What About Yesterday? - anne with an e

Chapter 16 - Cobalt

"Of course, this again. How many times do you have press your own fears of worthlessness onto us, before you realise that you don't care a wit about what I, or any of the girls actually want ?"

Anne heard her- voice drawn with inexplicable bitterness, lips spluttering in shattered composure. But she couldn't feel it- no, she could hardly move. She half expected Diana to blush, her flushed embarrassment as she apologised for everything she had just meant. But instead, her eyes flickered anew.

"Even with Gilbert. " She coughed up with another pained laugh. "Even with him, you assume the rejection because you are so scared, you're petrified that if you give it a chance, he might leave you again. How he left to travel on the steam boat, like when he left you for Winnie, and just like right now. But you're too stubborn say that, and too blind to see that- that you wish Roy were him."

Anne's low mutter. "You're wrong."

"Am I?" Diana was quick, she stepped forward so their chests nearly collided, head shaking.

"Am I wrong? Should I not even mention, how you said he feels 'safe', and 'familiar.'" Diana grit her teeth around the words. "That a boy you've known for three months, somehow still reminds you of forever? Am I wrong to bring up all the times you called him by another name?"

Anne's voice broke. "You're not being fair."

Diana barely heard it. "When Roy takes it further, you'll back right out. In case you are not enough, in case the you grow dependent on him and can't survive on your own. You haven't changed."

"And neither have you." Anne cut in, and her eyes stung in anticipation. "Because you're running away again. When things get too hard, or too complicated you don't want to have to deal with it so you run. I can't be a perfect person, but I want fix it, I want to stay. You are the one abandoning us."

"No, Anne. I'm growing up."

She winced.

"Because I now understand what I'm doing here. I'm here for you. And you can't be my first reason anymore."

Anne couldn't bare to clean her cheeks- perhaps it was her body screaming out, to her best friend, that she was hurting.

You're hurting me.

Diana held her breath. "If I don't leave now I'll be late."

Anne's eyes burned. "Now?"

"The train leaves in a few hours." She gathered her arms against her chest, rocked back on her heels once.

"Can I just ask, why?" Anne asked in the quiet. "Or when? Why didn't you tell me sooner?"

"Because I only decided last night." A dense cold fed through the stone under her feet, the snow falling harder and faster in her periphery.

Anne felt for the words with her tongue, unsure how they'd taste once they'd fled her mouth. "What made you change you're mind?"

"I made a promise." She exhaled, gaze falling away in memory.

"You promised to take the job?"

Diana nodded, "I promised to take more chances."

Trembling, Anne bit into her lip and looked away. Across the curtain of tumbling white, a bell tower loomed grey- it was nearly swallowed up by the surrounding sky, boundless bare enveloped the structure with ease.

I also made a promise, on the same night- and to the same girl, I think. The words were both close to spoken reality and forbidden from the moment. Instead, she simply murmured.