Sincerely, The Stranger You Call Sister

Childhood Arc: You're A Riddle, Dorothy

Dear Little Brother,

Dying hurts.

I don't recommend doing it.

(Although I guess that's kinda obvious, eh?)

How do I know this, you ask? Well, it's simple -I died. And it wasn't a quick death, like my neck snapping or head being crushed, or painless like passing on in my sleep. No, my death had been prolonged for months. I signed my own death warrant and it was for a stupid reason to boot.

I died because I was too stupid and stubborn to apply fucking sunscreen, of all things. See, I used to live in California and back then I was obsessed with getting tan and tanner. For years I would spend hours basking in the sun with little to no clothing (to avoid tan lines of course) and I can still remember my Mum saying:

"Olivia, if you don't put on sunscreen now you'll regret it later."

Well, I certainly fucking regretted it later.

I knew of cancer -how could I not? Adds, donations, and stories for it were around every corner. Still, the horrible disease seemed so...Far away, something that always happened to strangers but never touched me or my family personally, that I never thought I would get skin cancer because I spent too much time outside without proper protection.

I was a real fucking idiot.

Though I'll save the angst and heartbreak of my trail and lost fight against cancer for another time. The other thing I wanted to say is this:

Fuck God. Fuck the sun, fuck the fates, fuck both life and death, and fuck you too, little brother.

Can you even try to comprehend the pure and utter panic that consumed me when I realized that I was in the body of a fucking infant? No, no you can't because you're a lucky son of a bitch that won't ever remember the bone deep mortification of shiting yourself and having someone clean it for you every single fucking day! You won't remember how awkward and uncomfortable it is to have a giant tit shoved in your mouth...And then liking it because it stops the raging hunger pains. I'm scarred, I tell you, scarred for life!

And that's not even starting on the bitch that is the teething phase...Or the overwhelming frustration of being so weak that you can't even lift your own goddamn head, and how small and frightening the world is when you can't crawl, walk, talk, and being forced to be completely depended on giants.

So yeah. Fuck God, fuck the sun, fuck the fates, fuck both life and death, and fuck you too, little brother.

Sincerely,

The Stranger You Call Sister

~xXx~

May 2nd, 1934.

"Tom Marvolo Riddle, you put that rabbit down this instant!" I demand, hand on hip and pointing down at him with my other.

He scowls, rosy and chubby cheeks puffing up in indignation. Still, he slowly puts the poor animal down and I watch it scurry away. "He hurt you," Tom growls while pointedly looking at my right black eye, referring to yesterday when Billy and I got into a wrestling match.

"And if you remember, I had stomped on his balls quite painfully, too," I narrow my eyes. "The rabbit had nothing to do with it." The little spat all started when Billy called me "freak" and demanded that I move, and when I didn't he pushed me into the nearby mud puddle. I retaliated by snatching his wrist and forcing him to join me, and from there it had escalated until Martha came and forcibly separated us.