Author's Note

Hello there! Remember this fic?!

This story, which is all about history and memory, was not really meant to test the faculties of lovely readers by making you all reach back into your own memories to try to puzzle… well, what on earth was happening in this one? I am more sorry than I can say for my delay, which is around ten weeks and counting. To make it up to you, I have firstly split this chapter, so that another one will be hot on its' heels…

And secondly, I have written a second M chapter over in my sister-story collection By a Beating Heart at Dance-Time. That M chapter continues the 'Interlude' between Rob and Melissa right at the very beginning of this chapter. So really, you could read all of this chapter and then hop on over to M-land, if you are so inclined, or read the Interlude and then its completion in the M section before settling in for the adventures of Anne and David in the current timeframe. If the M section is not for you I have included lots of lovely moments between Rob and Mel here that I hope give you a fairly good idea of where things headed between them x

Thanks as always to anyone who is keeping faith with this story and welcome to any new readers, particularly those who have peeked through the door after reading The Land of Heart's Desire.

In particular, thanks to anyone kind enough to review … you have my hugs and gratitude and apologies until I can get back to you with proper acknowledgement.

With thanks again to elizasky for her beta read and her helpful, thoughtful suggestions… not least of which was to Just. Split. The. Chapter.

With love

MrsVonTrapp x

Chapter Nine

'And all a wonder and a wild desire'

Interlude: Melissa Meredith

Glen St Mary, PEI, December 1989

Melissa Meredith had been used to a little too much realism with her romance in times past; of young men whose imagination did not reach beyond a red rose on Valentine's Day, and who considered it the height of commitment to remove their socks before amorous relations. She had hardened her heart to the infinitesimal slights and disappointments; she had steeled herself to make peace with her ever-lowering expectations. A firm believer in not missing what you've never had, she began to cheerfully decry all the tender trappings of courtship that other girlfriends seemed surrounded by; casting an ironic eye over the infantile love letters and the little gifts and the tiresome pitching and mooning * and the little coupledom rituals that were insisted upon, right down to the boring affront of yet another shriek of that's our song! at whatever party or club or dance she had been dragged along to. Honestly, you'd think they were all back in school, graffitiing the desks with little scratched-out hearts, stabbing the centre of them with sets of initials with their compass from Math class; AS 4 GB 4 eva.

So she was completely, wholly unprepared for what it meant to have a boyfriend in Rob Blythe.

Faithfully as promised, come the end of the September of their final year, he had set off on the Friday night for Charlottetown, his handsome face growing resolute and determined, catching the last ferry across the strait and staying with his Meredith cousins there – and hers – possibly fitting in a morning tea with Great Uncle Jerry and Auntie Nan; calling on everyone's favourite of the Meredith daughters, the slightly eccentric Aunt Cordelia; and then seeing his soon-to-be former legal eagle paramour. Melissa waited all weekend on tenterhooks, not entirely convinced he wouldn't fall back into Kimberley's worldly, older, confident arms and forget her very existence.

He was very late in returning on the Sunday; she had stayed up especially, but her worry tired her and all she could think of was his dear, handsome face, a constant through all of her childhood and a feature of just about every memory she possessed, and him coming back to see her and apologising… Sorry, Mel… I don't think things will work out between us now. Have a nice life.

Instead he scratched at her door, well after curfew and risking the wrath of both their boarding house heads; she opened it to his careful hazel eyes and his mediative smile.

"Well, Melissa Una Meredith, I'm all yours if you want me."

Trust a Blythe to soften her hardened heart.

And now she was painfully aware that his niceness had made her needy, and she was terrified by the thought he could turn around at any moment and admit his monumental mistake in being with her, when there were so many others more deserving of his attention. Nice girls who didn't want to stab the occasional difficult patient with their own IV needle; dedicated girls who could balance bedpans and boyfriends (not necessarily at the same time) without turning a perfectly crimped hair. She could be cross with him or teary or despairing and it didn't matter; his embrace was the same. So not only was she afraid of doing something so unforgivably awful that he would end it; she knew that he had ruined her for all time, for no longer would any other average, run-of-the-mill, uninspired man gain her notice. She loved and had been loved by him and learned that she had crossed a great point of no return, and the realisation was terrifying.

And then, he was so frustratingly gentlemanly.

He was a truly marvellous kisser, in the whispered tradition of men in his family, and used this skill to inordinate advantage, making her forget that they were both adults now and could afford to be a little more adventurous. He would murmur amusingly ineffectual protests concerning some antiquarian three button rule ** passed down from his father – or even his grandfather – as her lips strayed to his collar, meant to safeguard his fled virtue – or hers – she was never sure. His hands had full permission to roam but rarely invoked the privilege, after that fevered occasion on Halloween, when as he would later sheepishly admit the sight of her Vampire Madonna, complete with rather-defeating-the-purpose-crucifixes, had done in his lovelorn Thriller -inspired zombie completely. That night had been quite the revelation; how had Rob Blythe, childhood comrade and third cousin, become quite so accomplished at that sort of below-stairs, south-of-the-border exploration? Her eyes had nearly rolled back into her head. She had done everything in her power to orchestrate a repeat performance, only to have him insist on more circumspect conduct; he wanted to romance her, not take advantage of her, pleading that he had years of catch-up courting, even as she teasingly tried to enlist Shakespeare to support her argument -"let lips do what hands do" -*** and had his warm, pleased laugh as her reward.

And then, she had an all-consuming work placement, and after that so had he, and end of term exams loomed, and before she knew it there they were, back on the ferry across the strait, linking fingers and whispering sweet nothings and attempting to play it cool before their parents, lest half of the Glen pass comment on their new romantic status before they had a chance to fully figure it for themselves.

So both by chance and design, they hadn't yet slept together, except in her increasingly fraught dreams.

Christmas was sweet and strangely contemplative; making secret eyes at one another across the table at Ingleside or up at her own house during joint family gatherings; seeing her brother Michael off to visit friends in Toronto; and finally, an unlikely breakthrough… an invitation to Ingleside, whilst Rob's parents were away overnight so his mother could hit the sales in Charlottetown before the new year.

"Do you think you could make it over tomorrow night?" hazel eyes gleamed their own invitation as his whispered aside tickled her ear. "That is… if you want to. No pressure, Mel."

She might have once rolled her eyes at his Boy Scout-ness; now she found his second-guessing quite charming and not altogether unsexy.

''Goose…" the old nickname now gained new life as breathless endearment. "Wild horses couldn't keep me away. "

"Well… that's very reassuring to hear."

"Shall I bring my deck of cards?" she teased.

"By all means. I'll have the Monopoly all set," he grinned.

"Remember that I'm the top hat. It's my lucky token."

"With or without it, you might still get lucky, Miss Meredith," he smirked unrepentantly, and gave her a look that made her honeyed hair curl of its own accord, as he sauntered back to where their parents were devouring Christmas leftovers and mulled wine in the lounge.

And so it came to pass that she stood on the Ingleside verandah, little overnight bag at the ready and staying-at-her-girlfriend's alibi in place, the day after Boxing Day, contemplating whether Rob Blythe might indeed have been her destiny, all along.

XXXXX

She might have expected a smart shirted Rob Blythe to greet her at his door; she did not expect the Abominable Snowman, decked out in the woolliest of jumpers, looking like he'd be happy to add a scarf and earmuffs to his astonishing indoor ensemble.

"Rob?" Melissa spluttered a laugh, "going on a ski trip?"

He rolled those hazel eyes at her, grasping her hand to lead her inside.

"You're going to wish we were," he frowned, and then sighed excessively. "God, I'm so sorry about this, Mel."

"Sorry?" she puzzled up at him.

"The central heating's been on the blink since I woke up this morning, not long after my parents left. I've been trying to figure it all day. I can't get anyone to come out and take a look at it; everyone's still off for Christmas. It's freezing. It was probably warmer on your walk down the street to get here."

Mel looked around, her nose testing the decidedly frigid air.

"Mmm… I see what you mean…" she drew her coat around her, golden-dark brows drawing together.

"The lounge is fine, it's more than fine, because we have the fireplace… but its just… upstairs…" he emphasised, trailing off forlornly.

Mel could have laughed at the expression on his face, akin to a kid whose candy had been stolen, but who was trying his best to be brave about it.

"This is such a disaster… this was not what I had in mind… for us," Rob lamented, shaking his head. "I understand, really, if you just want to take a raincheck, Mel."

Melissa bit the inside of her cheek. Honestly, men. She could hardly get to sleep last night for thinking of this moment; of hands, and lips, that could roam free and with abandon, of being closer to him than any other person in the world… Of making good on the delightful promise of the last three transformative months, and perhaps the knowledge of the last five years, since she had started, slowly, to become aware of his look to her, and how she had once shied away from it, only to draw back to it now, and to have his eyes on her as necessary to her as breathing.

She wanted to show him how much she had grown to love him, so that it would not occur to him to ask such questions now.

She had also spent the entire day shaving and buffing and shampooing and preening in preparation. She was wearing matching underwear. She had a very nice negligee, newly gifted to herself, hidden away in her bag. There would be no rainchecks.

"Do I look like I want a raincheck, Robert James Blythe?" her voice dropped in register, hovering around sultry, as she bravely shrugged out of her coat to reveal formfitting soft pink angora sweater, black mini shirt and matching stockings and boots, shaking her silken tresses until they settled in fragrant repose about her shoulders, and looking up at him with a mild challenge in those blue Meredith eyes.

He seemed to finally see her, forgetting his distraction in best-laid plans gone awry, and visibly swallowed, his eyes widening as he surveyed her, slowly, up and down.

"Er… no," he gave a shamefaced smile. "God, you look wonderful, Mel. I'm sorry. I'm being an idiot."

He leant down to kiss her, his nose cold but his lips warm and his eyes beginning to smoulder, and his large Blythe hands strayed to her waist and then, with a grin as challenge of his own, he drew her to the waiting warmth of the fire and of his strong arms.

Anne sat up in bed, willing herself beautiful; clutching at the old, musty book like a prayer and imagining herself with glorious muddy-red tresses, the imploring Blythe hazel eyes and magnificent milky skin. If she had been Bertha Marilla Blythe, later Rilla Ford, then she must do better at communing with her girlish, fanciful and occasionally frivolous ancestor and spirit-mate, so that she could truly figure who her own modern-day love was channeling himself. Was David sharing his soul and spirit with Ken? Was he his own ancestor Jem, he of the same eyes and curls if not the coloring? And what of this Gilbert, married to that first Anne, whose name had come unbidden when she had looked at David seeming so anguished the other day?

Anne felt like tossing the Diary of Bertha Marilla Blythe, Aged Fifteen across the room in frustration, but it was far too old and too precious, dating back from the very start of the Great War and with some tremendous asides regarding other members of the family, even if Anne did have to contend with this troublesome contradiction inherent in a girl who would stubbornly wear a stupid hat for half the war and yet would adopt an abandoned child out of the clear blue sky and effectively rear him singlehandedly. Or think that she might be engaged.

She sighed into the night, turning worn pages giving new meaning to paper-thin; feathery to her fingers; the neat writing faint and often indistinct; sometimes smudged if by an impatient hand or blotted as if by a tearful eye.

"I couldn't bear to have Walter go," Rilla Blythe had written, not long after war had been declared. "I love Jem ever so much but Walter means more to me than anyone in the world and I would die if he had to go. He seems so changed these days. He hardly ever talks to me. I suppose he wants to go, too, and feels badly because he can't. He doesn't go about with Jem and Jerry at all… ****

…Everybody seems busy but me. I wish there was something I could do but there doesn't seem to be anything. Mother and Nan and Di are busy all the time and I just wander about like a lonely ghost. What hurts me terribly, though, is that mother's smiles, and Nan's, just seem put on from the outside. Mother's eyes never laugh now. It makes me feel that I shouldn't laugh either—that it's wicked to feel laughy. And it's so hard for me to keep from laughing, even if Jem is going to be a soldier. But when I laugh I don't enjoy it either, as I used to do. There's something behind it all that keeps hurting me—especially when I wake up in the night. Then I cry because I am afraid that Kitchener of Khartoum is right and the war will last for years and Jem may be—but no, I won't write it. It would make me feel as if it were really going to happen. The other day Nan said, 'Nothing can ever be quite the same for any of us again.' It made me feel rebellious. Why shouldn't things be the same again—when everything is over and Jem and Jerry are back? We'll all be happy and jolly again and these days will seem just like a bad dream… ****

Anne sighed at the sad innocence of that remark. The war did last for years and nothing was ever the same again when everything was over.

More pleasantly diverting was the tidbit about Shirley, who received scant mention from Rilla at the best of times (excepting his teasing of her alongside brother Jem) though he was closest to her in age.

…Susan is funny, but she is an old dear. Shirley says she is one half angel and the other half good cook. But then Shirley is the only one of us she never scolds… ****

This mention of Susan was puzzling. There was no trace of her on any family tree to speak of. Anne made a mental note to ask Rob Blythe.

…Faith Meredith is wonderful. I think she and Jem are really engaged now. She goes about with a shining light in her eyes, but her smiles are a little stiff and starched, just like mother's. I wonder if I could be as brave as she is if I had a lover and he was going to the war… ****

…I haven't seen Kenneth since the night of the party. He was here one evening after Jem came back but I happened to be away. I don't think he mentioned me at all—at least nobody told me he did and I was determined I wouldn't ask—but I don't care in the least. All that matters absolutely nothing to me now. The only thing that does matter is that Jem has volunteered for active service and will be going to Valcartier in a few more days—my big, splendid brother Jem. Oh, I'm so proud of him! ****

…I suppose Kenneth would enlist too if it weren't for his ankle. I think that is quite providential. He is his mother's only son and how dreadful she would feel if he went. Only sons should never think of going!" ****

What would it have been to see brothers and lovers and sons go to war? And then again a second time, a generation later? The knowledge lay heavy on Anne's chest; an immovable object she was trapped under; the weight of time and memory pinning her down. They lived in a world now that should be safe, and mostly was, and yet there were always occasional rumblings of discontent from corners of the world, fraying the edges of her smooth, serene life. What would it be like to see David off to war, smiling and handsome, bright with bravery and promise? The thought caused a mad, incomprehensible flutter of panic.

Anne thought of all the boys who had not returned from the war to end all wars; a generation mown down in a haze of bullets, their sacrifice remembered in a poppy pinned to a lapel twice a year. It seemed so little when it was meant to commemorate so much. Yesterday morning, with David studying and the weather having the affront to be overcast, she had taken herself around to the graveyard by the old Presbyterian manse, and finally to the church itself. She had seen the plaque in the church commemorating so many sons of Glen St Mary who had not returned from the war, including that one Blythe brother Walter; Rilla's favourite. She had meandered around the manse and thought of Carl Meredith growing up there, thinking on that Blythe boy across the valley, and later, if he had ever penned a reply to the letter of his lover Shirley, calling him back home, or had something stirred in Shirley regardless?

Anne lay back, eventually, and waited for sleep to take her. She thought her dreams would be full of soldiers and teary train platform farewells; or else a group of women sewing, waiting in agonised anticipation for any word from the Front; or even young Rilla Blythe struggling with the most unusual contents of a soup tureen.

But no. Incongruously, and certainly incomprehensively, her mind had thrown back to that atmospheric walk down a lane, opening up to a wood… and on the edge of it, a huge farm with a homestead, all white with green trim, winking at her in the sunlight.

David had made good on his promise to share with her the summer delights of Glen St Mary, ferrying her about the one or two cafes that were charming, if not, thankfully, exactly Toronto-cool; introducing her to a further series of friends and what passed for local hot spots, sometimes simultaneously; and even mostly behaving himself back during her sleepover with his cousin Maddie, only trying to gatecrash their girl gossip twice with other cousin Max in tow. They had been almost three weeks on the Island; several days in Summerside and now two weeks in the Glen for a visit that was initially to be a few days; not that she was in any way complaining, and her mother certainly wasn't, seeing as how she herself saw Rob Blythe at every opportunity, both parents still chronically comical in their efforts to be casual towards the other in company.

Today David had taken her for a drive up and around the coast, leaving the Glen and even the lighthouse far behind, finding them a secluded cove that felt as if it had lain in wait of them, undiscovered, till they had leapt from the car and had run down to the water's edge like two loons, finally circling back, collapsing with breathless laughter in the embrace of the dunes.

"I thought I was such a city girl…" Anne ventured after a time, looking around her at the symphony of sun and surf and sand and sky, "but I can't believe how much I love the ocean now. Don't you find it calling you, even in Kingsport? Do you miss it when you're away?"

David's expression was shaded from her by his sunglasses, though his tone and smile were wry.

"Sure I miss it. Though there is a fine port in Kingsport after all, and I hear that Toronto has a little old harbour there, too." His lips quirked knowingly.

"Oh, I know the harbour," she shrugged carelessly. "Grandad Tom has about five boats moored there. But I mean… this," she indicated with a toss of her head and the sweep of a small, smooth hand.

David plucked at a reed growing in a clump by the sand bank, twisting it with long, brown fingers.

"It's taken me a while, actually…" he seemed to swallow, turning the reed over and over. "After Ma died, all I wanted to do was to get away. I was only halfway through my course. I threw myself into life at uni – all the clubs, all the parties… I made excuses not to come back. It wasn't very fair to Dad, but I just couldn't stand it here. And then I came back one time and saw he hadn't been doing very well, and I felt pretty lousy after that. This summer was the first time I felt really OK with being home and around the memories of her… I was going to be the Good Son, spending all this time with him and drawing him back into the land of the living… and then your mom came along, and so my good intentions were needed for about two minutes. And now I'm completely superfluous to his happiness."

"Yes, Gerald David Blythe," Anne grinned and rolled her eyes, "that is certainly the word that comes to mind when people think of you. Superfluous."

He chuckled low at her baiting. "Well, then, I guess the question is whether or not I'm superfluous to your happiness, Anne Alexandra Ford?"

She wished for sunglasses of her own at this point, to help shield her, for something in her was trying, and failing, to keep up a sophisticated veneer of practiced polish around him, instead of what she felt like doing, which was to generally fall, worshipful, at his feet. Essential, she gulped to herself. You are essential to my happiness.

"Well, in the Hierarchy of Needs, ***** you are probably somewhere between sleeping and food," she instead responded with a deliberate arch of her lips.

"And here I was thinking I was at least Level Three…" he grinned at the game, crawling over the sand to hover over her. "Color me yellow, Anne."

"Well… that level is all about friends… and family… " she hedged, flushing, breathing rapidly under his gaze as he threw off his sunglasses to stare at her with darkening hazel eyes. "So you… um… pass that level on both counts OK, I guess."

He gave a wolf's smile. "Isn't there something else about that level?" he asked blandly, making a great show of thinking it over, dark brows knotted, even as he positioned a strong arm either side of her, waiting.

"Well…" Damn. He had caught her, well and truly, in every respect. Play with fire and you'll get burned, Ford.

That was the trouble. Some days she hesitated to light the match, and other days she was too happy to build a great pyre and stand herself on top of it. She was gearing herself up to tackle one of her mother's favourite books, Possession, but she knew the film version well enough – a little too well – along with its famous shared lines… I cannot let you burn me up; nor can I resist you… No mere human can stand in a fire and not be consumed… *******

He could leave her a charred ruin if she was not careful. And yet, oh the fire… the fire was warm and tempting, and she basked in it, even as she inched ever closer to the heat and tested herself against the temperature.

It was, evidently, a throwing-herself-on-the-pyre sort of day.

"This…" she breathed, touching her lips to his. "This is the other part."

He smiled against her mouth. "I thought so…" his voice was a low rumble, and his mouth found hers. His body blanketed her own as he sank with her low behind the dunes.

"Avonlea?" Anne repeated, frowning up into her mother's excited, ever-glowing face.

"Avonlea!" her mother grinned like a schoolgirl. "Isn't that a wonderful idea?"

"I guess… but when? And what's in Avonlea? I've never heard of it."

"It's where the Blythes originally came from, darling. Rob was going over some of his old research. There's a whole community who would have known his ancestors, and yours, love. From there we can go up to Charlottetown. Rob's able to take the entire week."

"You mean – this week?"

"Yes, love," Tessa's look was careful. "We thought we might leave tomorrow."

"But David can't come if we leave tomorrow!"

Her mother then directed them both to sit on the lounge, as seriously as she had that excruciatingly awkward morning after her own sleepover with Rob; if that was a forerunner to their discussion now things would not go well.

"Darling, I need you to listen, and what's more to hear what I'm trying to say. David has his MCAT coming up soon. He needs to start preparing himself, mentally and physically. The dreadful thing is seven and a half hours long, Anne."

"Mom, I know that!"

"And after, love, he needs to start thinking of his future. Rob's gone through the process with me. He'll receive his result around a month afterwards, and then start making arrangements for interviews to various medical schools, should they request it. He has to shore up recommendations and jump through various other hoops and entrance requirements, depending on the university. He'll have to decide to do an honours year at Redmond or take a gap year and work to offset his course costs. He doesn't know which schools will make him an offer and where he'll end up. It could be Nova Scotia or Saskatchewan…"

"Mom! I have heard this from David himself actually! I can't see what this has to do with us rushing off to Avonlea!"

"Darling, you have been spending a lot of time together…"

Anne reddened in indignation. "Mom, how can you say that when you and Rob have been –"

"Don't go there Anne, please! Rob and I just think that you and David could do with…well… some breathing space."

"Breathing space?" Anne repeated suspiciously.

"Oh, sweetheart…" her mother reached out to stroke her hair, "I'm just realizing how very young you are… you are so mature in some ways but in others…"

"What others, Mom?" Anne questioned stubbornly, shrugging off that hand with a mulish turn of her head, so that it fell back to Tessa's side, ineffectually.

"Darling, you know what I'm talking about."

"I thought you said that you were so glad David is such a gentleman!"

"I am glad, Anne – very glad - and I still believe that wholeheartedly, but that doesn't stop the two of you from having feelings and… acting on them."

"Sort of like our parents."

Tessa gave an expressive roll of usually warm brown eyes, rapidly beginning to cool. "Yes, wonderful, I was just waiting for the teenager to show up."

"Yep, go large on the sarcasm, Mom."

"Not sarcasm, Miss Ford. Realism." Tessa sighed.

Anne sat back on her chair with a huff. "Well, now you've lost me."

Her mother's look in that moment was unbearably fond. "You don't think that I have been grateful for the kind and thoughtful way you and David have tiptoed around Rob and I these past weeks? Allowing us a little, ah, time together without fuss or recriminations? I have been trying to repay the favour – really I have, darling. So I don't blame you now for seeing the obvious irony of the situation. But sweetheart, the wish still stands. David does need to study, without any distractions. And I beg of you to get a little distance from him, just for a little while. Things have been rather intense around here. It helps when you're not always in the eye of the storm."

"That's all very well, Mom, but you're still going to be with Rob, and I'll be this sad third wheel and David will be all by himself chained to his desk. None of that comes off as fair!"

Tessa sighed again, deep in thought.

"You're right, love. Well, then… I'll ring Rob."

"Mom… you don't have to cancel…" Anne bit back her victorious smile.

There was a dramatic pause, and then Tessa Ford arched a perfect dark brow.

"I'm not," she gave a knowing smile in return, which she made no attempt to cover. "I'm ringing Rob to say, regretfully, I think it's best if you and I go on our own."

The next day they were soon back amongst those red roads and rolling hills, under a tauntingly picturesque sky, though Anne frowned out of her window and stubbornly longed for the sight and sound and smell of the sea.

"Isn't it lovely?" Her mother encouraged, and Anne shrugged with exaggerated nonchalance, holding fast to her affront. She had endured an almost tearful farewell with David that morning – from her end at least – though she couldn't have imagined that wistful look on his lean, handsome face, and she certainly hadn't imagined the three part-joking texts she had received from him in the hours since… I miss you… I still miss you… OK, I SERIOUSLY miss you…

Tessa looked across to her daughter, smiling in sympathy.

"Darling, if it's any consolation, I felt the same when I first met your father, you know. Not bearing to be parted from him, hours that felt like days, that sort of thing."

Anne stilled. There had been very little talk of her father since Rob Blythe had happened across Tessa in the hotel bar.

"You weren't much older than me when you met him, were you?"

"Nineteen," Tessa smiled wistfully. "Second year of drama school, just really beginning to make friends and get used to being in the big city… and then my girlfriend convinced me to go along for an open call for a new play."

"Had you… heard of Dad, before that?" Anne had asked the question many times but wondered if she would glean more information now.

"Oh, the Fords were always rather a presence in Toronto, love. So I absolutely knew the name. And who doesn't know the Life Book connection? There had been a lot of advance press about your dad adapting it. It was going to be an exciting opportunity for actors to workshop it – actors love feeling they are involved in the creative process, and not just glorified mouthpieces. So there was a definite buzz about it. A Canadian classic, adapted by one of our own, and a descendant no less… you can imagine how the press liked that. And it didn't hurt that the writer-director was rich and talented and rather easy on the eye…" she smiled knowingly.

"How did you get the role of Lost Margaret?"

"Haven't you heard this story enough times?" Tessa asked indulgently.

"No!" Anne finally offered a grin.

"Well… there was a sea of girls at the call – no pun intended – who were dressed up as if they'd stepped out of a pioneer settlement. They all presumed that your dad was going to keep strictly to the nineteenth century timeline… but I knew he was cleverer and more creative than that, and also I'd read a little known article in one of the stage magazines, about how he wanted to shift the action and the story back and forth, between the story of Captain Jim and of Owen, to a modern girl who may or may not be Margaret's possible descendant, had she survived. And how Margaret and the girl would be likely played by the same actress. So I went in as myself, and read a passage of the script as Margaret, wearing a scarf around my head, and then I slipped it off and continued, without break, as the modern girl, as if Margaret was narrating from the past and then…"

"…you finished her sentence. You finished the thought for her."

"Yes, love," Tessa winked. "It worked a treat! I survived all the culls, and then in the end it was… just me."

"I'm sure the fact you were talented and gorgeous didn't hurt," Anne groaned, but her mind was already on other things. "Mom, do you think that's really possible? That someone might have a connection like that to a person and then… and then… still walk around as themselves?"

"How do you mean, Anne?"

"Um… well… that there might be, um, a soul connection to a person from the past, and that you might be linked to them in the present?"

Tessa was silent for several moments. "Love, is that how you feel… about your dad?"

"Dad?"

"Because, sweetheart, it's natural to want to feel he's not really gone. Especially here, on the Island, seeing places he had a connection to. To feel he's still with us. And he is… he always will be… but Anne, I'd hate you stuck on the idea that he's directing your thoughts… directing your life… because that's not healthy. You could become fixated and not be free to be your own person…"

"Mom…"

"And I do worry about you and David, too… I know he still feels the loss of his mother, and you've both had a hard, emotional couple of years… and that you might feel bonded over that, but it in turn makes you rather vulnerable to… to… heightened feelings…"

"Mom! It's just… it's not that! It's OK! We're not about to conduct a séance, or…" or jump into bed together… she swallowed, "or anything."

"Well… OK…" Tessa didn't look completely convinced. "But please, darling, come and talk to me. About anything. I know I may have seemed… distracted. But you are my priority, always. Please know that."

"Thanks, Mom…" Anne mumbled. "It's OK. I do."

Anne bit her lip, leapfrogging to yet another problematic thought. We're not about… to jump into bed together.

Her heartbeat quickened, thinking that her mother might observe her sudden, guilty flush. And in an instant she was back with David in those sand dunes of the other day, tasting the salt of the sea on his lips, his body pressed into hers, his hands, for the very first time, not quite as polite as they had been…

"Mom?"

"Yes, love?"

"How much longer have we got?"

"Till we arrive? About ten minutes."

"No…" Anne's brow furrowed. "I meant here, on PEI, before we have to go home?"

Tessa now frowned herself, making some mental calculations. "Twelve days. No, today was eleven."

Anne's heart now raced. She continued to gnaw on her lip relentlessly, all the way till they zoomed past the proud sign, welcoming them to the township of Avonlea.

Oh, God. It was happening again. Those first flutterings of recognition; the butterfly wings, deep in her belly.

She had become acclimatized to that feeling in Glen St Mary; she had been to Ingleside so many times that she barely noticed the gauzy veil of the past anymore. And David's features had become so interchangeable with the vision of that boy in her head that she barely paused to consider the ramifications of this anymore; it had just become an accepted fact. David was that boy… but how could she have been Rilla, when Rilla had grown up in the Glen, living there and then Toronto, her entire life? How could she be Rilla and at the same time know Avonlea?

As had become their practice, they made a slow circuit through the main street and nearby surrounds of the quaint township, its still-rural setting and obviously gentle pace easily conjuring a time of horse and cart; when a boyfriend was a beau and a hankerchief a love token. Anne stared at a landscape largely unchanged in a century or so, trying to quell the wash of memory threatening, this time, to swamp her; the old schoolhouse, now the home of The Avonlea Historical Society; the post office now a tea room; the fields and byways beyond, beckoning.

There was a lake… with a bridge. There was a laneway and a gate. There was woodland, and on the edge of it, a large house, white with green trim.

"Well, we'll be close to all the action, as such," Tessa smiled knowingly. "Our B&B is just behind the main street."

"Mom! Can we drive around a little longer? Just, ah, out a bit?"

"Sure. But honey, I don't think there's very much more to it."

There wasn't, and yet there was. Oh, how there was. Anne had to blink away the shadow images assaulting her, as if dust blowing in the wind, obscuring her vision. Children running, in little caps and knee-high breeches or plain pinafores with white aprons, mouths open in silent laughter. Dancers coming out of the hall, long skirts trailing. A lake indeed; still waters shining in the sunlight, and a curved wooden bridge spanning it. And then… a wood.

"Mom, can you just take this turn up here?"

"Anne, what's this all about, love? There's nothing up this way."

But there was; a sign, and then a turn, and a long approach to a big old house, set back from the road beside the woods; bordered by an orchard and beyond that, undulating fields of gold. She could almost taste the crisp tang of a just-plucked apple in her mouth. She could almost feel the sun on her face, rising in the morning as she had, writing and dreaming in her little garret room.

"Anne…"

"Mom! We have to stay here!"

Tessa looked dubiously at the sign by the steps to the verandah, in ornate green lettering on a white background; Green Gables Guest House.

"Anne, love, we already have a booking, right in the town center. And we don't even know if they're taking any guests here." Brown eyes travelled, unconvinced, to the lone car, almost forsaken in the little carpark, which looked too old to be the hire car of a cavalier holidaymaker from the mainland. The vacancy addendum under the sign proper swung forlornly in the breeze at that very moment, in clear reproach to such thoughts.

"Please, Mom. I just… I just have a feeling about this place."

Infact, she had so many feelings about this place it was impossible to harness them all; they floated and swirled about her as dandelion tufts, passing by her, tantalizingly close and then rudely snatched away on the wind. Whether the memories were wishes or no, she couldn't say.

Her mother was frowning, which meant she was relenting. "Alright, it won't hurt to take a look."

They were at the steps when the green front door opened, and a genial looking lady, around her mother's age with a ready smile and pretty blonde features, stepped down to meet them; whether in excited greeting or possible waylay it was difficult to tell.

"Hello! Are you looking for some rooms?"

"Hello," Tessa answered, raising her brows to her daughter's imploring look. "Yes, we would be, thank you, if any are available. For one or two nights?"

"As many nights as you would like," the woman rejoined cheerfully. "It's been a slow summer for us, I'm afraid. So warm that everyone's fled to the coast."

"We've just come from there, actually. My daughter here, Anne, and myself. A little place called Glen St Mary. You've probably never heard of it," Tessa smiled.

"Sure I have!" came the enthusiastic reply, and the woman's hazel eyes sparked at the thought. "But it's a name I haven't heard of in years. And then, what do you know, about a week ago, I get a call from Beth at the Historical Society, saying some man from the Glen who contacted them is asking about title deeds to this place, and one of the farms the other side of the woods, trying to find links to his family."

Anne flashed a grin, admiring the very composed look on her mother's face.

"That's fascinating. Did you find any?" Tessa asked, nonplussed.

"Well… it's a long story," the woman offered. "But the short answer is… possibly. Indirectly, mind." The woman took a new look at Anne, eyes suddenly curious and assessing. "Well, I'm very pleased to welcome you both to Green Gables."

"Thank you. Oh, and I'm Tessa Ford."

"Ford…" the woman mused. "No, can't say as I've heard of that one."

Now it was Tessa's turn to grin. "No need to have done." There was always, with a certain generation, the prospect of recognition, usually of the weren't you the one? variety. Her mother was always pleased when recent anonymity trumped past notoriety.

"And I'm Amanda Wright."

Would you like some help with your bags, Ms Ford?"

"Oh no, thanks, we'll be fine."

"Well all the same, come on through to reception, and I'll get my husband to carry your things upstairs. We have four lovely guestrooms, all with ensuite bathroom. You're welcome to have a look at each and take your pick."

"Do you have a garret room available? Up the very top?" Anne piped up excitedly.

"The attic room?" Amanda Wright laughed. "Oh, love, there's barely room to swing a cat up there. Really, we only offer it in emergencies. Though you're welcome to it, at a reduced rate of course, should you want it."

"Attic room? Really, Anne!" Tessa shook her head in mock despair, even as her daughter, eyes shifting to green as of the door, bit her lip to stop from grinning at the thought.

Anne (via text): I am in a little attic room in this big old guest house. It's quaint and wonderful.

David: Which means Slightly Rundown.

Anne: It's not! Well, not much. The woman who runs it says it has been in her family for years…

David: That's the one Dad was asking about?

Anne: Yes, but her family are the Keiths, though she married a guy called Joe Wright. No mention of Blythes though, so your dad struck out, I think.

David: Oh, don't worry, that won't stop him!

Anne: How did your study go today?

David: Oh, good. By which I mean it was torture. YOU are in this little writer's garret. I'M in a too-hot, too-messy bedroom, decorated with abandoned MCAT tests and junk food wrappers. And my dad is on the phone to your mom, but I don't think they're discussing title deeds.

Anne: Same old, same old…

David: Has it been warm today, where you are?

Anne: Pretty warm.

David: Kinda hot?

Anne: I guess so.

David: Probably too hot to wear much to bed?!

Anne: It's Avonlea, not Barbados!

David: Mmm…

Anne: Actually, we went around the town a little bit today, and to the Historical Society. They are tracking some photos for your dad. It had a nice little ye olde gift shop. All these cute floaty Victorian nightgowns… I might have bought one.

David: You bought a cute floaty Victorian nightgown?

Anne: I might have.

David: I guess… I can work with that.

Anne: Huh?

David: You are adorable, Anne Ford.

Anne: So they keep telling me!

David: I guess… I might still be missing you.

Anne: I might… be missing YOU.

David: Really?

Anne: Almost positively.

David: Good to know. Well, I'd better turn in. Lots more exciting study tomorrow.

Anne: Sorry about that…

David: Sweet dreams, Anne xxx

Anne: Sweet dreams, Gerald xxx

Anne stared at her phone for long minutes after, in the gentle, warm glow of the lamp from the side table, before nestling it in the drawer for safe keeping. She drew her knees up to her chest, watching the filmy curtains waltz against the window, carried on the breeze which brought the sweet scent of apple blossom, seasoned with salt from the distant shore. Crossing over to the full-length mirror inside the little wardrobe, she pondered her reflection; the long ago dream-girl of the garret contemplating her in turn.

…In another time, she fancied to stare at the naked flame of a candle until it burnt itself down to a puddle of molten wax. She scratched out letters by it sitting at an upright desk made of rough hewn wood that still carried the faint forest-scent of its source. She read by it till the darkness shrouded the little east gable room and her grey eyes diverted to the darting shadows on the wall as they entertained in mesmeric dance. She prayed by it, pale hands clasped reverently, mouthing her unchanging incantation for nut-brown hair, and perhaps a few less freckles… ********

… that she wasn't dreaming at all, but had been flung back through time, catapulted through the centuries. She would leap from the bed and pace, and she could almost feel the starched swish of a long nightdress with fluted sleeves, and her cascading hair held in a thick braid resting over her shoulder, and the creaking floorboards resisting her weight, and the kiss of the branches of a tree, blossoms snow white, against her window when it swayed in the wind. And then she would catch herself, and try to laugh. It was a dream. It was a nonsense…

It was a madness… ********

It was neither.

Anne gathered her hair with trembling fingers, braiding it slowly, watching herself through trance-like grey eyes as she did so, until she fastened the braid and let it fall over one shoulder. The low light shimmered an otherworldly echo upon her; the breeze through the open window drifted around and up and under… the white nightgown with long sleeves and delicate piping around the wrists and neckline moved of its own accord; floating around her, with so much superfluous material she billowed as if her own sail.

Superfluous. Am I superfluous to your happiness, Anne Alexandra Ford?

Essential, she should have said. She had wanted to say. You are essential to my happiness.

She closed her eyes and imagined him as he had looked at her that day in the dunes; with something more than affection in his kiss and more than mere curiosity guiding his hands, and the weight of his body anchoring her in the sand. She swayed now as his hands roamed across her… large Blythe hands that knew her, brushing the pointed peaks of her breasts with his palm… trailing long surgeon's fingers from clavicle to coxal… resting with possessive wanting on her stomach… and then finding that place at her throat with his lips that made her arch backwards into him, gasping in both delight and…

'Anne-girl…' he murmured into her ear.

'Gilbert…' she sighed.

Anne's eyes snapped open, and the room spun about her. The flush to her cheeks made her grey-green eyes blaze, and the sheen of sweat on her brow matched her panting breaths, and the sudden still heat in the room fired her body as if a furnace, and the shadow in the mirror held her body and her gaze for half a second; David; older, mature, knowing, needy…

No… not David.

With a startled cry she ripped off the nightgown and plunged into bed, nearly naked and trembling.

*Probably too hot to wear much to bed…?*

She hugged the pillow to her, curled up on the narrow mattress in the little east gable room, blinking back bewildered tears, thighs pressed close in erotic effort to hold tightly to whatever sensation that was or would have been.

Her breaths slowed, and the room receded to normality. But something long slumbering was awakened, and wouldn't let her rest; not till dawn's fingers stretched to close her eyes against the glare of the new day.

Chapter Notes

The title quotation is taken from Robert Browning's famous narrative poem The Ring and the Book, beginning with the following section, which I have quoted some of before;

"O lyric Love, half-angel and half-bird

And all a wonder and a wild desire, -

Boldest of hearts that ever braved the sun,

Took sanctuary within the holier blue.

And sang a kindred soul out to his face…"

*Anne of the Island (Ch 12)

**Please see everything elizasky, in particular Glen Notes (Ch 37 'Realism and Romance'). Rob Blythe is certainly one to follow all the various traditions of Blythe men (there are others alluded to here). Quite scrupulously.

***William Shakespeare Romeo and Juliet (Act 1 Sc 5)

**** all from Rilla of Ingleside (Ch 5)

*****Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs. In 1943 Abraham Maslow had published his 'A Theory of Human Motivation' in Psychological Review, later fully expressed in his book Motivation and Curiosity (1954).He identified that humans had five stages of growth, represented in a pyramid, with the base physiological needs at the bottom, rising through safety, love and belonging (the yellow level) to esteem and finally the top of the pyramid, self actualisation. When Anne and David parry regarding the love and belonging level, they are flirting around the idea of these 'needs' as outlined being friends, family… and sexual intimacy.

It is not my desire here to enter the debate regarding the problematic nature of this concept with regard to culture, race, religion, geographic region, gender, disability or even the needs as related to situations of war or external threats as opposed to peace time. Suffice to say Anne and David here are happy to accept a very rudimentary reading of the Hierarchy.

*******referencing both the novel Possession (1990) by A.S. Byatt (Ch 10 for interest) and the film of the same name with Gwyneth Paltrow, Aaron Eckhart, Jennifer Ehle and JEREMY NORTHAM. The book is a seminal reading experience, and you won't be the same, and has been a key inspiration for this fanfic foray into memory, history, family, poetry, letters, diaries, talismans and love across time. Both the novel and its lovely adaptation (2002) can't come more highly recommended.

For those who have seen the film, I need not explain why Jeremy Northam's name was capitalised.

********quoting Chapter 1 of Betwixt the Stars. Don't worry if you've forgotten. I posted that first chapter eight months ago (*sigh*)