After All…
The train pulled into the station was an ominous screech. At last, they had arrived. Each of the four passengers in the compartment silently grappled with their own feelings. Mr Hale was feeling guilty for having brought his family here at all. Mrs Hale was afraid of what was to become of them. Dixon was dismayed that it should have come to this. And as for Margaret, she did not know what she felt. Not yet, anyway. If anything, she was curious. As she watched all the people milling past with their determined strides that spoke of purpose, she craned her neck to look at the sky. It was not remotely blue as it had been when they had left Helstone, but a thick grey that blocked out the sun with its billowing smoke from the chimneys that she could see towering high above the expanse of the city. She wondered what this meant. Was it an omen, she thought? One sent to forewarn her that things were about to change for the worse? That nothing good grew here in this metropolis built upon the bones of poverty and the backbone of greed? That this place would stifle all her hopes of happiness and suffocate it in its decaying smog? She prayed not. But she was curious all the same because even if this strange netherworld was assaulting every single one of her senses, not to mention her sensibilities, she felt oddly stirred by it all. Even in the few minutes since they had arrived in the town that would become their new home, Milton, she had discerned a oneness with it, and she could feel, deep in her soul, an awakening that refused to be quelled. She did not know what awaited her here, whether it be good or bad or somewhere in between, but she was ready and willing to embrace, come what may. Yes, she was home now, she knew herself to be. So, you see, it did not matter what her family said, because, for Margaret, she was a woman embarking on the next act in the play that was her life, a fresh start in which she was determined to be not a victim of doubt or fear, but a person of courage, conviction, compassion, and above all else, character.
After all…a girl should always be the heroine of her own story.
The End