27, Monday 7:32 PM

"When was your last time?" The replies went around the circle accordingly. Two weeks ago. A week ago. Yesterday. Today. An hour ago. And then it came to Ally. The group's eyes were set on her, the therapist's narrowed as he sat; prepared to quickly catch her answer. Looking around at the group of five, not including herself, were the usuals. The distraught and single mother, the wife who once led happier days, the drag queen who sought purpose, the artist who sought inspiration but never quite knew where to look, and that one kid, the young one, who wasn't so sure if she should be here tonight or not. Ally cupped her hands together and looked up at the therapist. She was the anorexic drug addict ex-model whore, except she hasn't had actual human contact in so long.

"Right before I came here." she bit her lip and quickly looked back down, not wanting to see the therapist and her 'peers' stare at her. They were nothing to be afraid of, she told herself, time and time again. Everyone was in the same boat. But she still found herself looking away, because to Ally Strose, her therapist was a second chance not deserved, and her peers were mirror images of herself, a broken woman who no longer had a past worth mentioning, a present worth living, and a future worth contemplating.

"Right, so today, we're going to work on establishing the truth of our problems. Now I know many you are expecting a miracle tonight or in the next few weeks, but I assure you, no miracle comes without hard work. And if you are willing to push, everyone here and myself will support you as you reach your goal."

'God, who does this hippie think he's kidding.' Ally thought to herself.

The session had begun about fifteen minutes ago and would last until 8:00. Ally was already prepared to leave, she knew that no matter how many times she came, she would never change. She knew that she had officially dug a hole that was far too deep for her to seek an escape anymore.

"Hi, my name is Meryl. I am living with my two sons. Aaron turned 14 two weeks ago, and I haven't seen him since. Davis is four years old and." Meryl paused as she looked at her hands, wondering what she had done. She wiped her eyes and her voice became wavery. "I don't know where Davis is either." Meryl sat back down and covered her mouth, wincing in slight pain.

'What a sad bunch of people.' Ally laughed inside her head. 'Most of them are probably going to have their next fix in the bathroom of this very building, right after this very session.'

"Hi, my name is Claire. My mother forced me to marry a man that I still think is my cousin. His name is Allen." Claire smirked a bit. "My mother came to her choice for me a couple of days before she died of a heart attack. At first, I wasn't sure how I should live. And then as all stories go, he began to come home and..." she tried to think of a way to make everyone laugh. "He came home at 3 AM in the morning, smelling of hookers and whiskey, and he would beat me with our antique lamp."

No one laughed.

Ally's mind began to wonder, she remembered the girl she saw standing outside her bedroom window earlier that evening, smiling and laughing with a man, her lover perhaps. She remembered seeing the girl the night before. Ally was stuck outside her room, not remembering which key was needed to get inside. Her hunger and cravings were overwhelming her and she couldn't think straight. When the girl walked by, Ally tried to act like any normal person. She wondered if the girl was going to see her boyfriend, maybe he was going to take her for a night on the town. The girl had walked by without a word, but Ally could sense her fear and suspicion. Ally closed her eyes at the thought, dreaming of someone who would come to her and sweep her off her feet, taking her to a dream land that out shined reality, in every single aspect. The thought that now, people were scared and disgusted by her, but this was something that found itself common place in her reality, many years ago.

The modeling industry was cruel to her. It welcomed her in with the high life, inhabited by money, the beautiful people, and a picture-esque world that was at her beck and call. But it did not take long before it consumed her, swallowed her whole and digested her. She was covered in vanity and her morals were thrown astray. The picture-esque world became a dizzying array of lights and bitter animosity among her fellow models. And then Ally was let go, left with only the scars of an unforgiving reality covered in the shadows of a perfect dream world. And now, Ally lived day by day, not quite sure if she was alive or dead.

The Strose family consisted of Randal Strose, Ellen Strose, Maxine Strose, and Ally Strose. Randal and Ellen met in the US Virgin Islands, of course Ellen was still Ms. Darcy back then. The two were both there on their parent's business, but it was the children's pleasure. Randal's father was a famous movie director, filming his 6th award winning masterpiece, 'She Came From the East'. Ellen's parents were speaking with a good friend of their's, a manager at a local private resort island, Mr. Huebury. The three were discussing a land deal, Mr. and Mrs. Darcy were trying to win over a small plot of land, one in which they could build a small summer home. It was a chance of coincidence that Randal and Ellen met, fell in love, and would later get married and raise two children.

Mr. Strose and Mr. Darcy were members of the Pacific West Horse Racer's Association before it was disbanded in 1974. Funny how a horse racing fanatic association was commonly held on a tropical island. After the disband, the two seldom spoke or met with each other, but during the time that they were both in the PWHRA, the two were rivals that headed the top of the top. Strose had his purebred Callebarry and Darcy had his legendary Amorette. Of course, that was the past. Now both were at the beach during this second meeting in their lifetime, Strose accompanied by Randal, Darcy accompanied by Ellen. After a brief exchange of greetings, the two adults had to leave on important business, and the two youthful teenagers were left to play their games.

Three and a half years later, on the island of Maui, Randal would speak his vows and Ellen would change her last name. Randal was a successful businessman who often dabbled in the stocks, having an odd (yet valuble) talent of knowing when and what to sell and buy. Ellen became an interior designer, her jobs included the homes of famous politicians and modern artists. About a year into their marriage, Ellen gave birth to a beautiful baby girl, Ally Strose. Three years later came Ally's younger sister, Maxine Strose. Ally began her modeling career at the age of two. Nowadays, when one thinks of commercials for infant products, such as milk, diapers, clothing, toys, etc. One would think of a million faces. But during Ally's early years, her face was what became the association. As if everyone owned at least one baby, Ally Strose, and Ally would lay dormant in their minds and memories until she awoke when her commercials came on, her face appeared in a magazine, or someone mentioned that they needed to buy diaper powder.

Where Ally was the beauty, Maxine was the brains. Ally continued her modeling career until she was 22, that was when she began to sunk into a depressive state and looked to drugs for comfort. Maxine on the other hand, attened Princeton and became a successful lawyer. Ally remembers that after her first year, she began to run to Maxine for financial aid. Ally didn't really need money, she had more than enough money to survive. She just wanted to reassure the fact that Maxine was still her little sister, and that if all went sour in the end, she would still have her. It didn't take long before Maxine grew tired, so she cut all ties to Ally. She cut all her ties to the cause of burden in her life, the one thing that held her back, the curse from the past that would nag her in the middle of the night, asking her a series of pointless questions that would enfuriate her and distract her from her much needed sleep.

It has been 3 years since Ally has had any word from Maxine. Ally always wondered what little sissy Max was up to now, maybe she has a husband, maybe she has children, maybe she's a piss poor hobo who deserves nothing. But quite truthfully, Ally had little to no recollection of Maxine. The crack had done wonders on her mind, she could only recall the time when the two fought over petty matters like toys and boys.

Randal Strose had died of cancer when Ally was 20 and Ellen followed soon after. In their will, they left millions, if not billions, in the names of Ally and Maxine Strose. Along with the money accumulated from her model days, Ally survived and continued to live her meaningless life.

The remaining thirty minutes of the therapy session quickly came to an end. Some of the people had a smile on their face, happy to know that had taken the first big step in their recovery. Others wore a blank expression, hoping that tomorrow would bring new hope. Everyone slowly dispersed from the room, Ally was the last to leave.

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Kaitlin's hand slid underneath Eric's shirt and across his stomach. She closed her eyes as he lifted her shirt up slightly and motioned his body as if to tell her to slide to the side. Eric slowly moved up from Kaitlin's neck until he met her lips and his breath filled her lungs. Then Kaitlin slowly began to unbuckle his belt and dipped her hands below the waistband. She smiled up at him and unbuttoned his pants.

The two tense bodies froze as they heard a clicking and clacking noise coming from the road outside of the small blue car. Kaitlin looked up, pushing her hair back from her face. Eric slid out from underneath her and squinted his eyes. Ally scratched the back of her head, trying to cover her face with her arm. She didn't want the two to see her but she didn't know why.

Eric sighed and laid back down. "It's just one of the whores who lives in the hotel."

Kaitlin had a smirk on her face. "They let whores in here? How can she afford this place?"

"Don't know, she must be really busy I guess."

Ally could hear the two whispering, she was more than sure that they were talking about her. She tried to make out their words, 'did he say whore?'. Occupied from covering her face, eavesdropping, and her cravings, Ally didn't notice the curb ahead of her. She let out a whoop as she stumbled and fell flat out onto the sidewalk. Her purse opened and make-up scattered about. She frantically picked up her belongings and tried to walk away from the two giggling teenagers, with what dignity she had left that night.

Inside her apartment, she threw the purse against the wall and sat down on a couch, colored a dark grassy green that upset the rest of the room. She reached for a throw pillow and hugged it tight against her body before throwing that against the wall too. Her hands grabbed her head and rifled through her hair as she rocked back and forth, sobbing. The clock read 8:10 when Ally pulled out a cabinet from the coffee table in front of her. Inside the cabinet were sewing materials that Ally had purchased from a nearby cloth store a couple months ago. The materials were there merely for a disguise, as if to say Ally's family had a lineage of mothers and grandmothers and great grandmothers who all taught their offspring how to knit a winter scarf. At the bottom of the 'decorations', as Ally enjoyed calling them, was a half open ziploc bag filled with cocaine.

A small blade laid across the table. Ally poured the cocaine onto the hard, flat surface and lined it into four straight rows. She wiped her tears back and took a long inhale, which to Ally, felt like many small, short and quick breaths. She bent down over the cocaine and closed her eyes.

A noise that came from all directions startled her. Everything went pitch black, and when Ally opened her eyes again, things remained dark. The electricity had gone out, and only the quiet yet stark moonlight peered through the blinds that Ally had forgot to close. Ally wiped her nose and sat back. She curled up her entire body and the tears came again. She was shaking, but not from the cocaine, at least, she didn't think it was from the cocaine. Her mouth was left ajar when she sobbed. She was alone now and she refused to leave.

When the lights came back on 20 minutes later, Ally had found that she had fallen asleep. It was an eerie feeling that enveloped her head and body when she woke up. The feeling that always meets you when you wake up after crying yourself to sleep. She looked at her wrist watch and then the clock. Ally bit her lip and took a deep breath, trying to figure out what she should do next. Directly in front of her were three straight lines that would have her back to somewhere else. Slightly to the right was the door that acted as both an entrance and an exit to her apartment building. 'Walk it off, just go walk it all off.' she told herself. Ally left her table as it was, except the Ziploc bag, which she took with her, tossing it into her purse. Before leaving, she checked her blinds, seeing if the happy girl and her lover were anywhere in sight. No where, not here, not tonight.

The plan was to cross the street, go down Lake Avenue, and around the block. That would take about approximately 20 minutes usually, but if Ally took her time tonight, she could possibly lengthen it to 25 minutes, or perhaps even 30. Twenty to thirty minutes should be enough time for Ally to realign herself and get back on track. Although in the dark recepts of her mind, she wondered what exactly was there to get back on track for. But that voice spoke too softly to make any significant thought or discussion echo in her brain.

As Ally turned the corner, nothing in her 25 years could possibly prepare her for what hit her next. For the second time tonight (from what Ally's memory could recall), Ally hit the cold pavement ground and her purse went flying. But this time, it wasn't a curb that caused her to lose her balance, it was a dark blur in the night. After recovering from the impact, Ally reached over for her purse but a frightening force crushed her hand into dirt. She retracted back the five (possibly broken) fingers and screamed in agony, turning over and watching the mysterious entity run off.

"Fuck! Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck. God fucking Jesus dammit. You don't go walking alone outside at night Ally." she cursed at herself aloud. Ally examined her right hand, trying to move her fingers around. Another painful scream of agony. But all of that was interrupted when she remembered the contents of her purse. Make up, cell phone, pocket change, ID, and a half open ziploc bag containing an illegal substance.