I actually wasn't planning on writing this chapter, because I didn't think I could fit it into the story. But it's been floating around in my head practically writing itself since I decided to scrap it, and now that I'm well past that point, I realize that the Hatter-and-JD thing doesn't have proper closure. Which is what this chapter was all about to begin with. So, I wrote it. It's more about character relationships than it is about progressing the story, but sometimes you've gotta do it that way.

Update (3 May): I'm killing this story for an unspecified amount of time. It's pretty ill-conceived, and no good, and frankly I'm starting to hate it for that. In the meantime, the story can idle in limbo where it was left at the end of this chapter.

o…o

He walked with Nel as far as the edge of the building, where she broke off to go on with Bello. It never failed to surprise him how well she could control that dog even though he probably outweighed her by at least a third. "Well, at least no one honks at me and makes catcalls when I walk him," was all she ever said about his size. "Saint Bernards are the anti-flirt."

Hatter told Alice about her, unsure what to expect. He admitted—nervously—that the person he'd become friendly with over the last months was another woman and then waited to see if she might get cross. She didn't. Her only reaction had been to raise her eyebrows and say, "And?", as if she expected there to be more to it than that.

"And nothing. It's just that the only good friend I've made here is, you know, a girl."

"Okay. Not like you're not fucking her when my back is turned or anything, are you?"

When she'd said it like that—so frankly and bluntly and crudely—he choked on his Chinese food and erupted into a coughing fit. "No! No, of course not, it's nothing like that!" He said quickly, preparing to reassure her as fast as he could and repair a hole he wasn't even sure was in the dike.

"All right, then it's no big deal." At his surprised look, she clarified. "What kind of freakin' hypocrite would I be if I got my undies in a bunch over you having a woman for a friend when I have JD? And I've slept with him—you haven't done anything with what's-her-name, have you?" When he shook his head emphatically 'no', she grinned and kissed the shocked expression off his face. "I trust you, okay? I'm not worried."

Really, he'd expected her to at least be the littlest bit cross with him, if for nothing else than for keeping Nel a secret; or he'd expected her to be suspicious, or worried, or something other than totally nonchalant and easygoing. He didn't think his troublesome Oyster would be that easygoing about it. But she was, and it surprised him.

Trust Alice to be level-headed when he least expected it.

Smiling, he went up to his apartment—and nearly jumped out of his boots when he saw there was a man sitting at his kitchen table, looking quite at home. He looked at the front door just to make sure he was actually in the right place; he was.

"I let myself in," the man said. "Hope you don't mind."

Instinct kicked in and in a flash he was over there, grasping the intruder by the shirt and lifting him right up out of his chair. "Who the fuck are you and how the hell did you get in here? You'd better talk fast!" He'd promised Alice he wouldn't use his right arm in her world but this seemed like an appropriate place to do so; if he couldn't give an explanation in the next five seconds then Hatter would break his whole damn face.

"Hey, let go. I like this shirt."

He prised Hatter's fingers open one at a time until all of them were unclasped.

"I figured we needed to talk," he went on, smooth and even and untroubled, like he ended up in stranger's apartments all the time. He stood back and extended his hand politely—almost daintily. "We've never been properly introduced and all. I'm JD."

He didn't take the offered hand. Instead, Hatter stood back, arms crossed, looking him up and down. In trying to pretend that his existence didn't bother him, he'd never said anything about wanting to meet JD, so he never had. Now he was glad he hadn't until now. Meeting him before sorting things out with Alice might've made things worse.

JD was intimidatingly good-looking—he was almost girlishly small, just a few inches taller than Alice, and slender; long wavy strawberry-blond hair was pulled into a ponytail, with blue-green eyes and a rosy-fair compexion with a faint trace of freckles over his round face. He wore those ridiculously tight jeans that lots of people here wore, and a leather jacket.

He could see why Alice went for him 'just because he was there'. He'd never really been into men before, Hatter thought absently, but he might almost consider changing his mind about it for JD if he was single.

"So you're JD, then," he said slowly.

Pause.

"Yeah. I just said."

Another pause.

"You're Hatter. I can see why Alice likes you. I could borrow you for a bit—I won't dent you or anything and she'll get you right back…"

That made Hatter take a step backwards and flatten himself against the door like he was trying to phase back through it. Alice told him that her friend went for men as well as women. ("And he's kind of a slut, too—he'll go for just about anyone," she said.) It didn't bother him, but he was unnerved that this guy got into his flat and might or might not have been trying to make a pass at him.

"Geezis, stop trying to climb the door like that. It's just a joke. Mostly. Unless you didn't want it to be."

"How'd you get in here? And why?" He asked.

"I slid under the door," he said.

Hatter crossed his arms.

"Bear in mind I could call the police for you being here."

JD sighed. "I blew your doorman. I figured it was an emergency."

"An emergency?" He was suddenly scared—had something happened to Alice?

"I figured we had to talk."

"And that constitutes an emergency?"

The other man sat back down at the kitchen table and crossed his legs in a startlingly feminine fashion; Hatter sat down across from him, leaning back in his chair and keeping his face stony.

"Seems we have something in common," he said.

"Plumbing?" Hatter asked.

"No, but good guess." He pressed his fingertips together gently. "We both love Alice."

He said nothing.

"Look, I know you don't trust me. I don't blame you and you wouldn't be the first. I'm here, I'm cute as a button, I've known Alice forever—freaks people out, y'know?"

"It's not that—I just don't like that you turned up in my flat without me knowing."

"Doorman was very obliging with the right motivation," he said, grinning cheekily and winking. Then his serious expression came back and he leaned forward. "I give this talk to anyone who gets serious about her."

"Oh?"

"Alice doesn't trust people easy. She trusts you and that's something huge."

"I know."

He remembered how guarded she was in Wonderland, how impossible to crack. When she finally said she trusted him he knew it didn't come easily—he'd had to prove himself again and again to her.

"She's loyal, too. Stupidly loyal. Once she decides she likes someone she'll let 'em get away with a remarkable amount of utter bullshit. It's good if you're a friend and you fuck up every so often, but if you're a total shitwad then she'll just suffer in silence."

"Oh, I know that, too," he said quickly. Alice was most definitely, as JD said, stupidly loyal to people once she got attached. She put up with his moping, after all, and neither had he forgotten how much she defended Jack Heart even after she found out he'd been lying to her the entire time he knew her.

"Okay, so we're on the same page," he said.

Then he adopted the most disturbingly cheerful expression—the kind of sick grin that Mad March sometimes wore when he was coming up with some hideous new interrogation technique. Back when he actually had a head, rather than that cookie jar. JD reached across the table and took his hands in a surprisingly strong grip.

"Alice won't tell you to fuck off when you upset her, so I'll only say this once—if you make my Alice cry, then I'll make you cry."

To punctuate this, he gripped his hands and crushed all of his fingers together; Hatter yelped in surprised pain and tried to pull his hands away—he didn't expect JD to be so strong. He couldn't free himself.

"Understood?"

"Yes, yes! Understood!"

"Good." He dropped his hands.

"What the hell was that all about?" He demanded, flexing his fingers to make sure they all still worked.

"I've seen Alice sit and endure some really dysfunctional relationships before because she decided she trusted someone and didn't want to take that trust back. She's funny like that—she tells other people to get the fuck out of bad situations when they're not working but she won't do it herself."

"She gave me what-for about you," he said.

"Yeah, I know."

"We got it all sorted out."

"Good, then that means I don't have to kick the shit out of either of you."

Another silence.

"She never slept with me, you know," JD said.

"Alice told me she did," he said plainly—it was nothing for Alice to lie about, so he knew she'd told him the truth.

"No, no, not that," he said. "She never stayed the night. She was always gone before breakfast."

He stayed silent a long time, turning that over and over again in his mind.

"Really?"

"Yeah. It's not that kind of relationship between us—I'm just a friend, you see. Not a boyfriend, never have been. She loves me to death and I love her but it's nothing even broadly romantic. The no-strings-attached sex is fine for her, but what with being up to her pretty little butt in commitment issues, it takes her a good long time to get to where she's comfortable spending the night with someone."

He said nothing.

JD got up from the table.

"You're a lucky man," he said. "Just remember what I said."

"Take care of her, you mean?"

"Oh, no, not that—Alice can take care of herself. She doesn't need protecting—she gets kind of offended when people try and play the knight-in-shining-armour shit with her."

Snort. "Yeah, true."

"But if you do anything to hurt her, just remember that my Irish-mafia relatives could have you eliminated with one phone call and you'll be scattered all up and down the eastern seaboard in little shreds."

"You smooth-talking romantic, you."

He grinned. He had dimples, too.

At the door, he turned around.

"Hey, by the way."

"Hum?"

"Who was that girl you were talking with? The one with the huge dog?"

"Oh, she's just a friend."

"Yeah, I figured that. Alice know about her?"

"I told her. She didn't care."

"I wouldn't think she would. Of all the things she worries about in her relationships, one thing that never bugs her is girl buddies. You'd think with her laundry-list of issues she'd go ape about it, but she never has. I guess she figured it'd be the pot calling the kettle black." Then he gave a sort of half-shrug. "What's dog-girl's name?"

He raised an eyebrow.

"Nel—why?"

The grin turned into that cheeky one again.

"She's cute," he said.

Then he left.

For some reason, he didn't like to think of JD going after Nel.

o…o

This chapter references another fic I wrote called 'Bedtime', in which Alice has issues sleeping the night with guys. You don't have to read it in order to understand this, but I thought it bears mentioning.