*I just saw the new Tim Burton Alice In Wonderland, and got inspired! I am using the characters and conflicts in that film, so if you haven't seen it.....GO SEE IT! If you have, you may agree that it was epically awesome, and...Hope you like my origins of Wonderland!*
**Regina's POV**
"Goodbye Mother! I'll be home soon!" I trilled in a tuneless way as I grabbed the berry-basket and skipped out to the garden. The raspberries were ripe in season, and I quickly dashed a few red delicacies in my mouth, making sure that Mother would have enough for cobbler, though. I was far more than fond of her raspberry cobbler. Something about the color red just made me smile. Maybe that was why I loved my hair so much.
"Candice, go help your sister." I heard Mother say to my sister through the open back door. I wondered if I should have closed that.
"Of course, Mother. Should I take another basket?" the sickly sweet voice of Candice made me sick to my stomach. If she were to trill to Mother, it would most definitely have tune, and most definitely a nice one.
"Yes, I think that's in order. Do check on the peaches while you're at it, too." I looked back to see mother toss something looking like rosemary into the pot of soup she had been brewing. My mind flashed to an image of her tossing bones into a cauldron with a wart on her nose. How accurate. I giggled to myself as Candice picked up the other basket and danced over to me. Well, even if she'd been walking, it looked like dancing, anyhow.
"My, they really have bloomed this year, haven't they?" she said, picking a bundle at a time, never pricking her fingers on the thorns underneath.
I popped another in my mouth, ignoring the fact that they would stain my lips red, and Mother would find out.
"Regina! Don't eat them! They're for cobbler!" Candice gently pushed my arm, and rolled her eyes as I stuck out my rose-red tongue at her.
"You should try one, they're quite good." I plucked one from the bush and handed it to her.
"I can wait." she said simply turning around to see the peach tree, leaving me to finish off with the raspberries.
We both picked patiently, silently, not enjoying, but not loathing each other's presence. I wished that I was alone so that I could at least sing to myself. If I sang around Candice, she would sing along and put my simple voice to shame. I was thankful at least for my thick red hair from which I could hide in like a palace. It was my own personal Red Palace. If only Miles were here to help me. Miles was my best friend, but he was a little too obedient, and I was under the impression he had some sort of thing for me. I did deserve at least one person that liked me best, right?
"Regina? Can I ask you something?" I blinked and turned, seeing Candice holding a peach in one hand and her basket in the other, looking thoughtful.
"Of course." I said, waiting for her to say whatever she had planned to.
"Why is it that...they make wells so that they're big enough for people to fall down them? I mean, remember that story about Timmy falling down the well? You think someone would learn..." she stared deeply into the peach, and I almost expected it to implode from her stare.
"Come on, that was just a story, and you can't really fall down a well! Come one, let me show you." I grabbed her basket and set it down next to mine by the raspberry bush. I grabbed her hand and laughed inwardly at her horrified expression. It was only a matter of time before she understood that I was fearless.
"Girls! Visitor!" Mother called, and, immediately, Candice's face was filled with relief, and she dragged me back towards the house, thanking the unknown visitor. "Now, girls, my soup is so thick it's starting to look like a stew, and I need you to take yourselves and your visitor to the well to get some water for this, or else it's going to end up being a casserole at this rate."
We nodded and headed towards the den of the home, passing our fathers study. He had his nose and mind buried in any little thing that wasn't reality, so he didn't hear our hellos. Miles was waiting on the front porch, watching the rabbits hop around the vegetable garden.
"Miles!" I squealed, and ran over to hug him. "What are you doing here?" I said, backing up so that I could see him properly. He was a full two heads taller than me, and I focused on his right eye. He didn't like it when people looked at his right eye, which was glass because of an accident when he was young.
"My mum kicked me out and told me to be useful, so I knew you'd have somethin' or other to do around here, and that's useful, innit?" he patted me on the head like a cat, and I scrunched up my eyes in a childish scowl.
"Well, me and Regina, were just about to go down to the well to get water for Mother's soup. So you can come with us and help." Candice went to the other end of the porch and picked up three water buckets, handing them to Miles, herself, and I.
"I heard just last week that a cat in France fell down a well, and when they sent someone down to look for 'im, nothin' was there. Nothin' at all. Isn't that frightening?" Miles walked ahead of us to open the door for us as he told us.
"I was just now telling Candice that it's ridiculous for someone to fall down a well, and I had more than half a mind to go show her." I looked at Candice, who still had a shocked expression from Miles' story. She seemed very focused on her walking, and it was hard to keep up with her. We were almost at the top of the hill, anyway.
"But, listen to that, Regina. A cat disappeared down a well, so I'm going to let you get the water, okay? I'll walk with you, but I just don't want to get too near that well." she shivered and grimaced and I just giggled at her.
"Miles, is she ridiculous, or what? I mean, cats are much tinier than us, so she shouldn't worry." I smiled a tiny smile at him, which he returned.
"We do have a rather small well, and I don't even think a cat could fall down ours, Candy. I'll sit in the well, if you really want proof that it's safe."
"Oh, now you two are just being intolerably obnoxious. I'm just worried about it, alright? If you really want to, you two can just go fall down the well for all I care!" Candice dropped her bucket, threw her hands to her face and ran as fast a as a jackrabbit towards the back porch, and I saw Mother run out with open arms and a scowl heading our way already on her face. I grabbed Miles' hand and rushed up towards the well so that we wouldn't have to see that.
"Isn't she just a little...." I couldn't muster up the words of which she was. It was something, and it wasn't very nice, let me say that. I sighed and sat down next to the well, not caring in the slightest that my skirt was dirtying.
"Come on, she isn't that bad, just...sensitive." Miles came over to me and patted my mane of red as I picked up my bucket and stood, facing the tiny well which had started all of this mess.
"Can't fall down a well..I mean, look!" I leaned over the well's top, and I could barely fit my shoulders through it's meek entry. "Ha! No one can fall down this well!"
I suddenly felt the edge of the well that my head was facing jut out and hit my legs, startling me so that I kicked up quite a bit. Little did I know, the whole well was increasing in size the edge that had hit my feet extended just enough for me to tumble down. I screamed shrilly and looked up, seeing only Miles' head peering over the shrinking well top.
"Miles!" I squeaked, praying that he would do something. I saw him panic and plunge his head down towards me. Idiot! What was he doing, coming after me?! It was very sweet, but now he'll land on top of me at the bottom of the well! I closed my eyes and started to anticipate the fall, but instead I found myself landing on a hard stone floor. You would think that's what you would expect at the bottom of a well, but, no, this stone was smooth and gold and it was just maybe a square meter of it surrounding me. I was on a tiny stone square in the middle of a forest. I looked around before a second square appeared beside my and Miles landed squarely on it, like I had done myself. He blinked and looked around, equally confused as I.
"Oh, my. Is it another little girl? With a little boy? Oh, my. What'll we do with this one?" I whipped my head around to see a blinking cat floating above an enormous mushroom. It's bright green eyes were fascinating, but I couldn't take my eyes off of it's wide, toothy, endless, frightening, grin.