The Cat vanished. Then, from her left ear: “You think you’re falling.” From her right: “You’ve been standing still the whole time.” His face reassembled in front of her nose, upside down. “Wonderland isn’t a place you visit, Alice. It’s the shape your sanity makes when it’s tired of being a square.”

But when she stood up, the ground felt suspiciously like a grin beneath her feet.

She wasn’t sure if she’d heard anything at all.