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A mirror, for all intents and purposes, is a reflective surface. When light waves strike said surface and bounce back in an equal and opposite direction, an image is formed—identical and reversed.

The earliest mirrors were of nature: basins of still water, polished stones and metal. Over time, people began to produce mirrors made of glass, one side with a thin coating of metal. As mirrors were widely used for people to look at themselves, they became synonymous with the term ‘looking glass.’

Wonderland, mid-summer.

The Queen of Hearts wanted Hanbin’s head on a platter.

Again.

“Off with his head!” the Queen screeches, her shrill voice carrying across the garden. 

A discordant sound escapes from Hao’s violin as his finger slips on one of the strings, the bow sliding sadly across the failed note. The Prince of Hearts closes his eyes and lets out a simmering exhale.

Patience is a virtue he is trying very, very hard to exercise these days.

In just a few quick strides, Hao is across the room and up against the window overlooking the garden, swinging it shut with a resounding thud. Immediately, the commotion outside reduces to nothing but a muffle, his mother’s murderous screams dwindling down to an afterthought. 

In line with practiced virtues, Hao walks back to where he had put down his violin and delicately places it back into that familiar juncture between his chin and shoulder, bow at the ready as his eyes scan to find where he left off on his sheet music before he had been so rudely interrupted. He resumes playing, slowly dissolving back into the lulls of the music.

Of all times, he cannot afford to be distracted right now.

A wide stage. Its edges dimmed in contrast to the blaring spotlight above him. He places himself in it, imagining the sea of faces staring back at him, mesmerized. The smooth wood between his fingers, the slight vibrations as horsehair angles against steel. The resulting notes, sweet, so sweet, so perfect. 

And yet—that was not how it had gone last time. This unwelcome thought scalds his mirage like searing tea on tongue, tasting of bitter leaves and his mother’s wrath.

By the time he reaches the end of the lengthy score, the volume outside seemed to have settled considerably, the resulting silence a stark contrast to the earlier uproar. 

Hao carefully places his instrument down, wincing as he rotates his shoulders back. His head drops into his chest as he gently kneads the back of his neck with one hand. He’ll have to remember to ask an attendant to deliver folded hot towels to his room later. 

When he finally lifts his head, a floating pair of eyes and an accompanying grin reveals itself not three feet away from his face. 

Hao swallows down a gasp, pressing a hand to his jolted heart. 

“Cheshire Cat,” he says as he glares at the offensive levitating facial features. “I told you not to sneak up on me like that.”

The air ripples, and colors and shadows begin to take shape where there were none before, saturating the corporeal form of the previously invisible creature. Then in front of him stands a young man of similar stature to himself, clad in a tweed vest of deep plum fitted over a simple, flowy tunic, holding in one hand what looks to be a plate of fruit tarts. 

“Oops,” Hanbin says. “I forgot.”

Hao knows he didn’t forget. Hanbin doesn’t forget anything that has to do with Hao.

“So what did you do this time?” Hao asks. He eyes the pile of desserts balancing in Hanbin’s hand. “Those don’t look like they belong to you.”

Hanbin’s grin only grows wider, two rows of white teeth flashing in blinding fashion. His cheekbones press up into whisker-like divots below his eyes. 

“They’re strawberry tarts. How was I supposed to know that only the Queen gets to eat these? I would’ve chosen the blueberry ones if I knew they were going to be worth my head.” He laughs, a short breathy noise. Laughs, like he doesn’t currently have a bounty and a death sentence on said head. 

Hao scoffs, giving him a pointed look. “Everyone knows the strawberry tarts are her favorite.”

“Well, the oyster cakes are my favorite and you don’t see me trying to murder every person who tries to eat one,” Hanbin says. 

It’s a good point. But when the Queen speaks, it becomes law.

“Whatever. Those are still stolen goods in your possession.”

“Delicious stolen goods,” Hanbin corrects. “Want one?”

Hao shakes his head at the plate now outreached towards him. “I still need to practice.”

“Oh. I thought you were done.” Hanbin’s grin drops, a crestfallen expression replacing it. He places the plate atop the nearby grand piano as he perches himself on its bench, mannerly hands on his knees, which peek out blotchy and pink from where his tailored shorts ride up his thighs. The afternoon sunlight bathes the back of his head through the window, blond hair glowing like a halo. “I was waiting for you to finish.”

Of course he was.

Because Hanbin does it all the time—conveniently camouflaged by the folds of his power, he watches Hao.

And Hao knows this. Not ever in the moment, no, as Hanbin only reveals himself to him when he wants. But he knows it happens. It’s but one of the many strange and unsettling things he’s come to realize about the other man—and like with the other things, he doesn’t much like to dwell on it if he can help it. 

But his mind betrays him today. A sudden image: Hanbin settled into one of the armchairs across from him, pale legs crossed as he indulged in a strawberry tart, attentive eyes enjoying his own private little show. Enjoying the privileges of his power, having access to the Prince of Hearts in the privacy of his own home. The thought makes Hao sway a little, off-kilter by something heavy weighing in his stomach.

“Well, you’re too early. I’m not done practicing.” Hao clears his throat, which has suddenly gone dry. “I’ve only got a couple weeks until the summer concert. My instructor wants me clocking in an extra hour of independent practice every day until then.”

“Don’t let me stop you! I can wait. I know how important this is to you,” Hanbin hurriedly says, waving his hands in front of him. “Besides, I don’t mind waiting; I love hearing you play. It’s my favorite sound in the world.” 

From anyone else, this would be a flattering hyperbole, something almost too juvenile in its phrasing to be serious, but from Hanbin, Hao can tell it’s close to the truth. It’s in the earnestness of his voice, the starry squeeze of his eyes. His face maps out every corner of his thoughts, making him so terribly easy to read.

It’s really why he lets the Cheshire Cat roam around him like he does, stealth and shadows and all. He’s harmless; he adores Hao.

“I doubt that statement would still hold true if you’d heard all the mistakes I made today. There was a certain distraction outside that kept interrupting my practice,” Hao sniffs. 

“Ah.” Hanbin’s eyes round as understanding dawns on him. “I didn’t realize that I… apologies, my Prince. I never meant to disturb you. I was just…” 

Hao stares down at the Cheshire Cat’s stumbling, and almost feels bad. It’s cruel of him to nitpick at this, to stick the needle and leave it in, especially when he knows Hanbin does it all for Hao. It’s no coincidence that the target of his mischief is always the Queen. The Prince had never asked for this, and yet, he knows.

He decides to be merciful. “Forget it; it’s fine. Tell me, why were you waiting for me to finish practice again?”

Seemingly revitalized by this single line from him, Hanbin leans forward, equal parts eager and conspiratorial as he says, “Come with me after practice? I have someplace I want to show you. It’ll make up for what happened today, I promise.” 

Admittedly, it’s an alluring invitation; Hao could use some fresh air after hours of being holed up in this music room. But with Hanbin, he has to be careful with how he expresses such sentiments.

“Won’t the Duchess be looking for you?” Hao asks, frowning as he turns to sift through his sheet music.

“She’s still playing croquet with the Queen.” Hanbin shrugs, unfazed. “Besides, chances are she wants me out of the Queen’s hair as much as possible after what happened earlier.”

“You can’t keep running from your keeper like that,” Hao chastises, but there’s no real bite to his words. They’re practiced, said enough times now that they both know where this conversation is heading. Like an actor reading from a script, saying what he knows to be the ‘right’ lines. Because between the two of them, someone should at least try to keep them in check—heaven knows it won’t be Hanbin.

If it were up to Hanbin, there wouldn’t be a script at all. 

“It’s fine. It’s not like she’ll come running after me.” Hanbin’s lips quirk, sly. “And I’m sure by now she knows I’m with you.”

Ignoring the warm flush inching up the back of his neck at the implication, Hao deigns a low noise of acknowledgement, loudly flipping a page of his sheet music. It’s enough that the palace attendants and guards all know that where the Prince is, the Cheshire Cat is sure to be near—by default everything is prepared in pairs: two places at afternoon tea, two riding horses, two sets of slippers. But whispers love to travel, and if enough ants murmur about, the birds flying overhead are bound to take notice. The Duchess does not scare Hao—but the assumption that this awareness has, by extension, reached the Queen is a harder poison to swallow. Something about it feels too exposed, too intrusive. Hao despises it.

“Maybe,” Hao reluctantly concedes. “But just know that if she needs you back at her side later, there’s nothing I can do.”

It’s a lie, and they both know it. So far be it from Hao to resist adding his lashings, if just to stubbornly get his point across: “You’d do best not to forget yourself.”

Hanbin has enough instinct to look somewhat abashed, or as abashed as one could look when staring at Hao with a carnal look of want.

Hao pretends not to notice, pointedly looking away as he kneads his wrist, taking his time with it. Even in such passing moments like this, Hanbin can never quite seem to contain himself—his desire. It’s always an underlying current, thrumming in his every word and action with Hao, as innocent as it initially may seem. As time has gone on, Hao has learned to leave nature as it is, for any morsel from him is equivalent to the shifting of tectonic plates for Hanbin, and he is loath to incite any disasters.

It’s easier like this. A cold shoulder, a flat stare. Holding it all at arm’s length.

After a long moment, Hao says, ”Give me half an hour.”

It’s as if he had told Hanbin he would run away with him, with the way the Cheshire Cat full-body shivers from excitement, hands squeezing into balls on his lap. He looks at Hao like he’s the moon itself.

Tectonic plates.

The sleepy lull of late afternoon blankets the air as they idly thread their way through a dirt path running alongside the White Rabbit’s cottage. At some point, they had to deviate from the pathway and push past a thick patch of tall grasses to enter a cozy patch of field near the edge of the woods, all lush greenery and buzzing, iridescent insects. 

They’re holding hands. Though, Hao thinks, it’s only because it had been necessary in order to sneak them out of the palace, as Hanbin’s invisibility only transfers to other people if he’s touching them. It’s only like this that they were able to slide past the ever present guards posted in nearly every corner of the castle.

They are well out of the way of the castle now, and Hanbin had dropped the invisibility cover some time ago. 

Hanbin’s palm is warm and slick against Hao’s. 

The Cheshire Cat leads them to an area of the field where a colorful thicket of gigantic flowers are gathered. As the pair approach, the flowers break from where they had previously been huddled together in conversation, their heads swiveling to face the newcomers. From stem to petal they tower over both men, so Hao has to look up to face them.

“What’s this?” one of the flowers—a tiger-lily—asks. “You brought a friend.”

Hao loosens his hand from Hanbin’s and lets it drop by his side. Out of the corner of his eye, he sees the other man’s face falter in disappointment for a moment, but Hanbin seems to recover quickly as he steps forward to address the flowers. 

“This, my friends, is your Prince of Hearts!” he announces proudly. “How would you all feel about performing for him? Your performance at the Mad Hatter’s tea party last week really impressed me, so I thought you all needed some well-deserved royal recognition.” 

For all his pranks and hijinks, Hao sometimes forgets that Hanbin does this part so well: he’s incredibly eloquent in speech, in both cadence and flattery, somehow managing to bring a touch of formality that lends respect rather than distance. To the untrained eye—namely, everyone who is not Hao—he’s a proper gentleman, with all his polished words and toothy smiles. It’s no wonder that he’s so beloved at court.

And it is also just like Hanbin to somehow have befriended these unexpected creatures that Hao would have never encountered on his own accord; his open demeanor is captivating in a way that it’s nearly impossible to not get pulled into his orbit, charismatic and amiable almost to a fault.

Hao remains the exception, of course.

“The Prince of Hearts, eh?” A violet pulls closer, its green stem stretching. Its dark bud—face?— seems to scrutinize Hao up and down. “You sure you’re not just trying to fool us by bringing us some handsome man to pass off as royalty?” 

Hanbin blushes as if it were him receiving the compliment. “Of course not! I’ve told you before—I’m close with the Prince.”

There’s that blinding grin again as he turns to look back at Hao. “Very close.”

Finding great interest in a red and white spotted mushroom by his feet, Hao kicks at it passively for good measure.

“What say you then, ‘Your Highness’?” the tiger-lily pipes up. “How do we know the Cheshire Cat is telling the truth?”

Deliberately avoiding eye contact with the suspect in question, Hao raises his head only to tilt it, playing up his pondering. All of this is very much low stakes to him, but it seems like Hanbin is eager for Hao to see whatever these flowers are so great at. They’re already all the way here, so they might as well get what they came for. “If you’re as good as the Cheshire Cat says you are, I’ll draft up a formal invitation for you all to perform for us at the palace, how’s that? My mother is fond of performances; it shouldn’t be too difficult to convince her.”

“Really?” a dahlia in the back squeals in excitement. “What about the summer concert? Could we get invited to that too?”

“It might be a little late for that this year, but maybe next year,” Hao appeases. “But again. I’ll just have to see how good you really are.”

The flowers look at each other, forming a huddle as they exchange a few words in low tones before the violet turns back to the pair to deliver their final verdict: 

“We’ll need some time to rehearse.”

So Hao and Hanbin wander a little until they find a relatively shaded patch of grass not far from the flowers, onto which Hanbin unrolls a checkered blanket from his knapsack. As the Cheshire Cat unloads a collection of stolen snacks from the palace onto the blanket, Hao sits and pulls out a small tin case from his pocket, popping open the lid with a push of his thumb. 

He holds it out, showing its contents to Hanbin. “You want?”

All it takes is one look for Hanbin to punch out an excited laugh, his leg swinging over the mountain of food to collapse beside Hao on the blanket. 

“You really brought that for us?” His eyes crinkle from how hard he’s smiling. 

“I had it around.” 

Hao pulls out one of the two rolled cigarettes neatly nestled in the case and lodges it between his lips. From the corner of his eye, he can see Hanbin tracking his movements voraciously as he draws out a pack of matches and, in one swift practiced motion, strikes a flame and brings it up to the end of the joint, inhaling as he does. Once he checks that the flame had taken, Hao exhales a steady white stream of smoke upwards and passes the joint to Hanbin, who takes it from him with both hands, almost reverent. Hanbin’s lips press pink and white against the rolled paper, placed carefully at exactly where Hao’s lips had been earlier. He takes a long, savoringly slow drag. When he finally exhales, tendrils of smoke spill from his mouth and nostrils like a dragon. 

Every once in a while Hao ventures out into the forest to pay a visit to the Caterpillar, the businessman of a creature supplying him with a month’s worth of the magical plant substance at a time. It’s fantastic pain relief after grueling hours of practice.

They pass the joint back and forth like this until they finish it down to a nub, and before long, they’re digging into the stash of stolen food, the floaty feeling in their heads convincing them that their stomachs are cavernous. 

Hao finally takes a bite of one of the unpacked strawberry tarts. Perfectly sweet and flaky, it melts in his mouth like honey in tea. Instinctively, a low hum escapes from the back of his throat. “Maybe I’m starting to see why the Queen would kill for these,” he says between bites.

Hanbin cocks his head, lowering his oyster cake. “You’ve never tried one before?”

“And have my head served on a platter next to yours?” Hao snorts. “Please. It’s treasonous to eat a strawberry tart meant for the Queen, royal family or not. And every strawberry tart in the palace is meant for the Queen.”

Hanbin doesn’t say anything for a while, staring down at his uneaten cake, then— “I’ll make sure there will always be strawberry tarts meant for you from now on.”

Something about the serious expression on the Cheshire Cat’s face combined with the lightness Hao feels in his body pitches him over in a fit of giggles. It’s dreadfully cheesy, but he can’t help the flash of endearment that washes through him. Something about it feels wrong, like he’s somehow breaking a rule, but the avenues of his mind are foggy and Hanbin is funny and he laughs and laughs and laughs.

Then Hanbin too is giggling, his previously solemn countenance crumbling into a familiar scrunch of whisker dimples across his cheeks. The magical substance they had burned up and filled their lungs with leaves them in a state of dizzying euphoria, and every little thing is somehow that much more whimsical and silly. They snort over how the White Rabbit showed up in his nightcap this morning in his haste to get to work on time, how the flamingo the Queen had been using as a croquet club decided mid-game to take to the skies, never to return, how the Queen sneezed turtle soup all over herself at lunch because the chef had accidentally used pepper instead of salt.

They become a lackadaisical mess of limbs on that blanket in their mirth; Hao’s hand grips Hanbin’s shoulder for support while Hanbin’s own hand lands on Hao’s thigh, right where his shorts end and skin begins. They’re unconsciously leaning into one another, and Hanbin takes the opportunity to drop his head onto Hao’s shoulder, face skimming the side of his neck. The shape of the other man’s smile tingles against his skin. 

“You know, you should wait a few days before coming back to the castle,” Hao says in a brief moment of clarity once they had alleviated most of their tittering. “Give the Queen some time to cool off. In time, she’ll eventually forget that she has an execution order out for you. Like last time.” 

Hanbin lets out a sigh that tickles the base of Hao’s neck. He hasn’t moved from his earlier position, even though Hao has already pulled his own hands off of Hanbin to support himself as he leans back against the blanket. 

A pleasant breeze wafts across the clearing, ruffling strands of Hanbin’s hair against his jaw. He smells like cedar and longing.

“I don’t want to wait that long to see you again,” the Cheshire Cat murmurs quietly.

“It’s just for a couple days.”

Hanbin shakes his head, burying his face further into the crook of Hao’s neck as he does. The air seems to run cold as he hears the other man inhale deeply, long and full, his nose pressed directly against Hao’s skipping pulse. A shiver threatens to run through him.

Here, a decision is made.

This time, it’s Hao who sighs. He shifts himself so that Hanbin’s head can no longer rest against his shoulder, and straightens when Hanbin looks up at him, dark eyes quivering. 

It’s moments like this where Hao feels the need to draw the line on their friendship—or whatever it is they had going on. 

From the first day they met, Hanbin had made his desire for the Prince abundantly clear. 

Back then, he was just the Duchess’s newest pet, the interesting sometimes-invisible creature she brought along with her to the palace one day as a sort of show-and-tell prop. For months, it was common knowledge at court that she had been searching for something; she had fallen wayward on the social scale among the noble circles after a particularly embarrassing incident involving one of the Queen’s peacocks at the prior year’s summer concert (don’t ask), and had somehow gotten it into her head that in order to be lifted back into society’s graces, she needed to find the most fascinating creature in all of Wonderland—and make sure everyone knew they were hers.

The Duchess presented the Cheshire Cat to the Queen and the rest of the royal court at a garden party early last spring, where Hanbin unequivocally stole the show—first with his pretty face, then with his unexpected abilities. No one had been prepared to witness him vanish out of thin air on command, only to leave his eyes and ever-present grin eerily hanging behind. He was deemed to be an absolute delight by the Queen of Hearts herself—which, looking back, is a terribly amusing thought—and for the rest of the day, the Duchess flounced around the party with newfound pride and confidence, her ruffled balloon sleeves swollen like her ego, her cowbell earrings ringing with the promise of royal favor. 

And somewhere in the midst of it all: enter Hao. 

It’s only fitting that Hanbin noticed him first. Up on the platform with his glossy violin and tidy outfit, the Prince was a sight to behold and a symphony for the ears. At least, that is, according to Hanbin. Hao remembers that day differently.

(Despite it all, he quietly takes Hanbin’s words and tucks them into his pocket for safekeeping.  For a rainy day when his fingers stiffen, for when he pulls at a wrong note, for when he wonders, despite the love he has for the instrument, if it’s even worth it.)

When they finally crossed paths later that day, it had been in the washroom of all places. 

Perhaps Hao should have been paying more attention when he stepped out of the stall to wash his hands at the marble sink. Perhaps if he had been thinking less of his mistake on stage and the way his mother’s frown seemed to muffle out the polite applause and the resulting shame that seemed greater than death, he would have noticed the door to the washroom open and close with seemingly no cause. Instead, he had been greeted with a curiously frightening sight behind him in the looking glass: a pair of glowing eyes and an equally blinding white smile, hovering in thin air without a matching body to be seen. 

He saw madness, in more ways than one.

He knows this because on that first day, when Hao had asked him in the washroom, “Aren’t you that Duchess’s Cheshire Cat?”, Hanbin had given him his true name instead. 

To readily give away your true name in Wonderland is to be reckless to a fault. There’s a reason why everyone has a distinct title here, one both identifiable yet impersonal—there is both intimacy and power in knowing another’s name, in calling it. Names are a dangerous, slippery thing; if whispered into the wrong tree hollow, or chanted as one brewed a peculiar concoction, or hummed into a lilting tune as one strolled through an unexplored part of the forest, the named is beholden to lasting consequences, and very much at the mercy of the one who utters it. You do not give your true name to someone you don’t trust with your entire existence, and more. 

Hao knew then that Hanbin was mad.

The thing is, most people do not probe far enough around Hao’s iron exterior to find its cracks, much less break themselves into small enough fragments to slip through. But Hanbin was nothing if not persistence personified. It had started with excuses to slip away from the Duchess during her visits to the palace, to gifts left on the Prince’s windowsill, to walks around palace grounds under the thin moonlight. Lingering looks across the ballroom, mugs of spiked hot cocoa over playing cards, trembling shoulders by the crackling fireplace. Like sediment, the Cheshire Cat settled into the crevices of his daily life with startling ease. And over time, his presence compounded into something more solid—companionship. A friend, Hao supposes.

But it was too easy, the way he readily showed Hao these pieces of himself. After all, there was burden in trust, even misplaced ones, and Hao had never wanted to be a keeper. Not even now, when Hanbin looks up at him with shining eyes framed by those long, thick eyelashes, a darling blush dusting across the tops of his cheeks, gaze thick with hunger as it imperceptibly flickers down to Hao’s lips. 

There are just some things you shouldn’t do with a madman.

Hao pulls back and looks away, breaking the moment. Suddenly, he regrets smoking so much. 

“Do you think they’re” —he angles his head towards the flowers— “done rehearsing yet?”

When Hanbin picks himself up, his whole face and neck are flushed pink as a petal, but he pulls Hao up with a steady hand and leads him back to where the flowers are now singing together in a lovely harmony. At Hanbin’s inquiry, the tiger-lily says: “We’re ready, but you have to forgive us—we’re rather nervous. We want this to be good for His Highness.”

At this, Hao draws out his tin case once more, then offers his last remaining joint to the flowers. “Would this help with those nerves at all?” 

Another match is struck. Hanbin holds the joint to the bud of each flower as they take turns taking hits, their soft petals fluttering with each exhale. Hao and Hanbin sneak in their own turns as well, and Hao humors the gradually swaying flowers by pursing his cheeks and blowing out rings of smoke that Hanbin attempts to throw blades of grass through. Eventually, the flowers come to the conclusion that their nerves do indeed seem to have settled, and thus, are ready to put on a performance as planned. Hanbin claps his hands excitedly and whispers to Hao, “You’re going to love this.”

The flowers sing a long-winded, nonsensical song for them, their buds expanding as they harmonize like a chamber choir, perfect notes filling the chirping field. Then they sing another, and another, and another, until Hanbin says, “Oh! Can you sing the one about the girl who fell down a rabbit hole?”

“Remind us how that one goes again,” a rose says.

“Ah,” Hanbin clears his throat. “I think it goes a little like—” 

Then he lets out a short melody in his sweet, airy tone, and although the flowers had put on an exemplary show, Hao can’t help but wish that the Cheshire Cat would keep singing instead, that pretty, pretty voice chiming in his skull like a hymn. He stares at Hanbin’s mouth, those corners lifting into a slight smile even as he sings, and those eyebrows, usually so straight but now upturned—gentle, so bright. It’s hard to look away.

However, it seems that the singing flowers are not of the same opinion; their demeanor quickly sours, and they begin to hiss at Hanbin, their petals poised and sharpened as if to attack. “Well! If you were just going to show off, you should have done it before we made a fool of ourselves!” the violet spits. 

“Oh, no, I didn’t—” Hanbin sputters, tripping over his words as he attempts to do damage control. His hands wave frantically in front of him. “You were amazing! I wasn’t—”

But Hao lets out a loud snicker when he understands. “They’re jealous of your pretty voice,” he says low into Hanbin’s ear, which reddens almost immediately. 

Eyes alight, Hanbin seems to latch onto this and this only as he pays no regard to the flowers slowly looming over the pair and growing angrier by the minute, turning fully to look at Hao with an awed smile pulling at his lips. It takes an incredibly strong yank on the arm to pull Hanbin from his revery, and then they’re sprinting across the field, stopping only to grab the Cheshire Cat’s knapsack before dashing away into the orange sunset, giggles heard through the rustling of tall grasses.

Spain, late 1640s.

The goddess Venus lays nude across a bed. In this display of casual elegance, she gazes upon a mirror that is propped up for her by Cupid, her cherub son. Venus’s back is turned toward us, but we can see her face reflected in the mirror, gazing—presumably—upon herself. 

Rokeby Venus, painted by Diego Veláquez during the Spanish Golden Age. Since then, critics have provided their own interpretations of the artwork. Perhaps it is less so an actual portrayal of the goddess herself, they say, and more so a depiction of sensuality, a motif of erotic nature. Perhaps it is a commentary on self-absorption, of beauty admiring beauty.

Our angle provides us with the knowledge of Venus’s face in the reflection, turned our way, and yet—we are not directly behind her. Nor are there any other faces reflected back at us. Indeed, a mirror replicates exactly the reality it screens, but thanks to distance, depth, and perception, reality is different for each individual in the room. Thus, it only seems possible that Venus is not looking at herself. Through the mirror, we witness the goddess of love, beautiful and half-shrouded in shadow, and in turn, she witnesses us—unnamed, invisible, caught in the honey of her gaze.

Without this acknowledgment, this simple act of witnessing, we would not exist. In the four corners of this world, Venus is the art. But because she sees us, suddenly—we are, too.

Wonderland, the previous autumn.

Carelessness is a flaw. Hao is careful to make sure it doesn’t become one of his.

Not that it has truly ever been an issue; when your mother is the Queen of Hearts, you learn very quickly that flawlessness is the expectation at all times. For the poor souls in her service, it quite literally translates to life or death. For him, it’s a different matter altogether.

So in his carefulness, he learns to compartmentalize. 

Well, first: he absorbs. Then compartmentalizes. Tried and true steps that he shuffles through like law—guideposts to his sanity, crucial to his being. The pursuit of knowledge is never-ending; it all sinks into Hao like stones in a river, and is held the same way, kept close near the bottom as he mulls it all over, weighing pebbles versus rocks for every decision in his waters. 

Good, not so good, bad. 

Easy, not so easy, difficult. 

Useful, not so useful, rubbish. 

Everything is given great thought and consideration. Every ask is intentional; every answer is functional. He buries his whirlpool of thoughts into dark depths so that he can maintain the smooth facade of unbroken water on the surface. 

Differentiating between fear and love was the earliest of his lessons. Nurses reached their arms out for Hao to soothe his babbling cries; the noise was bothersome to the Queen. Teachers spent extra hours tutoring him after class periods to make sure he thoroughly understood the material; the Queen held an exact and unmoving standard for the heir’s education. Guards wrapped his elbows and knees and fitted him with a helmet before he was allowed to run off for playtime; the Prince must be protected, but they themselves must be as well—one from injury and the other from cruel death. 

Hao eventually learns that placation and apprehension are no replacements for love. 

As for Hao’s parents, well. 

One can imagine the gears churning in a young boy’s mind, attempting to decipher the bramble bushes of the Queen’s demeanor in the context of love. The strict routines, the staggering expectations, the ear-ringing reprimands. The polished public appearances as her perfect, shining musical doll, made to twirl and entertain every time she opened up his box. Now as a man, he’s slightly less so subject to these things—presumably because he’s mostly filled out the way she wanted, achieved some sort of satisfactory marker in her book for now. Sometimes he still finds himself trying to convince himself that in some twisted way, that, too, must be a form of love. But truthfully, he doesn’t know what to think of it anymore; it’s all he’s ever known, so he takes it as it is.

Apathy is not wasting more than a line on the King of Hearts, as he made sure to embody the same principle when it came to fatherhood.

So when Hanbin comes to him with saccharine words and no expectations besides his company in the plainest sense of the word, Hao is wary. And with him, he brought things he only showed to Hao, things that the others at court must dream of receiving: smiles that squeeze into dimples, a chin lifted in a silent ask for scratches, a vulnerability that rivals open heart surgery. The Cheshire Cat shares so much of himself that Hao’s river threatens to overflow, his offerings less so material and more so disastrous. But Hao is nothing if not resourceful, so he keeps it in, holds his cards close to his chest. The forthcoming edges of Hanbin’s offerings are made smooth by Hao turning them over and over, trying to make heads and tails of it all.

Hanbin is the one thing he hasn’t been able to compartmentalize. 

And so Hao waits. After all, it means there’s something he’s missing, some piece of information he hasn’t absorbed yet, and until then, a decision cannot be made. He waits for the other shoe to drop—for someone else to catch the madman’s eye, maybe, for him to eventually lose interest. Like everyone else who has flitted in and out of his life, he waits for Hanbin’s supposed love to become conditional.

When a horseback riding incident leaves Hao bedridden with a bad ankle fracture for weeks, the Cheshire Cat leans in from where he sits by his bedside and says, “I want to take your pain.”

It’s the way he says it—not I wish or if only, but a dare against the impossible, something someone who only thinks in impossibilities could possibly conjure up and act upon. A madness. The thin set of his mouth and stillness of his eyes speak to the solemnity of his statement. 

Hao fidgets against the bedding, unsettled by the other’s uncharacteristic graveness. “What are you saying?”

“There must be a way. We have potions to shrink people down to the size of bugs, and there are rabbit holes that spit people out into strange worlds with moving machines of metal and rubber. There has to be something that can do this, right?” 

“To do what exactly?” Hao presses. He rubs his temple, where he’s starting to get a pulsing headache. “To take away my pain?”

“I told you. I want to make your pain mine.”

Strangely enough, Hao understands what he means. Because he knows enough from Hanbin’s offerings that Hanbin merges his desire with his sense of self, and from it, concocts something of a reflection. To him, both of those things are the same: experiencing Hao’s pain in a way that means taking it for his own, and experiencing his pain in a way that means understanding it, their bodies aligning so identically that maybe even the universe would confuse their existence as one.

Good, not so good, bad. So good that it’s bad? 

Hao stumbles over rocks.

He knows what he feels in his chest suddenly is not physical pain, and yet—it’s become so tight and warm right in the center, like a small but powerful hearth threatening to outglow the boundaries of his being.

When he reaches the point where he can’t decide, he defaults to deflection. “There’s a stronger possibility of the White Rabbit getting a pocket watch that runs on real time.”

This is hilarious to Hanbin for some reason, as suddenly his mouth is wide with laughter. There’s a little gap in the bottom row of his teeth that peeks out in the midst of his mirth; Hao sinks this pearl of information. 

In truth, Hao does not think he’s half as funny as Hanbin always makes it out to seem, but he suspects it has less to do with the actual humor and more to do with who it comes from. “Oh, my Prince. You’re so adorable.” The Cheshire Cat gently traces a pale finger along the back of Hao’s hand resting atop the sheets. “Anything’s possible in Wonderland.”

Hanbin never does find a way to feel or absorb Hao’s pain, though it is not for lack of trying. He comes close enough; they learn that the Caterpillar supplies more than just magical plants for the right amount of coin—and that as much as there are substances with healing properties, there are many others that do the very opposite.

With the tide of time, Hao eventually heals.

But if he looks back to that period of time, Hao thinks perhaps Hanbin did succeed in a way—because in that moment, his pain was briefly forgotten, lost somewhere between the words possible and unconditional fogging the avenues of his mind. 

Hope is a terrifyingly fickle thing.

Hao patiently waits for that to leave him too.

Wonderland, mid-summer.

It’s the smell that alerts Hao first. The rose garden is an unlikely place to host such a sharp, acrid stench.

Peeking out over the trimmed labyrinth of bushes is a crown of blond hair, moving back and forth between rows of greenery, busy at work. So busy, clearly, that Hanbin doesn’t notice the Prince approaching from behind until he’s yanked back from his work by the scruff of his neck. He yowls in surprise, but quickly melts away from a fight when he sees who holds him at his mercy.

“Cheshire Cat,” Hao seethes, “what the hell are you doing here?”

Hanbin is painted in guilt—literally. He holds a dripping paintbrush in one hand, and by his feet sits a bucket filled with white paint. Behind him, half of the Queen’s treasured red roses have been purposefully redesigned into a chalky white hue. 

The other man has the gall to crack a smile as he says, “I’m leaving a little gift for the Queen.” There’s a streak of paint smudged across the top of his cheek; it cracks against the weight of his dimples. 

“I can see that,” Hao says, his brows knitting. “But that’s not what I asked. I said, what are you doing here?”

Hanbin’s smile wanes. “What do you mean?”

“Didn’t you lis—” Hao sucks in a sharp whistle of air through his teeth, reseting. It’s unseemly to let his emotions run amok like this. Un-princely. He relinquishes his hold of the Cheshire Cat and steps back. “I told you to stay away from the palace for a few days. What if someone sees you? In case you forgot, there’s still an order out for your damn head.”

“Ah, right. That.” Hanbin doesn’t seem particularly concerned with that piece of information, his shoulders half-shrugging. “It’s hard for me to stay away for long. You know that.”

“It’s been one day.”

“A day and a half,” Hanbin corrects.

“You—” Hao glares at him. “You’re impossible.”

He receives two rows of gleaming teeth in response. His eyes become trained on a wayward strand of sandy hair sticking out from the side of the Cheshire Cat’s head. He’s taken aback by the sudden urge to reach out and smooth it down, to fix this little thing that doesn’t need fixing, not really.

“And careless,” Hao adds, for extra effect (as well as a reminder for his own sake). “What’s the point of having invisibility powers if you don’t even use it?”

Envy is not something he would ever outright admit, especially not to Hanbin, because the truth is a little more muddled than that. The golden bars of his gilded cage are at least wide enough for him to see Hanbin in the distance, encased in his own jeweled pen. But at least the other man has the option of disappearing—has the option of existing at times without the scrutiny. He just doesn’t understand why the Cheshire Cat doesn’t always hole away into the shadows all the time when he can. 

“If I had made myself invisible, then how would you have found me?”

A drop of white paint falls from the end of Hanbin’s brush, landing on grass. Somewhere behind Hao’s ear, a bee buzzes by in a ticklish flurry.

Somehow when it comes to Hanbin, even when it’s not about Hao, it becomes about Hao. 

“Anyone could have found you just now,” Hao says.

“But it happened to be you.” Another drop of white splatters on grass. “If I had hidden away, no one would have been able to find me. That includes you.”

“Is that so awful, Cheshire Cat?”

“The worst,” Hanbin replies, rueful grin still plastered on his face. But his eyes don’t squeeze into that familiar scrunch. Half-humor, full truth.

“I’m starting to think you have a death wish,” Hao says, choosing humor—albeit the dark kind—as the easier version to deal with.

“If I’m to become a ghost in the afterlife anyways, shouldn’t I enjoy living in my body to the fullest while I can?” Despite Hanbin’s teasing tone, Hao frowns at the thought.

“I’m sure the Queen will still find a way to behead even your ghost when she sees what you’ve done to her precious roses,” Hao says, nodding at the paint job behind him.

As a principle, he tries not to encourage Hanbin’s mischievous behavior, mainly to avoid spilled blood—but he can’t help it if a minuscule part of him settles into quiet approval, waiting in anticipation for when his mother will eventually stumble upon Hanbin’s handiwork. 

“Not if she doesn’t know that I did it. You wouldn’t tell her, would you?” It’s a rhetorical question. Even as it passes through Hanbin’s lips, the Cheshire Cat looks at him with a strange expression of somehow both smugness and hope, as if he already knows the answer he’ll receive will be different from the one left unspoken. 

“I won’t if you promise not to show your face around here for at least a week,” Hao grumbles. 

Now it’s Hanbin’s turn to sulk. “Fine,” he relents, bending down to pick up his pail of paint, but not before giving Hao one last lingering look, as if committing his face to memory, lest he forgets it in the upcoming week.

As Hanbin petulantly gathers his supplies, Hao asks innocently, “Are you not going to finish your work first?” His eyes trail the lush red roses still dotted around him. “I don’t think finding half of your precious roses redecorated would quite inspire the same anger than if you were to find all of them in that state.”

Half an hour later, Hao leaves the garden sucking on a knuckle, blood swirling through his saliva. Paint dots along the collar of his shirt, alabaster against the beige fabric. 

He forgets that thorns sometimes have roses.

Wonderland, the previous winter.

The thing is, Hao is always tired. 

Bone-tired, like the marrow’s been carved out and he’s left wobbling around on hollow sticks, susceptible to even the slightest jostle. How is it possible that he’s so pampered and yet so drained of life?

Sometimes he looks at his violin and thinks of ways to destroy it. He would start at the strings, snip them all with pliers, listen to their fading shrieks as they fell, loosened. Then he would snap the neck, watch as it splintered from the body in jagged pieces. And finally, he would take something heavy—perhaps a sledgehammer—and ram it through the center of the body, right between the f-holes. 

These are thoughts he never thought he’d ever have. Back when this instrument belonged to him and him alone, Hao thought the world ran through his fingers, cradled between his neck and shoulder. He didn’t realize that sharing his art meant that he had to carve out pieces of himself as well. Suddenly, there were rules to his passion, standards to his love. He tried to keep up as much as possible, but it seemed that it was always inevitable that he would fall wayward, unbalanced by all the parts of him he’d lost in the process.

Sometimes Hao thinks about his imaginary destroyed violin and thinks he would feel right at home among its tattered parts. But instead, he has to act as it exists now, intact with its glossy exterior and finely crafted edges. Cold to the touch, beautiful to the eyes and ears. 

When he licks his wounds, he does it in the shadows where no one can see. It’s not his fault that Hanbin is already there when he does.

“Why do you keep doing it if it gives you so much grief?” Hanbin asks one night as he wrings a towel over a steaming pail of water. 

With one warm towel already folded around his neck and two wrapped across each of his wrists, Hao can only answer with words, lest he forgoes his comfortable position on the armchair. “It doesn’t give me grief.”

“You look pretty grievous to me right now.”

Hao risks it, kicking out a leg to land a soft blow to the other’s shin. He’s too slow. Hanbin lets out what can only be described as a giggle, barely dodging it as he twists around on his stool. Several drops of water fly from the towel in his hands, dotting across Hao’s lap and the dark leather of his armchair. 

“Are you trying to help me or not?” Hao complains, glaring at his stained trousers. 

“Alright, alright,” Hanbin relents, but not without a sly smile. “Lean your head back.” Once Hao does, he pushes Hao’s hair back with his fingers, gentle and careful, and lays the folded towel across his forehead. The Prince can’t help the sigh that escapes from his lips from the comforting heat pressed against his skin. He needed this more than he knows.

“Good?”

“Very good,” Hao murmurs, his eyes fluttering shut. But before they do, he doesn’t miss the way Hanbin seems to squirm at this, so clearly affected by the simple praise. He shuffles this bit of information somewhere, for some other place and some other time. 

With his eyes closed, he hears Hanbin moving about beside him, probably organizing away the rest of the towels. After a while, the movement quiets, and he feels a hand—no, two hands—on his, holding it, turning it over. Hao peeks an eye open to see Hanbin still on his stool but slouched forward so that his elbows rest across the thick arm of his chair. His hand is sandwiched between both of Hanbin’s, the other man taking liberties and running his fingers across his palm, the grooves between his fingers, his fingertips. The Cheshire Cat is so concentrated, his brow furrowed as if this is the most fascinating subject he’s ever come across.

“Does this part not give you grief?” Hanbin’s tapping on something, looking somewhat concerned, and Hao looks down just enough to see without dropping the towel on his forehead. He’s pressing on Hao’s calluses on the tips of his fingers, feeling the thick skin there.

“No, it doesn’t.” Years of pressing down on violin strings have granted him rough pads on the surface of his digits, a badge he wears with honor, something tangible to show for the hours holed up in the music room besides a stiff neck and aching wrists and elbows. He tells Hanbin as much. “I actually like that part. You know, there are some benefits to it. I can pick up really hot things; I don’t feel it at all.”

“Really.” Hanbin’s mouth rounds. “That’s impressive.”

“Right? Who needs invisibility powers when you have I-can-pick-up-really-hot-things powers?” Hao deadpans.

The tinkle of Hanbin’s laugh is airy, lovely. Hao is fortunate to hear it often.

This thought makes room in Hao’s mind before he realizes what’s happened, and he duly squares this one away as well. In his flustered haze, he just barely registers the other man saying, “Whatever. It’s different because you worked to earn it. So this doesn’t hurt?”

Hao shakes his head, watching the other man cautiously press the edge of his thumbnail against one of his calluses. “You don’t have to be so careful. It won’t hurt me.”

But Hanbin doesn’t continue. He lets up, and instead attempts to smooth out a nonexistent indent. “It must’ve taken you a long time to get here. You’re very passionate about this instrument.”

“That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you.”

The towel on his forehead begins to slide down, but Hanbin’s already fixing it for him before he can even react. “But you know what, my Prince?” The Cheshire Cat’s fingers ghost along the perimeters of his face. “I think that wherever you find grief, you find that in it, there’s always love.”

It’s as if his thumbnail had sliced through the calluses of Hao’s heart, carving it wide open for Hanbin to look directly into its gory, beating mess. Hao—suddenly raw, exposed, seen.

“Exactly,” he whispers, despite himself. An admittance.

And when Hanbin smiles at him, toothy and sincere, he decides that this, too, gives him grief.

China, 2 ^nd century BC.

When humans fail to find an explanation, we like to default to calling things magic. Women become witches, doves teleport from top hats, and surprise, the card in your hand is no longer the same one you pulled—that one is now across the room, under an untouched pile of books.

The magic mirror, though recognizable in its phrasing, is not the same one in fairytales that whispers names of fair maidens. First forged during the Han dynasty in China, it is circular, made of bronze, typically the size of the average width of a hand, and has two sides: on one, a polished surface serving as a reflection, and on the back, an etched image or design. The magic of it all comes when light reflects against the mirrored side: suddenly, the mirror casts a projection of its back design, making it seemingly as if the mirror is transparent, light somehow managing to filter through solid bronze. But it’s not transparent, despite the optical consequence—it is still very clearly a metal object with no openings for which light can pass through.

Here, we dispel the magic. The surface of the mirror is slightly convex; although it was cast flat, when it was polished, the thinner areas in the design on its back protruded into the mirrored side. This formed tiny scratches imperceptible to the eye on the flat side, imperfections that matched the image on the back. Its convex surface allows the light hitting it to scatter, darkening the areas it reflects off of—meaning the image is created from light reflecting against these minuscule bumps and scars. 

So no, not magic. But the science of it doesn’t make it any less extraordinary, any less of a wondrous thing to behold. It shows us that even within the laws of our reasonable reality, the most solid and impenetrable objects, too, can become transparent. And in that transparency, art emerges—intricate, lovely, a reflection of itself. 

The only thing it needs is light, cast across its flawed surface.

Wonderland, the previous summer.

The first time Hanbin reaches out to touch his cheek, Hao recoils. 

“What are you doing?” Hao asks, warily backing away from the slim finger that had just brushed over the area right below his eye. It tingles, the place where contact was made.

“Sorry, it’s just—” Hanbin retracts his hand and bites down a smile brimming with fondness. “—pretty.”

He has an inkling as to what the Cheshire Cat is referring to. “Oh. This?” His hand instinctively reaches up to touch the beauty mark under his eye. He’s seen it a million times in the looking glass, so often that he forgets it’s even there: the heart-shaped mole on the right side of his face. A distinct, natural etching that proves his lineage as a member of the royal Hearts family. 

Hanbin nods. Somehow, it feels like both a warning and a confession.

The moment is over even before it begins, and it falls from Hao’s mind. 

Until he sees him a few weeks later, the Cheshire Cat appearing out of thin air, draped across a tree branch above him as the Prince sits at its trunk, hunched over a book. A quiet entrance, the oak tree’s rustling leaves in the wind masking his presence until he dangles a leg off the branch, effectively catching Hao’s attention. The Prince starts, straightening in his surprise.

This, too, has become something of a daily routine now: Hao has grown used to Hanbin’s sudden appearances in a way. But he’s come to realize that any immediate discomfort he feels can be traced back to the same thought that blooms in his mind whenever the Cheshire Cat reveals himself this way—because strangely, selfishly, he always imagines himself through Hanbin’s eyes. 

It triggers a series of other equally arresting thoughts: he wonders what Hanbin has seen, how long he’s been lingering about, what he’ll do with the knowledge of these private moments later. If he’ll go home and replay those memories as he lays tangled in his sheets, breaths growing shallow. Or if it’ll become a more casual thought, one that comes through during the mundane day-to-day when it’s least expected, one that flutters in unexpectedly but settles and stays, a brief respite in the turbulence of life. He wonders how much invisible space he takes up in Hanbin’s life.

It must be some form of narcissism, Hao figures, to think about yourself through the eyes of another that way. 

When Hanbin hops down from the oak tree, softly landing right by his side, it takes Hao a moment to realize what it is that feels different about him.

“Is that—” His book tumbles off his lap and onto the grass. 

And Hanbin’s a little breathless, his eyes roaming Hao’s face with anticipation. “Yes?”

Hao points. There, right under Hanbin’s right eye—a dark heart-shaped mark where there was none before.

“Where did you get that?” He means for his tone to be accusatory, but it comes out a little awed instead.

“I marked it on myself,” Hanbin replies simply, as if that explains everything.

“Why?”

The beat of silence is unexpected, an unusual wedge of hesitance between them. It gives Hao time to look, really look. 

The beauty mark sits on Hanbin’s face like it’s always been there, a lovely quirk of nature, like a wink of sunlight reflecting off waves of the sea. 

It suits him. It reads as something so familiar that it’s only noticeable because he searches for it. A familiar mark on familiar features, the summation of it: the hard line of his eyes, his flushed cheeks, the divot of his top lip, his glossy pert nose, the rigid angle of his eyebrows.

Suddenly, he’s thinking those thoughts again—he’s Hanbin, seeing himself through his eyes, looking at him, looking back at himself. He’s staring at Hanbin’s beauty mark, and he files this very scene away for later, for when he stares at the cut of moonlight washed across his ceiling tonight, counting dodo birds, waiting for the quiet to drag him under.

But no—that’s not Hanbin’s beauty mark. It’s his. And that’s not his nose, his lips, his eyebrows. In his panic, Hao turns to familiar patterns. He catalogs them each carefully, double checking his notes, filing them away into separate folders. Hanbin’s. His. Separate, never the same.

It reminds him a little of that first day in the washroom, when Hao had been washing his hands when he saw the Cheshire Cat’s floating features behind him through the looking glass. Hao had yelped, spraying water across the reflection. Through the water droplets, a man emerged to fill in the spaces, eyes and mouth finding home on a small, pretty face, sturdy shoulders lining a tall stature that easily matched Hao’s own. If he hadn’t known better, he would have believed it was one of Wonderland’s tricks—a looking glass that showed you two of yourself, another version from another world. 

He thinks about Hanbin and his soft fingertips. The pain he wanted to leech from his bones. This sweet little mark etched so precisely on his cheek.

He understands it, in a way. Hanbin had never hidden his desires.

If he continues filing away these facts into the storage cabinet of his mind, Hao knows that he’ll find out he can easily catalog the ways he’s bled into Hanbin. But what suddenly seizes his mind—heart?—is the chilling realization that he isn’t be able to compartmentalize the ways Hanbin has bled into him.

So he stares and stares and forgets who he is, except not really, because he knows Hanbin too well to ever forget any part of him, until—

“Because it’s yours,” Hanbin all but whispers. “And I want to be yours.”

And then Hao is terrified; this concession is devastating in its simplicity, its implication. 

It’s different, hearing it said aloud like this. No space is left for re-interpretation, not the way longing gazes and searing touches do. And it’s the fact that in the most fundamental way that matters, Hanbin technically already is his; he had made sure of that the day he placed his true name in Hao’s hands for safekeeping, for him to use or not use as he pleased. So how is it possible that there’s more he can give?

Around them, the world looms, beautiful and unforgiving.

“You can’t,” Hao grits out. Answering both Hanbin and himself. 

He thinks about the only other person in Wonderland who holds Hanbin’s true name in their grip. Thinks about the only two people who know Hao’s true name—parental privilege, if anything. That’s how it works, after all: names are tied to belonging, and belonging only ever goes one way, unless it’s between lovers. So forgive him for being cautious with the soft folds of Hanbin’s heart. He’s just the Prince—just—and nowhere near powerful enough to selfishly pull on one end without ripping a chasm. 

His is the only true name Hao knows besides his own, and he holds it the only way he knows how to.

“Why not?” Hanbin, ever so trusting. 

An unwelcome rush of tenderness ravages through him; affection choking in his throat, so violent that it nearly hurts. Hao shakes his head, as if that will somehow clear it.

What is he to say? 

Because you’re a madman. 

Because what you feel isn’t real, can’t be real.

Because I can’t quite seem to figure this thing—you—out. 

He stands up, carefully brushing grass off his lap. Then he holds Hanbin’s gaze at eye level as he says, “Because it’s not right. You don’t belong to me. Don’t you get it? We’re both somebody’s fucking pets. You, the Duchess’s. And me, the King and Queen’s. You can’t ever be mine, just like how I can’t ever be yours.”

“That’s… that’s bullshit.” The curse is unshapely coming from Hanbin’s mouth, the other usually so exact and careful with his speech. But it’s just as authentic as the rest of him, even as it spears through the hairline cracks beginning to form in his demeanor. Hanbin’s eyes are dilated, impossibly dark against the gentle spots of sunlight filtering through the branches and dancing across his face. His cheek twitches. “I don’t care about that, I just—what about you? What do you want?”

Something snaps, and Hao pushes it away, so far away. Because he thinks if he doesn’t, something unseemly might surface from his depths, shattering his meticulously crafted resolve. Because if he sifts through the murk and sets out to label all the things he knows about himself, he’s afraid they’ll all say Hanbin, Hanbin, Hanbin. 

Because if I cave in, I’m just as mad. 

“Not this,” Hao spits. Lets his words fly, aiming to injure. 

The effect is catastrophic. Lunging forward, Hanbin latches onto one of his hands with both of his own. It’s too much; Hao jerks his hand back, shaking the Cheshire Cat off easily. He backs away, leaving the other man standing empty-handed, frame trembling like an autumn leaf.

The reddening rim of Hanbin’s eyes underscores his natural flush; unshed tears pool along its edges, glistening. “You don’t mean that.” He moves to reach toward him again.

Some of the landscaping staff wandering about are beginning to stare at the unseemly sight out in the palace yard. Hao grounds his teeth and feels the back of his neck growing warm. The humid air is making his head spin; he feels unsteady, in both mind and body. “Please don’t touch me.”

Hanbin’s hand falls.

“Alright.” 

The word drops as a sinking stone, not said with any bitterness nor disappointment, but with a simple finality that rivals the slam of a gavel. Because Hao’s word is law to him, and Hanbin, devout, does not stray.

But Hao has been careless with his words. It’s rare that he ever feels stupid, and in this moment he does. Because Hanbin is looking at him with so much hurt that he never wishes to see this expression on him again for the rest of time. His hand rakes through his hair, remiss. “You don’t get it, Hanbin.” 

He doesn’t mean to say it—his true name—and yet it slips out, natural as the seasons. 

If Hanbin’s eyes had drowned before—now, they burn. 

“That’s alright. Maybe I don’t,” the Cheshire Cat says with impossible grace. “But please, whatever you do, please don’t tell me to leave. I don’t think I could stand it.”

This should scare Hao more than it does, but maybe it says more about him that it doesn’t. 

“I won’t,” Hao says finally. “As long as you do not forget yourself. Don’t make the mistake of believing we could ever be anything more, and I won’t.”

He’s still staring at the heart-shaped mark on Hanbin’s cheek when it suddenly lifts, cresting dimples. There’s that familiar smile again, right where it belongs on the Cheshire Cat’s face. 

“Then I won’t either,” Hanbin says, earnest. “I won’t, so just let me stay by you. That’s really all I ask for.”

Tragically, it would seem that as much as Hao convinces himself otherwise, he has never been able to deny Hanbin, not truly. Not then, not now, and perhaps, not ever.

Above, the sun beats down on them, relentless.

Wonderland, mid-summer.

The water is a much needed reprieve from the oppressive heat of summertime and the murky churn of his thoughts. 

Hao does not particularly engage in physical exercise if he can help it, as his terrible sense of balance rarely lends itself to any athletic fortitude he might otherwise possess, but he isn’t above the occasional dip in the garden pool, especially not on a day as sweltering as this. Planting his hands against the cool tiled edge, he lifts himself out of the pool so that he sits with just his lower legs in the water. Water trickles down his face and into his eyes in fat streams, so he reaches blindly behind him for a towel on one of the nearby pool chairs. 

The plushness of a towel suddenly presses snug into his hand. Hao takes it without question and brings it up to pat his face dry. When he lowers the towel, eyesight finally restored, he’s sitting shoulder to shoulder with Hanbin, the other man occupying the spot beside him at the edge of the pool. 

“Where have you been?” Hao asks in lieu of a greeting. His tone is kept even, though not without some effort.

“Oh, it’s been the craziest week, my Prince,” Hanbin laments. The Cheshire Cat has another towel in his hands, which he’s bunched up in his frustration. His sandy hair falls into his eyes as he shakes his head. “The Duchess made me babysit again. And of course her daughter decided to turn into her piglet form that day, and then also took it upon herself to run away from home. I was on three days of zero sleep searching the forest for her.” He lets the towel drop on his lap, and instead grabs Hao’s hands, suddenly beaming. Hanbin’s grip is warm, scorchingly so in the day’s heat. “I’m so glad to be here now. I spent all week thinking about this.” 

Hao peels his hands out of Hanbin’s grasp under the pretense of reaching for his towel and drying off the rest of his body. He ignores the way the other man’s lower lip trembles, smile wobbling. “Where did you end up finding her?”

“At the Mad Hatter’s, if you can believe it. Honestly, the potential long-term effects being in that man’s company during the critical developmental years of your life cannot possibly be good.” Hanbin says this so bitterly that Hao can’t help but snort out a laugh. It’s the type that bubbles out of him like a release, loud and brash.

His reaction seems to cheer Hanbin significantly, as the Cheshire Cat jumpstarts to wrap his towel around Hao’s shoulders and helps him dry off. As he does, Hanbin’s eyes wander downward, brazenly ogling, greedily drinking in the sight of Hao’s exposed torso. His throat bobs, taking in a thick swallow. 

“Dry my hair too?” Hao suggests, pretending not to notice. The other man’s gaze is searing. Hao shivers.

His head is then promptly enveloped by Hanbin’s towel, the other’s hands gentle on his head as the soft cotton rubs back and forth. He’s wrapped in the smell of chlorine dripping off his skin mixing in with earthy notes of jasmine from this close proximity with Hanbin. It’s suffocating; it’s comforting. 

“Did you miss me, my Prince?” he hears Hanbin ask through the ruffling towel. There’s a hesitant yet hopeful tone to the question. 

Hao breathes out through his nose. It’s such a direct question, obvious in its intent. “Is a week really long enough to miss someone?”

“Well, I missed you.”

“Ah.”

“Ah,” Hanbin mimics teasingly. If he hadn’t been drying his hair, he would have seen Hao roll his eyes underneath the towel.

It’s intriguing when Hanbin is like this—not so intense, easing back into his naturally agreeable disposition. It’s a step closer to the buttoned-up, proper version of Hanbin—the side everyone else at court sees—but not quite, not really. Hao can tell this Hanbin is still for him, only him. 

Here, the barest of smiles, one only the shadows under the towel can see.

“You’ll be happy to hear that the Queen’s called off the orders for your execution,” Hao says. Casually, he hopes. “Sur-prise. See what happens when you actually listen to my instructions?”

The towel drops, and Hanbin comes into view once more, sunlight washing over him. 

“She called it off?” the Cheshire Cat asks, head tilting to the side. “I thought she would just forget about it?”

Hao brushes a nonexistent drop of water off his arm, swallowing. “Forgot about it, I suppose. Does it matter? All I know is that it’s no longer an active order amongst the guards. I imagine there must be too many execution orders to keep track of,” he lies.

(“You’re bringing up that troublesome creature again,” the Queen sniffed. “What is it this time?”

Hao frowned. “You ordered his execution over some strawberry tarts.”

“Oh. Right.” The Queen took a terse sip from her teacup. “That is a capital offense.”

“But the Duchess is your cousin. I don’t think she would take kindly to her favorite pet being beheaded.”

“Well! Maybe it’s high time she found another pet, preferably one that doesn’t like to steal.”

Hao locked eyes with her across the dining table as he said, regretfully, painfully: “Mother.”

Both recipient and messenger flinched at the term. It was one rarely used, ‘Your Majesty’ being the more natural address.

The attendants had left the dining hall’s lofty windows open, the summer air warm enough at night to be invited to bear witness to this bloodline’s uncomfortable dynamic. Outside, the cicadas chirped loudly, filling the silence.)

Hanbin seems to accept it. A smile breaks out across his face. “So that means I can see you regularly again?”

“That’s the part you’re excited about?” Hao grumbles in disbelief.

Hanbin nods zealously, not to be cowed. “Actually,” he starts, fishing for something in his pocket, “I have a surprise for you too.”

“What…” 

Before he can fully process what is happening, a singular silver key tied with a crimson ribbon is pressed into Hao’s palm. 

“For you,” the Cheshire Cat says, as if it isn’t already obvious. His eyes are scrunched up into little crescents from how hard he’s grinning. “It’s a key to the baker’s corridor in the main kitchen. You know, the one and only baker who makes all of the Queen’s strawberry tarts. You can access it anytime you want now, whenever you’re craving them! The only other people who have a copy of this key are the baker himself and your mother—and she never goes into the kitchens anyway, so you wouldn’t have to worry about being caught.”

Hao stares at the key glinting in his hand. There is something caught in his throat, like the way he sometimes feels like he can’t breathe when he cries. “How in the Mad Hatter’s hat did you get this?”

“Well…” The Cheshire Cat takes a moment too long to answer. Hao’s head snaps up to catch the other man’s smile wanes slightly.

“Well?”

“I just had to put in some favors. It’s not a big deal.” Hanbin reaches out, firmly closing Hao’s fingers over the key and patting it as if to reassure him.

“What kind of favors?” Hao asks. It isn’t until the words are out of his mouth that he realizes they cut sharply through the air. Too sharply.

An image pools into his mind, unwelcome and unexpected. Hanbin, with his long lashes and pink, pink cheeks, smiling sweetly at some faceless kitchen chef, expertly slathering them with smooth talk like butter on toast. A coy look here, an innocent touch there. Then suddenly—the Cheshire Cat on his knees, promising favors as he looks up through those God forsaken lashes, lips no longer delivering sweet talk but mouthing that they can be put to better use instead.

“Oh.” Hanbin stares at him with a stricken expression. For a moment, they just look at each other.

“Don’t be mad. I offered to babysit his daughter,” Hanbin confesses finally. “She’s also a piglet, you know. She would get to grow up with the Duchess’s kid, get the same education.” It’s clear Hanbin is holding back from saying something, but his expression does enough of the talking.

And now, under those keen eyes, Hao feels as if he has been laid bare, like he has let some disastrous secret slip. There’s that feeling again—of being under a glaring light, open, vulnerable. 

He knows what he should do, what he should say. He can take the out Hanbin has graciously given him, side-step with non-answers and evade the situation as usual. He can reprimand Hanbin for the risk he’s taken, messing around with the Queen’s precious tarts again just when his execution order has been dissolved. He can shove this key back into Hanbin’s hands and demand that he return any and all favors done in his name. 

(“It’s a promise, then? You’ll call off the order?”

“Fine, fine, yes. If it gets you out of my hair about it.” His mother’s lips pressed into a displeased pucker, her red heart-printed lipstick warping into some unnamed shape. “Clearly this has distracted you enough from matters of actual importance. You are not going to embarrass me again on that stage next week, you hear? No more excuses, no more of your stupid mistakes. How will you ever become a competent king if you can’t even do just this?” 

His tongue felt bloated in his mouth, swollen with trapped words. “I understand.” Then: “Thank you.”

It was a miracle her teacup didn’t shatter upon impact when the Queen finally set it back down on its saucer. She waved a languid hand in the air, signaling for an attendant to refill her cup, but the bitter pinch of her eyes underscored her true thoughts. 

“Lovesickness is the worst sort of disease, boy. One day, he won’t have you around to save his pretty head.”)

The grooves of the key dig into his palm. It’s warm from Hanbin’s touch.

Hao looks up, and when he sees the Cheshire Cat watching him, lips slightly parted in bated breath, he thinks, maybe, some things just don’t need to be compartmentalized. Sometimes, they just are, and that should be enough.

Hanbin is so bright, in more ways than one. 

And if he’s honest, Hao’s grown a little tired of hiding from the sun. The depths of his river are cold, and treading water is much more work than letting yourself float. 

It takes the strength of a thousand Jabberwockies to keep the corners of his mouth from quirking upward. 

Hao makes a decision. He stands up, letting the towels wrapped around him fall to the ground. 

“Good job,” he says, words carefully rolling off his tongue like cut gems. Precious, weighty.

“Me?” Hanbin asks, surprised, eyes dancing across Hao’s face in barely contained ecstasy. 

“Who else?”

Suddenly, there is a steely hold on his hand, anchoring him down. The strength of it tips Hao over slightly, towards Hanbin, who is now on his knees, having lurched forward to grab at him. For a split second, Hao questions his decision-making. Wonders if perhaps he shouldn’t have deviated from his usual script, from his familiar tried and true steps. His heartbeat roars in his ears in alarm, suddenly unsure if he’s equipped to deal with the fallout.

“You like it?” His face lifts towards Hao like a man in prayer. His voice is edged with awe. “This is okay?” 

“Yeah,” Hao breathes.

Then, like a flower unfurling in its bloom, Hanbin glows, adoration filling out so plainly across the dips and curves of his face that it elicits a sort of secondhand embarrassment from Hao for how ridiculously easy it is to read him. The sight makes Hao a little unsteady, a little brave.

“You were good.” Hao’s voice cracks a little. Then, louder: “Very good, Cheshire Cat.”

Hanbin preens. His ears are ablaze under the sunlight.

Out of the corners of his eyes, he can see a handful of palace attendants slow in their work, staring at them, at this scene—Cheshire Cat on his knees, holding the Prince of Hearts; the Prince and his heart, held. 

He lets them watch.

Greece, 8 AD.

The word “narcissism” hails from the story of Greek myth Narcissius. Several versions of Narcissus’ tale exist, but the most popular one was penned by Ovid in the third book of his magnum opus, the poem Metamorphoses. In this version, Narcissus was prophesied by a seer to live a long life, but only if he never sees his reflection. 

Young and beautiful, Narcissus was beloved by many, but he never returned any of his admirers’ affections. Cursed to only speak the last few words she hears, mountain nymph Echo struggled to communicate her love for Narcissus; so when she spied him in the woods, she dashed out to hug him instead. Bewildered, Narcissus ran from her. In her grief over his rejection, Echo chose to waste the rest of her life away in a cave. When the gods witnessed this, they cursed Narcissus with a devastating fate: to never be loved back by anyone he fell in love with. 

One day during a hunt, Narcissus stopped by a pool of water for a drink. There, in the reflection of the water, he saw someone so beautiful that he fell in love—deeply, maddeningly. Stars for eyes, rosy cheeks, a smooth column of neck. He reached out to touch but failed to ever catch his reflection, not knowing that his efforts were in vain. Delirious in his desire, he refused to part from the image in the water, forgoing food and sleep to spend the rest of his days with his beloved. Eventually, Narcissus burned away from heartbreak until he became a flower—one of a golden heart and white petals.

Narcissism is defined as something that goes beyond self-love—it’s a culmination of self-absorption and extreme arrogance. 

Strange then, that at the root of the term is a man who fell in love not with himself, but with another.

Indeed, the tragedy of Narcissus is not that he had fallen in love with himself, but that he had fallen in love with his reflection, whom he did not recognize as himself. In Narcissus’ eyes, he loved someone beyond the veil; after all, he yearned to touch them, kiss them, hold them. Why could they not be together? He did not understand.

A device in his own story. By meeting his end the way that he did, both prophecy and curse were fulfilled. His life had not only already been foretold, but forced into its direction by those more powerful than he. Was it his fault that he was beautiful? That he had many admirers? That he could not return their love? That he followed his natural instinct to run away from the embrace of a stranger leaping out from the shadows of the woods?

The world is cruel and unfair. But even under the heavy hand of our creators and the terrible promise of fate, at least we can say that we have loved.

Wonderland, late summer.

For all the prim appearances and lavish grandeur of balls, there is a certain ecstasy to be found in disregarding the strict upkeep maintained for the attendance of these events and unraveling it all in the most indecent of ways.

The ornate framed portraits shake as Hao’s back slams against the wall. His head tilts back lazily, resting on the edge of a frame containing some unfortunate soul forever immortalized in paint to watch the March Hare plant kisses up the Prince’s neck in a hot, desperate fashion. The reading room is coated in shadows, save for a gentle wash of moonlight from a crack between the curtains, so precise maneuvering is not terribly expected, nor is it really top of mind.

“Missed this,” he hears the March Hare murmur against his skin as the buttons of his shirt are hastily undone. Hao lets out a low sound from the back of his throat in response, not really an answer, but perhaps an acknowledgement. 

“Missed you,” the March Hare presses into his jaw. 

Hao would really much prefer if the other man just shut up, so he takes it upon himself to keep the other’s mouth busy. Weaving his fingers through long strands of hair, Hao tugs the March Hare into his mouth, receiving him with tongue and teeth and the fervor of someone revisiting a familiar experience after a long while. It’s good; it was good then, and it’s the same now. The March Hare still has that enthusiasm that makes him a generous lover, and that tendency to bend at a single touch—which his knees do now, hitting the cherrywood floor with a melodious plunk as he works to unbuckle Hao’s belt.

The faint sounds of ball attendees still permeate from beyond the door, a steady backdrop to the clinking and shuffling and soft sighs echoing through the reading room. Somewhere out there, nobles are nibbling their finger sandwiches and exchanging gossip behind their colorful fans, all gelled up and press powdered and pearled and frilled, pompously parading their garish wealth for each other under the guise of celebrating the King’s sixtieth birthday. It’s a satisfying thought, knowing that just paces away, the Prince participates in what would otherwise be considered lewd debauchery, slowly becoming undone by the mouth of an ex-lover. 

As the March Hare fumbles with unbuttoning his pants, hungry puffs of breath against his thigh, Hao lifts his head off the wall a fraction, eyes trained on one of the corners of the room, right by one the windows. There’s nothing of note there—just the end of a wide bookcase and a large potted plant, and in the dark, both of which are only really identifiable by deductive reasoning rather than visibility. A curtain flutters, letting in a gentle breeze and a tremble of moonlight over the plant’s balmy fuchsia leaves.

It’s only when his pants are finally slid down his legs, and the March Hare’s warm mouth lands on his slowly stiffening dick, that Hao realizes the window had not been open when they first entered the room.

The sharp gasp that escapes his mouth is only encouragement to the man on his knees, who finds nothing amiss and instead works to push more of Hao into him. Hao reluctantly looks down at the scene below, mind spinning in a million different directions: the first, immediate one being his own pleasure, the eager wetness enveloping his cock—but on the other hand, there’s another thread to be unraveled, something less obvious but just as pressing—if only he can focus on one thing long enough to—

He feels the head of his cock hit the back of the March Hare’s throat, and he exhales a low groan as he places a hand on the other man’s head to steady himself. It’s a sudden reminder that it wasn’t a lack of physical chemistry that led to their relationship’s eventual downfall, but rather a misalignment of every other aspect that made up their respective characters. So as much as this moment is a return, it’s also a confirmation that this is all they’ll ever be. Which is fine, because this is all he wants from him tonight anyways.

The March Hare’s head bobs back and forth, working Hao’s dick to full hardness. He’s found himself a good rhythm. Hao lets his head fall back onto the wall again in a dizzying rush. His eyes, half-lidded, find the darkened corner by the window again, and like a nail caught in a sweater, he latches on to that unsteady thought, finally pulling, pulling, watching it unravel.

All those desires, so carefully tucked away, spilling over. 

Here’s one of them: an image, playing over and over in his mind since that day last week—all through his violin lessons, through dinners of stuffed mushrooms and turtle soup, through the meaningless small talk with pompous nobles, through quiet nights. He revisits it again now.

The pretty, pliant Cheshire Cat on his knees by the garden pool, clinging onto his hand like a lifeline, pupils trembling.

And what if—

What if Hao had decided to extend one of his fingers and parted those rosy lips—pushed it in? And if he had added another one? 

Would those tears finally leak unbidden from Hanbin’s eyes? Would saliva gather and pool at the sides of his moldable mouth as Hao worked his fingers in and out as he pleased?

Hao feels a tongue swiping over the head of his cock, and he lets out a little sigh, his fingers stroking through the March Hare’s locks. His eyes still have not left that dark corner, that berth of space where he can feel the Cheshire Cat watching him at this very moment.

What sort of pretty noises would Hanbin have made? How would they have sounded, pressed around his fingers, vibrating up his arm—that pretty, favorite sound of his?

And if it hadn’t been his fingers in his mouth? If it had been his cock that was swallowed by the wet heat between Hanbin’s lips?

It’s almost laughable now to think that he had believed he knew so much about Hanbin. The reality was that he knew so little. All these gaps in knowledge, empty fucking folders, entire subjects left unresearched. 

Finally, Hao closes his eyes, frustration somehow fueling his arousal. He imagines what Hanbin must look like right now in that dark corner, invisibility be damned. 

Is this the sight of his dreams? Has Hanbin ever thought about Hao like this, late at night as he rutted against his mattress? 

Is he also touching himself right now, pathetically palming at his crotch while his other hand clamps over his mouth in an effort to keep himself quiet? Or is he too dumbstruck by the sight in front of him to even spare a brain cell to get a hand down his pants?

Hao feels delirious, equal parts aroused by the thought of Hanbin in compromising positions and the thought of Hanbin looking upon him in compromising positions—him, right now, pressed against a wall, simultaneously reveling in arrogant pleasure at not needing to put even an ounce of work and yet still completely held at the mercy of another’s tongue. He knows there’s another version of him who would balk at this, bend away at this raw presentation of desire, but he’s starting to think the things he once believed to be easy were actually just cheap fixes, slapdash coats of white paint over red roses, bound to crack and melt away in the heat.

The March Hare moans around his cock, lewd sucking noises drawing out of him. Hao hears it all with his eyes shut, imagines it in another voice. He imagines blond hair between his fingers, shining eyes gazing up at him in the dark, stretched pink lips, those cheeks, hollowing for him, all for him.

Hanbin, ears sensitive and red—

Pleading eyes staring up at him, cockstruck and willing—

Hanbin, ever so sweet, precariously gentle—

Pearlescent drops messily dotting his thick lashes, painting the flushed canvas of his cheeks, dribbling down his cupid’s bow—

Hanbin, his shadow, present—

You always see me, Hao thinks. His eyes flutter open a fraction, brow tense. But I want to see you too.

Hanbin, his to see.

Hanbin, his.

“Fuck, Han—”

With a stuttering groan, Hao comes without warning. One hand flies up to his mouth, biting down on his nearly incriminating cry, while the other grips the March Hare’s shoulder as he rides out his climax straight into his mouth. Once he’s finished, the other man slides off his dick with a pop, making a show of swallowing and wiping his mouth. 

“Been a while since we last did that,” the March Hare finally says, sitting back on his heels, voice unsteady.

“Yeah,” Hao rasps. His eyes are still adjusting to the moonlight illuminating this bit of the room, but he flicks a glance at that corner again. He wonders if the Cheshire Cat is still there.

His line of sight is suddenly blocked when the March Hare stands. A pair of hands encircle his waist, drawing him close. “So?” he breathes into Hao’s ear. 

He wants more, Hao can tell, but then there’s a tinny whistle of air, so faint but just perceptible to someone searching, listening. There, the tiniest gap where the window has been left ajar—open, but not as wide as it was just minutes ago. 

Hao pushes the March Hare off of him. “Next time,” he says as he pulls his pants back up.

The March Hare’s expression is half cast in shadow, mostly unreadable but not unguessable. “Which will be?”

“For fuck’s sake, I don’t know. The King’s sixty-first birthday?” Hao throws out, careless. Something has shifted, triggering a maelstrom within him, and he’s lost in the eye of it all, thought and rationale dispersed in its wake. He zips himself up and pats down the fine fabric of his shirt. “Consider this your early invitation.”

It must say something that cruelty is the first crutch he leans on when he feels adrift. Maybe something about bloodlines and inheritance. It wouldn’t be the first time. He thinks back to the previous summer, standing under the great oak tree.

But this—this is different. He knows it from the weightlessness of his steps as he walks out of the reading room, the lack of remorse in his heart as he weaves his way past gaggles of partygoers in their feathery gowns. It’s different because this didn’t matter. He knows he will not be turning over his own words at night, reliving the cruelty of them to torture himself, over and over.

He’s always been good at running like this. Away, always. 

But somehow this feels more like he’s running after something. Chasing, so fast in his weightlessness that it’s almost like he’s flying.

The sky is clear; he sees his path perfectly. The sun dazzles.

Dreamland, two hours past midnight.

He’s on a stage.

That part’s not new. What’s new is that Hanbin’s right there next to him, and he’s barreling towards him like there’s no other place he’s supposed to be. They collide; he has his arms around Hanbin, and he can feel the other’s wrapping around him as well, just as tight, just as desperate. 

Hao presses his face into Hanbin’s neck, lips pressing into his hot pulse, nose inhaling his familiar scent; he smells of cedar and longing. 

This time though, he thinks the latter might be his own.

Maybe if he looks hard enough, he’ll find a rabbit hole that leads him to this moment.

Wonderland, late summer.

He’s on a stage, and he’s perfect.

With his violin in one hand and his thin courage in the other, Hao places his bow on the strings and plays.

Then the audience erupts into a roaring applause, a standing ovation from thousands of people so loud that Hao can hardly hear himself as he plays his final note, sends his thanks to the crowd, and bows out.

It’s everything he had hoped and wished for. Before the final curtain dropped on his summer concert stage, he had seen a rare nod of approval from where the Queen sat in the royal booth, and beside her, he thinks his father had even cracked a smile for him. Around him, attendants are slathering him with praises, a bumbling energy that presses against him on all sides. He smiles as he graciously accepts his literal and metaphorical flowers, and humbly laughs off the grandiose compliments. 

The love and adoration is palpable in the thick summer air. 

He’s afraid he may choke on it.

Something is missing, and he’s haunted by it, his eyes lingering a little too long on every face that passes him by. In a palace filled with thousands of people, with thousands of shadowy corners for someone to disappear into, Hao searches, despite knowing that Hanbin is not here.

He doesn’t know how or when, but at some point, the other man’s existence became not something to learn, but something to know, inside and out; he no longer needed eyes to know the Cheshire Cat was nearby, no longer clutched his heart in shock when the Cheshire Cat appeared by his side. It became instinct—innate. 

So when Hao manages to pull the White Rabbit aside amidst the flurry and whispers in his ear, “Have you seen the Cheshire Cat anywhere?” the last thing he expects the herald to say is: “Have you not heard?”

The Prince stares at the mixture of expressions on the White Rabbit’s face—notably: pity, apprehension. “Heard what?”

When the herald confirms one of his worst thoughts, Hao looks down at the bouquet of red roses in his hands, the crisp ruby petals curling over the velvety wrapping. 

He would have liked them better if they were white.

Three days later, the King of Hearts is found dead, just minutes after he had left afternoon tea.

A gardener discovers him on a lounge chair by the pool, eyes glassy and mouth open, crumbs dotting the corners of his lips. On the stand beside him, a mostly-eaten strawberry tart.

There is much confusion in those first few hours. The King had been perfectly healthy. Was this the work of nature, or was something more nefarious at play? What are the doctors saying now—poison? If it had been that strawberry tart, then had the Queen been the original target? After all, it’s no secret that those sweet treats are her favorite. 

And somehow, it feels a little scandalous to know that in his last moments, the King had been committing the greatest crime of all: eating what belonged to the Queen and the Queen only. 

The suspect list is easy enough to narrow down. There’s only one baker specifically designated to oversee the production of all the strawberry tarts in the palace, the only person who had access to any part of the process, who could have, at any point, tampered with the desserts.

Well, besides the Queen. She brandishes her key, a little silver thing tied to a crimson ribbon, in front of the guards as she screams bloody murder. “There is only one other key like this and he has it! Search his quarters immediately!”

The poor baker spends two days in the dungeons before he’s unexpectedly released to stand trial.

But not his own. 

Within these two days, the doctors and potioneers find something very curious upon further examination of the King’s body. 

Yes, indeed, poison had been involved in his passing. But not any regular poison that can be found in supply closets or even a cottage witch’s common brew. 

No, this had been a rare type of poison, a more nefarious kind. One that had been imbued with a sort of dark magic—one that involved the use of his true name.

With the turn of this discovery, the finger pointing towards the baker begins to wane, and hesitation mars every breath in the palace. 

It’s no secret that the Queen regards the King, as she does everyone else, with little more than contempt.

Is it so much of a coincidence then that the only other copy of the key to the baker’s kitchen is owned by the Queen?

Is it too much to assume that the Queen, his partner of decades, his equal in every measure, his lover once upon a time, is the only person in Wonderland who knows the King’s true name?

At the trial, the baker tearfully provides his alibi, but all the attention is on the woman in the red gown who seems to spoil her own case darker and darker with each word that escapes her mouth.

“Of course I know his true name! What does that have to do with anything?” the Queen shrieks. “Dimwitted lot you all are, asking me these ridiculous questions instead of looking for the murderer. You’re wasting your time, you imbeciles!”

The Prince of Hearts stands. Suddenly, all eyes are on him.

Hers look at him in a way he’s never seen before. It’s interesting. Gone is the disgust, the disappointment. Instead—fear. Recognition. 

He feels seen, and it’s electrifying.

He meets his mother’s eyes as he says, words ringing loud and clear: “Off with her head.”

The silence left behind in the courtroom after the Queen of Heart’s screeches are dragged away is sweeter than any strawberry tart he’s ever tasted.

“Cheshire Cat!”

Hanbin turns around. 

Even from across the meadow, Hao can see that he’s visibly frazzled. The wind blows against the back of his head, ruffling his blond strands into an artful mess. As he stares at Hao walking across the clearing towards him, an emotion passes across his face, clear as day. Hanbin may have the ability to turn invisible at any given moment, but he can never hide the way he wears his heart across the features of his face—wide open, beating, lovely.  Hao smiles to himself, endeared. 

“You found me,” Hanbin breathes as Hao nears, looking at him like he’s a miracle.

At the edge of the clearing, a group of gigantic flowers whisper none to quietly among themselves. In truth, it’s thanks to them and their blaring chorale that Hao even found them again, having been lead through the tall grasses and unconventional paths in a besotted daze last time, remembering only the warmth against his palm and the fingers slotted between his, filling the empty spaces. Hao forgives them the way they seem to have forgiven Hanbin—easily, naturally.

“Did you not want to be found?” And it’s with barely contained hunger that Hao takes in Hanbin’s full form: his rounded eyes, slightly open mouth, the breeze billowing through his open-collared shirt, the grass stains on his tweed pants. He looks well. He looks beautiful.

It’s been about a week. Hao can’t stay away for long.

“I know the Queen banishing you from Wonderland wouldn’t have been enough to keep you away,” Hao says. “So what then? Have you been avoiding me on top of that?”

The Cheshire Cat is silent. He looks down suddenly, soft strands of hair falling into his eyes.

“So you have been,” Hao pouted. 

“I just—I—” 

It’s unusual for Hanbin to be at a loss for words. Hao frowns. “I’m sure you heard the news. She’s not around anymore. So why didn’t you come back?”

Hanbin’s front teeth worries into his bottom lip, that fretful habit of his, and his eyes dart about, barely landing on Hao before sparrowing away again. 

“What is it?” Hao doesn’t mean to raise his voice. He isn’t angry—or at least, he doesn’t think he is. Desperate, maybe. Embarrassingly so. 

But acting based on something as trivial as sense is the least of his concerns at the moment because Hanbin, startled by his tone, finally says, “Alright, yes, I have been! But it’s not because of you, never you. It’s me. I’ve been... disorderly.” His throat bobs. “I’ve been punishing myself, keeping away. Even though I know I’m no longer banished.”

Hao takes a step towards him, then another. They’re nearly chest to chest, a breath apart. “And what did you do?”

“You’ll hate me.” Hanbin shakes his head, looking close to tears.

But at this distance, he soon has no choice but to look up at him, his glassy eyes tracking every minute change in Hao’s expression. 

Hao leans in close until their breaths mingled and whispers, throaty and low, “Cheshire Cat. For which part? Watching me get pleasured? Or what you did to the March Hare afterwards?”

A delicate beat passes.

Hanbin stares at him. “You knew?”

Hao lets him flounder like this for a bit, taking in this tenuous moment of uncertainty for the other. Has he ever caught the other man so unawares like this? It’s always been Hanbin who had the element of surprise on his side. And it’s always Hao who stayed stagnant in the way that clay could be kneaded—able to be worked into different versions depending on the day but at the end of it all, consistent in his apathy, unchanged by external forces, whether it be affection or barbs.

Will Hanbin still like him like this, clay hardened into an unexpected shape with sharp edges?

“Answer the question.”

“My Prince?” The Cheshire Cat is frozen in place, pale. 

“King. I’m the King now.” 

“Oh.”

(If his father the King had been cleverer, or perhaps more in tune with his son’s personality, he would have found it strange that the Prince had lingered behind at dinner one night, if just to share a glass of wine together. Hao rarely drank; his father, quite the opposite.

Getting him drunk was easy. Even easier was spiking the wine bottle with a drought supplied by the Caterpillar that loosened the tongue. 

As for the charm and crafty words, Hao learned it all from the Cheshire Cat, from watching him from the edges of garden parties and balls, mirroring his smooth words and easy affability to win over his audience.

And just like that, a true name fell into his lap, slipping through blubbering lips and purple-stained teeth.

For the first time ever, Hao knew exactly what to do with it.)

“What a strange week it’s been at the palace. So many” —his breath ghosts over Hanbin’s face— “mysterious” —his eyes meet his, soft— “deaths.”

“Yes. So strange,” Hanbin breathes.

Does one have to use words to see their reflection?

A stray piece of hair protrudes from the side of the Cheshire Cat’s wind-tousled head, fluttering, feather-like. Hao lets instinct take over; he reaches out to smooth it down, his fingertips pressing gently down against his sideburns. He holds Hanbin like he holds other scorchingly hot things—like it’s a power. But to be able to feel what he touches, he has to split open his calluses, those hard layers around his heart. So he does—he stands before Hanbin, fingertips burning, blood trickling from the chasm he’s ripped within himself, and presents the red, glistening mess to the light.

“I think I might be dead,” Hanbin says, awed. “The Queen has beheaded me, and this is the afterlife.”

“If this is how you imagine your afterlife to be, then you have much to look forward to,” Hao replies. His fingers trail the planes of Hanbin’s face, tracing the paths his eyes have carved a million times. His skin is soft, supple; Hao knows this finally, doesn’t have to imagine it in the backs of his eyelids. 

“You have no fucking idea.” Despite his dumbstruck daze, Hanbin still manages a rueful smile. “Why else would I try so hard to get myself killed?”

“Well, I’m sorry to foil your plans,” Hao says. “She won’t be bothering us anymore.”

“Lucky me.” Hanbin’s smile turns into a grin, wide and sharp. 

Then they’re both grinning at each other, twin images of unbridled joy.

Still cupping the other’s face in one hand, Hao asks: “In the reading room. Did you enjoy yourself?”

For a moment, Hanbin is silent. Then—

“Yes.” 

“Did you touch yourself?”

Hanbin lets out a sigh of a hum—a purr, if you will—and his eyes flutter shut as he leans into the King’s hand. 

“You can be honest with me.”

“I did.”

“And did you finish?”

He burrows his face into Hao’s hand. “Yes. Fast.”

The thought seizes something in his throat, then releases it: “Oh. My sweet, sweet Hanbin.” 

Hanbin’s eyes fly open, and he stares at Hao like he holds the sky on his shoulders. 

“Yours?”

Hao nods, fingertips tapping the soft skin of his cheek. 

Then Hanbin is holding Hao’s face as well, but with two shaking hands, his thumbs lightly caressing the tops of his cheekbones. 

“Oh,” Hanbin breathes. 

When Hanbin leans forward, Hao lets his eyelids drop. 

Unexpectedly, Hanbin’s lips press gently not onto his mouth, but rather: the area under his right eye; then the bridge of his nose; just above the left side of his mouth; the corner of his left eye; high up on his forehead. 

Just as Hao is about to open his eyes and demand for Hanbin to quit playing around, he feels a whisper brush against his mouth. 

“My King.” 

Here, a decision is made.

“It’s Hao. My name is Hao.”

The moment elongates, stretching and trembling and tightening. He lingers in the darkness behind his eyelids, sitting in his culpability, the words having already left his mouth and floating somewhere out there, waiting to be captured and rehomed.

“My Hao.”

A name, a prayer, a threat.

Under the burning light, this gory red, glistening mess of a heart is still a heart.

Then they’re on each other, lips colliding, devouring the worship between them, teeth and tongues as their divine battleground. It’s full of heat and mayhem and fear; held in between Hanbin’s hands, equally at his mercy and his exaltation, Hao is cleansed. He grips the sturdy line of Hanbin’s waist, feeling the warmth of his skin through the light material of his shirt, and wonders why he kept himself from feeling like this for so long. 

When he finally pulls back, head spinning, Hao says breathlessly, “This is mad. I must be mad.”

“Oh, Hao.” Hanbin’s lips, bruised and swollen, tug into a fond smile. He looks sinfully good, and all Hao wants to do is keep this moment in a rabbit hole forever, for him and only him to visit, over and over. “We’re all mad here.”

Maybe so.

And maybe it’s all worth it, being able to hear his name said back to him with such devotion, pressed into his skin as offerings, exhaled in that pretty voice like a hymn. 

“Hanbin, Hanbin, Hanbin,” the madman himself all but chants under his breath as he pulls the King of his heart in, consuming him and letting him consume, an ouroboros of desire. 

If you’re mad enough, you may just find a happy ending out of it.

A human eye looks into the mirror and sees itself looking back at it. It thanks the contraption and processes that make this all possible—glass, metal, light. Without these things, it thinks, far less would be known.

The mirror is a reflective surface. It thanks the light for giving it purpose.

A human eye looks into the mirror and everything that it sees, is a reflection of light. The light, it realizes, has always been us. 

“But I don’t want to go among mad people,” Alice remarked.

“Oh, you can’t help that,” said the Cat: “we’re all mad here. I’m mad. You’re mad.”

“How do you know I’m mad?” said Alice.

“You must be,” said the Cat, “or you wouldn’t have come here.”

— Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland