Flowers and Fences (SIX)

Chapter 2

    When Jane, Anne, and their new friend returned to the house it was less chaotic than they had anticipated. They presumed this was because everyone had a day off so they were either still asleep or had been dragged off to mass by Aragon. They all greatly appreciated this as it would be difficult to ask Willow the things they needed to know in a calm environment with four resurrected English queens from the 16th-century pestering her. 

      Jane led Willow to the sofa in the living room while Anne, not really sure what to do, leaned against the wall and prepared to rescue the girl; Jane had a tendency to overstep boundaries.  

"So", Jane started with a kind smile, "You said your name was Willow." 

Willow simply nodded. 

"Well, Willow would you mind telling us why you were sleeping on that bench?" Jane asked gently, careful not to trigger or offend the girl. 

This gained a verbal response from Willow, "I dunno, that's where I usually sleep." 

Anne's face transformed from a look of concern to one of understanding while Jane still appeared confused. 

Jane leaned back into the sofa, "Could you tell us why that is?" 

Anne piped up from behind, "You don't have to if you don't want to." 

"Well I just have nowhere else to go, I'd rather not get into that right now though, if that's okay," Willo answered, fidgeting a little. 

     Suddenly they heard footsteps and a mumble of "morning" from the stairs. This startled Willow and she leaped from the couch and looked towards the door. Anne, having recognized the voice immediately, smiled and ran to the bottom of the stairs, yelling, "Cathy! Good morning!" 

"Anne, love, it's way too early to be that loud." 

Anne rolled her eyes, "Cathy?" 

"Yeah." 

"It's 12:30 in the afternoon." 

"And?" 

Anne just smiled and skipped back into the living room, "If you're awake enough come here." 

     Parr followed slowly, still stretching the sleep from her muscles. When she saw Willow standing there she didn't have a clue what was going on but she did notice how on edge the girl seemed and attempted to calm her nerves, "Anne did you steal another kid?" She realized that this was probably not the right word choice as Willow looked up fearfully and said, with terror evident in her voice, "Another?" 

"Cathy what the hell! Now she's gonna think I'm some creep who kidnaps and kills children." Anne said in outrage and then spoke again, directing her next words to Willow, "Which I am not, by the way, I'm just someone who wanted to help." 

Willow nodded and walked back over to Anne, some humor returning to her features, "Yeah, figured. But you know, can never be too careful." 

Anne smiled, "Good. Now that it's been established that I'm not going to murder you, how bout I grab you a blanket and Jane fixes you something to eat?" 

"Oh no you really don't have to I can just -" Willow started before being cut off as Anne waved her hand and began speaking, "We do have to actually because if we didn't we'd be horrible people, now go in the kitchen and enjoy Jane's wonderful cooking." 

Obeying this time, Willow nodded, said "thank you." and made her way to the kitchen. 

As Anne walked towards her, Parr looked up and tried to get her attention, "Anne I'm sorry I didn't mean to." She pleaded but the other girl kept walking, acting like she hadn't heard. 

                    ------&------

     Parr found Anne in her room picking up an extremely fluffy blanket. She rapped softly on the open door, hoping for better luck gaining the other girl to listen to her than she had before. Anne looked up and gestured her head in a way that Cathy assumed meant she could come in. Parr sat down on the other queen's bed and looked up at her sheepishly. Anne turned and glared at the shorter queen sat on her bed. 

"You have 1 minute, and you're lucky I'm giving you that," Anne spoke with the vexation obvious in her voice. 

Parr took a deep breath, "I just wanna say, I'm sorry for upsetting Willow and doing so was not my intention. I intended the opposite actually, I just wanted to make her feel more at ease." 

"And a comment about us kidnapping people is going to do that?!" Anne yelled, though quietly enough that the people downstairs wouldn't hear.

     Parr was taken aback by this outburst, she had seen Anne far angrier before but it was usually directed at rude "fans" at stage door or creepy guys staring at Kat, never at her or the other queens. She must have looked visibly hurt because Anne softened and came to sit next to her. 

The younger queen sighed, "I'm sorry for yelling, but I feel really protective of her, I can tell she's been through a lot and I want her to know she's safe with us." 

Cathy grabbed her hand, "I know, I feel the same and frankly, I don't know why I said that I guess I'm just an idiot who can't read a room." 

Anne suddenly grabbed the other girl's face and turned it to face her. "Catherine Parr! You are most certainly not an idiot and if I ever hear you say that again I'll steal your journal and feed it to Wolfie!" Wolfie was Katherine's puppy and he was known to chew up everything that got in his way. 

Parr held up her hands in surrender, "Okay, okay I'm a genius." 

Anne smiled, "Yeah, you are. You were right about your ability to read a room though." 

"Hey!" Cathy exclaimed in mock surprise.

"Now," Anne stood up, "Let's go talk to our new friend." 

Parr grabbed the blanket and stood up as well, "Hope it goes better this time. 

And with that, the queens made their way down the stairs to give Willow a proper introduction to Catherine Parr. 

AN: Not very proud of this one honestly but I'm a week late and I needed to post something. Ciao for now, -Trash ☆