14th of October, 1901, The English Countryside

It was a cold morning and the rain was gently beginning to fall against Jessalyn’s bedroom window. It was one of those mornings where everything was perfectly peaceful and even the birds were chirping louder and more joyfully than usual. Until it wasn’t.

“Jessalyn!” Her mother yelled, banging on her door to the point where she really should have gotten splinters, “Jessalyn! For goodness sake wake up and get dressed.”

Her footsteps slowly got quieter as she disappeared down the stairs until they were finally inaudible. Jessalyn hauled herself out of the safety of her bed. At least today was Monday and a few more hours of sleep were not a very heavy price to pay to spend the day at Milford. Yes. Today was going to be a good day.

She quickly washed and put on one of her mother’s favourite dresses before running out the door without even saying goodbye. Her parents wouldn’t notice, she was sure. Her father was probably on his way to work at the bank and her mother was most likely too busy fixing her little sister, Sophie’s, hair. Sometimes Sophie was almost as stubborn as her. Sometimes.

Eventually, after her long trek, although she really should have taken a horse, she arrived at the grand, tall, marble building that was Milford Academy. You would apply to the prestigious school at the age of eleven and should you be lucky enough to attend, you choose your pathway at fourteen. There are four pathways:

The Computative Pathway, for those whose passions are maths and the sciences.

The Artistic Pathway, for those who enjoy things such as music, theatre and painting.

The Humanities Pathway, for those with a desire to understand subjects like geography, history and politics.

and finally the Writer’s Pathway, for those with a love for creative writing, the written word and languages.

It was this level of specialisation, amongst many other things, that truly made Milford unique.

Jessalyn and her class had all chosen the Writer’s Pathway. No surprise there. It was all she had wanted to do since the day she learnt to read. Usually there were a few more who would have chosen the writer’s pathway but, unfortunately, the class of 1902 was a very number loving cohort with most of them choosing the Computative Pathway.

“Good morning!” Jessalyn quickly spun around to see her best friend and greatest competition Eliza Lockhart standing behind her, a huge smile on her face.

“What’s got you in such a sunny mood, then?” Jessalyn laughed as she led Eliza to their seats.

“Nothing much,” Eliza said with a purposeful air of mystery, “It’s just that-“

Before she could finish, James Winthrop walked in with all the grace he could muster before tripping over a chair and falling onto the hard, polished floor.

“Oh no… again… really? Thanks world…” James muttered as he slowly pulled himself off of the floor and into his chair.

He didn’t even bother trying to fix his unruly brown hair this time, avoiding eye contact with everyone who had the misfortune of already being in the room.

“James?” Jessalyn whispered, gently tapping him on the shoulder, “Are you hurt?”

“Yes,” Came his immediate reply, “Only internally, though.” He smiled a weak, forced smile.

He always seemed to get himself into these kinds of situations, whether it be tripping over a chair or being in the wrong place at the wrong time when all fifty two loaves of bread go missing from Mrs Laughton’s bakery. It’s a wonder he hasn’t been expelled yet. Although, it was never really his fault, he just kept his head down and tried to do the best he could. Lately, though, his grades have been declining more rapidly than usual and he’s been more unlucky in his misfortunes. He really needed to pull himself together and just pass this last year so that he could get a good, respectable job in the family business and make some money. Is that really too much to ask?