Made and Meant for Each Other (an Anne of Green Gables fanfiction)

Mrs. Rachel Lynde

It was a Providence, that was what. After everything—after all the years when Anne would pretend she didn't know Gilbert was alive, a thin ruse Mrs. Rachel Lynde prided herself on having seen through all along; after the years before they went to college when everyone assumed it was all but settled between them; after the ridiculous years when they pretended they didn't care about one another and got themselves entangled with other people; after Gilbert's illness and the way Anne had looked when she found it out ... well, it wasn't so much a Providence, when you looked at it like that, Rachel thought, sighing and shaking her head and laughing a little to herself. She'd got so she did that now. She'd never been used to being alone, and Thomas had been there so much in his later years, she was used to having an audience. And the best kind of audience, too, she thought fondly—the kind who listened and interjected only when asked and never argued.

She spent a fair amount of time in Marilla's kitchen, talking to her, but there you had the twins—Davy, at least—interrupting. And while Marilla would listen, it was with half an ear while she was busy with other things, and she did sometimes argue. She'd gotten positively spirited since Anne had come along, especially when you compared her to the old days. Sometimes Rachel liked a good argument—but other times it was nice just to talk things over with a sympathet

Picking the rolling pin up off her piecrust, Rachel frowned. What had she been thinking of, before she went off on a tangent? That happened a lot, too, nowadays. You started off thinking about one thing and found later you were off on something else entirely. She would have thought it had to do with getting old, but Anne had always been prone to that kind of thing.

Oh, that was it. Anne, and Gilbert Blythe, engaged at last. Just as it should be. A mercy Gilbert never gave up on Anne, the dance she'd led him. But Anne wasn't like other girls, never had been, and Rachel supposed if you had your heart set on her you weren't going to find another one like her any too soon. Funny how Anne had always been so romantic and never seen what was right under her own nose. But then, people never did, did they? Sometimes you had to think you might lose something before you knew what it meant.

Rachel turned her piecrust into the tin and turned to start picking through the raspberries that were to go in it. Take Green Gables, for instance, and Marilla herself. Rachel had never realized how much she cared for her friend until the prospect had been held before her that she might never see her again. She was everlastingly grateful that Marilla had seen it the same way and made her the offer to come live at Green Gables. To be sure, it had benefits on both sides—how Marilla would ever have coped with that imp of a Davy by herself was a thought not to be considered. Rachel had a hard enough time with his never-ending questions, although now at least she could put them to use by making him write them down for Anne, which kept him still for whole minutes at a time. He was pretty knacky with the animals, when he wasn't teasing the life out of them, though, and Dora was real useful in the house. Yes, all things considered, they were making things work here pretty well. And a good thing, too, with Anne engaged.

Smiling, Rachel continued to pick over her raspberries while she considered which kind of pattern to make Anne for a wedding quilt.