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“Malice!” Tweed roars. My head whips around, seeing his glowing green eyes focused on me. Oh shit, camouflage has worn off. He’s running in the next second, the ground bouncing beneath me as I hobble against the ripples. Stretching her hand out, my fingers just thread through the girl’s and she whips me through the door, slamming it closed behind me. Crumbling against the wood, the pain at my side sears too hot, my heart thumping too quickly and before I can find out what smells so damn awful, the girl’s concerned gaze is the last thing I see.
8
Pepper burns my nostrils. The more I scrunch my nose, the harsher it hurts. The familiar tingle of an impending sneeze lingers, despite the fact my eyes won’t open or my body feels numb. It’s coming, it’s happening.
“Haaa-“ the high-pitched sound escapes my lips. My heart rears back in my chest, anticipating the fall out. As if my body is being sucked forward by an invisible force, I shoot upright. “Choooo!” The sting of release in my side is dulled by the satisfaction of pepper flying free of my mouth and nose.
“That’s one way to do it,” the girl marvels, rushing to wrap a dressing around the side of my torso. A woman opposite, with a witch’s wart on her nose and gnarled fingers, rips off a length of tape and begins strapping me up like a fed-ex parcel. The blood seeps through almost immediately, although the pain is non-existent, and the obvious answer is – stick another dressing and strip of tape on top. By the time they’re done, my back is ram-road straight and I’m rendered immobile in the middle.
Crossing the room in her mucky white apron, the girl braces her feet either side of the thorn my sneeze shot out and uses all of her strength to heave it from the wall. Black hair flicks around her slender neck, stopping short of her shoulders. Her limbs are equally tiny, like splinters of pale flesh on bone as she relieves the thorn and struggles with the weight of it. Frowning, the size of the thorn seems at odds with the room we’re in, but I’ve learnt not to question these things.
“Useless lass,” the woman to the left of the table I’m sitting on mutters. “Hurry it up Mary Ann!” Picking up the pot of pepper she must have used to revive me, she shuffles across to a cupboard and swaps it for a slice of lemon cake. I watch her walk away with interest, my eyes spazzing out briefly when she steps out of a door and shoots to full size.
“Hey, wait! Gimmie some!” I shove myself off the table, as the Cook’s massive shoes stomp away. Finding another slice of cake in the cupboard, I wait to give my rescuer a piece and lean all my weight on her to leave the tiny room behind.
“Mini treehouse in the tree trunk? I like it,” I smirk. Mary Ann doesn’t return my smile, just keeps her gentle hold around my waist as she nibbles on the cake. I do too and fuck me if multiplying your size by a thousand whilst mortally wounded doesn’t hurt like a bitch. A scream escapes me, sending birds flocking from the tree overhead. Knocking the tiny door closed with my foot, I spot a wheelbarrow and lower myself into it.
“So, maybe I’m being too logical here, but shouldn’t I be getting some stitches or some shit? You know, before I bleed out,” I loll my head back, watching Mary Ann struggle to heave the wheelbarrow up the incline to a farmhouse ahead. The ground is rather rocky and if it weren’t for the slickness seeping through the double dressing, I’d be happy to walk.
“It’s necessary,” she grunts, sweat lining her brow.
“Mmhmm, bleeding out is necessary,” I nod along, not sure why I didn’t think of that myself. Reaching the back door of the farmhouse, she tips me out and I have to use the wall to stay upright. Blood has pooled in the wheelbarrow, which she artfully whizzes around to tip onto a patch of weeds between the flowers. They sizzle away on impact. “And, just to clarify, what are we doing with my corpse after all the blood has gone?”
“Regeneration bath,” Mary Ann states matter-of-factly.
“Got it. Cool, cool, cool.” She hands me a broom to use as a crutch and opens the door to a dated kitchen. Cook is bent over huge pans bubbling on a lit hob, the stench as worrying as the random objects she’s chucking in. An old boot, some screws, a cable. The only area not currently in use amongst worktops of molding peelings, a lone metal tea pot sitting collecting dust. “Well, I’m going to make a tea while I wait to die. You want one?” I ask. The girl freezes one foot inside the door and I don’t miss Cook’s quizzical look over her shoulder.
“You’re offering me tea?” Mary Ann asks in a tiny voice.
“Sure, why not?” I shrug one shoulder, a rush of dizziness almost causing me to lose my balance. “I’ve only ever had one friend before and being made of plastic, she never appreciated my teas.”
“Friend?” she echoes back. Geez, don’t hurt yourself.
“You know what, you start running that bath. I’ll fix us a cup.” Venturing into the kitchen, I get as far as pouring some water into the kettle before changing my mind. Either because the water is vomit yellow or the energy quickly zapping from my limbs forces me to take a wooden seat.
“What’s- “I wave my hand around, “all this for?” My voice sounds breathy but if the Cook is expecting company, I’d rather know before they get the chance of free rein over my dead body.
“Dinner for the Queen of Spades,” the woman grumbles. I can’t tell if the hump in her back is growing or if my vision is just swimming. Her feet shuffle around in open-toed sandals that immediately prove why they’re a terrible choice, given her various missing toes. It defies gravity she’s standing at all. Over a shit-brown dress, a matching white apron to Mary Ann’s covers her front with a maid’s fabric hat over her greasy brown hair.
“Spades?” I mumble, my head sinking towards the table. “What happened to the Queen of Hearts?”
“Silly girl,” she tsks, not looking my way. “You think because she’s the only queen you met during yourbriefvisit, that she is the only one we have?” If I had full consciousness, I’d have bristled at the way she spat ‘brief’ belittling the time I spent here. Wonderland is where I needed to be all those years I struggled to come back, convincing myself I’d found it the first time for a reason. If it was nothing but asilly girl’smistake, then where does that leave me? Desperate to fit in when all I do is fit out?
Now she’s said it, I begin to notice spades hidden within the decor.Used as cupboard door handles, spanning the floor tiles, etched into the wallpaper and the shape of photo frames visible in the hallway. If I squint, I can just about make out the white rabbit in each image, Mary Ann a constant in the background.
Hands slip under my arms, dragging me limply across the lower level. As Mary Ann comes to the stairs, she braces herself each time, heaving me up with a heavy clonk, thud, thump. Step by step. My chin seeps further into my chest, the trail of red following like a brush stroke of red showing my journey. At least my senses have dulled enough to escape the wretched stench of the kitchen wafting through the house in billows of smoke the others seem accustomed to.
Reaching a bathroom on the upper level, my head is dropped heavily as slender fingers rush to undress me. Chunks of mushroom topple out of my hot pants and Mary Ann mutters words like poisonous and lethal. Ripping off the dressings which had no real use, she proceeds to roll my body up a wooden plank she’s strategically placed and shoves me off the end, in the tub with an almighty splash.
The water is fucking. Freezing. I’m practically dead, and even I can feel the frost clawing at my bones. Maybe it’s a preservation thing. Huge chunks of ice knock against my jaw and scrape over my nipples. Bottles in all shapes, sizes and colors line the other side of the tub, and as Mary Ann yanks a crumpled scrap of paper from her apron pocket, her elbow knocks one into the tub. Lime green liquid snakes through the water like eels with their own lifeform.
“Oops!” she cries, fishing it out. Oops? What does she mean ‘Oops’?! My mind splutters in and out from then on, each time I come to presenting with a different scenario. Mary Ann trying to fish out the green liquid with a sieve. Her scrubbing my skin raw with a piece of coral. At one point, she pulls a welder’s helmet over her face and powers up an angle grinder. I wonder if I’ll emerge as a cyborg…
9
Gasping awake from my third induced nap in the last twenty-four hours, water splashes over the side of the tub and Mary Ann screams in shock. Placing a frail hand over her chest, her chocolate eyes widen and I know instantly something is wrong.
“What” I choke on my own voice. Swallowing a lump of bile, I brace myself and try again. “What is it?” Not answering, she fetches a thick robe and holds it out with her face turned away. Guess I’m doing this shit on my own now. Surprisingly, my legs only wobble a fraction when dragging myself upright, the gaping hole in my side absent. There’s a circular scar but who doesn’t love a badass scar? Stepping into the robe, I pull my hair free of the neckline.
