Änglamakerskan

I used to live in a small village in Northamptonshire, a county somewhat near the centre of England. I won't be naming it due to the nature of what I am about to discuss because I feel that it does not deserve any more attention on top of what it has already had to deal with in the past few years.

My name is Annabelle. I'm twenty five now and I've lived in London for nearly five years. Up until the age of twenty one I had spent my entire life in that little village. The thought of leaving had never crossed my mind and the suggestion, when spoken, was something ludicrous to me - even when I was very young - as I was passionate about my home. I had my practical reasons as well however; everything I needed was within the confines of the village. Nice shops, a comfortable amount of space, the beautiful countryside, peace and quiet, my job, everything was local and accessible. It was genuinely a slice of heaven for me.

The reputation of the village wasn't exactly untouched. In its past it had served as a much more important location as the Great Central Railway had gone straight through the place. You wouldn't guess now unless someone told you. Only small traces of that history remained by the time I was born in 1999, and nowadays I should imagine even those have been swallowed up by the countryside and the passage of time. Following the closure of the railways the old tracks, station, bank and every other fixture of its presence in the village was gradually taken over by nature. Most of it was demolished or smashed up but the pieces remained, scattered in what became woodlands over the next few decades.

The end of the railway led to the village shrinking. It became isolated and adopted its now well known quiet pace. People there are friendly but still view outsiders with a slight sense of curiosity. The closures affected the village in another, much more tragic way however. Village children often spent a lot of time in the woodlands where the old railway bank had once been and, for the most part, it was safe to do so. There were always one or two who pushed their luck, ignoring the warnings of their parents, going higher up to where the old station itself had been. It wasn't safe by any means. Some children got hurt or got lost. The final straw was when a boy (or so the story passed around my school went) drowned in an old pit. The council completely closed the highest points of the bank off - to anyone and everyone - leaving them to be taken back by nature entirely. Big wire fences served as barricades.

There were still accidents after this, namely with children going missing due to the sheer size of the forests, but such stories only really came along every few months. There were a few when I was in school that I heard amongst the typical gossip but most of these turned out to be made up to scare people or baseless rumours (people vanishing in the woods, monsters living up there, or some deranged slasher stalking the place were all prominent stories passed around school). Still, some were genuine. These genuine cases, along with the masses of rumours, deterred even more people from moving to the village. Most people didn't mind the lack of newcomers as it kept the place quiet.

I have very fond memories of my childhood in spite of these things. My family was very well known in the village - I was the start of our name's sixth generation - and so I fit in quite well. I was an only child but I made friends fairly easily. I absolutely loved school and I can recall all of my teacher's names and faces eagerly. The summers were long and careless whilst the school months were entertaining in their own ways. Winter was, and still is, my favourite time of the year above all else though. The barren trees, the white landscapes, the frost - everything about winter touches me in quite a profound way and the village looked stunning under its gentle hold. It always snowed each year, without fail, much to our delight when we were children.