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"You're back."
- Charlotte Wells
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"SURELY IT CAN'T BE THAT AWEFUL."
Charlotte looked over at Diana. She would never say it, but Anne's hair was that awful. And probably worse than what Diana was imagining in that moment.
"I'm a monstrosity, Diana," Anne replied. "In fact you best forget me now and forever because I would never want to bring humiliation upon you."
Charlotte glanced towards the crowd of school children, laughing. The girls had gotten to school later, Anne not wanting to get out of bed out of embarrassment. Charlotte had no idea what was going on in the school house.
"Best take off your hat," Diana stated.
As Anne removed the hat covering the hair clipped down to her scalp, the appalled look on Diana's face changed to comforting. She untied the ribbon from her hair, tying it around Anne's head in a bow. "I made a promise, never to forsake thee. Besides, it's only hair. It will grow back soon."
Charlotte moved out of the cloak bay, towards Cole. She didn't even watch as Anne stepped into the classroom, all eyes landing on her.
"What're you drawing?" she asked, sitting beside him.
Cole didn't answer, watching as Anne moved through the crowd in attempt to sit at her spot. "Did you know Gilbert was back?"
Charlotte's face dropped, her gut flipping. "What?"
She followed Cole's finger as he pointed. The sight of the boy in the crowd of his friends hit her eyes like a truck. Gilbert was back in school. The one reason she enjoyed school was back. She bit the inside of her cheek, an attempt to hide the subtle smile growing on her face.
Just as she looked away, Gilbert's eyes flickered towards her. He hadn't seen her in almost a year, a weight on his shoulders he didn't know was there lifted.
Charlotte stood from her seat as Mr. Phillips stepped into the room, brushing past the crowd and sitting herself down in her chair. She spun around to face Diana and Anne. "You okay?"
Anne looked down at her desk. "No."
"Need me to punch someone?"
A small grin rose on Anne's lips. "No."
Charlotte nodded, spinning herself around to face the blackboard.
Mr. Phillips stepped in front of the desks, glancing over at Anne. "It appears we have a new boy in class. Are you sure you're in the right place young man?"
Charlotte clenched her jaw, raising her hand in the air.
Mr. Phillips nodded at her. "Yes, Wells?"
"At least it doesn't look like a caterpillar embedded itself into her lip," she answered, not breaking eye contact.
Mr. Phillips went visibly red in embarrassment and anger. "Excuse me?"
"You're excuse." Charlotte raised her eyebrows, pointing at the chalkboard. "Please, continue with the lesson."
—
Charlotte sat alongside Cole in the corner of the classroom. She didn't want to sit with the girls, he didn't want to sit with the boys, so they sat together.
Cole drew, she wrote.
"How did you do that?" Charlotte pointed to a section of the drawing he was working on. "The shading and the shadows."
Cole flipped the page of his book, revealing a empty page. Charlotte watched as he drew a replica of the shading she wondered about.
"Just apply different pressure on where you want the shadows."
"Oh," she nodded. "I've always wanted to do art, never have been able to."
"I'm sure you can."
"Trust me, some people have the talent of being able to draw," Charlotte replied. "I am not one of them."
Cole opened his mouth to reply, before his vision was directed at something over the girl's shoulder. Charlotte turned, raising an eyebrow as Gilbert walked towards the two, stopping behind Charlotte.
"Charlotte can I talk to you?"
She frowned slightly. "Sure?"
She stood up following as he walked a distance away from Cole. "You're back."
"The work on the ship wasn't fit for me, I guess," Gilbert scratched the back of his neck, not knowing how he wanted to speak. Maybe he just wanted to talk to her, or maybe he didn't. "Did you guys sort out Green Gables, when you were selling everything?"
"We did," Charlotte nodded, confused as to why Gilbert even pulled her away. "Why?"
"Well, last time I saw you, you were getting chased down a street because of it," he chuckled slightly. "But the way, I liked the letter you sent me."
Charlotte frowned up at him, her eyebrows dropping subtly. "What letter? I didn't send you a letter."
"The one Anne attached in her letter about the gold," Gilbert answered, pulling a sheet of crumpled paper from his pocket. "I thought I would give it back since it didn't look finished but it was-"
Charlotte cut his sentence short, snatching the paper from him and scanning her eyes over the page. Her face flushed out of embarrassment, her eyes widening. In her hands, was the poem she had been searching for, the one she hadn't yet finished, the one she had spilled her raw emotions onto the page.
One of her poems beginning with Dear Gilbert.
Gilbert had read it without knowing his stupid brown eyes were never supposed to see it. He had unfolded the page, and soaked in each letter, each syllable, each metaphor. Gilbert, of all people. The person she didn't want knowing what she thought, what she felt. That she had written a poem with his name on it, while she was thinking of him for a reason she didn't even know herself.
Embarrassment and anger crashed over her in a wave, the poem was in a letter he received, and there was only one person who had access to Charlotte's poems as well as sending him a letter.
"Are you okay?" Gilbert asked, picking up on the tension building in her shoulders, the nerves washing over her.
"This wasn't for you," Charlotte snapped without realizing.
"Either way, you're a good writer Charlotte," Gilbert replied, brushing away the tone in her voice.
Charlotte ignored him, crumpling the page into a ball and throwing it on the ground, storming away from him into the school house, her vision not catching Gilbert lean down, pick up and pocket her letter.
The brunette stomped towards the girls, towards Anne. "Anne I need to talk to you."
Anne looked her up and down, following as Charlotte walked into the cloak bay, frowning at the girl's shaking shoulders, her trembling lips.
"Did you send Gilbert one of my poems."
Anne's gut dropped, her eyes widening. "No."
"Really, because he showed me the one I've been searching for since you sent your letter," Charlotte snapped. "Why did you send it?"
"You're writing's so good, Charlotte and I thought he would want-"
"No, that wasn't any of your business," Charlotte scoffed. "I told you I didn't want him seeing these and I told you they were just for me."
"Then why is his name on them?"
"I don't know," Charlotte raised her voice. "Maybe because I felt the comfort that he would never see them, and now he has."
"I'm sorry," Anne croaked out.
Charlotte began to walk away. "It's fine. I'll see you at Green Gables."
The brunette grabbed her bag, throwing the door to the school house open and swiftly strolling back to the Cuthbert's.
Anne knew by the way she dragged her feet, she wasn't fine. And by the fact she walked out of school with half the day left.
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15/01/2024
Already started writing season three and ohmygosh ohmygosh