I do not own any of the characters created by Lewis Carroll. But, I own the plot, and I own what I did to the characters to make them mine. Please respect that.

This story is not in any way based on historical events. No people, living or dead, (except Lewis Carroll) or events that happened are meant to be historically accurate. Actually, my portrayal of Lewis Carroll is not that accurate either. As for Alice's hairstyle, look at the original illustrations: it's how she wears her hair in Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. She wears it in a headband only in Through the Looking Glass.

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"I can't say I appreciate what Mr. Carroll did with my story."

"Miss Greenwood, he took your story and tuned it into a child's tale. And they love it; Wonderland is a place for every child."

The aging Miss Greenwood sat up even straighter in her chair and glared at the man, her eyes still as clear and blue as they had ever been. "Wonderland," the woman began, "has never been, nor never will be, a place for children." She used the same stern voice she had used as a schoolteacher, but with more severity, conviction and fear than she had ever chided a student with.

The journalist was taken aback. "I'm sorry, Miss Greenwood."

"As very well you should be."

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I detest parties, I thought to myself. They are so very droll. I had managed to sneak away from almost every one my parents hosted, and the one that was in celebration of my fifteenth birthday was no exception. I just told Mother I was going for a walk to get used to the longer skirt that I was now required to wear as a young lady of fifteen. The dress was wonderful, which made the longer length of it tolerable: a light blue princess-line silk.

The dress was my first silk and Mother had let me wear it without an apron to keep off grime. I felt very grown-up.

Despite the lovely dress and the lovely weather, I couldn't help but think what turning fifteen meant: I had one more year before turning sixteen.

Now, you may think that obvious, and it is. But then think about what turning sixteen meant: I would have my debutant party that year. And that means that I would soon be betrothed, then married and stuck in a world of housewifely duties, which in my particular social class meant running the household and giving your husband the credit for it all.

One shouldn't be so selfish, Alice. If you were poor, you would actually be doing the housework, Imaginary Alice told me.

I can't help that I'm not poor! I replied.

Silly girl, Imaginary Alice chided. I didn't mean for you to feel guilty about not being poor; I just meant you should be thankful that you aren't.

I didn't honor that statement with an answer. I just stuck my nose in the air and walked away in a huff, leaving Imaginary Alice wherever she lives when I am done talking to her.

I walked daintily and ladylike until I was out of my mother's line of sight. Then, in an atrocious disregard to propriety, I hitched up my skirts and ran as fast as my feet could carry me across the grassy lands of our estate, until I came upon my favorite place in the world: the daisy field.

Dinah, my devoted kitten, had followed me. I sat in the daisy field next to her and took off the gargantuan pink bow my mother had tied around her neck. After smoothing out the creases and dusting off traces of orange cat hair, I used it to tie my hair into a half-up style. The pink matched the color of the embroidered flowers on my dress, so if Mother caught me she wouldn't mind.

"Was it rude of me to take that bow from you, Dinah? No, of course not; Mother knows you hate ribbons; I even caught you pawing at it earlier trying to take it off. I rescued you!"

After justyfing my actions, I sat there, making a daisy chain of colossal proportions and dreaming about a nonsense world of my own.

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"He at least got that part right,"

"Yes, he did indeed, from there up until the part where I met the Mad Hatter and the March Hare," the elderly lady clad in mossy green velvet replied paitently.

"How about we just skip to where you met them, then?"

"And they say it's children who have no patience. Very well, Mr. Harper. We will skip to where I met the Mad Hatter and the March Hare."

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