But, I have already followed one white rabbit down a hole, changing my life forever. I’m more than apprehensive to stumble down another. Alice does learn some lessons from Wonderland, after all.
Such as how it wasn’t Time’s cruelty which trapped the Hatter in a perpetual mad tea party—it was the murder of time which imprisoned him in a punishing loop. Yet, even in a nonsensical realm, the Hatter knew he couldn’t beat Time to escape…
Alex didn’t.
By smashing his pocket watch and a room full of clocks, Alex deceptively thought he could escape his tormented reality.
That freedom came later, once we bled for each other, after we drew blood for each other.
I can no longer loathe Alex for what he did to me, just as he can no longer loathe my nature.
With the aid of a compound he engineered specifically to help regulate my brain chemistry, in time, my emotions did taper. The overwhelming extremes leveled out, the highs and lows more comparable to the swing of a pendulum. I never returned to my base level of shallow affect, but I also don’t suffer the crazy-inducing emotional onslaught, either.
Alex is the only one who takes my feelings to shattering heights.
Our night together under the waterfall did unlock a chamber, some dormant part of my mind, that awoke an emotion strong enough to alter the chemicals of my brain. And despite every rational cell in my body trying to deny it, and in spite of Grayson’s claim it can remake us…love is the only possible explanation.
I fell in love with Alex at Devil’s Peak.
I fell in love with the devil himself.
And I suppose this rare anomaly makes me disempathetic. A fairy tale psychopath enchanted by her dark Prince Charming.
We are lovesick villains.
My sickness isn’t without a form of compassion, however. That is the deciding difference for what governs me from becoming a heartless monster who takes life without thought.
Reason must exist in the face of compassion.
Because without either, I may have killed with the sole purpose of selfish thrill seeking.
We have to accept who we are becoming as the evolution progresses. This rare level of empathy gives me a special ability to select revenge targets who are deserving of not only justice, but of a second chance.
Whereby I design their retribution, and Alex structures their rehabilitation. Though he now refers to his upgraded methods as cognitive aversion restoration.
To me, it’s a little derivative of A Clockwork Orange…lacking the fun side effects of the milk. But Alex is improving upon his procedure exponentially, and we now even have one viable test subject
Some agree to the treatment as a test subject…and some don’t. We’re very selective with who we vet for each level of our project. Only the vilest, irredeemable human dregs are chosen for the full scope of the treatment without an exit plan.
We discovered a common ground when it came to the continuation of his experiment: London.
Knowing her field of expertise is in rehabilitating dangerous offenders, we expect to see her face appear on social media announcing a breakthrough miracle drug or procedure whereby she’ll claim fame to Alex’s research.
I don’t blame Alex for needing to know if his research and methods would ever result in a cure. Dr. Frankenstein met his death weighted with regret, wishing he’d killed the monster he created.
Alex isn’t seeking atonement; he’s pursuing a different fate.
More than support his endeavors to reclaim his research, I have always stood up to bullies. I have never backed down. Thus I refuse to let London call the final checkmate.
So for now, the pieces remain unmoved on the board. We cultivate our garden, as quoted by one of Voltaire’s great works, by focusing on our projects, on building our life together.
And we wait.
Until it’s time to make our move, we explore each other and the intimate world we created. Both the light and dark facets, as they coexist outside of us just as they do within, to be seen, felt, experienced.
What I believe: Every person on this planet has a twisted desire, some sickness and dark hunger begging to be fed. If this wasn’t the case, I wouldn’t have the lucrative business in revenge that I do.
Whether or not everyone is strong enough to acknowledge their inner monster, well, that’s why there are laws, to help the weak keep their devils in check, to make them feel safe and secure in a world that is anything but.
Because there is a little depravity in us all that craves to wander into the darkness.
Some do it safely from the comfort of their homes, investing in entertainment, movies, books.
Others do it more openly, seeking dangerous careers, whether legal or not.
Alex and I accept our twisted malady of the heart. We feed our monsters. We atone in shed blood, locked in each other’s arms.
Hell, driven mad, the Hatter tried to drown the dormouse in a teapot. In an alternate world that is completely illogical, murder seems the logical outlet to madness.
Alice spent her whole journey trying to return to her world of logic, where everything made sense, then she awoke only to miss her fantasy.
Draw your parallels to that.
The sound of Alex entering the cottage interrupts my journaling, and I look up from the page to see him lean against the doorway. He’s wearing his glasses today, his dark hair disheveled from hours of work. A layer of stubble shadows his jaw.
This is my favorite look on him, especially when his gaze devours me with purposeful intent, all dark yearning and craving reflected in his heated blue eyes.
I tuck my journal away and turn my chair to face him, crossing my legs slowly, seductively, the way I know drives him crazy. “I take it you found something.”
Removing his glasses, he pushes off the doorpost and stalks toward me. He drops his glasses on the rustic oak desk before he grabs the armrests of my chair, dragging the desk chair forward and caging me below him.
“Tell me you love me,” he says, something devious sparking behind his eyes.
I smile, lick my lips. “I love you, you fucking nut.”
Alex groans and captures my face between his palms, crushing his mouth to mine in a feral kiss, stealing my breath and senses.
I slide my hands up his chest, my fingers curling into the worn fabric of his shirt.
When he finally breaks away, he says, “We had a breakthrough with Subject Thirteen.” He delves into formula mixtures, rattling off metrics and readings, his excitement turning frenzied. “It’s only a matter of time—”
I press my finger over his mouth, silencing his manic spiel and talk of time. “Don’t tell me,” I say. “Show me.”
He smiles and nips my fingertip, then hauls me out of the chair and into his arms. He passes the doorway leading to his lab and instead enters the bedroom.
“You’re taking me the wrong way.”
He halts at the base of our bed and drops me on top of the feather comforter. Peering down at me with hooded eyes, Alex reaches behind his head and tugs his shirt off, revealing the defined, leanly carved muscles of his chest and abdomen.
“Correction,” he says, as he moves in to cover my body with his. “I’m taking you. Period.”
As we conduct our own feverish chemistry experiment between the sheets, embracing all that is violent and needy and loving within us, we accept the choices that wove our fate together.
Alex chose to love his monster.