Alice's Beginning
Chapter 1 – Wrong
1914
"Mary, come on! We're going to be late for school, again!" Tia's nasally childish voice broke into my mind, her tugging on my arm wrenching me from my dream. I slowly opened up my eyes, rubbing them with my fists to get out the residue in my eyes. I sat up, slowly, shaking my head to try to clear it. They were all going to die.
Tia, of course, was already dressed, attempting to do it herself – her braids askew and her buttons mixed up, making her dress run crooked down her back. I sighed, and threw the covers aside. It was going to be a long day. "Come here Cynthia…"
"Miss Brandon! Are you with us?" Ms. Baker's sharp voice sliced through my musings.
"Yes ma'am!" I sat up straighter, trying to look attentive. Some of the older kids at the back of the class sniggered. Now I was in for it…
"Miss Brandon," Ms. Baker said smoothly, walking towards me with ruler in hand. I shuddered to look at it – I had heard far too many stories about children who had fallen on the ill side of a teacher. "Could you please tell me why it is that you seem to think that you are above helping us solve these math problems?"
"Um," I scrambled to come up with an excuse, but failed miserably, "no, Ms. Baker I can't."
"I will see you after school then." And she walked up to the board, and continued the lesson. I picked up my chalk and slate, and began to work out the problems. I could hear the older students muttering amongst themselves, and wondered why they didn't get in trouble. Doesn't matter, let them have their fun now before they lose their chance.
And so the rest of the school day dragged by. When Ms. Baker announced that class was dismissed, I stayed in my seat, my head down, fearing what she had to say. She didn't speak, at first. She swept the floor, put the chalk and brushes into one drawer, her books into another. She closed the windows before turning towards me.
"Mary, what is it that you have done wrong?"
"I wasn't paying attention to the lesson."
"And why were you not paying attention to the lesson?"
My lips tightened at this. I didn't want to tell anybody about the sights. I knew nobody would understand. Nobody else knew these things. And I was pathetic at lying, so there was no point in coming up with an excuse.
"Mary, you have to pay more attention in class! I'm sure daydreaming is much more enjoyable, but we all have to do things that we don't want to do – no exceptions. You should act more like your age – a respectable thirteen-year-old girl must act so – respectably. Society expects as much from you."
"Yes ma'am."
"I'll only warn you this one time, Mary, and then I'll have to talk to your parents about it."
"Yes ma'am."
She looked at me, probably wondering if she needed to delve into a bigger lecture. Thankfully deciding not to, she nodded and stated firmly, "Very well. I expect it won't happen again. You may go home now."
"Yes ma'am."
Cynthia, was, of course, waiting right outside the door, trying to listen in to see how much trouble I had gotten into, no doubt.
"Well? How bad was it? Did you get hit?" She glance at my hands, looking for the welts from Ms. Baker's ruler.
I sighed impatiently. "No, Tia, she just told me not to do it again."
She frowned at this, obviously quite displeased. I scowled at this. "Come on, let's go home," I grumbled, grabbing her hand, and pulling her in the direction of our house.
I could tell we had guests as soon as I walked up our short laneway. The curtains in the parlour were open – something Mother only did when we had visitors. Otherwise, they stayed closed – she feared the sunlight would fade the room, as was the case in the rest of our house. Tia noticed too.
She leaned over to grab my hand. Even though I was three years her senior, Cynthia was almost taller than me – something she revelled in quite gleefully at times. "I wonder who it is?" she whispered fervently.
"Well we'll soon find out, won't we?" I said in a normal tone. Her mood instantly disappeared.
"You're no fun at these things, you know that?"
I smiled slightly. "It's what siblings are best at." And I opened the front door. Minny, our housekeeper, was standing in the hallway, waiting for us.
"Take off your shoes and go change quickly into your Sunday best," she told us in a hushed voice, "The minister and his wife are visiting."
Cynthia and I complied, pulling off our shoes and running quickly and quietly up the stairs. Tia was done in an instant, her school clothes thrown aside on the floor. She didn't even glance in the mirror as she impatiently watched me change my clothes.
"Come on! Hurry up!"
"Fix your hair – it's a mess." She undid her hair, brushed it quickly, then hastily pulled it back into the two braids. I had only just finished doing up the buttons down my back. Grabbing the brush from her, I carefully un-plaited my hair, slowly untangling it, and putting it back in the same style it was always – one braid.
Tia was tapping her foot on the floor. "Let's go! Let's go!" I walked over to the small mirror on our dresser, making sure everything was in place.
"Alright. Let's go." And together, we walked down the stairs.
Minny was waiting by the parlour door. She looked us over from head to toe, frowning slightly at Cynthia, but nodding her head anyways. She knocked on the parlour door, and opened it for us. We walked in.
Reverend Smith was old – about this. Despite this, though, his sermons had a lively, youthful flair to them, and kept everyone listening raptly to his every word. His wife was more quiet, careful and cautious – she led the Sunday school in a gentle manner, the only admonishments she gave were cautious ones. She was adored by all the children – she usually had treats for all of us. They sat amiably on the couch facing the window.
Minny forgot to mention that our neighbour, Mrs. Cooper, was also visiting. She was sitting on a chair taken from the dining room (even though there were still several other sitting places available in the parlour) with a severely straight back, and smiled, tight-lipped and falsely, at our arrival.
"Why, young Mary and Cynthia have come to join us! How lovely, girls, we were just talking about you. Please do sit down." Even when not in her own house, she was giving orders.
Cynthia and I sat beside Mother, who was sitting on the sofa facing the minister and his wife. Everyone was silent for a moment, before Mrs. Cooper spoke up.
"So will Cynthia be singing at the Easter Service in two weeks?"
Mother smiled, "We hope so."
Mrs. Smith smiled too. "Of course she will be. It wouldn't be the same without her sweet voice to sing our Lord's praises on that glorious morning…"
My attention drifted. It was always Tia getting the attention – I probably wouldn't be noticed. My eyes began to wander around the room, staring at the paintings that I had looked at so often during conversations like these. Small paintings of country houses, farms, forests. Hardly worth much attention, just there as background decoration… One picture I particularly liked – one of a castle in Europe somewhere, standing nobly by a small lake.
Not long before it's all gone. I pushed the voice to the back of my head, as usual, ignoring it's nagging. It had become worse, of late, pulling harder and harder to come up to my full attention, and doing so more often.
This time, it refused to stay down.
The parlour vanished around me. Instead, my world was filled with a vast, muddy plain. The sky was dark, threatening to rain, as if it hadn't quite rained enough yet. The ground was filled with deep ditches and huge holes, filled to the brim with rainwater. It was silent.
There were men in the ditches, all looking identical with their blackened, grim faces and filthy uniforms, waist-deep in the water. And they were waiting.
The silence was only broken when the air filled when several high-pitched whistling noises rang through the air. Suddenly, the world flashed white.
I was back in the parlour. Screaming.
They're all going to die. It's all over for them. Boys who thought they had it all, their future destroyed in one instant. The voice was whispering non-stop in my head, repeating those words, over and over again. I didn't notice Mother shaking me by the shoulders, telling me to stop it, immediately. I didn't notice Rev. Smith and Mrs. Cooper looking at me fearfully from their seats. I didn't notice Mrs. Smith telling Minny to get my father, quickly.
The world was on fire. Men were being slaughtered by toxic gases that shredded them from their lungs out. Destroyed men, their bodies mutated and twisted by bombs and gunfire. Paralyzed men stuck in muddy holes being eaten alive by rats, feeling the pain, but not being able to move to stop them…
"No, no, no, no, no…" I was moaning, over and over again, my legs curled up to my chest. I was shaking, feeling nauseous from the images that flashed through my mind.
My mother stepped back from me, unsure of what to do. "Mary Alice Brandon, you will stop this now!" she shrieked at me, her eyes going wide in her franticness. I glanced up at her, but could not see her face as it was, only seeing the agony it would twist into when she heard that her brother was missing in action.
"No! No, no, no, no, no…" I could not look at her – I turned my head down towards the floor. There, I saw a rat grin at me from the parlour floor, it's fat body wobbling as it climbed up onto the sofa, scurrying into my lap. It opened its mouth wide at me, its teeth dripping with thick, dark blood. Its mouth was full of blackened flesh – it was finding it hard to swallow it all. It coughed it up into my lap.
I couldn't help it. I vomited. And everything went black.
