My Dark and Stormy Night

Chapter 1; Meet Alice

Rain. It was always my lullaby. It's so calming and beautiful, like a more common aurora borealis. I wish I could say that the clear crystal droplets that fall from the sky still had that hypnotizing effect on me, but they don't. The rain has become so common that it only bores me. For the past six months, it hasn't stopped. It's just part of the world now. Playing in the rain was once one of my favorite things to do, but this stupid rain won't allow it. One step in the rain could be my death or suffering. Either way, it's not worth it.

My heart ached from what happened on the day the rain started just six months ago. I lost track of where my friends had run too. Now I don't know where they are and have no contact with them at all. It was only me and my mother in this house. She was the only person I could talk to, so after one month I stopped talking to her every day. Well, not talking per se, more of communicating. Now she's lucky if I talk to her at all. It's not her fault just how the cookie crumbled. Every soul-crushing hour in this blasted house was driving both of us closer to insanity.

My mom was behind me washing dishes while humming a song she used to sing to me all the time. The chorus of the sink, glass, silverware, and humming was enough to calm my nerves slightly, but I could feel her staring into the back of my head. I knew what she was going to say, but I continued to stare out the window. I closed my eyes as I heard mom sigh in annoyance at what I was doing.

"Alice dear, stop staring out the window, it's not going to make you be able to go outside any faster." She scolded me.

I understand where she's coming from, but I don't think she understands what I'm going through. This window and couch are the only things keeping me alive even if being inside all the time is going to kill us all one way or another.

I went back to looking out the window and letting my mind wander to its darkest depths. It went back to my friends and when the rain had started. I had split up from the group and ran off with my boyfriend, but then we went separate ways and I haven't heard from them yet.

A tear fell down my cheek as I desperately tried to think of something else.

I thought of my mother and then back to my father. I haven't seen him in fourteen years. He was killed when I was very young, three to be exact. A hitman was hired to kill him and never revealed who hired him. He was on death row for thirteen years and on my sixteenth birthday, he was shocked in the electric chair. I would never wish death upon anyone, but that was an amazing birthday gift. My dad missed so much of my life, and I wish I could say I missed him, but it had been so long that I barely even remember him.

I missed my friends and my dad. I missed the sun and being able to go outside. More tears slipped from my eyes and just as quickly as they came, I wiped them away. My emotional storm won't cause me to have a waterfall of tears flowing from my eyes.

"Alice, what did I say?" My mother asked me, more sympathetic than irritated, but she was still mad.

I sighed as I turned to answer her question,

You told me to stop doing the one thing that keeps me sane in this meaningless world.

She looked at me with empathy, but she rolled her eyes all the same. She sighed out a small 'k' as she went back to the dishes who seemed to give her more attention than me. I slowly turned back to the window and put my focus back on the red droplets that fell from the sky. I reached out my hand and placed a careful finger on the window. I slowly traced the slow-moving rubies down the clear glass pane dividing us. I continued this until the water droplets got smaller and harder to keep track of. They all faded into each other and became a mere pattern on the window for the eyes to behold. I closed my eyes and let the small wonders of the world slip away. I've done this time and time again so it's nothing new to me.