With such grateful thanks to all the wonderful reviews and follows thus far.

I wish you could properly know my delight!

Chapter Two

Give a Villain a Chance

Gilbert's grin was fixed to his face as he wandered the grounds of Redmond College, in his very first week of classes, sure as he had ever been that his place was here, almost delirious with the thought that his life could finally start. He had felt it on hiatus ever since that dreadful spring when he was still just a boy; when he would awake, in the night, not to the crickets serenading or the rustle of the wind in the trees, but to the sound, muffled but unmistakable, of desperate lungs gasping for air, of the hacking, insidious, ceaseless cough.

And now, he admired the haughty grandeur of the stately buildings, the neat paths, the manicured lawns, even as he acknowledged the irony of the contrast to his cramped, utilitarian, uninspiring boarding house quarters. He had a very definite feeling he would be spending all the time he possibly could outdoors; Kingsport would be made to give up her secrets as Avonlea had, and he would learn in time to navigate her as he had the lanes and fields and dusky red roads of home.

He was not the only one marvelling in his surrounds this early morning; in the distance he could see her, the other side of the nearly empty quad, making him grin to himself as she looked up and around more often than she looked ahead, her arms weighed down by too many books, speaking to her enthusiasm over being here as much as gushing sentiments ever could. He recognised her from his first Literature class only the previous day; if he had been closer to her he would have known her by her intelligent, inquiring grey eyes; her earnest bookworm industriousness, leavened by quick flashes of humour; her ready, knowing smile; but at this, so many paces yet from her, somewhat inevitably, he knew her for her hair.

He was almost at the point of a wave, to attract her attention, but they were on the same path, and would soon meet in the middle. He searched his mind for an amusing anecdote to tempt her, but then was sidetracked by his name, shouted from behind.

"Blythe!"

Gilbert turned to see, somewhat regretfully, that it was one of the fellows from his boarding house. Tall and strapping, with a surface affability that did little to mask a private arrogance. They would probably end up on the football team together, so he couldn't dodge the acquaintance, but it was one that he knew, instinctively, he would take no pleasure in.

"Hey there, Peters."

George Peters slapped him on the back, heartily, his greeting over familiar, in the way of such men.

"Out for your morning constitutional, then, Blythe?" he grinned, looking about as if Gilbert had noticed something in the trees or the flowerbeds that he had missed. "Ah… taking in the sights, I see."

Peters' gaze had fallen on a certain individual, making her way towards them, not having altered her course, Gilbert noted with a certain admiration. The two men slowed, expectantly.

"I think I'm going to like college," Peters muttered under his breath, with a broad smile to Gilbert that could have been a leer.

The young lady paused before them. Indeed she could not pass them without difficulty. They were their own line back; Gilbert reflected uncomfortably on how intimidating the sight of them together in this way must be to her, and stepped to his side.

"Miss… er …" Gilbert hesitated, trying to remember.

"Shirley," she answered firmly, awkwardly adjusting the books in her arms.

"Yes of course, Miss Shirley," he greeted, offering a warm smile. "Good Morning…"

"Miss Shirley, is it?" Peters interrupted with alacrity, not even having the good sense – let alone the good manners – to wait for Gilbert to introduce them. "Pleased to make your acquaintance. George Peters. I'm in rooms with Blythe here. You look rather loaded up – can I offer assistance?"

Peters had stepped forward unsolicited and, obviously alarmed, Miss Shirley had stepped back.

"No thank you, Mr Peters! I'm quite fine with these. I haven't far."

"Sorry, Miss Shirley, we will allow you to be on your way," Gilbert apologised, stepping even further off the path as if overcompensating for his companion, and her huge grey eyes flashed to him with something approaching gratitude, before lighting again on Peters who still stood, blocking her belligerently.

"Thank you, Mr Blythe. Good morning, gentlemen," Miss Shirley responded quickly, head up resolutely, and stalked past them, although her skirts had to come into contact with Peters as he had not moved an iota, which rather contradicted his earlier appearance of chivalry.

Gilbert watched Peters turning to watch Miss Shirley and felt the distaste rise in him, and this was in the full knowledge that he himself had more than once been referred to by Mrs Rachel Lynde as The Great Flirt of Avonlea.

Peters reluctantly turned back, smirking, and Gilbert made a mental note to have as little to do with him as possible.

"Well, Blythe, and what would you call that?"

Gilbert turned away, frustrated, thrusting hands in pockets, fearing his morning had been ruined irrevocably.

"I don't follow your meaning," he frowned.

"The hair! Have you ever seen its' like? Extraordinary! How to even describe it?"

Gilbert considered this, momentarily, pausing to stare into the middle distance. "A flaming sunset," he offered, almost to himself.

"Oh, good God, Blythe!" Peters scoffed. "Save us all from the romantics! Although what should I have expected from an Island boy?"

The remnants of Gilbert's good mood dissolved completely and he found himself scowling like a schoolboy at the jibe. He was not some stupid, backwards provincial. He'd won the Gold Medal at Queens, for goodness sake.

"Well, then," he plucked the first thing that came to mind. "As vivid as … as orange as… a bunch of carrots!"

Peters laughed loudly, obviously easily amused. "Carrots! I like it! All credit to the farmer's son!"

Gilbert began walking, wanting to separate himself from Peters and the entire unfortunate encounter. Unbeknownst to either man, during their conversation, the flame haired young lady in question had dropped one of her many books, requiring her to quickly, silently, double back. Gilbert, uneasy, had gone almost a dozen paces before he had turned, and it was a great relief for him to observe Miss Shirley had made her escape, already far from them, her determined pace so brisk she almost looked at a run.

Anne Shirley, as she had that day a month ago, allowed her fury and mortification to propel her across the quad, walking at such a ferocious pace she almost welcomed the sharp stab of pain to her side, all the better to deflect attention away from her heart constricting in her chest for an entirely different reason. She slowed, taking in great gulps of the air that burned her throat and made her gasp. The heightened wind whipped around her, blowing stray red tendrils into her eyes which she tugged away impatiently, ineffectually. She darted a glance around her; the perfectly calm morning, with its faint, lazy sun, had given way to this growing tempest; the trees disgruntledly swaying; the flowers in their well tended beds buffeted and bent over; the sky beginning to swirl from pale blue to grey, as if Prospero himself was stirring a malevolent spell.

Her temper, which had been brought to heel on a very short leash over a number of painful years, had broken free of her in the worst possible way. The last thing she had wanted to do was to make that painful admission to the very person who had caused it to again rear its head. She had relished this opportunity for a new beginning, where no one knew her, where she could not so much reinvent herself as present to the world the new, improved, enlightened version of Miss Shirley; buffed and polished, with all the little dents and chinks smoothed out. And before that new version was even allowed to take hold she found herself, in Literature class, darting daggered looks, consumed with revenge.

… I could easily forgive his pride, if he had not mortified mine…*

Now Anne sighed and despaired at herself, seeing that her hasty, hot headed journey had taken her in the opposite direction to where her boarding house lay, with the additional definite threat of rain in the air. Perhaps she could skirt around back to her destination via some of the parallel streets in town. She drew her overcoat around her more tightly, head down, prepared to be caught in the inevitable downpour. Really, this was Kingsport, Nova Scotia, not the French Riviera. She should always carry an umbrella at this time of year. Why didn't she bring her umbrella? Because, she sighed again to herself, lustily, it was her Literature class, that's why. And because her head had been full of what she may or may not say to one Mr Blythe this week to worry about such prosaic practicalities.

Anne quickened her pace again, clutching at her satchel protectively. The wind squalled and her hair fought a losing battle with it. At last the fat raindrops began to appear; the prequel to the coming event. She looked up to squint at the sky but all was black.

She looked up, astonished, under the canopy of Gilbert Blythe's umbrella.

"Pardon me – may I offer you – "**

Gilbert Blythe was unable to get the rest of the words out; the heavens opened and all merry hell very literally rained down on them.

"This way, Miss Shirley!" he shouted above the hubbub, half taking her arm and dashing with her ahead, to the edge of campus and through the gates, joining the throng of students who were doing the same with excitable shouts and cries. Gilbert Blythe directed her, not to the nearest building in front of them just outside of the College's surrounds, now being commandeered by half the town population, but around the corner, down the next street, till they came to a generous shop awning. They huddled under it as the rain pummelled them overhead.

Anne gratefully leant against the front of the building, wincing as she clutched at the pain in her side.

"Thank you… for your assistance … Mr Blythe…" she gasped.

Gilbert Blythe had been shaking out and folding his umbrella, barely troubled by their physical exertions. He turned to her now.

"You are very welcome, Miss Shirley," he gave her a careful smile, and then his hazel eyes narrowed. "Do you have a stitch, there?"

"I beg your pardon?"

"A sharp pain in your side. It's caused when our breathing and running are not in time together."

She looked askance at him, nodding quickly as her face contorted and her hand went back to press on her side.

Gilbert Blythe moved closer to her, instructing her over the roar of the rain.

"Just breathe deeply, Miss Shirley, deeply and slowly. Concentrate on the breath. It will pass. We get them all the time in football training." He offered her a loaded look. "Of course our movements are not additionally constricted as they are for ladies."

Anne gave him an astonished glare, momentarily forgetting her pain. Gilbert Blythe had just made reference to her corset. He silently accepted her glare and her admonishment, muzzling a small, shamefaced smile and stepping back from her.

She breathed deeply. She breathed slowly. The pain eased.

Attempting to properly compose herself, she patted down her coat, shook out her skirts, and realised that, apart from her rather sodden boots, she was nearly bone dry. However, in obvious contrast, her companion's dark curls were plastered to his head, his face was dripping with the rivulets that ran down it from said hair, and his coat was wet and heavy. Although his umbrella, which he had stowed under the eaves, was generous in size, he had used it to shelter her completely, leaving himself absolutely exposed to the elements. Anne's brows came together. Such gallantry was not at all what she was used to, and almost impossible to reconcile with the knowledge that he had so carelessly insulted her those many weeks ago.

"Mr Blythe!" she offered in clear dismay. "I am afraid you're soaked!"

He turned back to her from his position scanning the steady rain, a broad grin breaking out on what was, she realised distractedly, a remarkably handsome face.

"It would appear so, Miss Shirley," he offered good naturedly, seemingly unconcerned.

Their eyes met, and then both looked away.

"Miss Shirley – "

"Mr Blythe - " they began simultaneously.

"Miss Shirley," he continued. "As much as I do hold to ladies first, I respectfully ask on this occasion that you hear me out."

Anne could feel the color come to her pale, cold cheeks.

"As you wish, Mr Blythe."

She noted him taking a breath, steeling himself. He approached her with slow steps.

"Miss Shirley, I am so desperately sorry to have caused you offence, and to have just realised that you overheard my stupid, insulting remark, which shouldn't have been for anyone's ears, let alone yours. I regretted it instantly, thinking it was not known to you, and resolved to do better. But now that I know it was heard by you …" he faltered, his hazel eyes showing a flash of contrition, his face etched in regret.

"You hurt my feelings most excruciatingly!"

Gilbert Blythe sighed, deeply. "Yes, I understand. And well might I now understand all the verbal barbs in class you have thrown at me in the wake of my idiocy."

Anne bit the inside of her lip, a little chastened herself. On the strength of one ill judged comment, accidentally overhead, she had launched some stinging attacks of her own, hidden behind the intellectual sparring of their discussions in class. Her anger and mortification had held firm for around a fortnight; thereafter it was easier to continue the vendetta rather than try to explain, even to herself, her desire to abandon it.

Anne crossed her arms in front of her, to both ward off the cold as well as her uneasy conscience.

"And what of the friend with you that day?" she challenged. "He seemed to enjoy your cleverness hugely."

Gilbert Blythe's face darkened by degrees. "Believe me, Miss Shirley, George Peters is no friend of mine, then or now."

She tilted her chin. "I am very glad to hear it."

He smiled knowingly at that, offering a nod of his head in silent acknowledgement. There was a pause.

"I'm sorry, Miss Shirley," Gilbert Blythe offered simply.

His eyes searched hers and held them. His earnestness and sincerity were obvious, even as her pride warred with itself and the memory of the past slights and untold embarrassments of her childhood rose to taunt her. There was, she felt instinctively, no malice in him. Moreover, there was something in that honest, direct, intelligent hazel gaze that caused the pulse to strum in her throat.

She cleared that throat, carefully. "Apology accepted, then, Mr Blythe."

His response was not one of triumph but, surprisingly, of relief, as was his answering smile.

"That is very good to know. Thank you, and please, call me Gilbert."

"Very well then, Gilbert," she couldn't help but meet his grin with a reluctant smile of her own. "And, well, as you know, it's Anne."

"Is that Anne with an e, then?" his tone and look was all innocence even as he tried to hide his smirk, remembering her forceful insistence on the issue of spelling in their very first tutorial.

She refused to be flustered, arching an imperious eyebrow instead. This seemed to please him unduly, and he chuckled and passed a hand through his damp curls, shaking the excess moisture off them.

"Really, Mr - er, Gilbert – you really should abandon that coat. You'll catch your death of cold!"

He made a great show of testing out his sodden coat and shivering on cue. "It would be a small price to pay, Anne Shirley, to have finally gotten off on the right foot," he grinned at her, hazel eyes alight.

"Just so long as you don't again put your foot in it, Gilbert Blythe," she replied sweetly.

He laughed loudly at that, and she allowed her own pleased smile. He leant in close to her.

"I assure you, Anne Shirley, I will tread with the utmost care from now on!"

Anne rolled her eyes at this and almost groaned. "What astonishing wordplay, Mr Blythe! I think you did better with carrots!"

Her teasing grin combined with the green lights in her grey eyes, and his clear surprise at her turning the tables on him, may have caused his cheeks to flush ever so slightly. Although it could, admittedly, have been the cold wind chafing them.

He shook his head at her, his smile wry, and she watched as he walked carefully to the edge of the overhang that had so protected them, looking out again. The rain was finally beginning to ease, after the initial deluge, and the wild wind was dying down. There was almost, now, an unnatural calm descending.

"I'm sure there will be scads of people caught out in this today," Anne ventured, trying her best at something approaching regular conversation, nodding to the rain from their safe haven. "Our classes will probably be half full tomorrow with those laid low by it."

Gilbert's hands were in the pockets of his coat as he turned to her again, and now it was he who rolled his eyes. "Don't believe that old chestnut, Anne. You can't catch a cold from being caught out in it. It doesn't work that way. The common cold is an infection."

She was heartily bemused by his precocious pomposity, and it showed in her answering look and tone.

"Well, thank you very much for that information, Doctor Blythe! Stitches in the side, the cause of the common cold… are we undertaking secret medical training?"

She was astonished to see him pause, stock still, his face taking on a peculiar look that was both eager and embarrassed, as if a boy caught out with some mischief, and unsure as to whether to confess it. He stared at her a long moment before answering.

"Perhaps… perhaps I may wish to, eventually."

Anne blinked, a little incredulous. "You want to become a doctor?"

He contemplated his answer carefully, brows drawn together as he looked away briefly, and then back to her, his expression guarded.

"Yes…" he admitted. "Yes, I have, for a while now. Not that it will do me any good at this stage to even think about it. It's such a long way off that the very idea is slightly ridiculous…" he grimaced, suddenly chagrined.

"No, it's not ridiculous, Gilbert," she was quietly admiring, her huge grey eyes suddenly serious on his.

He stared at her further, as if judging her response, before offering a smile that was almost shy, pacing again up and down. He stopped and ran a hand again through his drying curls, causing them to stand to attention at entirely disparate angles, like drunken soldiers.

"Well, all it amounts to at the moment is dipping into a few medical texts," he shrugged, "which is hardly anything very noteworthy. Although… the idea that I might be interested in a medical career at all is… well … it's rather a little known fact. I'd like to keep it that way, if you don't mind, Anne."

"Of course…" she nodded, unhesitatingly.

"Thank you," he expelled a breath. "Keeping my secrets, now. That's a little way along from debating Dickens." He quirked a smile, and his look was searching. "It's something that a friend would do, come to think of it."

He let the idea sit with her. Anne was disturbed by the warmth that flooded her cheeks at this most audacious prospect, untenable even hours ago.

"Do you think we could be friends, Anne?" he queried, smiling. "It's not quite so draining on the psyche as me being your mortal enemy, surely? And I think …" here he paused, and then grinned leadingly, "I think, despite all appearances to the contrary, that we might be rather good at it."

Anne blushed even more fully, much to her annoyance. She flashed a look at him, registering his imploring hazel gaze, his knowing, sardonic smile, those damnably desirable dark curls.

"I would have thought the recently elected President of Freshman Year to be overrun with all manner of friends, Mr Blythe," she offered a little archly, grasping at her last line of defence.

He looked to consider her response carefully. "Why yes indeed, Miss Shirley," he answered with mock gravity, nodding, though the twinkle in his eye clearly betrayed him, "though it would be refreshing to have one friend who was at least as smart as me."

She didn't want to give him the satisfaction of her pleased smile but it escaped regardless, cantering away from her.

Gilbert seemed to sense his advantage, because he leaned in again, conspiratorially. "And I don't really mind Dickens.''

She reddened dangerously, and couldn't possibly look at him in that moment, so she turned her attention to the view of the street, noticing for the first time that the clouds had emptied themselves, and all was finally calm and quiet and still.

Friends. Her throat closed painfully around the word. Gilbert Blythe evidently collected friends with the insulting ease of a tall flower attracting bees. They buzzed around him excitedly, male and female alike, jostling for prime position, in a frenzy of swarming adulation. How was he to know of the exquisite agony of the moments before acceptance or, more likely, of rejection? Of serving your heart up on a platter, either to be consumed entirely or chewed and spat out at will?

Anne had hardly collected any friends not of the imaginary variety, growing up. Except for that one boy of long ago; tall and tow haired, gangly and good natured, and best forgotten. Friendships with men she was not adept at handling either; they regarded her curiously, like some unusual zoo exhibit, not quite sure how to take her. Or else they looked at her like George Peters had looked that day, quietly assessing, with a cutthroat's smile.

But the man standing patiently with her, this moment, didn't look at her or through her, and yet still seemed to see her.

She took a halting breath.

"Dickens…" Anne now answered, finally looking back to him, acquiescing to inevitable defeat, "is probably best left off the table, between friends, Gilbert Blythe," she smiled into his eyes, but then her own narrowed in challenge. "However, if you come in merry defence of Mr Thomas misogynist Hardy next week, I might have to break something over your head!"

Gilbert Blythe, who had thought he had lost her for a moment there, that she had journeyed momentarily to a place to which he could never follow, now rewarded her with his most appealing grin, hands raised in surrender.

"Your warning is duly noted, Miss Shirley!" he laughed.

Chapter Notes

"If I had to have villains at all, I'd give them a chance, Anne – I'd give them a chance."

(Anne of the Island Ch.12)

*Elizabeth Bennet in Pride and Prejudice (Ch. 5) [Naturally]

** "Pardon me – may I offer you the shelter of my umbrella?" (Anne of the Island Ch.25)