Chapter Text
Winifred had been understandably upset by the turn of events— something Gilbert found himself bracing for from the moment he set out for Charlottetown early that morning, all the way up until he’d sat down with her in her parent’s drawing room and revealed that he couldn’t in good conscience go forth with proposing to her. Not when his heart already belonged to someone else.
What Gilbert hadn’t expected was for Winifred to suss out the person responsible for his change of heart…
“It’s Anne, isn’t it?” she asks after regaining her composure.
Gilbert’s brows shoot up toward his hairline at her remark. In truth, he’d had every intention of keeping Anne’s name out of the conversation entirely. But once Winifred herself had spoken her name aloud, Gilbert found that he couldn’t bring himself to deny that it was true.
“How did you…?”
“Gilbert, I’m not blind. I saw the way you looked at her at the fair,” she says through a watery laugh. “I knew you were…but I had hoped that…well, that maybe you might one day look at me that way-- like...like I'd gone and hung the moon and all the stars up in the sky."
“Winifred, I’m so sorry. I never meant to lead you on. I never meant to hurt you,” Gilbert reiterates— an echo of the words he’d spoken toward the beginning of their conversation.
“I hope you know that I did care for you— I do care for you— just not…”
His sentence trails off, but Winfred is quick to pick it up. “I know, Gilbert. I won’t lie to you. I’m disappointed…and a little embarrassed, but…but you should marry for love— if you’re lucky enough to come across it in life.”
“I’m not even sure if she’ll have me after all of this— after what I’ve put her through— put the both of you through,” he confesses before he can stop himself.
Winifred raises a single, delicately gloved hand and Gilbert watches as it inches toward his forearm. She hesitates at the last moment, as though thinking better of it, and instead lets her hand fall back onto her lap. A sense of relief washes over Gilbert when she doesn’t go through with trying to comfort him— he’s not sure he’d be able to bare it if she’d tried. Especially not right now when he feels as though he’s the least deserving of her kindness.
“She will,” Winifred says firmly.
“How do you know?” he whispers back.
“Because Anne loves you too,” she says through a sad smile. “The way you look at her? It’s how she looks at you when you’re not looking back.”
“I hope you find that someday Winifred,” Gilbert says meaningfully. “You deserve to be with someone who looks at you as though you're their whole world.”
Winifred says nothing in return but she tucks her chin, eyes downcast toward the hands that rest in her lap, and Gilbert looks away, offering her a small semblance of privacy as she collects herself.
When she finally does speak, it’s in a clipped and clinical tone— one that Gilbert certainly can’t begrudge her for.
He listens intently as she explains she still plans to leave for Paris in two weeks as originally intended, protesting only when Winifred states that she’d prefer he not be around when she tells her mother and father that Gilbert won’t be proposing. She’s quick to cut him off when he does though. And there’s a chill in her voice as she reminds him that she’s the one being put out, so the least he can do is let her deal with this on her own terms.
It’s later than Gilbert anticipates when he finally gets on the train back to Avonlea, leaving Charlottetown behind with a heart that’s feeling much lighter than it’s felt over the course of the past twenty-four hours.
He’s the first one off when the train pulls in to the Bright River station and Gilbert wastes no time in retrieving his horse from the nearby stables, making quick work of paying the stable hand before riding off post-haste to Green Gables.
A sense of relief washes over him when he finally spots the distinct facade of the Cuthbert’s residence up ahead in the distance, followed quickly by a swarm of butterflies that infiltrate his stomach. He’s still not sure what Anne will say. He’s not even sure if she bothered read the letter he’d poured his heart into the night before…he thinks he wouldn’t blame her if she’d instead opted to rip the letter up into a thousand tiny pieces without a second thought.
Gilbert can’t bring himself to harp on the what-if’s for long though— not when Anne is just within reach.
And it’s the realization that he’ll soon be seeing her in the flesh again— this time without any obstacles in the way, and with all of his feelings laid bare between them— that has Gilbert’s heart maddeningly fluttering away in his chest as he dismounts his trusty steed and makes to tie him up near the Cuthbert’s barn.
It’s only when he comes around to the other side of his horse that he realizes he’s got company.
“What are you doing here?” Jerry asks, arms crossed defensively over his chest.
“Hello to you too, Jerry,” Gilbert replies, confused as to why the Cuthbert’s usually jovial farmhand suddenly looks like he might, at any moment, thwack Gilbert over the head with the rake he’s holding.
“I just came to see Anne…” he adds hesitantly.
Jerry mutters a few words in French that Gilbert doesn’t understand before he switches back to English.
“Some nerve you have coming here— especially after what you did to her.”
The way Jerry’s acting toward him now has Gilbert recalling a story Bash once told him back when they were new friends shoveling coal on the Primrose— a tale of how hard he once had to work to win the approval of a girl’s older brother back in Trinidad, just so he could earn the right to ask the the girl in question if she might fancy taking a stroll around the center of town with him.
“Consider yourself lucky, Blythe,” Bash had teased as he elbowed him in the ribs. “At least your Anne doesn’t have any brothers you’ve got to get past before you can get to her!”
Anne and Jerry might not have been related by blood, but Gilbert knows better than anyone that sharing a bloodline wasn't exclusively needed to form a familial bond. So perhaps he shouldn’t have been all that surprised that Jerry was currently doing a fantastic job of playing the part of a protective older brother.
“Anne…told you?” Gilbert asks, stomach knotting, brow furrowing.
A pang of dread seeps into his heart. He’d spent all of last night and all of today desperately clinging to the hope that there might still be a chance…but if Anne was as upset as Jerry was implying…
“Non, not exactly,” Jerry concedes, pulling Gilbert from his spiraling thoughts. “I just…overheard her talking to Butterscotch this morning— it’s not a very big barn, and Anne can be very loud when she’s passionate about something.”
“She was…talking to a horse. About me?” Gilbert asks, voice tinged in befuddlement.
“It’s Anne,” Jerry says with a shrug, as though Gilbert should know better than to question anything Anne ever does, no matter how peculiar.
“Look, Jerry. I’m not sure what you overheard but I am sorry-- believe me when I say there’s no one who hates me more than I hate myself right now,” Gilbert says earnestly. “But I love her, and I need to make this right. If only for her sake. Anne deserves that much at least.”
Jerry holds Gilbert’s gaze with a steely stare of his own, one that Gilbert doesn’t dare back down from— not even after he starts to feel a bit uncomfortable under the scrutiny.
“Vous l’aimez? You love her?”
“Yes. I love her,” Gilbert says solemnly. “I’ll only ever love her.”
Jerry drops the defensive stance he’s been holding ever since Gilbert arrived, and Gilbert, in turn, feels his own body relax. He can’t, however, help the way his features tug into a frown when Jerry tells him that Anne isn’t actually home at the moment.
“I wish I could tell you where she’s gone,” Jerry says apologetically. “Wherever Anne was going, she seemed to be in a hurry to get there.”
“It’s alright Jerry— thanks anyway,” Gilbert replies as he unties his horse and prepares to hop back on. “If you do happen to see her…could— could you tell her that I stopped by, and that I’ll try again later?”
“Oui.”
“Oh, and Gilbert?” Jerry adds, just as he’s got one foot in the stirrup. The other boy waits until he looks over before he continues. “If you hurt her—”
“I won’t— not ever again,” he finds himself promising before Jerry can even finish his sentence.
“But if you do…”
“If I do, you have my permission to do your worst— I won’t even put up a fight,” Gilbert vows.
Jerry nods his head in approval as an impish grin blooms over his face. “We both know that it’s Anne who would, as you say, ‘do her worst.'"
Gilbert laughs in agreement, knowing Jerry's warning to be true. He thanks him for his time, before bidding Jerry farewell as he sets off in the direction of his own home.
As he nears the gate at the edge of Green Gables, he hears Jerry call out an enthusiastic “bonne chance!” to him from where he’s already working away once more among the crops, and Gilbert smiles, thoroughly appreciative of the well wishes.
He knows Anne would hate the idea of any potential suitor feeling as though they had to gain anyone’s blessing— least of all a man’s blessing— before asking her to court. At the same time, Gilbert can’t help but feel a bit pleased over the fact that he’s earned Jerry’s approval. More than anything, his heart swells (as it tends to do) whenever he’s reminded of the fact that Anne has people like Jerry in her life who love her so, they’d do anything to ensure her well-being.
The sun is hanging low in the sky by the time Gilbert finally reaches the edge of the Blythe-Lacroix property, and it bathes the expanse of land before him in a golden light. He’s always thought the orchard looked particularly breathtaking in the golden hour, and Gilbert gives himself purchase to pause and marvel at how the afternoon glow makes the rich browns and deep greens of the apple trees seem all the more vibrant.
It’s a flash of red, seeping through the earth tones like a fiery flame that finds Gilbert rubbing at his eyes and feeling like he must be imagining things. As though his desperation to see Anne again has prompted his mind to start playing tricks on him by conjuring up bits and pieces of her in the world around him.
When he spots the same flash of red again though, it seems too coincidental for it to be but a mere mirage. He ties his horse up to a nearby fence and treks on foot toward where he can still make out that same glorious burst of red peeking through the leaves.
Picking apples in his orchard is the last place he thought he’d ever find Anne. That’s exactly where she is though, and Gilbert looks his fill as he watches her stretch up to pluck a ripe apple from the branches up above. When she does, the light of the golden hour catches in her hair, lights it up into a thousand different shades of burnt orange and crimson. It’s not unlike the way she looked just the night before when Gilbert had come across her twirling in the firelight. Once again he finds himself feeling breathless at Anne’s expense, hardly able to wrap his head around the fact that he’s lucky enough to exist in the same world, at the same time, in the same place as she does.
He doesn’t even realized he’d been slowly moving toward her— enchanted like a sailor to a siren’s call— not until a twig snaps under the weight of his boot, startling him out of his trance-like state, while simultaneously cluing Anne in to his presence.
Anne stares at him for a moment when she sees him, frozen for a second on the tips of her toes, one hand wrapped around another large apple hanging just above her head. She plucks it from the branches before planting her feet back on the ground and turning to face him full-on.
She takes a step toward him and Gilbert mirrors her action, heart racing as she pegs him with an unreadable expression. He's got no time to think on it though because suddenly Anne is hurling the apple she’s just picked straight at him.
Gilbert dodges it, staring as the fruit hits the ground and rolls past him before looking back up at Anne, eyes wide. And that’s when he sees it— the heat simmering beneath her icy grey-blue stare.
“THAT is for carelessly dumping all that information about Paris, AND the Sorbonne, AND Winifred on me when you knew I wasn’t in the right frame of mind to receive it!”
Gilbert opens his mouth to apologize. He doesn’t get the chance though because Anne has already reached back into the satchel she’s got looped around one arm to procure another apple. She hurls that one right at him too, missing again— but just barely.
“THAT is for unburdening your heart in a note and then just up and disappearing without telling ANYONE when you’d be back, or how long you’d be gone!”
She throws a third apple at him then, and this one hits Gilbert square in the head— fittingly, quite close to where Anne once smacked him with her slate on the first day they’d met.
“And THAT one is for...well...I’m not quite sure— but I’m sure you deserved it!”
“I definitely deserved it,” Gilbert winces as he rubs at the tender spot on his head.
He flinches when he sees Anne reach back toward the bag, thinking she’s not done using him for target practice just yet. She bypasses in favor of slipping her hand into her pocket before procuring a folded up piece of paper with her name scrawled across the front in his penmanship.
She lets the bag of apples fall to the floor at her side before she holds up his letter. “Did you mean what you wrote in here? Really mean it?”
“Every word,” Gilbert says ardently.
“Anne...Anne, I’m so sorry. I’ve been so stupid, and so foolish. And I’ll understand if you need time or space. I’ll give it to you if that’s what you want— I’d give you anything you ask me to— so long as you promise you’ll let me try and make it up to you someday,” Gilbert continues. “Please…just promise me you’ll give me the chance to show you I’m worthy enough to be on the receiving end of your affection.”
“Time…space…it’s what I should want-- it’s what I should make you give me…” Anne whispers as she takes a step closer. And another. And then another, until she's standing right in front of him.
“The thing is, Gilbert…I’ve been thinking while you’ve been away all day…” she reaches up to touch the spot where her apple hit him, fingers gently probing over the small bump that's already starting to form against his scalp.
“You have?” he asks, faintly— in part due to her intoxicatingly close proximity, and in part due to the fact that he’s still got no idea where she’s going with this. No idea whether this is the part where she’ll crush his heart, or make it feel as though it’s in danger of flying straight out of his chest.
“I have,” she continues. “And I came to the conclusion that I’m sick and tired of depriving myself of what I actually want…it seems silly, really. That I should convince myself I’d be fine with settling in love, when I have no intentions of settling in other aspects of life.”
Anne’s words offer Gilbert a glimmer of hope to grasp on to. He thinks he understands, but miscommunication is what got them into this mess in the first place, and it’s taught him that it doesn’t do either of them any good to live off of assumptions. He needs to hear her say it again now that she’s sober— to spell it out for him in a way that leaves no room for confusion.
“I love you, Anne. With all of my heart— with all that I am, and I can only hope…” Gilbert can hear the desperation in his own voice when he speaks, wonders if Anne can hear it too, tries not to harp on it either way as he swallows thickly and pushes on-- posing the one question he’s been longing to hear her answer.
“I have to ask— just to be sure-- do you truly have feelings for me?"
"Didn't you hear what I said?" she asks, a small smile beginning to bloom across her face when it dawns on her that she's repeating the same words the alcohol pulled from her lips the night before.
"I said I love you, Gilbert Blythe— in spite of everything, I still love you,” Anne continues as she slides her other hand up his arm and onto his shoulder. “And maybe I'm still a little bit mad at you...but I figured you can start making it up to me tomorrow…”
He stays stock still as Anne rises up on her toes, her mouth so close to his he can feel her breath fan across his lips as she says her next words. “I think we’ve both suffered enough heartache for today though, don't you?"
Gilbert lost track of how many hours he’s spent reading about the human brain and the central nervous system long ago. He thought he understood, but no amount of time spent studying medical texts could have possibly prepared him for the way his brain short circuits the moment Anne’s lips finally touch his— or for the way that his entire body thrums with indescribable energy when she softly trails the hand in his hair down his jaw before using it to cup the back of his neck. It’s even better when he finally regains control of his limbs and wraps his arms tightly around her waist and pulls her closer, mouth parting against hers as he kisses her back with all the years worth of love he's been keeping tightly bottled up inside for far too long.
Tomorrow, he’ll do as she says and start making it up to her. Tomorrow will mark the start of a lifetime he’ll spend at her side, doing everything in his power to ensure his Anne with an E never questions the undying love he has for her ever again-- marveling every day over how lucky he is that out of anyone Anne Shirley-Cuthbert could have chosen to love, she chose him.
Today though, Gilbert wants nothing more than to stay just as they are, tucked away among his father's apple trees with Anne’s fingers tangled in his hair as he kisses her senseless for as long as she’ll allow him to-- wrapped up in the knowledge that, by some miracle, Anne loves him just as much as he loves her.