I've delayed in posting this chapter because I wanted to get the ending perfect. Thanks so much to everyone who's read and reviewed this story. One free review to the first person who can tell me where I stole Fiona's song from - but no cheating!

Fiona turned and smiled at Hugh as his head poked up between the leaves of the apple tree. She was sitting on a low branch, growing apples for dessert that evening, and as she always did when Hugh came close to her, she had heard his bees buzzing before she could see him. He looked at her, and at first, she thought she only imagined the disappointed look on his face. But then he muttered, "Bullocks."

Fiona lowered one hand that she'd extended to grow apples. "What's wrong?"

Hugh looked sheepish, then said, "Well, I keep trying to hear that song you sing when you're growing things, but you always stop whenever I get near enough."

Fiona blushed. She often sang the same song softly to herself whenever she was growing plants, but she hadn't thought that anyone had noticed. "My daddy taught it to me," she said slowly, remembering how the words had sounded in his deep voice. "I don't know where he learned it. It's about a man who had an apple orchard."

"Will you teach it to me?" Hugh asked. "Please? I want to hear you sing it properly."

Fiona hesitated, biting her lip. She felt too shy to sing in front of Hugh, but just then, a little breeze blew, and the leaves of the apple tree all rustled around them, as if they were encouraging her. For a moment, Fiona remembered those sad, lonely days in the forest before Miss Peregrine found her, when the leaves and plants were her only company. She could never have imagined, back then, living here in Miss Peregrine's fine house and having so many friends.

Suddenly, her nerves vanished, and she smiled at Hugh. "All right," she agreed and softly, she began to sing. "I owe the Lord so much, for everything I see. I'm certain if it weren't for Him, there'd be no apples on this limb. Yes, He's been good to me."

Hugh grinned back at her. "Blimey, that's perfect for being in an apple tree," he said, and they sang it together. When they reached the end, Hugh found that Victor's words had come true. The time was right, and Hugh knew it, and without thinking, he leaned forward on the branch and kissed Fiona on the cheek.

When he pulled back from her, she was giggling, and he worried for a second that she was laughing at him. But then she said, "I could feel your bees buzzing. It tickled."

Hugh's worries vanished, and he grinned so wide that his face hurt. There was a strange, wonderful surge of excitement in his chest like he'd never felt before. He had done it. He had kissed Fiona, and she had liked it. "I guess it must feel funny to you," he managed to say. "I'm so used to them, I don't notice it anymore."

Fiona smiled and slowly reached out and picked an apple from a leafy branch over their heads. But as she handed it to Hugh, he saw that it wasn't an ordinary apple. She had used her Peculiarity to make it shaped like a heart. He held it reverently between his hands, as if it were something very precious. "Blimey," he whispered, "I'll never bring myself to eat this."

It felt so private up in the apple tree, with the sunlit green branches like a curtain around them, that they both had a rude shock when suddenly, Millard's voice came from quite nearby.

"Ooh, Hugh and Fiona are in lo-ove," he jeered, teasing.

Hugh's face burned, embarrassed and angry, and whipped his head around, looking for Millard's clothes, but Millard must have taken them off. He did that sometimes, even though Miss Peregrine was always telling him that "polite persons do not go about in the nude to spy on their housemates."

"Millard, shut up!" Hugh yelled, as Millard began making kissing noises. He took a deep breath, preparing to open his mouth and sic his bees on Millard, but Fiona was faster. She picked another apple, made it grow bigger, and threw it hard in the direction of Millard's voice. They heard it connect, and then a series of ow's and oof's as he fell to the ground.

Emma and Abe were approaching, on their way back to the house after returning the baby squirrel to its nest, and they heard him grunting. "Is that you, Millard?" Emma asked, her eyes searching the empty space under the tree. "Where are your clothes?"

Hugh quickly began climbing down the tree, not wanting to give Millard a chance to say that he'd just seen him kiss Fiona. "He took them off to spy on us again!" he called to Emma.

"Hugh and Fiona pushed me out of the tree!" Millard countered, hoping to get them in trouble, too.

Abe shook his head and muttered something in Polish. "Millard, if you're meshuga enough to climb a tree naked, you deserve what you get."

Hugh and Fiona giggled at this, their hands over their mouths. They had both climbed down from the tree now, and Emma and Abe had reached the bottom of it. "But really, are you all right?" Abe asked the empty space where Millard was, and he mumbled an embarrassed "Yeah, fine."

"Come on, then," Emma said, smiling gently, "let's go in and get ready for supper."

Abe picked up the basket of apples that Fiona had picked and fell into step beside Emma as they walked to the house. His free hand took hold of hers – it was a well-known secret in their house that Emma and Abe were sweet on each other – and Hugh copied the gesture with Fiona. She smiled at him, and as they went inside, the last words of her father's song played again inside her head, and she understood, in a new way, that they were true.

Yes, He's been good to me.

The End