Part 2

Alice woke about 6, having made an early appointment with the dentist that would allow her to make her 9:30 class at the dojo. Hatter lay on his stomach, blankets bunched up around his shoulders. He usually woke when she did, but after the horizontal acrobatics they'd engaged in the night before, she wasn't surprised he slept through her alarm. There were bruise-like shadows under his eyes, highlighting his exhaustion. She pressed a light kiss into his hair and was surprised but amused when he merely shifted and grunted softly before settling back down to sleep.

"See you later," she whispered with a tender smile, then snuck out of the apartment.

A couple of hours later, Hatter blinked his eyes, feeling first the still-pounding headache followed closely by a burning ache in his limbs. The shiver that went through him, head to toe, confirmed what he already suspected. A fever. The thickness in his throat had sprouted into a fiery sting, and that damned tickle was causing his sinuses to flood.

"Ah-PTSCHh! Heh-EHktschu! Ngh..." he groaned, pressing his face down and coughing raggedly into the pillow. This was bad. This was very, very bad.

Dragging himself upright, he staggered into the kitchen for a glass of ice water, shivering hard when it sluiced down his hot throat and chilled his tight chest. Putting the kettle on for tea, he briefly contemplated making something for breakfast. But he wasn't hungry.

"Hhk'SCHghh! hak'GSChu! ehh?... hh-HH!-- Uhnn." he groaned, pressing a cold palm hard against his temple that throbbed with the beat of his heart. His nostrils still twitched, a third sneeze lingering maddeningly just out of reach. "Bloody hell." He knuckled the offending organ brutally, eyes watering a little as the itch slowly teased and tormented him to agitated distraction. "-iihhh!! Hk-KKhtsch! ....hkNGKtshh-uu! .

He shivered again, tucking his hands under his arms as he began to do several chores around the apartment that Alice had mentioned she planned to do this weekend. He liked taking care of her when he could, liked feeling like he was contributing something to this relationship. He didn't have a job yet - wasn't sure what he would be good for in this new world of hers. But he could keep the apartment clean and run errands, fix the lock on the bathroom door and hang several pictures she'd leaned against a wall.

When she came home tonight that "to do" list would be done, even if he had to battle his body every step of the way.

Which was looking more and more likely as he stopped in the middle of making their bed to bend over and cough up half a lung. A strange, long-buried part of him ached for Alice to come home, to feel her cool fingers on his fevered skin, to have her ease him down into their warm bed and hear her soft voice lulling him to sleep. But a bigger part of him was terrified.

She can't know.

So when she shoved the sticky front door open several hours later, she found him standing next to the dining room table with a wide, welcoming smile, no visible sign of his day-long battle with whatever this was. He had always believed that to name something gave it power. So he wouldn't. Everything was done and he had dinner ready and waiting.

"Hey there," he purred, folding his arms around her and pressing a kiss to that spot just below her ear that made her breath catch. "How was your day?"

She began to chatter about her beginner class, about one lady in particular who made distracting grunts when doing the forms. He pulled her chair out, settling her down and moving to take the seat opposite. She complimented his pasta - one of the few things he'd learned to cook in this alien kitchen - and let him refill her wine glass more than once.

"So I was thinking tomorrow maybe I'd take you to the science museum."

"Okay," he forced an eager grin. "What's there?"

"They've got this touring exhibit from the Natural History museum in D.C. The evolution of man."

"Evolution. Is that, like, wheels n' things?"

She cocked her head at him. "No, not revolution. Evolution. You've never heard of Darwin?"

He shook his head and half-listened to her explanation, adding the appropriate responses when she paused for breath. He thought he was doing well: pushing through the chills and aches to seem as normal as possible. He'd let his own pasta boil a little longer than hers so the noodles were overly soft and slipped easily down his sore throat. He'd poured a glass of wine for himself, but sipped it sparingly and gulped his ice water when she looked down to twirl another noodle around her fork.

"Museum it is, then. Is it an all day affair?" he asked as he took the dishes to the sink. "No classes tomorrow?"

"I've got one class at 10. But we can go after lunch."

He made tea and left her on the couch with a movie while he made the excuse of going to put some laundry away, stalking quickly into the bedroom at the far end of the apartment and closing the door.

"N'Nggsch!" he smothered a sneeze in a crumpled tissue from his pocket, trying to swallow as much of the sound as he could. It hurt. "Hh'nxgsh!" But he did it again, ducking into the bathroom and turning the water on full throttle so he could cough into a towel. It rattled his chest with a slight burn, his gut clenching with dread. Flicking off the tap, he gathered all the towels and tossed them in the basket.

"I'm gonna go downstairs and do another load," he said as he crossed the living room, the basket tucked under one arm. "Be back when it's done."

"You don't have to do that..." she started to get up.

He set the basket on the couch and gently pushed her down. "I know." He cupped her neck and pressed his lips to hers, giving his signature Hatter grin: boyishly mischievous with a glint of the devil in his eye. "I want to."

She smiled, both indulgent and chagrined. He winked and plucked the basket up, pulling the front door firmly closed behind him.

Once in the hall, he leaned his back against the wall and closed his eyes with a low groan. The shivers were back with a vengeance, and he wasn't sure he could have held them back much longer. His fingers seemed almost numb as they gripped the plastic rim of the basket, and his arms felt like lead. But he pushed his body upright, shuffling slowly down the stairs to the basement. No one else was there at this time of night, so he was able to start the wash and then bend over the humming machine to rest his pounding head on his folded arms. God, what he wouldn't give to lay down.

But being half-horizontal caused the fluid in his head to shift, and a twinge in his left sinus burgeoned into a wet sneeze. Hh-eeh! ... hiih! k'ESSchh! Uuhn." His groan was muffled by the rush of the washer beginning its first cycle, and the vibration of the machine shook loose another sneeze. "Hhk'SCHghh!" He sniffled hard, feeling the slippery sluice of hot congestion, and stood up before it could escape. Closing his eyes against the sudden dizziness, he pressed a hand to his burning chest as he coughed.

There wasn't anywhere to sit, so he leaned against the cold concrete wall to wait for the wash to finish, arms crossed and teeth clenched against the near-constant chills. When he was finally able to put the load in the dryer, he sat on top of it to soak up the warmth. "Ngt'sshu! Hh... igscht!" He was sneezing more than he ever had in his life, and when he wasn't sneezing he was coughing or swallowing gingerly down his raw, hot throat. "hehkigtschu! Ughh."

Whatever this was, it had come on quickly. And gotten worse in a matter of hours.

What if he was contagious?

A wave of fear shivered through him harder than any chill. Alice.

But what could he do? Other than keep away from her, which she would notice and question. Unless he figured out a way to make her want to keep away from him...

Of course.

Frowning, he swiped a knuckle under his nostrils with another liquid sniff. He didn't like it. It would probably kill him to do it. But if it was a choice between that and Alice falling ill? He'd take the pain any day.

Resolve gave him new strength, so he tossed the warm towels in the basket and carted them quickly back up the stairs. Alice was just where he'd left her, curled on the couch with the movie near its end and the empty mug of tea on the coffee table. He strode to the bedroom, setting the basket down and stalking back towards the front door to snatch up his hat.

"Goin' for a walk."

"Okay," she reached for the remote, as he knew she would. "Let me get my shoes."

"No," he tossed back, just a little forceful. "Stay. I'll be back later."

"It'll just take me a minute..." She already had one on.

"For God's sake, Alice!" he barked, pain spearing his chest at her wide-eyed expression. But he schooled his features and forced out the rest. "I haven't had two minutes to myself for the last bloody month! I'm just goin' for a walk and I'll be back later." Jerking the door open, he added not-so-under-his-breath the final touch, "Knew this wouldn't work..."

He didn't dare look back. Knew one glance of her blue eyes brimming with pain would bring him to his knees, have him grasping for her hands and begging her to forgive him. He was gone before she had a chance to start arguing. God, but Alice loved to argue. He was counting on her to be stunned long enough to make his escape.

He hated himself for doing it. Alice had deep trust issues where men were concerned, having believed her father walked out on her and her mother when she was ten. Even though she discovered her father had actually been abducted and taken to Wonderland, his memory of her locked away, she would still be deeply hurt by Hatter's words.

But it was better this way. She would be in bed by the time he got back and hopefully tomorrow he'd wake and be over this feverish coughing-sneezing-achy thing. And if he wasn't he knew he could stretch out this 'needing space' act a few more days until he was. Provided the illness didn't prove fatal.

Somehow he didn't think it would. In Wonderland if you fell sick with something deadly it got you within a day. When he'd woken this morning still able to get out of bed he'd instinctively stopped fearing the worst, determined to simply outlast it.

He didn't allow himself to even contemplate that he'd pushed her too far, that she'd turn tail and run before he could really hurt her. She had a history of that. He knew she'd leave him eventually, and if 'eventually' turned out to be 'now,' he'd find a way to live with that.

Even though it would shatter him into a thousand jagged pieces.

Stepping out the door to the apartment building, a gust of icy wind raked its claws through him, making him shiver convulsively. Glancing up, he noted the dark sky threatened rain, a right good storm if he didn't miss his guess, and didn't that just figure?

Tucking his hands into his pockets, he ducked his head and stubbornly headed towards the park. HkNgtshh! He smothered the wet sneeze into his shoulder, loathe to take his hands from the slight warmth they were generating inside the leather. But the sharp tickle only got worse... hnngkTSHh! hh'kgtschu!" His nose was running, and he was forced to take the last crumpled tissue from his pocket before the inevitable. "Heh-EKGNTschh! Uggh. Bloody hell..." He cursed as he blew thickly and wiped at his upper lip. He'd have to try not to sneeze again, unless he could come up with more tissues. As full as his his head felt, another sneeze would be an embarrassing mess.

I can hold back 'till I get home...

Home. Alice. He swallowed hard against a suddenly tight throat, blinking his stinging eyes.

Coughing raggedly, he jogged across the street and into the park, intent on finding a bench where he could wait out the next couple of hours...

--

Alice simply stared at the door for a few seconds, unable to breathe or blink as his words echoed in her head. Anger and pain waged a war in her chest, grief at his muttered words squeezing her heart in its vise. 'Knew it wouldn't work...'

What did that mean??

As usual, her first response was to charge after him and demand an explanation. But by the time she got her stunned legs under her and yanked the door open, he was gone. She sprinted to the window just in time to see him jog into the park, knowing he'd be impossible to track by the time she got there.

She half-growled, half-screamed in frustration, clenching her fists and shaking with fury as she kicked at a basket of magazines. Sure, Hatter had always been difficult. They'd argued and fought their way across half of Wonderland, even while being chased by suits and hunted by the Jabberwock. But he'd never been deliberately cruel. His suddenly distant behavior made no sense.

Unless he's really feeling smothered, she crossed her arms and paced restlessly, chewing her lip. She searched her mind for any sign over the last week that this had been brewing. Nothing. She couldn't remember a single look on his face or a single thing he'd said or done to hint that he wanted some space.

She continued to brood over it as she folded and put the towels away, as she checked her email and spent some time reading news stories on MSN. She barely remembered showering, still examining every day they'd spent together since he'd left Wonderland.

This isn't like him, she found herself thinking over and over again. But then hard on the heels of that thought came the cynical And how long have you known him? A month? Just over? How would you know what he's really like?

But somehow she knew. This wasn't like him. Hatter was many things, but cold and reserved wasn't one of them. That was part of why she'd chosen him over Jack in the first place. With Hatter, what you see is what you get. He'd never lied to her before.

She stopped cold. That was it. His outburst at the door had rung curiously false. Empty of truth, pure shock value. And she couldn't fathom the reason for it. She would bet money there was something going on.

She lay in their bed for an hour in the dark, awake and tense. When she heard the bedroom door ease open and felt him cautiously slip in next to her, she breathed a sigh of relief. At least he came home. At least he didn't sleep out on the couch. She could smell the cold rain on him, and a little worried that he'd been out in it. But she was sure whatever was going on with him wasn't really about her, and they could talk through it in the morning.

He didn't speak, so she pretended to be asleep, giving him the space he'd asked for. After a while, she gave what she hoped was a sleepy-sounding sigh and rolled over, pressing close to him. True to form, he gave a small involuntary shudder at the contact, and she smiled. Slipping an arm around his waist, she breathed in his warm scent and drifted off to sleep.