Hello, again! I decided to write something with a little more depth this time. This was definitely challenging, and I hope you all enjoy it. The inspiration for this story came to me the other day after looking at one of ~BriarRose86's drawings (Before You Go) on deviantart. My other source of inspiration came from a really beautiful song called "Need" by Hana Pestle. This is somewhat based around Alice and Reggie from rain27 and bri-chan's web-comic, "When Curiosity Met Insanity."
Disclaimer: I don't own anything at all. The only thing I own is the story printed below. Everything else belongs to someone infinitely more talented than myself.
"I'll miss your every moment. I can't hold it, and I swear I'll miss your perfect charming selfishness. I can't say goodbye…."
~Just Keep Breathing, Automatic Loveletter
There was no point in crying anymore. Tear drops, even enough to flood a small parlor room, could not reverse her present situation. There was no time to grieve, to weep. He was gone, and it was time to put her pain behind her and finally move on. Yet, somehow, Alice couldn't bring herself to wipe the moisture from her eyes. She felt that if she wiped the tears away, she would wipe his memory away as well. She wasn't ready to forget him completely, even though she had promised herself long ago that he would just become another shadow in her imagination. Something inside made her continue to cling to him, to need him, and for that reason, the tears continued to trickle down her face, even as she put the pretty white veil in her hair.
Alice adjusted the veil slowly, watching her reflection from her vanity mirror, and finally wiped the last few remaining tear drops from her face. From the outside, she looked just as a blushing bride should look: coy, demure, and beautiful. On the inside, she was like a ship caught in a sudden storm being tossed about helplessly with no way back to shore. The only indication of any of her inner turmoil was reflected in her blue eyes, so lifeless now without her once insatiable curiosity.
It was silly to cry on one's wedding day. This was supposed to be the happiest day in one's life, and yet Alice didn't feel any happiness. Instead, she felt a large void inside of her. Everything was cold and empty, and even though she had everything, none of it seemed to matter because he wasn't part of that everything anymore. It was like tea without sugar, or the night sky with no stars.
It wasn't supposed to be like this. She had never imagined it this way, but he had always been such an unpredictable force that she should have been ready for whatever came her way….and maybe she had been ready at one point. There was a possibility that she had been ready all along. It was just so easy to get lost in his world, to start believing in the impossible, that she had just forgotten somehow. And, if Alice was really truthful, she had wanted to get lost. As long as they were lost together, being found didn't really matter.
If only he had understood her just a little bit better. If only he had been able to connect with her just a little deeper. She would have never left then. There would have been no need to come back to reality, if this really was her reality. Sometimes, she wondered if she had everything backwards, and this was her imagination, or maybe reality was just relative to the individual. Yet, if that were true, she would not be sitting in front of her vanity right now. She would be back in the garden surrounded by mismatched teacups and lemon tarts.
A knocked sounded on her door then, and she took a deep breath knowing that her time was drawing to an end. She wouldn't be Alice, his pretty, little Alice, anymore. She was to be someone else's….someone who didn't understand anything about her but was stable and almost insufferably boring. This someone was the perfect contrast, and she tried once again to reassure herself that this was the right decision. Honestly, even if this wasn't the right decision, Alice didn't see another option. She had to keep moving forward, and this was the only way. Eventually, she would forget, and so until that moment, she would keep pretending.
Hoping to catch one last glance of her true self, Alice looked into her vanity for the last time. Yet, instead of seeing her own eyes, a different pair looked back at her. Temporarily frozen, Alice could do nothing but stare until she regained control of her senses. For one last time, Alice was prepared to believe the impossible. She was prepared to believe anything because he was suddenly on the other side of the mirror staring back at her. Everything about him was exactly as she remembered, except for the tormented look in his eyes. It was the same as her own, and Alice realized for the first time that she had made such a terrible mistake. She had let her own logic and selfishness get in the way of something that was so much bigger than she would ever be able to understand. She wanted to cry out to him. For a moment, she even thought of finding the rabbit hole again, but she couldn't go back through. Her inner child had disappeared too long ago for that to be a possibility. It was too late to be fixed now.
He seemed to already know that. The way he stared at her said everything so clearly. He had only come to say his good-bye. She had never given him the chance to really tell her before, and now she wished, more than ever, that she had never given him a reason to need to say it now.
"Stay with me," she whispered. "Only for now."
With a remnant of his old smile, he pressed his hand softly against the glass. Alice did the same, and they both pretended, that for this one moment, they could once again feel the warmth of each other's skin.