Geraldine & The Gypsy Boy (Still needs work) Her mother was a house wife, and her father a business man. She was brought up in the suburbs of a prestigious town called Gallalane. She had lived in the same house for the seventeen years of her #life, where she had been locked away from the harsh reality and treatment that many other had faced. Tragedy and loss she was blind to, for she had forever been protected and lived a greater way of #life, that so many others had dreamed of. For Geraldine it was normal, and to her everybody else lead the same lives as her. Little had she known that people on the outside envied her, and wished for the very #life that she had. Geraldine spent days out in the poppy fields, picking them and dressing her bedroom with fresh flowers and making daisy chains she placed on the crown of her head. She was out there from sun rise to sunset. It was 6 in the morning on this particular day. She had picked the last poppy for her bouquet, when she noticed a young men sat in a tree across the field. He jolted and fell from the tree. Geraldine ran over to him. "Are you ok?" She asked. He stood up and brushed himself of the dry grass that stuck to his clothing. "I'm fine love, but I couldn't help but feel so entranced with just how beautiful you are," he said, belong out smoke from his cigarette that he'd still managed to keep alight. She blushed. "What are you doing around here anyway?" She asked, shying away from his kind remark. "This is where I live." He said. "You live here?" "Yup. Over in that caravan over there, you see it?" He pointed. "And this is my field, and my sheep. Wanna say hello?" He chuckled. "Geraldine," her mother called from the kitchen door. "Oh sorry, I have to go." She said, "nice speaking to you." "Take care love," he winked. Geraldine ran to her mothers call. "Who were you speaking to?" She asked. "Oh just this boy." She said. "From next door? Don't you go speaking to them gypsies Geraldine. They are not the kind of people you should be associating with. They are bad news, you stay away or you won't be allowed in the poppy field." "Yes mama" she said. Geraldine didn't listen to her mother though, in the early afternoon when her mother took a nap and her father was at work she would purposely go out in the poppy field, just to be seen. Oscar was his name, he took her to see the animals. He had goats and sheep, and horses and chickens. All the animals you could imagine, and he looked after them. When Geraldine returned home one afternoon, her mother had been awaiting her return. 'Dont you speak to that gypsy boy!' Her mother raged. 'I told you to stay away from that family! That is no place for you to be hanging around!' 'But mum he' 'Dont you speak back to me! Go it your room this instance! Dinner will be waiting for you outside your door. And don't you dare show your face here again. You ought to be ashamed of yourself!!' Geraldine spent days in her room, and she only parted with it when she needed to use the bathroom. Cold soup and french bread was served outside her bedroom door. The poppies dropped and dried out as days swept by. Geraldine wept day and night, and tissues piled up on the floor at her bed side. The gypsy boy paraded her mind with his sweet comfort and peculiar #life. Every night before she went to bed , her heart raced as she thought about them riding the horse through the forest and into the moonlight, it was the perfect paradise. And all this had been taken away from her, all the love and the joy and he happiness that she had found in the heart of her empty #life that lead her to no pleasures or fullfillment that she forever wished for. Her heart had been buried alive , and ripped and torn apart she had rather just die. She lay in bed one night, and a knock on her window have her a fright . She crawled into her bed and quickly pulled the duvet over her head. 'Geraldine. Geraldine,' she heard a whisper, but a whisper that was loud enough to be heard from the inside. It was him! It was him! He had come to find her! He loved her! She rushed out of her bed and pulled away her long, silk curtains that rippled on the floor. 'Oscar, what are you doing here? You can't be here.' She cried, her heart racing with excitement and fear all at the same time. 'I came to find you Geraldine, come outwith me tonight,' he said. His eyes were like blue marbles and mystical blue skies that had her hypnotized. She stood in silence, worrying about what her mother would say and what would happen if she had found out. 'Please geraldibe, come with me.' He said, touching her hand gently. 'Ok,' she said. But I can't be long'. She quickly went to her door and put her dressing gown on. It was made of silk, and shone like the feathers of a swan in the glimmering light. Oscar put his arms out and carried her out of the window, they ran across the poppy field into the moonlight, and over the wire fence that separated their lives from one another, but bound their hearts together. They spent the evening tucked under a cosey blanket in a caravan that was candle lit, laughing and joking about what they just did and cuddling in the warmth of each others caresses. It was truely majestic, touching each other's soft bodies and locking their love for each other with a sealed kiss. Their love grew and grew for one another. It was a love like no other. Out of the window and onto the dirt track, was a torch light that shone like the lantern of a guard hut. 'Who is it?' She gasped, reaching for her top and dressing herself as quick as she could. 'Geraldine! Geraldine!' 'Its your father, quick hide!' Oscar said blowing out the candle light. 'Get under the bed Geraldine, quickly,' he ordered. Geraldine slid into the cupboards of the wooden bed and shook with fright. The door swung open. "Where's my daughter?" He shouted. "What have you done with her?" He raged, lifting the boy by his shirt. "You stay away from my daughter, the next time I come around here you'll be lucky to be seen alive." He said. "Where is she?" "I I don't know sir. She, she's not here I haven't seen her since last month, out in the poppy fields." "You're lucky boy. You're lucky that I don't beat the crap out of you. Your lucky that I don't throw you out of this dirt wagon and feed you to your animals and let the maggots have ya. You dirty scum bag. You stay away from my daughter. You don't go near her. Do you hear?" Oscar nods his head in fear. "Do you hear boy?" He raged. "Do you hear" he spits in his face. "Yes sir." Oscar says. "You won't see me again." Her father lets him go. "You stay away from my daughter," he says one last time. And slams the door on his way out, it swings back and forth. He coughs the evidence of the years he's been smoking, and grumbles to himself. "I spent all these years bringing my daughter up to be hanging around here in this badgers den. What have I done? What have we done for her to meet a no good gypsy boy like this? So much for a god. Where has god been all these damn years." He laughs hysterically and smashes his beer bottle onto the ground. The caravan is filled with fear, and white ghosts escape their breath in the cold air. Geraldine gets up from under the bed. "I have to go! I have to go!" She said. "My dad will kill me if he knows I'm here!" "No Geraldine you can't! He'll know! I want you to be safe." "I have to oscar, I have to!" She panics. "I'll say I took a walk for some fresh air, no, I'll say I took a walk to the pond and pinched one of his cigarettes!" She said, grabbing her leggings and putting them on quickly. "Pass me your phone," she said. She looks at herself in the reflection and ties back her hair. " I have to go" she runs out of the caravan and heads towards the wire fence. "Geraldine wait! He says, running after her and kissing her again. "Will you be ok?" He asks. " i'll be fine," she says. She jumps over the fence and runs across the poppy field and into her back garden, she lifts herself into the window sill and tucks herself in bed. Only a few minutes had passed when she heard the front door open. "I told that boy to stay away from our daughter. He and his no good family are to stay away from our daughter and make sure they don't show their faces around here, anymore!" He shouted. Another beer bottle was popped open. "Honey don't you think you have had enough for one night?" "I will drink however much I want, whenever I want. This is my house, my rules!" He shouted. She could hear the sound of her mothers slippers clap along the corridor. Geraldine hides under her blanket. "Geraldine? Geraldine are you here?" He calls, approaching her bedroom door. "And where have you been you stupid girl? Have you been out with that gypsy boy!" He rages. "No pa, no pa I haven't!" She cries, clinging onto her blanket. "You have you liar!" He strikes her with the back of his hand. "You dirty bitch. You are a disgrace to this family, you have put a bad name to us. You filth, you filth. Go and live with that gipsy boy, go on!" He strikes her again, and again until her eyes are blue and beaten and she cries in despair. "I'm sorry pa I'm sorry!" She cries weeping and dribbling over the wooden floor. "You bitch! You whore!" He stomps on her and throws his beer bottle at the wall. "Chris what are you doing?" Her mother cries at the door, rushing to Geraldine's attention. "What do you think I'm doing?" He raged. "Is this how we raised our daughter!" "Chris, go to your bed, you've had enough, you've done enough now!" She starts to cry, "Geraldine sit up." Blood is seeping from her nose and her eyes are beaten black and blue. They are so swollen she can barely open them. Her hair is matted with dribble and snot. Her father leaves the room. "You complain and tell me to do something about it, and then I get told off for it. Well isn't #life fair," he complains. Geraldine and her mother slept side by side that night . Geraldine didn't speak to her father or leave her room for days on end. Her back was black and bruised, and ached whenever she moved. She didn't return to the poppy field either, and every day Oscar sat in the tree and waited for her until sunset and even after. Seven days had passed and still there was no sign of her. Oscar had written a song for her, that he wanted to play on his guitar. He knocked at her window. "Geraldine" he whispered. She opens the window, "I can't see you anymore." "Geraldine, what happened to you?" He asks. "Oh it's nothing, I just had a fall. "Your lying, your lying. Your dad did this to you didn't he?" He's shaking with adrenaline. "No, no it wasn't him." Geraldine cries. "Come here," he says, holding her through the window. "I'll look after you, I promise," she wheels in his arms. "Come with me Geraldine, let's go away, let's get you away from here." He says.