Walking through the garden, I look past my left shoulder to find my mother trailing behind me, surrounded by all her servants. The bottom of her dress poofs out as her corset ties everything else in. I turn round to see my little sister running towards me, her dress flopping in the wind. I can picture the look of disgust on my mother's face; she has never approved of my sister's shenanigans. Emily jumps into my arms and I spin her around, like we always do. Her laughter never fails to make me smile. As I set Emily back down on the gravel, we hear our mother clears her throat, at this point we know she’s mad. We both turn around and Emily tries to cover up the hole she ripped in her white lace gloves. “Girls, I have told you a million times, Magnolia women do not behave like animals. We have a reputation to uphold, you know this.” We both respond with a simple, “yes mother” and turn around with our hands in front of us, marching to the beat of mothers drum. 

We hop into the back of the carriage, although Emily and I would much rather ride on the horses pulling the carriage. My mother sits across from us with a stern look on her face. How many times do I have to disappoint her before she realizes this is not the life that I want to live? A life filled with poofy dresses, lace gloves, and an end goal to find a man with power and money is not what my life purpose should be. I want to bring more to this society and I want more in my future.

After what seemed like hours within my mothers glare, we finally made it back to the castle. Emily and I are making our way up the stairs when we hear father emerge from his chambers. We immediately turn around and run back down the stairs, jumping into father's arms. Although my time with father is usually quite limited he never fails to make my day a little bit brighter. My mother is watching us jump around from afar, disappointment written all over her face.

Father begins to walk me and Emily up the stairs, mother strolling close behind. Emily begins skipping up the steps and father turns to me and says, “I have a surprise for you!” I look back at him with a slight sparkle in my eyes. Father hardly ever has time to spare simply to be around let alone set up surprises. He places his ice cold hands over my eyes as we make our way up the remaining velvet steps. He leads me to a room where I take a seat onto what seems to be my bed but I’m not sure. He removes his hands from my eyes while telling me to keep them shut. I can hear him walking over to the other side of the room and I continue to wonder what the surprise must be. He makes his way back over to me, striding with great pride as he always does.

 I open my eyes to find him holding a small light blue box covered with a shimmering white lace. I open the box to find a beautiful pearl necklace. As he places the sparkling white pearls around my abnormally bony collar bone, I lean forward just enough to find my mother standing by the door; of course she loves this, she always says, “A lady with pearls is a lady with power.”  My father pulls me in for a hug and I wrap my arms around his broad shoulders, savoring every moment. 

As my father makes his way down the stairs to his study, I kick off my shoes and walk over to my vanity, admiring the pearls that rest upon my neck. As beautiful as they are it isn’t me. I spend at least five minutes trying to unhook the clasp before Maria walks in offering to help me. Although Maria is only our maid, she has always felt more like a mother to me than my actual mother. As she unhooks the clasp I let the pearls fall into my palms as Maria begins to untie the back of my corset. 

I slip my nightgown over my head and begin brushing through my hair. Maria has left to go help Emily with her studies so it is just me and the silence. This has always been my favorite time of day because it is the one time I can be myself without my mother’s judgement. As I stare at my reflection in the mirror I begin to wonder what my life could be like if I didn’t grow up as an heir to the throne. Would I be the person I have always wished to become or would I long for the life I am living now? So many questions remain unanswered but as I lay my head down on the soft, freshly pressed sheets I can’t help but hope that tomorrow will be different.

I wake up just as I do every morning when Maria opens up my curtains, letting the sun flow through the windows. My eyes squint as I roll to the other side of my bed praying that I don’t actually have to get up. I hear Maria drawing a bath in the other room and know that she will make me get up whether I like it or not. As I emerge from the sheets into the crisp air, a shiver runs down my spine causing my appendages to tingle. I head into the bathroom, dreading whatever prissy activity my mother has planned. Oh how I wish I could go outside and ride the horses with father. 

Once my appearance is up to mother’s standards I head downstairs for breakfast finding a strange man sitting in the dining hall with mother. I make my way down to the opposite end of the table as Maria brings out my breakfast omelette. My mother proceeds to talk to the strange man as if I wasn’t even there. Emily skips into the dining hall and takes a seat in her chair, without realizing that there is another gentleman sitting in Father’s chair. 

Everyone continues to get settled at the table and Emily piles all the pastries she can fit onto her plate. Mother rolls her eyes and looks back at me with a nasty grin on her face. “Girls, now that you are both down here I would like you to introduce you to Thomas Williams.” I look up from my plate to find Emily giving him a polite nod, I catch on and do the same. “Mr. Williams is the Director of Education at Wycombe Abbey and he is very impressed with your girls status.” Oh no, not again.  Emily and I look at eachother with despair in our eyes. You see, Wycombe Abbey is an English boarding school where parents send their delinquent children. Father has always been against it but seeing as he has been tied up with work lately, I doubt he would even notice that we are gone. 

Mother dismisses me and Emily from breakfast and requests that we go work on our studies. We both know that is not actually going to happen so we make our way out of the dining hall and into the stables. John, the horse groomer, knows us well and leaves us be. Emily and I try to make our way out here at least once a day as it is a good distraction from the standards and expectations that mother and society holds us to. “I wonder why mother wanted us to leave the dining hall so soon,” Emily begins to say and now that I think about it that is extremely out of character for her. She usually demands us to stay in her devious presence for at least an hour. I try not to think about it but no matter what I do the thought of being sent away to boarding school still lingers in my mind.  

We spend hours in the stables and completely lose track of time. This is the only place we can actually escape our mothers judgment. We both rush back to the castle hoping that we have time to freshen up before mother finds out where we’ve been. 

We make it back to the castle and sneak in through the back entrance that leads to the underground tunnels. Emily and I discovered these a few years back and have been using them to sneak around mothers back ever since. I make my way up to my bedroom and Maria is already waiting for me. She has already drawn a bath and gathered a basket to put my muddy clothes in. What would I do without her?

I get myself cleaned up just in time because mother has summoned us back to the dining hall. As I make my way through the entryway I see Mr. Williams standing at the back door with Emily and my bags. This is not good. Mother walks out of the room and Emily and I try to make a run for it but the guards catch us before we even make it to the living space. Mr. Thomas packs us away into his dusty old carriage and we are off. Mother doesn’t even stay to say goodbye. I have no idea what is going to happen next.

  I wake up in a panic believing that I had the worst nightmare but in fact it was all real. I’m not sure where I am but I look over to see Emily tossing and turning in the bed next to me, at least we have each other. I have know idea what today holds but I can tell you with complete confidence that I will never be returning home. At least not in my mother's lifetime. 

Emily wakes up and she looks at me with fear in her eyes. I can’t imagine how anxious she is feeling right now. I have always been able to handle change well but that has never been the case with Emily. I roll out of bed and go curl up in a ball next to her, giving her the biggest hug I have ever given in my life. We spend another 5 minutes in bed when suddenly there is a loud pounding sound on our door. “This is your wake up call ladies, everyone downstairs in five minutes.” Five minutes? How do they expect us to get ready for the day in only five minutes?

We jump out of bed and run over to the dresser drawers. We both grab the reach for our dresses that are the easiest to put on. Even though I despise lace and try to avoid it at all costs this is my only option. We throw on our flats and tie each other's hair up in a bun. We decide to not even try to throw on makeup and make our way out the door. 

The hallway is chaos and neither of us know where we are going but I assume if we follow everyone else we will get to where we should be. We make it to the dining hall and Mr. Williams approaches from the now blocked off hallway and asks that we all take our seats. He begins to speak, “Ladies, you are all here because your parents feel you need a little extra help when it comes to maintaining the line of royalty. For some of you this is your first day here at Wycombe Abbey and we thank you for joining us. I expect your peers to show you what it means to be a student here. Please enjoy your breakfast and I will see you all later during our daily etiquette class.” I can’t believe mother actually sent us here.

Mr. Williams begins to approach me and Emily. I try to keep my head down and avoid eye contact as he sits down at our table. “Eliza and Emily, I know you must be feeling a little anxious right now but I promise that over the next year and a half this place will feel like home. Our staff is working on moving your things into your permanent rooms and whenever you are ready I will introduce you to your new roommates.” I was heartbroken. The one thing that made me feel the smallest bit of joy was being able to share a room with Emily and now he is taking that away. 

Someone comes over to clean our plates and Mr. Williams escorts the both of us to a small room that I assume is a study of some sort. There are two other girls that follow us into the room and Mr. Williams invites us to take a seat wherever we would like. “Eliza, I would like to introduce you to Miriam, she will be your new roommate.” We both exchange polite smiles and then look back down at the floor. Another young gentleman enters the room and shows me and Miriam to our room before I even got to say goodbye to Emily. This day just keeps getting worse. 

I spend the rest of the day in my room trying to keep my thoughts from spiraling into something far from the truth. Miriam is tucked away in her bed and we haven’t said one word to each other all day. I decide to break the silence and ask her when she arrived and turns out we both arrived last night. We continue to exchange stories and it turns out we actually have so much in common. We both believe that being raised with the sole objective of finding a suitor is absolutely ridiculous and that women should be raised to have higher expectations of themselves and their futures. 

We talk for hours on end and before we know it, the loud banging begins once again. “Five minutes ladies, five minutes.” We both turn our gaze to the door and let out a sigh. We can’t do this again. Miriam and I head over to our closets and begin to throw on the most casual gowns we can find. “Eliza, what if there was a way that we could get out of all this prissy nonsense.” I like where she is going with this. She continues, “Think about it. We can totally outsmart all of these nincompoops and get out of this place.” It’s a good idea in theory but what do we do after we leave? Where would we go? How would we make a living? There are so many things that we need to think through but we need to get out of here as soon as possible. With all this in mind Miriam and I quickly begin planning and researching all of the possibilities that await us beyond these gloomy gray walls. 

Today is the day. After months in the making we are finally getting out of here. Miriam and I make our way down to the dining hall for dinner and it takes all of my energy to contain my excitement. Mr. Thomas enters the room and gives us the pleasure of listening to the same speech that he gives every single day. Miriam and I both try and focus on dinner but every single time I look up at her I can see the thrill and excitement in her eyes. Emily and Miriam’s sister, Sydney, come join us at our table and the excitement builds. After months of misery at Wycombe Abbey, freedom is within my grasp. 

The second that dinner is over the four of us make our way back to our rooms, anxiously awaiting the chime of the midnight bell. Miriam and I work on packing our essentials (toothbrush, hairbrush, money, etc.) into the smallest bags we can find. We try to keep our minds off the fact that in two short hours we will finally be free but nothing can take my mind off of it. 

We watch the little hand of the clock for the next hour, praying that God grants us the gift of speeding up time. Tick, tock, tick, tock. This goes on for another 58 minutes before the moment finally arrives. We hear the midnight bells chime and Miriam and I look at each other with anxiety and excitement. 

We push our bedroom windows open cautiously making sure we don’t wake the headmaster. Thankfully we reside on the first floor of the gloomy brick building so it is easy to climb out the window and reach the ground. 

I climb through the metal window frame first and then help guide Miriam’s dainty feet to the ground. We look to our right to find our sisters doing the same. Once everyone has made it safely out the building we close the windows once again and just like that we are off. Goodbye Wycombe Abbey, goodbye mother, goodbye undignified life principles.