In Wonderland: A Combination Of Fact & Fiction

Effie walks into my kitchen, sporting an orange tube top highlighting her freckles and black shorts that flaunt her long legs, giving her the look of Hippolyta just stepping out of a blue pickup truck. Clearly the preferred vehicle here, I observe with a smile. Her pixie haircut slashes up and out at all angles. I’m itching to put her in gladiator sandals and hand her a sword. Instead, she is waving a bottle of vodka in one hand and a lemon in the other.

“Shots! Got any sugar for me, Caroline,” she asks with a wink that makes me blush.

“Don’t worry,” says Jessica, “I’m our Sober Mama for the evening.”

“She doubles as our bartender,” Effie says, opening cabinets until she finds sugar and juice glasses. I watch Jessica wet and rim each glass with sugar. Effie slices into the lemon and eyes my long dress.

“Nice,” she says, pointing with her knife. “Blue looks good on you.”

“Thanks. I thought this and a jacket for later, and this necklace,” I add, touching the ruby heart.

“Perfect. Gets cold fast. Claire will have lots of bonfires going, but you’ll need one. Pretty necklace.”

“It was my grandmother’s — my mom’s mother.”

“Sweet. What was she like?” Jessica asked me, filling the glasses and pushing them over to Effie to top them with the yellow wedges. She watches my eyes the way I do when others speak.

“She was soft and lovely and kind. She had the softest skin. I loved her hands,” I added, turning mine over to examine them — small and slim like hers — twins.

Jessica pulls me in for a quick hug and pecks the top of my head.

“Like you, then,” she tells me, and something about that makes my eyes wet, but I smile through the tears, noting how long it’s been since she passed. Still, the hole is there. And just like that, my brain connects the events quickly without my desire to do so. Her death, then the death of two others, swiftly followed by towers falling in New York. I wince internally, and before I can stop it, I see the spider on the wall, blocking my thoughts before seeing further into my assault. Then today and all of the times men have been wolves, before I can stop my mind from spinning through the memories like a toy top, whirling in the air. Until I see that Effie is watching me quietly. I loosen my jaw, unclenching and relaxing. She says nothing to call attention to it, but I watch her bookmark the moment. Jessica too.

“Thank you,” I smile again, “That is a true compliment. She was wonderful.”

“Well then, a shot for Grams,” Effie says.

“For all of the old biddies,” Rebecca follows suit, lifting a glass, and the women follow, our drinks clinking quickly against each other.

“Oof, not her drink of choice, though,” I say, laughing at the resulting burn in my throat, not entirely from the alcohol.

“No? What then,” Effie asks me, neatly scooping the glasses into the dishwasher.

“White wine. Or a brandy old-fashioned. Sometimes, a whiskey. Neat. My other grandma is a Grasshopper gal, or Bailey’s. Likes it sweet. With a Hershey’s Kiss on the side.”

I brush my hands down the sides of my dress, following my hips south, steadying my receding nerves.

“Don’t worry,” Charlotte whispers in my ear. “I killed him for us. It was a slow death. Remember? Just breathe now,” she tells me, piercing a fly with her fangs, her venom sinking into her prey.

“I like what you’ve done with your hair, Rebecca,” I tell her, distracting them. I point to her messy bun, her thick chestnut hair spilling out in strategic spirals on either side of her ears.

“Thanks. Emma did it for me.”

I don’t reply. I’m usually so good at keeping up a conversation and finessing the air, but I’ve locked up for the moment.

The poisonous venom turns the insides of the paralyzed fly to liquid, and the spider sucks it up, leaving the carcass hollow, though it looks normal, retaining the shape and look of a dead bug.

“See? He’s dead now. Take a breath, Caroline. I’m right here.” Charlotte retreats to a corner of her web to groom herself with her pincers, her eyes smiling gently. A mother hushing her child.

“I make a mean grasshopper,” Jessica adds, breaking the silence.

I’ve changed the mood in the room without meaning to or wanting to, but it’s there now. Can they tell the reason why? No. No, and I shake my head slightly. Of course not. The undertone of violence comes from my brush with Jay and his idiot friends and the less pleasant adventures on my road trip. Each one lengthens a cord around me, pulling these darker memories out of me. It unnerves me.

“Sorry. I’m working through some things at the moment,” I volunteer, noting my tension. I realize I might as well say it out loud. And with that simple sentence, I understand that my rape was one of the reasons for my trip here. A realization that I hadn’t quite reached before. The newness of the word as it applies to me is still there, like paint yet to dry.

“Hey,” Emma says, “Back at you, friend.” The group nods, and I shove everything down with a nod back at them.

“Later. Maybe. For now, can we table it?” I ask, walking to the closet to grab my boots and stuff a pair of gloves and a hat into my coat’s pockets.

“Consider it tabled for now,” Effie says. I see the look that she gives to Rebecca, who nods back at her.

“Let’s go, kids. Lobsters in ten,” Jessica says with a wry grin. “Bedtime’s at one.”

Effie snorts at Jessica. “As if. Tonight, we cause sandy mayhem until dawn. Come on, Caroline,” she crooks my elbow into hers and walks me out the door, the others following and waiting while I lock up, leaving the key under a flowerpot on the porch.

“Let’s gobble some crustaceans and wiggle our asses off. Claire will have a few local musicians there — the good ones. Not the crap cover bands. Although,” Effie adds with a look meant to tease a laugh out of me, “there is a time and place for Abba, I suppose.”

“Nope. Never,” I tell her, grinning back at her. I let her pull me out of the darkness, grateful for it.

“Right. We’ll be playing their full catalog later. We can convert anyone. Just facts. Jessica, catch!” Effie tosses the keys to her, and we climb into the truck.

“I want to dance on the beach tonight,” I tell them impulsively. “Recklessly and like children.”

I can see it in some of their eyes as they turn to me without hesitation, nodding and understanding — the eagerness and grit in each of them, full of the same need as me. We stare at the ocean. Jessica pulls the truck out of the driveway and steers us towards the waves. My shade waves to us from the house.