My dad appears in the doorway behind Jeb. Even though he's an inch shorter than my boyfriend, it's Jeb who looks small and vulnerable lingering at the threshold, as if unsure whether he's welcome to come in.
Mom glances down at her polka dots. Someone coughs in one of the rooms across the hall and a nurse's voice carries over the intercom, the only reprieves from our awkward silence.
"Ali-bear," Dad says to Mom, taking charge of the situation, "I think it's time I show you off in that dress. How about we get some dinner?" He squeezes Jeb's shoulder, then steps around him, patting my ankle on the way over to the window.
Something has definitely changed between Jeb and Dad. They're pals again, just the way they used to be.
"Let's give these two some privacy," Dad says. My mom starts to protest, but the look he gives her makes her force a smile and take his hand. He kisses her wrist.
She lays her phone next to the paper cup on the nightstand. "If you need us, call your dad's cell," she says without looking at Jeb or me. "Visiting hours are over at eight, Jebediah."
Jeb steps inside to let them out. Dad slaps his back encouragingly before closing the door.
Hands in his pockets, Jeb stares at me, dark green eyes full of pain.
"I'm sorry…" I struggle to piece together an apology. If he heard what my mom said about Wonderland, there will be questions to answer. Impossible questions.
He shakes his head. "You aren't the one who should be sorry." He doesn't break my gaze as he strides toward me. Dropping into the chair Mom used earlier, he scoops up my hand, laces our fingers, then presses my knuckles to his warm, soft lips. "I'm sorry. I promised to always put you first, then I walked away for a stupid phone call and nearly got you killed." His mouth tenses, a press of firm muscle against my hand.
"Oh, Jeb. No." I stroke his face, smooth as silk. He shaved, and considering he's dressed up more than usual-gray khakis and a black short-sleeved Henley-I get the impression he's trying to polish his way into Mom's good graces. The only tribute to his usual grunge rocker clothes are his combat boots.
Yeah, he cleans up nice. Too bad his appearance is the least of Mom's concerns.
My finger traces his chin, and he watches me while I touch him. I pause at the brass labret under his lip. It's about the size of a ladybug, but if you look close, it's shaped like a brass knuckle. I gave it to him a few months ago for his birthday-teasing him that he needed some gangsta hardware to make him look tough.
Even though right now he looks like a little boy, he's always been tough for me. He beat up a guy once just for calling me the Mad Hatter's love slave. He was my rock every time I felt the absence of my mom. And when he followed me into Wonderland-leaping into a mirror without a second thought-he nearly gave up everything to save my life. I really wish he could remember that sacrifice, so he'd stop beating himself up.
"You don't get to be sorry, either," I say. "Dad said you rescued me. So I owe you a thank-you. Now c'mere." Snagging his shirt collar, I pull him close and press my mouth to his.
His long lashes shut, and his free hand cups the back of my neck, fingers weaving through my hair. His closed-mouth kiss is so gentle, it's almost painful, as if he fears I'll break.
He draws back and rests his forehead against mine so the tips of our noses touch. "I've never been so scared, Al. Never in my life. Not even when my dad…"
His explanation stalls, but he doesn't have to finish. I know what he lived through. You don't share a duplex with someone and not bear witness to their pain. Unless you choose to ignore it.
"What happened in the storm drain?" I ask while holding his hand. "I can't remember anything after the water came."
He looks down at his boots. "When the strand of lights tangled around you, they caught one of my ankles, too, tying us together. I backstroked until I got into the shallower water outside the tunnel, then I reeled you in. But you were…" He winces, face paling. "You were so blue. And you wouldn't wake up. Wouldn't move. Wouldn't breathe." His voice catches as he glances at our hands, still entwined. "I tried to give you CPR, but it wasn't working. I've never been so scared."
He keeps repeating that, but he has been. There was another time I almost drowned…when he told me never to scare him like that again. Another time and another place.
"I keep seeing it, over and over," he mumbles. "It's like a bad dream I can't wake up from."
A dream.
"Wait," I say. "I'm confused. You never lost me in the water? I didn't go away somewhere and then drift back to you?"
"You were never out of my sight." He bites down, causing a spasm in his jaw. "Why did I make you pick up the stuff? If I hadn't left you there, you wouldn't have gotten tangled up." He curses.
"Jeb, stop it. You didn't make me do anything."
He studies my face intently, as if sorting through a mental checklist that every feature is still intact. "You must've hit your head when the water first knocked you down. I could see your clothes filling with air bubbles, ballooning around you." His Adam's apple swells on a swallow. "But your body kept sinking…I wasn't letting you go." His gaze intensifies on mine. "You know that, right? I would never let go of you."
"I know." I nuzzle his palm.
So what happened with Morpheus was a dream after all. Of course it was. He doesn't have the ability to move the rabbit hole. No one does. I didn't use my key to open it. I was floating unconscious in the water. I didn't visit Wonderland, other than in my mind.
Which means what I saw wasn't real. Which means things aren't as bad as he made them out to be.
And best of all, he's not here in my world like he said he was.
For once, I'm glad he was just playing me. I don't have to feel guilty about Wonderland, because everything was a lie.
Is your artwork lying? Morpheus's question buoys to the surface of my mind. My mosaics-are those lies, too? Is he behind them somehow?
I hear the doorknob turning. Jeb must, too, because he sinks back into the chair.
A nurse comes in, an attractive younger woman with auburn hair and jewel-tipped glasses. Instead of scrubs, she's wearing a white nurse dress, like one of those Halloween costumes-although not as short and formfitting. It's the first time I've seen an outfit like that in real life. If not for the American flag pin on her lapel, she could be every guy's librarian and nurse fantasy rolled into one. She writes her name on the dry erase board and introduces herself in a soothing voice.
Jeb and I meet gazes and I smirk.
"Sponge bath?" he mouths in my direction, waggling his eyebrows. I roll my eyes and try not to burst out laughing. His teasing is a good sign. It means he's trying to forgive himself.
Nurse Terri comes to my bedside. Her eyes are gray behind the glare of her glasses. There's a sadness there that makes me want to do anything to cheer her up. Within minutes, I'm standing for the first time. The floor chills my bare feet. Every muscle in my body aches from my fight to swim against the flood. My legs tremble, and I hold the back of my gown, embarrassed about the tubes running in and out of me. Jeb winks, then goes into the hall to look for a courtesy phone.
After he's gone, I use the bathroom, then brave a glance in the mirror. A part of me fears Morpheus will be behind me in the reflection. When he's not there, I'm relieved, until I see the red streak that stands out like flame from the rest of my platinum blond hair-the one reminder of Wonderland's hold on my life that Mom can't ignore. We tried bleaching it, but it won't fade. We tried cutting it, but it always grows back the same vivid hue. She's basically accepted it.
But she would never be able to accept my emotional connection to that place. To accept that, even now, I sometimes miss the chaotic netherling world. If I told her, it would make her crazy with worry.
Fresh guilt simmers inside my chest. Morpheus may have tried to fool me with a fake crumbling Wonderland, but that doesn't mean there isn't something very wrong going on. I can't just turn my back on that world; I can't let it fade to decay and ruin under Queen Red's thumb. Yet I can't abandon the people I love here, either. I don't know how to follow one side of me without leaving the other one behind.
I splash my face with cold water.
Get better, get out of the hospital, and find out the truth. Then I can decide what to do about everything.
Once I'm back in my bed, Nurse Terri returns to offer a handful of herbal cough drops. I pop one in my mouth without hesitation, just to see her smile. The vanilla and cherry sweetness soothes my throat.
She draws some blood for tests. I hold my breath, worried that my essence will come alive like when I'm making my mosaics. Once three plastic vials are filled and capped without incident, I breathe easy again, and Nurse Terri promises to return with broth and crackers.
While I'm waiting for Jeb to get back, the wind picks up outside and whines through the glass panes-a sound I'm used to here in Texas, yet which leaves me uneasy tonight. I stare at the IV in my hand, watching a thin red strip of blood back up into the clear plastic tube. It flutters like a kite string. I'm about to push the nurse's button so I can ask when the needle's coming out, when Jeb steps inside.
"Hey," I say.
"Hey." He closes the door.
Once he's seated, he laces a hand with mine and props his elbow next to my pillow. His free fingers play with my hair where it spreads across the mattress. A spark of pleasure races through my achy body. I'm enjoying being the recipient of his undivided attention so much, I hesitate asking my next question, but I need to know.
"What happened with your interview?"
"We rescheduled," he answers.
"But the two-page spread, that was a big deal."
Jeb shrugs, though his forced nonchalance is transparent.
I bite my lip, searching for a subject change. Something positive. "You and Dad. You're on his good side again."
Jeb winces. "Yeah, but now your mom hates me more than ever."
I study the window behind him. "You know how overprotective she is."
"It's not helping, you lying for me. I heard what you said…"
I frown. "What did you hear?"
"That you covered for me. Told her I didn't 'choose to be there.' You and I both know I did choose to be at the storm drain. I took you there without even considering all the rain or what could happen."
I squeeze his hand, partly out of frustration and partly out of relief. "That's not why she's mad."
"Why, then?"
I glance at the stuffed animals on my window ledge: a bear, a rather large clown with a boxy-checked hat that covers the top of his head, and a goat eating a tin can with Get Well on the label. The clown looks familiar in a sinister sort of way, but I decide it must be the lighting. Shadows drape across all the toys, making them appear to have missing eyes or limbs. It reminds me so much of Wonderland's cemetery that my stomach flips.
"Al." Jeb nudges me. "Are you going to tell me why you guys were yelling when I came in?"
"She just wants me to concentrate on my career, to not get sidetracked. She feels like she lost her shot at being a photographer after being committed. It's not you specifically. It's about anything she perceives as a distraction." I fidget under my covers. A lie shouldn't be so easy to spin.
Jeb nods. "I'm not a distraction. I'm helping. I want you to succeed just as much as she does."
"I know. She just doesn't see it that way."
"After my meeting with Ivy Raven tonight, I should have all the money we'll need to get started in London. That will prove how much I want to help."
My fingers jerk in his. So that's why he shaved and dressed up. To make a good impression on his new heiress client. My mom's warning of betrayal surfaces in my mind, but I push it down. I know I can trust Jeb. Still, I can't seem to control what comes out of my mouth next.
"You're going to leave me for work on the first night I'm awake?" I cringe at the neediness in my voice.
Jeb wraps my hair around his fingers. "Your mom made it clear I should be gone before she gets back. Ivy's in town, so I'm going to meet her and let her choose a painting. She's not in the country very often. We have to take advantage while she's here."
"But it's a holiday. Isn't the gallery closed? Is Mr. Piero meeting you there?"
"He's home with his family. He's letting me use the showroom as a favor."
My lips tighten. I don't like him going alone, though I can't put my finger on why. Maybe it's my netherling side, because the emotion feels animalistic…feral. A dark and disorienting instinct that's pecking away all of the trust we've forged over the past year.
Jeb's mine. Mine mine mine.
A snarl tugs at my lips, but I suppress it. What's wrong with me?
The stuffed clown flops to the floor with a metallic twang, and Jeb and I both jump.
"Huh," Jeb says as he picks the toy up and rearranges it on the windowsill. He tugs at the oddly shaped hat. "There's something metal under there. Must be top-heavy."
"Who's that from?" I ask.
"The guy who helped on Friday after I pulled you out. I was trying to get you to breathe, and he appeared out of nowhere…said he saw an ambulance going down the street and waved it down for us. My cell phone was lost in the flood. He got the help I couldn't give you."
There's something about the clown. Apart from it looking distantly familiar…apart from it being bigger than the other toys. It almost appears alive. I keep waiting for it to move.
As it stares back at me, the shadows seem to change its expression-from a smile to an evil sneer. Even the cello in its hand can't soften the image.
A cello.
My wariness kicks up another notch. That's the one instrument that I know how to play. The one instrument I haven't touched since last summer. How would a stranger know that about me?
Jeb said the guy appeared out of nowhere…
Trepidation knots in my throat. "What's this person's name?" I ask.
"I didn't get it," Jeb answers. "The card on the clown said, 'Hope you're feeling up to your old self soon.' No signature. But we checked with everyone else and no one we know sent it. So it must've been him."
The toy's beady black eyes zero in on me like eager cockroaches.
"Up to my old self," I mumble. "That's a weird thing for a stranger to say, don't you think?"
Jeb shrugs. "Well, maybe that's how they talk in England."
My pulse jumps. "England?"
"Yeah. After the ambulance left, the guy helped me drag my bike from the water. He's a foreign exchange student, enrolling at Pleasance High. Seems pointless to enroll during the last week of school. But his parents insisted."
My arms feel limp. "He told you he was from England?"
"He didn't have to. He has the accent."
Morpheus's threat rings loud in my memory: By the time they find your body, I'll already be there.
Heart pounding, I kick off my blankets. "We have to get out of here!"
"Al!" Jeb tries to keep me from sitting up.
Instead, I use his arms for leverage to stand. "Please, Jeb, take me home!"
"What? No, c'mon, you're going to hurt yourself. Just lie down."
When he attempts to guide me back into bed, my pleas escalate to shouts. I rip the IV from my skin before he can stop me. Blood drizzles out the back of my hand, getting on the blankets and sheets, slicking up Jeb's fingers as he tries to stop the flow while pushing the nurse's call button.
Mom and Dad return. Mom's face pales to the color of my sheets as she takes over for Jeb.
"I think you need to leave," she tells him.
I cry out, "No!"
What I really want to say is that my panic has nothing to do with him and everything to do with the netherling guy who played a pivotal role in her commitment to the asylum twelve years ago.
"Nobody needs to leave," Dad interjects, the voice of reason amid the chaos.
Nurse Terri comes in, and her sad gray eyes coax me to behave.
She and Dad ease me back into bed. She mentions something about a delayed reaction from being in shock and comatose for three days. Then she reinserts the IV and sticks a sedative-filled syringe into it.
As I watch the needle appear on the other side of the clear tubing, I move my lips to ask her not to do that. Not to leave me vulnerable to my dreams. To please at least take the sinister clown away. But my tongue is frozen and my mind is racing.
I'm groggy within five minutes. Jeb kisses my hand, says he loves me and to get some sleep. Dad hugs me good night, and they both walk out together. Mom strokes my hair, folds down her cot, and goes into the bathroom. Then, despite all my efforts to hold them open, my eyelids droop shut.
I'm not sure what time it is when I wake up. I'm just glad to be awake at all.
The scent of disinfectant reminds me where I am. It's dark. There's no light coming through the blinds or seeping under my door from the hallway. I assume Mom shoved some rolled-up towels there. Sometimes she sleeps better if she seals herself in, a habit she formed while living at the asylum. Each night she'd check every crevice of her room-from the walls to the floors-for insects. Once convinced that none were there, she'd stuff the bottom of the door with her pillowcase.
It's hot, like I'm being smothered by heavy air. I should move the towel away from the door for better ventilation. I kick off my blankets and inch my ankles toward the edge of the bed but freeze in place before sitting up.
The wind shakes the panes…louder than earlier. An eerie, vibrating hum that almost sounds like a song. Even the plants and flowers on the windowsill stay silent, as if listening to it. A sudden flash of light blinks across me. It takes a few moments for me to realize that it's lightning. I don't hear any rain. It must be an electrical storm.
The next flash illuminates my surroundings. Thick cobwebs stretch from my bed frame to the windowsill to the ceiling-a morbid canopy, as if a giant spider has laid a trap.
I sit up, and a sticky film suctions to my mouth. Next blink of light and it's even thicker, suffocating me. I scrape webs from my face and scream for my mom, but I can't see her; there are too many strands between us. I yank out my IV and leap off the bed.
Blood flows from my hand, different somehow. It floats upward, a solid strip, forming a glowing red sword. I take it instinctively, slashing at the filaments, cutting my way through the sticky fibers to reach Mom's cot. A thick sheet of spider silk has engulfed her body.
The red glow from my sword reveals stuffed animals and dolls hanging in effigy on the glistening radials all around me, more toys than I remember seeing on my windowsill. They grab my hair and bite my skin as I hack my way and weave toward Mom's cocooned form. An instant before I'm there, the clown drops down from a swinging thread. It plays the cello and laughs, taunting me. What I heard earlier wasn't the wind at all…it was the instrument.
I lash out with my dagger of blood, and the toy drops to my feet, its song silenced, though its arm continues to move the bow across the muted cello strings.
Finally, I reach the cocoon. I slice open the white shell, afraid to look. As the sides fold back, it's not Mom's corpse staring dead-eyed at me.
It's Jeb's.
Jeb's face, gray and lacerated. Jeb's mouth that opens and screams. I scream in unison, our combined wails so shrill I have to cover my ears.
In the resulting silence, a voiceless whisper slides into my mind.
"It will end like this, unless you fight back. Rise to your place. Wake up and fight. Fight!"
I wake up, gasping for air. Hair tangles around my face. I comb back the strands so I can see. Moonlight filters through the blinds. There's not a web in sight.
My heartbeat settles as I see Mom sleeping peacefully in her cot. The stuffed animals sit in their places on the windowsill, all but one. The clown hunkers on my nightstand, staring up at me, its hand slowly moving the bow along the cello strings in time with the wind howling outside.
I stifle a horrified moan and shove the heavy toy to the floor. It lands with a strange jangling noise and slumps there, unmoving, yet the message of its muted song still resonates: Morpheus is here in the human realm, and everyone I love is in danger unless I find him, reclaim my throne, and stand up for Wonderland against Queen Red's wrath.