Grow Up
She never wanted to grow up. No one ever does, really.
She still wanted to be that child playing with her dolls. That young teenager exploring new places, building dens in the nature-reserves and the scruff land between fields. She still wanted to be that older teen, using the dens to drink in, to have some fun, to explore herself and others.
She never wanted to be twenty three, out in the big wide world and all alone. Out of university and unable to find a job, in a new place yet again. She never wanted to be unable to settle down and be happy, maybe meet someone to join her. She never wanted to be rejected so many times, to build up such a reputation.
She's always wanted to be happy.
Now she's in a new place, further north than she thought she'd ever go if she's honest. The weather's colder, the air's cleaner even in the city. She's in the countryside and at the coast all at the same time. She's slowly getting used to life in a caravan as she tries to find a house or flat to rent. God knows, she'd love to be out of this caravan, but at only £10 a week it's cheaper than the bed and breakfasts scattering the coast, and she needs to save as much as possible as she searches for a job.
She's been in to the city a lot applying in all of the clothes shops and cafés and restaurants. She's even tried the enormous department stores. But the recession is biting and no where is hiring. Everywhere is trying to cut back on expenditure. She volunteers at a museum, her travel and lunch paid for six days a week, saving her money and allowing her to travel further afield in her search for work.
When she looks out of the front window of the tiny caravan she can see the glittering blue sea and a tall lighthouse on a tiny island. There's a small seal colony on the island, and she sits for hours sometimes, watching them jump from the rocks in to the sea and then flop back up with their fishy meals. She still hasn't visited yet, she's been at the museum when the cause-way is uncovered for the most part, and it's not yet May so the sea is still pretty unbearable. She's promised herself that one day she'll visit because the lighthouse looks so alone and sometimes frightening, especially when the rain is pounding on the roof of the caravan and the waves are rearing up.
She's waiting for the kettle to boil right now, gazing out of the large window at the lighthouse in it's imposing stance. The sky is blue and the sea matches it, from her vantage point high on the cliffs she can see the deeper areas, where the rocks drop away. The owner of the caravan site had been down earlier and told her about the history of the place. He's old and grey-haired, but she doesn't mind because he has a generous heart and brings her some biscuits and milk every so often, in exchange for a little company. His wife died a few years ago and now he's alone, with no family willing to come and see him unless it happens to be a bank holiday weekend and they want somewhere free to stay with their kids. He told her that he might not let them stay this year, that bigger caravans on the site would be put to better use by other families, paying families, in the summer months.
The kettle's boiled. She pours the water in to mug and swirls a teabag with a tea spoon, too impatient for traditional brewing. She sloshes some milk in and fishes the tea bag out, putting it in a small plastic tub next to the sink, ready to go in the compost heap up by the owners house. She leaves the tea on the table at the front and walks to the door, stuffing her feet in to some scruffy blue converse, greying with age. She opens the door and steps out, the wind hitting like a wave, cold and unforgiving. Her caravan is next to the gate anyway, and once she is through the gate she is on the high cliff edge path and walking towards the lighthouse. The sun is warm through the wind and everything looks so perfect. The beauty of the place strikes her as never before as she walks down the steadily lowering path, nearing the lighthouse. The tide is almost completely out and only a little of the causeway is covered in water. She scrambles over rocks now, suddenly desperate to get to the lighthouse. She's a child again, a young teenager on an adventure, exploring a new place. She sits on the last rock and pulls her converse off before her feet sink in to the soft sand. A small bay connects the rocky cliffs to the point of the headland and the start of the causeway.
Suddenly she is on the concrete of the causeway, and she runs. It's only thirty feet or so, but she has to get to the island. She splashed through the water in the middle and it never passes her ankles. Only the very bottom of her jeans get wet. Over the causeway she runs up a steep slope towards the lighthouse. She stops and pushes the door open, pads in with her still bare and wet feet.
"Hello?" She calls, suddenly alone and feeling the chill of the inside of the lighthouse.
Something seems to call her to a door a quarter of the way clockwise around the circular wall from where she is standing. She walks to it and goes through, suddenly in a gift shop. An old woman is standing behind the counter on her own, a paintbrush and small model of the island, complete with lighthouse, in her hands.