Simone had gotten into her car and was taking a last look at the school before Annabelle had gone running down from one of the buildings to her car. “Here,” Annabelle murmured as she handed the beads over to Simone. Either woman could have said something like, ‘Don’t forget me,’ or even, ‘This isn’t good-bye,’ but they both knew the truth without having to say it with so many other people around, and anything they would have said would have been a complete cliché.

    It was summer before a replacement for Miss Bradley had been found for the following school year, so the girls had Mother Immaculata for a teacher for the rest of the previous year. Colins had tried to convince Mother Immaculata that pizzas were healthy for teenaged girls, but she hadn’t bought it. Instead, she seemed to focus on Kristen’s lack of chemistry skills, which puzzled Kristen immensely. Cat found herself getting more and more bored during the school year, but they had all graduated, which meant they were free. Well, if by being free meant that they got to go home anyway.

    Annabelle had gone home for a little while, but Senator Tillman had barely noticed her daughter’s existence as it was. She was too focused on the elections that coming fall. So, it was easy enough for Annabelle to leave when she felt the whim. Annabelle decided that three was her lucky number, because it was three days after arriving home that such a whim to leave developed. It was offically three days after summer vacation had started, three days after she had graduated, when she received a photograph in the mail. It was of herself from a few months ago, when she had gone to Simone’s house, and they had gone down to the beach. Annabelle was smiling at it. It was the first real smile that she had gotten to use since Mother Immaculata had taken over Simone’s classes. The smile in the photograph was identical to the one that she was wearing when she looked at it. She turned the photo over and read the back:

"The only real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes, but in having new eyes."
    -Marcel Proust

    Annabelle took a few moments to pack a bag and to grab her cell phone and keys. Her mother wouldn’t care that she had gone on a trip; she would be lucky to even really notice. The last thing that Annabelle grabbed before she walked out of the house was the photo.  She was a girl with a destination to get to.

"FOR ONE HUMAN BEING TO LOVE ANOTHER; THAT IS PERHAPS THE MOST DIFFICULT OF ALL OUR TASKS…THE WORK FOR WHICH ALL OTHER WORK IS BUT PREPARATION."
    -RAINER MARIA RILKE