As always, to Ana. For putting up with my mind and all the crazies it contains.
Alice eyed the woman across from her in the small carriage. Blonde curls washed, face clean, normal dress, and teeth...well, the teeth were about the same.
The big blue eyes peered out from under her lashes and the wide, feminine hat with a purple feather she wore. She had an overall purple theme going on with her dress, hat, and gloves. She wrung her hands absentmindedly. Her long bony fingers intertwining and weaving with an unexpected grace in her nervousness.
Alice looked back out the window. A light drizzle of a mist covered the countryside. An infinite fertile green spreading across the acres ahead of the road. The horses' iron shoes made a steady 'clip-clop' over stones, calming to some, an invitation to insanity for others.
Alice brought her left hand's fingertips to her pounding temple. Only bringing her hand back down due to the fact it intercepted her view of the world. A sight she did not want to let go of for a minute. She had spent too much time in the asylum. Too much time being subjected to ice cold baths, beatings, and starvation. They hadn't forced her to do slave labour at the asylum, they feared her too much to want her anywhere but the confinement of her cell.
Essie, as Alice found her name to be, leaned across her seat toward Alice, showing generous amounts of cleavage In the process. "The World. Hasss it not been forever?" She said with a mischievous glee. It was almost as if she had been a trickful child, and after having been locked in her room for so long and bored to DEATH, had found a handful of worms, and had an unholy idea as to what to do with them.
"Quite." Alice said, turning to her. "A world where no one knows what it means to suffer. A world where no one has seen what you have." Alice turned back to the window and stared into nothing. Maybe her pupils were just black holes in her eyes. Perhaps if you took a needle you could stick it through right into her brain, because such nothingness dwelled there.
"Oh, Alissse. How bitter you are. Live and let go?" Essie said, leaning back. "But then again, I would love to ssstick needles in every nerve of their bodies. The sight of them squirming in pain makes me feel warm inside."
Alice eyed the girl coldly. "I don't wonder for a minute why you were admitted to the asylum. You are bloody mad."
Essie's brows knit together and her lips formed a pout. "Oh, silly little Arthur didn't have a problem with me. Until I told him to make his own damn sandwich." Her dissaproving face now changed tactics and flowed into an easy smile. "That's the reason we all go there. Men. They want us to be pretty, interesting, run their homes, bear and raise their brats, and be nothing but obedient to their every whim. Not to mention its a requirement you 'do it' whenever they want. Or you end up in the asssylum. I honestly don't know how so many women manage to stay out of such places. But look on the bright side my dear Alice, neither of us received a clitoridectomy."
Alice stared into nothing (a growing habit it seems.) "Yes. Luckily, I have not married. Nor do I ever wish to do so."
The carriage jostled in the air as the wheels made their way over a nasty hole in the road. Essie grabbed the edge of her ridiculous hat (fearing it would fall off maybe?) And gave a look that could kill. Alice didn't know if it was directed at the hole or carriage.
Essie has a very short temper, a foul mouth, and an indecent flirtatious nature. That is how they managed to acquire their nice clothes. After they had escaped the asylum, not a difficult task, no one cared if they had two less cages of dirty crazies to look after.
After they got back to the city, they stuck to back allies until Essie managed to seduce a man to come over by her flirtatious looks and glimpses of her bare skin and took him around the corner and...well, Alice didn't want to know exactly what happened behind that corner. All she knew was in exchange the man went over to the store across the way and bought two dresses, two pairs of gloves, some cheap shoes and stockings, and that ridiculous hat Essie loved so much.
After dressing like normal people, rather grungy ones at that, they begged off some money from passer-bys and had enough to get one nights lodging at a very cheap inn. But all Alice and Essie cared about was the bath they could take and the safety they would have under the roof.
The next morning they hitched a ride on a coach who took pity on them and was going in their direction anyway so let them ride aboard.
Where are they headed?
A thick settle of woods outside Canterbury. Since escaping London was so easy, and they could travel by carriage, arriving there in a jiff would not be a problem.