Sweet as Sugar, White as Ivori

Prologue

It was Midnight on the fourteenth of July. I was out in the pouring rain, grieving what I had lost. My mother was gone and my father was gone. But that wasn't where most of my sorrow laid. My sister, who was as free as a bluejay, running across the sky. My name is Meeve, the one whose long, black hair was getting mud in the tips and grieves for one and only one.

Chapter 1: How it all started

My sister, Ivori was as wild as possible. She who was younger by five minutes and still be considered my opposite. I was silent and I stayed behind my sister. For I was the shadow and she was the life. Every Saturday morning my mother would wake us and we'd go into town for mother to sell her fine herbs, fruits, and vegetables. After that, mother would give each of us ten dollars and tell us to go around. While Ivori went into the candy shop, I waited outside in the shadows, waiting for her to return with her four free spiced candies and a peppermint that costed her only fifty cents. We'd go straight to the candle shop after that and I would wait outside in the shadows again while my sister tested the newest candles and chose the best nine dollar one to purchase and bring home. I saved my money until our birthdays came to spend it on something nice or spend little pieces of it for mother and father. Ivori was always hyper and she could never sit still. Her hair was long and black and her eyes were of the softest ocean blue. While I had a pure forest green eye color. When Ivori and I were two years old, we couldn't be parted. I was shy though, I never talked. I was the shadow of my sister, the opposite, the giver. While my sister was life, freedom, the fire, the taker. My sister and I liked to go up on the roof of our house in the forest and gazed up to the stars. Sometimes we would tell each other secrets up there. We might have been different, but we were both happy. Over the past four weeks, Ivori was getting two fireballs and two sugar cane gummies from the candy store and I would hear the candyman say to Ivori before she left "Ivori, your just as sweet as that candy." I didn't smile at much, but this I did smile at because it was true. No matter how many times I did double chores while she was outside by the river, fishing, I would always remember those nights.

Chapter 2: What scares me?

Three nights ago, Ivori and I were looking up at the stars and I could tell that something was bothering my sister. "What's wrong" "Meeve, what scares you in life?" "Why?" "Because mine is losing you. I don't know what would happen if i ever lost you." "Why are you thinking about this?" "Mom and dad are acting weird. Can't you tell? It's like they're nervous." "You're right. They have been acting quite strange lately." "So, what's your fear?" "Losing my opposite, Ivori, losing my life." "You literally believe all that? I'm no one's life and you're no one's shadow, understand?" "Ok." "Good." we didn't talk for the remainder of the night.

Chapter 3: That night

Last night, the very night before our birthdays, neither of us slept. we told each other stories, but that only kept us up. We were going to turn four in about three... two... one... BANG! both of us heard something that sounded like someone just broke in. Ivori led the way down stairs to where the eruption of noise sounded. The kitchen light was on so we ran toward that to find mother and father were being attacked by three people with serious weapons. Three against two, not good. "Go children, run!" Mother called out. both Ivori and I started for the door. But Ivori tripped and fell. when I looked back, I realized that one of the strange men had my sister by the foot. "Go, Meeve. I'll be fine." I had to, it was an order from my sister, my opposite. I dove under the rose bushes and waited. A scream past through the air that rattled my eardrums and put tears in my eyes. I waited until one of the strange men came out. He was without a weapon and seriously injured. I got up and ignored the pain where the thorns hit me. As soon as the stranger saw me, he smiled and collapsed. He was dead. I walked inside to find both parents on the floor oozing blood and, at my feet, was Ivori, slowly dyeing. "Ivori, get up." "Meeve, you have to leave, there was only one down." "I'm not leaving, not without you." "I'm gone now, Meeve. a young pyro has to go sometime." " No, Ivori, stay with me." I cried. But it was too late. I no longer had an opposite. i took the sword that held Ivori's blood out of her corpse and swung it behind me. The last man died without a word. I took the sword out of him and looked outside. Dawn was coming. "Happy birthday." I whispered to my sister, uncontrollable tears flooding my features. Chapter 4: The Funeral The morning dragged on. I buried my parents and I looked for firewood during the day of my birthday. At night, I started the fire and had my sister cremated. there was no record of their deaths, I made certain of it. I left the fire when it was just ashes and set off towards town with the sword that murdered my sister in its sheath and some valuables that I can trade in for money in town. No one will notice me. I was in a black velvet cape with the hood up and I was going to be the nightmare that everyone will avoid. I will live my life out in secrecy. But before that, I burned my house. I never returned to the spot where the black roses grew or where the mockingbird's song rang out. No, I was no shadow, I was the ghost, the illusion of sadness. I was Meeve, who had lost her reflection in the mirror.