“I thought Ella offered you a job,” Suzie said with confusion.
“She’s marrying Ever After Sweet Shoppe’s owner, but that doesn’t mean she owns the business. Besides, I don’t want to accept her charity.” Though the idea of working in a candy shop had been tantalizing. Her other grandma, Grammy Larsen, had discouraged Adelie from taking the position.
“You’d be great at it,” Grammy had assured, “but being around all that candy all day long? Makes my mouth water and my waistline expand just thinking about it.”
Grammy had worked in one of the stores in downtown Westville for a year now, and she assured Adelie the part-time position wouldn’t cover the expenses she and Suzie needed it to.
“You know you’d offer the same to Ella without a second thought if the situation was reversed,” Suzie said.
That much was true. Adelie knew Suzie was referring to the surprise she and Suzie had helped their other grandma with last Christmas. Ella had been in need, though she’d refused to ask for any help. Grammy had gathered reinforcements to help clean Ella’s apartment and convince her to attend the ball where she’d met her soon-to-be-husband.
But this was different. Adelie hated putting herself out there for anyone or anything. She preferred staying close to home, away from crowds. While she loved reaching out to help others, receiving help, on the other hand, or being around more than a handful of people at once, made her feel too exposed. She was the queen of reservation and caution, and she wasn’t about to lose her crown.
“At least come to Wonderland with me.” Suzie interrupted her musings.
Adelie shook her head. Suzie didn’t understand. Her sister was an extrovert. Where crowds made Adelie want to cower in corners, they were like an IV pumping energy straight into Suzie’s veins. She thrived off the attention and the vitality.
“Come on,” Suzie whined. “This is our hometown. All these other people have to travel or drive long distances, but we’re right here. You have to come. You’ve never even been to Wonderland.”
“Because it costs a fortune to get in.”
“It’s one day,” Suzie said. “It’s a magical, whimsical, granted, campy, place, and how often do you get to see me rub elbows with thousands of others out to catch a rabbit? You know Fletcher can’t go with me. He has to work. I need you.”
Adelie could no longer hold down her smile. Suzie had always been good at melting her defenses. The Fletcher reference did the trick. Suzie’s boyfriend was just as quirky as she was and would probably love something like this.
Suzie didn’t usually beg, so Adelie knew this was something she really wanted. How could she tell her no?
It didn’t completely alleviate the worry in her chest, but still, it managed to lift her spirits. “All right. I’ll come—”
“Yay!”
“—but only to watch you make a fool of yourself.”
“I’m finding that rabbit.” Suzie punctuated the statement with a bite of eggs.
“I’ll believe that when I see it.”
Her sister smirked. “Then you have to be there to see it.”
CHAPTER THREE
Adelie exhaled through a part in her lips. This was worse than playing the lottery, something she’d never wanted to do because the chances of winning the jackpot were so unlikely it was laughable. Seeing these crowds? All these people who would use the same clues to find the same prize? They didn’t stand a chance.
She couldn’t help being charmed by the park’s setup. The ticket booths sported top hat-shaped roofs. Towering rides, including a double-loop roller coaster, coiled through the sky above the park’s fence. The sight gave Adelie a tiny thrill in her chest. She’d never ridden anything like that before.
The line trickled forward, and each step wound Adelie tighter with nerves. Just when she’d talked herself into accepting this scenario, they approached the window, and Adelie’s mouth dropped.
Fifty dollars for the entry fee? That money was food on their table, and here they were, blowing it on some silly whim.
The woman behind the register, wearing a brightly colored, imaginative uniform with patched, puffy sleeves smiled patiently. Suzie, however, was the opposite of patient. She widened her eyes in a pointed sort of way at Adelie’s hesitation, as if to say, what are you waiting for?
With a sigh, Adelie ignored her better judgment. She forked over the money from her wallet and received a ticket, a stamp on her hand, and a midnight-blue flier the size of an envelope.
“Your first clue is in here,” the woman behind the register instructed. “You have until midnight tonight to find Mr. Missing Cottontail. Good luck.”
“Thanks,” Suzie said, beaming as she stepped through the silver, three-pronged rotation bar. Adelie followed, nabbing a park map from its distributive box in the process.
Suzie whirled around the instant they stepped out of the way of thronging people. “Let me see, let me see.” She tried to tear the first clue from Adelie’s hand, but Adelie yanked it to her chest and inspected the thick paper, then read the gold inscription aloud:
"It's rather curious, this sort of life."
“That's the clue?” Suzie said skeptically.
Adelie’s brows furrowed. She’d read Alice's Adventures in Wonderland a long time ago, but she found herself intrigued by the quote, by the detail and depth someone had put into choosing it. A quote like that could be taken in multiple ways, which was probably what made it so appealing.
She couldn’t allow that to give her false hope in this little scavenger hunt. She should be out job hunting. She should be doing something that could actually help them, not make them pilfer the little money they had left. A hundred dollars was a sliver she couldn’t dig out.
“It can’t be a clue,” Adelie said. “I think it’s just a teaser. Look, it opens.”
“Here.” Suzie reached for it again. This time, Adelie gave the card up willingly.
“They’d better be good riddles,”
