Mirror Dreams

The layout was a mirror image of the other tower. She decided she might as well go upstairs and see if anyone was at home. A delicious smell wafted out of the room as Jodie pushed the door open. The king’s counting house had been quite cold, the golden glow from the money not managing to warm it. But this room was the opposite. Smells of food, incense and spices mingled together to create a great aroma. A cosy fire glowed in the corner of the room and the colours in the room transformed a brick room into an Indian themed palace. Silks of all colours of the rainbow lay scattered artistically around. In the centre of the room a long table was set for ten people.

At the head of the table sat the white queen, on her right was the black queen. Further down the table sat a hare and a mouse and opposite them sat Sundance. Jodie blinked, rubbed her eyes and blinked again. She wasn’t imagining it, Sundance was really there. Her Sundance; the person she had been looking for since she fell in the water. She couldn’t hold her joy in any longer.

“Sundance!” she squealed. Everyone at the table turned to stare at her. A white pawn that had been lounging lazily on a chaise jumped up and announced loudly,

“Thou ist now entering thy white queen’s parlour. Prithee please state your name and business.”

“Err...Jodie and I’m just um...visiting,” she finished lamely, not really sure why she was here except that she was just being nosy.

“How exquisite. I beg of thee to join us in our humble afternoon tea. How wouldst thou like the seat at the far end?” the white queen said.

“I shall like that a lot,” said Jodie. For that seat at the far end of the table was right next to where Sundance sat. She sat down next to him and smiled.

“You made it, finally. Have some food, it’s the best,” Sundance said to her, smiling back.

“Oh I can’t eat. It seems to make me grow and I don’t want to smash up this nice tower.” She sighed and looked wistfully at the table full of food.

“Course you can child,” the black queen shouted down from the other end of the table, “It’s just the rainbow coloured foods and red liquids that you should avoid.”

“Oh well in that case; what food is there?” Jodie asked as she eyed up the plates.

“Bread and honey, bread and honey or...bread and honey,” the mouse said sulkily.

“Ignore him; though he is right about the food selection,” the hare whispered. “The white queen only allows bread and honey to be consumed in her presence; it’s all she lives on. The dormouse here is sulking because his wife is no longer allowed to these parties because she brought some digestive biscuits with her once. I’m a march hare.”

“I was born in March!” Jodie said.

“I wasn’t; I was born in September.” The march hare replied.

Jodie couldn’t think of what to say to that, so she busied herself with eating the bread and honey. It was delicious and each one was different. Some of the bread was white, some brown, some seeded and some had no crusts. The honey was in various textures too; some that runny gooey type, others that more compact yellow-white type. They were cut into different shapes too.

Jodie was just reaching for her fifth piece when the door opened. The white pawn announced that the Hatter had arrived. The Hatter was tall and thin, with a large top hat on his head. He had brown hair, going grey and a handlebar moustache. He was wearing a black and white vertical striped suit and was carrying a large hat box.

“Good day your queens, good day fine people,” he said as he bowed respectively. The Hatter then took a deep breath and reeled out with hardly any pauses,

“Hats, hats, get your hats. Tall ones small ones short ones fat ones big ones little ones funny ones sombre ones classy ones fancy ones. Hats for all fashions all seasons all sexes all occasions. Get them here, get them now, state your price and I’ll go lower.”

While he had been talking the Hatter had opened his hat box and was pulling out hat upon hat, all in the styles he described. Jodie was amazed; his box was like the legendary Mary Poppins bag; it defied all laws of dimensions. The white queen and the black queen put down their food and started pawing at the hats; their sticky honey fingers leaving marks on the various hats. Jodie also got up to look at the hats. Some of them she found plain ridiculous; they were shaped like teapots or plant pots. But others were beautiful, made of the finest materials with delicate hand stitching on them.

“Hast thou found a hat thou favours?” the white queen whispered in her ear.

“Oh well...I haven’t quite decided between these two,” she replied, pointing at the two hats she liked.

One was a little sunhat, a pale blue colour like a sparrows eggs, it had a chain of yellow daisies stitched around the rim and a white silk ribbon to tie under her chin. But the other hat was a big showy hat like what her mother wore at Ascot. It was big and lilac with magenta stiff silk ruffles around the tall part. One part of the rim was wider and pointed upwards; strings of tiny pearls were sewn artistically around the hat and brim. A black velvety rose lay nestled in the silk and Jodie knew that it was a real flower. To most people, the hat was probably an eyesore, the colours clashed and whole style could possibly be called tacky. But to Jodie it was delightful, yet she didn’t know where she would ever go to wear such a hat.

“Hurry up child, there’s others in the queue and I'm parched for a drink.” The black queen was waiting to purchase several hats, her impatient voice rose higher as she screeched at Jodie. She took another look at the two hats and decided on the large colourful one.

“I have nowhere to wear it and no way to pay but I do love this hat so,” she said to the Hatter.

“Thou canst not use the bread and honey, that ist mine money,” the white queen said.

“Pay with bread and honey? Why do you do that when the king has piles of gold in this room?” Jodie asked the white queen.

“What wouldst thee Hatter want with gold, it is too heavy to be a hat. But bread and honey, it wouldst make one a delightful hat.”

“There is always a way to pay dear child,” said the black queen.

“Let’s see what you’ve got then; this hat here will cost you a bit,” the Hatter said. Jodie rifled through her pockets and pulled out everything she had. There wasn’t much. A clean white handkerchief, a small pink comb and a piece of string were laid on the table. The Hatter looked at them, he sucked his teeth and shook his head.

“No no these will not do. Sorry no deal – but wait, what’s that I hear. Tick tick tick it goes, now I know plenty people who would want a hat that ticks. Hand it over and we have a deal.”

Jodie realised he was talking about her watch; she looked at it and shrugged as she unfastened it. It was just a cheap plastic watch and the time was wrong anyway; she exchanged it for the hat and went to sit next to Sundance again. He looked at the hat that she had placed on her head and smiled.

“Nice hats, cool colours,” he drawled, “here, have some of these.” He passed Jodie a handful of skittle like pills. Jodie swallowed them immediately. She turned to watch the white queen and the black queen fighting with the Hatter over a hat. The white queen was raising the amount of bread and honey higher and higher while the black queen offered various items of clothing. Jodie laughed as she realised that as soon as one queen decided on a different hat the other one would suddenly start bargaining for that one too. She shifted her gaze onto the dormouse and march hare. They were talking to each other while not listening to each other. The dormouse was talking about the best sleep he had while the march hare seemed to be re-enacting a dream of his that either involved lots of gun shots or backfiring cars. Their conversation made Jodie realise how tired she was, she gave a sleepy stretch as she yawned and settled more comfortably into her chair.

“They’re mad...all mad...I’ll just close my eyes...just for a little while,” she muttered as she drifted off to sleep.