by A. G. Howard
He grasps my elbow. “Would you look at me, please?”
I yank free and skip around the tea wagon to the other side of the table so the place settings form a barricade between us. To my left sits the Door Mouse. He’s the size of a gerbil, but his thin tail is furry like a squirrel’s and covered in white frost. Pillows are piled high on his chair, boosting him so he can reach the table. His head rests next to a cup half-full of hot tea. He must’ve frozen while napping.
I lean close to his ears—silvery with ice and oblong. “I don’t blame you for sleeping your life away,” I whisper to him. Jeb’s gawking at me like I’m from Mars. “Wish I’d slept the last few hours of mine.”
Jeb’s expression falls, and I know I’ve hurt him. That wasn’t my intention. I feel anything but spiteful. Aside from being hungry, I’m whimsical, light-headed, and uninhibited. It’s very liberating.
“Al, c’mon. I don’t want things to be like this … not with us.” Jeb starts around the table and I’m about to bolt, thinking a good chase could be fun, when I hear a sniffle. It’s so soft, at first I think it’s the leaves rustling overhead. Then I see the mouse’s nose wriggle. It’s shiny, wet, and pink, like a teensy ball of strawberry icing. I’m about to pluck it off and eat it when Jeb steps up behind me.
The mouse sniffs again.
“What do you think, Jeb? Use the pepper to wake him up. He can be our sidekick. We’ll call him Skittles, like the candy.” The things coming out of my mouth are nonsense, but I can’t seem to stop them. Any more than I can stop the colossal stomach growl that follows.
Watching me with an uneasy frown, Jeb takes the seat next to me and drags out the bag. “Its nose must be defrosted from the tea.”
I can’t concentrate on anything but my body. My skin feels itchy, like I need to do something. I climb on top of my chair, then onto the table, kicking some dishes aside.
“Al, what the—?”
Music plays in my head … not Morpheus’s lullaby. Something with a sensual, addictive beat. I twist my hips back and forth. The rubies on my belt sparkle, and the rings jingle—belly-dancer style. I didn’t know I could move like this. Must be from all those years of hula-hooping with Jen.
Jeb’s eyes look like they might pop … so do the veins in his neck. He makes a sound—somewhere between a cough and a moan—mesmerized by my rocking hips. He stands. “Would you get down? You’re going to hurt yourself.”
“No. Come up here with me.” I raise my arms over my head and roll my pelvis seductively. “It’s a wake-up dance for Skittles. You know, like the Native Americans used to do to bring down rain.”
Jeb gawks. “I seriously doubt any Native Americans moved like that.”
Feeling the groove through every pulse of my body, I envision the chains on Jeb’s belt dancing to the music, imagine coils of energy running through the links, inducing movement. I beckon them toward me with a fingertip.
“Hey … hey, wait!” Jeb’s chains lurch, forcing him up onto the chair. He tries to grab the links with his hands, but they break free, tugging until he’s standing in front of me on the table.
I catch his hips, coaxing his body to sway with mine. Pressed against him, I nuzzle his neck, dropping kisses over his soft skin as I rake my fingers through his hair. His ponytail comes undone. “You taste good enough to eat,” I whisper.
The chains wind around his thigh, squeezing. Tensing all over, he grabs them. “H-h-how are you doing that?”
I laugh, running my palms across his biceps and chest. “Morpheus showed me I could animate objects. Isn’t it spectacular?”
I’m concentrating too hard on how good his muscles feel, and it breaks my connection with the metal links. The minute he’s free, Jeb climbs to the ground and lifts me down. I drop into my seat, giggling as he clasps both my hands crossways over my chest.
“You’re freaking me out, Al. Come on.”
“Come on where?” I break a hand loose and run a fingertip down his shirt, tracing the line of sheer black fabric over his yummy navel and stopping to clutch his waistband.
A muscle in his jaw jumps.
I purr. “Poor control-freak Jeb. Your world’s way off-kilter when little Alyssa’s not tripping over her chastity belt. Is that it, bad boy?” I tap the button at the top of his fly.
“Uhhh …”
“Why don’t you wake up Skittles, and then we’ll go home and have a real party?” I’m smiling so hard, it hurts my face—a provocative, teasing smile. For some reason, I can’t stop.
“You need to quit looking at me like that,” Jeb says, a husky rattle in his voice.
“Or else what?” My insides tickle with an unfamiliar power, knowing that he’s flustered. Knowing that I caused it.
Swallowing hard, he fishes out the bag of pepper again. “‘Home.’ Right. Maybe if we wake the mouse, the others will wake up, too.”
“Yeah! Let the tea party begin!” Then I can finally eat something. I play a drumroll on the table’s edge with my forefingers.
Jeb shoots another bewildered glance my way. It’s delicious being able to unbalance him. Like when his blood turned green over Morpheus earlier. I’ve never known any girl to be in control of Jebediah Holt. Sure would rock to be the first.
A tiny voice inside me tries to break through, tries to remind me this isn’t me … that I wouldn’t say these things, not to Jeb—that I wouldn’t take pleasure in his pain. Something’s wrong and I should tell him so he can help, or at least defend himself. But the hunger inside crushes my conscience. It’s more than just an ache for food. I’m starving for power, too. Power to bring the guy I want to his knees. To make him pay for not wanting me back.
With one eye on me and one on the bag of pepper, Jeb packs the mouse’s nostrils. The tiny creature inhales sharply. A sneeze gathers, then erupts on a hiccup. His icy shell shatters with the force of it. Clumps of frost slide from his brown fur and red jacket as he sits up to rub his nose.
The instant he sees us, he scrambles behind his teacup. Braving a peek, he blinks black dewdrop eyes our way. They look like chocolate chips. That fierce hunger rolls through me again.
Drooling, I scramble on top of the table.
“Eep!” The mouse’s voice is a high-pitched squeak as he scuttles out from his hiding place.
“Al, stop. We need his help.” Jeb tries to grab my ankles, but I’m too fast.
Shoving platters and plates aside, I crawl after the mouse as he skitters toward his friends, fuzzy tail jouncing behind him. He skids to a stop when he sees their condition. Whiskers drooping, he twists to look at me.
“Miss Alice, you must wake them!” he squeaks. Hesitant, his tiny feet patter backward. “You’re not Miss Alice.” He pats the edges of his eyes while staring at mine. “You’re much more—”
“Hungry.” Now I understand the octobenus’s preoccupation with his stomach—intimately. I smack my lips and veer to the left to escape Jeb’s attempt to snag my waist. My palm lands in a pastry, and I fling off the squished crust. I’ve got my sights set on live bait.
The mouse backs up, squeaking nervously. Tiny clawed hands reach for his whiskers, drawing them down under his chin. He’s close to tripping into the broken crust that I landed in earlier, and I’m rooting for that to happen. I could really go for a slice of mouse pie right about now.
Jeb steps onto a chair and climbs from one to the next to follow me. “Listen, little guy.” He talks softly to the mouse. “I’ll keep her from eating you if you’ll help us wake the others. Do you remember how Alice put you to sleep?”
The mouse wraps his tail around himself, hugging it. “She dropped the watch into the teacup.” He studies me warily from the middle of the table, stepping closer to the purple pie.
Sitting up on my knees, I gouge my fingernails into my kneecaps to distract myself from my stomach. Eyes shut, I concentrate on the book. The story’s details are hazy, but I remember an argument over the inner workings of the Hatter’s pocket watch. Something about the
hare buttering—mmm … butter. Butterscotch candy, buttercream icing, butter cookies.
I growl and pound my fist on the table, rattling silverware and plates and sending a jolt of pain up my arm, which gets my brain back into gear. Gear! That’s it—the hare buttered the gears with a bread knife and mucked up the insides with crumbs. In the Wonderland book’s version, that’s why the March Hare dropped the watch into his tea—to rinse it off. But maybe he wasn’t the one who dunked the watch at all. He must’ve been trying to get it out. By submerging it, Alice suspended the mechanism and froze the guests in time. That’s what I have to fix. The gears. I just need to dry them off and start them up again.
I open my eyes, and Jeb’s way ahead of me, book in hand. He’s already next to March Hairless’s place setting. Jeb tilts the teacup, careful not to break off the rabbit’s frozen paw. I crawl over as tea sloshes across the pastries on the plate. The pocket watch glides out, dragging its chain behind it. Jeb flips the lid open. “It stopped on six o’clock.”
“Teatime!” the Door Mouse chirps excitedly, clapping. His enthusiasm knocks him backward into the broken pie.
My focus lasts only long enough for me to take the watch from Jeb, blot the gears dry, move the hands to one minute after six, and rewind the clock. I lose all train of thought after that, because the mouse clambers onto the edge of the pie pan, eating berries and dripping with purple syrup.
Luscious purple syrup.
Saliva trickles from the edges of my lips. The insatiable hunger I’ve been fighting explodes. My surroundings disappear. In my mind, the Door Mouse is that roasted duck from the banquet, which makes him fair game.
I chuck the watch, barely even hearing the clank of metal. Jumping to my feet, I give chase. My prey dives behind pastries and tunnels through breads, managing to elude me each time I almost have him. I skate past dishes, slip over platters, and skid through cakes. I don’t even realize Jeb’s on the table until he catches me and slams me down, his solid weight flush across my back. “Al, stop! Have you lost your mind?”
Like an animal, I growl and claw at the tablecloth until it snags on my fingernails.
“Al.” Jeb’s breath is hot on my neck. “Come back to me. Be my skater girl again.”
My skater girl. The tender entreaty almost brings me back.
Only almost.
Maybe it’s the adrenaline, or maybe it’s whatever demon possessed me when I fell into that pie and tasted that purple junk … but something gives me enough strength to thrust Jeb aside like he’s a twig. He rolls off the table with a grunt and I snag the screaming, sticky, mousey delicacy. Purple syrup oozes through my fingertips and down my gloves. I’m just about to bite his head off when I’m tackled from behind, and he escapes.
“Let me up!” I snarl, my momentary burst of superhuman strength all but gone.
Someone flips me onto my back and pins me in place. My vision blurs, and I can barely make out the two forms bent over me.
“She’s sampled berry juice from the Tumtum Tree,” the silhouette wearing the hat-cage says in a voice that bounces between tenor and alto. “She must eat the berries whole, else she’ll go mad.” The speaker then bursts into giggles so loud and absurd, he sounds like a hyena on a pogo stick.
“Oh, now … being mad’s not all bad,” the shadow with two long ears intones, adding his giggles to the mix. “We could let her eat us. Hold her mouth open, and I’ll climb in. I’ve always wanted to see the inside of a stomach.”
A paw stuffs itself into my mouth and gags me, nearly cutting off my breath. I chomp down. The intruder jerks free and I spit out the taste of scorched flesh.
“She bites!”
Laughter and howls explode all around.
“Get away from her!” Jeb’s outburst shuts them up. He strokes my hair to soothe me. It has the opposite effect. Being close to him makes the hunger pierce my gut—like a thornbush taking root deep inside.
There’s nothing funny about the way I feel now. “Jeb, please! I’m so hungry! Feed me or I’ll die!”
“Okay, okay—” His voice cracks, and I realize that I’ve brought him to his knees, after all.
My intestines blaze as if fire ants are gnawing through them. I close my eyes but can still smell the food—everywhere.
After a pause that seems to take forever, something cushiony and cool nudges my lips. I open my mouth, greedy, and take every plump berry that can fit inside. They burst on my tongue, juicy and succulent. Gulping, I beg for more.
Five mouthfuls later, I can concentrate with no more pain.
I sit up, blinking at the tea party guests who have settled at the other end of the table. The rabbit’s preoccupied with the pocket watch, dabbing it with a napkin and doling out apologies to Father Time. His white eyes sparkle like marbles as he smiles, his lipless mouth revealing three crooked yellow teeth. The Door Mouse is taking a bath in a teacup, his teensy stained uniform laid out on the saucer. And Hattington—he really is faceless. He keeps flashing from the mouse’s likeness to the hare’s, as if someone’s switching channels between them.
Jeb leans over the table. “You all right?” He looks worried.
Guilt slashes through me for the way I wanted to punish him. “I was …”
“Uninhibited and impulsive. In a big way.”
I look at the broken plates and crushed food around me. “I have another side to me, Jeb. And I’m not sure it has to do with the curse. I think maybe it’s always been there.”
He joins our hands. “It’s okay that you have a little bad inside. So do I. We’re a great match like that.” He helps me off the table, folding his arms around my waist. As he kisses my forehead, his labret presses between my eyebrows, cool and comforting.
I pull back. “So, you weren’t faking that you want to be with me and not Taelor. This … us … is real?”
His thumb and forefinger pinch my earlobe gently. He’s so quiet and thoughtful, I’m afraid he’s not going to answer.
Taking a breath, he looks down. “I dated Tae … to try not to think about you. Hoping that it might get you out of my system. Just like with the pencil and sketchbook, it didn’t work. Then I wasn’t sure if you felt the same way. And if you did, I was afraid of …” Jeb studies the cigarette burns on his forearms through the sheer black stripes of his sleeves.
“Go on …,” I press.
“Of unloading my baggage on someone as sweet as you.”
I can’t keep the smile off my lips. “Oh, wow.”
“What?”
“I guess we’re both oblivious. That’s the same reason I kept running from my feelings for you.”
“Because I’m sweet?” That dimpled, boyish grin flashes over his face.
Running my fingers through his messy hair, I giggle. “I didn’t want to pull you into my family’s madness.”
A clatter of dishes shakes the other side of the table where the mouse and hare wrestle over a spoon, both trying to see their reflections in the silver.
Jeb cups my jaw, recouping my attention. “Listen, I never meant to hurt Tae. She gets enough crap from her dad. But when she came to pick me up for prom, we had it out. I told her it was over … that we should break up. I was just going to keep it quiet for the dance because she asked me to. She’d already bought her dress, and I’d rented a tux, you know? But she knows the truth. That you’re it for me, Al. Only you.”
They’re the most beautiful words I’ve heard in my life. My stomach feels wonky, like when I was a kid and the merry-go-round at the playground finally stopped spinning and I just lay there facing the swirling sky—dizzy and blissful and exhilarated—until the world came back into perfect clarity. “Oh, Jeb.”
He raises my hand and kisses my knuckles. The labret on his lip glistens in the light, reminding me of Morpheus’s jeweled eyes. I hate that I let him put doubts into my head about the most devoted guy I’ve ever known. I can’t let Morpheus get to me like that again—ever.
“You’re it for me, too.” I link
my fingers with Jeb’s. “I’m sorry for the things I said to you in the Hall of Mirrors. And that I lied to you about Taelor’s purse … and stealing—”
“Shh.” He leans down to kiss me, so tender-sweet, it chases away everything but his touch. “Let’s forget it all. Except one thing,” he whispers against my lips. “When we go home, can you keep the chain trick? That table dance was very hot.” He growls.
I laugh, shivering at the sultry vibration in his chest. He laughs, too, then pulls my hips close and kisses my ears, my temples, my lips—immersing me in a thousand different sensations, each so delicious, I almost forget what I have left to do.
I break our embrace. Jeb’s half-lidded expression looks back at me, questioning. “Be right back,” I say. I peel off my soiled gloves, cast them aside, and scramble onto the table, stopping beside Hattington. “The vorpal sword. Alice brought it to you, before you were frozen. We need it.”
The flat screen of his face blinks, flashing between a reflection of mine and Alice’s. The effect is creepy, like a movie screen snapping between two different eras. Jeb steps closer, waiting.
“Sword?” Hattington glances at his two companions. “Either of you remember anything about a sword?” They all burst into chuckles—a sound that rattles me.
“Perhaps you swallowed it, Herman,” the hare says between snorts. “Open your mouth, and let’s have a look.”
“Better take a flare gun,” the mouse squeaks. “It’s dark and wide as a canyon in there!”
More snorts and giggles.
Jeb grabs the hare by the ears and holds him above the table, ending the laugh-fest. He points to Herman and the mouse. “A little cooperation would go a long way toward you two keeping your hides.”
Hattington’s face flashes to Jeb’s image. “You’re barking up the wrong tree, woodchuck.” He glances at the mulberry overhead. “Someone sent you on a wild duck chase. Wonder who?”
The leaves rustle, and Morpheus appears at the top of the canopy. “That would be me,” he answers, a smirk on his face.