Willow | The Wayfarer Series

Chapter 1

The Death of Willow Caulton

The day that I died started like any other day. I woke up, spend the next thirty minutes in bed regretting my life, and went downstairs to have breakfast. After my mandatory bowl of cereal followed a cup of coffee with three sugar cubes and some milk. Then I got dressed, put on my mask of makeup that concealed last night's lack of sleep and headed out.

You see, I love routines. I find that I thrive under them. I would never claim to love spontaneity. If anything, I like knowing what will happen next so that my overly concerned brain knows what to prepare for. 

My best friend Anya did not agree with me. We always met up at the train station on the exact same spot. I would be there every day at the exact same time and I'd usually get to watch her come running in late, or have a smug look on her face when she's earlier than me. 

Anya had light blond hair and bright blue eyes. She spoke with a soft Russian accent, influenced by her parents who I could hardly understand. She had been living here in London for longer than I had, though never claimed to be English. She was proud to be Russian. 

Today was a smug day. She grinned widely as I approached. "That's three days in a row now." She taunted me.  

"Good morning to you too." I answered. We headed down to our correct platform. Both of us attended the same university, just outside of London. We had to get the same train every day, so everything was still in a nice familiar rhythm. 

Anya had gone on a date the night before. A highly anticipated one too. She had been crushing on her new neighbour's son for weeks, before finally stepping up to ask him out. We spend a good ten minutes going over all the details of the date. What he wore, what he said or what he didn't say. I could already tell she was smitten.

We stood near the edge of the platform. All around us were people, as it was the morning rush hour. I could faintly hear a homeless man mutter to himself behind me, though that wasn't that unusual around here. My parents sacrificed a lot of money for the proper education that I was receiving. Because of that, we had to live in a bit of a rough area. My dad told me it would build character.

"Maybe you should go on Tinder." Anya said to me. It was true that I had been looking for a boyfriend, even if it wasn't very actively. I hoped one would sort of magically appear in front of me. Without me having to do any of the work. 

"Tinder is just for hookups." I answered her. In the distance, I could see a train approaching, though that wasn't ours. It skipped this station but drove through to the next one. It always scared me how fast they are going, as though I am being sucked forward.

"That's what I thought, but my baby sister found her boy on there." She told me. "Maybe something like OkCupid?" 

OkCupid sounded like something I should not be on at the ripe age of eighteen. It sounded like that was for divorced mums. 

I was about to joke about it when the train got closer to the station. I'll admit, even I did not think to prepare for the next thing that happened. I heard the weird hiss-talking the homeless man had been doing grow louder in my ear when suddenly something knocked into my shoulder. I stumbled forward and fell onto the tracks.