The Mad Hatter had a finger pressed to his lips, the one with the thimble on it. He was thinking. He was sitting across from a woman, one with blond scraggily hair and was watching him intently with bright blue eyes. There were two piles of cards on the table and they were both holding a hand of five cards, which seemed to be the point of the the Hatter's concentration. They were sitting on a very long table that was cluttered with teacups and plates and crumpets and teapots and cookies and more teacups and more plates and more crumpets and more teapots and more cookies. A broken record was playing in the background, but the Hatter and the girl didn't seem to mind.
"You are fairly good at this game, Alice," he said.
"But I thought that I was losing," said Alice, giving him her one-sided smile.
the Hatter shrugged. "Who is winning and who is losing all has to do with perspective, you know."
"I guess so," said Alice, looking down at her cards and fanning them out.
This was a game of nonsense that the Hatter and Alice had begun playing hours ago. The Hatter would not tell Alice how you won, she guessed that there was going to be a nonsensical moral to the game once the Hatter decided that it was done. You basically played cards one after the other and made up reasons why your card beat theirs, but once you went through the deck once you couldn't use the same reasons again.
The Hatter placed down the seven of spades on top of his card pile. "The spades pierce your diamonds so that they are nothing but powder."
Magically, the spades lifted off of the Hatter's card and dive-bombed into Alice's seven of diamonds, the red diamonds inside shattering into a million miniscule pieces.
Alice picked a card from her hand and laid it on the table. "The queen of hearts," she said, "because love is harder than any blade."
She had discovered this statement to be true. True, she had returned to Upperland, but once she realized just how much she truly felt for the Hatter she came tumbling back down the rabbit hole, and was infinitely glad that she did.
The Hatter grew uncommonly still. His eyes were fixed onto the card, dark shadows growing underneath his eyes. His electric green eyes grew more wild than before. He suddenly stood up from his seat, the chair crashing to the ground.
"NO!" he roared.
He paced along the table, flailing his arms all about as Alice watched in horror.
"No!" he shouted, apparently to one of the voices inside of his head. "No! Not her! Not my Alice! Don't hurt her, don't send her out there! She's my Alice! Mine! Don't send her-"
"Hatter!" exclaimed Alice, her face full of fright. She had never seen the Hatter this angry, this upset, this mad. He was using a voice that Alice had never heard before. This time she really was scared of what the Hatter was experiencing in his mind.
The Hatter startled at Alice's voice. His eyes were wide, desperate. "Alice! I'll save you!"
It was as if invisible men were holding the Hatter's arms back: his arms were behind him and he was leaning forward, struggling against his imaginary restraints. Alice sprang from her seat and rushed over to the Hatter, trying to get him to calm down, but he was viciously shaking his head so that his hat flopped to the ground. He was whimpering, and Alice could see his eyes welling up with tears.
"Hatter!" Alice exclaimed once more, holding the Hatter's face in her hands. His eyes focused in on hers, and she gave him a friendly smile. "See? I'm alright."
The Hatters eyes continued to bore into Alice's. A tear leaked from his eye.
"You dropped your hat," said Alice hastily, not wanting to see the Hatter cry. She bent down and picked it up. When she stood back up, the Hatter's face was inches from hers. Alice caught her breath. She had never been this close to the Hatter before.
His eyes looked into Alice's, then to different features on her face: her nose, her lips, her cheeks, her chin. His voice softening up, he said quietly,
"How beautiful is your hair,
how wonderful your eyes?
Your face fills my dreams
with sweet lullabies."
His sweet breath tickled Alice's face, sending pleasant chills down her spine. "I don't understand," Alice whispered back, her eyes locking once again on the Hatter's.
"You don't have to," said the Hater.
He moved in closer to Alice and cupped her chin in his hand. Alice's heart was pounding so hard in her chest that she wondered if the Hatter could hear it. Then he tilted her face up, and his lips met hers.
When they broke apart, the Hatter's eyes were the most sane that Alice had ever seen them. He took two cups from the table, handing one to Alice. "To forever, to my Alice, to our future," he said in his gruff Scottish voice, holding up his cup to Alice.
Alice smiled and clinked her cup to his, raising the cup to her lips that just moments before had been touching the Mad Hatter's.
The Hatter took the cup from her after she had taken a drink and placed it on the table. Then he swept her close, twirling her to the music of the broken record. Alice felt so good to be close to the Hatter, to have his chest under her hand, and his hand on her back. Alice took the Hatter's toast to heart: that she would now forever remain in Underland with him, creating their own Wonderland together.
Somewhere above them in a tree, the Cheshire Cat smiled.