This is my first ever complete fan fiction. I hope that you enjoy it, and that you tell me what you think. Be gentle with me. Also, note that the story and characters of the movie and novel Chocolat do not belong to me.
Freedom on the Wind
We came on the wind, you and I. I followed it, and I followed you, like a puppy following its beloved master. Twisting and turning, sniffing out anything of interest, nosing in corners, licking hands and making friends, but always I trailed behind, following. You, however, were an umbrella, inanimate, blown along because the wind moved you, inspired your every action. You seemed to know nothing else but the wind, no particular purpose. The wind would blow, and we would leave all.
Did we do any good, you and I? Could we have? Was it possible, that in our running around, chasing nothing, we changed people, made them better? Certainly we made them happy… for a while. But it does not take long for everything to go back to how it was. No window once cleaned stays sparkling and cobweb free forever. No amount of paint, or chocolate for that matter, can keep a small town happy. You thought differently. You were so unlike me. Experience made me, shaped me, and I did not like it. I did not like the experiences, nor did I like how they moulded me. I do not like to recall how we were, how I was.
As I stand here in my house, I remember our coats and capes, and walking with them flapping. Walking in the wind, following it unquestionably along hilly ridges. What was your mission? What called you, drove you? What was your magic? I never quite knew. Mine was different. But children either copy their parents, or go a separate way. So many years of unquestioning walking, unquestioning fleeing, making it seem normal yet foreign. It is 'how it is, how it was, how it always will be'. I hated it, as my own daughter, your granddaughter does now. You hear me? I hated it. I could not go a separate way. Not then. Just like my daughter could not until now, freed by my own decision.
However, I sometimes wonder what I would have been if you had not been how you were. Would I just be a grey little housewife, married to my daughter's father, possibly in a loveless marriage, caring for nothing but sewing and silly gossip and pretending I see nothing, never helping? So in a way I am glad for what you were. But I cannot go on like this for my whole life. I have played my part. I have done what you have asked me, all these years, alive and dead. But I now know that it will do no one good, not the villagers, not our ancestors long dead and finished their wanderings, not who I love and care about, and certainly not me. Your methods change nothing in their lives, in your life. Mine, they set people free. I can accept that you would not like it, but I am making my own magic. I will find my own way.
You may continue to follow the wind.
Goodbye, mother.