Michelle I remember the day I met her as if it were only yesterday. I could never forget that face, the sound of her voice, the way that she moved. I had never seen somebody so unique and astonishing before, she truly was beautiful. It was an ordinary Tuesday evening in December. I was taking Jess out for her daily walk along the fields. Living in the middle of nowhere did have its occasional perks. There was never anybody around to yell at me for walking across private property. It was nice and peaceful although I did miss the hustle and bustle in the city centre. It was fairly cold outside so when I saw a young woman standing at the top of the hill in only a t-shirt it caught my attention. Nobody came up here, especially at this time of day. Her long brown hair caught the wind and danced in the air effortlessly. I remember thinking about how soft her hair must have been for it not to get tangled up in the gale. I pulled Jess closer to me and she barked at the long grass which was waving frantically in the gale. She didn't move an inch when the gale picked up which surprised me. I could only see the back of her but yet I knew that her gaze was fixed solidly into the horizon of nowhere. The direction of which she was looking into was only a mist and blur of hills and a small forest which resembled a green fog. The rumors and superstitions of the world ending on December 21st seemed to become reality for a few minutes. It was only the 18th but it looked like a freak storm of gales and rain were approaching slowly. Jess knocked me out of my trance by running in the opposite direction and pulling me with her. I stumbled to my feet and cursed. The ground was wet and I had happened to of slipped over on the muddiest patch of the field. To my surprise she stayed still, she didn't even flinch. Surely she would of heard Jess barking and a thud on the ground. It occurred to me that she might be deaf. I wanted to confront her and ask her why she was outside in weather like this wearing so little. Her skin looked almost translucent, there was definitely something wrong here. However my instincts told me to stay away from her, although I felt a physical pull towards her my conscience was repelled. I couldn't make sense of this so I decided to head back. Jess wouldn't stop barking so I thought it would be for the better. I walked back towards the small cottage that I rented over the fields. Jess seemed happy to be heading back as she pulled firmly on the lead. I let her off and she ran down towards the cottage. I wasn't prepared to have her pull me over and make a fool of myself, just incase anybody was watching. As I made my way towards the cottage my mind wandered towards the brunette girl. I wished I had said something. I turned around to see if she was still there although I was a good few fields away by this time. I couldn't even see her silhouette so I gathered that she had left. Jess was already waiting by the front door when I arrived back. I opened the door and she frantically ran in and curled up in her bed in front of the fire. I threw a few logs into the fire and lit them. I was about to curl up on the sofa and put a movie on when there was a knock at the door. Who on earth would want to visit me at this time in this weather? It was almost 10.00pm, and visitors always rang in advance to tell me they were coming round. I walked towards the door and opened it. To my surprise it was the brunette girl. She stared straight at me. It felt as if she was staring into me which was incredibly intimidating. Neither of us said a word for a good few seconds, until she raised her hands and pushed them towards me. In her perfectly cupped hand was my wallet. "You dropped this" she told me and pushed my wallet closer to me. I took the wallet from her hand being careful to avoid touching her. "thank you, I had no idea I even dropped it" I replied. She simply smiled at me, which caused an awkward silence. I thought I'd better invite her in after she'd come all the way across the fields just to return my wallet. "Would you like to come in?, it's awfully cold out there". I asked her, still not too sure about how she managed to find my wallet when she never even turned around to see me. "Yes thank you" she answered, this surprised me because I thought the awkward silence between us had put her off. I let her in and closed the door behind her. " You can sit on the sofa if you want to, make yourself at home, would you like some coffee?" i asked heading into the kitchen. " Yes please" she replied taking a seat on the sofa. I filled up the kettle and waited for it to boil. I never took my wallet with me when I walked Jess. Never. I had to of lost it earlier today or sometime yesterday. On the other hand she seemed like a nice girl. She had deep brown eyes and a pretty smile. When I had finished making coffee I took it in to the living room and put it on the table next to her. Jess was curled up on her lap and she was petting her in a steady rhythm. "Jess"! I exclaimed, it was unlike her to bother strangers. Usually she went mental if she came into contact with somebody she didn't know in her own home. However she seemed content and the girl was smiling. "Thank you" she said as she took a sip of coffee. " I hope she isn't being a burden to you" I said as I sat in the chair across from her. "Of course not! She's lovely"! She said still petting Jess. "I'm Michelle by the way, what's your name?" she added. Her gaze left Jess and fixated on me. "I'm Daniel" I stuttered. I didn't know what else to say, she was still watching me when I took a sip of my coffee. "It's nice to meet you Daniel! I'm glad i managed to find your cottage or I'd feel so guilty for having your wallet, it would eat me from my insides out" she chuckled and took another sip of her coffee. I laughed and agreed. The awkwardness at the door seemed to have melted away and I found myself in a deep intriguing conversation with her. It was incredible how easy it was to talk to her. I already felt like I could trust her and consider her a friend even though I barely knew her. After a few hours and another cup of coffee we exchanged phone numbers and arranged to meet up on Thursday at a small cafe only a few miles from here. As I said goodbye to her I realised that she was the first person I had ever felt comfortable around for years. Ever since I left university and worked at home I rarely came into social contact with anyone. I had easily lost all my childhood friends and college acquaintances. It's not like they cared anyway. They all moved on to find other people and I was always stuck in the same place. I could never make friends with anybody, I didn't understand how people did it. But Michelle was different, there was something about her that captured my attention. It was Thursday and I was sat in the coffee shop waiting for her to arrive. I had chosen the table in the middle of the cafe so that she could easily spot me. The coffee shop only had a few customers apart from me yet however I still felt incredibly awkward sat there waiting for her without ordering. Luckily enough at that precise moment she walked in through the door, smiled at me and took the seat opposite me. Michelle looked even more beautiful today, she was wearing a casual black skirt and blouse with red detail on it. "Morning!" she exclaimed whilst smiling and picking up the menu. "Nice to see you again" I replied and watched her scan the menu. I had already chosen what I wanted whilst I was waiting for her. Just like the day I first met her I was suddenly hit by a wave of this strange feeling. I couldn't describe it but I was sure that I had never felt this way before. The feeling made me incredibly wary of her every move. It was as if I was waiting for something but I didn't know what. Michelle put down the menu. "What are you having then?" she asked me. " I'll probably have the pasta dish, what about you?" I replied. Michelle laughed, "same" she said and smiled at me. It did linger on my mind for a while that it was slightly weird that we picked the same meal without any discussion out of all the meals to choose from. But I guess we just had similar tastes. We ordered our meals and made small talk for a while which resulted in her telling me about a holiday she once had in France where she outsmarted a con man who had tried to get into her hotel and steal her laptop. I could listen to her talk for hours and hours, I don't know what it was but I felt as though there was nothing around me. The whole cafe seemed to melt away and it was just me and Michelle. What I felt for Michelle was strange, i wasn't in love with her. Well I'd never been in love so I wouldn't know what it felt like but I was sure that this feeling was something else. Something new and exciting. The hours on the clock seemed to fly by and before I knew it 3 hours had flown by. Michelle had missed her bus so I asked if she would like to stay the night at mine. She accepted my invitation and we began to walk back to my cottage. I didn't mind walking, I had done it a few times before and with Michelle it wouldn't be as much as a drag. I cannot remember what we talked about but I recall being happy and laughing a lot. We reached the field where I had first seen her and Michelle abruptly stopped. "Are you alright"? I asked her, she had a strange glassy look in her eye. Michelle laughed. It wasn't the high pitched chuckle I had grown to recognize but this deep laugh that came from somewhere else. " I think the question is, are you okay?". She answered staring into my eyes. Michelle looked me in the eyes when she spoke to me all the time but this was intimidating and I was beginning to get worried. "I'm fine" I said taking a step back from Michelle. "If you say so" she said and threw her arm out towards my stomach. I was standing a good few feet away from Michelle so I didn't think to move. But her arm expanded at the elbow to reveal clockwork parts, her arm literally split and flew at me. I screamed and froze. This certainly wasn't normal and I was already trapped, I couldn't do anything to stop her because I knew she could just expand as much as she wanted to. Michelle laughed as she looked me in the eye and I felt her fingers stretch around my waist. I looked down to see wires and cogs surrounding a piece of what must be elastic but looked like rusty metal. It was like something out of a horror film. She was gripping me so tightly that I couldn't breathe and began to feel light headed. I didn't think to try and escape her grasp because there was no point, she could tighten her grip as much as she desired to. Michelle was still laughing when I blacked out, her laugh had gotten even deeper and throatier which I didn't think was even possible. I don't know how long I must of blacked out for but it felt like years, although when I came around Michelle was still holding me but less tightly so I figured it was only a couple of minutes at the most. She had stopped laughing now and reached towards her chest. I didn't know what to expect, I knew she was different but a clockwork horror woman was out of the question. She grabbed her chest and ripped it open. I stood horrified, I didn't want to look at her, I couldn't bear to see what was really inside her. However my curiosity got the better of me as I heard her twiddling some mechanism that made a grinding sound and eventually ran smooth. Inside her was a clockwork mechanism with a stop watch placed right where her heart should be. It looked as if the watch was counting down with only a few minutes left. She was still holding me with her other hand so I could do nothing but watch her. "That ought to do it, thank you very much" she muttered as she turned the hands back on the watch to the top which read '50'. "What?", I said then immediately regretted my decision to speak. "You want to know why the time seems to fly by when you're with me?, or are you too stupid to even notice?" she asked me, closing up her chest and adjusting her ripped blouse. "I've noticed, I've spent the whole day with you , yet it feels like only a few minutes" I answered cautiously. "Well done, you're not as stupid as I thought you were Daniel" she said and chuckled her high pitched laugh. I noticed that she had gone back to before, less intimidating with a pretty laugh but she was still griping me tightly. "It's such a shame it had to end like this Daniel, you would of had a great future ahead of you, and you're a good looking fella too" Michelle sighed. What did she mean? It was silent for a few seconds. Her words played on my mind. What did she mean 'would of had a great future'? Surely I will have a great future? "Confused?" she asked breaking into my thoughts. " A little" I replied. I realized that although I was terrified I couldn't stop talking to her, the weird feeling that I got when I was around her was back and stupidly enough I still felt as if I could trust her. I knew this was something that she was doing but I couldn't make the feeling go away. "Every 10 minutes you spend with me gives me a whole year of your #life" Michelle explained. So spending an hour with me is the equivalent to 6 whole years. Time flys when you're having fun right?" She laughed. I didn't understand. I had spent 3 hours with her at the coffee shop that flew by, so that was 18 years? Surely it couldn't be true. Time certainly did fly by when I spent time with Michelle but that was in hours and definitely not years. She had to be lying, and judging by the stopwatch inside her that I saw, it must of been 50 years. How had she managed to take 50 years of my #life away from me? "You see Daniel I need your #life to keep me going, without taking people's years I will die, and surely I am more important than the rest of humanity, unfortunately you were at the wrong place at the wrong time." Michelle stated, her words went right through me and suddenly I began to feel very sick. Luckily at that moment Michelle let go of my waist and her arm and fingers clicked back into place. I breathed steadily and looked at Michelle. She was smiling at me. If it weren't for her ripped shirt then I would of thought that nothing had happened. "Goodbye Daniel" Michelle said blankly. Then she turned around and began to walk back over the fields. I stared helplessly at her. She stopped. "Oh and Daniel, never trust somebody who steals your wallet and then willingly gives it back to you". Michelle added and continued to walk away. As soon as she was out of my sight I ran to my cottage. I must of moved too fast because after about 30 seconds all my muscles began to ache and I was already out of breathe. I managed to make it back to my cottage after limping for a while. I was greeted by a howling Jess. She jumped at me and almost knocked me off my feet. I didn't know what was wrong with her. She growled at me and wouldn't let me touch her. I ignored her and headed upstairs. I really needed some sleep. The stairs took up the last of my energy and I stumbled into my bedroom. I caught a glimpse of myself in my mirror. I looked back again just to make sure I wasn't seeing things. I looked about 70 years old. My face was old and wrinkled, I had very thin wispy grey hair. It definitely was still me though, I had all the same features. I was 70 years old. Michelle had taken 50 years of my #life so she could live. How many years did I have left? I couldn't believe it. what was i supposed to do now? I couldn't do anything about it. Practically my whole #life had been taken away from me because I trusted a stranger. Now I was left with nothing and Michelle had everything.