Hearts

The light penetrated her fluffy eyelashes, causing dancing dandelions to prance across her vision; opening her eyes further she gazed around at the expanse that stretched up to the horizon as if pulled taut by the sun. Unconsciously she flattened down her jet black hair and patted down her blood red dress to try iron out the wrinkles and hide the grass stains.

She was sat in the middle of the dancing daffodils and singing sunflowers; the buzzing bumblebees bumbled about, and the dragonflies exhaled small puffs of smoke after drinking from the ponds. Under her fingertips she could feel the rubble and dirt which threatened to rip her attire, so quickly she rose to her feet. Caterpillars darted across her vision, blurry from the sudden change in altitude.

“Focus Valentina,” she whispered to herself. One moment she was looking down a rabbit hole and the next she was waking up in a very strange land: a wonderous land. The beetles perched on pebbles would sing chants of “hello and goodbye” as she made her way through the meadow. The butterflies would smear glorious dairy along her skin which she licked off like buttercream from a bowl. The kingfishers would swoop down low and high, fishing for their queens and the roses turned their blushing cheeks towards her.

“What a curious place,” exclaimed Valentina, “what a curious, wonderous land I have found myself in.”

All her troubles melted away from her like the ice-cream trees melting in the midday sun; drips of chocolate fudge and raspberry ripple trickled onto her forehead as she passed back under the branches a dozen times. What could she possibly be upset about in a place where the sun always shined?

A kingfisher glided past her like water down a waterfall and hooked its queen. Hearts bubbled from the surface of the water where they had perched; it seemed to make them giddy and irresistible to each other as they snuggled.

“I wonder what those hearts feel like,” wondered Valentina, “Surely they won’t mind if I borrow one, they have so many after all.” With that she poked her hand into the water and picked up a little red heart. It didn’t do anything.

Valentina waved the heart around in anticipation.

“Why aren’t you doing anything!” she exclaimed in frustration. More hearts appeared around her from nesting birds and budding romances across the meadow. In a frenzy Valentina ran to each couple, one by one, harvesting a heart from each and trying to feel the effects that they gave their owners. A couple of deer rested in the thicket and as their noses touched a cascade of hearts was produced and visual happiness spread across their faces. Valentina wanted this. She wanted this bad.

She strode up to the deer and bent down until they were in breathing range and whispered in a harsh voice, “get up and do as I say, or you will not live another day.” The deer rose and so did all the other woodland creatures when threatened in a similar manner. The hearts popping up like sugar cubes in tea halted as fear took over and marinated the air in a creamy haze.

“Each of you will give me a heart,” Valentina commanded, “each of you will supply me with a heart in payment for me allowing you to live here.” Her shadow covered the grass in an enveloping darkness, but the creatures complied. She thought if she received enough hearts she would feel the giddiness and happiness that the hearts brought the couples that she observed around her.

Many years passed and Valentina grew angry as her pile swelled to an immense size so did her hatred. The creatures continued to produce her hearts, but they would not give her joy. Why was it not working?

She began to try another approach. Taking a piece of card, she pressed a heart into the corner and another then another. A little card with three hearts was perched in her hand and it suddenly sprang to life. A little army was produced, she decreased her pile of hearts to make little card men. Maybe they would give me the giddy feeling? She thought.

The card men obeyed her every command, did her bidding, and carried out the tax collecting. Still no feeling was produced. What was wrong?

As she passed through the meadow one day, the woodland creatures whispered to each other in hushed voices that the keeper of hearts was visiting, and she was coming for payment.

“Oh no darlings,” Valentina replied, “The Queen of Hearts is visiting, and I am taking my payment.” From under her blood red dress, cards sprayed everywhere and stole every heart in sight from birds, animals, insects, and budding flowers. Stripped of hearts, yet they were still so happy.

Valentina sat in her towering home, surrounded by her hearts, and wondered why after all this time she couldn’t get this giddy, numbing feeling that she so longed.

The Queen never figured out that the hearts were a product of this giddy feeling she longed for, the product of love. Hearts were a vessel for which love could fill and although Valentina had so many hearts she did not fill any of them with love. The Queen of Hearts was born from a young girl who gave hate but expected love in return. She had fallen down the rabbit hole many years before Alice would venture into Wonderland; escaped from an orphanage where she had received no love and no kindness.

Valentina sat in her garden every day but one day she had enough. If she could not get the hearts to work then no one could. If feelings came from the heart and were processed by the brain then those with brains could no longer have them. But how? She pondered. A brilliant, wicked idea sprung to mind, and a curled Cheshire grin spread across her face.

Turning viciously towards her nearest guard she cried, “Off with their heads!”