Dedication: Happy (belated) birthday, Minnie, darling. Sorry this oozes with fail and late-ness.

This is my first try at a film I barely watched. Expect it to be a fail.

[Last minute betaing, courtesy of Pink Pigeon. Thanks. :D]

be[lie]ve

"Oh Hatter," she mumbles as she hides her face in his chest, tears streaking down her cheeks. "I promise I'll come back. I'll come back as soon as I can, I promise. You won't even know I'm gone." She sniffles and then tells herself that she's okay. But as Alice comes to face him, she feels her eyes glaze over with tears all over again.

He feels tears welling up in his own eyes, too, and he blinks them away before she can see. Because she's just a little girl, five going to six, and he has to be the brave one. He nods slowly, her words repeating in his head over and over again.

I'll come back. I'll come back, Hatter. I promise.

He tries to believe her and almost convinces himself that she's really going to come back. He puts on a smile for her and she smiles along with him, glad to see him happy. She giggles a little, because he looks a little funny, but she doesn't know the difference between a natural smile and a pained smile.

"Don't forget me, Alice," he manages to croak just before she leaves Wonderland. She stumble a little as she leaves, and he chuckled under his breath. Alice straightens herself out, smiles, and waves goodbye over her shoulder, calling out something he couldn't quite hear.

I won't. I love you.

But maybe it was just his imagination running wild again.

fri[end]s

He was sipping tea slowly (it was very hot, mind you) when she managed to wander through the rabbit hole and into Wonderland again. He's jubilant; he hasn't seen Alice in years. But something's wrong.

a) She's not Alice. Not one bit. Her name might be Alice, but he knows, with every fiber of his body, that she isn't Alice. Or maybe Absolem is right. She might be Alice if he just waited until the end of the plot.

b) 'Alice' didn't know the Hatter. Thus proving the first statement true. In fact, she even seemed afraid of him when they first met. (He ran over and hugged her, violating her mother's golden rule: Don't interact with strangers.)

c) He should befriend her anyways. Who knows? She might turn out to be Alice after all. (Even though that's highly unlikely. Alice was much more brave and believed in Wonderland a hundred and ten percent instead of calling it a dream like pseudo-Alice did.)

"Hello, Alice," he called out to her with a bemused grin plastered on his face. His grin faltered a bit when she approached him hesitantly, but he beckoned to her once more to sit and drink tea with him.

He grins at her manners (pinkie out, sip slowly) and she smiles just to please him. A little memory comes back to him, but he shoves it back inside. This just might be Alice after all, he muses. But it can't be. Alice loved him. They were friends.

He'll just let the story unravel and maybe there will be time for Alice and Hatter, Hatter and Alice, once more.

l[over]s

His heart pounds rapidly when he sees her again, and he's pretty sure she can hear it. But if she can, she's doing a pretty good job of ignoring it.

"Hatter, you're a riot," she manages to say in between her fits of laughter. He smiles because it's Alice saying this and Alice doesn't lie. Especially not to him.

He contemplates this for a while—how Alice makes him feel and how he really maybe sort of might like her more than he should and it just comes out unexpectedly: "Alice, oh how I love you."

Then, an awkward silence.

He breathes in, she breathes out. They're both trying to respond to what he had said, but are at a loss for word.

And she smiles later, because she loves him too and this is a relief because she sure as heck wasn't going to say it first. "I-I love you too, Hatter," she stammers, all the while trying to hide a grin.

They're from two completely different worlds, but it'll work out. They'll find a way.

Until she has to leave again, spilling promises of 'I'll be back before you know it and Hatter, I love you, I'll come back for you.' And he tries to believe her, but it's oh so hard and they just turned into lovers and it's all just too painful.

tr[us]t

She spends a little longer than usual in Wonderland, but she doesn't notice. Her head's in the clouds, her heart's on her sleeve and she falling madly in love with her childhood friend. But there's this one feeling she can never shake off. There's something important waiting for her. And it's about time she goes to find it.

So she says, "I'm going to say goodbye to my mother, alright Hatter? It'll only take a little while." And he trusts her because he's too blinded by love to notice anything lately.

When she leaves, a dark shadow passes over his heart and Hatter goes back to the gloom of missing her. But she promised, he reasons. She'll come back for me. She'll come back.

Back home, her mother pays no attention to Alice. It's all 'oh, Alice, have you met the Duke? I quite think he fancies you. I must find your corset at once.' So, immediately, Alice was betrothed.

But Duke Steven was a kind soul. Not like Lord Ascot. No, nothing like him. And soon, Alice came to love him almost as much as he loved her.

And Hatter was forgotten, yet again.

l[if]e

He wants to move on, but he can't. Because she's his Alice and he's her Hatter. But when he found out she was to marry someone else...

It was just all to painful.

And so he's withering away.

Slowly.

Hanging on desperately to nostalgic thoughts and trying to delude himself from the bitter reality that she's never coming back.

Written for Bookaholic711's Project PULL challenge~

Review?