Anne Shirley Blythe-I'm glad my ideas and thoughts about it worked for you on Anne and Gilbert stance about Rilla own truths. I hope this chapter gives you more happy feels for these two. I had loads of fun writing it, and they are super sweet!
The second night he's at Ingleside, everyone is asleep but for some reason, Ken can't. He goes as silently as he can downstairs, only to see a faint glow of the lamp coming from the living room draws his attention. Unlike his parent's house, she hadn't crawled into his bed, instead he sees her there a vision of cotton and lace curled up in a chair. Tears streaked down her face, pale as marble and her hair brushed out and let wild.
She looks at him quickly drying her eyes
"I'm sorry I didn't mean to disturb you," he says. "Why are you crying?"
Rilla shrugs a thin shoulder, pulling her shawl around her more. "I was just…sometimes I cry when I'm tired and can't sleep?"
"Can't your father can help you if you ask?" Ken speaks quietly.
"I guess, but I don't like how it makes me feel in the morning. So I just sit down here until I'm almost asleep. I make up stories about the ghosts that wander around in my head until I can't anymore." Ken nods his head as if he understands.
"Do you want more water?" He asks her noticing an empty glass. She looked at him with hollow eyes and nodded her head meekly. He moves to take her glass, but she doesn't move away from him the closer he is to her. He brings her more water, and some for himself as well from the pitcher of drinking water from the ice box.
"Sit with me?" She asks him quietly. Moving the quilt to allow him to sit across from her. Her white little feet poke out for a moment before she hides them from view.
Her feet were on his lap sometime later, his hands tracing around her ankle and the top of her foot, to the bottom of her calf.
Can I kiss you?
That is all he wants to ask but doesn't. She looks at him heavy through her lashes tired, but somehow less hollow and more present as her tears have dried over her cheeks. Still, her entire look is a kiss in itself, and her the closer she gets to him the more his heart beats. It wasn't until she wiggled closer toward him, partly for his warmth he guesses but it reminds him of Christmas and makes her smile.
He can't help himself now, it's hesitant, as his lips find hers. He shouldn't be doing...they shouldn't be but she is too sweet to not allow her this moment. To show her that things didn't have to be frightening. She's still to entirely innocent kissing him though, but with each kiss she gives but she's an ounce braver and timid at the same time. Even more so then earlier that afternoon.
They've never kissed in such a way, it has always been with one of them going away. Innocent pecks of lip lock, occasionally lasting more than a moment.
He doesn't even think of it at first, pulling on her lower lip with his for the briefest moment. She shyly returned the next time she pulled away slightly to change the angle, which caught him off guard and sent a shiver done his spine. Next, when he let his tongue run over the seam of her lips, she instinctively opened them. She makes a small gasp but doesn't pull away from him when she feels his tongue. Slightly confused, and doesn't quite make sense of what to do. It takes a moment for her to even consider trying to imitate his moves, subtly at first, shyly letting her tongue touch his.
She's only heard whispers of kisses like this. She never imagined she would like or enjoy another person's tongue in her mouth, or hers in another mouth. She pulls away when she feels her breath gone, her face flushed in the lamplight as she looks at him with swollen lips. There's a strange tremble in her stomach, butterflies? People always spoke about butterflies but never understood it.
She likes kissing, she likes kissing him she decides to lean in for more. She doesn't know what to do with her hands, but the find their way awkwardly on his shoulders. This time it starts as the last ended, and she finds herself closer to him his one arm around her waist, his other has his fingertips trailing down her spine. She has to remind herself to breathe. His hands are on her shoulders, playing with the strap of her chemise.
When it happens as fast as lightning, one moment she is enjoying herself and the next she is scattering away from him. Her chest heaving and her legs are awry as she looks at him like a frightened deer.
"I am so sorry," he rushes out to say. Her hair is glowing embers in the light of the fire, the cotton lawn of her chemise shining through the loose material. If she only knew how she looked to him, how the cream and roses of her skin looked like stained ivory if she only knew that the outline of her breasts, and the dusty rose beneath was on display. It didn't matter now, and if she had any idea it would only make her recoil further as his touch burned now, in a strange mix of cruelty and want, as images assaulted her mind. Their laughs echo in her head as she looks around the room.
Deep breaths
Something broke through to her. He didn't try and touch her anymore.
"It's okay, I'm sorry," he whispers. "I shouldn't have…I got way ahead of myself."
Rilla can only shake and nod her head not sure what she really felt or wanted now.
"Bed, I think I need a bed," Rilla tells him and Ken nods his head. He brings her to her room quietly and settles her into her bed.
"Stay until I fall asleep?" She asks him and he looks at the other bed and nods his head. He sits down, only a few moments later deciding to use the pillow as she watches him in the darkness.
They couldn't be doing anything inappropriate if they were in separate beds. He wakes up with the sun shining through her window and her bedroom door open but no one says anything to him or Rilla when they show up at the breakfast table. Even the quilt on the sofa was neatly folded, which had memories of their kiss burned into both of their brains.
She eats slowly, still yawning.
"Sleep a bit more, then we'll head into town," Ken tells her quietly, but she shakes her head.
"I'm fine, really," she tells him. Dipping her toast into her egg and eating it delicately. Ken wanted to go into town to the Island Bank and put her name on the registrar that allowed her to access funds without having to ask her parents and she could. Also, it was a place to deposit her own money once he enlisted and she received her separation allowance. Mostly she was happy to be away from the twins after Nan caught her and Ken embracing as they kept giving her a look over the breakfast table, while Walter brooded about or sighed when Nan teased Rilla about it seeing them kissing. They all settle in the living room after breakfast, trying to plan out their days while Ken went to get his wallet and other things from upstairs.
"I thought you were over this," Rilla looks at her brother from his spot on the sofa. "You were fine over Christmas."
"You weren't kissing in bedrooms back then," Walter says pointedly.
"If I can't kiss the man I am wed to, who can I kiss!" Rilla's voice rises with the injustice of it.
"I don't care as long as I don't have to see it," Shirley chips in as he takes a bit of his apple. "Walt is just begrudging because he can't decide on what to do now that school is done with."
"And what about you?" Walter retorts back stretching his long legs out. "You're eighteen now?" He says in a tone that their parents and Susan have been walking on eggshells ever since his birthday on April Fools Day, of all the days to have as a birthday.
"I have ideas and plans," Shirley says shrugging so nonchalantly. "Una is in the back with Susan also she just stopped by? If you want to…" he adds on. Walter looks at him and stands up righting his waistcoat in the process.
"I told Alice I would help her with…summer coursework," Walters says after a moment before leaving the room. Walter spent most days since his return leaving whenever Una was around, or with fair haired Alice Parker. Even when Nan tried to tell him that Alice was part of the group that had been talking about Rilla, he just didn't believe it, Alice wouldn't hurt him like that?
Rilla looks at the twins both ready to say something but is ultimately startled as she feels someone wrap an arm around her waist. An apology is murmured in her hair. Just Ken, another person she was losing to this blasted war.
Kissing the crook of her shoulder which she decided at that moment she oddly liked
"Are you ready to go?" He asks her, ignoring everyone. The twins giggle, and Shirleys eye roll.
Rilla nods her head.
They make it into town and the first stop is the bank, which takes a moment but not overly complicated. The most she felt was embarrassment even though the bank man already knew the story.
"I don't think I need it," Rilla tells him looking at the bank book. She had never seen so much money, did her father have this amount? He bought Ingleside after a year of marriage…while paying rent.
"Take it if I can get a lieutenant commission that's thirty dollars a month, save it if you need to. I know your parents will support you, but save it for a rainy day, save it just in case I don't come back." Ken says quietly at the end.
"You'll come back," Rilla tells him shaking her head and Ken can only smile back at her wearily.
"I promised Mom and Dad I would look in on the summer house," Ken says after a moment. "You don't have to come with me, but I do need to stop by." Rilla looks at him, the summer house to him, was her parent's first little house of dreams. Funny how they mean different things.
"But if you can try, I would like you to know what to do and where the keys are. Dad told me if we wanted it one day it could be ours…"Ken trails off. "He doesn't realize, but I told him that was extremely thoughtful of him."
"It is," Rilla says quietly. "I can manage the house…I think I can anyway?" She tucks her arm into his and smiles at him, trying for it to be genuine but it falters slightly. Ken can only shake his head, and kiss swiftly in the middle of the town. Not caring who was around to see, even if she blushes and looks away from him. They walk Harbour Road, eventually hand in hand as no one else is about, sneaking about the trees to steal kisses.
"I do like kissing you," She whispers with a small giggle against his lips.
"Those are the best words I have ever heard," Ken grins, pulling her closer to him, and wrapping his arm around her waist. "We should continue though."
Rilla can only nod her head and then finally make it to the old house. To think her parents lived here, that Joy had lived and died here few hours, that Jem spent half of his infancy in the house before the Fords bought it and Ken and Persis spent their summers here. A small addition was added on for another room, but otherwise, it was still the same papers and floors.
She had been young though that last time she and her mother had come to visit Aunt Leslie, but she remembers it well. Still, it felt different this time around, maybe it was the fact that she was with Kenneth's wife now? That they could live here? Did she want to live here, knowing how close it was to 'there'?
"This was your room?" Rilla looks around the blue room, oak furniture and an old iron bed, she sits down on it, ignoring the dust covers. Ken can only grin and shake his head. The bed was little rumpled, but she playfully kissed him and if he kept his hands around her waist and not touch her shoulders she stayed in the moment, the happy moment.
They walk back through old trails on their way back to Ingleside before Rilla stops at the fork in one of the roads. "Minnie lives up here, do you mind?" Rilla asks him.
"Of course not, I've heard a fair about about her, might as well meet her?" Ken says letting her go first before falling into place.
"It's nothing grand or anything," Rilla warns him. "But it's quaint and clean."
"I have seen every sort of place Rilla, I may like in Toronto but I travelled to Japan with father as a child, and other places over the years," Ken reminds her.
Rilla only nods her head and the closer they get, you see Minnie Anderson hanging up her washing that she just scrubbed, flannel diapers and little rompers and nightgowns.
"Rilla, I wasn't expecting you," Minnie says waving hello. "Who is this?"
"Oh, this is Ken," Rilla blushes.
"Kenneth Ford," Ken says nodding his head. "I have heard a good deal about you, it a pleasure to meet you."
"All good things I hope, and likewise," Minnie smiles watching Rilla stoop down and pick up her son from his basket.
"And this is Little Jims," Rilla tells Ken. "Can you wave hello to Ken for me?" She says to the infant child in a whisper but Little Jims hides into her shoulder.
"He's a decorative kid," Ken states with a smile. "He likes Rilla doesn't he?" He watches Little Jims cuddle into Rilla even more.
"He does doesn't he, sometimes I feel like his first words will be Aunty Rilla," Minnie laughs. "Would you like some iced tea?"
"If you're offering, please," Ken says and follows her inside the simple house that Rilla once called shabby and threadbare, but these days it's cheerful and clean and with the separation pay, that was spent on things other than ale and cigarettes not that Rilla knew anything about that. The small house felt more like a cheerful home than what Rilla walked into months ago.
"So how long are you here for?" Minnie asks Ken as he sits down on the sofa before Rilla plants herself at his feet.
"Three weeks, and then I will be back to Toronto and hand in my papers," Ken says quietly. "Rilla told me that your husband is at the front?"
"James is," Minnie says with a nod of her head. "Even before Canada joined in he was gone. Rilla hasn't stopped for the past week about your arrival though, It's nice to see her so calm and smiling."
"Minnie!" Rilla says from her spot on the floor with the baby and his toys.
"Don't Minnie me, I had to hear about it," Minnie tuts her with a grin. "It's nice to put a face to the name, of course, I know your family vacationed here over the years, and you have kin here but Rilla talked about much more than all of that."
"Yes, well, I am sure my friends who were still in school might say the same," Kenneth coloured slightly and took a drink of the cold tea.
"You are very brave to do what you did," Minnie tells him as Rilla moves off the floor with Jim to fix his wet flannel in the small bedroom.
"Not really brave at all, just selfish in a way," Ken says quietly with a shrug. "I am just glad that she trusts me and isn't afraid of me."
"She has a good sense of people, good and bad and she felt awful about the Fred situation I think a part of that was being afraid he if knew the truth he would hurt her in some way," Minnie tells him as Rilla comes back into the room.
"What are you going on about?" She settles by Ken's feet again.
"Oh you know, this and that, warning Ken that I don't want to hear about any little Kens running about, even if Jims would love a playmate," Minnie grins at her as Rilla's mouth drops slightly.
"Minnie!" Rilla's mouth drops slightly but her indignation is from all her embarrassment.
"I am kidding," Minnie says laughing and Rilla sticks out her tongue, but her mind travels. She likes kissing him...but could she ever like something enough to even contemplate that sort of physical relationship? Would he ever want it? What if she couldn't...even if she liked kissing him as she did? Ken gives her a look raising an eyebrow and she blushes, catching Minnie's look of interest.
"I'll remember that when your birthday comes about," Rilla says switching to airs. Minnie was turning twenty-four this year and Rilla already had her gift picked out. "Oh Jims, don't grumble like that," she says turning back to Jims who squealed and threw his toys for attention. As for Ken, he didn't think spending the afternoon watching Rilla be on the floor playing with an infant would be such a thing that would be burned into his memory for years to come. Especially knowing how much she suffered from the previous fall. Yet, it was something that he couldn't get out of his mind watching her with the little boy as Minnie and him conversed freely about his school, and things about the war.
"She fell asleep on us," Minnie whispers looking at Rilla who was curled up with Jimmy in his own nap time. "She does this a lot since she doesn't sleep a lot, but I am glad you are here right now truly Mr. Ford. It's nice to see her happy. There are days at a time where she struggles a lot."
"I see it in her letters as well, I worry about her a lot," Ken nods his head. "It's Ken as well, please," he corrects her looking at Rilla curled up form with the infant.
"We all do Ken, she's come a long way of course, but some days it's like she's right back there and it's just heartbreaking," Minnie tells him. "Just don't break her heart and not come back, so one day you can show her that love can be something special."
I hope everyone is enjoying this and if you have a spare moment I appreciate all comments and hearing your favourite parts of this story so far!
Tina