Page 70 of A Wonderland Wish on Ever After Street
‘Cleo!’ Bram must catch sight of me because he calls my name, and then I hear him shouting, ‘Excuse me! Let me through!’
He’s obviously stuck inside the doorway too, but I don’t wait to hear any more. I dash from the castle as fast as I can.
Usually I love everything about this beautiful old building and this place, but for today, I want to run away from Ever After Street, and never, ever come back.
20
‘I miss his hugs.’
‘I know. You’ve told me 15,698 times this week, and it’s only Tuesday afternoon.’ Marnie wraps her arm around my shoulder and gives me a squeeze.
‘He was the best hugger.’ I know I’m annoying her. I’m annoying myself, but I can’t stop thinking about Bram. Every inch of The Wonderland Teapot reminds me of him. Every customer who comes in either looks for him or asks me where he is. The third child this week has just left with their parents, disappointed that they didn’t get to see magic today.
‘I can’t work out how he does it, can you?’ Mrs Moreno says, unaware that when she asked where the Mad Hatter was, my bumbled explanation of ‘he’s not in today’ really meant ‘he’ll never be in again’ and that I’ve got my lip clenched between my teeth to stop tears forming in my eyes as she waxes lyrical about him when I take her toasted teacake over. ‘I always think I’ll catch him out if I watch closely enough, but I never do. Maybe he’s got actual magic powers, do you think?’
‘It’s a distinct possibility,’ I mumble, and then I have to go andhide out the back to get my emotions under control, and when I look up, Marnie is leaning against the doorframe, looking worried. ‘Why don’t you answer one of his texts?’
‘I did answer one of his texts. I told him to go away.’
‘And?’
‘He went away.’
She laughs and then schools her face when I must look like I’m mere seconds away from wailing.
We’ve opened The Wonderland Teapot again today. I was at such a loss yesterday morning, the day after the wedding, I didn’t know what to do or where to go, so I did what I’ve been doing every Monday morning since March – I put on an Alice dress and a black bow headband, added the pair of shiny black shoes that I’ve worn so much they don’t even pinch my toes any more, and came to work.
No one from the council has said that I shouldn’t. No one has confirmed that I’ve been fired from the tearoom, although it’s probably a safe bet to assume that I have. I’m expecting a ‘cease and desist’ visit from Mr Hastings at any moment, or one of his minions if he can’t stand the sight of me himself, but no one has come. The postman has been and gone, and yet another day has passed without a letter arriving that tells me I’m sacked and currently trespassing on council property.
So I carry on, even though everything’s in limbo, and the tearoom is missing a Mad Hatter. Marnie’s insisted on not leaving me to handle it by myself, so she’s bought a Cheshire Cat jumper and a cat ears headband, persuaded Darcy to look after A Tale As Old As Time, and spent the past two days helping me.
A father comes in with two little boys who want an Unbirthday party, and Bram’s absence is felt like a sinkhole in the middle of the tearoom. I push two tables together in a corner and put some props out to make it look like a Mad Hatter’s tea party.Colourful teacups glued together in stacks. Broken teapots with clay mushrooms sprouting from them. Colourful plates and a table sprinkled with confetti. But I never realised how impossible it would be to have a Mad Hatter’s celebration with no Mad Hatter.
I try to be fun and carefree, but I’m not loud. I can’t do magic. I mess up pulling a playing card out of my pocket, never mind making one appear in mid-air. I sing the boys ‘The Unbirthday Song’ but Bram’s lack of self-consciousness made me less self-conscious too, and without him, I’m crowing an out-of-tune disaster.
He’s left a bag of confetti, and I blow it over the boys. One of them gets glitter in his eye and starts bawling. One of them misses the playing card arch with the hedgehog ball on the flamingo croquet and has a tantrum, and the dad is busy dealing with the glitter-in-eye incident, and there’s no one to distract him from the tantrum with a magic trick, and I try to handle it by attempting to… persuade him not to have a tantrum. It does not end well. Technically it ends with him kicking me in the shin, which is fair enough, really. When the dad and two boys leave, it does not look like they’ll come back, ever.
I never went to his house and never got the Unbirthday cake recipe on Sunday, but I’ve been using Marnie’s kitchen to bake. It’s been days since I needed to use any of my supermarket-bought back-ups, and eventhatmakes me sad because Bram worked so hard to make me believe in myself and now he’s not here to share it with.
‘Oh, thank God,’ I murmur as I see off the last customer at 5p.m. the following day and turn the ‘open’ sign over to ‘closed’. Wednesday was no more successful than Monday or Tuesday were.
‘How can you mope in a place that’s as happy as this?’ Marnie starts clearing the tables and I pull on Bram’s bright pink rubber gloves and make a start on the washing up.
‘It’s not though, is it? It was Bram who made it happy. With me it’s just… doomed to failure, like everything else I get my hands on.’
‘I don’t think it’s theshopthat Bram made happy, do you?’ Even though I’m in the back room and she’s still on the shop floor, I canhearthe all-knowing raised eyebrow.
‘It’s like a break-up but we never actually broke up, and I’m not even sure youcanbreak up if you only kissed someone for the first time less than ten hoursbeforesaid break-up.’
‘No, but you’ve been emotionally attached to him for a lot longer than ten hours. And he has to you. I’ve never seen anyone so happy simply tobearound another person. I’ve known Bram for a while now. He’s bright, loud, hilarious, and always,alwaysputting on a front. He’s worked on that carousel for nearly two years and none of us have ever got to know him because he’sneverlet anyone see behind that front. Apart from you. And me and Darcy when we came over the other night. And you’ve done that. I don’t know anything about his life or why he finds it so hard to let people in, but he’s let you in far enough to let you bring other people in too, and that means something.’
‘It means everything, but look at what he’s lied about…’
‘Maybe, but there’s no way he sabotaged those bakes. He was so dedicated the other night when we were there. He worked harder than any of us.’
‘That was for his sister’s wedding.’
‘It’s not his style, Cleo. He’d make things disappear, not pour bloody salt onto them. And honestly, I believed everything he said the other day. It’s obvious how much he believes in this placeandin you. I think that obliterated whatever was supposed to come before.’
