friend_i_hope

Let me know how I'm doing. Comments screened, Anon enabled.

He's never liked Ratty. And it's not just the smell. You live in Wonderland long enough you get a sense of who can and can't be trusted. And Ratty's got that stink about him too. That stink that says you should guard your teas and loved ones around him because it'd take about a drop of Happiness for him to turn you over to the Suits.

Fortunately, Hatter's got more than a drop, and Ratty's story about an Oyster named Alice...

Well, he may not have mastered basic hygiene, but he's smart enough not to offer something he can't deliver.

(Hatter's perfectly aware that it can't be the Alice of Legend, but the coincidence is too much to ignore all the same.)

He tells Ratty to bring her in and quietly sips his tea while he waits.

His chair is faced away from the door when they enter, but he can still smell Ratty.

"Would you like a cup of tea?"