Into Another Time

Reflecting

Hey guys, this chapter contains a time leap and is just a reflection of Emma's thoughts and a recap of what has happened meanwhile. The story will resume in the next chapter!

It has been a month since I had that conversation. Over a month since I was staying with Amelia,, in the 12th century. Away from home, friends and family. Although I had never accepted it, I had gotten use to the life here in the village of Norman, in Windsor. I had fallen into a rut: get up early with the sun, bath and wear one of the dresses Amelia bought for me, have breakfast, toil on the fields with Amelia, eat, spend whatever time was left with her and the others,dinner and then sleep.

It was boring, yes, exhausting actually. Life in the Middle Ages was hard. There was little to no time for one to relax. I wanted to be on good terms with Amelia's family so I made it a point to help in the fields, otherwise they would just have just thought of me as a burden. Prior to coming here, I had no experience with farm work, and why would I?. I had lived a privileged upper middle class life where my only problems were not having enough fun, everything was handed to me on a silver platter. I actually felt annoyed and contemptuous of myself whenever I use to think of my old life and how silly and stupid I was, indeed. Nothing was the same for me. Instead of getting up in a warm bed, I woke up in the cot like bed with Amelia earlier than I ever had, instead of pondering whether I should look cute or girly today from my immaculate wardrobe, I simply chose whichever of the 3 dresses I had recently washed in the fucking river. Instead of driving around in my car or going to an air-conditioned school, I had to walk wherever I wanted and bear the scorching sun when I was helping on the field. I was as tanned as everyone else around me now.

And most of all, my biggest problems were not being popular or Shawn liking me, but avoiding getting married to a stranger or getting killed as a witch.

Yup, life was different.

But it was like this for everyone, not just me. Having water meant walking to the well and drawing buckets of water. Having fresh, clean clothes meant washing them themselves in the river. I just wasn't use to it. Despite girls my age being innocent and feeling shy and giggling over a kiss despite being almost or even an adult, and probably not even knowing what sex was until they were married, they were thrust into more responsibility than girls in my world ever encountered in their teens. Life in the 21st century was a luxury you could only cherish once you live in the past like I was living. While teenagers my age are free to decide what they want to do, drop out or do an internship or 'take an year off and then decide', here they had to work hard and land a job quickly or get married and start having a dozen kids and manage the household ( depends on whether you are a boy or a girl). Also, teenage didn't exist here. You were either a child or an adult. You were a child till you were 14-15 and then you jumped straight to being a man or a woman from 16 ( or again, slightly later if you were a male) and had to live your life like people live in their late 20s or 30s in the modern world.

But then again, people died pretty early in these times, so...

However, working hard and not having any time to myself was also a blessing in disguise for me. It kept me from going insane, that and Amelia and Barrett. They had become my best friends in my time here, and there was no sign of the hostility and coldness they had shown me when we first met. I was even wrong about Barrett, he was a total goofball!. It was laughable that I thought he was a serious, cold guy. Like I said before, he only seemed older when you don't hear him talk. Once he opens his mouth he sounds exactly his age. Amelia sounds more mature than him most of the times, especially when he sings. He is an absolute amusement when he sings the local village hymns, without a care in the world, on top of his voice. He is a total riot!. Although his singing voice isn't that bad, it's comical to see someone with a manly face like him, sing so animatedly.