Gothically speaking

I have realized that
Life sucks
Again
And the Four divided by two and divided by two again is one.
Amazing observation.
Now, in a pathetic attempt to stay alive with the cold turkey from notebook related distractions for the next month, I have taken to writing a fanfiction based of American McGee’s Alice. It is turning out to be rather fun. Rambling has never been so awesome.
Enjoy. Or not. *shrugs*
The door clicks open, a sound not a sound.
The Doctor trots in, hurriedly flipping his pocket watch open and examining it carefully before stowing it in his left pants pocket. He pulls over a rickety chair, the same one he replaced at the end of the last consultation. Trying to smooth his hair and suit at the same time, he spares the prone figure on the tattered mattress a nervous glance.
“Alice,” he calls, clasping a record loosely in one hand and a sharpened pencil in another.
Me.
I deign to swivel my eyeballs towards him. Expectant. Unsure. Maybe I would have looked like that, if I had been leading my past ten years like a normal person. But then, if I were a normal person I wouldn’t BE here would I?
He blinks, not sure whether to be pleased or concerned to get a response out of me. “Ah, yes, good. So,” he glances hastily at the scribbled record. Not that he has been able to do much scribbling. “How are you today?”
I finger the dusty ears of Rabbit mechanically “Well,” my tone as dead as my movements. And my heart.
“Uh, very well, very well, I was hoping that today we could perhaps touch on coming to terms with the…” At his words, I saw red. Literally. All around my vision, tongues of flickering flames licked at the edges the same way a cigarette burn eats away at a photograph. My ears catch none of Hieronymous Q. Wilson’s (what an utterly ridiculous name) questions, but are filled with crackling roaring and screaming. Echoing, tortured screaming.
“Fire! Fire!” ”Hurry, we must save Alice!” ”Daddy? Mummy?” “Hush, Alice! Drop everything and run!” The doorknob, roasted by the flames, is searing to the touch, but my father yanks it open and is greeted by the staircase leading to the bottom floor crashing down. “No! Dad, Mom, I can’t just leave you like that!” “We have no time for this, Alice. Save yourself!” My father heaves me out of the window into the hard snow, moments before the fire-weakened mansion collapsed.
“NOOOOO!!” A bestial scream rips its way out of my throat, and I grab the most lethal weapon I can find, hurling the handful of jacks which thud into a closing door. I cannot even see enough of his fast-receding figure to get enraged at. I’m not sure about his credentials as a psychologist but that guy has a hell of good reflexes. Stalking over to the grimy windows, I swing the badly-ripped curtains shut, blocking out some measure of the unbearable light.
I cast my eye gloomily around the filthy, bloodstained room. Which they never seem to bother to tidy up, but then an institute such as this probably doesn’t get enough grants to keep itself going, much less clean. They declared me a ward of the state, and took everything away from me—knives, hammers and even the little sewing scissors, so people would not find me with slit wrists, or a caved in skull, or a broken neck.
Fine. I admit. I’m not that into sewing anymore. But it was mine. As were my parents. Were. They were taken, just like everything else. My property. Which I lost. My fault. In the fire. It was me. I didn’t rush back in. I didn’t pull them out and hug and thank them for saving my life. Two lives were lost for mine. My fault. And there is no solving that.
Pain pain is good which I won’t get good I don’t deserve good I’ve been a bad, bad girl I’m sorry I’m so sorry, Mom I wasn’t good enough I wasn’t good enough to save you Dad I’m so, so sorry It was ALL MY FAULT I DON’T DESERVE TO LIVE.
Down the hallway, I hear as if in a dream, the mutterings of the Rutledge asylum workers…
“Isn’t it that annoying Liddell girl again? Fortunately we cancelled the cleaning service for THAT room. Day after day of cleaning out bloody spots would turn away any cleaning personnel…”