All right, this is an extremely short chapter but it's a start in the right direction. I typed this when I was very very tired so it might have some mistakes, so please let me know if I've made any. Really sorry for taking my bloody time but I was feeling very confused about where the story was going (I experience writer's block a lot. That and exams and other stuff has made me very busy, but I am now back to writing, so without further ado, chapter three….
Child of Two Worlds
Chapter Three
The rays of the sun beat down mercilessly upon my backside. The insane buzzing of insects swarm inside my head. The earth seemed like the humid fireplace I had cooked over every day for years. Mother Nature would not spare a traveller like me a cold breeze.
I didn't know how long I had been walking. It seemed as if the world had stopped completely and I was the only living creature not frozen in time.
I savagely broke off a small piece of the stale loaf of bread and thrust it into my dry mouth. It tasted like soil and stuck to the walls of my throat. But it was the only food I had, so I ate it as greedily as a king might eat roast duck.
My head and heart begged me to stop and rest but my feet dragged on, too determined to pause or even slow down. As I continued to trek to Paris, I would come upon the sight of farmers surveying their summer crop's growth or wives feeding their infants or children playing among the meadows. The sight of one young golden haired boy would always hold a memory for me. He was riding on a black pony in circles around a woman who looked to be his mother while she held the creature's long reins in her small effeminate hands.
"Don't ride to fast on him Paul" she called out.
"Of course not Maman" he called back.
" Don't bear your weight on him. He's still a bit weak."
"Of course I won't Maman."
I watched the boy named Paul and his mother for longer than a normal person should have. There was something about Paul that carried his image in my head. I longed to just walk over to the mother and become her daughter. I longed to be the boy's older sister. I wanted them as a family. I wanted their blissful simplistic life; free of the cares I now carried.
As I was walking later on that day, I still could not remove the boy's likeness from my thoughts. He seemed so familiar, so sickeningly familiar. But I had not known any children of his likeness. I had hardly known any other children at all, and the ones I did know were relatives of my father. But the Paul boy seemed so familiar, but familiar for no apparent reason, if that made sense to anyone.
I walked for many more hours, hours that seemed like days. The road was forever twisting to adapt to France's many hills. Occasionally I would come across the way of other humans. I had rather tiredly walk past an elderly couple lounging in the sun in their rickety rocking chairs in the front of their farmhouse sometime in the late afternoon. I politely sent a small smile in their direction but otherwise refused to stop.
"Good afternoon, Mademoiselle," the man called after me.
"Good afternoon" I attempted to call back, but the lack of use in the past hours had made my voice go quiet and croaky.
"It's getting late Mademoiselle. Young girls like you should not be wandering the roads without a respectable escort!" the woman called after me in an authoritative voice. To that I gave no reply.
The sun was beginning to set when I finally gave in to my weakness and searched for a place to rest. I didn't want to leave the road side, yet I wanted to be as out of sight as possible to the naked eye. That way no one would notice me and no one would take pity on the helpless homeless girl.
When the sun had set a dark yellowish glow on the land, I had found a large oak tree with a great shadow facing away from the road to call my resting place. I flopped onto the ground and nestled weakly into the trees bark. I buried the last small remaining piece of the loaf of bread underneath my arm. I was becoming incoherent and faint. My eyes were becoming heavier and it was becoming harder to do anything. I heard a dog bark, the snap of a twig nearby and then the world went black.
I know, I know "What kinda update is that? The chapter is barely eight hundred words!" Well the good news is I have much more to write, I just wanted to give you something new. And don't worry, I'm almost getting to Erik, I'm almost there. Please don't shoot! Anyway, I'd loved to hear what you think about Maria Antonia's obsession with the farm boy Paul and any other comments or anything is appreciated. See you soon!