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The ballroom was decorated with streams of flowers making the cold February snow seem like an afterthought. Gilbert had never been in such a house; he had always thought the Barrys’ and then the Roses’ houses were grand, but this was truly like a… palace. When Anne invited him, he had said yes because she wanted him to attend with her but in reality, he was so very dreading the thought of being at a party with high society men and women. He was but a farm boy who managed to scorn one of Charlottetown’s most eligible society ladies. Anne was already wearing her dress for the evening, it was a dress Mr Cuthbert had gifted her for Christmas, knowing that she would have events like this to attend and she couldn’t go in her everyday clothes (Gilbert wouldn’t have minded if she spent every waking hour in that gorgeous peacock blue dress Miss Cuthbert and Mrs Lynde had made her). The gown was made by the dressmaker in Carmody, Miss Pippett and it was made of a willow green mercerised cotton with gold lace trims around the neckline and hem of the skirt and a thick belt of phthalo green silk, the floaty black lace sleeves hung off her shoulders slightly, revealing freckles that dotted all over her chest, they too had the golden lace trims, the sleeves matched the pair of long gloves that she wore, she also had two large gold fabric flowers where the sleeves connected with the bodice. There were small green leaves embroidered in silk thread all over the corsage. The redhead wore her hair in a chignon, small fabric flowers decorated the reams of curled red hair that had been piled at the back of her head. She looked just as beautiful as she did when she wore a brown dress and two braids in her hair in the schoolhouse, he had already showered her with compliments, having been wonderstruck as soon as he laid eyes on his love. Gilbert, however, had never felt more out of place, he hadn’t realised that he was such things as an evening suit. He also was dreading the idea of Miss Barry recognising him as either the boy who broke Anne’s heart or… never mind.
“Strawberry for your thoughts?” Anne asked, offering a red fruit that had clearly been imported from somewhere around the empire because not much grew in Canada’s snowy February climate, he accepted it with a smile. The guests hadn’t arrived yet, but Miss Barry had let them roam the ballroom before the soirée started.
“It’s nothing, I just…” Gilbert stammered after biting into the sweet fruit, “but it’s just… Miss Barry… she- I-”
“What about Aunt Jo?” Anne asked, Gilbert groaned, if Miss Barry remembered what had transpired, how she had-
“It doesn’t matter, I’m being stupid, I’m sure it will be a splendid night,” Gilbert said quickly, old people forgot stuff all the time, it was fine.
Guests had started filling in around an hour ago, the party was well and truly alive. Gilbert hadn’t really known what he expected from such a soirée, but he was sure it was not this. Anne, as he had expected, had managed to find friends in the most random of people, leaving him alone by the drinks table. The affair was quite ribald, with people in the most extravagant of outfits, not caring for the fashion trends or social convention. He felt a little less strange for wearing simply his Sunday Best. He knew Diana and Cole were about, but he hadn’t caught sight of them yet.
“Well, if you don’t look like a fish out of water,” someone said, swaying up to him, the man was quite short and stout, he wore a black tuxedo with flowers beautifully embroidered by the collar, “you do look rather sad and handsome all by your lonesome, I’m Barnaby Smythe.”
Gilbert chuckled, he shook the hand that the man had extended out to him as a greeting, “Nice to meet you, sir, I’m Gilbert Blythe.”
The man, Mr Smythe also joined in with the chuckle, “it seems, Mr Blythe, that we were destined to converse, now, what is a man like you doing at a place like Josephine Barry’s Summer Soirée?”
“Well, I’m here with my… inamorata, Anne,” he said, pointing to the redheaded girl who was animatedly chatting with a woman with a moose skull as a hat, “we’re both good friends with Miss Barry’s niece, Diana.”
“Barnaby, dear, it’s so good to see you,” someone said from behind them, it was Miss Barry, “and Anne’s beloved Gilbert, I see you’ve both made each other’s acquaintance, Gilbert here is quite infamous around these parts.”
The farmer boy blanched, what was that supposed to mean?
“Do you remember that tale my dear Gertrude used to tell, the one that would have us all in fits of laughter?”
“Why yes, a young boy had accosted you at a party and dumped a pile of worms in your lap, and you shrieked at him so shrilly that the poor boy’s father had to rescue him,” Barnaby said in a raucous tone. Gilbert knew this story, he knew it so vividly he could remember the shrieks of ‘horrid boy’ as if it had happened last Saturday, he knew this story and it had been exactly what he had been dreading all along. Miss Barry did remember the worms.
“Well, that begetter of merriment was in fact, this here, Gilbert Blythe,” Miss Barry said jovially, Gilbert’s cheeks flushed red, “Gertie loved to tell that story, she would never let me live it down.”
He had been quite gangly as a child, being mostly skin and bones his whole nonage but what he lacked in baby fat, he made up for in waggery. It was 20th June 1887, everyone in Avonlea was celebrating the Queen’s 50th year on the throne. Miss Barry and her wife in every sense of the word but law had come to Avonlea to join in the festivity, but Gilbert thought she had looked rather highfalutin and decided to run around the Barry’s garden looking for the wriggly creatures to perform his ultimate antic. When he had collected a substantial amount, he had marched over to her and dumped the pile in her lap. He had never heard a woman squawk like Miss Barry had, when she immediately noticed the jumble of dirty worms on her nice gown. Gilbert had grinned up at her looking quite pleased with himself which made the woman screech many insults at the boy until his father intervened and took him home, where he had confided in the boy that it was actually pretty funny but maybe he should try such a trick on Billy Andrews instead.
“You’re something of a celebrity at this party, Mr Blythe,” Mr Smythe said.
“Really?” he asked, “I mean, I was kind of hoping it had been forgotten.”
“Forgotten? Dear boy, it amused my Gertrude to no end, I will never forget the laugh she let out after your father had dragged you away,” Miss Barry chortled, “Barnaby, did you know Gilbert here came first in all of Prince Edward Island for his Queen’s exam? Equalled by the similarly meritorious Anne. He’s currently studying medicine at the University of Toronto.”
“Oh my, so you’re not just a pretty face,” Mr Smythe said, looking him up and down, Gilbert’s face went even redder, “well I must depart, unfortunately, good evening to you both.”
Mr Smythe walked off gleefully and unbeknownst to Gilbert, telling everyone that Gertrude’s worm boy was the sad and handsome young man over by the drinks table.
Anne had reunited with Gilbert, holding two crowns of flowers, he let her rest the chaplet on his head, bowing down so she didn’t have to stretch her arms up. He carefully placed the other one she was holding on her head, making sure not to disturb the resplendent hairstyle.
“You look like a painting, my dear Anne,” he said, pressing a kiss to her pale freckled cheek. Anne’s face lit up bright red from the compliment.
“Why thank you, dearest Gilbert, you look rather like a marble sculpture yourself,” Anne replied, her face then changed into a quite serious one, “now, Gil, you must tell me, why are there people calling you ‘worm boy’? I have had at least three people come up to me and tell me that the morose young gentleman at the drinks table is Gertrude’s worm boy.”
Gilbert laughed nervously, “yes, well…”
He relayed the entire story for her, making sure he got every detail right, even telling her about how he had searched for the compost heap knowing that was his jackpot and how he had collected them all in his knitted tank top that had been too big for him but the perfect size to create a makeshift bag, watching her face change into one of mirth at the rather hilarious yarn.
“I can’t believe you, Gilbert Blythe, all this time I have been mortified by my own scrapes, but you have had a similar sense of plight all along,” Anne said teasingly.
“Did Bash not tell you about the time I drank babash in Trinidad to prove I was a man and vomited in front of everyone?” he asked, “I have always had a proclivity to get myself into mischief, it just took the back-burner in my life.”
Anne gave him a sympathetic smile, her face perked up into a coy smile, in a way only Anne’s face could, “well, you’ve certainly made a cynosure of yourself at this soirée with your worm rascality.”
Gilbert smiled, feeling slightly more relaxed. He couldn’t help but think they made quite a winsome couple.
“Anne, you look wonderful,” a woman said, running up to the pair, her hair was cropped short, and she wore an extravagant outfit of purple moire, “are you doing a reading tonight?”
“Oh, I’m reciting a poem,” she confirmed. Gilbert didn’t notice her looking up at him affectionately, but the woman did.
“Is this the infamous worm boy I’ve heard things about? I didn’t believe it at first, Barnaby Smythe is an awful gossip, but Jo confirmed it herself.”
“Oh yes, Evangeline, this is my inamorato, Gilbert Blythe,” Anne said, introducing him, he thought to himself about how truly kindred he and Anne were that they would choose the same extravagant term to refer to each other, sometimes he felt like they were well and truly intertwined with each other by a force that not even God could control, “or Worm Boy as he had been christened by the guests at this soirée.”
The woman held out her hand to shake, which Gilbert accepted, “Evangeline Byrd, nice to meet you, Gilbert. You were the subject of Gertrude’s favourite tale; Jo would always burn up in a blush when it was brought up. I hope we weren’t laughing at something that had got you horribly scolded.”
“Oh no, my father found it quite funny,” Gilbert replied, thinking of the way his dad would laugh at his antics, he so dearly missed that wheezing laughter, he pushed down the feeling of dread that he was never going to see his dad again, “the only downside was that I missed out on Miss Cuthbert’s plum puffs as we went home straight away.”
The redhead Gilbert loved with all the power his heart could possess stood in front of the mass of people as if she was a seasoned politician. He had seen how the girl had flourished into a young woman, but dresses and puberty could not take away Anne Shirley-Cuthbert’s impulsive and gingery attitude to life. Those blue-grey eyes connected with his, as if she was solely choosing to speak with him alone, ignoring everyone else in the room.
We cannot live, except thus mutually
We alternate, aware or unaware,
The reflex act of life: and when we bear
Our virtue onward most impulsively,
Most full of invocation, and to be
Most instantly compellent, certes, there
We live most life, whoever breathes most air
And counts his dying years by sun and sea.
But when a soul, by choice and conscience, doth
Throw out her full force on another soul,
The conscience and the concentration both make
mere life, Love. For Life in perfect whole
And aim consummated, is Love in sooth,
As nature’s magnet-heat rounds pole with pole.
She read the poem with perfect and rehearsed meter, every word meant something to Elizabeth Barrett Browning (the art of poetry is a meticulous science, and one never puts empty words into a piece), and it would be disrespectful to not give her a recital that mirrored the passion of which these words were written. Every laborious word hit Gilbert with the force of a thousand suns, he was starstruck by Anne’s reading, never having felt more love in his body until this moment. All the underlying insecurities and stresses he had melted away with the heat of those suns because he knew Anne loved him and that was truly all he needed. He clapped loudly, cupping his hands so his clap alone echoed around the room and struck right into Anne’s ear. She shone with the praise and descended to her beau.
“I love you, Anne Shirley-Cuthbert,” he said, capturing her hands in his and planting a kiss on the back of them.
“I love you too, Gilbert Blythe,” Anne replied warmly, “but I suppose you inferred that from my recital.”
It took everything in the swain to not passionately kiss her lips and scandalise the entire soirée.
“Anne,” Cole Mackenzie came running up to the pair, “you were truly magnificent, it was a very romantic recital, very charged.”
Gilbert and Anne blushed synchronously; their hands clasped together as they stepped away from each other to face Cole.
“Thank you,” Anne said, “I find that reading to one specific person does truly make you feel like you can conquer any stage.”
Gilbert had never truly been jealous of Cole, perhaps at the beginning when he returned, he felt the green-eyed monster rear its ugly head, but he pushed it down, he had no right to think of Anne as if he was a small child and she was his favourite toy that someone else was playing with. Although, (and he would never admit this) he did feel quite relieved when Anne informed him of Cole’s preference towards men.
“What’s this I’ve been hearing about the handsomest and nicest boy in Avonlea, Gilbert Blythe putting worms in our dear Aunt Jo’s lap?” Cole asked. Gilbert chuckled, having got used to the fact that people would want to talk about his wriggly escapade.
“I mean… you were there,” Gilbert responded, “everyone in Avonlea was there, Mrs Lynde spun tales about it for weeks up until Moody fell in Barry’s pond, that’s what my dad told me anyway, if you asked her, she’d probably be able to tell it like it was yesterday, that woman has an incredibly sharp memory.”
“I must have been too young to remember it,” Cole said, he was wearing an evening suit of bottle green, the quiet boy Gilbert had known him as was practically non-existent. This new Cole had an air of confidence that one could only have when they were finally true to themselves, “how have you been, Gilbert, how’s Toronto?”
They fell into a polite conversation, Gilbert talked about his roommate and his tendency to stay up until the early hours of the morning, constantly waking up the dark-haired boy, who had a strict sleep schedule of 9pm to 5am that he had developed living on a farm and doing hard labour every day before school and after, only breaking it when he was veraciously studying until the wee hours. He also spoke about his classes, and how modern everything seemed in Toronto, some of his classmates had even ridiculed him when they found out that none of the households in Avonlea had electricity and he had only seen it while travelling in New York. Gilbert was well-liked wherever he went because of his easy-going personality, good looks, and polite sensibilities, so he wasn’t hard-up for friends, but he had yet to find anyone to rival Anne and Bash or even Moody and Charlie. He liked Toronto well enough, and he enjoyed learning about the medical research they were doing there but he often found himself missing PEI and Avonlea with its awful smelling rural air, small town politics, and red soil that reminded him of Anne's tresses.
The party began winding down around 11pm, everyone was particularly jocund from the alcohol that had been offered up all night. Anne and Gilbert had decided to stay sober, drinking only the elderflower cordial, Anne’s track record with drunkenness and Gilbert's encounters with rum was enough to put them both off for a lifetime. Gilbert was sitting outside the ballroom fiddling with the wreath Anne had placed atop his head a few hours before, relaxing in peace from the crowds of people, when Josephine Barry approached him for the second time that night. He helped the elderly woman sit beside him.
“I remember all those years ago when a young redhead mentioned the name ‘Gilbert Blythe’, I believe you had just lost your father and you and a certain girl had a disagreement. She believed she had a great store of knowledge about being an orphan but unfortunately, she was naïve and hadn’t understood the pain of loss... that was the year I lost my Gertrude. I remember it so vividly not just because it was the first time, I truly met dear Anne but because the name ’Gilbert Blythe’ felt so familiar and it reminded me of my dearest love. I decided not to trouble myself too much over the name, but when we were searching the ship logs to send you that letter in Trinidad, it suddenly came upon me. That this Gilbert Blythe who young Anne seemed so intertwined with, was the same young boy who had dumped worms in my lap all those years ago,” the woman said, “oh, how you made Gertrude laugh, I was so angry afterwards, my gown was covered in dirt, practically ruined, but she helped me find the humour in the event and all my frustration dissipated. I loved her as you do Anne. I am so grateful that I found the one person who saw into my soul and shared the same spirit. Anne might refer to the phenomenon as a kindred spirit, but I prefer the more generic term… soul-mates.”
Gilbert smiled. He knew Anne had penned the term ‘life-mates’ instead of husband and wife, believing them to be far too restricting; he thought the term would fit them and their future marriage of equals but the idea of them being soul-mates made his heart soar. Their souls were two halves longing to match, even in death they would belong only to each other.
“I think the term is splendid, Miss Barry,” Gilbert replied, imitating his dearest Anne. The old woman tutted.
“Gilbert, my boy, you must call me Aunt Jo.”