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Anne nodded. Tears fell off her cheekbones. She knew. She’d guessed since that awful day at Bravey’s Inn, and she’d mostly given up all hope when Wellington had begun to rust, and she’d been certain when her toffee hammer with ANNE etched on it turned into a birch branch halfway down the stairs from one Parsonage to another and all their wonderful medals had turned into chips of rock and pinecones. But she had to try anyway.
“I’m sorry,” Anne’s voice started to hitch
a little, full of tears to come. “I should have let you have it for poor Welly after all. You knew I had it, Charlotte. I saw. I saw you knowing it. It was only that—”
“Don’t be silly, Annie. All of us being six again is ever so much more important than the Duke of Wellington. And even if Emily’s right . . . there was a hope, you know. It was always little. But it was big enough.”
Anne squared her shoulders.
“It will work like it did in Glass Town,” Anne said. “And . . . and . . .”
“And everyone will wake up and start talking all at once and kiss us like mad,” Branwell took up the game. “And . . . and . . .”
“And we’ll all turn into birds and fly away into the stars,” Emily said, her eyes wet. “And . . . and . . .”
“And nothing bad will ever happen, because we will be all of us together forever until the very, very end of time,” Charlotte whispered.
Anne opened the vial and turned it upside down. A single red rose petal fell out, bright and vivid and stark against the graves.
“We brought you flowers, Mummy,” said Anne, and leaned over to kiss the fading headstone.
She smiled at her brother and sisters. Her eyes were dry. You couldn’t ever really fix a sad story. You could only make another. And another. And another, until you found the right one at last, the one that ends in joy.
The children lingered under that benign sky, watched the moths fluttering among the heath and harebells, listened to the soft wind breathing through the grass.
“How anyone can ever imagine unquiet slumber for our dear sleepers in that quiet earth I shall never know,” Aunt Elizabeth said finally, and went down the path to coax the four tired, sweet things up toward the warm candlelit house.
