Tuck Everlasting - Alternate Ending

Chapter 1

Winnie Foster never had many friends. She was always pulled in and trapped in her house the second school let out. But as she went to school on the first day, she was determined to isolate herself; to not get attached to anyone. Thoughts of her beloved Tucks clouded her mind. She spent the end of summer gazing out of her window and staying alone in her room until her family forced her out.

There were times when the thought of being alive forever seemed idiotic. She would never have the future of sitting in a rocking chair on a porch somewhere with wrinkles and old hair. Everyone she came close to would deteriorate, while she stayed in her prime for eternity.

But then she would realize that she would deteriorate. The peaceful mental image of her in her rocking chair would get a new layer. Jesse, gazing mournfully at her as if she were already dead. Then, the image of him sitting and waiting by the spring. In the first image, he was happy. Though the thought didn't move, she could almost see his shoulders bobbing up and down. Waiting. Then the next image formed. He was sitting in the same place, looking the way she had come through when first they met. Waiting. The last image was blurry. The figure was leaving rapidly in the opposite direction from where he had been looking. Running.

She couldn't bring herself to do that to him. She cared about him, sometimes more than she wished to admit. And in those moments, she couldn't find anything wrong with drinking from the spring and running away with him. Maybe her thought was right, and he would come looking for her. The first image would be all she ever had to see.

However, she vowed, no matter what decision she would make in six years, she was to keep the vial he had given her for the rest of her life.

When Winnie was fourteen, her grandmother passed from a stroke. She despised the thought of death and what it brought to those around her. She almost ran to the spring that day. But she kept herself back.

When she was fifteen, her father became obsessed with the wood. Seemingly every other day he would declare across the house, "That wood is ours. There is no harm in taking a walk." She would pray every time he went in that he would get distracted by something and miss the spring.

In October 1898, she turned seventeen. She wanted to go straight to the spring and gulp down gallons of the water. She had done it! She had survived the six years of slow, repetitive life. But she decided to wait until the first week of August, as that was when she thought Jesse would think to look for her.

Her mother wanted to marry her off. By March, she had chosen the suitor. Winnie met him once, in June. His hair was dark and neatly kept. Unlike Jesse. His posture was stiff and his tone was to the point. So, so unlike Jesse.

"Winnie, doesn't a December wedding sound perfect?" her mother asked one morning during breakfast.

"I'd prefer August," Winnie muttered without thinking. She sat up straighter and cleared her throat. "Pardon me, mother."

"Winifred, this is your future we're talking about. Please take this seriously."

Which is why she found it so easy to run away.

She stuffed about 3 days worth of clothes into a bag and stuffed it under her bed. She reached out for the vial that always rested on her nightstand. Three more days. Three more days of tea; three more days of gazing out of her window at the wood.

Three more days of waiting for August, 1899.

The 31st of July dragged on and on.

"Mother, why do you want me to get married so young?" Winnie asked, stepping downstairs. Her mother put down her book.

"Well Winifred, I want you to have a lot of time to spend with your family. I want you to be in the best hands when you're out of mine. Go to bed soon, darling. Tomorrow is a big day. We're meeting with your fiancé."

"Yes, meeting with my... fiancé. I can't wait."

And she waited for midnight.

And she slipped out without a sound.

She looked around for her toad. It had not come to bid her goodbye.

After all I did for you, she thought.

And so, she walked to the spring.

She set the stones covering it aside and stared at it.

She couldn't drink.

She sat there for what felt like hours before giving up and lying down with her head on her pack. She fell asleep.