Chapter One: The Rabbit Abduction
Alyssia P.O.V.
Once upon a time there were two fair maidens. They lived in a country suffering from a terrible curse, a curse so villainous that it threatened to wipe out half the population. The curse was called…Boredom. Wasn't that the most amazing opening for a story you've ever read? I know, I'm a natural. "Omigosh, Alyssia! He is soooo hot!" Squeals Kira, waving her hands in the air. Okay, so we're so far from being princesses it's not even funny, in fact me and Kira are probably the plainest excuse for gossipy teenagers you've ever met in your life. "What was his name again? Dylan?" I enquire, scrunching up my eyebrows. "No, no! That was yesterday. Today's is named Todd. I thought I told you!" She says, rolling her eyes like this was common knowledge. "Ri~ght…Todd…" I say, shaking my head. "I'm hoping that he'll give me something for Valentine's!" She sighs as if lost in a dream. "Uh, but that's tomorrow and you barely know him!" I say, aghast. "I know him better than you think, Alyssia. I stalked his Facebook profile all free period! Plus, I dropped a few hints!" Yeah, that's Kira. She gets a new crush, like, once a day, but in the end she never even likes any of them long enough t actually go a date. Gotta love her.
I hear the doorbell ring from downstairs. "That's pizza!" I say excitedly, jumping off my sofa-bed and bounding to the top of the stairs. "Yeah, I'll just wait here..." says Kira, pulling my laptop off the floor and onto her lap. "No Facebook stalking Dylan while I'm gone!" "It's Todd!" She calls as I run down the stairs, jumping over the banister at the bottom. "Whatever!" I call up the stairs, my voice echoing through the ancient house. I open the dark green door and look out. No one's there. Damn kids and their pranks! I step forward and my toe bumps into something hard. "Shit!" I say, grabbing my foot and hopping around on one leg. "Everything okay down there, Aly?" comes Kira's voice from upstairs. "Yeah!" I yell, letting go of my toe. On the floor just outside the door frame is a small box wrapped in pink tissue. I bend down and pick it up, reading the tiny card attached the outside.
My dear love Alyssia,
I give this gift to you to express my feelings of towards you this Valentine's Day. Please use it well.
~Your Secret Admirer.
I look off the side of the porch and into the blackness of the street, but whoever left this is nowhere to be found. I look back down at the gift, an admirer, eh? I close the door and climb back up the stairs to my room. "No pizza? I thought you said we could eat it up here if we promised not to get any tomato sauce on your sheets." says Kira, looking up from the computer screen. "No pizza, just this." I say, holding out the box to her. Kira takes it from me, looking confused. "A gift from my secret admirer." I confirm. Kira jumps off the bed and launches herself at me, screaming gibberish the whole time. She grabs my by the collar and pulls me to her. Man, that girl is freaky strong when she gets excited. "Omigod, it was the pizza guy, right? Bobby? So your type, and totally hot too!" she gasps, pulling my collar so hard that she's practically choking me. "Air!" I wheeze, struggling for breath. "Oh, right…" she says, letting go of my neck and falling back onto the sofa-bed. "And no, like I said, it was from a 'secret admirer', I never even saw the guy." I say, crossing my arms. "Well then stop sitting around and open the damn box!" "Yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm getting to it." I say, slowly peeling off the tape, just to aggravate Kira. Finally, after a short while of sitting and twitching, Kira rips the box from my hands and tears open the pink wrapping paper. Inside the box is a bottle of perfume that says 'Smell Me' written on the front in scrawling black letters with a picture of a cupcake painted beside the words. "Omigosh! He gave you perfume! He is so totally in to you, Alyssia!" squeals Kira, her eyes shinning brightly. "Yeah… into me…" I say, spraying some on my wrist. I take a whiff of it and a strange flash-back fills my mind.
A big grassy field stretches out before me… A park maybe? Yes, there are trees and families sitting around having picnics, definitely a park. There is a little girl seated on a picnic blanket, she's dressed in a bright pink gingham summer dress and there is a party hat placed messily on top of her jumble of long blonde hair, I can't see her face well, but she seems familiar, could she be me? I can voices coming; happy voices, singing voices. They sing Happy Birthday to the little girl. The two voices come in to view, they are a man and woman. The woman is unquestionably my mom; she has the right short brown curls and soft blue eyes, even though she looks younger. But the man, not my uncle, and surely not my step-dad, but there's no way it could be my real dad either, he died before I was born. But it is him. He looks unmistakably like the photo of my father that I keep on my desk. The man – my father – puts down the cake before the little girl, who I am convinced is me, and she blows out the candles. My mom leans down to cut the cake, but before she has a chance to the little-me digs her hands into the cake and shoves a big handful into her mouth. I can almost taste the delicious vanilla flavour in my mouth; feel the sticky icing on my fingers as if… as if I really have lived this moment before… Then everything goes blank and I hear a man's voice say: "I will come back for you, Cupcake."
My eyes flutter open and I'm back in my room, my vision over. Kira's face is staring into mine, she has a puppet on each hand, one is a dark haired man in a tuxedo and a strangely dilapidated top hat, and the other is a little girl wearing a red princess-type dress with perfectly curled hair that shines the colour of fresh strawberries. My father's handmade puppets. The ones that I don't let anyone touch. "Alyssia… Alyssia…" says Kira, hauntingly moving the dolls around my head. "Where the hell did you get those?" I shout, snatching the puppets out of her hands. "From that secret box that you keep under your bed… I just couldn't resist…" she says innocently. "Kira! You know that box is strictly off limits!" I say, shoving the dolls back into the box and pushing the box back under the bed, not wanting Kira to see any of the other souvenirs of my father that I keep in there. "Whoa, chillax, Alyssia, I think your 'secret admirer' put a little something in that perfume that made you go a little crazy…" says Kira in a slow calm voice, like the kind you would use for talking to a small child. "No Kira, I just don't appreciate people touching my father's stuff…" I sigh. "Alright, Aly, I won't touch it again, but please, please don't freak out at me…" she says, raising her hands out in front of her, accepting defeat. "Yeah, I can do that." I say, sadly. "What did the perfume smell like anyways?" she asks, putting down her hands, and wrapping a tanned arm around my shoulders. "Like vanilla. Like vanilla cake." I say, as if in a trance. "Le'me smell it!" she says, automatically returning to her natural, cheery state. I don't reply, just hold out my wrist and let her smell it. Kira looks like she's about to say something, then she pretends to faint, falling back on to my bed. I start laughing hysterically, that's Kira, always trying to make me laugh…
But she doesn't move. She just lies there, motionless, her eyes closed in an unconscious state. "Okay Kira, not funny anymore… you're kinda freaking me out now…" I say, shaking her seemingly lifeless body. She doesn't move. I check her breathing. Normal. I fumble for my cell phone and dial 9-1-1. "Hello, this 9-1-1, do you need the ambulance, firepe—" but before the man on the other end can finish the line goes blank. I look down at my phone, but all there is on the screen is a message that says: Sorry, you are currently out of the service area. Then all the lights in the house flicker out and left in total darkness with an unconscious Kira and no phone signal. I look out the window, everyone else on the block is in the same boat, even the street lights are off. I turn back to face the center of the room and a huge explosion of blue light bursts from my closet. "What the hell…?" I ask, under my breath.
The cabinet doors swing open and omit a rabbit in a waistcoat in to the room. Wait, did I just see a rabbit in a waistcoat? "Okay, whoever gave me this perfume totally drugged it, 'cause I am having major hallucinations right now." I say my voice full of awe. "Not drugged, Alyssia, cursed." says the rabbit. Okay, the rabbit just talked to me, I am officially fanatical. "Who are you? How do you know my name? And for the love of god how can you talk?" I ask, holding my cell phone out in front of me as if it were some deadly weapon that I could use to kill the rabbit if need be. "I don't know about where you come from, Alyssia, but in my homeland all animals can talk." he replies, barely answering any of my questions. The rabbit pulls out a pocket watch and presses the button on the top. An insubstantial mist wafts out of the clock, making the air thick and heavy. My head starts to feel light and I fall to my knees, unable to keep my balance. "I'm sorry Alyssia, but it was the Red Queen's orders." says the rabbit, taking out a potato sack from who-knows-where and pulling it over Kira's head. I try to hit him or push him or… something… but my movements are sluggish and my vision is starting to blur. The last thing I see before I close my eyes and let sleep wash over me is the rabbit pulling the bag of Kira into the shinning blue light in the closet.
