Work Text:
When Alice thought back on her trip to that theme park, she questioned if she was the perfect person for Blinky to manipulate.
Self-conscious. Constantly in her head.
Scared.
Scared of being alone. Of being forgotten. Especially by someone that she thought so highly of, like Deb.
Blinky must love scared people, Alice figured. Maybe it could even sense her fear, the moment she stepped through the park's gate with her dad. That would make an unsettling level of sense.
How else would that fortune teller, Iris Something, know to take her phone, during a time when her eyes were glued to the party?
How else would she have known exactly what fake Instagram photos would set her off?
Because, when the Woodwards left the park, the most incriminating photos disappeared from Deb's page, so quickly that it was as if they were never there in the first place.
Which made Alice think, Maybe they never were.
Because fear makes you vulnerable. When you think your world is crashing down, and you're about to lose that last little bit of stability left in your life, you can be convinced to do horrible things to fix it.
But, looking at Deb's page now, she questioned why she would ever be scared of that -- scared of her -- in the first place.
Deb was so gentle and sweet with her. She always made her feel loved when she was in town -- and even when they spoke on the phone.
Nothing -- not even a theme park demon -- would ever make her forget that again.