July 2001, Grosse Pointe, Michigan

Six months later, Anne still didn't have any answers about where Frederick fit into her new life. A regimen of radiotherapy and chemotherapy at MD Anderson had succeeded in bringing down Grandma's tumor markers, and they'd decided to continue whatever maintenance therapy that might be needed at home. It suited Grandma to be near the family, and it suited Anne because she could start thinking about getting a job again. She got Walter to hire a housekeeper, Rosa, to help with the day-to-day caregiving, so that she could return to full-time work; persuading him wasn't that difficult when having more hired help also boosted the Elliot pride. And working was the one thing Anne dug her heels in about, as far as her family was concerned. It was all that was left of her hopes and dreams from college.

Anne was lucky that Northwest Airlines' hub was in Detroit; she could get an aviation-related job and continue living with Grandma, even if it wasn't potentially as exciting as what she could do in Boeing. At her level, it didn't make that much difference; if she really wanted to get involved in the heart of research work at Boeing, she'd eventually have to get a graduate degree and clock in many more years of experience, and none of that seemed likely anyway if she married Frederick, assuming he stayed in the Air Force.

All the practical tasks that needed to be done left Anne with very little time to think but at night, after Grandma went to bed and she had completed everything for the day, sometimes she'd write down everything she wanted to tell Frederick but couldn't say. She'd imagine she was writing to him, and then staple it into her journal or send it to Harriet instead.

Watching tumor markers is like watching the tide - it goes up and down, and all the books and blogs I read tell me it'll become like a riptide in the end, taking on a life of its own with no way to stop it. But now that the tide is ebbing low and lower, I can believe how things can go on this way. After all, there may be many cases I read where someone lives for three, or six, or nine months, but there are also a fair number of people who live two years, five years, even ten years. The medical report said six months, but now it's been six months already and Grandma is still with us, walking, eating, and going out. Chemo has been kind to her, I guess. So what's there to say it can't go on like this for years?

The thing is, no matter how many years it is, it's still never enough once you know for sure it'll end someday. When I'm waiting in the hospital, sometimes the only thing I can think about is when I can go back to enjoying the wider world outside. But at the same time, I don't want time to pass. I want the time to last forever, so Grandma can be with us forever. When I just can't take it anymore, sometimes it helps to just read, or daydream, so I can be somewhere else. It's so boring when time stands still, but if I do anything at all, the day will pass so quickly, and then there's one day less left. I don't know how long more I can carry on like this.

As she wrote, Anne felt the enormity of the Hobson's choice she faced squarely on her shoulders. She didn't want time to pass, and didn't want things to change. Yet if she was to stay with Frederick, surely something would have to change - either he'd have to leave the Air Force, or she wouldn't be able to stay with her family and Grandma. The third possibility was too unthinkable for her at this point; the best case would be to reverse the illness, but since the illness couldn't be reversed, the status quo was the best outcome, the only outcome she could possibly hope for. It was a choice she wished she didn't have to make; in fact, it was a choice she wished nobody else would ever have to make either. But in the end, the Hobson's choice was no choice at all; when facing something as final as death, there was never a way that anything else could possibly win out.

In Anne's imagination, she and Frederick would go their separate ways amicably. He'd understand that everything was for the best, for both of them - he could continue to live a pilot's life without anything else to tie him down, and she wouldn't be stuck in this limbo where she wished Grandma could carry on forever, while at the same time keeping her hopes hinged on a future that didn't include Grandma in the picture. He'd wish her well, and she'd wish him well, and then they'd both move on with their respective lives but remain as friends. She didn't talk to anybody, not even Harriet, about her plan; and as long as nobody gave her a reality check, she was able to keep churning the scenario in her mind, letting it get more real every time she imagined it.

As her farewell present to Frederick, Anne bought the single of "Learning To Fly"; it was the song that had started everything, so it seemed like an appropriate gesture to end things with the same song, as a memento of their time together. The single came packaged together as two songs: "Learning To Fly", and "One Slip". Anne didn't think much about the connotations at the time, though; in her mind, she knew she had no choice but to split with Frederick, and she had fully convinced herself that Frederick would understand that she always had his best interests at heart.


August 2001, Detroit, Michigan

Frederick couldn't wait for the suspense to be over, so he could settle that funny feeling that was starting to well up in the pit of his stomach. Over the past months, he'd sensed that something wasn't right with Anne - she'd been saying less and less in their emails and phone calls, and whatever she said was so vague that he hardly knew what she was doing with her life anymore. A small part of him worried that Anne was getting more and more distant from him, but his confident, sanguine self took over and told him that he was worrying too much; that everything would be all right once they got together and formalized their engagement. After all, Anne was keeping their appointment for the weekend, wasn't she?

He fingered the ring that he was keeping in his pocket, the one he'd quickly popped into an airport jewelry shop to buy. It wasn't as fancy a ring as he could've gotten if he'd waited till he had more time to shop properly in downtown Detroit over the weekend with Anne, as they'd planned; but he was anxious to have a proper token to mark their formal engagement. At least it made things feel a little more certain to him, to counter the tiny doubts that had started creeping into his consciousness from time to time.

Their plan for that weekend was to stay in a hotel in Detroit, to make it easier for both of them to travel up to Grosse Pointe to meet Anne's family. Anne was supposed to check in first so that when he got there, she'd be waiting for him.

Indeed, Anne was there to meet him at the door; but instead of the happy reunion he'd pictured, she looked utterly miserable and dejected. Something definitely wasn't right, and there was no way he could possibly deny it to himself any longer.

"Anne, is something wrong?" he asked.

Yes, thought Anne as she held her chin up defiantly. She wished things could be different, that she could simply launch herself at Frederick and let him comfort her and leave it to him to think of a solution for the entire problem. But that wasn't what she was here for.

"I need to tell you something." She felt like she had to speak faster and faster, before she lost the ability to get the words out. "I've moved home to Grosse Pointe, back with my family."

The shock of this revelation left Frederick totally dumbfounded. Hadn't Anne been working so hard, even prolonging their engagement, precisely because she wanted to be independent from her family? An Anne who'd go running back to her family, tail between legs, after trying out working life for barely a year was entirely alien to him; over the nearly five years he'd known her, he'd thought her to be made of sterner stuff than that.

"My grandma has cancer," Anne carried on explaining. She'd had to say that sentence many times in the past eight months, but this time was the hardest of all. "It's Stage 4. The diagnosis came in January, and I moved back home in February. We've seen her through chemo and radiation, and things are stable now, thankfully. But I'm going to carry on staying here to look after her. I've quit my job at Boeing to do just that."

"And I hope we can still be friends," Anne barreled on. "Congrats again on graduating from UPT - I know you'll really enjoy life as a pilot, and I guess - I guess I wish you well." She pushed past him, across the threshold.

"Friends? What the hell do you mean, friends? I thought when we promised each other, on commencement day - we're more than just friends, and you know it. And now, you're saying you want to be just f***ing friends? I thought I meant more to you than that."

"You do. You always will." In all the scenarios Anne had played in her mind, which actually converted to just one scenario, really - an angry Frederick had never figured. But she was determined to ride through this situation with dignity. "I thought you would understand, though. For as long as I have to look after Grandma, my obligations are here, and there's no way I can possibly join you on base. I'm not going to ask you to quit the Air Force, and I don't think you want to quit the Air Force either. It'd be a total waste of all the effort you put into getting your wings. So there's no way we could possibly be together, and the best I can do for you is to let you go ahead with your plans. And we'll always be friends."

"Didn't you think those promises you made mean something more than that? If you're willing to wait, I'm willing to wait too. It's as simple as that. Is what we have so flimsy to you that you won't even wait for us to be together?"

"Wait? For what?" Anne knew what he was going to say, but she'd still force it out of him anyway.

"Come on. Knock it off. You know there's nothing stopping us from being together after your grandma passes, and that's going to happen sooner or later anyway. You mean enough to me, that I don't mind waiting for us to be together. But what the hell do I mean to you, if you can let go of me as easily as that? We might not even need to wait that long after all - she's what, 70, 75 years old - and she's got cancer -"

"No!" Anne cut in. "That's not what I want at all, and that goes to show you have absolutely no idea what I really want. It's going to be many years, maybe forever, and that's what I really want OK? I want it to be forever. For your information, she's 80 years old, actually, but that doesn't mean you can slap a death sentence on her just like that. Frederick Wentworth, I'm sick and tired of hearing that from everybody, and I thought you, of all people, would know better than that. Anyway, this is for you. I wish you the best of luck." She thrust the gift-wrapped CD into his hand and marched off, walking out of his life, before he could even think of a reply.

Frederick had no idea how long he remained frozen there in the doorway until his brain started processing information again, and realization washed over him in waves.

Anne had moved home; in fact, she'd moved home more than half a year ago and hadn't told him anything about it until now. That had to be the realization which hurt the most of all - they were engaged, and by right that should mean he'd be the first one to know about anything that major in her life. Yet it turned out to be exactly the opposite; all this time, she'd been actively hiding it from him. That explained why she'd been getting more and more vague and evasive over the phone. He wondered when he'd been bumped so far down the food chain of her acquaintances, that after all this time he was probably the last person to know about her move back to Grosse Pointe.

Anne's grandma had cancer, in fact, she was probably dying of cancer. Frederick's concept of cancer was based on the time when his mom had been going through it, and he'd been too young then to really appreciate the daily dance of hope, fear and dread that every cancer caregiver goes through. He only knew the sense of doom and gloom hanging over the household, and his constantly pressing need to escape from it. So although it did register with him that Anne was most likely very distraught and miserable, what he didn't get was that the element of hope was very real to Anne at that point. Based on his family's experience, once things got to Stage 4, it meant things would move on very fast; to him, Anne's denial seemed like a willful rejection of reality.

All that said, Anne was probably feeling really, really lousy, and he'd said nothing at all to comfort her. Frederick's mind switched to an alternate reality, one where Anne would confide all to him, and he'd hold and comfort her. Then they'd both band together to face the future, even if it wasn't the same future that they'd planned a year ago. If his mouth hadn't worked faster than his brain, maybe that reality may have played out, instead of the current stalemate they were in. But then for that to happen, he and Anne needed to be on the same side; and he wasn't so sure she was on the same side as him anymore.


As Anne walked away from the door, she kept her back resolutely turned towards Frederick so he wouldn't see the rivulets of tears running down her face. Once she was out on the street, she walked on and on for what seemed like miles without looking aback, determined that she'd get as far away as possible so Frederick wouldn't find her. Finally, she found a park bench and slumped onto it, and that was when she allowed herself to let go.

She stayed there for two whole hours, immobilized by grief, mourning the loss of the entire life she'd worked so hard to build up: not just her relationship with Frederick, but everything else that came with it - her dreams, her independence, her freedom. Apart from the one fragment of passion she'd retained through her job with Northwest, nothing now remained of the Anne Elliot in MIT. The old Anne had believed she'd have plenty of opportunities to see the world and chase her dreams, but this new Anne would have to give up everything in order to devote herself to her family. But she couldn't complain; everything was a matter of fate and timing, and nobody could have predicted or prevented the diagnosis from happening so soon after her college graduation.

As the sky darkened, she slowly got up and squared her shoulders. It was getting late, and Grandma would be wondering where she was before long, if not already. Now that she had made her choice clear and fully resigned herself to it, the walk back to her car was measured and deliberate. She was no longer in flight, now that she had followed through with her resolution to see through the obligations she'd put upon herself. From then on, she'd devote every fiber of her being to Grandma's needs, and nothing else.


Meanwhile, Frederick was pondering whether he should look for Anne, to try to talk to her and get through to her again; and to take back those hurtful things he'd said to her without thinking. But Anne had never told him her exact address in Grosse Pointe; it hadn't seemed necessary when she'd be going with him when they went to meet her family. If he wanted to seek her out, he'd have to look for Walter Elliot in the telephone book, or even go asking around from door to door. And if after all that effort, he ended up knocking on Walter's door only to be disparaged and insulted by Anne's family on their doorstep, Frederick didn't think he'd be able to take it. Calling Anne wouldn't help either, if she took the call in front of her family; he also couldn't stand the thought of them sniping and sniggering as they listened to her side of their conversation.

He opened the gift, thinking he might be able to find some clues in whatever she'd given to him. It was the CD single of "Learning To Fly", and even though he knew the song almost by heart by now, he still played it hoping he could get some kind of inspiration on what to do next.

The CD had two tracks, and after the familiar song ended, there was another song, something which he'd never really noticed before from the album. But as it played, the chorus stuck in his head:

One slip, and down the hole we fall

It seems to take no time at all

A momentary lapse of reason

That binds a life for a life

A small regret, you won't forget

There'll be no sleep in here tonight

A momentary lapse of reason. He'd been prepared to commit his entire life to her, and now, she'd reduced their entire time together - when they'd been practically the most important people in each other's lives, for God's sake - to just that. So their relationship had been the Track 1 in the CD, and now they were in Track 2, where she was telling him it was all a big mistake. Frederick's imagination now readily supplied all the details that were missing in this puzzle: he could picture how her family must have worked on her after she moved back to Grosse Pointe, convincing her of all the disadvantages of the relationship. They'd probably told her how he'd never be able to provide for her well enough to meet the Elliot standards; that she could do much better for herself if she married someone with money and connections instead. Maybe, there was even some such person in her life already. None of it was true, and in fact the inclusion of the second song had been completely unintentional; but he couldn't possibly know that without talking to Anne, and he wasn't talking to her.

Frederick Wentworth, you sorry sod. That little voice used to play in his head when he was younger, when his harried family members used to say, "Why can't you sit still and be quiet like Ed?" or "Why won't you just go and study, instead of rambling all over the streets and making us worry?" or "Can't you find something useful to do with your time?" all the time. From the day he'd decided to work towards becoming a fighter pilot, that voice had fallen silent and never surfaced again. Until now, that was.

Frederick Wentworth, you sorry sod, the voice said. You thought you were such a smart dude, but now you've been played through and through, and by a girl no less. You've been tying all your hopes to Anne Elliot all this time, and now you finally find out that she's edited you out of her life long ago. When that happened, you didn't even know. That's how stupid you really are.


Chapter Notes:

Canon Notes - Although I changed Frederick's age vs. canon for when they met, by having Frederick and Anne be the same age (so they would have opportunities for a deeper relationship in college), their ages tie-in with canon when they meet and fall in love at age 19 and then break up at age 23, since in canon she is 19 and he is 23 when all of this happens. Although it seems as though Anne made the decision to break off with Frederick on her own without direct influence from Lady Russell / Grandma, the main nuance here is that Anne has internalized all the reasoning from her family members (family won't accept Frederick so she can't live at her family home and be with him at the same time, and it's disrespectful to disobey her elders, especially when Grandma is ill). Previously she thought that she could overcome them, but now that her circumstances have forced her to live with her family, then she thinks she's doing the right thing to both her family and Frederick by breaking off with him, even if it means sacrificing her own happiness. "Had she not imagined herself consulting his good, even more than her own, she could hardly have given him up. The belief of being prudent, and self-denying, principally for his advantage, was her chief consolation, under the misery of a parting, a final parting; and every consolation was required, for she had to encounter all the additional pain of opinions, on his side, totally unconvinced and unbending, and of his feeling himself ill used by so forced a relinquishment."

Crossover Notes - This is a crossover fic with the Pink Floyd song "Learning To Fly" and the way the single is packaged with "One Slip" is factually accurate. It's a nuance that I was able to capitalize on as a plot device, to compound the misunderstandings between them. Also, "A Momentary Lapse of Reason" is the name of the album that the song came from, and lends itself as a motif to the breakup and why it caused such negative emotions for Wentworth.