TUCK EVERLASTING
Spring of Choice
*The same disclaimers apply- Thank you to everyone who R+R'd, it helps keep me writing! This chapter is a little shorter than the others, but I wanted to appease all of you who've been waiting with so much enthusiasm. (ah-hem HAA ah-hem) I apologize that I haven't been very good at updating lately, with Halloween approaching I was suddenly taken with the insane notion to make Winnie's white dress from the movie, so I've been working on that in my spare time. I don't care if I don't finish it in time, I just want that beautiful dress dammit! I'll use any excuse to make it. ^^ I like to sew… it's a ridiculously expensive but waaaay too fun hobby of mine. (sorry you didn't need to hear that, but I feel like sharing)
Chapter 6- Escape
Winnie spent the remaining few days avoiding her parents as much as possible. Her mother made that easy, since she was bent on ignoring her. They had both sat for a long time in deep thought after she had made her departure known. She wondered what in the world they could have been thinking…
"Or plotting…" she thought glumly. She was currently in her room, immersed with the challenge of deciding what to bring when she went to live with Jesse.
" Lots of warm clothes probably…" she mused. " It's worse to be too cold than too hot…but then again… if I only have warm clothes in the summer, I can't exactly walk around naked to cool off!" She shrugged and settled for her medium-weight, autumn corset-cover and two other of her favorite dresses, one for warm weather, and another for cold. "Shoes are easy." She dropped in her most comfortable pair of black leather boots, and several pairs of stockings and underwear. She knew she was probably packing too soon, it was still one more day until her rendezvous with Jesse, but now that her parents knew, she wouldn't be surprised if they might cook some scheme to keep her at home on her important night. She may have to leave early and live in the woods for a night.
"Not that I haven't done it before." She told herself, trying to summon courage. "However…" She glanced out her window. The clouds on the horizon were very dark, and they were inching ever closer to Tree Gap. "It looks like it will storm pretty soon. I don't think I'd like to try living out there alone in the rain… "
Just as she buckled her small suitcase closed, she heard the first few drops of the impending storm splatter on the roof.
Suddenly, her mothers voice carried up from downstairs. "Winifred!"
Winnie's eyebrows knitted together in confusion, her mother had not said a single word to her in three days. And now she was calling for her?
"I wonder what it could be?" She thought as she slid the suitcase under her bed and left her room. She smoothed the fabric of her skirt as she descended the staircase. Winnie was wearing her recent favorite outfit, a high-collared white blouse with ruffles at the shoulders and half sleeves that ended in lace trim, a blue sash, and a narrow skirt of white silk with pale blue flowers decorating the length of it.
She saw her mother at the base of the stairs in traveling coat and hat. " Yes, mother?"
"Winnie, I want you to come into town with us." Her mother was holding Winnie's hat in one hand and a closed umbrella in the other. She was tight lipped and looked very pale, but her eyes were wide and alert. "I have some business at the seamstress, and your father just received an urgent letter from a client of his, he needs to get to the post office right away.
Winnie took her hat and placed it on her head. "Why do I need to come with you?"
"I just… want you too." Her mother said softly and attempted a smile. Winnie felt a pang of guilt. This may be the last time she would do anything with her parents.
"Okay…" She nodded as her mother opened the front door for her. Her father was already in the car with their driver. The two women walked briskly through the rain under the umbrella, and quickly got in.
"Hurry, Robert, the post office will close…"
Winnie noticed how agitated her mother seemed, and her father seemed to be muttering to himself under his breath and fiddled with an envelope he had held in his hands.
She glanced from one parent to the next, but kept her mouth shut. What was going on? Should she ask? It was probably just some trouble with her fathers work, he seldom spoke to her of the subject, but it often made him very stressed out.
They entered Tree Gap and stopped at the seamstress first, her mother bought a bolt of brocade for a new skirt, and then the post office. Her father was inside no less than ten minutes before he was back in the car.
During the excursion, Winnie occupied herself by watching the rain run in little streaks down the windowpane. She could see paths for raindrops developing through the pearling water on the window, they created lots of little avenues for the individual drops to travel and she tried to guess the path that the next drop would take. She was so enveloped with this game, that she failed to notice that her father was not taking them back to Tree Gap after he'd returned to the car. She snapped to attention when the car hit an unfamiliar bump in the road. And suddenly she realized that they were almost out of the woods that outlined the town, and heading in the opposite direction of her home.
"Where are we going?" She asked hastily.
Winnie's father tensed, but it was her mother that spoke. " Your aunt Marjorie has been begging for us to come and visit her at the ocean for the last few months. I finally took her up on her offer. I thought that a nice holiday would be just the thing for you. Away from the wood and the house and all the usual—"
"MOTHER!"
Winnie turned to her shocked. "You… how DARE you decide this without even
asking me!"
"Winnie!" Her mother looked at
her in pained shock. "I was only thinking of your health! I am convinced that
being cooped up in that house for so long, with that same boring scenery has
addled your mind! Your father feels the same way."
"Take me back! I want to go back home!" She felt panic rising in her, adrenaline began to rush through her veins and she began thinking very fast. "They want to take me away from Jesse, so I will miss my meeting with him! They want me to go far away and never see him again!"
" We are only thinking of your well-fare." Her father said with forced calm.
" You will not run off with some ruffian whom you hardly know!" Her mother said matter-of-factly. "It is simply out of the question!"
" Has nothing I've said gotten through to you!?" Winnie clenched her fists with supressed rage. " You think that you can bend me? Make me dance like a puppet to your own tunes? I'm my OWN person!"
She looked at her mother through teary eyes, her mother watched her tensely with horrific fascination, as if looking at a viper that was about to strike. Not one ounce of compassion could be found, and so Winnie's anger exploded. "I'll make my OWN choices!"
She grabbed the car door handle, and before her mother even had time to cry out, Winnie launched herself out of the car.
The first thing she felt when she hit the ground besides the sudden impact of flinging herself from a vehicle that was driving at roughly 40 mph. Was the slimy mud of the wet dirt road. The second thing she felt as she slid into a grassy ditch just off the side, was a searing pain in her right forearm.
No time for it now. She braced her arm against her body, grimacing as she staggered to her knees. Her head snapped up as she heard the brakes on the car. She knew her father would be out at any moment and with the help of their driver, would come to reclaim her. She had to get away! She had to find Jesse…
It was amazing what adrenaline could do when used under such circumstances. She was on her feet before the car had come to a complete stop. Without glancing back she ran towards the awaiting woods.