Well, this is my first story for Alice In
Wonderland, and it all began a few weeks ago during my schools
production of Alice In Wonderland (with yours truly playing the
infamous Hatter ;)), and I was up far too late as I'm want to do
and couldn't get a story out of my head. So I wrote it down, put it
out to people and apparently it is fantastic!
This story is my
property, but the back story of Alice's Adventures In Wonderland
and Through The Looking Glass belong to Lewis Carroll.
I'd like
to thank Bri-Chan for her web-series When Curiosity Met Insanity for
inspiring me with my ideas for The Hatter, also thanks to Adelaide,
Kathleen, Hayden, Tania and the rest of the cast of Alice In
Wonderland, as well as Lynden, Emily and Courtney for helping me
concoct all of this =) I hope you enjoy!
Alice drew back the shutters of her window and
squinted in to the morning sunshine that warmed her face. She
stretched up on her tip toes and smiled at the light, the cheery
songs of the birds wafting through the glass and filling the room
with music.
On the bed her cat purred contentedly, its tail
swishing and leaving streaks of hair along the white linen sheets.
"Now, now, Mrs. Shire!" Scolded Alice as she picked up the
feline and held her to her face. "You know that we aren't to
dirty the beds. Run along and behave yourself."
The cat mewed
and twisted out of her grip, landing silently on the wooden floor and
making for the closed door where it sat.
"And I suppose now that
you want me to let you out, too?"
The cat stared at Alice, and
then back at the door.
Alice heaved a sigh and drew herself away
from the window to open the door for the pampered pet. As she did,
she heard her parents voices drift from the floor below her.
Curious, she
thought Mother and Father aren't
normally up this early. I wonder what could be the matter?
Quietly,
she followed Mrs. Shire out of her room and stood on the landing to
hear her parents begin to bellow at each other. Alice covered her
mouth in shock when she heard her mothers voice raised to her father.
Never in her eighteen years had she heard them quarrel so.
Well,
at least not since her… disappearance.
She chastised herself for
thinking of the incident. Its thoughts always drew back waves of
memories and feelings, images of the world she visited. No!
Not memories! It never happened!
Straightening
her golden hair and patting down her night gown, Alice stepped down
the stairs with the cat at her feet to confront her parents.
The living room was immaculate and spotless,
the white walls and ceiling gleaming orange in the sunrise. As Alice
passed them, her eye was drawn to the chair that her father always
smoked his pipe in. Her body stopped of its own accord and her eyes
bore in to the chairs upholstery. The colours and patterns –
normally static as a statue – began to dance and form at her gaze,
shifting and re-arranging themselves. Thoughts and ideas, words and
numbers all struggling for a position in her vision. So many
vibrant images that she had lost…
"Alice! What in heaven's
name are you doing up at this hour!"
She jumped as her father
directed his voice at her from the kitchen. Both he and her mother
were standing there, framed by the door and staring at her. Her
father with a mask of rage and her mother with shock and sorrow.
Alice froze like a rabbit caught in the light, her eyes wide and
ashamed at being caught eaves-dropping before she had a mind to
introduce herself. "I was… Mrs. Cheshire woke me and wanted to
come downstairs, so when I opened the door I heard voices and was
wondering the same of you."
Her father continued to glare at
her, weighing her words against her as the verdict was considered.
"Very well then, child. Go back to your room and prepare for the
day, your mother and I have matters do discuss."
Alice bowed and
smartly turned to leave, colours still dancing in the corners of her
vision.
She waited on the landing, stroking Mrs. Shire as her
parents began to converse once more in hushed voices.
"Arthur,
she's a lady now. If she doesn't get married soon I fear she
never will." Her mothers voice wavered with concern.
"Nonsense
Bernadette, she is a prize for any suitor no matter her age.
Marionettes College for Ladies will be the perfect place for her."
Her father scoffed; always the man of sensibility.
Alice pondered
their meaning. Surely they weren't planning on sending her away?
But as their conversation drew on, their intentions became clearer.
"Then it's settled." Sighed her father. "I'll fetch the
girl and inform her."
Alice bit her lip and dropped Mrs. Shire.
She quickly ran up the stairs and to her room, shutting the door
behind her and diving back in to her bed.
As her father
opened the door, Alice closed her eyes pretended to sleep. Without a
word, he stepped towards her and stood over her bed. "Alice…
Alice darling, wake up."
She didn't stir and focused on
keeping her eyes firmly closed and her breathing even. To add to the
act she kicked her leg slightly and gave a little "Humm…" as
one would expect a sleeping mouse to produce.
The floorboards
groaned under his weight as her father left the room and shut the
door.
Immediately Alice sprung out of bed and rushed to her
wardrobe. She wouldn't allow her parents to send her off to a
school that would teach her to be little more than a puppet. If
they are so eager to be rid of me then I shall run away. She
pulled out her blue petticoat and white smock and laid them carefully
on the bed. Mrs. Shire leapt fluidly on to the bed and stood just to
the side of her clothes, eyeing them with curiosity. Alice ignored
her and closed the shutter to change.
When she caught her eye in
the mirror, she turned and curtsied to herself. "Hello there Alice,
how do you do?"
"Very well thank you, and yourself?" Replied
her reflection.
Alice giggled. Talking
to yourself, the first sign of madness. Although, we're all mad
here. At that thought she stood
stiff as a board. Those words were familiar, like a nightmare that
gnawed at the edge of the mind but never made its self known. A
shiver crept down Alice's spine.
The rose bushes stood guard beneath Alice's
window, planted four summers ago by her father when to celebrate her
safe return home when she was lost in the woods.
Her white bed
linen swung down from the window with Alice clinging to it for dear
life. It wasn't until she was halfway down that she realized how
much of a bad idea this actually was, yet she was too terrified to go
back. With her legs swinging wildly and her elbows scraping along the
bricks, Alice finally came to the conclusion that she would have to
let go.
"Three… two… two and a quarter… two and a half…
two and three quarters…"
The linen tore and she fell square in
to the garden bed, missing the two largest bushes by inches. Alice
sat where she had landed in a daze. She shrieked as something soft
brushed past her leg. Her leg kicked out at it and Mrs. Shire hissed
at her. "Oh! It was only the cat… Dear me."
Alice stood and
brushed herself off, annoyed that she was so early in her adventure
but already her nice clothes had been dirtied.
Around her the
roses rustled in the breeze and the smaller flowers at their bases
seemed to sing as the wind whispered through them. Out of the sea of
red, Alice spied a single white rose out of the bunch, its petals
drooping and dying. Clucking her tongue, Alice smiled at the poor
flower. "Perhaps if you were as ruby as the rest then you wouldn't
lose your head…" She mused.
As Alice ventured further from
her house she couldn't hide the happiness inside her. The emerald
fields of her parents estate stretched from the creek to the south,
to the woods in the west. When she was fourteen, she wandered in to
the woods and was lost for three days and four nights until she was
found sitting underneath a tree and petting the cat which became Mrs.
Shire. Alice could remember nothing of while she was gone, yet some
nights when the air was still and warm, she was sure she could hear
mad laughter ringing in her ears…
With a wave of her hand she
dismissed the thoughts, knowing that they would bring back memories
that she no longer wanted.
Though, the woods weren't too far
from where she was now. What harm could come from taking a peek?
After all, she wasn't a cat so curiosity wasn't that
dangerous.
She skipped over
to where the grass gave way to pine needles and stood at the entrance
to the forest, trees bent over in reminisce of a gaping maw.
Alice
peered through the gap in the trees, expecting to see something,
anything, but there was darkness and more trees. Nothing
more.
"There." She told herself. "You've satisfied your
silly curiosity, and now we should go back to the trail and run away.
Isn't that right, Mrs. Shire?"
The cat ignore Alice and darted
quickly in to the forest.
"Oh you silly cat!" Alice called
after it. Hesitantly, she crossed the border between the forest and
the meadow and felt the pine needles crunch beneath her feet. Instead
of the fear she was expecting, Alice felt a strange sense of peace
flow through her. She caught the sight of Mrs. Shires tail weaving
and bobbing between trees so Alice hitched up her dress and followed
after it, stepping daintily over sticks and logs as she did so.
The
warmth and light of the sun couldn't penetrate the thick canopy of
the forest so the gloom was new to Alice's eyes and it took her a
few moments to adjust to them, so in her state of semi-blindness she
failed the see the rabbit hole in front of her, nor notice that the
forest floor she was about to step on had been so weakened by the
rabbits digging that as soon as she placed her weight on it, it would
give way and swallow her up.
Which is exactly what it did.
