A Proper Young Lady

Dear Diary,

It's been tough, you know, now that it's officially been 3 months since Matilda took her own life. I've been managing to the best of my abilities. I have been putting on a brave facade for everyone else. I smile and say 'I'm fine.' When really I'm anything but. And no one cares to even notice. To be honest, I can't seem to find a reason to continue living, I had a reason but now she's gone. There is absolutely no reason for me to extend my painful existence...

Sincerely,
Jo

"Joanna!" My putrid mother called in a feigned sing-song voice. "Joanna! I will not call for you again. Come down here and be a apart of this family." My hag of a mother knew I hated when she called me that, which only made her want to do it more. "Hold on!" I hollered as I slid off my window seal and chucked my diary onto my flowered comforter and walked out my bedroom door. My so-called'family' and I always sat in the same seats at our circle table that was somehow still in use. I sat across from my horrid mother, and next to my sickly sweet brother, Wayne, and an empty chair where my estranged father should sit. My mother and Wayne chattered through the whole meal while I sat in silence taking small bites of food here and there, when they finally finished eating I knew I was dismissed from dinner.

        I slowly stumbled back up the stairs to my far too cheery room, wondering if my mother and Wayne had even noticed I'd left. I pushed open my sunshine yellow door and found that my precious diary full of all my secrets and dark thoughts was now gone. I freaked out because I knew that I never ever, not ever, not even once lost my diary. I racked my brain trying to think of what could have happened to my diary while I throughly searched every square inch of my room. Right as I had given up I found my sweet safe haven, my diary, in the corner of my room behind a pink fluffy childish chair, open to the most recent entry. At first, I was pissed that my brother went through my diary, but then I remembered he had been and still was downstairs with my mom. So why the fuck! was my diary in such a bizarre spot, open, when I remember closing its cold metal clasp. I quickly jumped onto my bed and hugged my pillow just like I had once done when I was young. Somehow even despite my terror I drifted away into the warm and comfortable embrace of sleep.

       I woke up feeling completely uneasy, I could sense someone watching me. Which was unsettlingly close to the nightmare I had just woken up from where there was this man standing in the corner of my room behind the pink fluffy chair. He was only a shadow but inhumanly tall; he just watched as I slept. But when I opened my eyes no one was there, just my same cheery room, now dark due to the fact that the sun had done down. The dream plus the creepy unexplained feelings make the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end and sent a shiver down spine. Though I was frozen in fear I was knocked back to reality with the sudden discovery that I desperately needed to eat, since I barely ate at dinner. 'Perfect!' I thought to myself as I slowly forced myself to get up and go down stairs, being very careful not to wake anybody up. I slowly inched my bedroom door open and creeped down the noisy old stairs, right as I turned the corner I came face to face with the awful gangly pitch black entity from my dream. I felt his icy hand curl around my arm while I stared him in his nonexistent eyes. My heart dropped to my stomach and I swear it stopped beating, as my eyes widened and I shook with unbelievable fear. He slithered down and whispered in my ear.

         "Proper young lady's don't think such crude thoughts." He let out a long disappointed sigh. "I guess I will just have to teach you have to be good."