Chapter One~ Down the Rabbit Hole
"Please, Laura, let me cut short my practice. Just this once," Finny begged, letting her violin fall to her lap. Her older sister, Laura, glanced up from her book with an irritated look on her face.
"If you don't practice now, you won't be any better later," Laura said monotonously, methodically turning the page of the psychology textbook she was reading. Finny set aside her instrument in frustration, pulling a cigarette out of her dress pocket and lighting up. Laura glared at her. "You shouldn't smoke. It's illegal, for God's sake." she muttered, not really taking action against her younger sister. Finny giggled lightly and brushed a few strands of long dark hair behind her ear.
"You don't seem to care," Finny teased, blowing a stream of smoke in her sister's direction. Laura snapped her book shut and slipped it into her pack, irritation scrawled plainly across her face.
"I'm going to go check up on the cat," Laura announced darkly, referring to their tabby kitten named Dinah. "When I get back, that cigarette had better be gone," she finished, standing and dusting the grass off her pleated blue skirt. With once last glare at Finny, Laura jogged off, her knapsack bouncing between her shoulder blades. Finny watched her go, rolling her cigarette lazily between her fingers.
Finishing her smoke, Finny tossed the butt aside and stretched out on the spring-like riverside grass. She cast her blue eyes to the side, her violin hovering at the edge of her vision. She should probably finish practicing. Laura would be mad if she didn't. But I'm so tired, Finny thought. Maybe a quick nap won't hurt. After all, the grass was so soft against her skin, and she could feel the coolness of the damp summer soil through the front of her thin, gray cotton dress... No, a quick nap wouldn't hurt. Finny slowly closed her eyes and drifted off...
~
In the distance, a man in a red coat watched the girl. Her dark hair was spilling out of its ponytail, and her knee-length gray dress was twisted around her thin frame as she splayed out by the river. "Alice..." he sighed. This girl was younger, and she looked much different than the man's former love, but they had one thing in common- the desire to find a new world.
~
Finny awoke to the sensation of being lifted. Which, in fact, she was. A tall man in a red jacket was cradling her against his chest! She let out a little scream and kicked out at the stranger, but he held her arms and legs securely to her sides. Stranger Danger! her mind cried out as she struggled against her captor. Then she realized something. Sprouting out of the man's long snowy hair were ears- not just ears, but white rabbit ears. Finny's brain went into immediate shutdown. Impossible. People don't have animal ears. She blinked up at the strange man, who was still smiling down at her with a strange emotion in his eyes... Love? Her shell-shocked mind could barely process anything at this point. But somehow, in some way, her subconscious registered that she was being carried towards her garden, albeit her garden with a large hole swallowing where her mother's pansies once stood. Wait... Was this person going to throw her in the hole?
"NO!" Finny cried, lashing out at the strange man. He grunted in surprise as her fist connected with his chin, making him drop her... Directly over the hole into which she had been trying to avoid. She screamed as she spiraled down and down into the blackness that terrified her beyond any nightmare she had faced before.