Beyond Her Years

Eleven-year-old Alice-May Jayne Kingston-Woods had always been an intellectually advanced, highly responsible, brilliantly polite, and extremely respectful young girl; she had been incredibly bright her whole life, even before starting her school career, she had been incredibly smart and this had only been proven more correct since starting school, she had always been the top student in her year, in all academic and creative subjects, Alice-May excelled exponentially. At every parents evening, her teachers praised Alice-May profusely, not just for her academic achievements, her involvement in extracurricular activities and charitable works, but also for her fantastic imagination, and her wonderful character and beautiful personality. Her teachers would congratulate her mother on how generally fantastic Alice-May was, in every aspect of life that they had seen her or heard about her in the news, through word of mouth from local charities and care facilities she would volunteer in and watched as she interacted with other children and members of the public- no matter their age, gender, race, religion, ability or belief, calling her an “absolutely outstanding, phenomenally well-rounded and generous member of society”. Both her teachers and her mother were incredibly proud of her and would tell her as often as they could that she would go very far in the world- whatever she chose to pursue in later life.

As well as being a superstar in her schooling, extra-curricular and weekend clubs and within the community through her charity work, she was also an incredible daughter and doting big sister; her mother was grateful for such a magnificent daughter and was full of pride whenever she spoke of her. Alice-May was the eldest of three children to single mother Jesslyn Woods, unfortunately Alice-May’s father had tragically passed away when Alice was just seven months old; he got caught in a horrific car accident which left him in a coma for three months before slipping away during the night- his name was Killian James Kingston and whilst alive, was a full hands on father the moment he found out Jesslyn was pregnant with their child. Years after the loss of her boyfriend, when Alice-May was six years old, Jesslyn met a man, whilst working in the library on her university dissertation, and opened her heart and home to him; Harrington Christiansen-Briggs, Jesslyn and Alice-May lived happily, as a little family for three years before Jesslyn fell pregnant. Just six weeks after finding out the exciting and lifechanging news, and two weeks after telling Harrington, he up and left the pregnant Jesslyn for another, younger woman. At her next scan Jesslyn found out she was pregnant with twins and knew her life would be very difficult; she would continue raising her daughter alone and now two more babies were on the way. Alice-May knew how sad and stressed her mother was and promised to help as much as she could with her new twin siblings, Jesslyn loved her daughter even more that day, not knowing that was possible to do so, but she did. Her life was going to be crazy yet rewarding, no matter what.

Seven months after making that promise to her mother, and just a few weeks after Alice-May’s tenth birthday, her mother gave birth to her twin siblings. Two beautiful healthy babies were born in the late evening on a sunny Saturday in August, one baby brother and one baby sister for Alice-May; her little brother came along first, he was lovingly named Elijah-Rhode Killian Woods, his middle name a tribute to Alice-May’s late father, and then along came her little sister, who would be the last of the Woods siblings, adorably named Poppy-Elsbeth Vera Woods.

Alice-May and her now one year old twin siblings were spending the weekend with their mother and her parents, the children’s grandparents Hannah and Greggory Woods, at the Grandparent Woods’ home. The Woods children absolutely loved staying at their grandparent’s house, firstly because they got their own bedrooms, and didn’t have to share like they did at their own home, secondly because they adored their grandparents very much and thirdly, because they got away with anything and everything as they were spoilt rotten by Hannah and Greggory, for any and all occasions. Despite being able to get away with anything and everything, Alice-May was, as usual, a pleasure at all times and Poppy-Elsbeth and Elijah-Rhode were good little babies, happy and content and very rarely behaved unfavourably, they had a very good role model in their big sister to show them how to behave even at such a young age.

This weekend would be extra fun as they were going to be taking a trip to the funfair which had just come to town; Alice-May was beyond excited to take her little brother and sister to the fair for the first time, she was especially excited to take them onto the small carousel, the very same one that she had loved every single year since she herself was one years old. At the funfair, the Woods family enjoyed a wonderful day, playing games, eating good food and riding different rides, Alice-May and Jesslyn enjoying big thrilling rides whilst Hannah and Greggory took the twins on the small train and other baby rides. After several hours at the funfair, the Woods family drove home together, taking the long way round through the scenic country roads; during the long drive home Poppy-Elsbeth, Elijah-Rhode and Greggory all fell asleep while Alice-May and Jesslyn read their favourite books while Hannah drove them home. The drive was long and beautiful as the sun was setting, turning the sky from a brilliant blue to a dusty pink and orange; the twins slept soundly while Greggory awoke halfway through the drive to swap with Hannah, Jesslyn and Alice-May finished their books and began talking about Alice-May’s school work that she was excited for over the next week, and Hannah watched out the window at all of the animals that they were driving past.

At the last junction before getting back into their village, tragedy struck the Woods family, yet again, a large semi-truck barrelled down the road and clipped the front of the car that Greggory was driving. The car spun, rolled, and slipped down a ditch at the side of the road; the semi-truck screeched to a halt and the driver jumped out of the cab. Calling the police and ambulance, the truck driver checked on, as best he could, the Woods family and found Poppy-Elsbeth and Elijah-Rhodes in their car seats, awake and crying but unharmed as far as he could tell. He found the rest of the Woods family unconscious but breathing and monitored them as he awaited for the ambulances.

Three days later, laying in her hospital bed, Alice-May learnt that her Grandparents and mother were all in serious condition, with a very slim chance of them making it. Alice-May was told that her twin brother and sister were both very well, only had small bruises from their car seat buckles, and were being cared for by her late fathers’ parents, who had been visiting every day since she was in hospital, giving them the permission to perform surgery on Alice-May’s leg to fix it, and were missing her lots but were settling well. After a further three days in the hospital, recovering in peace, visiting her grandparents and mother every day in their hospital beds and having her grandparents coming to visit her, Alice-May was discharged to recover in the care of the Kingston grandparents, Richard and Harriett. Not even a week after the accident, Alice-May, Poppy-Elsbeth and Elijah-Rhodes lost their Woods Grandparents to their injuries. Alice-May cried herself to sleep every night after putting her baby brother and sister to bed and being tucked in by her Kingston grandparents. Two weeks after the loss of her grandparents, Alice-May attended their funeral with her Kingston grandparents, the day was beautiful and sad.

A week after the funeral of her parents, Jesslyn also passed away from her injuries, this caused even bigger loss and sadness in Alice-May’s heart. She was an orphan and her baby brother and sister had lost the only parent they had known. Just a few weeks later, Richard and Harriett Kingston were granted full custody of all three of the Woods siblings, Jesslyn’s funeral had come and gone- which was beautiful although not attended by the twins as they were too young, and Alice-May was back at school. At just eleven years old, in her first year of secondary school, Alice-May would never have a proper childhood any longer. She had always been a child beyond her years, being very responsible, polite and respectful, she was now helping her grandparents raise her twin brother and sister, working very hard in school to catch up and get ahead, and had started earning with a small paper round in the morning before getting her brother and sister ready for nursery and taking them before school with her grandmother. Alice-May also helped pick up her brother and sister from nursery in the evening with her grandfather, get them fed at night, bathed and dressed for bed, tucking them in and helping to get them to sleep.