Doctor ~ G.Blythe [1]

fifty-five.

+ strawberries +

I walked down the stairs of my house, the sun beaming in through the windows as I stood still for a while, looking around as I heard the small humming coming from somewhere. The floor creaked under my feet as I grabbed the post at the bottom of the stairs, swinging around it as I made my way down the small hallway, standing at the archway that's led into the kitchen.

I watched my mother as she kneeled some dough, not knowing I was watching her as she worked more flour into the mixture. I watched her for a moment as she quietly sang to herself, turning away from me as she grabbed the bowl and set the dough in it. I walked into the kitchen grabbing the bowl of strawberries that were setting on the counter, picking up a knife as I stood at the table in the middle of the room, starting to cut off the green leafs off of the strawberries.

My mother turned around as she saw me, not saying anything as she walked over, wiping her hands on her apron which sat around her hips as she grabbed a cloth, wiping the flower from the table and into her hand. "I was thinking" I said to her quietly, causing her to look up at me, surprised that I was finally talking to her after quite a while of silence of my side of the relationship. "Yes" she said to me, telling me to continue as I didn't look up at her, staring at the strawberry in my hand as I made my way through the bowl.

"Maybe I should organise a spring gathering for Mary" I said to her as I looked up at her, seeing her nod her head with a soft smile on her face. "Her favourite season was Spring, but she won't be able to see it this year" I continued as my mother held the cloth in her hand, walking over to the food compost bin we had for cooking scraps as she put the flour into it. "That sounds like a nice idea, dear" she replied to me as she turned around and smiled at me, causing me to smile back.

"Do you think that the Barry's would let us use their flower garden? I saw it when I was there for Anne's party, with the new flowers I think it will be amazing" I told her as she nodded her head, walking over to me and passing me another bowl to put the already cut strawberries in. "You'll have to ask, but I'm sure that Mr Barry wouldn't mind" she told me as I nodded my head, a smile on my face as I looked back down, pushing the blade through the strawberry and letting the top fall off.

"Catherine, I never did tell you but I truly am sorry" she said to me as the smile dropped from my face, causing me to look back up at her and shake my head. "It doesn't matter anymore, if there's no way I'm allowed to stay I'm not going to waste my breath trying" I told her as I shrugged my shoulders, looking back down as I let out a breath. "Plus I don't think arguing back is very lady like anyway" I said quietly as she shook her head, placing her hands on the table as I looked over at her.

"I tried to convince him to let you stay I promise, I wasn't even aware that your father had already spoken to Gilbert" she told me as I looked over at her, my mouth opening a little bit as I held my breath for a moment before letting it out. "Gilbert has other plans anyway" I told her, shaking my head as I looked down, placing another strawberry into the bowl before picking up another one, not particularly wanting to talk about it.

She didn't reply for a moment as she nodded her head, exclaiming quickly as she walked out of the room, my eyes following her briefly before continuing to cut up the berries. "I went to the post office yesterday" she said to me as she came back into the room, an envelope in her hand as she held it out for me to read it. The cursive on the front was neat as my eyes shifted to the top left corner, the senders address looking very familiar.

"Oh" I said loudly putting the nice down as I took it, looking down at the stamp, seeing it had been sent around a week ago. "Did Tom send you one too?" I asked her as I looked up at her, setting it on the table on a clean patch as I very quickly cut the rest of the strawberries, my mother starting to get the ingredients ready to make the filling for the pie. "Yes, he just let us know how he was settling in" she told me as she took the strawberries from me, grabbing the sugar jar as she spooned some into the pot as well.

"Do you need anymore help?" I asked her as she shook her head at me, nodding down at the letter as I raised my eyebrows in excitement. "You can go read it" she said to me with a smile, nodding her head as I smiled at her, grabbing the letter and running out of the kitchen and up the stairs, happy to finally hear word from my brother.

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A/N: IM SO SORRY FOR NOT UPDATING I haven't had much time recently so I haven't written anything but here's a bad chapter to soothe you
basically she made up with her mother because she realised that life is fragile and anything could happen at any moment (like mary's life) but I struggled to get that through so i'm sorry
please vote and comment and i'll see you soon