Author's Note: Hi all! This is actually just a story idea I had but, due to the extensive research that it will require to do it justice, will probably never have time to work out. Therefore I thought: let's put it online and maybe someone else gets inspired by it! If you are inspired, let me know so I can read it! (:

Prologue: A change of scenery

May 7, 2018

She had been a mere child when it happened, so many years ago such that her life before had started to feel like a distant memory, a figment from a dream that had started to fade as soon as she woke up – yet she recalled the day everything changed like it had been only yesterday.

One moment she had been on her way to school, ready for it to be just another day like many others in which she would smile and lie and pretend. She had taken a short cut through the park, hoping that it would save her just enough time to be in class before the bell rang, practicing what she was going to say if it was not. She remembered it had been a warm summer day, and the park had been filled with life; people going for a run, for a relaxing stroll, or walking their dog peacefully. She had hardly noticed however, had hardly cared, and so had missed the cycler as he'd appeared from between the trees.

Even after all this time, she was not sure what had happened next. She was inclined to believe that they had never truly collided, if only because the idea sounded better than the alternative, and the many implications that were tied to it. What she did know was that all had gone black after that, and when she had awoken, she was no longer in the park.

Somehow, in the split second that seemed to be missing from her memory, she had moved from the small park in her hometown to a bustling street in a city. Beautiful old mansions lined the street, not unlike the ones she had once seen in a school trip to London, and the sidewalks were filled with people of all walks of life. Transfixed by the scene she had stood gaping, until rude shouting called her to attention just in time to step to the side of an approaching carriage. There had been more displeased mumbling as she accidentally bumped into someone, and she had turned to apologise only to note the woman she had bumped into was dressed in a floor-length soft pink dress with a wide skirt and a matching trimmed bonnet. She had been on the arm of a pompous looking man with a large moustache and top hat, wearing what had appeared to her at the time as a pair of leggings. Noticing she was still there, the woman had given her a disapproving look and had sprouted something that she did not quite understand. Before she could ask for her meaning, the woman and man had already continued their stroll, leaving her standing alone and forgotten on the sidewalk.

With that odd encounter in mind, she had suddenly taken notice of other oddities that she had failed to notice before. Such as the carriages that kept on buzzing by. And the strange fashion trend all other people seemed to be following, the women in their full-length, frilly dresses and matching gloves and hats, and the men with their waistcoats and those tights that she kept seeing everywhere. And then there had been the incessant buzz of lilting words that she could not understand, that surrounded her like a swarm of bees and had made her head feel heavy and light all at once. Feeling dizzy, she had moved towards the side of the sidewalk, where she had sat down next to some shopfront or another that she could not understand and had closed her eyes, willing for the world to go back to normal.

But it had not, and when she felt a hand softly touching her shoulder, she opened her eyes to the same beautiful and terrifying world that she had tried to escape. A man was crouched down in front of her, keeping a respectable distance and eying her with what appeared to be a mixture between concern and wariness. He must have been in his mid-forties, his dirty blond hair thinning at his temples, with heavy eyebrows but a friendly complexion. He was talking to her, but once again the meaning behind the words failed to reveal itself to her. In that moment, she had felt as lost as the words the man had spoken were to her, and tears welled up in the realisation that she was truly, horribly alone in this strange new world.

'Where are we?' She had blurted at him.

His thick eyebrows had drawn together and he had looked as confused as she must have looked at him. Then, he had started speaking again in that strange lilting language that seemed to flow like the waves of the ocean.

She tried again, breaking into his speech with a desperate note to her voice and a lump in her throat. 'Please, I don't know what you are saying. I just want to get home. I need to get home; my father he…. I don't know what to do anymore; please help me.' Her voice had risen to hysterical heights during her speech, and although he looked just as confused as before, he held up his hands in a placating motion, as would one do to a child.

But of course he had not understood any of what she was saying, and he continued again. At this point she had been ready to start crying, screaming, anything that would help in setting the world to right. '…, mademoiselle.'

Her ears had somehow managed to pick up that word in the unintelligible flow of words; that four-syllable word an anchor that she had desperately clung to in a sea that was attempting to drown her. She had followed French lessons for one year, and although the language had never settled with her, she remembered that address. Clawing through her muddled memories, she had valiantly tried to search for a response, yet the foreign words had been as lost to her as they had been in her classes. In the end, she had managed only four words, 'Je ne parle pas français,' she had stammered, the words tumbling off her tongue in a garbled mess. Luckily they had been enough – for indeed, otherwise her story might have turned out very different – and the man seemed to understand for he nodded, although seeming no less and even a bit more wary of her than before. Again making a placating motion with his hands, accompanied by more of the foreign words, he had stood from his position and had disappeared in the throng of people.

For a moment, she had considered herself once again alone, thinking that he had simply given up on trying to speak with her. She had looked around her, for the first time seeing through the beauty and seeing the ugliness that hid in the shadows. Beggars were seated at every street corner, desperately grabbing at the skirts of the wealthy passers-by. In the alleys between the tall buildings she noticed even more of them, dirty and sickly, dressed in rags that hardly covered them from the eye, some missing teeth, eyes, or limbs, so thin that she could not fathom how and why they still clung to life. Some of them had taken to surveying her as well, emaciated faces following her movements, dull eyes observing, assessing – and she had realised she stood out like a sour thumb with her crisp white blouse and plaited skirt. Before she had any more time to consider it, the man reappeared, pulling a bespectacled young man in his late twenties behind him. He spoke to the new man in agitated tones, once every while gesturing in her direction. The younger man only nodded, before he lowered himself on his hunches like the dirty blond man had done before him.

'You are English?' He had asked her in a clipped voice, the words sounding all wrong on his tongue. But she had hardly cared at that point, and the tears that had filled her eyes now fell at finally having found someone she could understand.

She leaned forward, grabbing him by his lapels as she cried, 'Yes! Please, I… you must help me. I don't know what happened, but all of a sudden I was here and I don't understanding anything that is going on or what people are saying, but…-'

'Slow, please,' the young man had said, before looking up at the blonde man. He'd rushed to say something in the strange language – French, she had reminder herself – to him and the other man had nodded tersely, eyed her once more with that curious mix of concern and suspicion, before he'd left down the sidewalk. Then, the bespectacled man continued, 'Go inside to shop. Too loud,' he had explained as he gestured to the busy street.

He had helped her up from her seated position, and had then steered her across the street to what appeared to be a small bookshop, judging the shop front. Once the door closed behind them, the constant buzz lay down and she felt like she could finally breathe again. He moved her to the back of the shop, where a small wooden table and two chairs were set up, and guided her into one of them.

'Now slowly.'

As they had walked, her mind had finally managed to catch up to the situation, and she had reached several tentative conclusions. Yet, she needed to know for sure, needed to know this was not simply some very elaborate joke at her expense. And so she had asked her first question. 'Were are we?'

He had looked a bit funnily at the question, but answered regardless. 'Paris.'

She had taken a deep breathe, forcing herself to ask the second question. 'What is the date?'

Again he'd seemed surprised at her question, but he was completely serious when he answered – and for some reason she had no doubt about the honesty of this young and kind man, despite the absolute impossibility of it all. 'May seventh, one eight two eight.'

Despite her suspicions, she had not been able to respond immediately after this. 1828. If a sudden and unexplained transportation had not been enough to shock her, it now seemed she had also somehow managed to travel almost two centuries back in time.

But of course she could not very well tell this to this perfect stranger of the nineteenth century; he would think her absolutely mad, if he did not do so already – what with her strange behaviour and clothes, and her inability to speak the language of the country she had suddenly found herself in the heart of. But if there was one thing she had always prided herself on, it had been thinking on her feet.

If this was real, if she was truly in nineteenth century France, then who was to say she could not leave behind the broken home that she had known, that she could not be whoever she wanted to. 'I travelled here from England, but I must have fallen asleep in the carriage for I don't remember arriving here… in Paris.'

He had looked unconvinced by her explanation, but seemed to have decided to humour her for now. 'Your clothes are very…,' he seemed to be thinking of the right word, but eventually settled for, 'odd.'

She had bit her lip at this, even at that point realising that her clothing must have been completely inappropriate, to say the least. 'It is a travel outfit,' she had simply said, hoping that if he had been willing to listen to her so far, he would not turn her away after this.

A terse nod once again told her the young man did not believe a word of what she was saying, but once again he seemed to contend himself with the answer for now. 'My name is Théodore Clavette, I own this bookshop. You are fortunate I speak English,' he had been sure to let her know, and she'd smiled a little at it. 'Tell me, who are you and why you come to Paris?'

'My name is Celeste,' she had begun slowly, testing this new name on her tongue. 'As to why I am here… I simply needed a change of scenery, I suppose.'

Some notes for those interested:
- I envision for the girl to move in with the bookshop keeper (name idea: Theodore Clavette) under the guise of his cousin
- Feel free to change the way she time travels. I realise this may seem silly, but I actually had no idea how to go about it.
- The story starts in 1828 and so I planned for some chapters to be about her development. Over time, her old memories and life (which was not all that pleasant) slip away, although she will always have a bit of a 21st century mentality. That is, expecting equality, being too opinionated for a lady, etc. Eventually, I planned for this to be a very very very very (etc.) slow burn towards an attraction to Enjolras, but it would be very longterm as I kind of went with the whole Enjolras-is-asexual trope.
- Barricade is at Rue Mondetour (near Les Halles).
- Bookshop is at Rue du Four, which intersected with the rue des Cordeliers (currently Boulevard Saint-Germain) near the Église de Saint Germain-des-Prés.
- Bookshop is at about the midpoint between Église Saint-Germain-des-Prés and Église Saint-Sulpice. About 5-10 minutes walk south to Gardin Luxembourg.
- This area is also referred to as Faubourg and is part of the Latin Quarter. Latin Quarter is also the place of the Sorbonne University and so a lot of students are in that neighbourhood.