A/N: This is the last chapter, folksin this installment, at least. Do you all really want ANOTHER Juliet story?! It would be a sequel to a sequel to a sequel to a sequel! Since I started this loop off with "Emily's Path" a sequel to "Emily's Quest!" But if the consensus says yea than I suppose I must listen. J
I feel like LMM herselfshe only planned to write three books about Anne at most, but people kept clamoring for more so she kept on and on. Glad everyone liked the story, though. It gives me a fuzzy warm nice feeling inside.
Miri: No, John Lester isn't any Anne character's child. Just a random dude with ties to the Island. I wanted him to have some ties to the Island so that the fact that he liked the city more would show that he really wasn't a "kindred spirit" to Juliet.
Terreis: San Francisco was a surprise to me, too! It just popped into my mindI wanted Allan to go someplace far away from the Island, though, so that Juliet could prove how much she really loves him by leaving her home far behind. And P.S. I think Chris is just at the right age to be in engaged in your story! I was a young bride, too (21!), and I think it's the sweetest thing. WRITE MORE SOON!
Thanks for all the birthday well-wishes, guys! Now, here goes.
* * *
The next days--Juliet's last days at New Moon--flew by in a frenzy of packing and planning. She packed all of her and Allan's things and arranged to have them shipped to San Francisco. Father booked tickets for them on the airlines. Aunt Ilse helped Juliet shop for new clothes for the both of them--many of their heavy woolen things would be too warm for the mild climate. And Mother gave them so many lovely things for their new house! Juliet's wedding might have been simple but her trousseau was fit for a queen.
There was the old silvery gazing ball to hang above her dining table--the Wedgewood tea set that had belonged to Grandmother Juliet, her namesake--linen tableclothes and silk sheets and a little green agate frog. Juliet marveled over each one and planned where she would put it in her new house--for she had seen what was to be her new house and felt a bond with it already!
Allan brought her a picture of a little red house built into the side of a hill, with the sea glinting in the distance. It was lovely--beautiful! But not as beautiful to her as New Moon--not yet, at least. Perhaps one day it would be.
She traipsed the grounds of New Moon whenever she got the chance. "Aren't you going to take pictures of it?" Trudy asked. She'd given Juliet several rolls of film as a goodbye gift--it was the perfect gift. Juliet had already filled a roll with the familiar Island faces that she loved, but she could not photograph New Moon.
"Photographs don't do this grand old place justice," she said. "I'd rather take pictures of this dear old place with my mind--and carry them forever in my heart."
A steady stream of visitors poured in and out of the parlor. By the time she was done receiving them Juliet felt as though she'd been run through the mill!
"Mrs. Drew warned me several times not to dye my hair," she laughed. "She's convinced that everyone in California does it. Although she did imply that I could use a color rinse! Irene Howard told me that it was a bad thing to follow your husband wherever he takes a notion to go off to--advice about marriage from a spinster! And Rhonda Perlman delighted in telling me that there might be another earthquake and if there was, I'd likely die since I didn't know what to do in one. Oh, Allan!" She laughed and settled her weary head on her husband's shoulder.
But most of the people who visited were loving, kind people who wished her well--and that hurt Juliet almost as much as the ones who came that were mean. Because she didn't want to leave such a warm, loving circle of friends. Cathy Douglas--Mrs. Gilbert Ford, Trudy's sister-in-law--came for tea and by the time she left both she and Juliet had filled several hankies with their tears.
"I didn't know you were such friends with Cathy Ford, dear," said Mother, perplexedly.
"I'm not," Juliet wept. "But she is a nice girl--and now we'll never get the chance to be fri-e-e-ends!"
One person didn't come to call: Bea. Juliet rang over to her house in Harmony several times. But Bea was always busy or asleep. Juliet knew that it was painful to Bea that her brother and best-friend were leaving but
"Does she really plan to let us go without saying goodbye?" Juliet sighed.
* * *
And suddenly, the day of their departure was before them.
Juliet was up with the sun--what little sun there was that day. It was raining, spoiling any hopes she had for one last ramble through Lofty John's bush and the old family graveyard. The cold wet day put a damper on everyone's spirits, which they were trying to keep up.
"I don't mind a lovely, snowy day," Juliet said. "But a cold winter rain is the worst."
Everything brought quick tears to her eyes. The sight of Mother in the kitchen, turning bacon in the pan--Father, reading the paper in his bedroom shoes--Douglas stirring his coffee and Bella encouraging Embeth to eat her eggs. Aunt Ilse in her ridiculous pink-feathered hat. Uncle Perry's crinkled smile--the old cracked everyday dishes that had been at New Moon for seventy years, at least--even the jar of colored grasses on the sideboard that had annoyed Juliet in her youth made her feel strangely nostalgic.
Juliet went up to her room--her little, charming, over-the-stairs bedroom where she would never spend another night. Not really--she might stay here when she visited but it wouldn't be the same--the room would have forgotten her. It would be Embeth's room when she was older--Doug and Bella were thinking of moving back to the Island. If they did, Mother and Father would surely move back to Evensong and let them have New Moon. They would move in Embeth's toys and Embeth's books--she would hang the closet with her own pretty dresses--she would lie in this bed and dream her own rose-hued dreams. No, it was Juliet's room no longer.
Juliet ran her hands over the bubbly glass of the window panes--glass that had been there for over a hundred years. She touched the sleek wood of the mantlepiece and touched her lips to the splintered old windowsill. She flung open the closet and stared at the old dresses that hang inside. It gave her a chill--they looked like Bluebird's wives. There was the dress she'd worn to Bella's wedding--the blue dress she'd worn on the night she thought she fell in love with Blair. The old, faded print that she'd been wearing when Allan had come home from the war. Juliet touched them all and sighed.
When she moved the rack of dresses, a flickering prism of light danced over the back wall of the dark closet and something caught her eye. Juliet opened the door wider to let the light in--parted the hangers and peered back to get a better look.
Carved delicately into the back wall of the closet was a name and a date: JULIET MURRAY 1870.
Juliet's heart caught in her throat. She had always know that this was Grandmother Juliet's childhood room, but they had never found anything of hers in it. That had all been cleaned out by Great-Grandfather Murray after Grandmother eloped. He had wanted no trace of her to be left. Growing up, Juliet had envied Bea the heaps of information she had about her own Grandmother, her namesake. She had diaries, and letters, and photographs.
Stepping into the closet Juliet took a slim nail file from her pocket and touched it to the soft wood, carving a message of her own underneath that of the lost Juliet Murray.
JULIET KENT WAS HERE. 1947.
"Now, even if this house forgets me, there will be no doubt," she said, straightening and giving a smile.
* * *
They'd double-checked everything and packed up the car. Now all that was left was the hardest part--the goodbyes. Juliet and Allan turned to both sets of their parents and embraced them.
"You darling, darling girl," Aunt Ilse cried, holding Juliet close. "I wouldn't have trusted my man-child to anyone but you, you know. Oh, Allan, dearest!" And it was his turn to be embraced.
Uncle Perry smoothed her hair and kissed her cheek--he was unexpectedly solemn and Juliet wished he would make a joke. It wasn't like him not to joke! Teddy felt his girl touch his hand gently, as softly as if a breeze had touched on it, and nothing more.
"Goodbye, Father," she said.
Then Juliet turned and faced her mother. Dear Mother! The two women held each others hands and smiled into each others eyes. There was nothing to say--there was too much to say. They would leave it at a wink and a smile.
But then Juliet's smile faded. "I suppose Bea isn't coming," she sighed. "Oh, she might, still--can't we wait a bit longer?"
They waited for a while--but it was torture, postponing the inevitable. "You should go," Father said, though that was the last thing he wanted. "You'll miss your flight if you don't leave now."
So Bea really wasn't coming. Oh, well! It wasn't the last time they would ever see each other.
Allan opened the door of the car and Juliet hopped in. Everyone shouted out last minute advice.
"Remember to put the parking break on when you're on the ferry," Uncle Perry said.
"Leave the car in the airport lot and we'll get it later," said Father.
"Call when you arrive," said Aunt Ilse. "Don't forget!"
"I love you," said Mother simply. "Both of you."
Juliet's picture of the four of them--the four of them, whom she loved so much--was clouded and blurry. "God knows when we all might meet again!" she thought. Out loud she said,
"May God bless you all and keep you safe--may He keep us all happy and safe!"
Allan started the car and they drove away, Juliet watching lovely New Moon in the rearview mirror--like a contented cat with its feet folded under it--until it faded out of sight.
* * *
Juliet was quiet as they drove down the main road. As they neared the Harmony turn-off she said, suddenly, "Allan, turn here!"
"What is it?" Allan said.
"I want to drive by Bea and David's--I know we're pressed for time so I won't go in. I just wanted to beep and wave to her. Oh, Allan, please. You know we can't go without saying goodbye."
Allan sighed and made the turn.
"Bea!" Juliet shouted as they pulled up in front of the house. She leaned out of the window of the car and shouted again, waving her hat. "Bea! David! Bea! Beep, Allan, beep the horn!"
Allan let loose with a frenzy of beeping, but there was nothing. Not even a curtain moved.
"David's car isn't here," said Allan. "Likely they're both in town. Come on, Juliet, we'd better go. I don't want to leave without saying goodbye, either, but we can call when we get to San Francisco--when we get home."
The car was started again and they drove sedately on.
When they were almost around the bend that hid the house from view Juliet heard a whistle and cry.
"Jul-i-et! Allan!"
Juliet turned back to see a figure leaning out of the upstairs window of the Walsh residence.
"It's Bea!" she cried, recognizing the honey-colored curls.
The figure began to wave a white pillowcase frantically.
"She's waving goodbye!" Juliet grabbed her handkercheif and leaned out the window to wave back.
They kept it up for a moment or two more--then just before the car disappeared around the bend Bea leaned inside and closed the window. She knew it was bad luck to watch a parting loved one disappear over the horizon and out of sight.