JMJ
Chapter Twenty-Four
What Comes After Tea?
The trees were bowing long willow-like veils, which grew thicker and thicker, blotting out the oaks and narrow pines. These new residents were reminiscent of very bulbous baobab trees and were very strong and needed lots of room. Had a traveler below them been slowed down enough to see and experience the growth and movement of trees they would have seemed to be throwing their weight around the other trees rather rudely despite their leafy graciousness, but since in the time in which humans dwelled the weeping willow-like boughs moved like graceful doffs, it was enough to surmise that in the time of growing trees, these motions would have been like waving fans on top speed and would have been even ruder yet.
It was all really more clumsiness than rudeness, however. They seemed to have little control over it. The sense of friendly oafishness could only make one smile despite it all, and besides, the strange trees were far too clumsy to attempt climbing up the surrounding slopes and thus gave the oaks and pines plenty of room in the sunnier places.
How crowded the boughs were getting the deeper they went. Each time the humans looked up, the less often they caught glimpses of the sun and the closer the air became. Sometimes there was so tight a squeeze along the path between one potbellied trunk and another that Matthias and Esther had to climb over them. The bark was so smooth that they would slide down clumsily themselves, but their hearts remained at a gimble for a time longer with these marvelous trees even in the darkening wood, especially with the giggling stream that came round the next zigzag bend so crisp and chipper for encouragement as a friend to vouch for their character. The birds calling in strange but musical tunes above them agreed.
It all came to a curdling end when they came to a great T in the road and a sign that was also in the shape of a T. To top it off, the letter "T" so big that one almost did not notice the rest of the word behind it like the flick of a mole tail behind the rest of the lump.
"Well, here's the sort of 'T's' I feared," sighed Esther.
"'Tulgy Wood'," Matthias read putting a hand on her shoulder.
"Well, the sign seems to be pointing that way," pointed out Esther to the left, "and I doubt that the Mad Tea Party will be down there."
"Agreed," said Matthias. "One could hardly say that a gentleman's backyard would be at the edge of such a heavy and foreboding danky place. Plus the other way seems to follow the river."
"Does that matter?" asked Esther.
"The river is more likely to break out into the open again, and… if I was a lazy dandy sort of person I'd want my house looking out over a river like that and… it's where the 'Poet' said to be."
Esther paused. "Lewis Carroll?"
"'All in a golden afternoon,' right, Alice?" grinned Matthias. "Can't be too golden-warm or good-dreaming weather to glide along in there. At least I can't see any reason why it should be and this is Wonderland not Nightmareland. Things like that aren't contrary just for the sake it. There's always a reason when there is a contradiction. Unless—" He paused. "Unless it's something we aren't aware of yet."
Esther smiled warm enough to brighten the darkness of the opposite of a 'storm-wind's moody madness', but Matthias' own mischievous smile faded as he looked back into the tunnel-cavern of trees.
There was more than darkness in the foreboding aura beyond that sign, but it also seemed in some ways too easy to simply go the easy rout. There was a taunting and a suction where the sign pointed into that bleak wood in which the silly potbellied trees seemed to shudder. There was a whisper that was not the trembling boughs, though they did pay homage to something in a rather cowardly toady fashion to some cruel and monstrous lord.
The fingers of sound nestled in the nests of Matthias' ears and tugged at his heart in a way that froze him into staring the harder. He paid no heed to the staring Esther, her own smile cooled to ashen, as the tunnel itself appeared to invert into a black shape, blacker and bleaker than the stupid hamster ball in the sky. It was a deeper, older, wiser darkness.
There was nothing stupid so much as deranged with such a range in time and space that the darkness was well beyond mooding-out irrationally. It was only patient in its all-consuming depravity. It had its steady focus now on him with sentient contemplation— a focus that was both fear and mocking as though the entity feared some omen about Matthias as much as Matthias felt the ominous of the unknown thing in its own right.
Like some sort of prognosticated fated destiny of augers… Matthias caught himself thinking without realizing the redundancy of his words.
He was ready to face the fate too, despite his fears. He felt his hair bristle and his eyes harden into a stone-faced leer. His hands gripped into fists like claws flexing for a vicious onslaught.
The darkness in turn was breathing like an ancient leviathan deep in the bowels of the earth as powerful as it was in agony and as hate-filled as it was in grief until it seemed that they were all just unknown words together like colors melting into blackness daring him onward.
A faceoff between opponents? A sizing up, anyway.
"Matthias?"
Esther's voice sounded so distant that it was a little alarming, but he was too entranced by the living cavity of empty space to see if she was somehow further away.
How long had he sat in that ball?
It was the unknown time between his old life and now that bothered him. How much time had he wasted? It had felt at one time like he had spent his whole life in the ball. Now all compressed into one like a composite image of light-years of universe into one smoggy ominous shape or a passing dream of one night, but that one powerful night was tickling his brain now most of all with how he had ignored his fears while in there. Certainly, he had been under a sort of hi-tech spell, but he had felt it even then that something was wrong. He recalled sitting with a cup of tea looking out his window at the glitters of the boiling sea and knowing in his heart that there was more to life than the ball. He had stared through the steam and saw heavens beyond the drabness of a pointlessly cog-ridden steam punk farce.
Coward.
He had been a coward right up to the end with Lise at the trial to a girl-boss he had always known was not the one truly in charge of Heartland. Queen Amoris (what a joke; he was surprised no one had named the Queen of Hearts that name before) was more a puppet than the rest of them. He had known that full well somehow, and yet he had not acted upon it. He had never dared. From fear or laziness? He could not tell them apart anymore it was all so dizzying to think back upon as he tried to pry the amalgamation back into its original autonomous parts, but whatever it all had been, he was determined to his soul of souls that it would never happen again like that. He would never be spineless, never be foolish, never give up or turn away from what had to be done, never be walked over again.
"Do you see something?"
Her voice became more distant still, and Matthias' mouth felt very dry.
In the present time, if indeed time really existed at all in Wonderland or even otherwise, he took a step towards the tunnel like one in a dream. He had no weapon to fight any sort of beast. Not so much as a stick was at his disposal, and yet he would use his bare hands if he had to.
Then he felt a clasp on his arm like a thunderclap.
He cringed and stopped.
"Please!" begged Esther.
Matthias turned roughly to her so that she recoiled in sudden fright. Recovering himself, he dropped his head in shame.
"Sorry."
"What's down there?" Esther whispered.
"I don't know," Matthias admitted sheepishly. "Are… you alright?"
"Yes. If you are," insisted Esther earnestly. "What happened?"
Matthias shook his head. "Nothing."
It came out almost like a squeak. He coughed. Then he trotted to the lighter path along the river, which though was still merrymaking like blameless baby fairies or something equally as silly was giving the entrance of the cursed wood a very wise berth.
"I don't believe you," said Esther, but her intensity was cut short as he was quite along the path away from her by then.
She quickly hurried after not without looking with one last anxious look at the sign and its ominous doorway.
"Did you sense something?" asked Esther.
"You were standing right there," said Matthias carelessly. "Saw, heard, smelt, tasted nothing. Same as you."
"But did you feel something then?"
"An ominous creepy evil feeling of being watched," said Matthias candidly.
Esther sighed, and she looked into the river as they carried on at a quicker pace than before.
"Oh," was all she uttered after a moment or two and Matthias had already moved onto what was ahead of them rather than far behind. "Me… too."
She was second-guessing herself. In a sense she was even triple-guessing herself about whether or not she was trying too hard not to second-guess herself. She was too in-tune with Matthias, and she could not tell if it was good or bad or at least whether or not she was making stuff up or if she really knew what she was perceiving. He pitied her. There was an expected loneliness and neediness on this sort of adventure, after all. He was her only companion, but it was more than that, wasn't it?
He coughed.
He thought of making up a rhyme to tease the tension away, but he was not in tune with that part of him at the moment enough to start. The cough turned into a clichéd clearing throat in awkward silence, and he did not look at her for a time. Neither did she look at him.
He turned his mind to this Mad Tea Party they were supposed to be on the lookout for. He looked around at the glittering trees and glittering water. He listened for tinkling teacups or silly laughter somewhere beyond the birds and wind. A fly buzzed past lazily. A bumble bee bumbled about as a bee that was the equivalent to the trees, which he had no doubt were the infamous tumtums of Carrollean lore. He was about to say so, but changed his mind.
Esther looked up but blushed away as she second and triple guessed herself again wondering whether or not Matthias had only been taking in a breath or stifling a sneeze. She could have been wrong about him considering speaking.
The awkwardness was as stupid as a comedy about a couple trying not to speak to one another after a petty argument. If made him feel stupider than any Hatter-line that had ever come out of his mouth. He could almost hear the awkward chick-flick score musically drumming through the gentle woodland. Ah, no! It was the strumming of the string quartet in an awkward scene with the leading lady of an adventure film, of course! The scumbag, while she pined after an old lover, realized she had nearly fallen for the rogue instead.
Ah, there came the sparrows clanking and trilling in a theatrical replacement for the time-old laugh track.
He stopped with a jerking motion and wrinkled his nose.
Esther stopped too, but she did not speak as she looked at him once, twice, and then considered her words.
"Esther," he said.
Esther cocked her head much like a bird. "Hmm?"
He crossed his arms and turned to her. "Listen. We've been chary of each other since this began, and it's no pun with a cherry tart not being stolen."
Esther shrugged, but not in disagreement.
"What I mean to say is—" Matthias sighed. "I told you why I'm here. There's nothing more to say about it unless…" He cocked his head now too, "you have something to add to all this that you're not sure if I know about or not."
Her body stiffened and her face flushed.
"You follow me?" asked Matthias with full seriousness. "Is there something I should know about what's going on here?"
"Wh—which part?" asked Esther.
"You tell me," Matthias insisted gentlemanly, but he did not take his eyes off of her.
Esther pursed her lips.
Matthias pressed, "Something about who did this? The ball? Do I have a microchip planted in my brain ready for some digital fertilizer from the tractor beams of Planet X?"
Esther rolled her eyes despite herself and she smiled the most bashful overwhelmed sort of smile. "Oh, Matthias! Don't you ever stop teasing when you're serious?"
"I'm a business man," said Matthias pulling out his green coat. "It's my business to know what I need to know. People get the wrong impression about that line of work when they think it's all about being socially cold and distant and Scroogy. It takes personality to do it right."
"I know. Your business was booming, wasn't it," said Esther not quite accusingly, so Matthias took no offence.
"Took it off a boomer, so it should be, and I don't zoom enough to wreck a thing that's working," retorted Matthias smiling through his steady glare. "But you're trying to change the subject, I think."
Though, not entirely intentionally, he added to himself.
Esther looked up, and those eyes pained him to look at despite how he sneered at her all the more. They were deep and more harrowing than that hole into Tulgy. They urged him as much as they feared him and dared him as much as they stayed back, but it was not hatred that pulled these notions together into a single look. It was sincere devotion enough to bring the question to his lips almost without his own will as gentle and coaxing as to a bird with a broken wing: "Did I know you before—"
"T's!" cried two voices as all-encompassing as a school bell in a high school anime and as enthusiastic as a high school cheer in a dog movie. It was as out of place as a fiftieth high school reunion with all the old cheerleaders dressed in their old uniforms.
In their shock Esther and Matthias collided right into each other not realizing how close they had gotten or even where they were anymore. If it was not for a tumtum veil they would have had nothing to grab before falling right into the river.
The source of voices this time had nothing to do with school so much as tourism. Two female hares sat in the trees on either side of the path. They were dressed as safari guides or some such thing with buttons on their khaki vests almost too big for their chests to bear. As the hares leapt down their giddiness was still a bit like cheerleaders on homecoming night.
"Well, it was a tease!" snapped Matthias pulling himself back onto the path.
"Free T-shirts!" gasped one hare tittering as she held out a shirt T-shirt with a tumtum tree that said "Tum, tum, tea, tum" with a tea cup under the word "tea" and musical notes scattered about alongside a starburst or two.
"More T's of course," muttered Esther.
"But we're on the right track with the right kind of tea," said Matthias.
"We have small, medium, and large in unisex," said the second.
"No thanks," said Esther.
"But you two are the sixteenth of a couple to pass through here since October sixth."
"How do you figure that?" laughed Matthias.
"A lot of complicated stocks," said the First.
"And bonds," said the Second with a nod and a hop.
"The more we find two bonded, the more we should give out or we won't have the spending for next year, you see," said the First.
"We figure that two bonds are four and we divided them into our stocks of twenty five shirts and we've given out all except what's left and you fit it all together," said the Second cheerily.
"Uh…" Esther winced.
"So, we can start the tour now!" said the First pulling on Esther's hand so that she leapt back.
But suddenly Matthias grinned as he felt nearly a literal light bulb spring to life above his head. It was in actuality a white gleaming puff of cottonwood seed from somewhere. Oh, wait! He was sure that was a tree made entirely out of cotton across the river. He brushed the fuzz away playfully.
"No, let them," he said.
"Why?" demanded Esther.
"It'll be good!" said the Second Hare.
"So good!" agreed the First.
"So much stress!" said the Second.
"Yes, exactly!" said Matthias motioning Esther along. "Stressing it quite a bit."
Only reluctantly did Esther comply with a droop and suspicious sulk.
"What they say may be nonsense or it may be just plain stupidity in the physical sense of mathematics, but it's plain enough that they are leading us to the place we want and for less than ten shillings and six pence."
"We do our touring in marks, you know," said the First Hare confidentially with paw over her soft face so that it came out as a muffle.
It was difficult to say if she was attempting to censor herself or if she had simply mistaken how to cup a hand round a mouth with how her paws were shaped.
"The Mad Tea Party," whispered Esther.
"That's a mark towards you!" laughed the First Hare with paws away from her face again. "That's our first stop!"
"And you already have a few towards you!" insisted the Second to Matthias. "Encouraging someone else to come too is always a bonus!"
"So off we go just round the bend and we'll show you the table and chairs and everything that is so famous in Wonderland," said the First Hare.
"Some argue the most infamous!"
"Some argue the most famous!"
"Most can agree that it has the most dayness!"
"And the least amount of grayness!"
"Except if you prefer the heinous."
"But you don't seem that type to be so blameless!"
"Lead on!" agreed Matthias.
And on they went.
Just as the hares promised, just around the bend, there was the table— the table just as it looks in the illustration that everybody knows from table cloth to cups and plates and the exact shape of the teapot. The window to the March Hare's house behind was visible in just the right place and the great armchair at the end of it. All to a T!
If this had been an artist's work, it would have been a most admirably authentic piece of workmanship or at least a zealous stage of cosplay, but in the actual circumstance in which both Esther and Matthias were in, it like coming to Pripyat's Ferris wheel when expecting London's Eye or at least like waiting in line for a ride at Disney Land only to find it out of order once it was your turn to ride. There was no Hatter, no Dormouse, and the only hares were the tour guides and they were not quite Marchy enough even if a bit over zealous.
"Here we are!" exclaimed the First Hare.
"Isn't it beautiful!?" exclaimed the Second.
"Well, I have a question," said Matthias. "If an endless tea party comes to an end, will dinner still come after tea?"
"Hold all questions until the end of our tour," said the First.