With love, Alice x

Prologue: A Chance Meeting

I first met Alice when I volunteered at Radley's mental institute in the South of Florida in the March of 1943. To me there seemed nothing wrong with her other than the fact she did not speak much. In fact she never spoke a word during those two weeks I was there.

I was a young woman in those days and I had gotten married two months before, on the 12th January 1943, it had snowed. I came from Seattle Washington it was cold that's why me and my husband wanted to change after our marriage.

We thought of having children but Tom decided he wanted to explore the world more broadly and visit new places until we found something perfect that we could afford and that's when we fell in love with South Florida. Here he felt like we could raise children in a nice environment there were good schools and nice people and I was a trained nurse in mental health due to my family's wealth.

I enrolled as a volunteer nurse and switched from hospital to hospital, there was only three of them around the area, a mental hospital, a children's hospital and a normal general practice but they were desperate for nurses and doctors even in the a&e hospital.

I volunteered for the first few months at all three but began as a full time nurse at Radley's especially after my encounter with Alice.

Alice was alluring and seemingly perfect despite being admitted to Radley. She was like something out of a fairy tale, straight out of a story book. I could not explain what it was about Alice but I was captivated by her aura and knew I was not the only one. So naturally, when the chance arose, I jumped to become her personal carer and guide whilst she was there.

I looked after her for two whole weeks and even then she never gave me more than a nod or a shake of the head to agree with something.

So I asked her to write it down and after I left to volunteer at the children's hospital I received my first letter off her and it turns out she is more intelligent and articulate than what may have been perceived about Alice.

That was the spark of our friendship. Our twisted relationship and entanglement of letters to and from a physch hospital. There was nothing I could do to save Alice but at least I could save her memory and her families memories in a book or a diary or in these 200 or so letters I received off her.

I can remember walking in, pacing marbled flooring sitting on uncomfortable wooden pine chairs, in the 21st century everything is much nicer and more comfortable now, and I waited for my uniform to be handed over to me. My superior showed me the room I'd be looking after and that is when I saw her.

Alice wasn't interacting with anyone, instead she sat straight up, her body posture was impeccable and her long wavy blonde hair fell down her back and lay softly on the bed. She was gazing into a hand held silver mirror and she never moved an inch.

I was intrigued the moment I saw her and I did not understand why, I asked my superior her name and story.

She told me that Alice had been sent here after losing her family and therefore her sanity as she made up lies and hallucinated that tragic things were happening to her. Little did I know everything that Alice hallucinated was true.