What have I done?

Chapter: 1

How to go on?

The dawn of autumn was inevitable, leaves turned from their usual vibrant green to a hazy palette of orange. Like shooting stars, they leapt from trees and shot down to Earth. Graceful when one takes the time to view but hectic to most too impatient to take in the beauty of nature's regular wonders we take for granted. Beautiful yet chaotic at the same time.

Everything has a story, even the leaves, the trees, and even the stars. All that lives, sees, moves, and speaks will all have their own unique story. Anything that's been on Earth has one. Through snow, heat, floods, and fires, one thing stays the same, her. Unlike the leaves who change every season, she was a line of continuity in the scribble of the world .She defies all odds starting from birth. Her life not full of glee but death, sorrow, and sadness. Her eyes had seen too much to process, yet she carried on. There was an ocean of tears waiting to be released from her  star filled eyes. Eyes are said to be the window to the soul. What a beautiful quote, it seemed to be true in her case. One look into her sparkling eyes, that looked ever so innocent and pure, one look was all it took, to realise how tired she was internally. 

Her eyes wept silent tears, 

her eyes frozen wide, 

her eyes stuck in place, 

her eyes differ to her face, 

her eyes seemed out of place, 

her eyes scarred from scenes of distaste,

her eyes that seemed to capture mine,

her eyes an ocean vast and shines,

her eyes beautifully blue,

her eyes ruined from what you do.

A heroine at most but a sad, tired, sobbing, feeble child on the inside. The heart of a poor soul wails and weeps as everyone sleeps. Dark as night and a delicate structure, her hair was like a moonless night, pitch black. It rivalled night itself with its deep shade of black. Malnutrition attributed to her fragile figure, which looked odd on her sun-kissed skin.

Though all seemed dark in her life yet a light, bright as a star shines through soon. In the end, through wind and rain, she had to persist because this was the destined life of an unfortunate child in Victorian Britain.

The roads full of dirt and grime, rats as big as her roamed freely. Streets full of crime and pernicious. Her mother would have been perturbed, but she had no mother to feel this way. Her eyes wandered the roads as if she was looking for something, maybe she was looking for her pride which she had long left behind in that house with everything and everyone she had ever loved. The rags she called clothes barely kept her warm. Daily, an overwhelming feeling of longing consumed her at night, every night, yearning for love of any kind, but she was no Oliver Twist that'd find a new family.

Run and scream was all she could do to not get there. Agony, suffering, hopes being drowned in a sea of despair wiping through the room. Not a chance to hide, no end to her merry-go-round of life. One that was unfit for anyone to live. Packed with paranoia and resentment. When you are scared, all you wish to do is hide, but there was no place to hide, seek refuge, and no sanctuary waiting for her. That was life for the poor, barely able to scrape by. The work house screeched her name in her mother's voice to lure her, to trap her, to imprison her. Its outstretched arms flailed for her, trying to seize her. It clung the frayed seams of her dress.

Thoughts raced through her mind like it was a racing track. The hair on the nape of her neck suddenly stood tall. Her shoe-less feet numbed by the temperature of the premature snow. Some people seem to be favoured by God. She seems to be out of his view. "Why?" was one of the few words she dared to mutter, not knowing or having the energy to utter another. Mother, Father, Anne, and Jack, their screams engraved into her head. The leaves fell dry. Mother's tears and father's yelps. Crunching of leaves could be heard behind her as more danced down to the floor in a duet with the snow pellets and snowflakes. Anne's screams, and Jack's yells. The singing of carols. All these sounds merged together, creating a sinister cocktail of trauma and happiness. Footsteps. The only clear singular sound. Deep and loud, obviously belonging to a man. The noise crept behind her, gradually approaching her and getting louder. She had been found.....

Victoria Vance was now in the wind.