Window Onto Another Outside

The little girl ran to her window and looked out expecting there to be a wondrous transformation of some kind. But she was disenchanted, and felt somewhere a deep sadness. Part of her had believed it was all really true. She turned away from the dull world of lampposts and cars and tidy lawns, sighing and running to her bed. She felt ruined and forced her face into her pillows.

The girl at once felt herself falling into endless folds of fabric. Down and down she went into her mattress until she burst through into open air, fell a few feet, and found herself resting in an enormous four-poster bed which did not belong to her.

Breathing quickly to catch her breath and regain composure, she looked around and discovered that it was almost as though she had not left her room at all. The walls and doors and windows were all in the right places, only the ceiling was higher, so that the modern room now looked like it was situated in an old Victorian house. She thought that the wallpaper looked very much like that which had been torn down in the decoration her real room. The furniture was all of polished brown wood, with sparkling handles and mirrors shining from dust-free surfaces. There was a cord above the bed which she pulled to no avail, unaware that somewhere down in the kitchens a bell had rung.

Swinging her legs over the side of the mattress, she found that it was a long way to the floor, and that a miniature set of box stairs were set to one side. She clambered down from the bed and the carpet felt deeper than any she had ever before come across.

The girl was unaware that she looked like a doll, which was too small in scale and inappropriately dressed, placed in a grand doll’s house by a child who did not care for such continuities. The tiny figure raced over to the window and this time she knew that she would not be disappointed. Yet before she could reach the curtains, there came a tap at the door, and sooner than she could hide a girl not much older than herself came in.

‘You called, miss?’ the maid curtsied, looking at the little girl and seeming to find nothing out of place. The girl was taken-aback for a moment before she glanced at the cord above the bed and tried her best to smile sweetly.

‘I was…’ she struggled, ‘I was hungry and was wondering if I couldn’t get a little something brought up?’

‘Oh, miss!’ the maid sounded horrified and the little girl cursed herself for obviously getting the answer wrong. ‘Oh miss, but you’ve only just eaten!’

‘Well, yes, I know I have. Not very long ago I suppose.’ She suddenly became anxious that the real occupant of the room might jump out and rumble her lies. ‘But I was playing at hiding… and I’m a growing child and…’

She did not seem to need to say any more. The maid smiled and nodded knowingly. ‘You think I don’t know when you throw cook’s broth out of the window? Never mind, I shall try to find something a little more to a young girl’s tastes.’ And with that, she hurried from the room in a flurry of skirts and closed the door behind her.

Instantly, the girl returned her attentions to the heavy curtains that stood as a barricade between her and her wondrous new world.

Taking a deep breath and pulling them apart, she found herself looking up from the bottom of a deep green valley. There was a balcony that she pulled the windows back and stepped out on to. She walked forward until she reached the wall, and looking around her in wonder she gripped it tightly as she felt like she might lose her balance. She tried hard to grapple with the sheer height and vastness of the walls of forest surrounding her.

: 26 Oct 2007 11:22 |  Tags: Prose |  Comments (1) |  Report a problem