Prologue- A Scandal in London, England

To my father, she was always the woman. I have seldom heard him mention her under any other name. Even in society, she was the woman. Of course, nobody knew who he was talking about, and for some time, neither did I.

It never occurred to me when I was young that the woman was my mother. I can not recall her very well, as she left us when I was still a baby. She did leave me a picture like in the movies, but unfortunately, I've never been able to see it.

I was born just outside of London in a small part of the country known as Sussex Downs in the year of nineteen hundred and thirty to parents Sherlock Holmes and Irene Adler. They were an odd couple, if I really think on it. Sherlock was English, Irene was American, which in those times, was quite uncommon.

My mother left only a few days after I was born. She never explained why, but I believe she didn't want the burden of an illegitimate child. My father of course, even with all of his analytical and detective work, had no clue as to raising a baby, much less a baby girl like me, but he had no choice. This sparked the year long search for Irene Adler, going to the far ends of the world to find her.

Don't misunderstand me, I love my father, and he loves my mother and I, even though he doesn't care to show it. Only a day after my mother left, he went searching for her, using every available power he had. But in the end, his sleuthing skills were of little use, and, disheartened, he gave up his search in New York.

The moment Sherlock Holmes stepped into New York City, he hated London and everything about it, save for his friends and only known relative. He despised the city with a passion, and will tell you of it if he gets the notion to.

By the time I was a year old, we were fully British-American, which is slightly confusing for somebody who's only been to England once in her entire lifetime. New York was our new home, and my father intended on staying there, no matter what happened. He did not want to return to England to face what he had lost.

The next year, my uncle Mycroft decided to leave as well. Apparently, his connexions in politics had run out, and he wanted a new start in a new government. Here he started his very own club instead of joining one, which is slightly against his usual character, but this story is an unusual one in itself.

I guess now that Mycroft is on the scene it would be wise to mention my name. Michelle Marie Holmes was an odd combination of names. Michelle is a combination of Mycroft and Sherlock, and originally spelled with a 'y'. To be honest, I don't understand the connexion. Marie was Uncle John's wife's name (which was actually Mary, but let's not argue on it.)

In any case, the year that I turned two (which if you do the math is 1932; try to stay with me here) things took a turn for the worse. Unbeknownst to anybody at the time, I had a disease which was later given the name Leber Congenital Amaurosis, which is basically a lack of vision at birth. At first, supposedly, my eyes responded well to light and brighter colors but in 1932 I became sick with Scarlet Fever and everything was lost. My vision slowly declined until eventually there was none left.

Of course, my father did not take the news well at all. Uncle John and Mycroft had to lock him in a room with nothing but books for a week after Deddy (my word for 'Daddy') nearly over-dosed on cocaine. It's always a terrible thing to learn that your father nearly killed himself because of something you did.

While my father was sick, I stayed in Mycroft's club, giving me my first taste of the British underground New York. Any slum who said 'poh-tah-toe' instead of 'poh-tay-toe' was shoved into the little nook that Mycroft called 'Little Britain'. I was especially drawn to the piano in the corner, to the left of the strange drunk man named Merle who mumbled about his favorite football player on Manchester United's team.

So it was the Little Britain that I grew up in. Everyday after school I would walk to the Club and play the piano for an hour before everybody became too drunk and things became dangerous. When I became old enough to be left alone for a few hours (which came rather quickly, I might add), I stayed at home and waited for Uncle John to call at four o'clock in the afternoon, even though it is already ten o'clock at night in England. I love my Uncle John.

By now, I'm guessing you want to know what it is to be blind. Well, the Merriam-Webster dictionary says the word means sightless, having less than 1/10 the normal vision range, having no regard or rational, and defective. Obviously, I don't like that last word. But what are words to you? Tiny pictures on a page?

Not to me. They're everything. The little bumps are my one-hundred and ninety three tickets to some island paradise in an unknown country somewhere in the Middle East amongst a band of thieves going for the Rajah's treasure.

One hundred and ninety three blank pages. To your eyes, at least. To really get to know a book, you need to feel it. Immerse yourself in it for hours on end until your fingers are bloody and callused from the work. That's what Braille is to me. It's how I feel when I read.

So, back to the story. Where was I…? Oh, yes, Uncle John. Now, when Deddy (Remember, that's my father) lived in England he had a flat-mate name Dr. John H. Watson. Since men have a hard time admitting things, I'll admit this for them: They were the best friends the world has ever known, in print too. Deddy went on adventures solving crimes and fighting bad guys and saving the day while Uncle John wrote about them and handed the copy to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, who in turn published the stories in a magazine called The Strand Sir Doyle tells me occasionally over the phone that he is going to publish a book about me sometime, but he's not the most reliable person on Earth.

At any rate, my story doesn't necessarily begin here. In fact, it begins around my sixteenth birthday. To the world, I'm a very small, round-backed teenager with crooked feet. But that's going to change. I'm about to become a whole lot bigger in the eyes of the world…

That's the prologue. Unfortunately, this one's going to be a very long story, since it's already taking up over 17 pages in a notebook (both sides of the pages too!). I've decided to write it backwards to save on the length but I don't think that's going to work. I probably won't continue unless I get atleast five reviews for the prologue and the first chapter, so review, review, review, and enjoy!