The End of an Era

She stood on the cliff edge, staring out over the pale horizon, and knew it was over. She could feel it in the air around her; in the whispering breeze and the shimmering voices of the ripples on the lake below her. She sat down and knotted her fingers into the wet grass, pushing dirt up under her nails as a pleasant dewy cool spread down her thighs. Perhaps jeans were not the wisest thing to wear today.

The breeze danced by, tugging at her fringe and the loose sleeves of her shirt, pulling her like an excited friend as it ran out over the lake, darting through the sunbeams and sending up plumes of soft white spray. A diving bird gave a warbling cry and ducked under the surface to avoid the wind's teasing, only to shoot upwards in a shower of spray with a tiny silver fish in its beak. She smiled and lay back in the grass, looking down between her grassy toes to the horizon. The sun was shedding its brilliant golden glow and settling into a comfortable ochre red as it nestled into the clouds, dimming the sky's light to a soft array of pastel pinks and blues, ready to sleep and rest, ready to light the sky again the next day. 

As the light faded away, the earth itself seemed to give a little sigh. It was the end; the end of a day of the past, of old thoughts and old fears and old duties, of things that were no longer necessary. But it was also the beginning of a new time, a new future of opportunities and excitements and adventures.

She looked up at the sky and smiled. She would never have to sit another Maths exam again.