This was meant to be the chapter for the wedding but it sort of got away from me!
So I know there are long pauses in my writing at the moment, it is hard to find the time, but it has been productive, I think! Shout out to all those who follow and comment on a regular bases, Love to you all! And yes, italics you'll find are from the books.
Carrots x
"Oh Marilla!" Anne exclaimed her fingers running through the flowers again "These Coral honeysuckle are just perfect!" she exclaimed standing at the gate of the old orchard where the ceremony would take place. "And I love the name, honeysuckle!" she exclaimed "I can just imagine the little bees coming for their pollen, suckling like a baby does on its mothers breast!" she exclaimed.
Marilla shook her head "I'll confess when you said you wanted natural flowers for you wedding it was quite convenient no extra costs in flowers to be used for one day, but are you sure its what you want?"
Anne smiled "Natures flowers were one of my best friends growing up, I had no one to really talk to, but I could talk to the plants and the tress the flowers and the birds." She sighed happily "the first day I came to Green Gables was like this do you remember?" she asked Marilla who shook her head "Oh I do!" Anne explained. "It was only June but Green Gables was blooming just like this." She said as they moved into the orchard the fence covered with Star Jasmines she smiled "the bushes were even blooming and the trees were covered just like this with fruit almost ready to pluck and eat. The flowers were whispering in the breeze, it me, it seemed a magical wonderland, a dream, something wonderful to reach for through a veil so ready to touch..."
Marilla looked at her seriously, she listened carefully to what she said "And what did you find?" she asked her.
"My deepest dreams came true, even the dreams I dare not dream." She said looking to Marilla knowingly.
"Gilbert." Marilla said with a nod to her.
"Not only Gilbert." She stated "but a home, a family, friends." She smiled. "I'm not the same person as walked into Green Gables all that time ago and I owe it to you and Matthew, everyone in Avonlea who has loved me." She told Marilla with a smile.
"So the flowers are sorted." Marilla said after a pause which had lasted a bit too long, "The minister has arranged for the chairs and the tables to be delivered this afternoon." Marilla told her.
"The Blythe's are bringing over the cake and have arranged for the food to be delivered tomorrow morning."
"I must admit Anne, I heard some horror stories of the bride-to-be from the other mothers," she said with a sly smile "You are incredibly laid back about it."
Anne smiled then looked at Marilla "I'm marrying the man I love." Anne said with a smile to Marilla "if nothing else goes right tomorrow but that happens, it doesn't matter, I'll be blissfully happy, because I'll be married to him." Anne smiled then looked at her watch, "Oh I better go and pick up Phil and the girls from the train station." Anne said to Marilla.
"I remember telling Matthew, that evening when he brought me to Green Gables, that I never expected to be a bride because I was so homely no one would ever want to marry me—" Anne said softly to Diana. Later that day while she and Diana were readying for her hen night. The other girls and Jo were staying in Avonlea's only hotel, they would meet them in town before heading out to party. Anne was sitting at her vanity mirror finishing off her makeup while Diana sat on her bed. "...unless some foreign missionary did. I had an idea then that foreign missionaries couldn't afford to be finicky in the matter of looks if they wanted a girl to risk her life among cannibals." She said with a laugh at her own folly. "You should have seen the foreign missionary Priscilla is engaged to. He was as handsome and inscrutable as those daydreams we once planned to marry ourselves, Diana; he was the best dressed man I ever met, and he raved over Priscilla's 'ethereal, golden beauty.' But of course there are no cannibals in Japan."
Diana smiled "Is there any missionary as handsome and as dashing as our own Avonlea's Gilbert?" she asked her.
Anne shook her head "I had no intentions of marrying in reality you know, I thought I was so damaged beyond measure no one would want something so used." Anne admitted quietly. "I never dreamed I would marry so well."
Diana sighed "I never really understood that side of you Anne, you always did yourself down." She shook her head the looked up at the dress hanging from the hook. "Your wedding dress is a dream, anyhow," sighed Diana rapturously. "You'll look like a perfect queen in it—you're so tall and slender. How DO you keep so slim, Anne? I'm fatter than ever—I'll soon have no waist at all."
Anne sighed "Stoutness and slimness seem to be matters of predestination," said Anne. "At all events, Mrs. Harmon Andrews can't say to you what she said to me when I came home from Kingsport, 'Well, Anne, you're just about as skinny as ever.' It sounds quite romantic to be 'slender,' but 'skinny' has a very different tang."
"Ask that husband of yours." Diana smiled.
"He's not my husband yet." Anne said with nervous smile "he might still change his mind."
"Oh Bish!" Diana exclaimed "I've never met someone so devoted, not even my Fred, Gilbert doesn't change his mind once its made up."
"Or his heart?" Anne asked her with a little smile. "No, not my Gilbert." She said shaking her head. "I must admit, I'm quite excited to be his wife."
Diana laughed "as you should be." She chuckled. "Now!" Diana said leaping into action once she saw Anne was ready. "We should go and meet up with all those ladies!"
Gilbert took a deep breath as he looked himself in the mirror.
"Tell me you are done priming yourself?" he heard from the other side of the door.
Gilbert rolled his eyes and opened it to Josh standing at the door frame. "Happy?" he asked his friend.
"Not until you've had your stag do!" Josh claimed back.
"No Strippers." Gilbert reminded him again.
"Oh, I thought you said 'strippers'" he teased "Did I get it wrong?"
"Josh!" Gilbert exclaimed. "I have a church minister and a man of high morals in the stag party, my old English teacher..."
"I don't understand how you're friends with your teacher..." Josh scoffed as if it were insane.
"He was young and we made friends with his son..." Gilbert looked to Josh who looked like he was about to objct "Don't worry he's Davy's age he's not coming too."
Josh did the maths in his head "Just how young was this English teacher when..."
"Too young and he'll tell you that, but he did it all the same and with no real ill effects, he grew up, fast and took care of his son."
Josh wanted to change the subject this much was obvious "This is your last night of freedom my boy!" Josh reminded him "You'll have an old ball and chain by this time tomorrow."
"You mean I won't need to be part of the dating scene anymore? I won't need to figure out what my type is, and how to go after it? I won't need to navigate through the one million different ways I could offend or unintentionally hurt, or have an anxiety attack wondering if I'll ever find someone I could love."
Josh looked at Gilbert "Is Anne your only girlfriend?" Josh asked him.
Gilbert swallowed "I was never in a secure enough position in my teens to feel like I should date, then by the time I was, I had already fell for Anne." He said quietly "there's never been anyone but her." Gilbert admitted "and I've told you that before."
"Yeah, but I thought you meant, you know 'in love' not, dated." Josh told him.
"Well to me they were one and the same." Gilbert said as they finally turned down the landing towards the stairs. "You can't tell me you never noticed I was a bit of a nerd." Gilbert admitted to him.
Josh chuckled "Quite escaped my notice buddy." He said as they started to walk down the stairs.
"Josh, I am serious you know, no strippers." Gilbert emphasised again.
"Is that what you wanted?" Josh said with a smirk to his friend.
Anne turned on her bed picking up her phone as she received a text. She smiled at the sight of the sender.
"Who would be texting now?" Diana asked as she turned on the makeshift bed on the floor of Anne's room. She was staying there the night after the hen do and before the wedding, the children were tucked safety in Green Gables down in the living room, they were safely asleep when they had come in at half ten. Anne was quick to come up to her bedroom to lay on her bed.
"Gilbert." Anne whispered.
"What?" Diana asked her "you aren't going now, its bad luck for the groom to see the bride before the wedding."
"Thats the day of the wedding we still have half an hour." Anne said pointing her phone at Diana to show it was a little before half eleven. "I'll be right back." She whispered.
There was no stopping Anne, she ran up towards lovers lane at Gilbert command. She smiled as she saw him there at the edge of the lane, even from a distance they smiled and ran towards each other meeting in the middle. He held her close when they met and as he placed her on the ground his lips met hers. Anne could taste the alcohol on him as she had no doubt he could on her.
"I miss you." He murmured lowly.
She smiled blushing slightly "How did your stag night go?" she asked.
"Josh surprised me with no strippers." Gilbert smiled. "Thank God, he listened, not just you but Diana wouldn't have liked it either."
"Or Josie." Anne added.
"Few rounds, bowling, which I only get worse at the more I drink." He said with a grin, wrapping the jacket closer "Soon this jacket will be accurate." He smiled at the old lettermans jacket she wore, a now faded green still his surname lay on her back.
"It will." She admitted and kissed him again, her fingers going through his curls, she felt the familiarity of her body turn for him. She smiled against his lips and whispered "I never thought such happiness would be within my grasp when I first got it."
"I remember the first time you put it on, I remember thinking just how beautiful you were in it, and the thought did flash across my mind..." he trailed for a moment his cheeks going slightly pink "...just how perfect your name and my name went together." He said stepping closer to her again "it torn me apart every time I got it back." He admitted.
She smiled up at him biting her bottom lip "never again Gilbert." She whispered to him. "I'm forever yours..." she blushed.
This was enough for him to lift her again from the ground her tiny weight finding itself against a tree.
"I hope you didn't expect us to have wasted the last two month." She said with a smile "giving up at the final hurdle are we?" she asked him.
He laughed "I just missed you." He whispered to her looking her in the eyes "and anyway fifteen minutes is hardly time to make sure the job is down properly now is it?" he asked her to which she laughed merrily.
"Well if you're going to do a job..." he said with a grin before he placed her on the ground. "Plus I always loved the idea that the next time we make love it is a legal requirement." Which made Anne giggle more.
"To consummate the marriage." Anne laughed "see I thought in some cultures if the consummation came first it means you're already married."
"In England and Wales, in a straight couple relationship you can seek an annulment if a partner can't consummate the relationship."
"Gilbert..." Anne started to object.
"The only religion to enforce it is the roman catholic..."
"Did you come to talk about irrelevant information on annulments?" she asked him with a smile.
He chuckled "No." He admitted. "I came to say; I love you, I love you Anne." He whispered. "Let me walk you back to the gate, we have time yes?" he asked her.
"Yes." She admitted.
They walked together for a moment in silence before he asked her "It feels like history is repeating itself." He said quietly as they walked down the lane "the number of times we walked here together." He smiled rubbing his thumb against her held hand.
"I'll never understand Gilbert, why did you forgive me? That first full year, you were an angel and I was so mean." She said shaking her head.
"All heaven opened before me," supplemented Gilbert. "From that moment I looked forward to tomorrow. When I left you that day and went home I was the happiest boy in the world. Anne had forgiven me."
"I think you had the most to forgive. I was an ungrateful little wretch—and after you had really saved my life that day on the pond, too. How I loathed that load of obligation at first! I don't deserve the happiness that has come to me."
"You do." He said simply as they reached the gate at Green Gables "You held a burden so heavy Anne, it had wounded you so deeply, I can't blame you for holding me at arms length, because I think we both felt deeply for each other and its those who we feel for deepest which can hurt us the deepest." He reminded her. "We needed that time, all that time, to build our friendship our trust our relationship, so that when everything else failed us, our deepest foundations were found in each other." He whispered.
"I suppose that's why it hurt us both so much when we lost Joy." She said quietly. "I have a seat for her." Anne admitted. "For Joy, a seat at our wedding along with one for my mom and dad and Matthew, I thought their places could be saved for just them." Anne told him.
Gilbert smiled and nodded "I can't think of anything more perfect." He told her "except for maybe the beautiful creature I see right now."
Anne smiled "you old charmer." She laughed. "I should go, it'll be tomorrow soon." She said looking at her watch again.
"Then until tomorrow." He smiled.
She reached across the gate and kissed him again. "I miss you too." She whispered to him. "I can't believe we vowed not to make love for... how long now?" she asked him.
"Two months." He smiled.
"Oh wow!" she blushed at him. She looked up at him her eyelashes fluttering "I'm so glad I'll never have to be without you ever again." She said romantically.
"You too." He smiled.
She reached over the gate and kissed him one last time. "Goodnight my love, For tomorrow I shall be your bride!" she smiled before she turned and ran down the field towards Green Gables, just as she opened the door and closed it again his watch turned midnight.
"Until we meet again." He smiled.