Red Queen

Hello

The eyes are the windows to the soul. That's what they say.

They're wrong.

The eyes may reflect your moods. They may capture starlight and steal hearts, but they are not magic windows.

No.

It's the mirrors. The mirrors are the windows. The mirrors are the doorways. You think it's you you're seeing when you look in one. You check your hair. Your lipstick. That piece of lunch stuck in your teeth. It's not. Not you.

It's them. The strange things. The shadows with the eyes and the teeth and the darker... darkness. They're hiding in there, in plain sight. Disguised as you and the room you're standing in. Or moving from car window to car window. Shop window to puddle. And you can't help yourself, can you? You can't help looking.

Even though your hair is just so, you've only just applied your lipstick and you haven't eaten since you brushed your teeth that morning, you still glance. You suck in your stomach and push out your chest. You bare your teeth like a monkey performing at a zoo. You brush away a hair which isn't actually dangling in front of your eye.

There's nothing there. No trapped food, saved for later when you're a little peckish. No hair refusing to be imprisoned in the braid or ponytail laying lazily down your back. It's them. The shadows. They make you look. They make you stop. That's how they trap you.

That's how they trapped her.

Alice.