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“Now, you listen, Alyssa Victoria Gardner. Normal is subjective. Don’t ever let anyone tell you you’re not normal. Because you are to me. And my opinion is all that matters. Got it?”
As a teenager, Alison’s mom, Alicia, painted the Wonderland characters on every wall of her home, insisting that they were real and talked to her in dreams. Years later, Alicia took a flying leap out of her second-story hospital room window to test her “wings,” just a few hours after giving birth to my mom. She landed in a rosebush and broke her neck. Some say she committed suicide—postpartum depression and grief over losing her husband months earlier in a factory accident. Others say she should’ve been locked away long before she had a child.
“He rides the wind,” it whispers once more, then flits off into the courtyard.
She refocuses. “Because we’d have to go down the rabbit hole.”
I know these things because he taught them to me. The winged boy. British … I’m reminded of the voice I heard in my head at work, along with the poster and the guy’s bottomless, bleeding black eyes. His challenge resurfaces in my mind: “I’m waiting inside the rabbit hole, luv. Find me.”
The mosaic is normal—still and inanimate.
“You can cure your family. Use the key to bring your treasures into my world. Fix Alice’s mistakes, and break the curse. Don’t stop until you find me.”
“Remember me, Alyssa.” A nose stirs the hair at the back of my head. “Remember us.” He starts to hum, a haunting melody. No words ride the music, only the familiar notes of a forgotten song.
I should be terrified. I should be committed. But something about the netherling is sensual and exhilarating, more evocative than anything in my world has ever been.
Find the rabbit hole …
Overhead, someone dives in after me.
In seconds, he latches on to my wrist and tugs to align our bodies. It’s impossible … “Jeb?”
“This shouldn’t have happened,” I mumble, wrestling my guilt. “Wonderland is my nightmare. Not yours.”
“You think I’m crazy, right?” He huffs. “Have you taken a look around? If you’re crazy, I’m riding the banana train right alongside you.”
“Morpheus.” I say it more as an accusation than a revelation.
“Your voice is a song. Say it again.”
I’m so entranced by seeing him alive and real, I don’t even try to resist. “Morpheus.”
“Taught you things, rather. Oh, but we made time for recreation as well. I shall have to see that we continue that tradition.”
“All she needed was a few miles of distance between you. She could’ve arranged a divorce, moved to the other side of town, given your father full custody. But she loved you both too much to hurt you like that. She wanted to be a part of your lives … yet still keep you safe. So she sacrificed her life. That is the purest of loves.”
“You found me. Since you were the one to seek me out first, you released me of the bonds of the promise. Clever, clever girl.
The scars throb as if freshly cut. Morpheus bows over me, smoothing my hair. “I told you that you were special, Alyssa,” he murmurs, the weight of his palm strangely comforting on the top of my head. “No one else has ever bled for me. The loyalty of one child for another is immeasurable. You believed in me, shared new experiences with me, grew with me. That has earned you my sincerest devotion.”
“Never let me go, okay?”
“I’ll be happy to take Alyssa back with me. We can pick up where we left off in my bedroom, right, luv?”
“Jeb, I won’t leave without you.”
“You lifted me out of the darkest night of my life,” he says. “Even after, you were the one who kept me going.
You’re my lifeline. You always will be.”
“Morpheus is not his true name. He is glory and deprecation—sunlight and shadows—the scuttle of a scorpion and the melody of a nightingale. The breath of the sea and the cannonade of a storm. Can you relay birdsong, or the sound of wind, or the scurry of a creature across the sand? For the proper names of netherlings are made up of the life forces defining them. Can you speak these things with your tongue?”
“I wouldn’t let her go. We fought on the ground beside the sundial, then on wing in the trees.
“Lovely Alyssa. What a grand pupil you were,” he mumbles, his mouth on the top of my head. “Yet you taught me more than I taught you. You are far more worthy to wear the crown than any other. Courage, compassion, and wisdom. The triad of majesties. You have something I could see even through the eyes of a child. You have the heart of a queen.”
“It was to be so perfect!” Morpheus all but cries the words, concentrating solely on me. “Your mortal suitor has already forgotten this journey. But you and I, we share memories of a childhood that I will never forget. You are the lady of my heart. My match in every way. I would’ve stayed at your side once we banished Queen Red, never left you to rule alone. We could’ve danced every night in the stars above your kingdom. For you, I would’ve given up my solitary life … been your loyal footman and cherished you eternally.”
😭😭😭
“Good-bye, Alyssa,” my one last hope says, his wings drooping in resignation. “I’m afraid neither of us is strong enough to defeat her.”
“You left me.”
He moves behind me, breath warm on my nape. “I’ll be watching over you. We bent the rules. Outsmarted magic.”
“Perhaps. Then again, it could be that we’re already paying the price.” There’s a hint of sadness in those words. He steps back and bows, wings forming a beautiful arch. “Ever your footman, fairest queen.”
“I’d trust Jeb with my life. He’s everything his dad never was. And you know it, or you wouldn’t be so busted up over losing him. He treated you with respect … and he never wanted to hurt you. Why else do you think he put up with your attitude for so long?”
You’re my muse, Al. My inspiration. I was hoping … maybe … you might want to be—” Before he can finish, I clench his T-shirt and drag him down for a kiss.
Little does he know we already have; we went to Wonderland and back, after all. I smile, then give him a kiss he’ll never forget, to replace all the ones he’ll never remember.
