I'm Not Crazy

"Now now, stop struggling! It's only medicine!" The woman holding me down looked for a clear patch of skin for the rusty syringe.

"NO. POINTY BAD! BAD FOR ALICE! BAD WOMAN! BAD!" I scolded her like one might a puppy or a child with one threatening finger in the air. "SIT, AND STAY." She scoffed and took the hand I was pointing at her with before slamming the needle into my wrist painfully. "OFF WITH YOUR HEAD!!!" I screamed in her face. She winced and wiped the spittle off her face.

"Why you little-"

"-Caterpillar?" Her brows furrowed and she slid the metal out of my wrist. I flinched and screamed, "I wish you would eat the mushroom so I could STOMP you out! Or you'd be EATEN by FLOWERS! Or TRAMPLED by CARDS! Or-" but she had already left the room, locking the door behind her. I picked up the abandoned chalk I was using before the nurse came in. The walls were covered with my beautiful drawings of wonderland and the cat. My little Cheshy! I've seen him before, in my cell. He likes to hover about the room as just a head and place himself on my knees. "Cheshy! Come out come out wherever you are! Cheshy!"

"It insults me to call me such a docile, domesticated name. I am not a dog." At first I can only see his bushy, striped tail, which I of course chase around the room. "Oh do stop that nonsense. I've just groomed myself." His voice is deeper than Pa's, but in a lull like a permanent purrrrrrrrr. "Alice how unladylike! Stop that!" And in a puff, he fully appears. His fur has changed to a rusty color, like the dried blood I usually see him covered in. His claws are abnormally long and he is double the size of a normal cat. His teeth are red from his latest meal.

"Look Cheshy! The mean lady hurt me!" I held out my arm as proof. He clicked his tongue and floated down to my level.

"Poor deary, here let me." I smile and he takes my injury in his paws. He licks his long teeth hungrily before dragging his rough tongue over the hole, cleaning up the blood in one long stroke.

With a grin as wide as the sky he says "Dear Alice..."

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