A Walk with Clara Phillips

Chapter 1

The first snowfall of the winter season started to trickle down from the sky late at night in northern England. The fire was crackling in the drawing room, and blankets abounded. Clara Phillips was sitting on their Chesterfield sofa along with her three sisters. Her mother got up from her seat, leaving the almost fully knitted overcoat she was making for Grace, which was one of her four daughters. Elizabeth was as any mother looks when they have four children, worn out. Her eyes still at times conveyed life. Elizabeth had grey hair which came down a few inches past her shoulders. She was a fair weight, as the rest of her family was. She had just turned fifty years old, but tried to beat age by doing what she could.

Elizabeth walked toward the window, placing her hand on it. "Looks like we have snow now, it's about time." Her voice was a happy, enthusiastic tone, and Elizabeth was always wearing her husband out with all of her talking, and how she would ramble to Clara that she needed to find someone to get married to, and find someone wealthy. She put emphasis on the last part every time. Clara looked up from her book, and out the window, and then the rest of her sisters looked up from their books. Clara imagined how wonderful it would be to ride on her horse right now, under the puffy clouds with snow falling, and some sort of romance was plugged into the short burst of imagination. In her day dreaming, as she was cantering on her horse, Autumn, she came across a handsome man walking back to his home. He was a modest, and kind gentleman. But that soon went away, when her mother yelled, "Oh! Someone is coming up to our house!" She squealed and picked up her dress, doing a little excited trot to the door to welcome them.

Everyone looked curiously to the door, waiting to see who entered. The expected knock came and Elizabeth whispered loudly, "Sit quietly and nicely!" Her face showed an excited and eager smile. Her hand grasped the doorknob and the girls looked back down at their books trying to act behaved and not alarmed at this late visit. James stood up.

Elizabeth opened the door and two young men spoke. Clara couldn't help but glance over, trying to get a good look at them, but all she could really see was their figures standing at the door. "Let me introduce myself," one of the men began. "My name is William Smith, and this is my brother, Edward." He said kindly, his voice did not convey anxiety or excitement but something nicely in the middle, soothing to listen to. All of the girls couldn't read their books, though they pretended to. Slight laughter came from them.

"Oh! It's very nice to meet you," Elizabeth said to the gentleman, with a quick smile. All of the girls gave a slight laugh again, they knew their mother would invite them in. "But do come in, it's very cold out there!" She backed away from the door for them to walk in. "Thank you." William said to her. He and his brother walked into the house, with the men holding their hats in their hands.

"Please, come sit down! You must be freezing!" She said keenly. "I guess we can sit in for a few minutes. Thank you for letting us in." William said kindly and smiled. Elizabeth went to work taking off their coats, and hanging them. Clara looked up and saw William, but his face was still very shaded, she looked back down as she saw the two gentleman walking to the drawing room. She tried getting rid of her smile but she couldn't contain it, and it didn't help with her sisters laughing.

William came into the drawing room first, with Edward behind him, and lastly Elizabeth came beside them. Elizabeth looked at the girls very avidly. The girls knew that she wanted them to stand, and they did. William and Edward bowed their heads, and the girls followed suit.

James made his way over to them, and shook their hands. Clara came up with the fact that these brothers must be about six feet tall since her dad is a little bit shorter than them.

"Girls, introduce yourselves." Elizabeth said forcefully, looking at them with anxiety. So it went in order from left to right of who was standing. First it was Grace. Then it was Alice. Then it was herself. "I am Clara." And she looked back up to look at William. She stared into his eyes but only for two seconds. She saw they were an elegant dark brown. He had kind eyes. For a second, she imagined herself with him. But his eyes moved on to Anna, who is the youngest of the daughters. Once Anna got done introducing herself, William looked back to Clara's eyes. She wasn't sure if it was just herself imagining things, she thought that she must be imagining something because he's probably looking at one of her sisters like this or he's just looking at all of the girls like they are regular people. Clara wanted to believe that look was deeper than what it was.