The instant I shut the door behind me, all my confidence wavers.
The room is small and windowless. An ivory tapestry hangs above a cream-colored chaise lounge and a tall lamp stands beside it, casting a glow on the checked floor.
An almond scent drifts from the moonbeam cookies that always seem to be waiting on a plate. As hungry as I am, I can’t eat them. Everything is too painfully familiar here.
I hugged Jeb and Mom in this place, felt their love as they embraced me back. My arms ache with longing. On the opposite wall, red velvet curtains wait to open and unveil hidden snippets from the past. I viewed my parents’ love story on this train, watched Jeb’s memories, too. I walked in their heads and wore their emotions as if they were mine.
I felt Mom’s change of heart when she gave up the ruby crown to give my dad a chance at life . . . even saw Morpheus as he helped her, carrying my dad through the portal into the human realm, despite that it was putting all of his meticulous plans at risk. I experienced Jeb’s nobility and courage when he turned his back on his future so I could have one instead.
So many sacrifices have led to this moment. I would do anything to reverse the clock and set things right. But time is merciless.
“Time. You’ll have no such constraints in Wonderland. Let that be your silver lining. Now pull yourself together. We must prepare for Red.” Those were Morpheus’s words on prom night, mere hours before everything fell apart. The message is so resonant, it’s as if he were connected to my mind; but that’s impossible with the iron dome between us. Still, it makes sense that his insight echoes through my soul when I’m teetering at the edge of insecurity, considering he’s Wonderland’s wisdom keeper, the custodian of all things mad and daring.
Jeb is an anchor; he holds me grounded to my humanity and compassion. But Morpheus is the wind; he drags me kicking and screaming to the highest precipice, shoves me off, then watches me fly with netherling wings. When Jeb’s at my side, the world is a canvas—unblemished and welcoming; when I’m with Morpheus, it’s a wanton playground—wicked and addictive.
Each guy occupies a different side of my dual heart. Together, they bridge my netherling and human worlds. What I’m supposed to do with that knowledge, I’m not sure. And unless my dad emerges from his room with memories intact, I might never get the chance to figure it out.
Tears prick my eyes for the first time in weeks. I’ve become good at hiding my despair. It was part of my crazy act for the asylum—to appear numb and detached. But that’s the furthest from how I feel.
Refusing to cry, I lift my chin. Morpheus would say that I’m a queen, and queens don’t cry. And Jeb would say, “You got this, skater girl.”
They’re both right.
I turn the dial on the wall to dim the lamp. The stage curtains open, revealing a movie screen. “Picture her face in your mind whilst staring at the empty screen”—I mimic the conductor’s instructions from the last time I was here—“and you will experience her past as if it were today.”
I’m surprised how easy it is to recall Red’s image in the sketches from my mom’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland book. Before little Alice fell down the rabbit hole, before the queen’s world was shattered by an unfaithful husband . . . before she was betrayed by her king. Back when Red was only a princess.
The screen lights up, and I burst apart into a thousand pieces, reuniting on the screen inside Red’s body and point of view.
She’s small and young, maybe ten in human years. Although children are different in the netherling realm—wiser and more cynical, lacking innocence and imagination. Her breath rattles in her lungs as she chases a band of pixies. They’re dragging a dead body draped in red velvet. The pixies don’t stop until they’re within the cemetery gate, safe inside the covered gardens.
“Wait! Bring her back!” Red screams.
She almost trips over her gown, but flaps her wings and lifts off the ground. She lands outside the gate just as it slams closed. Standing alone, she peers through the bars. Sister One scuttles out from the labyrinth of shrubbery, her eight shiny spider legs kicking up her skirt’s hem. The gardener’s humanoid torso leans over Red’s mother and coaxes the spirit from her body. It wriggles, rising from the corpse like a fluorescent vine.
Sister One winds the spirit around her wrist and sends the pixies off with the empty body.