Part 2 of "The Three of Us"

Untitled Part 7

"I want him to see my wedding dress," Anne said, "But he can't, because it's bad luck for the groom to see before the wedding. I'm glad you can look; I'm dying for someone to see it!"

Emily gasped. "Oh, Anne, the sleeves! Rosebuds made of satin! My, did you make those? They're perfect down to the tiniest detail!"

"Marilla did," Anne said happily. "She found the pattern for it in Ladies' Home Companion and she spent hours every evening making them for practice, and tossing them out and starting over! We must have an enormous pile of them. She wouldn't add them to the dress until she felt she'd finally perfected the art!"

Emily was impressed. "My, that's commitment. Well, if you ever questioned whether or not she loves you, there you go."

Anne did not question Marilla's love for her; she had had five years to see that love grow and blossom. She sometimes wished Marilla were a bit more physically demonstrative, but she acknowledged that that had grown, too. Walter had helped: Marilla simply couldn't take care of a baby day to day without becoming an expert snuggler.

Anne put the dress back into the cupboard and lovingly patted it before she shut the door. "We're working on Clara's, too, because it'll be like a miniature version of mine. Rosebuds and all! I think she'll love it."

Emily shook her head. "Clara is more excited by having a new dress than she is by the wedding party. She's calling it her first dance! She keeps talking about Walter and the suit he's going to wear."

"Well, Walter thinks he can wear the same suit to his own wedding someday. It hasn't occurred to him that he's going to outgrow it." They both laughed.

As they went downstairs, they each privately thought that they might someday find themselves related through their children.

—-

Later, Anne took Walter and Clara over to the school. She was going to help Gilbert work on some things for the upcoming year. She'd taken Walter along so that Marilla could have a break from him, and because Walter gobbled up every chance to be with Gilber. And Clara was along for company.

Anne got the children settled on the floor by a window with their art supplies. "Remember not to color on the walls or the floor," she said seriously. "Paper only."

"All my crayons are in half, mama," Walter said. "I want new ones."

"If you don't want to use broken crayons, then stop breaking them!" was Anne's reply.

When she looked back at them a few minutes later, there was a pile of shredded paper that was growing ever larger as Walter sat yanking the casings off all the crayons. Clara was drawing a picture of her favorite thing- herself. They were quite happy with each other.

"Thick as thieves, those two," Anne said, shaking her head.

Gilbert looked back at them, then asked Anne, "Do you think I ought to pull the desks out, the way Miss Stacy did, and have them sit on the floor?"

"I wouldn't in the very first week," Anne said carefully. "But maybe the second? It's going to be harder for you to establish yourself, remember." She explained, "We never knew Miss Stacy as anything but our teacher. But the younger ones here know you as Gilbert and they went to school alongside you...it might be a challenge for them to see you as a real teacher! I'd show them the very first week that you mean business- leave no doubt about being qualified to teach. Then maybe the next week you can be more friendly."

"Good idea," Gilbert said, letting go of a shaky breath. That was what worried him the most- the local children knowing him. If he was teaching in some other town, he'd be introduced for the first time as a teacher. What if the children here in Avonlea wouldn't listen to him? He felt awkward expecting the ones he knew to call him Mr. Blythe. But he couldn't continue being just Gilbert, not if he was to be regarded as a professional.