Authors: Catherine Winchester
She looked through the pictures, alternately smiling at the happy memories they brought to mind and crying, for they would be unable to make any more such memories.
Finally she reached the jewellery box and opened it to see the tear drop amethyst earrings that Imelda used to wear all the time.
She wondered what her aunt's heart's desire had been for a while, then she wondered what her own heart's desire would be. Not Mark, that was for sure.
Mark was okay, but he was too superficial to ever settle down with. Like her family, he valued money above all else, whereas Carrie wanted to become an artist or a teacher. Something meaningful where she could really help people. Mark didn't understand that desire. He wasn't evil or anything, and when they had first met and he'd still been in his final year of Uni, he'd actually been rather nice. It was only since leaving and getting a job at the brokerage that he seemed to have gained such a love of money.
She knew she should dump him but like the coward she was, she couldn't face the grief she would surely get from her family over it, for they adored Mark. She had been planning to tell him when they got back from their holiday actually, but as soon as she turned her mobile phone on once they had landed, she'd received the text message telling her that Imelda had passed away.
She would break it off with Mark soon; she just needed to regain some of her strength first.
She traced the earrings with her fingers, wondering who had given them to her aunt; then on impulse she took her diamond earnings off and slipped them into her purse for safekeeping, then put the amethyst ones on instead. They were infinitely cheaper than the diamond clusters that they had replaced and yet priceless by comparison.
Finally, depressed enough for one evening, she put the lid back on the box of memories and put it out of sight for a while. She picked up her dog-eared copy of North and South off the coffee table and settled down on the sofa to read a little more of it.
This book was like chocolate to her, her comfort food in literary form, a safe haven that she could dip into whenever she needed a respite from her troubles or just a distraction for a while.
Carrie awoke the next morning and realised she'd fallen asleep on the sofa. She rubbed her eyes and was starting to regret that third glass of wine. Still, as she had class this morning, she really should make a move to get up and at 'em.
She closed the book that was lying on her chest, swapped it for the TV remote on the coffee table and turned the TV onto News24, while she attempted to rouse herself into a mobile state of consciousness. The clock on the corner of the screen told her that she had about an hour to get to her first lecture; plenty of time.
Finally she summoned the necessary willpower to get up and she turned the kettle on while she brushed her teeth, took a lightening quick shower and changed into clean jeans and jumper. By the time she made it back to the kitchen, the kettle was boiled and she made herself an industrial strength coffee and sat back down on the sofa while she sipped it, hoping that the caffeine might help her tap into an as yet undiscovered energy reserve.
It did help clear some of the cobwebs from her mind but the truth was, she was depressed; that's why she'd had the third glass of wine and that was why she constantly felt as if she had no energy these past two weeks.
It wasn't just her aunt dying, although that was probably the catalyst for how she felt. She just felt like she was stuck in a rut, living in an apartment bought by her family, studying for a degree she hadn't wanted and would probably never use. Dating a man she didn't particularly like any more, and basically just living a life that she didn't want.
She was studying literature because that was deemed a suitable subject for a society wife. She liked literature, obviously, but it wasn't something she wanted to make a career of. She had wanted to study engineering but her family had vetoed that idea, refusing to support her through university if she did choose that subject. Of course she had caved. If she did manage to break away from her family when she left university, she didn't really want to start her new life saddled with massive student loans.
It was cowardly. She was cowardly. She wished that she had her aunt's strength, but the truth was simply that she was weak and unable to stand up for what she wanted.
How much simpler things were in books, where any of life's obstacles could be overcome. Well, except for the downbeat novels but Carrie preferred books with happy endings. How she would love to just walk out of her life right now and into one of her novels. What joy it would be to know that no matter what happened, things would turn out all right in the end!
Still, as nice as that daydream was, she had places to be. With her coffee sadly finished, she pulled her boots on, picked up her handbag and rucksack, then headed out of her apartment.
Her flat might be owned by her parents but it was in one of the slightly seedier areas of London, convenient for the campus but not the safest place to walk alone at night. As such her front door had a deadbolt that had to be locked from the outside, so she turned back to the door as she pulled it closed and locked it. She turned back to the stairwell only to find that it wasn't there any more. In fact the whole corridor was gone and she was looking at a country garden.
She turned back to where her front door should be but it too had gone. She looked down at the keys she still held in her hands, as if that was proof that she had in fact just locked the door as she remembered.
“
Excuse me?”
Carrie spun around towards the voice. It was a young woman dressed in (she guessed) Victorian clothes. Was this fancy dress? Or Candid Camera perhaps?
“
Can I help you?”
Carrie tried to remember how to speak.
“
Where am I?” she asked, quickly becoming frightened. Had she lost her mind?
“
You're in our garden in Helstone.”
“
Helstone?” she queried.
“
That's right.”
Carrie shook her head. Perfect! Bloody perfect! Somehow she was in the fictional village of Helstone which meant that either she was asleep, and she was pretty sure she remembered waking up and leaving the flat, or she was insane.
“
Where did you expect to be?” The woman asked her.
“
The last thing I remember, I was in London.” There, that was truthful at least.
“
And you have no idea how you got here?”
“
Nope, not a one.” Okay, that wasn't strictly true, she certainly suspected that she was hallucinating.
“
Your clothes are very unusual,” the girl noted. “Is that what you usually wear?”
Carrie looked down at her jeans and sweater. Of course they looked odd here, women had probably never even considered wearing trousers in the 1850s, and whilst her clothes were not what might be called revealing in her time, they certainly were much more form fitting than a respectable young woman in this time might wear. Actually, they were probably more form fitting than even disreputable women in this time wore.
“
No.” There, keep the lies small and don't elaborate, that was something her mother had taught her.
“
Are you perhaps injured?” the woman asked.
“
I don't know,” Carrie answered, because now that she thought about it, she could well have been hit on the head and right about now be lying in a coma somewhere. This could just be a coma dream, if there was such a thing.
“
Well, let's get you inside.”
“
Who are you?” Carrie asked.
“
My name is Margaret Hale.” She smiled reassuringly at Carrie.
“
Oh.” Really, she should have been expecting that, so she shouldn't be as shocked as she felt.
She suddenly remembered how people always thought Margaret haughty, and seeing her for herself, she supposed she could understand why. Carrie was often accused of being standoffish but really it was because she was shy, not arrogant. She saw a lot of herself in Margaret, which was one of the reasons why she loved the book so much.
“
And you are?” Margaret prompted.
“
Oh, right, uh, I'm Carrie. I mean Caroline, Caroline Preston, but people call me Carrie.”
“
Pleased to meet you, Miss Preston.” Margaret gave a slight bow so Carrie followed suit.
“
And you.”
“
Well, let's get you inside. Perhaps you would like some tea?”
“
Um...”
Margaret put her arm around Carrie's shoulder and guided her inside.
The house, or vicarage, Carrie corrected herself, had clearly seen better days. Some of the wallpaper was slightly faded and the rugs in the hallway were rather old and slightly threadbare in places. Still, the place was immaculate and the floors had been polished to within an inch of their lives. No, this wasn't a show house, rather it was a home, and all the more welcome for its signs of wear and tear.
Margaret left her in the study, and Carrie had a few moments to think whilst Margaret set about ordering some tea and fetching her father. If this was a dream, she wondered how to wake up. She tried pinching herself but that didn't work so, remembering that Inception film she had watched recently, she tried jumping like they did to wake herself up, but alas that also didn't work.
She sat back down, feeling glad that no one had witnessed her jumping up and down like a mad woman, and turned her mind to a good excuse for being here. She really didn't think
'I was on my way to Uni in the 21st century when I suddenly ended up here'
would go down particularly well. The folks in this time hadn't even heard of Einstein yet, let alone his theories on time travel and parallel universes.
“
How are you feeling?” Margaret asked as she returned a few moments later with a tray of tea and her father in tow.
“
Um, rather disoriented to be honest.”
“
This is my father, Mr Hale. Father, this is Miss Preston,” Margaret said as she put the tea tray down on the desk and set about pouring it.
“
Very pleased to meet you, Miss Preston,” Mr Hale said with a slight bow.
“
And you, Mr Hale,” she answered, returning his bow and thinking that these manners would take some getting used to.
“
My daughter tells me that you are confused as to how you came to be here?”
“
That's right. I was in London and the next thing I remember, I was here.”
“
I'm afraid our village is too small to have a resident doctor but I am something of a learned man myself. Would it be all right if I examined you to see if you are hurt.”
“
Of course.”
Mr Hale took her pulse, felt around her head for a lump, then sat down beside her and asked a few more questions about how she came to be here, why she was dressed strangely and what she remembered.
“
What of your family?” He asked when he had finished.
“
I have no family. They...” She hated to tempt fate by saying this but really, what other excuse could she use? If she said they were alive, Mr Hale would surely insist on trying to contact them. “They're dead.”
“
You're an orphan?” Margaret asked, her voice full of compassion. She handed her a cup of tea which Carrie accepted with a smile.
“
Thank you. I'm a bit old to be an called an orphan, but yes, I suppose I am.”
“
Well, drink your tea, Miss Preston, we will be back in a moment,” Mr Hale said, rising and escorting Margaret out of the room. Carrie knew they were going to talk about her but there was little she could do to stop them. Instead she set her mind to ways to get home, or wake up, or whatever the hell it was that she needed to do to get out of this freak show!
Mr Hale and Margaret went next door to the sitting room where Mrs Hale was waiting for them. Not wanting to overwhelm the girl, Mr Hale had asked his wife to wait in her sitting room while they spoke with Carrie.
He filled his wife in on what had been said, on the girl's unusual dress, her memory loss and her seeming lack of injury.
“
Why should she appear dressed so strangely?” Margaret asked.
“
Perhaps she had no choice in her manner of dress,” Mr Hale suggested. “Perhaps those were the only clothes she could find.”
“
So what do you think has happened to her?” Mrs Hale asked, her voice grave, for anything that robbed a young woman of her clothing could not be a good thing.
“
I do not know,” Mr Hale began. “But I have read about a condition called amnesia, which is essentially memory loss. Sometimes this can happen after a head injury but sometimes, something so awful can happen that a person literally forgets about it, unable to face the horror of their own memories.”
“
And you think that something awful has happened to Miss Preston?” Margaret said, her voice again full of compassion.
“
She seems physically unharmed, so I think it likely that she experienced or saw something terribly traumatic, and that is why she has no memory of how she came to be here.”
“
So what should we do?” Mrs Hale asked.
“
We must take care of her,” Margaret said. “Though her turn of phrase can be unusual, her accent is that of a lady and she is clearly not from the working classes. Since she has no family of her own, I believe it is our Christian duty to take her in and look after her.”