Despite them both having excellent communication skill, despite their intimacy, despite all, they still forgot to share it. She had been all outward in her grief. She had retreated inside herself wanting to hide from the world, not take part in anything extra, where he had thrown himself in outward activity hiding from the inward pain, when he told her, when he started talking, it made sense, it was him, but her grief had stopped her from seeing it, his grief had stopped him speaking it.

He stirred before his eyes blinked slowly open he looked at her again as if he was still surprised by her presence.

"You're home." He whispered.

"And staying." She confirmed he looked at her again before he reached to kiss her. "You need to eat." She told him.

"I need to shower." He contradicted, though Anne couldn't deny the contradiction.

"Is it true you've been in bed for a little over two weeks?" she asked him, to which he shrugged.

"I, Um, I don't know really, what's the date?" he asked.

"Its Thursday 30th July." She confirmed.

He took a deep breath in "Really?" he asked. "30th May, Joy's Birthday." He said quietly. "Two months." He said shaking his head sitting himself up was even a struggle. "God Anne, I've been so crappy lately, God its like I didn't even think of..."

"No, don't." She shook her head handing him a muffin from the box his mother had left for them. "I know where you've been and it's been so dark." She said quietly. "and I abandoned you there." She admitted.

"I abandoned you." He said shaking his head "I was so distant with you, I guess..." he trailed before he continued "... I know, I don't have the experience in sharing myself in that way, I mean the side of me which needs to communicate." He said.

"But you're right, the expression is only half of it really, you've been bottling it up all the time, I saw you when you came back from your dad being ill, you never told anyone. Then later in the year when you thought he was ill you came back and you told no one else and it wasn't until we were friends that you even told me." She shrugged "I guess I thought you'd just tell me, like you did back then..." she trailed.

"But I knew you were experiencing too." He admitted. "I thought it was clear I felt the same way, I mean I am her father. Of course I felt the same."

Anne took a deep breath and said "but you need to say it Gil, you need the outward expression of it, as much as everyone else needs to see you express it."

He nodded biting into the muffin again "I thought you knew, because you felt it too."

"I know." She said looking into his eyes again. "Do you feel like you could walk?" she asked him.

"why?" he reflected back.

"I was wondering if you'd like to take a bath with me, in our bath tub, just we can change the sheets and jut be us again for a little while."

His lips upturned and he questioned "Us?"

"Yeah, Netflix, pizza, lazy bed, lazy food, where we can just talk and sleep." She suggested.

He nodded his head "sounds perfect."

No one would quite believe that Anne in her slightness could hold up a man as broad as Gilbert. That is unless you saw her, his arm around her shoulders, their robes snug into them as they left the room, they gingerly took the few steps from their bedroom to the bath room. Having only been out of bed for the occasional toilet visit the few sips of water his mother almost forced down his throat in the couple of weeks, an excited Mrs Blythe upon seeing her son ran into his arms with such force it almost knocked him over.

"Gee Mom!" He teased lightly. "Anyone would think I was at deaths door."

His mother slapped her son on the chest lightly he heard her break into tears, he looked to Anne for a moment who slipped out of the hug to give Gilbert the room he needed to wrap both arms around his mother gently.

"I...I thought I'd lost you!" she cried,

Gilbert's eyes closed in shame as he took a staggered breath out. "Its okay mom, I'm here." He whispered. "You have me back now, everything will be okay."

"Its all my fault!" she exclaimed.

Gilbert pulled her back a little and looked at her perplexed "How women, is any of this your fault?"

"I shouldn't have wanted you to have babies so much, I shouldn't have put on pressure, I should have made you sit and talk about your feelings rather then let you spiral out of control, I shouldn't have let Anne leave and then maybe the both of you wouldn't have..."

Gilbert's arms waved in front of him as his head shook "Mom, stop, you have to stop." He told her.

"I should have been a better mother and forced you to talk when you were younger about your feelings!" she exclaimed sobbing.

"And what?" he asked "Created resentment over being forced to tell you how I felt? How would that have been better?" he asked.

"You would have at least talked!" she exclaimed.

"But not about my real feelings." He said to her softly wiping the tears from her face. "I would have possibly put a false label on them and claimed to have been something I wasn't, I might have tried to have blamed you and mom, one day, no matter how you raised me it stops being your fault and starts being my own." To which she shook her head "yes mom, listen, if you have abused me kicked me hit me shouted me down, that would have been my example, but had I been abusive had I kicked or screamed, that would be me making a choice." He looked to her "you were none of those things, thankfully." He said with a half smile to her " and you tried to get me to talk, you tried to make Anne stay, but we all have our own choices to make, and I'm big enough to take responsibility for what I did." He gathered his mother in his arms and whispered to her "Mom, I'm a grown man, and you know the person who I'm most likely to share anything with..." he said turning them to look at Anne. "Is right here." He said quietly.

His mother looked to Gilbert immediately and hugged him some more before she pulled back held him by the cheek and said quietly "I'll let you get back to it then." She told them.

Gilbert smiled to Anne before he said quietly "I think I can make it." He told her referring to getting into the bathroom together. They shut the door and smiled sadly at each other before Anne moved over to the bath and turned on the taps to fill the bath.

"We're all very busy blaming ourselves." Anne said quietly.

"I think its natural." He said quietly.

"Are we right?" she asked absently.

"Does it matter?" he said to her folding his arms around her again.

"To the person," she said thoughtfully "yes."

He looked round at her and kissed her cheek from behind "Is it my mom's fault?" he asked her.

"No!" Anne exclaimed "of course it isn't!"

He smiled half heartily "I'm glad to hear it." He concurred. "Is it my fault?" he asked her more seriously.

"How could it be your fault?" she asked him turning in his arms looking into his eyes "Never, its never been your fault."

He looked at her more worried now, the question played for a moment, a fire threaten to burn, but its one he would have loved to have seen in the moment, however he knew it wouldn't, he asked her anyway "Do you think its yours?"

The heavy sigh would have been confirmation enough, before she said to him "It can't be anyone else's fault." She said quietly "I lost the baby." She said so dully so sadly to broke his heart.

"No one can blame you for that." He said quietly, "you did nothing which would have put our baby at risk, Anne it happens, sometimes for a reason and sometimes for no reason at all." He told her. "Do you know how scared I was when you haemorrhaged?" he asked her. "you were lying there so helpless, and we'd just lost our baby." He held her in closer "God, I don't know what I would have done if I lost you too."

"I have a good idea." She said with a playful eyebrow, to which he sighed and nodded.

"You can't blame yourself." He told her.

She shrugged gently "I think that may take some time." To which he kissed her on her forehead.

"I am here." He whispered.

She hugged into him tighter "you were there, right after, you were there for me and I did appreciate it, its just I couldn't be there for you." She whispered.

He took a deep breath in "You are now." He said to her "and you were there for me, your very presence is balm to me."

"Aw!" she exclaimed holding him close. "Gilbert!" she whispered. "I forget how sweet you are at times."

He chuckled "How many times do I need to be sweet for you to remember it." He teased.

Her eyes twinkled a little as she replied "there's my old Gilbert." Before she kissed him.

"There's something intimate about bathing together." She said as she rubbed in the soap to his shoulders.

"Is it that we're naked together?" he asked her with a grin.

She chuckled and rolled her eyes. "No, although, yes." She said nodding her head "no but I mean it's not sexual sort of intimacy but its not a friendship one, its like..." she said quietly "skin to skin body to body its like I know your contours better." She said quietly her hands slipping below the bubble "I can't help but notice, you're thinner then you were." She said sadly.

"As are you love." He whispered. "But we can make it through can't we?" he asked her.

"Together..." she commented "we can do anything."

It was Sunday night before either one of them cared to check their phones or even the date. From the Wednesday where Phil had left them they had maybe peered at their phones but they had not answered anyone.

"Are you ready to go back tomorrow?" Anne asked Gilbert.

He nodded before he said "As I'll ever be, I ought to message Josh and thank him for arranging the grievance leave with school. We have to take him and Phil out sometime..."

As Gilbert reached for his phone Anne's phone buzzed. "Oh, a new message, oh its from Cornelia I'll read it first the rest I can catch..." Anne paused reading the message again. "Oh my God!" Anne exclaimed in shock at the text message.

Gilbert came up beside her and kissed into her shoulder "Love is everything okay?" he asked her gently.

"Richard is dead!" she exclaimed looking at the phone in disbelief.

"What?!" Gilbert exclaimed looking at the text over Anne's shoulder "A heart attack?" he asked "at our age?!"

"He made it to the hospital before he went into cardiac arrest." Anne read outloud, "Cornelia went to the hospital with her, they're still there!" Anne exclaimed getting up and getting her clothes on to which he followed suit. "Come on lets go."

Upon arrival the doctor recognised Gilbert and smiled at him. "Gilbert!" he exclaimed. "Is this you back?" he asked.

"First thing tomorrow morning with my class if that's okay Doctor Perkins?" he asked the older man.

"Anything, anything for you dear boy." He said to Gilbert. "Can I just say how sorry I am for both of you." He said looking to Anne for a moment.

"T-thank you." Gilbert said with a sad smile to him, not knowing how to deal with the emotion he felt in his chest for a moment before Anne silently took his hand squeezing it.

"I know it's never a good time for it to happen, but you had us worried Gilbert, the brightest in your class, I know from your lectures, you were ahead of everyone else, we would of hate to have lost you. Several of us want you to choose us as your speciality next year after matching when you can practice."

"I'm flattered." He acknowledged. "Josh has been amazing getting me the leeway he has."

"Will you catch up?" The doctor asked.

"As you said, I was ahead of everyone, I think I had covered the tests I would have missed, and since I was working through the holidays in the hospital, I had covered my observing time, I've been quite lucky really."

Why are you here now?" he asked.

"Actually for a friend, well actually her husband, we weren't close to him but he just passed away, Richard Moore." He told the doctor.

Doctor Perkins nodded and leaded them to the room "Come on then diagnosis boy." He said with a smile to Gilbert, "Tell me what you see?" he said handing Gilbert the chart.

Gilbert opened the chart and looked at it. "Admined with a heart attack, patient is on Zoloft and prazosin." He said with a shrug "Makes sense for his PTSD." He said looking up for a moment, "but neither one of these would increase the likelihood of a heart attack." Gilbert looked at the page then up at Doctor Perkins before he looked at the page again "no this can't be right." He said.

"I'm afraid so." Doctor Perkins said.

Anne looked confused at the men before Leslie and Cornelia appeared at the door

"Anne!" Cornelia leaped into her arms "are you back?" she asked her "have you and the Doctor Dear made up?" she asked. Anne nodded with a weak smile.

Leslie stepped forward She took a deep breath and turned to Gilbert "He went out with his old army buddies, I was concerned when he didn't come home when he said he would be back, in fact two hours after, he wasn't answering texts or phone calls so I headed down to the whore house I knew he was at, to find him shot up to high heaven, quite literally." She said looking at Anne for a moment. "Cocaine." She told them. "He passed away but not before he gave me these." She told them showing them a new bruise on her face and up her arms. "I'm considering it a parting gift."

Anne went to her and wrapped her arms around her. Gilbert stepped away with Doctor Perkins and Cornelia, Anne pulled away from Leslie, where Leslie said to her "Lets go to the roof Anne, the hospital has such a beautiful view."

"Anne," said Leslie, breaking abruptly a short
silence, "you don't know how GOOD it is to be sitting here with you and being silent together."

They were sitting on the roof of the hospital looking out over the horizon the sun setting light in the distance The sun was beginning to be low, and the air was full of woven music from a nearby concert.

She looked curiously at Leslie, who was looking to Anne, speaking with a lack of restraint that was very unusual with her.

"On that horrible night when we all came over," Leslie went on, "I kept thinking that perhaps we'd have no more talks. And I realised just what your friendship had come to mean to me—just what YOU meant—and just what a hateful little beast I had been."

"Leslie!" she said shocked "I never allow anyone to call my friends names."

"It's true. That's exactly what I am—a hateful little beast. There's something I've GOT to tell you, Anne. I suppose it will make you despise me, but I MUST confess it. Anne, there have been times all this time, when I have HATED you."

"I KNEW it," said Anne calmly.

"You KNEW it?"

"Yes, I saw it in your eyes."

"And yet you went on liking me and being my friend."

"Well, it was only now and then you hated me, Leslie. Between times you liked me, I think."

"I certainly did. But that other horrid feeling was always there, spoiling it, back in my heart. I kept it down—sometimes I forgot it—but sometimes it would surge up and take possession of me. I hated you because I ENVIED you—oh, I was sick with envy of you at times. You had a dear little home—and love—and happiness—and glad dreams—everything I wanted—and never had—and never could have. Oh, never could have! THAT was what stung. You don't remember the first time I saw you, I suppose— In the elevator"

"It was the night Gilbert and I came home after I was published and I had my interview for university. I should think I DO remember it! I thought you were so beautiful—."

"I knew who YOU were, although I had never seen either of you before. I had heard of the dashing doctor in the penthouse and his girlfriend who was coming to live with him. I—I hated you that very moment, Anne."

"I felt the resentment in your eyes—then I doubted—I thought I must be mistaken—because WHY should it be?"

"It was because you looked so happy. Oh, you'll agree with me now that I AM a hateful beast—to hate another woman just because she was happy,—and when her happiness didn't take anything from me! I used to watch you from my window, when you and Gilbert would part in the street or walk down the street together—I could see you and your love strolling about together arm in arm—And it hurt me. I felt that, if I were not so miserable, I could have liked you and found in you what I've never had in my life—an intimate, REAL friend of my own age."

"But I couldn't understand you, Leslie. One moment you drew me to you—the next you pushed me back."

"I was very unhappy all the time every day was a hard day. Richard had been very—very hard to manage I was so heartsick—I—I hated you more, everytime you and Gilbert looked so happy every time I went around to your place,

"Leslie, dearest, stop blaming yourself. You are NOT hateful or jealous or envious. The life you have to live has warped you a little, perhaps-but it would have ruined a nature less fine and noble than yours. I'm letting you tell me all this because I believe it's better for you to talk it out and rid your soul of it. But don't blame yourself any more."

"Owen gave me a proper reprimand, the night we all came around after your baby..." she trailed. "I deserved it," she said honestly "I told him it was about time something bad happened in your perfect relationship, that it would make your love imperfect." She said to Anne looking nervously towards her. "Then you went away and I didn't see Gilbert again these last couple of weeks..." she said then sighed "Oh and Owen! What he must think! I've never seen him look so shocked, he walked away you know I haven't seen him since, I'm not surprised he could walk away, not after seeing what I am, at what I could feel, how angry I am for someone for just being in love and then to say what I did-" she shook her head "You didn't deserve this." She said quietly. "And in truth, its not made your love less perfect, I think once you come out of all this, once you've had time to heal, I think you shall be stronger."

Anne gave a sad smile "I'm glad someone thinks it." She said the cold suddenly felt on her shoulders.

"But maybe this tragedy, has made me see, made me see that life isn't perfect even for the best of people." Leslie said.

Anne looked up and said quietly "Do you really suppose Leslie that Gilbert and I haven't had our share of weathering? That our pasts have been all rainbows and sunshine?" she asked Leslie who looked at her a little shocked "perhaps in some respects we have had it easier of late, but I promise you our lives have been forged in the fire." Anne said softly "apparently its not over." said she with a wry smile.

"You both look thin, I've not seen Gilbert look so grey in the skin before." Leslie said after a moments silence where the news that not all was perfect for Gilbert and Anne snuck into Leslie.

"We haven't been eating, or sleeping, " Anne admitted "separately." Anne took a deep breath, "We've only just reunited." Anne admitted.

"Good," Leslie said to her, "because Anne, I didn't mean it, I didn't mean it..."

Anne took a sigh and said "I've really been struggling with someone at the university, she hated me, and I mean hated me, not like you did because there were glimmers of liking with you but really she hated me, and I haven't been able to tell her I forgive her, I don't know why."

"Because you are human," Leslie said to her "and have just been through a traumatic experience."

"I just wanted to be her friend too." Anne reflected. "I don't know why I feel as though I can forgive you over her." She shrugged.

Leslie sighed for a moment before she said "Heavens forbid she was worse then me!" Then in the moment "I'm sorry!" she exclaimed reaching over to Anne and hugging her. "I'm sorry Anne you've always been my friend I've just been too proud and hurt in myself to admit it." They remained in the hug for a moment before she asked "You'll come to his funeral, wont you?" she asked Anne.

"Of course." Anne agreed.