Disclaimer: This is a work of fan fiction using characters created by L.M. Montgomery and Moira Walley-Beckett. I do not claim any ownership over them and offer my writing to the world as a homage to their creations as well as an outlet of imagination to imagine an infinity of alternate storylines. This is just one of them!

To say it was a momentous day was an understatement. First Anne found out she had no known family left in Scotland which was a bitter disappointment. Later, she discovered that Gilbert wasn't going to marry someone else after all because he loves her. Now she had just been given a possession linking her to her parents. Her heart was so full...

Anne suddenly fell silent and smiled with a dreamy expression.

"Anne?" Marilla smiled at seeing Anne so happy. "I don't think I've seen you quite so...so speechless."

"There is a lot on my mind, and not just the incredible contents of this book, this gift you've given me. Oh, Marilla, Matthew, you'll never guess what happened just before you arrived!"

Matthew looked slightly alarmed. "Is everything all right?"

Anne's smile became even wider. "Everything is not just all right. Everything could not be better...no, that doesn't sound right. Everything right now is extraordinary, and beyond anything I could ever have imagined! I even pinched myself to make sure I wasn't dreaming…"

"Anne, please explain yourself!" Marilla suppressed a laugh, as she had not ever seen Anne like this before.

"Gilbert...he was here! He is not going to marry Winifred! He is not going to France! He loves me! Me! And now he finally knows that I love him." Her eyes filled with happy tears.

"Oh Anne!" Marilla embraced her. "What wonderful news! But where did he go? Why did he leave?"

"He had to catch his train...to Toronto! He is going to the University of Toronto to become a doctor." There was a hint of pride in her voice mixed with some wistfulness. Then she smiled all of a sudden. "But now we understand each other, and we found each other just in time. Rather, he found me as I was about to look for him."

"Well, it sounds like you have quite the story to tell!" Marilla looked into Anne's eyes and saw that she looked about to cry. "What a day you've had today!"

"Indeed!" Anne wiped the tears from her eyes.

Matthew looked thunderstruck by all that had transpired. "Gilbert loves you. And you-you love Gilbert."

"And the most unlikely person ended up bringing us together. Well, actually two people. Diana, as you know, was on the same train as Gilbert, and told him of my true feelings. I saw Winifred by chance while I was exploring Charlottetown! Looking back on it, it seemed destined to happen."

"Go on…" said Matthew.

"I think we were surprised to see one another, and then she asked me the strangest question. She asked if I came there to gloat."

"Gloat? You, Anne?" Marilla laughed in surprise. "Why would you gloat?"

"I was just as confounded as you. She then seemed upset when I asked if she was off to Paris, because that was what all of Avonlea believed would happen. Apparently she was upset because she had asked Gilbert to promise not to tell anyone about their trip. Or so I thought! When I tried to take my leave and wish her and Gilbert a wonderful life together, the truth finally came out."

"And?" Matthew was following Anne's story so closely, it delighted Marilla to see him so interested.

"She asked if Gilbert had told me anything about what had happened to them. I asked what he would have told me. She then admitted to me that Gilbert hadn't said anything to anybody and had actually kept his promise. And I'll never forget what she told me next.

"Gilbert told her he couldn't marry her or go to Paris with her because his heart belonged to someone else. He claimed that this someone else did not return his affections and was an unrequited love. She then paused and asked me, 'But you do love him, don't you?'"

Anne paused and smiled. "I confess that her words froze my tongue and that my cheeks must have been blazing crimson."

"She told me I didn't need to say a single word, and then she actually wished us well. She admitted she had been disappointed but understood that he truly loved me and it was clear I truly loved him."

Marilla and Matthew looked at Anne with a mixture of surprise and wonder.

Anne continued. "I know. It was hard to know what to say next but I thanked her for letting me know what happened, wished her well, and excused myself. I walked away until I had to turn a corner, and then I ran back to the boardinghouse. I had every intention of leaving for Avonlea to see Gilbert. And then suddenly he was there in front of me. I felt like I was dreaming!"

Anne took Marilla's hand in one hand and Matthew's in the other. "But I wasn't dreaming. He kissed me, I kissed him back, and finally we understood each other perfectly. He knows I love him. And I know he loves me. It was an incredible moment." The Cuthberts both sighed despite themselves, Matthew looking very red and Marilla with tears of joy brimming in her eyes.

"Both of you look so overcome! It's as if you feel what I am feeling," said Anne looking at them both with wonder.

It was true. The Cuthberts were so attuned with Anne's feelings after all these years, that they knew she was in the best spirits she had ever been in...not only to have her parents restored to her in a fashion, but also to have her bosom friend at school with her and to have found love with her school rival.

The three of them embraced as one, giggling with delight in a freefall of happiness and wonder.

Anne got to feel that whole freefall of emotions again when she and Diana conversed right before curfew. There was so much that had transpired that day that they wanted to discuss but they were surrounded by family in the afternoon and then by all their fellow boarders at dinner. They nearly ran up the stairs to get ready for bed and to discuss all of the events that had transpired that day.

"I have been dying to tell you so much about today, Anne. It is so good we can speak in private!" Diana was helping braid Anne's hair.

"Indeed. And as you once wisely told me, the events of one day can absolutely be life changing."

"I said that?"

"Well, something like that!"

"Well, as you might have guessed, Gilbert was on the same train as Father and me to Charlottetown."

"That's why you had his luggage!"

"Yes, he only saw us when he was changing seats on the train. One moment my father was wishing him well on his marriage, the next moment Gilbert told us he wasn't getting married!"

"So you spoke with him on the train!"

"Oh yes. He apologized that he hadn't been allowed to say anything about not being engaged before!"

"I wondered why he hadn't said anything about that before! He had hardly anything to say to me when we got our examination results. So that explains…" Anne paused. "Well, before I start another story, please finish yours. I am curious to know what you and Gilbert discussed."

Diana finished tying a ribbon on the last braid and sat next to Anne on her bed.

"Immediately following his revelation, I asked him if he was going to Queens and then he told us that he was going to Toronto!"

Diana's tone took on a tinge of anger as she recalled the frustration she had felt at that moment on Anne's behalf. "All I could think was, how could he let the entire town - and especially you - believe he was going to get married and move to Paris when it wasn't true. I was infuriated, and excused myself to take a quick walk down the train aisle. And so my walk away from my father led me straight to Gilbert to confront him. Well, after everything you went through, I felt the need to demand an explanation from Gilbert of his behavior. Because I knew immediately that he couldn't go through with marrying Winifred because he's always loved you."

"You-you said that?"

"Well..not in those exact words. I simply asked him why it took him so long to understand his feelings for you, because it has been so obvious that he's been smitten with you ever since you broke that slate on his head. I also berated him for giving you only half a minute to sort out your feelings for him and decide his entire future for him! Then when I proceeded to berate him for ignoring your letter, his reaction made my heart skip a beat…"

"What do you mean, Diana?"

Diana held Anne's hand and looked her in the eyes, smiling. "He never ignored your letter. Because he never got it!"

"He didn't get my letter? So is that why he had nothing to say to me when we got the examination results…"

"Yes," answered Diana in a tone that implied that Anne needed to stop interrupting her so she could finish. Anne nodded and let her continue. "He kept asking me about what letter I was talking about and what you had written in it. I was stunned speechless for a moment so I wasn't able to answer right away. I then told him about how you had tried to pay a visit but since he hadn't been home, you left him a letter instead. He asked where you had left it and I told him I believed you had left it on the kitchen table."

"Yes, that is where I left it under the water jug."

"Oh Anne, it probably got lost in the course of the day and never got to Gilbert. Anything could have happened to it. But this revelation about your letter just prompted even more questions. He asked if you truly had feelings for him and loved him. I answered him that when he had first asked you at the ruins, you did not yet know your own feelings. And that just a few days later you admitted to me that you loved him and had to tell him."

"He then kept asking me over and over again during the remainder of the train voyage, 'So she loves me?' It was almost comical how incredulous he was, as he had so thoroughly convinced himself that you didn't share his feelings. He admitted he had also written you a letter and thought that your lack of answer was answer enough that you did not return his feelings..."

Anne bent over in embarrassment and held her head in her hands. "Oh, the letter I tore up? The letter he left with the fountain pen he returned to me? The letter I repented in destroying and then tried to piece back together and later could only view his words with bitterness? Did he happen to mention what he had written in that letter?"

Diana could only nod. "He said he wrote you that he was not engaged because he was in love with you, and that he did not want you to be alarmed by this news as he did not expect you to feel the same. But he had also tried to see you and when you were not there, he left that letter because he could not go away without revealing his heart to you."

Anne laid down on the bed with a sigh, covering her eyes. "Oh Diana, what a fool I've been, what fools both Gilbert and I have been! Both he and I, priding ourselves, and perhaps rightly so, on our writing abilities and talents, and yet we had not just one, but two letters between us go unanswered, letters left because we kept missing each other! Of all the times to let my temper get the best of me!" She paused. "Did you tell him about how I destroyed his letter and how I willfully misunderstood him?"

Diana looked at Anne sheepishly. "Well, I had to. When he mentioned his letter to you and how he lost any hope when you didn't respond, I told him what you had done. Honestly he looked the opposite of upset. He seemed almost hopeful and could not wait to get off the train to find you! Perhaps his lesson with the slate made him all the more wiser about your temper."

"Oh but not as wise as you!" Anne got up and laughed, and Diana laughed with her. Suddenly they heard a voice. "Curfew in a half hour. Good night!"

"Let's not get on Mrs. Blackmore's bad side, shall we?" whispered Diana.

"We shan't. We will be the best boarders here by far! But I need to write a letter first. And Diana?"

"Yes?"

Anne embraced her. "Thank you. If you hadn't finally convinced your parents to let you come to Queens, you would not have been on that train, and I would have tried to find Gilbert in Avonlea in vain, only to find he'd gone to Toronto. You brought us together!"

"Oh Anne, it was always meant to be. Both of us studying together at Queens and you and Gilbert finally knowing your feelings for each other. Honestly it felt good scolding Gilbert about you. It was not as if I didn't express what everyone in Avonlea has plainly seen. Someone had to do it!" They both giggled covering their mouths so that the sound wouldn't carry.

"Okay, I'll leave you to your letter to your beloved." Diana smiled and yawned as she went under the covers of her bed. "Good night and beauteous sweet dreams."

"Beauteous sweet dreams to you as well my bosom friend," replied Anne with a smile.

Anne sat down at her desk and looked at her reflection in the window pane behind her desk. She dimmed her oil lamp just enough to still be able to see to write.

Diana's recent words echoed in her head: "Oh, Anne, it was always meant to be."

Was it meant to be? Anne thought. Why did it take so long for me to see what is so clear now in my mind's eye: that I love Gilbert Blythe with my whole soul, and that nothing, not even thousands of miles could keep us apart.

At that moment, Anne thought of her parents, and of the thousands of miles Bertha and Walter Shirley had traveled to move to Canada from Scotland. Having that book of theirs and his father's drawing of her mother made them all the more real to her. Oh, how she longed to talk to Gilbert of this discovery. She wished they had had more than the few precious minutes they had together before he had to leave so suddenly.

Anne looked at her reflection again and tried to imagine what her mother must have looked like. She smiled and took out a fresh sheet of paper. She dipped her pen in her inkwell and began to write:

Dear Gilbert,

I look like my mother...