Title: Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow
Fandom: Sanditon (TV)
Rating: G
Length: 300 words - 3 x drabbles
Summary: Charlotte Hayward reflects on what life has shown her.

Yesterday, Charlotte Heyward had been on top of the world.  She had felt like Cinderella, when Prince Charming tries the glass slipper on her foot and it fits perfectly, and she is whisked away to her happily ever after life.  She was in love with Sidney Parker and she knew he loved her.  They had danced at the ball and all she had to do was wait for him to return to ask her to marry him.  And she knew he would because she had seen it so clearly in his eyes.  She was deliriously happy and wanted for nothing.

Today, the glass slipper had been dashed to the floor and broken into a myriad of slithers.  She was not what Sidney wanted.  Oh yes, she saw in his eyes he still craved her, but she was only the daughter of a gentleman farmer, not the wealthy heiress he needed.  And whatever he might claim to salve his conscience, when it came to the crunch it was better to choose an ugly sister who had wealth behind her than Cinderella who had nothing.  Her fairy tale world had been torn apart and reality had stepped back through screaming at her.

Tomorrow, she would take up her brush again and sweep up all the broken glass.  She would bid farewell to her kind hostess and return to her own home, where she belonged.  She would wait, and in time she would find not a prince, whose life was sustained by wealth, but someone of her own rank.   She had had a taste of a fairy tale life and had seen the truth behind the pages of the story book.  She no longer wished to be a princess waiting for her prince, but instead intended to take charge of her own life.