Stitched Together

Chapter One
Play Time

Allison Anderson was a wonderful girl with a great life as far as anyone that knew her was concerned. Her parents Anthony and Linda were highly known and respected in the city of Gotham. Her father was a high paid attorney and her mother was a perfect, little house wife. Allison’s parents expected perfection from her and from an outsiders point of view they would think she had achieved it. She was beautiful, well behaved, and vastly intelligent. To her parents however this was not good enough, nothing was ever enough. She was not perfection in their eyes and she was punished for it dearly. The beatings her father gave her, as her mother stood back and watched or ignored, made a piece of her hate them more every day. Nothing was more damaging to a person’s soul and mind then being hurt by the ones that are supposed to protect and love you. There was no love in the Anderson’s home.

Allison was fifteen when her mind started to battle against her. Her own thoughts tormented her throughout the day. There were thoughts and ideas in her head that she had no control over and they never seemed to leave. She would lay in her bed at night when her parents were asleep and finally give in to answering the voice that now seemed permanently stuck inside of her brain. Its ideas frightened Allison greatly. It told her that she didn’t need to listen to her parents that she didn’t need to listen to anyone. She could be better than them. She could show all of Gotham just who they were messing with.

The voice scared Allison. She wondered how she could possibly think of such things. At first she tried to play the voice off as her brain just being over stressed and tired but she changed her mind when no matter what she did the voice never left her alone.

“Please, just be quite.” Allison whispered to herself in the darkness of her bedroom. It was around three in the morning and the voice wouldn’t let her sleep in peace. Allison had lived with the voice for two year now.

‘Awe, don’t be like that. Live a little more…dangerously,’ a more confident sounding voice said inside her head.

“I would be living more if you would leave me alone.” Allison whispered back angrily.

‘Now why don’t you ever use that tone with them,’ the voice said back speaking the word them, meaning her parents, like it was poison. The voice talked a lot about her parents it was its main focus these past few years. It told her constantly how she would be better off without them, to get rid of them. Allison refused to listen. The voice always taunted her whenever she got new injuries. She would stand in front of the mirror inspecting the damage while the voice would laugh and giggle at how weak she was.

‘If only you would let me out to play. We could so much more fun.’ The voice taunted her.

“Why won’t you leave me alone? Just go away I don’t want you in my head.” Allison told it trying to keep her voice down so not to alert her parents.

‘If you want me gone so badly why haven’t you told anyone about me? The first step to recovery is admitting you have a problem.’ The voice busted into a fit of giggles that made Allison cringe at the sound. It sounded deranged and crazy.

As much as Allison hated to admit it the voice was right. If she wanted the voice gone she needed to tell someone. Go to someone for help. She was just scared of what people would think and what would happen to her. Would they send her to a crazy house? That thought frightened her and the voice in her head just started giggling once again.

“If I don’t want you in my head I can make you go away. You’re just my imagination.” Allison said into the dark trying to sound as confident about what she was saying as possible.

Deep down Allison didn’t believe it was her imagination at all. The voice wasn’t anything like her. The voice was separate from her. It was like another person was living inside her with their own ideas and opinions. There was no way Allison could imagine the things the voice said to her and its philosophy. She often wondered if the voice had a name but she was too afraid to ask it. That would mean the voice was real and Allison wasn’t sure if she could handle that.

It had a female’s voice but it didn’t sound anything like her own. The voice didn’t sound harsh or evil actually the voice itself sounded quite nice. It was a voice that seized your attention and could keep it. The voice was confident and sometimes taunting and playful but never did the voice shout or sound harsh. The problem wasn’t what the voice sounded like at all, Allison actually found the voice itself to be rather soothing, it was what the voice actually said that was the problem. It talked about murder and chaos.

‘You must have a very corrupt imagination if that’s all I am to you. You must have more problems than you think.’ The voice told her. ‘Besides Allison if I was just your imagination you would have made me gone a long time ago. Or your father dearest would have beaten me out of you like all your other hopes and dreams. Don’t you agree?’ The voice probed her smartly.

“Your right, he would have.” She agreed in a tiny whisper but she knew by the happy giggle that the voice had heard her. This was the first time she had agreed to anything the voice said.

‘Why Allison are you starting to see things my way?’ The voice questioned her. ‘Maybe next time father dearest decides to beat you in to perfection you will let me out to play with him. I’m starting to get bored.’ The voice sounded threatening this time.

“Let you out?” Allison asked confused. She was scared of how this conversation was turning.

‘You didn’t think I was going to settle for being called ‘that voice inside my head’ forever did you? Haven’t you been listening to me? I have plans for this city and one silly, frightened girl isn’t going to stop me. You don’t want me in your head. You think I scare you. Well, I don’t want your little, frightening voice in here either. Out of the two of us I’m the one that makes the most sense. I’m not some little girl that lets her father beat her senseless just to seek approval from him. You’ve been living in this house for seventeen years you should know by now that they’re never going to love you. They’re never going to approve of you!” The voice reminded her.

Allison clutched her hands over her ears hoping that would make the voice stop but she didn’t know how to silence a voice coming from inside your own head. A voice she had no control over. She knew that the voice was only speaking the sad truth. She was stupid for still believing she could achieve her parents’ approval. Seventeen years of trying and failing had showed her it was not possible.

“Shut up, shut up, SHUT UP!” Allison screamed at the voice. She found herself knelt on the floor her head cradled in between her hands. Her bedroom door slamming open made her jump and finally she looked up. There in her door way was her parents looking at her with both annoyed and disturbed expressions.

“Allison, what on earth are you doing in here screaming nonsense this early in the morning?” Her father questioned her.

“N-nothing,” Allison answered her blue eyes widening with fright.

“So you’re just screaming at the top of your lungs for nothing at four-o-clock in the morning? I have a very important business meeting in a couple of hours I don’t need you waking me up with your tomfoolery.” Her father told her sternly.

‘You sure you don’t want me to have a uh talk with them for you?’ The voice suggested eagerly.
“Shut up!” Allison shouted to it.

“Excuse me? You will not talk to me that way! How dare you even talk back! I thought after all these years you would have some manners.” Her father said outraged. Allison backed away in fear.

“No, I- I didn’t mean you, I’m s-sorry. I didn’t mean it.” Allison tried to explain but it just made her father angrier.

“You’re sorry? I’m going to make you sorry you stupid girl!” Her father said before he back handed her making her fall to the ground.

Allison stayed down there breathing heavily. The room was eerily silent for a few minutes. No one moved or made a sound but when Allison finally raised her head up to the look at the man she called her father her face no longer looked scared. Slowly but steadily she got back to her feet and calmly stood in front of her father. She was no longer shaking of fear. She stared at him for a moment slightly turning her head sideways to look at him like a curious puppy.

“Finally, I thought she was never going to let me have any fun. I’m so tired of having to listen to you day in and day out.” Allison told him but it was no longer Allison’s voice coming out of her pale pink lips. The voice was now in control and Allison was just the voice stuck inside her head.

“Stupid girl, I thought you knew better then to talk back. I guess I’ll just have to beat some manners into you.” Anthony snarled back. A playful smile grew on Allison’s face as she still stared at him unafraid.

“You know, you really should think about what kind of mental damage beating you daughter is doing.” She scolded him with a nod of her head.

“What on earth are you on about now?” He questioned her angrily, his eyes narrowed.

“What I’m getting at is that you didn’t know your own daughter was CRAZY!” She told him before busting out into a fit of giggles. Both of Allison’s parents looked at her in shock.

“What are you saying, Allison?” Linda finally spoke up quietly. She shrunk back a bit when Allison’s gaze turned to her. She was quite for a few minutes as she studied her as well.

“I’m not Allison.” She said simply as she walked to stand uncomfortably close to her mother, or rather Allison’s mother. “I’m more like her better half. You see I keep trying to tell her that you two are worthless. It seems she’s finally looking at it my way since she let me come out and play.” She told her reaching up to trace a finger down the frightened woman’s face. She smiled playfully at her. “We sure are going to have some great fun.” Her blue eyes twinkled dangerously.

“Allison I don’t know what you’re trying to prove, but you’re not fooling me for a second. Stop this nonsense this minute!” Anthony shouted.

She quickly turned to face him the playful smile gone and her face hardened with anger. She could see Anthony loose some of his bravery as she walked back to stand in front of him. The man towered over her quite a bit. He being over six feet tall and she only reaching the height of five foot three. She stared at him straight in the eyes, unafraid which seemed to unnerve him. Before anyone could blink or stop it, she grabbed a sharpened pencil from her desk beside her and used all of her force to stab it right into his neck. It stayed stuck inside the flesh as blood ran down around the pencil. Linda screamed as loudly as she could as she watched her husband fall to the floor in agony before running like the coward she was out of the room. Sadly for her Allison wasn’t far behind.

“Oh, mommy dearest come out, come out where ever you are. Don’t you want to play with your little girl?” She taunted as she skipped gleefully down the hallway. She smiled happily as she felt the blood splatter on her pretty, pale face. The stupid man would be dead very soon. She stopped her skipping to listen to the quite house. She knew she hadn’t made it to the front doors yet she would have heard the unlocking of the deadbolts.

Her gaze finally turned to the only closed door in the hallway- her parents’ bedroom. Sighing at the stupidity of the woman she made her way quietly to the door. Testing the doorknob she found that unsurprisingly it was locked but luck was on her side as the lock on the bedroom was easy to pick. Pulling a bobby pin from her messy pony tail she stuck it in the hole in the middle of the door knob. She smirked when she heard the satisfying pop letting her know the door was unlocked.
Opening the door she was met with an empty room. But she knew better than that. Linda was in here somewhere and there was no way she getting out, alive anyway. She scanned the room quickly and quietly went to the closed closet door. Throwing the door open she found Linda sitting with her knees pulled up to her chest shaking in fear. Tears were flowing down her cheeks as she looked up at her daughter.

“Now, now mother, you look so frightened. You’ve seen me all bloody from being a punching bag and a toy to throw down the stairs when he’s mad and you not bat an eye. Yet you shed tears when I stick one, little pencil in his throat. I’m disappointed.” But she looked anything but disappointed in that moment. Her eyes were once again twinkling dangerously as she stared at the woman. Her mouth twitched into a smirk. “What do you have to say for yourself? You made your daughter crazy.” She scolded the frightened woman.

“I’m so sorry Allison. You’re such a great daughter. Please, please you don’t have to do this! You can stop this right now. We can say what you did was an accident. We’ll get you help.” Linda pleaded with her.

“I’m sorry, Allison isn’t here right now, but I’ll let her know that you’re sorry.” She told her before griping Linda’s hair in her hand and dragging her painfully across the floor to the center of the room. As she passed by the dresser she picked up a pair of scissors that were setting in Linda’s sewing basket. She tested them out a couple time by opening and closing them in the air in front of Linda’s face. Smiling in satisfaction at her choice of weapon she closed them and gripped them in one hand before she brought them down to land right into the side of Linda’s stomach. Allison smiled as the woman’s scream echoed through the large, quite house and blood splattered over Allison’s night gown and blood oozed down her hand that pushed the scissors deeper into Linda.
It didn’t take long before the blood loss was too much and Linda sagged helplessly. She fell to the floor as her eyes glazed over. The last thing she saw was her daughter’s blood splattered face smiling down at her.

Allison knew better then to stick around much longer. Morning was fast approaching and when Anthony didn’t show up for his morning business meeting someone would come looking for him. Quickly she scrubbed the blood from her body in the shower and watched in fascination as it ran down her body and down the drain. Putting on fresh clothes she quietly made her way from her house as fast as possible. She could feel the frightened voice of Allison pounding inside her head. She smirked at that. She now knew what it felt like to be locked up. She knew Allison would take control again but she hoped for not much longer. She couldn’t suppress her forever. She was the stronger of the two and someday she would win. Someday life would be too much for Allison.