Becoming Anne Again

Chapter Sixty-Three

A/N Hello my loves! Thank you for all the support you have given me, and not just for this novel, but for me as a person. It means the world to me, and I want you to know I support all of you too. I love you!

Gilbert didn't sleep that night. The articles had painted pictures in his head that was nothing short of hellish, and they kept flashing in his mind like a horror movie. Nothing helped—not thinking about how Anne was an anomaly, how she had defied the odds, how she had survived despite the nightmarish pictures that were all tattooed on his brain.

Whenever he closed his eyes, he saw Anne, shackled in one of those metal chains that had been pictured in the article. So he gave up, and instead began to pace.

At first he stayed in his room, walking the length of his bedroom, the carpet fraying from his slippered feet. But then he began to feel cramped, so he moved into the hallway, past his sister's bedroom, to his mother's, and back again, careful to be quiet so as not to wake either of them. Then even that was too cramped, and he walked up and down the stairs, the length of the kitchen, the living room—it woke up Angel, who began to follow him around, loyally keeping in step with his strides.

He tried not to think. He thought that was the only way to keep the pictures at bay, but his mind kept returning to one disturbing thought. Anne had said Esme looked like Hannah.

Hannah Wright. Hannah whose body couldn't be fully put back together.

He covered his mouth with his hand, sinking down onto the couch, beginning to shake uncontrollably. He suddenly became aware of every sound in the house—the creak of the eaves as the wind blew against it, the groan of the house as it settled, the clicking of Angel's paws against the kitchen floor. The sounds began to take on a life of their own, an eerie melody that was jarring against Gilbert's ears. Whoosh, creak, click, clack, whoosh, creak, click, clack—over and over and over again, until his face was white, his skin was clammy, and he felt like he was going to throw up.

He ran back to his room, diving under the covers and curling up into a ball, like he did when he was a little kid and he had to hide from the monster in the closet. He threw his blankets over him, carefully tucking it around his body, as if some malevolent spirit couldn't untuck the blanket just as easily and cast if off.

He tried to close his eyes, but then Anne was there again—flashes of red and girlish screams, blood and gore, and every other element that he had once seen in a horror movie that he snuck out to see with his friends.

He never did go to sleep that night. It wasn't until five in the morning that his eyes wearily drooped, and his body sagged, falling into a restless sleep filled with horrors he had only previously imagined.

After a tiresome morning with her psychologist, Anne had decided it would be a good day for walk.

Ever since the dust had settled, there had been no end of calls to Green Gables. Concerns and get wells and prayers were all offered up by people Anne either didn't know or had only seen in passing in church. They meant nothing to her, and she would just as soon be able to go back to the house when the phone wasn't perpetually ringing. But seeing as how that was, for the time being, out of the question, she would settle with finally reuniting with Charlie.

It was the first time since the kiss that the trio had properly been together—Anne, Diana, and Charlie, as it should be. And certainly, the circumstances were horrible, but better together than not at all. At least that's what Anne told herself.