Sierra

 

This is my middle daughter, Sierra Myst Plumb Cheesman.  She insists that I had to be drunk off of the stuff when I decided to name her that.  After all, I handed my Aunt Margaret's name to her older sister, Sage, my first-born daughter.  So when it came to naming her, well, I was fresh out of options.  I actually wanted to name her Siobhan, which I actually think I should have.  But Siobhan is such a beautiful Irish name, not sure it would have fit my little spitfire.  I have to admit I have a soft spot for Sierra.  Not just because she looks exactly like me save for the fact that she has blue eyes and she has my husband's complexion.  It's the fact that she's so much like I was when I was younger I'm actually scared.

Sierra was never the girliest of girls, unlike her older sister.  Instead of ballet, Sierra insisted on scouting lessons.  She hated dolls and dresses and didn't like dressing up.  She thought nothing of playing cops and robbers and pirates in the tree house and going fishing with Andy.  She also thought nothing of throwing the football outside with our butler, Max.



 
So when Sierra made her birthday and became a teen, I thought I was going to have it somewhat easy, since I hadn't had to bring the police with Sage like I had with her brothers.  I was wrong.  The day after her birthday, Sierra was caught throwing eggs at an elderly woman's house.  The police came, and poor AJ was rushed to the hospital because he passed out.  Sage pretty much blames Sierra for AJ going to the hospital. 

We don't know what's going on with Sierra.  She didn't even bother showing up to the hospital with AJ until the last day, and no one knows where she was until then.  Meanwhile the rest of us -- even Satis and Imsety -- stayed there round the clock watching AJ's progress.  It was like, you know, she didn't even care.



 

 

She and Sage argue constantly.  I don't know what it's like to have a sister, since all I had were brothers, and my closest brothers were either significantly older or significantly younger than me, so I'm not exactly an expert on this.  I think Sage was upset with her for not showing up to the hospital till the last day. 

 

And we have YET to figure out what on earth Sierra did to our computer.  Whatever she did to it, we had to buy another one, because when we turned it on, it started smoking and spitting out gobbledygook.  If she put that kind of effort into her schoolwork she'd be a straight-A student.

Poor Andy is at his wit's end with her. He is absolutely beside himself. The shouting matches between them go on constantly after Sierra comes in at all hours, and who knows where she is. I know, though, that the first night we got to Moonlight Falls, she was at the catacombs. That script is awfully familiar, and I know how that movie ends. That's why we need to nip this in the bud. NOW. 

Absolutely no one was prepared for Sierra's latest metamorphosis, for her dyeing her hair green and sporting goth clothes.  Certainly I wasn't.  Frankly I'm not sure what on earth has gotten into her.   

And it's not just the hair.  Sierra is spending an inordinate amount of time at the gypsy wagon and the gypsy area.  I've heard she may be experimenting with wiccanism. 
I've spoken about this on the phone with Dr. Bill, and he thinks that teens do a lot of experimenting with this kind of thing, but he thinks there's something she's looking for. 

Sometimes Sierra is capable of surprising us, like the time she gave Skylar her old bakery stand.   I'm definitely concerned about how this is looking to Sky, though.  The optics of all this are horrible as she is watching every move her sisters make and hanging on every word they utter. 

That is why I remain convinced that underneath the green hair and the attitude is the little girl I knew.  She's in there somewhere.  And I'm prepared to do whatever it takes to bring her back.