My feet brush against the rough edge of the cold stone floor. I look out the window at the midnight sky lit with tiny sparkling stars. The bright round full moon casting a shadow against the bare walls of my room. A memory resurfaced, two children running through the woods, a young boy chasing a girl who looked about a year older. Their giggles echoed through the silent woods. Twigs cracked under their tightly laced weather worn boots. The girl tripped over a stone and fell onto the wet forest floor. The boy quickly caught up to her and started to inspect the rock. Scratched into the stone was the name " Cerys Hearth."The rock looked like it was hastily placed leaning against a tree. He looked around and noticed that they had stumbled into a clearing in the woods. The boy bent down and continued to inspect the stone but the girl laughed it off
"C'mon Eth, we need to go back."
I look back down at the letter in my hand, the envelope sealed with a waxy blood red seal. I pull out my cold metal letter opener and break the seal. The neatly folded parchment inside
" Dear Aurora Graves, I am pleased to inform you that you have been accepted into Willard School For Girls, Thank you for applying here. We are lucky to have someone as gifted as you."
My eyes skip over the lines and a smile starts to form on my lips,Finally I can leave this place. I can start over.I look out the window and send a silent prayer of thanks.
I quickly fold the letter back up and place it in it's cream envelope. Tomorrow I'll be boarding a train with a ticket out of Warwick. I better get some sleep for the long day ahead of me tomorrow. I tie up my dull short brown hair and pull on some warmer clothes to sleep in. Once I've got the covers around me I light a candle and pick up my only copy of little women. It's pages are creased from every time I have carefully analyzed the pages. Which is a lot. I run my fingers over the leather bound spine. I open it to the page marked with a thick envelope. Then I'm lost in the world of Laurie and Jo.
If I could have a love story I wouldn't want a prince to come rescue me and take me back to his castle, I would want someone like Laurie to love me but also to be my best friend. Of course I knew I would never be one of those girls to have a love story that only existed in books.
At the time that this whole mess started I was still fifteen, and had just finished my freshman year at my local high school which was to say the least typical. The different groups that were in every normal high school movie also existed at my less than mediocre rather plain school, there were the jocks who were usually also guilty of a lot of the bullying that occurred along with popular girls who dressed in the current style and had make up that probably took many hours. Never in my young life had I put on much more makeup than a bit of lip balm.
Those girls were the type to pick a girl that they would torment for the rest of their high school years, I of course was a prime suspect for such bullying as I wore clothes that were mostly thrifted or hand me downs and never cared much for my appearance, if anyone even bothered to pay attention me at school they would probably find me
Hidden in a stairwell with some book propped up in my lap, probably Jane Austin or something older in greek maybe latin. Not that anyone would have cared what I was reading. Luckily I was well trained in the art of being invisible. So bullying was not in fact the reason i was leaving my plain old high school for an all girls boarding school somewhere in the middle of upstate New York. Though many would tell you otherwise I did not necessarily dislike my current school, you could say I just needed a change of scenery.
When I next opened my eyes I realized I must have fallen asleep the night before while reading, because the bright rays of morning sun had started casting shadows on the cold stone floor of my room. After I had finished hastily putting together an outfit and putting a few books, a leather bound light chestnut brown notebook, a black ink fountain pen, and my pair of round metal rimmed reading glasses. Into a canvas bag and slung it over my shoulder. I laced my black leather boots and walked to the bus station from my house.
Once the bus arrived at the train station in Newport I had already finished half of my book and started to work on some Greek translation in my notebook. When the bus jolted to a stop at the station. I saw a boy around my age getting off the bus. I only saw the back of his brown curly mop of hair. I hadn't seen anyone else younger than at least forty on the bus this early in the morning. I have to admit I was curious as to what he was doing at this early hour in Newport Station. I have to admit I was curious about the boy. He didn't look like the teenage boys at the dull high school that I had previously attended, he was holding a book in one hand, something I had rarely seen a teenage boy holding. He also was dressed very differently to those boys he had on a knitted dark forest green sweater and under his trousers were loosely laced boots not too dissimilar from my own. When I glanced up again the boy was gone and the bus driver was telling the passengers that it was our last chance to get off at Newport Station. I hurriedly grabbed my stuff and rushed out of the open door and into the staton.
