Before Paradise

"Unbidden tears slipped out of the corners of my eyes. We were going to have been married next summer. Fear drove me forward faster. With each step, my chest constricted, feeling as though my insides were turning outward. I clutched at my side, a sharp pain forming in it, and concentrated on breathing deeply. A lifetime of images flashed in front of me. There would be no wedding. I would never the chance to know him intimately. Gone was the privilege of growing old with him. Humming, I...
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"Unbidden tears slipped out of the corners of my eyes. We were going to have been married next summer. Fear drove me forward faster. With each step, my chest constricted, feeling as though my insides were turning outward. I clutched at my side, a sharp pain forming in it, and concentrated on breathing deeply. A lifetime of images flashed in front of me. There would be no wedding. I would never the chance to know him intimately. Gone was the privilege of growing old with him. Humming, I tried to drown out the voices of imminent demise. Exhaustion threatened to overtake me while urgency pushed me onward. The mountains still loomed tauntingly in the distance. My lungs cried out for much needed oxygen until at last I crumbled. He was out of reach, no more than eleven miles and several lifetimes away, and there was no way to get to him." College Senior Melanie Woods is finally on the verge of obtaining all she has ever wanted - a degree from a reputable university and marriage to her high school sweetheart - but when a mysterious package containing an antique pocket watch arrives and sends her unexpectedly into the past, she is compelled to consider viable possibilities for an alternate future. As Melanie desperately searches for a way back to her own era, she is forced to take on the hardships of daily frontier life as a means to her survival. Through these experiences Melanie finds the strength she never knew she had.