Alice Ends(Erica W) Trancelike, you drag yourself from your bed. Your darkened room smells of incense and unwashed clothes. A sliver of sunlight makes its lonely way across your floor, peering in through the crack in your heavy black curtains. You can’t stand the light. It hurts your eyes and your mind, and you are blinded by it when you open the bedroom door. You stagger back as if you have been hit. Your eyes take a moment to adjust. As soon as you can see, you pad silently down the hallway. Your socked feet never make a sound. You reach your destination. The kitchen is sunny and strangely nostalgic. You stand there a moment. On the table is todays paper and the remnants of your mothers rushed breakfast. On the fridge there is a faded photograph of your father and a note; “be back tonight, love you.” The dishwasher gurgles and spits and clunks and groans. On the wall there is those faded pencil marks, your age and height, age and height. You see yourself as a small child, fascinated by the idea of getting bigger. There is a noise and you turn around. Bessie is sitting in the hallway, her brown eyes inquisitive and her tail furiously wagging side to side, like she wants something. You almost laugh. She whines. You would have patted her once. You don’t. You go to the second draw from the bottom, underneath the sink. Your mother has them meticulously ordered, blades gleaming in the sunlight. You take the smallest one. Its handle fits in your palm as though it was made for you. Bessie whines again, she is at your feet now. She scratches at your leg. F**k off, you say it too loudly. She yelps. You are about to explode. You sit on the tiles, legs crossed, knife in your right hand. You shake like a leaf in the wind, pressing the blade softly against your left wrist. Calm. Inhale, exhale, inhale, exhale, you don’t feel, you don’t think. There is pain, beautiful pain. You open your eyes. Blood. It’s everywhere, turning your jeans red and the tiles red, glorious red. Then you realise. You are bleeding too much. Bessie is whining. She has stepped in the blood. She is leaving crimson paw prints all over the tiles. Everywhere all you can see is the blood. And the pain is just pain, and it’s all too real. You look up at the fridge and there’s that faded photo, Dad. You try to stand. You slip. It’s all over.

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