Alistair

1

The bike ride home from there was slow and sticky, like I had stepped in fly paper.

The scenery was coated in dizzying shades of lavender and blue. The lavender an eye, the blue a flame.

They remind me of you.

But it stays even when it's over, stuck to my shoe.

The inside is water, dousing the flames a bright red. Mother's voice when she calls me becomes a drawing along with the dull buzz of the whispers and at once I know it will be one of the bad days. I just run up the stairs faster and slam the door to my room, watching the water ripple with satisfaction. Mother won't be happy, but she never is anymore. Me ignoring her won't make any difference. She'll just blame it on an 'episode'.

They think I'm crazy, but they don't even know who I am. They see my blonde hair, my blue eyes, my black sweatpants and blue tee, and they see a human being. They see my need to wear gloves, a result of the claws growing due to Wondersand, and they see a broken one. They see me as a thing to be fixed, and that's the first and last mistake they made with me. I stopped paying attention after.

And that's part of why days like today are the worst. Reality moves in ways it isn't supposed to, a bone snapped in the universe. Bubbles come out of my mouth when I sigh. My reality is never real anymore, but these are the days when it feels fakest. When the ability to pretend I exist in their world melts away. When they realise I'm not one of them. Best to just ignore it and hope it will be better the next day. It probably won't.

I jump onto my bed and towards the glass wall it's against, doing the usual, closing my eyes, falling, and inhaling when the time comes. I shiver when I stop feeling soaking wet and sticky, and smile as the scenery fades from cooling to piercing, a familiar mint green filter coming over my eyes. It's calming, not having the unexpectedness of the Sleeping World colours. It feels like home here in the greens of the Living World. I wonder if you feel like this while you're here?

A twig snaps under a soldier's foot and I fall back into the routine I made after a week of visiting, ducking behind the me-sized flowers and avoiding the eye in their centres. Red Knights have brains as hollow as their bodies, it seems, because for the year I've been doing this, they never bother to check behind the flowers. They give a clear shot to the exit of Queen Cassy's garden, as long as you avoid their roots. If you step on them, they scream; my ears rang for days after I stepped on one because I didn't see it through the Wondersand.

When I'm through the gate and cant legally be caught by Red Queen Cassy, I begin imagining my travel to where I always go. I watch as the Train of Thought starts to rush past fish rowing upstream and ants climbing their hills. Every animal that is small in their world is people sized here, which always makes me feel as if I've shrunk. Since I've started visiting the Living World, however, I've learned how to tell when I actually have. How to pick up on the unease and panic shrinking causes. The Waking Glass doesn't shrink you, it just changes your point of view. It's better this way.

I pay a thimble as my fare, and as soon as I step on the train I know something is off. I've barely boarded when the train starts to move, but all eyes, including the conductor's, are on me. Their eady black gazes meet mine all at once, wide, with mouths pressed into thin lines. Each of their neon green aspects seems to glow brighter, almost blinding.

"To the Cat," they say all at once. Their voices project the image of a sharp spiking line in my head. "is where you go?"

The Living World is weird, and creepy, and not exactly a fun place at first glance. That's always true. But this? This is way beyond weird. What the hell is going on?

I shake my head, sitting down in a completely empty row of chairs. "No, I'm going to see Atanasio. I have a coming letter." I pat one of the pockets in my sweatpants. I need to deliver a note to Tam telling her she needs to improve her security. I've stolen at least 5 pieces of jewellery a day from her for the past week and I haven't been spotted once. Some of the stuff is ugly too, I just stole it to prove the point.