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Crickets chirp as they watch Anne flatten down the tall grass she stands in front of, and she can hear an owl hooting softly in the distance. It is a sad and mournful sound that Anne feels is appropriate for such an occasion.
The field surrounding Anne and Ruby is loud in a quiet, layered sort of way. If Anne stopped to listen, she would be able to hear the river burbling and the trees swaying, but mostly she hears the natural symphony it makes as it all blends together.
Anne is loath to pick the flowers and flatten the grass, worried about ruining the scenic picture, but she must. Ruby leans against a nearby oak tree, too weak to help.
“Anne, can I sit down?” She asks quietly, struggling to keep her eyes open. They are out in the middle of the night, after all. Her voice is hard to listen to, although Anne is used to the wet thickness that permeates every word her beloved speaks. Anne hesitates to answer.
“Just one more second, Ruby.” Anne finally says, reaching out to briefly squeeze Ruby’s cold hand. Ruby nods and squeezes back. They stand like that for a moment – a tender tableau framed by moonlight. Eventually Anne breaks free (as mush as it pains her to do so) and gets back to work.
It’s only a few minutes before she’s done, and Anne can see the relief in Ruby’s face. The trek out here had taken all the younger girl’s energy and although Anne wished she could have spared her from it, the hike was necessary.
Anne gently leads Ruby to sit on the bed of grass that’s been created. Flowers are woven into one chain that lays around them, and Anne has bundled their jackets and aprons into a makeshift pillow. It’s cold, but neither of them care. It’s beautiful in a childish sort of way and part of Anne hates it – she wishes she could have made it look like the image she had in her mind. Ruby, however, doesn’t seem to mind.
“It’s so pretty.” She says, voice cracking. Ruby smiles at Anne, who can’t help but return the grin. Despite the dark circles under Ruby’s eyes and the skeletal look to her frame, Anne still thinks Ruby is the most amazingly beautiful girl she’s ever met. The effervescent radiance Ruby had before is now gone, replaced by an unwittingly divine and tragic look, but Anne loves her all the same – she’s still the same girl underneath.
“Not as pretty as you.” Anne murmurs, brushing a strand of stray hair behind Ruby’s ear. Ruby blushes, the flush barely visible on her cheeks that have been reddened by the spring chill and fever.
“Here,” Anne continues, “let me braid your hair. I think these flowers will look positively captivating in it.”
Ruby nods and turns around so she can lay her head in Anne’s lap. Tears spring to her eyes as she combs her fingers gently through Ruby’s blonde locks but Anne forces them away – this is not the time for tears. Too many have been shed already, taking away precious time.
“…Anne?” Ruby says some time later, breaking the heavy silence that has fallen. Her braid is almost halfway done. “Will you tell me the plan, one more time?” This is the fourth time she’s had it repeated to her – Anne would be annoyed but clearly this brings comfort to Ruby, and Anne would rather die than take that away from her.
“We’re going to lay down here, in this bed I’ve made.” Anne says reverently. “These flowers in your hair are going to look beautiful, and when your hair fans out around your head you’ll look like an angel, come down to Avonlea. I’ll lay here, beside you.” Anne breathes a laugh, as is part of the script. “I won’t look anywhere near as magical, but I’ll lay beside you nonetheless.” Ruby interrupts, as she always does at this part.
“You’ll look beautiful too, Anne.” She murmurs softly – her eyes are closed as she pictures it.
“I’ll lay beside you, and the moon will softly light both our faces, just like in a painting.” Anne continues like she was never interrupted. “They’ll find us in a week, when we’ve had our time together. The grass will hold our imprint and all the creatures that visited us – the foxes, the cows, the crows – will remember us. In fact, all of Avonlea will remember us. But until then we’ll be here, together.”
By the time Anne’s done speaking she’s also done Ruby’s braid, but she keeps her hands in the girl’s hair anyway. She wishes Ruby could lie in her lap for forever and beyond. And for a while, Ruby does stay. The two sits in silence, Anne tracing her fingers over Ruby’s face to memorize it. Ruby clutches the edge of Anne’s dress, rubbing it back and forth between her fingers.
Eventually the moment is ruined, as it always is, by the cough that’s taken residence in Ruby’s chest. She coughs and she coughs until eventually Anne has to force her into a sitting position because Ruby can’t catch her breath. Terror infects every fibre of Anne’s being – this can’t be it, not now, not this moment. After what feels like ages Ruby breathes again, in a violent and painful gasp of air that has Anne wincing in sympathy.
“Anne.” Ruby says, clutching her hands so hard that her knuckles turn white. “Anne, I-I couldn’t breathe. It felt like I was drowning.” Ruby’s eyes are open wide and desperate – tears pool in the edges and they’re bloodshot from the force of her coughing. The pure and utter terror in her face reminds Anne once more just how unfair this is. This is supposed to happen elsewhere to other people; not to beautiful girls in Avonlea with silly dreams that will never come true.
“It- it’s going to be fine, Ruby, remember? We have our plan.” Anne’s voice is no longer calm, no matter how hard she wills it to be. “We’re going to be together, I swear.” Ruby nods.
Suddenly she leans forward and hugs Anne so tightly that she almost finds it hard to breathe – in a way it feels like poetic justice, like recompense for the fact that the cough that found it’s way inside Anne’s lungs hasn’t worked fast enough. Anne doesn’t deserve to breathe, not when Ruby labours to do so. But Anne pushes these thoughts aside and returns the embrace, kissing Ruby’s neck once and eventually making up for Ruby’s strength when it inevitably fails. Then they just sit in the middle of the wide, dark field, faces inches from each other as Anne whispers short half-finished stories she’s never going to get to write down.
The owl hoots again and something rustles the bushes to their right. Bright eyes peek out of the darkness, but eventually they leave, and Ruby and Anne pay it no mind. Soon it will be the darkest part of night, when the stars and the moon shine the brightest.
Two more coughing fits come and go, and after the last one Anne knows – this is it. Ruby, though delirious and only half aware, seems to know this too as she clutches Anne’s hands like a drowning man clings to a buoy. Her breaths are uneven and only half full, mouth opening and closing in gasps desperate for words and air alike. Anne silently prays that Ruby will be able to say whatever is so clearly on her mind before it’s too late.
“Anne.” Ruby finally manages to rasp. Anne nods quickly and fervently although she doesn’t speak, too scared to miss her lover’s words. “ ‘love you.” Anne manages a smile.
“I love you too.” She whispers. Her chest aches like someone has ripped her heart out, and in a way, someone has. Ruby is her heart after all.
The coughing starts again, and Anne wants to scream – this feels like its own special kind of hell.
Miraculously, despite both Anne and Ruby’s expectations, it stops, just once more. It should be a relief but instead it feels like a cruel joke – why won’t God just have mercy for once?
The girls sit in silence, unsure of what to do. All of the ideas Anne has are quickly discarded – none of them feel momentous or special enough, not when this will be the last thing Ruby ever does. Anne’s always taken pride in her imagination, but now she curses and screams at it in her head – please, do something! Instead Anne just stares at Ruby quietly, feeling like she might explode.
“You’re coming with me?” Ruby finally murmurs thickly, her words wet and filled with unvoiced agony. “Anne,” she repeats, “you promise you’re coming?” She’s looking right at Anne, but Anne isn’t quite sure that she’s really seeing.
“Yes, Ruby, I promise.” Anne replies, wishing with all her heart that her voice wasn’t so weak. Wishing her voice was a more beautiful final song for Ruby’s ears. Shakily she wipes away tears that blur her vision – she needs to see this, see Ruby. “I’m coming with you.”
Ruby nods, and the smile that lights up her face is so genuine and content that Anne can’t help but press one final, fleeting kiss to her cracked lips. For a moment it feels no different than the hundreds of other kisses they’ve shared.
Then the coughing starts again, for one last time.
It’s wet and it’s loud and Anne wishes she could look away. Every fibre of her being aches with the desire to shoulder the cruelty that racks Ruby’s body, to take some of it upon herself, but Anne can’t. All she can do is let Ruby crush her hand in a grip full of strength that has been missing for months and move so that the blonde can rest her soft curls on Anne’s shoulder. As the choking becomes unbearably intense Anne gently brings the both of them to rest on the grass, their heads pillowed on the bundle of jackets and aprons Anne had made earlier, faces turned to the impossibly bright night sky.
“Look, Ruby.” Anne murmurs. “The stars are here to say goodbye. They’re glistening extra bright, just for you to see. They’ll miss you.” Ruby’s grip on Anne’s fingers grows tighter, and although Anne feels a warm tear track its way down her face she refuses to lift a hand to wipe it – that would mean letting go of Ruby, and Anne never wants to do that again.
“It’s okay.” She murmurs mindless, not really fully mindful of what she’s saying. “I love you; it’s okay.”
More tears follow in the minutes that pass. Though Anne’s face is turned to the stars that’s not what she’s focused on – instead, Anne is memorizing the weight of Ruby’s body on her own, the smell of Ruby’s hair, and the pain that radiates from Ruby’s grip on her hand. Anne carefully doesn’t think about the wet choking that stems from Ruby’s lungs filling with liquid or the way her body seizes, desperate for air. And maybe it’s selfish to leave Ruby alone in that torture but Anne wants Ruby to stay in her memory forever as she was before this cruel illness stole everything away.
The broken silence that eventually falls is something that Anne doesn’t think about, either.
Instead, Anne buries her nose in Ruby’s hair and closes her eyes, because she made a promise, and she is going to keep it.
She always did like the special smile Ruby broke out into whenever she saw Anne, the one just for her. It always makes Anne feel welcome, no matter where they were.
Anne is going to see that smile again.