Alice’s naked body, stiffening her nipples. Quickening her pace, and getting more and more anxious as the woods darkened, Alice glanced down until she could no longer make out the trail. She turned, trying to backtrack, but couldn’t find the path she had taken to get there. However, through a break in the tree line, Alice saw the most interesting sight. A field of mushrooms.
But these were unlike any mushrooms she’d ever seen. Dark and enormous, almost up to her shoulders, with thick, fat stems and bulbous heads so big she couldn’t wrap her arms around them. The sight of the shrooms both repulsed Alice and drew her toward them, her feet heading into the field on their own volition. Soon she was surrounded by dozens, hundreds, a whole forest of mushrooms, so close together that Alice rubbed against them as she passed. The caps were soft, almost velvety, but firm and unyielding. They reminded Alice of something, but for the life of her, she couldn’t remember what.
The potion Alice had swallowed was making her tingle more than ever. Looking around to see if anyone was watching, Alice pressed her palm between her legs, trying to calm the throb. Her hand felt good there, rubbing softly against her as she walked, and Alice thought about her boyfriend, Lewis. Why couldn’t he be here right now? More than ever before, she would have liked him inside her. In fact, Alice had never been so eager for it.
She closed her eyes for a moment, imagined Lewis’s weight on top of her, kissing her neck softly, his hands cupping her bare breasts, wrapping her legs around him as the tip of his “Who are you?”
Surprised, Alice let out a gasp as she opened her eyes and saw a man staring down at her from one of the mushrooms. He straddled it like a biker astride a motorcycle, and indeed he looked the type. Black leather pants. Black boots. A black leather vest over a bare chest. Several days’ worth of beard on his face.
His voice was foreign-some sort of European accent- and Alice guessed English wasn’t his first language. His arms were muscled, and Alice noticed a tattoo on his shoulder, something that looked like a letter of the alphabet but upon squinting Alice realized was a caterpillar.
“I’m, um, Alice.”
The man didn’t reply. His dark hair was short, untamed, and he had the deepest green eyes Alice had ever seen. He glared at her like a lion glared at a gazelle. Even more self-conscious about her nudity, Alice lifted her arm across her breasts, tucked her knees together, and bent over to shield herself from his gaze.
“I am Pilar,” he said, pronouncing it Pee-larr and rolling the r at the end. Alice figured he might be Portuguese. “Why are you in my mushroom field, Alice?”
“I’m lost,” Alice said, close to sobbing. “Will you help me?”
“Stand up straight,” Pilar ordered. Though he said it softly, Alice sensed the steel in his voice.
“I’m naked,” Alice said, though she realized it was a silly thing to say. He obviously knew that already.
“If you need my help, Alice, we need to trust one another. One way to build trust is for you to do as I say. How do I know you aren’t a poacher, in my field to steal my mushrooms?”
“But I’m not,” Alice said.
“Then stand up straight so I may see you aren’t hiding any poaching equipment.”
Fighting embarrassment, Alice forced herself to straighten to her full height. She watched as Pilar swung his leg over the mushroom and dropped to the ground. He walked to her slowly, leisurely, the barest hint of a smile on his lips, and stopped when he was just a few feet in front of her.
“Put your hands at your sides,” Pilar said.
“But you can see I’m not holding anything.”
“I see nothing of the sort. You could be hiding all kinds of things.”
Alice wondered if she should run away. But to where? Back into the dark, scary woods? Into the field of mushrooms that Pilar claimed were his? Though Pilar seemed a bit strange, and rather intense, he hadn’t done anything that made Alice believe he would hurt her. Maybe he was telling the truth, and he just wanted to make sure she wasn’t a mushroom poacher.
Alice dropped the arm from her breasts, feeling her face flush with shame.
“You are beautiful, Alice,” Pilar said.
She blushed even harder. “Thank you.”
“Please remove your other hand.”
“But I’m surely not hiding anything in there,” Alice proclaimed.
Pilar stared at her. “As you wish,” he said. Then he turned and began to walk away.
“Hey!” she called after him. “Please don’t leave me!”
Pilar soon blended into the mushrooms, and Alice realized the fear of being lost and alone was far worse than the embarrassment of a stranger seeing her naked. So she hurried after him, running through the mushroom field, catching up just as he opened the door to a small, wooden shack with mushrooms sprouting on the flat roof.
“Pilar! Please wait!”
He had left the door open, and Alice took that as an invitation and hurried inside the cabin. The interior surprised Alice, because unlike Pilar’s rough exterior, this was pleasant, almost cozy. A fire crackled in a cast iron stove, where a pot of tea brewed, filling the air with the scent of peppermint. A large rocking chair, with a red blanket across the back, sat in the corner. Oil lamps on the walls cast a soft, orange glow over everything.
As Alice was looking around, someone stepped from behind the door and grabbed her shoulders, giving her a terrible shock.
“Why are you in my house?” Pilar demanded, his soft voice loud and firm.
“I… uh… you left the door open… and I thought-”
“I did not invite you in my house. You have no right to be here.”
“I’m sorry. I’ll go.”
He leaned in close, his face inches from hers. “Did you steal anything?” he asked, his breath smelling like peppermint tea.
“What? No! Of course not! I just walked in a second ago!”
“I do not trust you, Alice. How can I believe someone I cannot trust?”
“But you must believe me! I’m not hiding anything!”
“I should call the police. They have ways of dealing with liars and thieves.”
Alice realized she’d never been this close to a man before, other than Lewis. Pilar was near enough to kiss her. She stared at his mouth, his cruel lips, unable to turn away. The damned throbbing between her legs was becoming unbearable, and without thinking she quickly pressed her mouth to Pilar’s, wanting more than anything to feel his tongue in her mouth.
Pilar quickly pulled away. “What are you doing?”
“I… uh…”
“I did not give you permission to kiss me.”
“I’m sorry. It’s just, I drank this potion earlier, and it is making me crazy.”
Pilar raised an eyebrow. “A potion? Was it blue?”
“Yes.”
“Did it say DRINK ME on the bottle?”
“Yes. Yes it did.”
“And you drank it?”
“Yes.”
“What sort of fool would drink a blue potion without knowing what it was?”
Alice didn’t know how to respond. She felt like crying.
“This potion, which is making you crazy…” Pilar’s voice had lost the rough edge, and now was soft as a summer breeze. “Do you want to stop the crazy feeling?”
“Yes. Can you help me?”
“I can. But you have to trust me. Do you trust me, Alice?”
Pilar released her shoulders. Alice glanced at the door leading back into the mushroom field.
“You can leave if you wish,” he said. “The choice is yours.”
Looking up into Pilar’s deep, green eyes, she said, “Yes. I trust you.”
“Come with me.”
Taking Alice’s hand, he lead her through his cozy cabin to a large, iron door.
“This is my Pink Room of Bunnies,” he said.
“How adorable.”
