This one's a biggin'! Well, in comparison to the others so far :P I just couldn't find it in me to cut out one of the gifts.
Thank you to everyone who had been sending me get-well reviews :P I am going to bed right this very second and hopefully shall wake up to a less blocked nose!
xx
G is for the gifts you've given me over time. Both material and otherwise. The linen kerchief, the book of Whitman and the tiny porcelain dove. Of course, there were more and the gifts you've imparted me with in a less material sense have stayed with me to but it was those three things that I still have to this day.
I suppose the handkerchief wasn't originally a gift but you never asked for it back and when I did offer it back to you, you waved me away. So I kept it and, as such, I shall consider that scrap of linen embellished with your initials and pretty little vines your first gift to me. I guarded that damn thing with my life. Part of me liked to pretend it was a token of your affections (terribly sappy, I know) but a larger part of me simply enjoyed being able to keep a small piece of you. It was my lucky charm and even when it lost your scent I couldn't bear to part with it. Even now it sits in my bedside table, folded and pressed so that whenever I open the draw, I can see your embroidered initials.
To be honest, I wasn't so fond of Whitman until you gave me that book. I thought it to be the strangest gift I received that Christmas, the dedication in the front of the book made me smile. Knowing you were still thinking about me even though we'd not seen each other in years had me in the best of spirits. I think I frightened some of my little employees that year. I was so terribly thankful I'd actually gotten you something that year. Of course, I still hadn't decided whether or not to send it but your gift, whilst endearing me to the poet, tipped my decision and I sent the shawl the very next day.
And that brings us to the dove. I think it's one of the few gifts you gave me in those later years. I honestly thought you hated me towards the end. It's why I contacted you to help me die. I wanted more than anything for you to drag me back to the Sanctuary to hide me away though I didn't think it would happen. Then you gave me the dove the very first night you arrived. I kept it with me the entire time I was in hiding and now it sits with your handkerchief.
G is for the gits you gave me that kept my hopes up.