Alice in Mirrorwoods

Chapter One

Alice was glad to be leaving. She needed to get away from the chaos for a few days. Gran's place was the perfect escape. Gran wasn't really her grandmother she was her best friends Cassie and Alex's Gran but she had always loved Alice as one of her own grandchildren.

She couldn't believe how her life had turned from being perfect one day to getting all messed up the next.

Everything that could go wrong... Did... Past few months of her life started passing through her mind as their car raced along the highway.

Her mom got a stroke causing her sudden death...

Her dad decided to remarry an absolutely disgusting woman... How could he? If he wanted to fill up the void caused by mom's loss at least he could choose someone worthy.. she thought. But no... he just had to go and marry the most horrible witch that he could find in the city. She sighed. At least he realised his mistake within a few days. The witch had just married him for his money.

But before he could do something about it, her dad had met with an accident and now she was left all alone in the clutches of her vicious stepmother Muriel. The witch had been furious when she had realised that her dad had converted all his wealth into a trust and Alice was to be his sole heir once she turned Eighteen. Muriel had strapped Alice's back with her leather belt when she found out that her husband had left everything to his daughter before he died.

Only a week after dad's funeral she had started getting men to their home.

"Your dad didn't leave me anything." She spat at Alice when Alice had tried to confront her. "Why should I waste time crying over him?"

But soon the men that came to see her stepmother started getting interested in seventeen year old Alice and she found herself escaping to Cassie and Alex's place more and more. And it was two days ago that things got worse than they already were. One of Muriel's lovers turned up when she was not home and cornered Alice while she was alone.

She shuddered to think what would've happened if Alex had not turned up to check upon her at that time and punched the living daylights out of the creep. Alice had then left with Alex to his home.

Cassie and Alex were orphans and had moved into the same street where Alice lived a couple of years ago. Cassie was also in Alice's class at high school while Alex was a few years older and was pursuing his internship in law. He was also studying political science which was pretty smart as per Alice. Alex and Cassie had always treated her as their sister so when Gran invited them over to her place for a few weeks during summer break, Alice was only grateful for the opportunity.

She had only gone back to her home this morning to get her things. She had a strange feeling as she moved across her room, gathering her things; as if she would not be coming back here.

The feeling was so strong and weird that she had carried mom's jewellery along with her. Cassie had raised her eyebrows at that but hadn't said anything. Maybe she just thought that Alice didn't want her mother's jewellery which was also her last memory to fall into Muriel's hands.

Alice took her eyes off the car window and opened her backpack. The jewellery box was a small one. Her mom wasn't too fond of jewels. The box contained a gold chain with a locket which had her parents wedding picture, a delicate diamond bangle which initially belonged to her grandmother and was handed down to her mom. Other than that there were two pairs of earrings and her mother's wedding band.

"I think you should wear it." Cassie said suddenly pulling Alice out of her thoughts. "The jewellery I mean. You'll feel closer to her."

Alice sighed. She knew Cassie wore her mother's bracelet all the time. Maybe she was right, maybe this would make her feel closer to mom.