This chapter came out slow… sorry about that. I blame this site and its bugs; this could've been up hours earlier if not for the site malfunctioning on me.

Ashley Teslow got up early that morning and reluctantly left her boyfriend's house to head home. Taking a glance at the clock, she decided that her younger sister wouldn't be up at this hour, and so she didn't stop at Phil's house to pick her up.

Ashley pulled into the driveway of 19 Caulfield Lane and walked up to the front door. She unlocked the door, and put her keys on the small table by the door.

She looked at the ground and sighed. For some reason, she had a feeling that at least one thing in her life wasn't quite right. A sinking pit in her stomach, gnawing at her.

Shaking her head she walked into the hall and stopped dead. She saw her sister in the living room, hanging on a noose.

Ashley couldn't even move. She couldn't even think. She was shocked into immobility. She didn't scream, nor did she cry. She just stared at the scene in front of her.

Slowly, she started to soak in what was in front of her. Horrified, she left the room. Entering the dining room, she sat down at the table and held her head in her hands.

Keely groggily rubbed her eyes as her cell phone cut through the silence. Fumbling around blindly for it, she managed to knock several things off of the small desk beside Phil's bed before she could pick it up. "Hello?" she croaked.

"Keely, it's Ash…" her sister's voice said in her ear, in a tone that Keely wasn't used to hearing. She sounded unnerved.

"Hey, Ash… what's up?" Rubbing her eyes, Keely wondered why her sister could possibly be calling her at 5:30 in the morning.

"I… I think you'd better get over here. Now."

"Ashley, it's--"

"Keely… just get over here." Keely raised an eyebrow as her sister's quavering voice silenced and a dial tone took its place.

"What's up?" Phil asked, sleepily, as Keely gave her phone a questioning look.

"My sister wants me to come home… right now…" Keely shrugged and slowly got to her feet.

"Do you need a ride?" Phil asked.

"No thanks," Keely said. "It's only a few houses over… you get your sleep."

"Are you sure?"

"Phil, I'm fine. Just go back to sleep, okay?"

"Alright," Phil said, and promptly collapsed back onto his bed.

Keely walked down the sidewalk, wondering why her sister could possibly have needed her so urgently. She sighed, looking up at a raven perched upon a neighbor's rooftop.

Whatever it is had better be a good excuse, Keely thought as she walked up the sidewalk to her front door.

"Ashley?" she called out as she entered the house. She heard a faint murmuring come from the dining room, and so she headed there. "Ashley, what's wrong?" she asked, upon seeing her sister, who looked obviously distraught.

"It's… Bonnie…" she mumbled. In response to Keely's querying look, she stood up and led Keely to the living room.

Keely's reaction to seeing her hanged sister was radically different than Ashley's. Keely immediately let out a sound somewhere between a scream and a yelp. Shortly after, she began babbling incoherently and even started hyperventilating. Ashley had to drag her into the other room to even get her to pay attention to her.

"Oh my God, Ashley… Ashley… Oh my God…" Keely couldn't seem to get anything other than those four words out of her mouth.

"Keely… sshhh… calm down…"

"I… I-I…"

"Keely, I'm going to call Mom, okay? She… she needs to be here…"

Keely nodded as her sister dialed her mom's cell phone number. After an eerily similar conversation to the one she had previously had with her sister, Ashley hung up the phone. "She's on her way… She said she'd be here in an hour…"

"Ashley, what are we going to do?" Keely blubbered. "Everybody will be talking about it… her friends, her… what about school? What are we going to tell them?"

"Keely," her sister said, grabbing her by the shoulders, "calm down… can you do that for me?" Keely nodded slightly.

"I just… need…" Keely stuttered, tears escaping from her eyes. "I…" she sighed, and fled upstairs. Ashley sighed. She knew Keely needed some time alone… she didn't want to impede on that. She looked to the ground, and saw a sheet of paper. She picked it up and read it…

I must end it. There's no hope left. I'll be at peace. No one had anything to do with this. It was my decision totally.

All fled, all done. Now lift me on the pyre
The feast is over, and the lamps expire.

She slowly set the paper on the table with a trembling hand, half-wishing she hadn't read it at all.

Keely ran into the bathroom and promptly vomited.

Slowly getting to her feet, using the counter for support, she looked around the bathroom. So cold and empty-looking… it gave her an uneasy feeling.

She looked in the mirror at her puffy eyes. The only thing that was running through her mind was why?

Why her sister? Why would she do something like that?

Thinking about it was giving her a headache…

Fumbling through the medicine cabinet, Keely looked for an aspirin. Finally, she found a bottle of pain-killers. She took off the cap and a handful of pills spilled into her hand.

Keely looked with fascination at the red capsules in her palm. There must have been about twenty in her hand, and the bottle was 100-count… in fact, only one pill had been used from it; that was just yesterday when her head was in splitting pain.

They were small… but so powerful. 'Extra strength', the bottle declared. 'Long-lasting relief.'

Just what Keely needed. Long-lasting relief.

Ninety-nine little red balloons, ready to be released into the sky…

Heute zieh ich meine Runden
Seh' die Welt in Truemmern liegen
Hab' 'nen Luftballon gefunden
Denk' an Dich und lass' ihn fliegen

Keely looked up at her reflection and gasped. She put the pills back into the bottle, took one for her headache, and left the bathroom, though not before stashing the pills at the back of the medicine cabinet.

Lyrics by Nena.

…Thank you, Ashley.

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