OCEANS | shirbert

XIV. The Home

CHAPTER XIV

The Home

in which home does not specifically have to be a place

[ PLAY THE SONG hehe ]

If you had asked the people that loved her the most, they would all have agreed on the fact that Anne Shirley-Cuthbert had a special, innate talent for so many different things. She was artistic, passionate, an avid reader and an ambitious writer. But not everyone knew that she was a fast runner as well. For years, she had run through the never-ending fields of Avonlea, trying to reach impressive cliffs or towring trees. Yet she had not ran so fastly in her entire life as fast as she was running in this precise moment.

A train for Alberton was leaving Avonlea train station in less than ten minutes.

And she was late.

The previous day, when she had visited Matthew's grave, she made the decision that she had to do something; she could not stay in Avonlea forever, waiting for him to come back to her. He probably wouldn't, anyway, she thought, as she desperately ran through the fields. She needed to get to him. She needed to find Gilbert and tell him how immensely sorry she was for her behaviour.

Visiting Matthew's grave after all this time had helped her in some way. It had made her realise that she was still able to make a change — whereas Matthew could not. She could choose the option of being mournful and heartbroken over his death, she could choose anger and melancholy. But she had other choices. She had not been herself ever since her adoptive father left this cruel, yet beautiful and fascinating world. For once, she wanted to choose her own happiness, and that included Gilbert Blythe.

When Anne had finally arrived to the station, the train had just left, vanishing in the distance as the girl hopelessly watched it disappear.

No, no no, no no, NO!

"Excuse me, sir?" she approached one of those men in uniform, assuming he would be one of the station's workers. "Would please tell me when the next train for Alberton is?"

"Not until next Friday, I'm afraid"

"FRIDAY?" she cried out in a high-pitched and annoyed voice that reminded her of her old self. Of her true self.

"I'm sorry, miss" he man answered, scratching the back of his neck. A gesture that again, reminded her of him.

Anne sat on a bench inside the station, watching the lonely and quiet train tracks. Unbelievable. She would have to wait for almost a week to see Gilbert again. And she did not even knew if he was actually there, in Alberton, or somehwere else, farther from her. The prospect of not seing him ever again made her flinch in pain.

A train had just arrived from God knows where and the miserable girl watched the crowd of people getting off; families, farmers, lovely couples — people in general, moving from one side of the platform to another. "It's what I deserve" she mumbled after letting out an sigh of exasperation. "I treated him so poorly that he did not even say goodbye when he left" she fixed her eyes on the ground, regretting every single word he told the boy that awful day, three months ago. "I doubt he even wants to see me again" she sighed as she nervously played with a neatly folded piece of paper that she kept inside her pocket. Her eyes were still glued to her boots when a voice broke through the bustling crowd of people.