This is the first chapter, which is also posted on fanfiction under the title : "A Harvest Moon Life: Sandy's Story"
This is sort of like a prolgoue. The character is Sandy (Claire) and POV is third person, although i might change it to make it more interesting. let me know if I should.
Here goes:
Part 1: Year 1, Act 1: Spring,
Scene 1: Chapter 1
A New Life for 500 Dollars
It was raining cats and dogs. No. Forget those. It was raining saber-toothed tigers and mutant great Danes. To put it simply, it was sheeting, pouring, like out of buckets. The rain splashed onto the streets, onto the cars, onto the concrete sidewalks. It splashed into puddles it had created. There was no end to the rain.
In a little shop of Rose Avenue was a sixteen-year-old girl. She watched the rain through the glass of the shop’s display window as she squatted by one of the dresses that hung from the special display racks. Her blonde hair was curly only at its ends, were they were cut at her waist and at her shoulders. She had crystalline blue orbs for eyes that were framed in thick lashes and set into a heart-shaped face. Her nose was strong, set above full lips. A small assortment of freckles was delicately sprinkled across her nose and cheeks. She wore a white apron over jeans and a stylish blue blouse. In the apron’s pockets were various tape measures, a pair of scissors, some thread, and a few needles inside a small glass box.
The store was a small one that she squatted in. A simple but cosy building wedged between an insurance company and a deli/café shop. There were clothes hanging from racks, on display pieces, and posted on the wall. A simple orange counter stood to the left of the entrance, a closed door behind it.
Behind the counter sat a blonde some sixteen years older than the one squatting by the display piece. She had simply reading glasses on, her mist grey eyes clear behind them. She held her oval face in her small, short-fingered hands as she watched the girl. Her golden name tag, stating “ Hi! My Name is Lia Yoshi. How may I help you?“ glowed faintly in the dim light. Finally, she sat up and said, loud enough to break even the sweetest day-dream, “Sandy! If you don’t have anything to do but daydream, I suggest you help me.”
“Huh? What? Sorry,” Sandy replied, baffled, and stood up. She brushed her hair out her eyes and went over to her boss. “What was it, Lia?”
Lia laughed. “Check the time, air-head. You’re out of here in twenty minutes. But if you want to work, there’s something I need you to get from the back while I check for the gain and loose in this week’s payments.”
“I’m open ears,” Sandy replied.
“There’s a box in the back that has this really fancy red script. Ginny’s some clothes collection. Make sure its 1987,” Lia replied, scooting her chair back to behind the computer. She talked to the screen as she continued. “That’s it. Bring it here, and make sure to be careful.”
“Kay,” Sandy said, going into the back room.
She closed the door behind her and flicked the light switch. The single naked bulb hanging by a chain from the ceiling illuminated. It sent a strange glow about the small, musty room. Shelves lined the walls, each row supporting at least a dozen cardboard boxes. Sandy looked around, searching for the fancy red script Lia wanted.
Finally, she saw something red on the top back shelf. She reached up and wiped the dust away, coughing as she did so. Boy, they needed to clean this place up. Finally, the red script was visible on the box, bold despite the dim light. It read: Ginny’s Spring Clothes Collection, 1987.
Sandy pulled her handkerchief from her pocket. She studied it briefly. It was simple and white, but with sky blue lace all around the edge. Her name was stitched into the bottom left corner, Cassandra James, and in the bottom right stood With Love from your grandmother. Shall the Dove always be with you. Her gram had always believed in that one animal, the dove. And now she was dead. This was all Sandy had left from her.
She sighed, and tied it around the lower half of her face. It would protect her mouth and nose form the dust if any was raised when she hefted the box down. So she reached up, gripped the sides, and pulled. The box fell heavily into her arms.
Sandy kicked open the door and dumped the box onto the countertop, not at all gentle. The thing was starting to hurt her arms. She’d probably picked it up wrong. How did it manage to be so heavy? “Is this what you wanted, Lia?”
“Yeah, thanks,” The woman replied, glancing at it only briefly. She took a cardboard cutter out of the one of the desk’s drawers and tossed it to Sandy. She caught it awkwardly, barely managing not to cut herself. “Open it, please. You can have a look if you want.”
Sandy rolled her eyes as she found the side that was up and slit it open down the centre. Then she broke the cardboard aside and pulled the flaps open. A picture was on top of the other things in the box, and Sandy pulled it out to look at it better.
The frame was golden, encasing the picture elegantly. The photo depicted a version of the storefront. A large banner hung over the front, large red letter reading “Grande Opening.” The clothes in the display were different, too, but she couldn’t make them out. A poster was stuck to the inside of the window, red letters proclaiming “50% off if you buy two or more!” A figure was inside the doorway, but the picture was too faded for Sandy to see any details about it.
She put the picture aside and looked in again. The banner from the picture and the sale sign were inside the box, too, and she pulled them out and lay them aside. Then she pulled to a sheet of paper. It was written in a fancy cursive script, and Sandy found it impossible to read.
“That’s a letter Ginny wrote to me when she retired,” Lia said, smiling wistfully. Her glasses were perched above her forehead, and her hands clasped across her stomach as she leaned back in her swivelling chair. “She had beautiful handwriting, but she had to read it to me. I haven’t found a single person that can read it.”
Sandy laughed and held up the picture. “Is this her? Ginny? And who is Ginny?”
“Ginny was the one who started this store,” Lia said thoughtfully. “She designed some of the clothes we sell these days, and all the clothes from back then. She was the one that designed the store, started the money coming in. She also was the one that did all the advertising. She was amazingly beautiful.”
“What did she look like?” Sandy wondered, twisting a lock of her blonde hair around her finger. Her greenish eyes were twinkling curiously as she listened intently to Lia‘s story. The woman had always been a good story-teller. It was probably because she loved to read so much. “You can’t tell from the picture.”
“She actually looked like you,” Lia said, thoughtfully looking at the girl in front of her. “You’re a bit taller, and a bit skinny. You have more muscle. By golly, I think you’re prettier than she is. Yeah. Your hair is a bit longer, too, and her eyes were brown, not that really cool greenish blue you got.”
Sandy raised her eyebrows. “You’re kidding. I mean, Ginny was a model, right? What happened to be hers being amazingly beautiful?”
“She was,” Lia said, grinning. “You are just more so than she was.”
Sandy’s eyebrows shot higher for a second, but then lowered themselves. Her eyes went slightly out of focus as she thought about what Lia had said. “Wait a minute. . . .you keep saying was. What happened to her?”
“She retired, got old, and died of some kind of cancer,” The woman replied nonchalantly and waving her hand dismissively. “I miss her yes, but sometimes it’s better without her. I’m not trying to be mean, but she was a bit of a control freak. And now that she’s gone, I get this cool new job. She wouldn’t promote me before.”
“Oh,” Sandy murmured. The thought that this amazing woman had died made her a bit sad, and they way Lia had talked about Ginny and then how she’d reacted to the woman’s death confused her. “Can I look at some of these clothes?”
“Go ahead,” Lia replied.
Sandy pulled out the topmost article. It was made from leather, a shirt, sleeveless. It was white leather tank top, she realized. It was so tiny. She stared at it, and pulled out the next This one was just was tiny, only it was a simple pale green. Also leather. Sandy dug through the box. Everything was leather. Everything was either a shade of green or white. Everything was skimpy, being easily mistaking for underpants or tank tops, if that wasn’t what they were.
Sandy quickly repacked the box and kicked it under the counter. “What do you need that thing for anyway?”
“I want to look at some of the designs,” Lia said, smiling. “I was thinking about using them for next spring. But I wasn’t sure whether these were the right ones or if I’d gotten the year messed up on accident.”
Sandy raised an eyebrow a she headed over to the coat rack. “Did you?”
“Probably,” Lia admitted, laughing.
Sandy rolled her eyes and pulled on the white raincoat that hung from the employee coat rack next to the door. She opened her umbrella and waved, heading out into the rain. The droplets pounded onto the umbrella the minute she stepped out of the store.
Sandy walked leisurely towards the hotel, enjoying the rain, despite the cold, as it pattered onto her umbrella. Nothing like a good rain. April-showers bring may-flowers, she thought blissfully. But it was March, not May. . . . She sighed, glancing at the sky briefly. As long as there was no lightning, she’d be fine. Her brontophobia made her afraid of lightning, but she loved thunder and rainstorms. It really was unusual.
Finally, Sandy saw the sign of the hotel she lived at. Or maybe it was an inn. Or an extra fancy apartment complex. The name said nothing. Ashford Room and Board, she though, reading the sign without interest. It really is a strange name. . . . She shook her head as she stopped in front of the door. She was late and she knew it. Her mom was probably going to yell at her. Again.
Sandy wet inside the building and was immediately berated. At least it wasn't her mom. Mrs. James's voice tended to carry. The bad part was the fact that, even though it wasn't her mother yelling, the person was still extremely shrill. And twice as annoying.
“Missy James! What have you done?!” The voice screeched.
Sandy ignored the woman and went to her mailbox, taking out her key. As she opened the box and took out her mail, she said, calmly, “What is it this time, Mrs. Kingsley? Did I forget to knock on the door three times?” She turned to look at the strangely superstitious woman.
The woman was a strange sight indeed. Today, she happened to be wearing a bright orange bathrobe, fuzzy pink bath-slippers, and her orange hair was in hot pink rollers. Mrs. Kingsley was very superstitious, and was always telling Sandy to do strange and silly things. Like ask her to close her umbrella while it was pouring.
“I do not. . . . NO! I refuse to believe you just did what I saw!” The woman screeched as Sandy closed her box and started heading to the elevator. Once you'd been living with this person long enough, it was easy to get used to it and ignore her. “You know having an umbrella INSIDE is terrible bad luck. Why, I might just have to--”
The elevator closed in the poor woman's face. After pressing the button for floor 17, Sandy leaned back against the wall of the elevator. She had to get out of here. Not only because of Mrs. Kingsley. But her mom. . . .they were low on money, which was why both the woman and her sixteen-year-old daughter worked full-time. She was sick of the city, and having to rely on her mother just hurt. Both her pride and her love for her mom. She was a disappointment.
With a small ding, the elevator doors opened. Sandy pulled herself upright and headed into the small, empty hall. She walked dejectedly to the right room and pulled her key card out of her purse. She opened the door. With a deep breath, she went in, closed the door, and turned. Her eyes closed, her breath bated, she waited.
There was nothing. No shouting. No yelling. No slap. Not a noise. Sandy opened her eyes, listening for any tell-tale sounds of her mother's presence. The TV was off. So was the radio. There was no scent as evidence of cooking. Sandy looked around. Her mom's beige leather purse was nowhere to be fond. She wasn't home yet. Sandy breathed a sigh of relief. Peace and quiet for at least half an hour.
She locked the door and went to her room to change, dropping the mail on the same table as her purse. Once in a much more comfortable set of clothes, jeans and a pale green t-shirt, Sandy went to the living room to read that day's newspaper.
She paged through the paper patiently, reading snippets of the stories and looking for anything interesting. One story was about a dog that had been taught to water-ski (in this weather, Sandy wondered curiously) and a rabid parakeet that had gotten loose on an airplane (ever heard of something like that before?). She also noticed an article circled in bright red marker about a famous actress that had divorced and then sued her husband for every penny he was worth. Her mother had been following the story in every magazine and newspaper she could lay her fingers on.
Finally, Sandy turned to the advertisements. They were favourite part of the newspaper. Perhaps it was all those splashes of colour. Maybe it was the interesting, and sometimes funny, sayings they came up with to help sell their products. She didn't now. But she loved the ads anyway.
Suddenly, one of the advertisements caught her eye. There were two black-and-white pictures above a small paragraph. The first picture was a mailbox next to a small farmhouse and a doghouse a bit farther to the right. The second was a bird's-eye-view of a small village nestled between a mountain and a beach, complete with dock. The second picture was labelled, “Mineral Town.”
Intrigued, Sandy read the ad.
Is city life drudgery boring for you? Are you a little low on money? Do you need someplace to escape to? Do you need a refresher on life? If you answer yes to any of these questions, we have an item for you! For a limited time only, a little piece of farmland heaven is available to the ones brave enough to venture to this little village to live a life of farmland pleasure. Make friends with the townspeople, raise animals, grow crops, and refresh your life. This farm is on sale for a limited time, so call now! Before somebody else steals YOUR chance to escape from the city!
Call 483-291-5076 for more information
Price: Five Hundreds Dollars (500.00)
A farm. . . . ? Sandy stared at the ad, reading and rereading. A farm? Her very own farm. . . .
“Drudgery. . . . escape. . . .refresh,” Sandy murmured parts of the ad aloud as she reread it. Yes, it was true. They were offering her a farm. She reread the price. “Five hundred dollars, holy cow!”
She could afford it, she knew. She had about a thousand, maybe two, saved up. There was only one con to this idea. Her mother would never allow her. . . .but she could buy the farm, the travel tickets, and stuff like that first, and then her mom wouldn't be able to stop her. She was definitely doing this.
Sandy ripped the page out of the newspaper and ran to her room to report to her diary.
Let me know what you thought. As I said, this is sort of just setting up the story.
