This Could Be The End of Everything (REWORKED)

Once Upon Another Time

It was a beautiful autumn day outside. In the midst of chores, she looked out the window and saw birds flying without a care. She was once one of them, flying wherever she wanted and being free. She almost missed being a bluebird.
She saw her younger siblings playing around the leaf-littered ground. She had raked the leaves earlier that day into nice and neat piles, but her siblings had thrown themselves onto them and undid all her work. Of course, she was furious at first but then joined them after they had called her old and naggy.

She'd been thinking about life, now that she was back home with her family. She enjoyed being back with the people she loved and cared for the most, even if they did annoy her tirelessly. But she couldn't shake off the fact that everything now just felt so... out of place for her. It felt so weird being back home. It felt even weirder waking up the next morning thinking that she was still a bluebird and had to wake up the slumbering brothers to continue with their journey.

She still had her habits. She'd sometimes start preening or ruffling her feathers only to realize that she didn't have feathers. Or how sometimes she'd prepare to fly only to figure that she doesn't have her wings anymore.

She did miss the feeling of freedom as the wind ruffled her feathers when she flew around. She missed not having to worry about finishing her chores or responsibilities of being one of the eldest children. Most of all she missed Wirt and Greg. Not a single day has passed that she hasn't even once thought about them. She saw Greg in her younger siblings as they wrestled and tackled each other while they played around in the dirt. She heard Greg as they laughed and teased each other. She saw Wirt in her older siblings as they were focusing on their studies, especially when they were writing poetry. She heard Wirt whenever she heard her older brother practice his oboe. Oh, she missed those two troublesome brothers dearly, even if they just as annoying and uncooperative as her siblings.

But she thought about Wirt the most. She could never understand the feeling she always got whenever a thought comes to her mind that was about him. Sometimes her heart would go crazy and start pounding against her chest. Sometimes she'd be as red as a tomato everytime she thought she heard his voice. She longed for his company once more in her now dull and boring life.

Yes, life was quite boring in the redhead's homestead. It was always the same routine, same chores, same people. Unlike her adventures when she was a bluebird, she had no absolute idea who or what they would encounter next. She longed for adventure and thirsted for danger at every corner she turned to. She just wanted to be free again.

But unfortunately, her luck hadn't turned out as great as she had hoped for. A few months ago, her mother had arranged a marriage for her. Now she was going to be wed off and shipped far away from her home with some stranger.
It felt surreal to her. She was only 16, a year after being a bluebird, and now worrying about marriage. Her mother had brought up marriage countless times before, but Beatrice refused. But she was not one to be discouraged so easily. She kept urging her daughter and insisted that she was to be married as soon as possible or she'd grow old lonely.

"But Mom, I'm so young! I can't get married!" she rebutted to her mother.

"Beatrice, sixteen isn't so young. I married your father when I was seventeen, well above the age of marriage."

"That doesn't mean I want to marry!"

"Come now, dear. It's for the benefit of the family. Your father and I are very tired from working."

"Benefit? Mom, this doesn't benefit me at all! It doesn't do anyone any good but you."

"Stop being so stubborn. How can you be so blind?" her mother growled.