The Wanderer returns!
Special thanks to Jxuan, the PM was appreciated. Many of you know I write a few chapters ahead all the time, along with it being difficult to write, since mid August there has been someone ill in my house in one way or another, everyone except me, but it has been I've been serially tired beyond belief, a lot of things I've had to do on my own, and its nearing Christmas time and traditionally what we see as half way through the school year (although I think its a little before) but I can't quite believe it is because I've not had those moments to myself I normally have. My littlest one is intent on hurting himself or wrecking the place or both, I love him to piece and he's so loving and gorgeous, but it doesn't make it easier, it makes it worth it but no easier, when people have been well I've been having trouble sleeping just because I'm constantly worried about whats going to happen next... I make it very hard on myself, but I don't know if I'm going to be ill next or if I'm ill but just so focused on everything else, I don't notice... Its hard. As such this has been the last thing I wanted to do, because everything else took priority and so it should its real life and I have to deal with it, but this morning I got done more or less what I wanted to do so I had some time to look over this and to get started on the future chapter I wanted to get started on before I published this one.
Thank you as well to everyone who has commented its always appreciated, I do take the time to read them and you're all so kind. Time moves on so quickly so I don't want to seem ungrateful to you all. Aureliecoud thank you your compliments really mean a lot. Honestly Montgomery gave such rich characters we see through things like Green Gable Fables, Project Green Gables, Anne with an E (not all of these I like but I respect them for trying to explore these characters more), these characters can easily transcend their original setting and we can explore the different themes presented in both a modern context and a traditional one, the themes I believe don't grow old because they are relevant in the human condition. I do love watching my Gilbert and Anne grow and learn in particular, and there are things coming up (and things relating to what has happened already) which shows cause and effect, effect and growth.
I've had as well reviews on some of my other stories, and I love them! Thank you!
Anyway enough with my yabbering,
hope you all enjoy
love
Carrots x
"I have some good news." Anne said with a smile to him as she kissed him on the head as she came into the apartment.
"Oh?" Gilbert asked her looking away from his computer screen.
"I was called into the Chief editors office today," she said with a smile removing her jacket and sitting on the cuddle chair. "They asked me if I wanted to apply for a senior editors job based on the articles I've written."
Gilbert's eyes widened as he smiled "Anne! That's fantastic!" he exclaimed jumping up and hugging her. "What did you say?"
"Well I wanted to be sure that the hours were still compatible with my MA." She said "I still have the rest of this year to go." She said calmly as they sat again this time on the cuddle chair together his arms wrapping around her.
"Is it?" he asked.
"The good news is, I would only need to be in the office for 20 hours during the working week, the rest I could e-mail, even work in the office at a later time if I wanted to." She said logically. "I'd get two junior editors working under me and I would still have the chance to submit my own work, both articles and books, less leg work around launch parties, I'd only have to turn up." She admitted her face and eyes clearly trying to work through something.
"Yet, you look like you're not sure about it?" Gilbert questioned.
"I don't know, I mean its better then a junior, just is it what I want to do?" she questioned.
"Well you want to be a writer." He confirmed.
"I want..." she said her brow furrowing, "I want to be able to support us. I mean what happens when you finish all your training, we aren't going to be able to stay here." She admitted matter of factly. "and what about if you move hospitals with the matching next year?" she asked.
"Then you'll get a job at another publishing house."
"That's just it." She said. "its a job." She admitted "Not what I set out to do."
Gilbert sighed. "Anne you're thinking too far ahead, we've only just started this term and they aren't going to kick us out of the apartment anytime soon I still have my year in being an intern and then at least 4 years before I'm out of my residency." He said "which gives you plenty of time to map out your dreams while we're still here." He said "that's if we stay here." He said to her "Do you have something else in mind?" he asked her.
She blushed at him for a second before she said quietly "I was thinking of going for my teachers certificate." She said quietly, Gilbert did a double take before a smile appeared on his lips "I know I could look into the presidential scholers award, I know I would qualify for it but I would still need to find $10,000, I could have the money saved within this year. I wouldn't need to take a break at all."
"Then Anne-Girl, what are you moping about, it sounds like you have a plan already?" he asked her.
"I'm not moping!" she objected before she said quieter "what if I can't do it?" she asked him.
Gilbert looked to her perplexed "Is that self doubt in my Anne?" he asked her.
"Its that there's two of us now." She said sternly "And you know I'm right in being concerned, what if that becomes three or four or five..."
"Steady on girl!" he exclaimed a cheeky look on his face "Give me a chance!"
"Gil, I'm being serious!" she exclaimed.
"And so am I!" he reassured her. "We'll do what we planned with Joy." He reminded her. "we had that all planned out, and remember there's no point in worrying about the future if we aren't going to build the one we want now." He reminded her hugging her in. "we build our future together, our dreams together. Not just mine." He said then with a grin admitted "but if your going to be a teacher, that would more then pay for a nanny we'd still have some money for us." He said, there was a silence between the pair before he asked "would you keep on writing?" he asked her.
"I'd like to yes, I mean I know I would need to plan my lessons, and take care of our babies once they came along." She said logically, something which make him react beneath his trousers which made her chuckle. "You really believe I can do anything, don't you?" she asked him.
"You Anne Shirley can do anything you want." He said with a smile.
"So," she said slowly "I take the job?" she questioned.
"I think so, you can work all the way up until your training begins." He said with a smile to her.
"Wow!" she exclaimed kissing him lightly "This is crazy!" she whispered "all of this grown up stuff!" she said to him.
He looked to her softly and asked "It scares you?"
"Its terrifying!" she chuckled. "But its why we're together."
"Anne?" Her editor in chief came to Anne's door looking in "How are you liking it?" she asked Anne.
"Oh Yasmin!" Anne exclaimed "its incredible! I can't believe I have my own office!" she said "and have you seen the view?" she asked her.
Yasmin looked out the window, "its the street?" she questioned.
"not just the street, but all those people's stories, so much scope for the imagination!" she said.
"I'm glad you think so." She admitted. "Are you ready to come into the interviews with me?" she asked Anne. "We have our first candidate here."
"All ready." Anne said with a smile to her editor.
"I think this one you'll like Anne," Yasmin said to her. "She's almost as you were when you first came in for the first editing of your book."
Anne cringed "So under-qualified that its scary to think I was ever published in the first place?" Anne asked.
"No!" Yasmin said laughing with Anne. "No, just a diamond in the rough." She said as they left the office and turned the corner into the main office when there junior editors sat. "and look how you turned out, a year here already on the fast track, you could go further the moment you graduate." Yasmin hinted.
"I know, and believe me the compliment is appreciated." Anne smiled. "Beside a senior editor after a year, I'd say it was pretty fast." She smiled.
"Oh you were by far the brightest writer and editor in that room, you knew how to do it, how do you think you got published so fast?"
"I'll admit at the time it didn't feel so fast, but looking back now..." she said shaking her head.
"Well lets see how this interview goes?"
With that they opened the door to the interview room, the words Yasmin spoke seemed to blur into insignificance, her jet black hair and deep black eyes seemed to penetrate her every wits as Anne went pale.
"Anne?" Yasmin asked her.
"Sorry." She said shaking her head.
"This is Katherine Brooke." Yasmin repeated herself.
Anne cleared her throat as she sat down "I'm familiar with her, Katherine is on my course at university."
Katherine looked equally pale at Anne, "This is the publishing house you have a job with?" she asked Anne.
"That's right." Anne said focusing on Katherine's CV in front of her.
"Anne will be the senior editor you'll be reporting to." Yasmin said looking between the two. "If you're successful in your application." Yasmin looked again between the two and asked Anne "Is there a problem?"
"What was I meant to say Gilbert?" Anne asked as she paced back and forward that night recounting the interview to him. "Whatever problem I have with Katherine would sound completely unprofessional!" she exclaimed.
"Is she qualified?" Gilbert asked looking for a way out of the situation.
"Annoyingly so, and she did better then any of the other candidates on the test piece." Anne said rubbing her head and finally sitting next to Gilbert "Yasmin said it was up to me, my two juniors would be mine, and objectively, Katherine would be ideal."
Gilbert sighed putting his arm around her "Your past experiences make you very subjective though..." he reminded her, her head shot up to object but before she said anything he continued "Now that's not a bad thing, you'd be a fool if you stuck your hand in a fire twice." He said with a grin.
Anne chuckled knowing the story his mother loved to share of him. He was three years old and had figured out how to use the baby gate. The first time Mrs Blythe had assumed she had just forgotten to shut the gate, so when Gilbert went to the open fireplace and burnt his hand the first time she had blamed herself. The second time the very next day (Mrs Blythe had ensured the baby gate was shut before she turned her back for a minute) when she looked again the baby gate was open she ran in the room to find Gilbert already stuck his other uninjured hand in the fire. "You were three." Anne pointed out.
"Alright," Gilbert agreed, "but how about if you went back to the house of the man who abused you, or if you went back to Roy after everything that happened with him?" Gilbert asked.
"They would both be foolish." Anne admitted.
"Well," Gilbert continued "Somehow despite all the bad things which have happened to you, your instinct is to trust people, its a beautiful instinct and not one I'm calling foolish, but you know through experience not to put your preverbal hand into the fire again, and I think you're worried that if you let Katherine back in, she can hurt you." He said logically "And you know something? its true she could." He admitted "But in the real adult world we have to ask ourselves if we can work with people we don't like, it would show your strength in character if you chose to work with her, build up a professional relationship with her and see if friendship happens, if it doesn't well there's nothing lost."
Anne sighed and whispered "Its what she wants to do with her life you know, she wants to be a writer, an editor, a publisher, all of that side of things." She hugged closer into Gilbert "I would hate to deny her the opportunity to start her dreams. Maybe through editing she could get herself published. She'd understand it all more."
Gilbert sighed and nuzzled into her.
In truth, had it been him, he wouldn't hire her, after how mean Katherine had been to Anne it would be justifiable not to hire. Something that always amazed Gilbert was Anne's lack of resentment. "You are too kind." He whispered.
"So says you." She said "I was pretty resentful towards you once upon a time." She reminded him.
"So I must have really hurt you for you to behave like that." He whispered.
"But don't you see? I missed a whole year of our friendship..." she started
"It was 8 months." Gilbert grinned.
"It was far too long, look at what I missed out on." She flirted.
He shrugged "We made up for it."
Anne sighed "Maybe, I can't ever control Katherine's behaviour towards me, but I can choose how I act towards her, maybe this will help make up for the way I behaved."
There was a knock on Anne's door and she looked up as she said to come in.
"I've finished these." Katherine told Anne as she handed her the papers.
"Thank you." Anne said, she started scanning the paper before she looked up "is there anything else?" Anne asked her.
Katherine stood silent for a moment before she spoke "Do you forgive me?" Katherine asked Anne. "You giving me this job, does it mean you've forgiven me?"
"My opinion of you has never mattered before Katherine, I wonder why it should start now?" Anne asked her, Anne's eyes returning to the paper.
"Because I know you better now." Katherine told her. "I've stopped making assumptions and I thought since you gave me this job..." she trailed.
"I gave you this jobs because you're over qualified and aced that test piece." Anne told her. "I judged you on your merits not your faults."
Katherine sighed heavily "Then..." she trailed.
"I don't know." Anne said honestly, "Katherine I simply don't know, but I can hardly give you a fair chance if I consistently reject you. It would make me no better then your worse."
"Then you know it was my worse?" Katherine asked her, "You know that's not the best of me?" she asked Anne.
Anne looked at the paper and then looked at Katherine "I can't see any faults." She sighed before she looked up and said to her "it would be unfair to judge a book based on an unedited version of a final piece." She said.
Katherine looked to her hopefully. "Yes, yes it would."
Anne swallowed "Our stories..." she trailed and looked to Katherine thoughtfully "are not yet complete, there is still time for the true characters of Wickham and Darcy to show. I don't know if its forgiveness yet," Anne admitted quickly "its one thing to attack me, but that day, when you were as mean as to attack my baby..." Anne trailed quietly.
"I didn't know." Katherine responded, "I didn't know you'd been pregnant, I never would have..." she trailed "I didn't know there was a baby to loose!"
"Did there have to be a baby at all?" Anne asked her. "People are battling invisible demons every day Katherine, things you can't see or hear, touch or smell but they feel them Katherine, they are felt."
"I know." Katherine admitted, "I never thought someone so content would..." she stopped "all I can find are excuses Anne, excuses to the way I behaved but the truth is I was being prejudice." She told her. "I wish I had behaved differently."
Anne nodded and said thoughtfully, "then lets see where we can take this relationship, maybe we might learn to like each other."
Anne opened the door delighted to find Owen and Leslie standing there.
"What a surprise!" Anne greeted them.
"We wanted you to be the first to know..." Leslie exclaimed a smile on her face. "Oh Anne!" she bounded to Anne hugging her.
Anne looked over Leslie's shoulder to Owen and mouthed "together?" to which Owen nodded.
"Oh Anne!" she exclaimed. "Oh can we come in?" she asked Anne.
"of course." Anne replied opening the door to them. "so," she said with a grin taking a seat "do tell all?" she asked of them.
"It just happened last night," Leslie said taking his hand in hers. "You see I was going to sell the apartment, to look for somewhere else, somewhere which didn't have Richard's claim on it at all." She admitted. "but Owen had came around and he suggested making it my own, just ridding everything starting from scratch, since it is my home, it was never Richard's I own it." She admitted, "and he stayed and we talked and we..." she trailed blushing.
"I don't think I need to hear it!" Anne chuckled. "Oh Owen!" she exclaimed looking to him "Gilbert will be so pleased for you, he's a romantic at heart you know."
"I do hope so." Owen admitted.
"Oh he'll be thrilled!" Anne said with a smile. "As am I!"
"Oh Anne, I've never felt this way before!" Leslie gushed. "When I was with Richard it was out of an act of rebellion, my parents didn't want me with him and I wanted to displease them, there was never much love involved, but this, this happiness!" she exclaimed. "Oh Anne I don't know if I can bare it!"
Anne giggled "Well that you must," Anne told her "or you must find a way of making it so Owen." She told her friend.
"Will you help me Anne?" Leslie asked her, "I have a lump sum for Richard's life insurance and I want to make the most of it, redoing my apartment up, so it is mine! Finally all this happiness can be mine!"
"I'll help in whatever way I can." Anne smiled.