Inspired by rachelmanija’s alternate ending for Emily of New Moon. Only while hers is what really happened to Emily Starr, mine is what Pat Gardiner never said.
Phoenix Pat, a playlet
(set immediately after the last line of Mistress Pat)
SCENE: a beautiful night, with trees sighing in a light breeze and a half moon and stars rising above the shell of a house gutted by fire.
NARRATOR: And then the old orchard heard the most charming sound in the world: the low, yielding voice of a girl held prisoner by her lover.
HILARY’S mounth lowers to PAT’S. The lights dim, but not enough to hide a brief struggle.
PAT: Let – me – go!
HILARY, confused: What? But you just kissed me. Aren’t you mine now?
PAT: I’m mine now! Oh, Jingle, let’s not go home right away, not even to your new house in the West.
Hilary, hurt: But I built it for *you*, Pat. You’ll love it.
PAT: I will. And I’ll love you. But let’s travel the world first – I want you to show me a moonrise in Japan and twilight in the Old World. Oh, Hilary, I feel like the princess from an old fairy tale, kept in a tower all her life. Only I never knew it until this minute. Even burned, Silver Bush held me. But now – you have set me free.
She takes his hand and looks up in his eyes, at the moon’s reflection.
PAT: You always understand, Hilary.
HILARY, taking his hand back: I will always need to travel for my work, Pat. And I had envisioned coming back to the home I’ve never had – with you in it, making it live. I can only give up my dream on one condition.
He steps closer, but is careful not to hold her except with his eyes.
HILARY: Pat, if you won’t wait at home for me – will you travel with me? You were always all that meant home to me.
PAT steps closer and lays her head on his shoulder. Her words are slightly muffled.
PAT: We’ll have a real home, Hilary. And we’ll come back to it together. But we’ll leave it sometimes too. “Home” isn’t “self”, Hilary. I can’t be that for you – you’ve had to learn to be your own self and now I have to learn that too. We’ll face the world together, instead of facing only each other.
HILARY puts his arms around her, but gingerly, as if afraid to bruise a wild thing.
HILARY: We will.