If I Were

When Clara was a child, she wrote stories. She would dream of a life of adventure, and of handsome princes, and of magnificent faeries and elves.

That all changed when she grew older.

When she was the tender age of nine, she realised just how little she fit into the real world, and other people seemed to feel the same, too. They would single her out, bully her, and shame her for who she was.

And so when she moved house and began high school, Clara made an oath to herself. She vowed to become someone better; smarter, prettier and worthier than the girl she had been before. She forced herself to quit daydreaming, and escaping away from the real world, and to live in the now. To make what she had always dreamed of a reality: to become someone people would envy.

But when life took an unexpected turn, Clara found herself faced with a reality she couldn't escape. Transported away from the real world and into the land of her childhood stories, she was forced to reconcile with her younger self, and find peace within her identity.