As October is International Pregnancy and Infant Loss Month, I thought it was fitting that I post something that I had been thinking about trying for this chapter. I have experienced loss at birth from the perspective of a woman, but I thought about how a man like Gilbert could express himself when clearly he couldn't (at this stage) convey his feelings to Anne. Not a great fan of the epistolary style of writing, but hopefully people will like it. The idea is partly based on my own experience in a hospital room, telling my son everything he would miss in this life. I imagine that a man as sensitive in spirit as the young Gilbert once was, he could feel a sense of safety writing without fear Anne would read it. I apologise that it is so short, but time is something that I don't have much of right now. Anyway, I hope you like it.


Finding Joy

Every night he dreams of her – her curly brown hair, her smile, the way her hand feels in his and mostly how she has the spirit of her mother. Some nights he even sees her big green eyes look back at him and in that moment, he whispers… "My Joy".

However, Gilbert Blythe learned long ago that dreams are fleeting, and the fog of truth never brings back the intensity of the past sun. For a second when he wakes up, he hopes that his beautiful Anne would still be pregnant and that this had all been a terrifying nightmare – his daughter would be born healthy and that perhaps this time he would not fail her or his beloved wife.

The dawn morning shatters his heart when the frightened sun hits the windowpane, and the reflections remind him that he is alone in this – this burden he will wear for the rest of his existence. Anne was rarely up at this hour and often he would use the time in his office before Mrs Baker started his breakfast. It wasn't that he kept a secret on purpose from Anne, he just couldn't bother her with all the fluttering of emotions he felt in the hour before and after dawn - the hour his joy was born and had hastily left.

His strong and agile fingers opened the left draw as he gripped the long white crusted paper and placed in purposefully in front of him. The fountain pen dancing between his two sensitive and deft fingertips before he put an end to the frustration and the anger he wrestled with most mornings.

Dear Joy,

When you were born, I kissed your cheeks, your eyes, your forehead, and I told you the secrets of my heart.

Do you remember?

I looked into your emerald eyes, eyes just like my beloved Anne, and I shared with you the life I had planned. The favourite places we would discover, the walks you and I would have – just you and me. Anne would accuse me of feeding you too many treats and that you loved me just a little more than her. I would wink at you across the breakfast table, and you would assure your mother that your daddy only gives you sweets you need on such a big walk.

As you grew, we would take you back to Avonlea where your aunt Marilla would teach you to make her famous plum puffs, just slightly inferior to her own. I would show you the schoolhouse where I met your mother, and you would laugh hysterically grabbing your little belly every time I tried to reenact how your mother broke the slate over my head.

But those are only dreams. As I held you so delicately that warm June morning, I wanted so desperately to show you the bedroom that your mother had prepared so intricately down to the lace pillow, which would cushion you as your head grew. Instead, I told you of every dream I wished we could share and how your life would have been filled with love, wonder and laughter. You are infinitely loved Joy and I miss you so very much.

Love always, your papa.

There were always tears Gilbert wiped after one of his letters to Joy. After he read them, he would open the box – the box Anne had no idea he possessed and in which he had no intention of revealing. It was the Pandora Box of his soul. In it held his whole hope for the future – one that he knew would never come to eventuate. It was a lock of Joy's hair, so soft and thin. He remembered how strange it was that she was born with so much as most babies have virtually none. It was like his own - dark and curly. Anne had prayed every night during her gestation with Joy for a baby with brown curls just like Gilbert's - and he gave her that. Gilbert felt like it was betrayal taking a few pieces from her head after she took her last breath, before they bathed and dressed her in a cottoned laced gown for her burial. He risked the disapproval of Anne but it was all he had to remember that he was a father and that she had been real. As was his custom after finishing writing, he folded the letter, wrapping it in a piece of red silk ribbon and placed it in a small chest next to the box.

His day could begin now. His little girl was in his heart, and he could pretend for another day.