NOTE TO THE READER

Firstly, yes my main character is called Bella...but I wrote this before I ever heard of Twilight XD

The preface was just a little something I wrote while in a plane, I was bored... It doesn't actually have that much to do with the rest of the story, so you can skip it. I did want to add it though, so here it is

The locket

Preface

As the airplane descended, she was cast into another world: the fabled Land Above The Clouds.

All the apprehension and anger left her; he mind lost all sense of reality as she looked at the spectacular sight before her. It did not even for a moment enter her mind that the magnificent Cloud Castle was merely a pillar of raising smoke of some far off factory. She had thought that she was too old for such childish fantasies, but as she looked at an oddly shaped milk-white cloud in the shape of a unicorn cantering across the misty blue lake of sky, she felt as if she could believe in anything. She forgot that she was in an airplane - she was a Cloud Goddess, sailing on a pure golden gondola through the swirling cloud-sea.

The far-off lights of the city suddenly became visible through the cloudbank beneath her. She thought that they looked like crowd of fireflies covered by a soft, misty blanket. As she saw the peaks of a few great mountains breaking through the cloudbank, looking like enchanted islands, and for a wild moment, she expected the gondola to dock on one of them. She watched, completely enraptured, as the setting sun turned the milky white clouds a deep shade of red, and her cloud castle a soft shade of purple. She was in such a state of bliss that she didn’t even notice that the clouds were thinning, the ground getting closer. And then suddenly the plane broke free from the clouds altogether, and her magical world disappeared, as did her blithe ponderings. All her rage at the injustice of it all returned in a torrent as she watched the dirty grey buildings of the city get closer and closer. She almost laughed aloud. What she wouldn’t do to stay in the city… at least the city was fun, where she was going, however, was equal to exile from all of humanity.

The gift

It should be illegal to spend your birthday with your grandparents in the middle of no-where, thought still-15 year old Is miserably that morning at five when she woke up from a horrible nightmare in which all her friends (and her crush) had arrived at her grandparent’s small farmhouse and accused her of not inviting them to her party. When she tried to explain that there was no party and that they must be confused they grew angry and her Jason said, “What about them” and pointed at her grandparents, both clad in ridiculously oversized clown costumes with party hats and streamers.

She had awoken in a cold sweat just as her friends tried to smash her giant chocolate fudge cake in her face. She groaned. Fully awake now, she wished that she could go back to the dream. The reality of her day is sure to be much worse than having a chocolate cake smashed in her face…

She checked her watch; she would be 16 in just ten more minutes, and while all her friends had celebrated their sweet sixteens with huge all night parties, she was to be stuck all day with Mr Wrinkles and Mrs. Rheumatism. She mentally gave herself a prep talk. Since it’s too late to do anything about it, she might as well look for a silver lining…somewhere…

She started as the door opened suddenly and Mrs. Rheumatism entered, carrying a musty-looking old brown cardboard box.

“Happy Birthday Bella”

Is made a sound halfway between a grunt and a cough as her grandmother entered. Isabella hated being called Bella. She had tried hundreds of times explaining to Mrs. Rheumatism that she preferred to be called “Is” - Bella made her feel like the goat in on of her favorite childhood fairy tales.

Not wanting to start an argument this early in the morning, however, she quickly faked what she hoped was a warm, welcoming smile.

“Gran, what are you doing up so early?” She asked as her grandmother sat down on the bed next to her. “Oh, I just thought that I would bring you your gift before your grandpa got up” she answered mysteriously. Is shrugged “ok”; it wasn’t up to her to unravel the strange workings of a senile mind.

She watched as Mrs. Rheumatism struggled to open the box and reached out to help her.

“Thank you Bella, my rheumatism is at its worst on these cold winter days. There we go…”

She lifted out of the cardboard what looked like a small jewelry box made of black velvet. Great, thought Is, she’s probably going to give me some great great ancestors old pearls or brooch or something… so much for getting that new I-pod…

She waited for Mrs. Rheumatism to hand her the box, but instead she just sat there and stared at it with a dreamy reminiscing look in her eyes.

She wondered if she imagined it, or did her grandma look a bit different? She studied her grandma critically for a few moments, suddenly worried – her health had not been great these past few months.

Yet there was certainly nothing out of the ordinary about her gran’s appearance. She was a plain old woman wearing an old fashioned brown shirt and long grey pleated skirt. She had grey hair speckled with white tied tightly back in a bun, much wrinkled skin and a mouth slightly sagging in one corner. She knew that back in the day her grandma had been a beautiful woman (and she secretly hoped that she had inherited some of that beauty – her mother wasn’t much to look at) as she had recognized her in some of the old painted portraits lining the hallway. She sometimes wondered if the artist hadn’t accentuated her grandma’s features a bit. They only trace of beauty left of the gorgeous classic golden haired maiden was her grandma’s startling blue eyes, which still contained the sparkle and life of youth, as if oblivious to the fact that the rest of her body had aged. They were the only feature that she knew she inherited from her.

Her eyes…that was it. Her eyes suddenly weren’t sparkling anymore; it was as if they were temporarily glazed over by some long forgotten sorrow. All of the sudden Is looked at the box with more obvious curiosity than she had before; she knew that look in her grandmother’s eyes. That was not the same bittersweet serene look that came into her eyes when she spoke of her deceased mother or grandmother, thus ruling out an old family heirloom. No, it was a look much like her mother’s when she spoke of Is’ birth father who had died while her mother was a few months pregnant in a car accident. But hadn’t her grandmother been engaged to her grandpa when they were 18? And if her grandmother had ever had other romances, what did that have to do with the box? What was in there…?

At last, her grandmother looked abruptly up and smiled, the old glint slowly creeping back into her eyes.

“I know that you aren’t too happy about being cooped up with us all summer Bella, so I thought that it was about time to give you this. I think that I’ll give you something to do for these 2 months”

She smiled a slow mysterious smile, handed Is the box, and walked out of the room, shutting the door behind her. Is paused only for a second before she slowly lifted the box as if it was made from fragile China and slowly opened the lid.