What the frick...?

Christine was in her grandmother's Biloxi house, helping Grandma Cyn clean the attic. 'Wow, some of this stuff is really cool!' she thought as she opened a box, revealing a 1920's flapper dress. 'I wonder if there's anything about Great-Auntie Alice?'

Under the flapper dress was a small, leather bound book. Christine flipped through it, revealing handwritten pages. 'Awesome, a diary of Grandma Cyn's! Her stories are the best!' she remarked, remembering the fun she had in reading her grandmother's 1960's journal. I wonder what dark secrets she's hiding...she can't have been much older than I am now...'

"Chris, you alright up there?" Grandma Cyn called, causing Christine to slip the journal into her pocket, forgetting about it momentarily.

...Six Months Later...

'Ugh, suitcase cleaning...' Christine groaned inwardly as she went up to her room in Forks, after being told her mother to clean out her suitcase. There was little to be cleaned, other than a necklace Chris thought she had lost, a bottle of nail polish, a hair brush, and a small book, all lost within the pockets of the suitcase. 'Oh, the journal!' Christine thought happily, picking up the small diary, sitting in her window chair, and began to read:

I, Cynthia Brandon, of sound mind, hereby chronicle my adventures as a sixteen year old in Biloxi, Mississippi.

January 23, 1918
Today I had such great fun with Mary Alice, my elder sister, ice-skating at the pond. Mary Alice is always so cheerful and warm, despite her 'fits,' as Mother insists on calling them. They're not violent seizures, like at a mental hospital, I think she just sees something...not different, but something more than what everyone else sees. Mary Alice confided in me once, telling me when our cat Lucas was to die. I wept for days afterward, for I trusted my sister more than anyone else, but then I realized that there was no possible way she could have known. I was so cheered by this thought, until a month later, when Lucas died of 'natural causes,' just like she said.

Oh, God, how I hated Mary Alice! I thought she had killed our poor cat, and she endured my verbal lashings well, just like a Southern lady ought to. She then told me that she had nothing to do with the death of poor Lucas, it was just a premonition. Daddy always says there's something evil about premonitions, and I'm scared that Mary Alice had sold her soul to Satan. But then I see her in church, praying just as hard as everyone else, singing hymns as beautifully as an angel, and all my doubts to her piety vanish.

May 19, 1918
Where is the justice in the world? If God really exists, why did He let this happen?

They sent away Mary Alice, my beautiful, fun, charming sister. Mother and Daddy sent her to the mental institution on the outskirts of Biloxi. Just because of her 'fits!' Because someone's different, doesn't make her evil!

It all started when Mary Alice decided to tell Mother and Daddy about her visions, and it scared them so! I told her not to do it, but she didn't listen. Maybe I should have stopped her, but I don't see how I could have. I watched the conversation on the staircase silently, hearing Mary Alice describe her visions as she did to me. Mother got tight-lipped, Daddy turned a brilliant shade of red, and they exchanged a God-awful look.

"I'll call the doctor," Daddy said quietly as he walked over to the telephone grimly.

As he talked, Mother questioned Mary Alice, "Now, honey, are you sure it wasn't a dream or something?"

"No, Mother, I have visions, they tell me what's to come. But sometimes they change," Mary Alice frowned in confusion.

The doctor came within 15 minutes of Daddy's call. He arrived with some scary- looking men, and I realized then what they were here to do.

"NO! DON'T TOUCH HER!" I screamed at the men, clutching Mary Alice's arm tightly, as if for dear life.

"Sorry, ma'am, but we got to take her to the clinic," one told me, and a jolt of fear ran through my brain.

"Cynthia, calm down," Daddy prised my hands from Mary Alice's arm, who seemed calm and collected.

"Cyn, don't worry, I'll be back," Mary Alice kissed my forehead gently, then turned and left with the doctors, despite my screams and sobs of hysteria.

An hour later, Mother came into my room, and told me firmly that Mary Alice died, and she wasn't coming back. I sobbed as she explained that Mary Alice was very sick, and I was not to talk of this to anyone. But she can't tell me what to write! Especially when she doesn't know!

I plan on going to the clinic tonight to visit my sister, and talk to her, just like we always do.

Later That Evening

I went. And it was terrible. They locked up my Mary Alice in a small, dark cage with no one else to talk to! I wept when I saw her like that, and she stuck her hand out the bars and stroked my hair comfortingly, just like when Lucas died. Funny, how even when she's locked up in a mental hospital, SHE'S the one who comforts ME. I'm so ashamed of myself for losing my composure.

Mary Alice was calm, and quiet, and I wondered what sort of drug they gave her to change her disposition so much. I realize it was for the benefit of the guards, who were roughly twenty yards away, watching Mary Alice for a sign of her 'fits.'

I stayed for an hour, fearing detection from Mother and Daddy. I promised to return the next evening, if I was able. She bid me sweet dreams and kissed my cheek goodbye.

The house is unusually quiet without the bubbliness of her. Why did she have to tell?

Christine closed the book, tears streaming from her own face as she imagined the horror of what Grandma Cyn had gone through. 'Oh, God, that's horrible! Why, Auntie Alice, why?'

She resolved to read more the next day, as her mother was yelling at her to turn off her light and go to bed, as it was 11:00 at night, and isn't there school tomorrow? Chris sighed and put the book on her night table, then went to go brush her teeth.