"Hmm..." She nods as the curious officer peeks into her charts.
"She died in a bus accident."
"Oh. That's right." The nurse points at the name on the chart. "Poor girl. She killed her friends, driving a bus herself."
"Really?" I try not to grimace.
"Aren't you from around here?" The police officer chuckles, hands proudly tucked in his belt. "The incident was all over the news a few months ago," Mr. Know-it-all says.
"Ah, I've only worked here for a month." I smile like a weird girl. What am I doing about the fact that it's impossible the corpse is still unharmed when it's a few months old? Why would I be moving it at this point? "I am from a small town near Oxford."
"That's why," the nurse says. "Haven't seen you here before. You're good to go." She waves a hand without looking at me.
"Thank you," I say. "But wasn't this girl admitted to an asylum?"
"Nonsense." The policeman laughs with the nurse. "It's such a rumor. She is dead like the rest. How could she survive the accident when the rest died?"
"Then how did you know she killed them?"
"A note, honey," the nurse says. "She left a note with her sisters before she did it. You talk too much. Now get going. They say we have an injured mortician inside."
I nod and roll Jack outside.
A few strides into the red-and-blue-glaring street, the chauffeur, dressed as a medical driver, approaches me. It takes him a moment to realize I am the one rolling the bed, not the one inside it.
"I believe things didn't go as planned," he says in his mousy voice. Seriously, he has to shave the whiskers off. I shake my head as he ushers me toward the ambulance.
"We thought so when it took you too long to leave the morgue." He opens the back doors for me. "The toe tag prank was the Cheshire's, by the way," he says, and stops me from rolling the bed inside. "Don't ask me how he knew you'd be at the morgue. I guess he expected it."
"A friend is hiding inside," I whisper.
"A friend?" The chauffeur's mousy ears pop out like two pointed parachutes. "Who?"
"His name is Jack."
Suspiciously, the chauffeur zips the bag open, and then stares with confusion at me.
I don't understand the conflict at first. But then I look into the bag. There is no Jack inside. Just the corpse of some guy I don't know.
Chapter 23
The Pillar's ambulance, driving through London
The Pillar is sitting on the opposite side in the back of the ambulance, curiously inspecting the corpse I mistook for Jack earlier—however that happened, I don't know. I can't even think about it. I just thought I had a grip on the thin line between what's real and what's not. I was wrong again.
The nameless corpse is stretched on the ledge between us. The cold metal of the ambulance is set against my back. The chauffeur is driving us to the outskirts of London, so we take the Pillar's limousine back to Oxford and then to the asylum. He is struggling with activating the ambulance's siren, slowing us down. Foolishly, he sticks his head out of the window and yells, "Wee-woo. Wee-woo!" at the dense traffic so they will make way. "Wee-woo. Wee-woo," he repeats. "Ambulance! Dead man in here. Make way!"
I pretend I never saw this happen, and gaze at the Pillar, who is genuinely amused by the corpse in the middle.
The Pillar cocks his head, sucking on a mini hookah with a sticker saying, I know why a raven is like a writing desk. He reaches for the corpse and inspects the deceased's head. It's also chopped off—probably a fresh dead kid sent to the morgue.
How in Charles Lutwidge Dodgson's name did that happen?
The Pillar is interested in the corpse's mouth, touching it and inspecting it. He hands me his hookah for a moment and uses both hands, trying to make the dead man smile.
"It's a shame you can't smile when on your way to meet your maker," he says to the dead. "You don't want to leave a bad impression when meeting Him. It will be the most important interview in your afterlife." He winks at me and pulls his hookah back.
"Hey," he calls his Chauffeur. "If I told you that this miserable corpse"—he stops and points at the deceased—"is too tired to fly up there and meet his maker, what solution would you suggest?"
The chauffeur takes off his hat while driving, scratches his three hairies on his bald, egg-shaped head, and then answers, "Help him with a drag from your hookah?" His eyes widen. "So he could get high enough." He laughs and points upward and then sticks out his head out, blaring another "wee-woo" at the passing cars.
The idea of throwing myself out of the ambulance occurs to me. If this is how they talk in Wonderland, I might not want to be part of it. I am also dazed and confused with Jack's disappearance, but I know the Pillar doesn't like Jack, so talking to him about it will be of no help. I am afraid that my increasing attachment to Jack will only complicate things. Everything that happened to me tonight only worsens the way I feel about myself and the world.
"So, it was the Cheshire who pulled the toe tag prank on you?" The Pillar drags from his hookah, eyes sparkling.
"It's not funny." I scowl. "I feel like I am really going mad, having left the asylum again."
"You feel like you want to give up?" he asks. "You used to be so much more, Alice." He drags from his hookah again as if to distract me from what he is going to say. "Much more muchier in Wonderland. Have you lost your muchness?" He smirks.
I nod, although ashamed. But in all honesty, the incident with Jack wore me down a little. "Every time I feel I can do this business of saving others from Wonderland Monsters, I end up weakened, wishing I just stayed in my cell."
"Congratulations, then." The Pillar's face dims. "You just turned into what the Cheshire wants you to become."
"What is that supposed to mean?" I ask. "You have no idea what I have been through tonight. You have no idea!"
"The Cheshire wants you to succumb to madness under his pressure," he says, dismissing my whining.
"Succumb to madness?" I blink in confusion. "I thought he wanted to see if I'm the Real Alice."
"Exactly," the Pillar says. "Do you think the Real Alice will 'succumb to his madness'?"
"You mean, other than giving me clues, he tries to see how much unbearable insanity I can handle?"
"Touché. You just described the human condition of everyday life." He seems pleased. "Can't you see that this is what's going on? People falter and succumb under the pressure of madness every day of their lives. Be it work stress, spouse and family, self-actualization, boredom, teen issues, old-age issues, you name it. Madness is all around us. It needs to feed on us." He spreads his hands wide. "But only..." He leans a bit forward and points a finger in the air.
"...Wonderlanders can stand it," I finish.
A generous, curvy smile adorns his face. It's one of the very few smiles I like on him. It's like seeing through a devil hiding in the dark, glimpsing a faint possibility of goodness in him. "You don't realize what kind of madfest Wonderland was, do you? It was beautiful."
I wonder what your real story is, Pillar? Who are you, and why are you helping me?
"Why is it so important the Cheshire makes sure I'm the Real Alice?" If giving in to madness will prove I am not Alice, I wish to know why it is so important he finds her.