A Bend in the Road Chapter Six

 Chapter Six

Once a Broken Heart Heals...

    "Anne, do you think it is possible to fall in love more than once?" Katharine sprung this momentous question upon poor Anne the moment she had shut the door in the little east gable room behind her. Her heart was beating so strangely and she could feel the heightened warmth in her cheeks. It was all so unsettling… so new to her.

    "The fountains mingle with the river and the rivers with the ocean, the winds of heaven mix forever with a sweet emotion; Nothing in the world is single; All things by a law Divine in one spirit meet and mingle. Why not I with thine?" quoth Anne dreamily. She was sitting before the window, staring out at a silvery crescent of a moon floating in a star-studded sky.

    "Anne?" Katharine frowned, not certain of what her friend was speaking, or even if she had heard her. Anne turned toward her then, with the slightly-agonized look of one who has just been torn from a beautiful dream.

    "I'm sorry, Katharine… I was drinking in the beauty of this lovely night… and… well…" she paused with a faraway smile. "Never mind. What did you say?" And so Katharine repeated her fateful question, ashamed to own that her voice was trembling.

    "Of course it is, dear Katharine!" Anne laughed lightly. "The heart is not restricted in that way. Once a broken heart heals, it may find again the love it thought it lost." She leaned her head to one side and looked at Katherine contemplatively. "They told you about Emily, didn't they?"

    "How did you know?"

    "I have my ways," Anne smiled. "Or perhaps I should be less cryptic and just say that Mrs. Lynde has a loud voice." Katharine laughed.

    "She does at that!"

    "How do you feel then… about Emily, I mean?"

    "I… hardly know…" Katharine faltered. "I thought… well, I don't really know what I think. Even though Avonlea feels like home, I really am just an outsider and I'm walking in on years of life before I ever arrived…" Her voice trailed away and she was silent for a long moment. Anne said nothing, only waited for her friend to continue.

    "I keep thinking of my dreams… my dreams of travel. And then I think of this new dream that is somehow forming in spite of all I can do. This strange new dream of a home… and a family… someone who loves me."

    "Just wait till a dream comes true," Anne answered softly. "Mine did, although it was a dream that I didn't realize I even had until… until I nearly lost it. I know that yours will too, one or the other, someday. Remember, there really is a bend in the road. And don't contradict me this time," she finished with a laugh.

    "I won't," Katharine grinned. "I haven't the heart for contradicting you any longer… somehow you have a way of knowing what will happen. So I'll just wait…"

    "And trust in Providence," Anne added. "He knows your future… and He'll show you, just when the time is right."

oOo

    In spite of the golden autumn sunshine streaming through the windows of Green Gables the next morning, Katharine felt rather down. Part of it, in fact, was because of that lovely sunshine and the golden glow that settled all over Green Gables.

    Three more days. That was all Katharine had. And then it was back to Kingsport and the miserable dark drudgery that she detested.

    "I'm going for a walk," she stated bluntly to Marilla, Anne, and Mrs. Lynde collectively as she finished Marilla's home-cooked breakfast… such a breakfast! And the meals at the boarding house were dreadful… Dreadful, with a capital D.

    "Poor thing," Mrs. Lynde shook her head sadly as she watched Katharine's departing figure from the kitchen window. "Just dreading the thought of going back, that's what."

    "That", as Mrs. Lynde had said, was exactly "what". But perhaps a little bit more. And Katharine was so absorbed in her thoughts that she didn't even look where she was going. Her feet followed her heart as they led her down the red dirt road. Before she realized where she was going, she found herself, to her own great surprise, on the road just before David McAllister's farm. What's more, David McAllister himself was out in the pasture just then. Her first thought was to move on quickly in the hopes he hadn't seen her, but he was calling to her and she turned back.

    "Katherine… Katherine…" he was hurrying toward her and was now at the edge of the field, just across the fence from her. "I'm… I'm sorry… about last night."

    "Why… what's there to be sorry about?" Katherine asked innocently but her face was flaming.

    "Well…" he seemed awfully uncomfortable and she felt suddenly terribly sorry for him.

    "David… don't worry about it. Really. I'm not upset in the least little bit… I mean it. I promise."

    "Really?" he smiled at her and she couldn't help but smile back. There was something about David McAllister's smile that was completely irresistible. "About Emily..."

    "You don't need to explain," Katherine interrupted. "I know… all about it… now."

    "It was ten years ago, Katherine. Nearly a lifetime ago… or so it seems. There are times now and then when I miss her, but not in the way that I used to. When it first happened, I mean. I wonder sometimes what my life would have been if she hadn't… gone away. But if she hadn't, then I… I… wouldn't have..." he was speaking in a low voice, his eyes on the ground. But he suddenly looked up and his eyes met Katharine's. A feeling, sudden and unexpected, suddenly shot through her… an almost eerie feeling of premonition.

    "Never mind the past." Katharine attempted to laugh. "It's a beautiful day. So beautiful that I must live in the present. Will you walk with me?"

    And so he did. It was the last time for a long while that they would walk together and Katherine knew it. That fact alone put a rather gloomy outlook on the otherwise perfect day. He took her down his pastures and through the woods back of his house, showed her the little brook that ran through the back yard and the little clearing in the woods just made for a picnic. Then they took the back way, through what Anne called "The White Way of Delight" and what David called "Fraser's Apple Orchard", though why he didn't call it "The Avenue", as Katherine had heard it was termed, she didn't know.

    They stopped at the Green Gables gate and Katherine could see Marilla and Mrs. Rachel, complete with patchwork and knitting, sitting on the front porch. She sighed, internally. No escaping from Mrs. Rachel in this situation...

    "So you're leaving on the Saturday morning train..." David said slowly, with a sideways glance at the house. Katherine nodded.

    "I'll pick you up and drive you to the station," he added. "That is... if you want me to..."

    "Oh, yes!" Katherine said quickly, but then her face fell. "Anne had already asked Gilbert and..." she paused. "But would you come along anyway?" she continued, hopefully.

    He smiled and nodded. She turned toward the house, but he caught her hand and she stopped.

    "Katherine... you will come back soon?"

    "I hope to come back for Christmas," she answered.

oOo

    It just so happened that Gilbert and Anne left extra early Saturday morning, hoping to spend some time in Carmody before the train left the station. And so David picked up Katherine an hour later and they drove alone to the Carmody station. Anne was waiting for Katherine on the little platform, tickets in hand.

    The train was already slowly moving to a stop and Katherine felt her heart sinking with every moment that brought it closer. All too soon, the conductor was calling for passengers and her bags were being carried aboard. David still stood on the platform as she turned to board the train, watching her with a smile half-sad, half-hopeful. She stopped suddenly and went back to him.

    "Will you write? I mean... would you mind... if I write..." There. Something truly was the matter with her. She couldn't hardly speak a straight sentence any longer.

    "I'd be glad to," he answered eagerly. "And... I'll be counting down the days till Christmas."

    "As will I," Katherine smiled, relieved that she had the presence of mind to say that straight through. Just three words, but at least she hadn't stammered.

    And before she knew it, she was on the train, speeding quickly away from Avonlea. She leaned up against the window, watching David standing still on the station platform until she could no longer see him. Then she sat back against the hard leather seat and applied herself to composing herself. If she was going back to Kingsport, she was most certainly not going back in such a flustered state.