Willa

Chapter One: The Beginning

* I advise starting with Alberta if you haven't already, and working your way through the series in order*

As follows;
• Alberta
•Willa
•Harper
•Teddy
•Morgan
•Wren

❤️🧡💛💚💙💜

***

"My name is Alberta" came the sweet voice of the girl who sat down beside me, her feet dangling from the church pew, her lips lifting into a shy smile as she held out her hand, placing it on my lap, palm facing up.

An invitation.

I look to my Mom beside me, she hasn't noticed my new friend sit down beside us, and so I gaze back into the blue eyes that take me in eagerly, and place my small hand into hers. Im instantly swallowed and squeezed by her fingers, it makes me feel happy, happy even on a Sunday at the first, and earliest church service. I would rather be outside playing, or anywhere else, other than on this old wooden pew, that digs into my little legs as they hang over it's side.

"My name is Willa" I offer through raspy tones "I'm five" I add.

Her smile widens with joy "I am five too"

As I am about to reply, my Mom taps my knee "Shh" she whispers quietly.

I look coyly back at Alberta, and admire her braided red hair. I wish my mom would braid mine like that. It's incredibly pretty. 

"My birthday is July first" I whisper.

She is thrilled "mine is July third" she whispers back, and her nose scrunches up, and her eyes widen with her excitement about that revelation.

I would remember that, that moment I observed her for the first time, the fondest memory of two worlds, two beings, about to collide. I would know as an adult, why that little girl I once was, was so enamoured with the little red head beside me, because she was missing of me for five years, and it was as if she returned that day, that moment, and made me whole again.

Alberta Anderson, a name to give to my other half, my twin flame, my confidant, my soul mate, my everything. She would spend so long not knowing it, or not admitting it. My goodness, how looking back we couldn't feel it, the humming vibrating between us every time we were together. Then there was the magnetic pull of her hand into mine, as neither of us reached, but our bodies connected anyway.

How, didn't we know?!

That journey had started before we could even conceive a thought, as we cried in our mothers arms, bundles of pink flesh. July third, the day Allie arrived of this life, it was as if we were delivered one after the other, to a new world, our next life, placed in the same state, the same town, and all that was left to do was to find one another.

Alberta Anderson, at five years old, would have intuition beyond her years as she spotted me that Sunday at church. The day she first felt that hum, drawing her across the church, stumbling slightly as she walked and squeezed herself passed adults in the pew beside her family. Her eyes were unwavering, at the petite brunette opposite, a need to go to her... to offer her an open hand and a smile. It was an innocent and gentle connection between two little girls. We wouldn't know it at the time, but fate was sealed that day in the church.

Willa and Allie... we would be bound once more, for life together, if only we could admit it to each other.

***
I was born into my family last, the baby of the family, Alberta was the first in hers, two very different family dynamics and lives to unfold and unravel before us.

Allie was to be more responsible, moulded into the perfect doting daughter, with two parents who adored her, but nether the less, she had to be slightly more mature than I. Allie was the eldest, and that brought with it more expectations, where as my expectations were quite minimal.

I think the fact my family had less expectations for me as the baby of our family, it was actually more of a hindrance. I got lost a little in the role I didn't know exactly what was expected of me, other than to be the cute little sister that followed along behind everyone before her. I had four brothers, and a sister, who was much older, her hand me downs long strewn out, and her jealousy of all that I got, every attention and item I would receive, as the latecomer would dominate our relationship. I was the longed for, second daughter, and it led my sister and I down a poor path, a relationship plagued by jelousy and resentment, that followed us into adulthood.

My brothers would never see me as anything but something small and weak that needed them. To them I was the perfect little angel that they had all observed on her baptism, in her little white dress. I was a child of god that they would protect and love forever, or until she came out as gay, whichever came first.

That little bolt of lightening that struck that day, when I was merely eighteen years old... it tore through it all, not a person untouched by it. I had by all accounts, destroyed my entire family, and they would never let me forget it. Life as the baby, it was about to turn on me, suddenly I was irresponsible, childish, had no respect and had to grow up. Suddenly I knew nothing, and wasn't capable of knowing I was gay, or even what that meant.

But let's not get ahead of myself, firstly there came the realisation I was gay, it started as a concern when I was fourteen, and then became a glaringly obvious fact when I was sixteen.

Let's start there....