Writer's Craft: Monologue on a historical figure
An insomniac, I sit in my cell and wait for death. I chose this life, and the short run that I had amongst the socialites was well worth the few short years that I have spent in confinement. Even here, I am allowed my finery! This prison is nicer than the childhood home of Elizabeth Bigley, and just as respectable as the brothel that Mrs. Hoover was forced to raise her son in. Besides, I am infamous now, which is preferable to the obscurity of my past identities.
Of the five women lurking within the confines of my deteriorating psyche, I am proud to be Cassie. If only the rest of America could see this way! I deserved riches as much as anyone else, didn't I? It wasn't fair that I could be born into a poor home and have to live a poor life because of it. Even Madame Lydia deVerse had little more than a cracked crystal ball that promised a forlorn future.
Yes, I am Cassie. I learned from the mistakes of those foolish women.
They think regrets is the reason why I am still thirty pounds underweight when there is food to spare, why my eyes have become duller than ever before.
Even as I slip into sleep for what the doctors promise will be the final time, I feel not even the smallest tinge of shame. The hatred that I feel for society has drained away the last of my energy. With a sigh, I drift off, wondering absently whether Hell is up-to-date with fashions or has silver cutlery.
For information on Cassie L. Chadwick and the sceme that she is infamous for, please visit: http://www.lkwdpl.org/wihohio/chad-cas.htm.