The Trial Of Alyssa Miller (Teen Thriller)

1. Alyssa

Some are clothed.

Some are garbed with an invisible fabric far stronger and harder to unveil than a mask. She always believed that every human being possessed a hidden countenance shrouded in something elastic that does not necessarily show what you want to see but adapts to what's supposed to be. Perhaps that's what made it dangerous. Because, unlike a mask, it cannot be simply taken off.

***

Alyssa Miller, the jaded girl of Maple crossing. That's what the town's people called her. She has always been a curious person. But her tumultuous curiosity was not a fit for the small town she lived in. The town and its culture were insufferable, she found that they lacked the challenge to meet her everyday need for knowledge. Every passing day to her felt like she was in a stupor. Everything was stagnant. Every day the inhabitants of the selfish and corrupted town scrambled, reiterating their daily lives of the never-ending schedule of someone else's time. They murmured and spoke to one another forcing nonessential laughs and retaining unwanted relationships that had limited mutual benefit to either party. Like the lowest of pests in a much larger hive of activity, blinding, stumbling through life, insisting such monotony was the pinnacle of living and the peak of understanding. Truly, it voted the onlookers-like herself-to near extremes as she watched, observing the meaningless lives of those that roamed around her. There were much waste and excess use of things in every household too. What a pathetic town to live in; that was her everyday mantra.

To live in such bliss that normalcy seemed to offer was the end to a joke and a state of death to one such as her. She spent her days walking through life with no honest need to exert herself to any cause beyond the mundane cycle of endlessly seeking some sort of fulfillment before her age ripened and finally have the independence and power to leave.

She has achieved all possible awards that their school had to offer. Joined every town activity and any available association for teens but nothing lit her up. Well, those observations held value and meaning up until a week ago. Because the monotony of her everyday life crashed like the waves from a dark storm. It appears that the community was like still water and only needed a light stone thrown to create a ripple, a disturbance to have its inhabitants fall into chaos.

She predicted it would happen. She was never one to believe in fairy tales. She had seen everything unfold from the moment those corpses were unearthed. She was, after all, a part of the gullible public where persuasion is easily achieved even without attempt. When one cried wolf, the others would follow, and soon it wouldn't be just a wolf but a pack of them. Like a herd of ostrich, the community ate anything that was fed to them. Ignorance, oh how she loathed ignorance.

"Come out!"

"Face your crimes!"

"I hope you die, you lying bitch!"

The voices started a few days ago. The people never seemed to tire from protesting in front of her house. Alyssa sat on a stool in front of her vanity mirror. Slowly she reached for her comb and brushed her long locks. She never kept her hair in a high ponytail whenever she went out, but not on that day. It's not that she chose to tie it. It was more a need. A petulant desire on her part to showcase her scratches, wounds, and swelling of her left cheek.

She knew make-up wasn't enough to hide them, so why bother? Why not come out and show the town's people what they have done?

"Get a life! Get out of my porch!"

She couldn't help but grimace when she heard her mother's voice. Those lines had been her lyric since the day the protest began. Soon her father would...

A shot was fired!

Soon her father would fire a shot. But it wouldn't be enough to stop the shrew of a neighbor they had. That woman would stand on their doorstep if need be even when the others had scurried away. Why would that woman risk her life and face the muzzle of a gun? The answer was simple. Her name is Martha Dougherty and her hate for Alyssa was bone-deep.