Pixie Dust & Premonitions

Part 3/10

Whispers

By the time she's seventeen, Alice's list of friends has dwindled to just one: Lily. She barely leaves the house, and when she does, she wishes she hadn't. Stares and whispers and the pointing fingers of the neighbors… she can do without all this.

"Just ignore them, Alice. They think they know what's going on, but they don't. Hypocrites, all of them. They claim to live such a religious life. Ha! Half of them are cheating on their husbands."

Alice nods, but she hasn't heard a word. She feels like she's on display, something for people to laugh at and mock. Above all, she fears a vision coming to her in public. She doesn't know what happens to her when she has them.

"I thought we could go window shopping. I know neither one of us can afford anything, but…"

"That's fine, Lily," she says. "I'd like that."

They walk along the shops, agreeing and disagreeing about the dresses they like, and Alice longs for enough money to buy a pair of red shoes in one of the windows. She steps forward to look at them closely, but what she sees instead is enough to send her stumbling backwards.

Her own reflection stares at her in the glass, but she's different. She's pale, sickly looking, and her hair looks as though it's been hacked away. What scares her the most are her eyes; they're no longer hazel.

They match those of the soldier she dreams of.

She stumbles backwards, and Lily has to grab her to keep her from going into the street. "Alice? Alice what's wrong?"

"I don't… I saw…"

She gasps, and suddenly she's standing in the middle of a battlefield. …No, not a battlefield. A slaughter house.

Bodies litter the ground at her feet, and men with red eyes tear at each other's bodies with their hands and teeth. She cries out, frightened at being in such a place, but no one hears her. After all, she isn't really there.

She stumbles along, her shoe catching on the arm of a limp body, and flinches as a man falls at her feet. It takes her only a moment to recognise him: her soldier. He's on his stomach, and there are several attackers on his back. His left arm is bent back, his hand clawing desperately at them, and his right is beneath him, planted on the ground. He can't stand.

"No!" she calls, "Get off of him!"

As she kneels to help him, the scene around her diminishes.

"Alice? Alice, get up, what are you doing?"

She gasps, her hands shaking, her forehead covered in a thin film of sweat. "I… he's hurt… oh, Lily, he'll be killed!"

Lily laughs nervously. "No worries, she's just… she's ill."

Alice looks up. A small group of people have stopped in their tracks, staring down at her. She's on her knees, grasping Lily's arm as though it were a lifeline.

"Get up, Alice," Lily hisses. "Get up, get on your feet, right now."

She stands, but her legs are butter and she sinks to the ground again. "I can't, Lily, I'm sorry."

"Get up."

Alice winces as she feels Lily's fingernails digging into the skin of her arms. She's pulled to her feet again, and this time, she manages to stay that way. "Take me home," she whispers. "Please."

"You don't have to ask me twice."

Once she's at home and tucked in bed, Lily comes to say goodbye. "I'll come check on you tomorrow," she says distractedly. "You should stay in bed."

"Lily, I'm so sorry."

"I know. Goodbye, Alice. I'll see you."

The next day, no one comes.

When a week passes, Alice knows: she won't see Lily again.

* * *

"Actually, I thought I'd go by myself."

Alice looks at her sister in the mirror. Her hands pause the work on her hair, and her face falls. "…Oh. How come?"

"Well… Nicky's birthday party… it's just a bunch of younger kids, really. You wouldn't like it."

Looking at her own reflection, Alice purses her lips into a thin line. "Okay."

"I'm sorry."

No you're not. "That's okay, Cynthia."

"Maybe we can do something later, you know, just the two of us."

"You mean away from other people?"

Cynthia rubs her forehead. "That isn't what I meant, Alice."

"I know what you meant," she snaps. "Go on, go. Tell everyone it's okay to come; your crazy sister won't be there."

"Alice!"

"Just get out."

She winces as Cynthia slams her bedroom door, and then proceeds to rip the pins and ribbons out of her hair. She ignores the sharp pain when she pulls too hair. When she's done, she grabs a cloth and rubs furiously at her mouth. The red that had been painted on her lips now stains the skin around her mouth.

Black trails of thick eyeliner stream down her cheeks.

"I didn't want to go, anyway," she says aloud, sniffing.

When she gives up on trying to fix her appearance, she plops herself onto her bed and pulls out the new sketchpad she got from her father for her birthday.

The only art that graces the pages are images of her soldier.

"Who are you?" she demands. "Why are you doing this to me?"

His empty eyes stare back at her in silence.

Angry with herself and frustrated at not knowing this creature who haunts her dreams, she grits her teeth and, in one swift movement, rips the page in two. She rips it again, and again, until the only thing left is a tiny scrap of paper with a single eye.

She covers her face. "I'm sorry."

Because she has nothing else to do, she silently places all the piece face-up on her bed.

She begins putting it back together.