Altering Friendship | Shirbert | Anne with an E

Chapter 2

Anne woke up feeling...odd. She rubbed her eyes and squinted at the sunlight streaming into her room. She went to the little window in front of her desk and opened it, immediately hit by a gust of cold wind. Fuck winter really was here.

She went to her bed and wrapped her blanket around her and went back to the window. She stuck her head out and breathed in the cold and thin air. There had been some slight snowfall since last night and there was now a little blanket of snow covering the bushes in their little garden.

Anne smiled when she thought about how Gog and Magog would glisten orange next to the lit fireplace at Patty's Place again.

"What are you smiling about already Carrots?" she heard a familiar voice say.

"Gilbert! What are you doing here?" she asked, suddenly turning red because she realized she was still in her pyjamas, wrapped in her blanket, looking like a worm.

"I came to apologize for waking you up last night"

Ahh, that's why she felt odd. She'd drifted back to sleep wondering why Gilbert was even thinking about the chocolate.

"It's fine! You really don't have to apologize. I don't even have any early lectures today" Anne said.

"All the same I'd like-"

"GILBERT BLYTHE, IT IS 7 AM. Some of us are trying to sleep. If you want to talk to your darling Anne so bad, go up to her room!" Tillie shouted from her room on the ground floor. Anne's room was directly above hers so Gilbert was shouting right outside Tillie's window.

Gilbert blushed and Anne turned an even deeper shade of red at the mention of 'darling Anne' but neither said anything for the fear of being told off again. Gilbert lifted up a brown paper bag Anne hadn't noticed before and gestured that he was coming upstairs.

Anne barely had enough time to throw on some sweats before he barged in. Really, living with a bunch of boys had taken a toll on Gilbert's manners.

"You're supposed to knock, Gilbert," Anne said exasperatedly. "Crap, sorry. I always forget" Gilbert said. He couldn't help but wonder why she always asked him to knock when he'd seen Jerry, Moody and Cole walk into her room and plop on the beanbag without a single word being spoken.

"Anyway I bought you breakfast to apologize, It's an egg and cheese sandwich with extra cheese from Vee's just how you like it," he said, holding out the food like a peace offering.

Anne smiled and accepted the food, sat down on her bed and saw Gilbert settle down into her beanbag. At least he remembered her 'No outside clothes on the bed' rule, she thought with a smile.

Not one to waste a perfectly good egg and cheese sandwich by letting it go cold, Anne began to dig into her food. Gilbert was just watching her, which made her slightly uncomfortable. She was glad she had pulled on the sweats in time. Anne stared back at him and he blushed and looked away.

She finished her food and didn't know what to do anymore, so she tried to make small talk. "So...are you attending that meeting about Queens week?" she asked, getting up to pick up her outfit for the day. She watched Gilbert out of the corner of her eye and noticed he was rubbing his neck the way he usually did when something was on his mind.

"Yeah, it's compulsory right?" he replied.

"Yep," she said, popping the 'p'. "I think we're creating the committees for the events, I hope we get to do the carnival again this year, I have a bone to pick with that fortune teller lady" Anne scrunched her nose in annoyance.

Gilbert laughed and said "You know everyone still wonders what she told you to get you so riled up"

Anne looked at him with a wry smile and twinkling eyes and said "And you'll never know"