FOURTH EFFORT
Theme: Alice in Wonderland
Rating: G to R
1. Cat Power – Sea of Love (2:21)
"Do you remember?" he asked, whispering into her ear.
"Remember what?" she asked, leaning her head against his as they rocked to the music playing on the phonograph.
This was not the Quadrille. This was something much more pleasant. This was a Tarrant and Alice dance.
"The day we met," he said, as his hand painting lazy circles on the small of her back.
"Hmm," she hummed. "A little, like a dream."
She was standing on his toes, but he said it did not hurt. It was easier to guide her this way.
"You were my little pet," he said, kissing the shell of her ear.
Alice thought he had been rather Rude at the time, but she could not bear to admit it now. Sometimes a good memory was unpardonable.
"You said this dance would tell a story," she reminded him. Tarrant told such lovely stories: rounded, circuitous, and never-ending stories.
"Yes, it wants to tell you," he said, pausing as they turned a quarter turn, "how much I love you."
...
2. Carla Bruni - Quelqu'un M'a Dit (2:44)
Alice stared into the open grave. Life was so fleeting. Time such a funny thing. No one had a right to waste a moment.
Yet, she had. She had wasted many.
Do you still love me, Alice wondered, as she walked away, her skirts dragging in the mud? It would seem an impossibility that he would. She had never returned to him. That had been her promise—to be back before he would know it. He could not possibly still love her.
Once, Alice had felt something akin to a fairy wing beating against her ear. How she knew what a thing such as that would feel like, she did not know. Had it spoken? Had she heard?
It seemed to whisper to her: he does, he does!
But who? Who whispered such things in her ear? She could not remember. She could not believe.
...
3. The Smiths – There Is a Light That Never Goes Out (4:04)
"Alice," Hatter begged.
She blinked back tears that stung her eyes and blurred her vision. "Don't fret," she whispered to him.
"Be strong, lass," he said, wiping her the spilt tears from her cheeks.
Her brow knit, as it occurred to her that perhaps she was being made to go home. Perhaps that was what this feeling was: of being pulled into the darkness. Perhaps she was being tugged through a rabbit hole.
"I don't want to go home," she confessed, her voice breaking.
"You're not going anywhere," he groaned. "I won't let you go."
His hand stroked her cheek again and this time she noticed the profusion of blood smeared over his digits. Had he hurt himself?
Oh, she remember, as a sharp pain sent a wave of light across her vision. It is not Tarrant who is hurt, but I. I am undone, struck down. Knaves were such troublesome creatures, quite uncontainable, not respectful of exile.
"I'm not going home," she said with a sigh. "I'm dying."
"No, love," he said, pressing his forehead to hers.
Love, she thought. She was his and he was hers. "It's a pleasure to die by your side," she whispered. Her hand searched for his heart, creeping along his chest with the tremulous fingers. She wanted to feel it beat beneath her touch. "There," she breathed, as she found it. "Shh," she shushed him indulgently like a child.
"I can't…without you," he sobbed.
"You don't have to, my dear Tarrant. I shall be a light: here," she said, pressing her palm against the thump-thump that told her he was alive, "and it will never go out."
...
4. Jump, Little Children – Close Your Eyes (2:49)
Alice lay on her side, watching Tarrant pretend to sleep. He was still and his eyes were closed, but she knew beyond a doubt that he was very much awake. What she did not know was what kept him awake. What made him unwilling to sleep?
Tell me something I can assist you with, my dearest Hatter.
Bright lights and creepy shadows?
Thin air, so that you cannot feel the air when it moves?
Stars made of tin banging on the roof?
She would fix them all.
Please, if you don't want to sleep…
Last night he had slept. He had slept the slumber of a tormented man: tossing and rolling, troubled by Bad Dreams. He had shaken his head, when she had pressed him for answers about the visions plaguing him. Answers he could not share.
...
5. Norah Jones – Sunrise (3:20)
Alice pulled the white sheet over their heads, so that it billowed like a parachute engulfing the bed. Tarrant giggled, reaching up to twine his fingers in her golden hair, as the sheet fluttered back down to rest on her head.
"Lovely morning," he mused.
"It hasn't been morning for hours," Alice said, collapsing across his chest.
"Hasn't it?" he asked. He would not know. Time sometimes went very still. "The sun seems to be rising," he pointed out. That must be the sun lighting Alice's hair through the cotton of the sheet.
"The afternoon has already come and gone," Alice said with a laugh, before pressing a kiss in the sparse hair of chest.
"And teatime?"
"Would that bother you if we had missed it?" Alice asked, propping herself up slightly to look him in the eyes.
He pondered that for a minute. Teatime was special, sacred, sacrosanct, but Alice was pillowed against his chest. He lifted the covers a bit, so they rose off of their bodies as he peeked over her shoulder. A fine stretch of naked Alice skin met his gaze.
"Don't tell, Alice, but not even tea could tempt me to leave."
Alice smiled contentedly, sliding deeper into his arms, "We'll wait for morning then."
...
6. She & Him – Why Do You Let Me Stay Here (2:31)
"Hellooo?" the Dormouse called to the Royal Hatter, forgetting to practice Patience. The roar of his machine drowned out her tiny voice, however.
He would not take note of her: a distinguished Hatter such as he, a Hatter to the White Queen, and she just a little Dormouse. She peeked down from her perch—a shelf she had selected so that she could watch him. It would be a great deal of fun if he would only notice her. They had so much in common: a love of tea, an appreciation for swords, a thirst for rhymes and riddles, but how was she to get his attention so that she could tell him any of this? He was at work, and that left her sitting on the shelf.
"Hello! Hatta!" she squeaked when his machine went still for a moment.
He turned quickly, his eyes going wide as he spied her. "Oh, hello there, Dormouse," he said, reaching up a hand.
Reaching up a hand! Mally blushed pink beneath her white fur, as she climbed into his hand. Her heart gave a little flutter.
"Who is the most polished king in the world?" she asked him.
He brought his hand close to his face, as he considered with a cocked brow. "I give up."
"Blacking," she stated proudly. The introduction had been made—properly, just as she had hoped.
"Ah! Quite right, little friend," he said with a pleased smile. "Will you keep me company?" he asked, setting her atop his worktable.
"Most certainly."
She knew immediately: she would like him for herself.
...
7. Erik Hassle – Hurtful (3:03)
Alice ran quickly, dodging branches that seemingly wanted to trap her and keep her from her destination—Hatter, her Hatter, Tarrant. She had something important to tell him, and she could not hurry fast enough. Her chest was about to burst when she stumbled into the clearing, where her friends were sitting at tea, as she knew they would be. Have I made a rhyme?
"Alice?" Hatter said, standing up and knocking his chair over backwards. "Is that you?"
Alice wanted to begin speaking at once: I am sorry, I apologize, what I did was hurtful! All that came out were gasping breaths, however. She had run too fast too far, but not fast enough when every moment was another moment he might know that she was gone. What a terrible turn of phrase, she chastised herself. How could he not know she was gone?
Her friends were all chattering, but she could only hear her Hatter. She could only see him striding towards her and taking her by the shoulders.
"It is me," she finally managed.
"So it is," he lisped.
"I used to run," she said, clutching her chest. "I threw it all away."
He shook his head, "Nothing has been tossed or lost, lass, and we've set a place for you for tea."
...
8. Train – If It's Love (3:59)
Tarrant sometimes walked on the ceiling when everyone else walked on the floor. That did not seem to affect Alice in the least, which was another reason she was the best thing in his life: better than tea, better than hats, better than rhymes. They were two peas in a pod, two birds of a feather, like a cushion and pins, because Alice would join him on the ceiling, where they could stare down at everyone below, who were boring enough to think floor walking was the way of things.
"Ten bairns," he bargained.
"Ten?" she repeated, her eyes gone wide.
"We'll have to build a new house," he acknowledged.
"On a Hatter's salary?" she inquired with a small smile.
"We'll live on laughter and song."
"Of course. Sounds very nourishing," she acceded.
"And tasty, no doubt," he added, snaking his hand across the table to seize hers. "Shall we go to bed?"
"It is nearly lunchtime," Alice reminded him. "Not bedtime."
"Sometimes sleeping during the day as opposed to the night can be very refreshing for one's perspective."
"Refreshing, hmm? As refreshing as our morning stroll on the ceiling?"
"Ten times that," he assured her.
Alice smirked, "And this has nothing to do with these ten children you keep mentioning?"
Hatter laughed, "Only if you want it to, Naughty."
...
9. Pearl Jam – Just Breath (3:36)
Tarrant ran his hand over her hip. "Stay with me," he breathed against her neck.
The arch of her body against his was her response.
"I love you," he mumbled, tracing her collar bone with kisses. "I need you," he continued, as he reached the hollow of her throat. "I want you," he told her, as he pressed his hand into the small of her back, drawing her as close as she could be. "I'm a fool," he finished, as he kissed her lips.
"No," she said, threading her fingers into his hair.
Alice never let him speak ill of himself. She said they were both humans beneath their hats and hose and hilarity, beneath their sins and secrets and sorrow.
"Did I say I love you?" he asked, his brows drawing together in concern. He had meant to: it had been his first priority, but now he found himself rubbing against her and clawing at her clothes, and he could not for the life of him recall what he had said to her.
"Yes," she breathed in response, drawing her bare foot over his pant leg.
He sighed in relief, as he lifted her skirts. Now he had only to show her.
...
10. Muse – Uprising (5:03)
"The Alice is not what I was expecting," Mally said a little sullenly.
Hatter leveled her with a look. "Alice is the Proper Size and Alice has promised to Slay. What more were you expecting?"
"Scales?" Thackery offered, his one eye twitching.
"One doesn't need scales to slay the Jabberwocky. The prophecy says nothing of scales," Hatter said dismissively. "She would look quite horrid with scales."
"If we are mentioning the prophecy, I might point out that the Alice does not so much resemble a beamish boy as she does a girl," Chessur reminded him.
"The wee laddie is surprising," Hatter said with a smile. "But then, Alice has always been a girl, so we should not hold that against her."
"It's her muchness that ah find wantin'," Mally explained.
"No need," Hatter insisted. "She shall most definitely slay. We shall be victorious." He was certain of it, because Hope had crawled onto his shoulder and begun to whisper all manner of happy things. Hope promised victory, an end to degradations, an end to the Red!
Mally sighed. "I wish she'd come lookin' a bit better prepared to wield a sword."
Tarrant pulled his claymore out and raised it, testing its weight. "She tamed the Bandersnatch, did she not?"
"Stop waving that thing about!" Chessur begged. "You'll give me a heart attack."
"Cowardly Cat," he said, grinning at the blade. "Yes, the Alice will slay," he said with glowing pride. Tomorrow His Alice would put an end to everything Bad and bring Beauty back to Underland, and then, he would kiss her—vigorously.