Where it all began

 

      It all started on a rather cloudy day. It was raining and windy outside, but Mum and Papa went in the carriage to Annabel's to buy some meat from her papa. Mum had just gotten back from outside, and her dress was wet all over the bottom, and she had a package wrapped up in brown paper. I remember she had the periwinkle umbrella she loved best, better than Cara or me. I remember some of the wetness on her dress wasn't rain or water because it was terribly dark. There was a lot of that stuff, too. She never wore that dress again, I think.

     Anyways, that was the day that Mama told me that Papa wouldn't be coming home ever again.

     She said it had been a terrible accident, that the carriage had gone off course and gotten stuck, and when he went to get it out, it broke, and he was horribly injured. But I didn't believe her. I figure she killed him, because if she had been inside the carriage, she would have died, too. But if she had been outside with him, and broken it, or made him break it. Whatever it was.

     I remember that night it was very very dark, darker than usual, and that the trees were blowing around everywhere, and the rain never stopped, and that it was very heavy rain. I remember Cara was very afraid, but I didn't care. I remember I stood at the window for hours before Cara screamed loud enough to get Mum to come and pull me away from the window. I remember I was very cold and wet, and she hit a lot me for being so stupid, but I didn't really feel it. I was very sick after that. I remember Mama saying to the Doctor that she was sure I would die. I remember Cara sitting by me and putting cool cloths on my forehead, even though I felt very, very cold inside. After a long time I got better, because Cara wouldn't let me eat the things Momma gave me. She snuck me out food in the night so I wouldn't starve. Cara was a very good sister after the night I was in the window. We always got along after that. We would share toys and I wouldn't get mad when she would try to make new rules, and I would let her wear my dresses when she really wanted to. I would brush her hair and she would brush mine, and we would play dolls together.

     Then Mama started seeing this other man.

     He was a very nice man, and whenever he saw us playing he would smile and sometimes play with us, too. He had a daughter he would bring over sometimes, and her name was Charandella, and we called her Cindy. Cindy was fun to play with. She was nice and she shared too. We pretended that we were all real sisters and that one day we would marry a prince and be cared after and that Mama wouldn't hurt us anymore, not ever, and when we were all princesses we would throw her in the dungeon. Cindy didn't like the idea of throwing her in the dungeon, and she would get upset and cry. Then we would have to remind her that Mama was a mean person, and mean people have to be put in dungeons so they don't hurt little girls or their fathers anymore.

     A little while after that, Mama and Cindy's father got married, and Cindy and Cara and me were all real sisters. The man was a Duke, so we were all little Duchesses. Mama said that made us very important and that we had to act as though we were so. We didn't like the way she wanted us to act, but if we didn't, Mama would hit us with willow branches and make us clean out the stables and the chicken coop and sleep in the hayloft until we listened. Our new Papa didn't know about it because he was always working, helping people and attending important meetings, and helping the King. But not so long after Mama and our new Papa were married, new Papa and Cara both became very very ill. Almost more ill than I was, and I had been very ill. They couldn't get out of bed and Mama wouldn't let us see them ever. She would give them food and the medicine the Doctor gave her, but she would meet a scary man who would give her something she put into the food and medicine. I would try to do what Cara did for me, not let me eat the food or the medicine and get them good food, and sometimes Cindy would help me, but Mama would find me and banish me from the house. Cindy and I lived in the hayloft for a long time, but I still tried to get Cara and Papa their good medicine and food.

     I told the Doctor before he went inside to see them, when he was crossing the lawns. He was a good man and listened to me. He gave me a dose the medicine he would make for each of them and tell me to secretly give it to them, in the middle of the night. Cara and me took the most secret and old and unused passages of the house to their room and gave them medicine and food, and they got well again. Mama seemed happy around them, but Papa tended to avoid her, and would work very late so he would get to bed after she had fallen asleep. Cara and Cindy and me went into the hidden rooms of the house and slept and ate in there. We would play outside on the lawns when it was warm enough. We lived like that for two years. Cara and Cindy said the cost was clear and we could go back to our rooms. We did. Mama would come in and tuck us into bed every night, and we felt like a real family for once.

     One day we went on a walk. It was a very nice day and we went and bought things in the Market, like candy and a doll for me, and Cindy got a doll to and a book, and some paper to draw on, and Cara got a candy and a dress and a doll. Mama and Papa got flour and meat and milk and cheese and apples and celery and a lot more food, and new dresses and suits to wear, and hair ribbons, and a mirror, and a pretty goose, and some new tools. We were all very happy.

     The next morning, Cara wouldn't wake up. She looked fine, but she wouldn't wake up. The Doctor said she was in a coma, which means she was in a very deep kind of sleep because of something horrible that had happened to her. Her body was stopping her from doing anything so it could heal and she would get all better from whatever was so wrong. The Doctor didn't know what had made her go into the coma. We had to feed her mashed up things like we had to feed to the baby Mama had back before our old Papa died.

     Cara woke up five days later and told me that Mama had done something to her. She said she probably wouldn't live because she didn't know exactly what was wrong, but something inside her was very, very wrong. She wanted me to have her new dress and Cindy to have her doll. I held her and begged her to stay alive because I couldn't bear to have her die, because she was my Cara, my Cara-twin, and she couldn't go like that. I cried on her that day, and nobody came into the room for the entire rest of the day. I cried and cried and told Cara to stay with me, and she told me she would always stay with me but she would just be invisible like we had pretended in some of our stories. She would comb my hair with her fingers and tell me to stop crying because I was being a big crybaby and made me tell her a story. I told her a long, pretty story about magic and dragons and princesses who marry princes, and elves and talking animals and dwarfs. At the very end, she had been holding my hand, and her hand went all slack. She said how much she loved it when I told her stories, and that it was a very good story, and she would always remember it even when she was invisible, and that she loved me very much and had written me a long letter in her diary, and that Cindy could have her dolls if she wanted, but she should share with me. I realized I was crying again and she wiped off my tears and told me to cheer up because it would be just like in my stories with invisible people, and she smiled, and she closed her eyes, and she stopped breathing. She never opened her eyes again.

     I cried on and off that entire night, and the next day, and the next night, and the day after. Cara had gone invisible: three mornings later there was a depression in the bed that looked like her sitting there. I was afraid at first. It couldn't say anything. But it could move things a little. It found a pencil and paper and wrote me a message that said :

IM CARA. DONT B AFRAD. IM INVISBL, SE?

     It made me happy. My sister was alive, she had just gone invisible and lost her voice. I went and sat next to her, and told her how glad I was to see her, and I felt her squeeze my hand. Since she couldn't speak, we came up with a system of taps and lines she would draw on my hand. One tap was 'yes', one line was 'no' two taps was 'maybe', three was 'sometimes'. Two lines meant she didn't want to talk about it. Three lines meant 'danger', and a curved line was smiling and laughing. Sometimes she actually spelled letters and words on my hand. I think everyone was worried about me, because they didn't know about Cara. I told Cindy about her, but Cindy didn't believe me. She told me she didn't feel anything when Cara was touching her. She said she didn't see any depression where Cara was sitting. Cindy told me she thought I was going crazy. I even showed her the note Cara wrote on to reassure me. Cindy said it was just a blank piece of paper. Then she ran away from me. Back then I thought Cindy was either lying or tricking me or going blind or something. I realized later that I could see certain ghosts.

     I am still afraid.

Reviews

[Iyvoriah L.]

It's kind of written with a weird tone- but I think it fits to sound like a child. Hopefully the voice willl change throughout the story.

[Monatora]

I didn't think the tone was to jarring.
In fact it gave me the impression of a young child living in a sort of Jane Austen type era.
Good job.
I liked the way it twisted into a half-cinderella story.
Like where this story is going, I'd like to see some more.