IV. Alice, September 8

It was a gorgeous day. It was as if Mother Nature hadn't been alerted that it was fall now and she needed to stop tempting the students with gorgeous summer weather. Many of the teachers had opened the classroom windows to let the warm fresh air waft in. First class of the day, Alice Liddell found this particularly distracting… She could hear the birds chirping and could even smell the freshly cut grass on the school's front lawn. She propped her elbow on the desk and rested her cheek on her hand, staring out at the trees that were swaying back and forth slowly in the light breeze. A butterfly fluttered right outside the window.

Of course Alice didn't notice that Mr. Ratcliffe was now standing directly in front of her desk. He cleared his throat and she jumped a little, then looked up at him. He gazed down at her over his rather large nose and stroked his goatee.

"Ms… Liddell, isn't it?" he asked, and she nodded, folding her hands together on her desk and swallowing nervously. "Can you answer the question? You do know what the question is, don't you?"

"Um, no sir," Alice said quietly. "I hadn't been listening."

"Pity," Mr. Ratcliffe said. "Well, I'll give you a chance anyway. I asked the class for the answer to the third homework question… It would probably be in your best interest to get the homework out."

"I—I didn't do the homework," Alice said, looking down at her hands on her desk.

"And why not?" Mr. Ratcliffe snarled.

"Well, I… I suppose I simply forgot," Alice hoped he would move on—she was embarrassed enough.

"Forgot? Barely started high school and you're already forgetting homework—yes, I can see your future is not going to be very bright at all," Mr. Ratcliffe shook his head and made a "tsk" noise with his tongue, picking a clipboard up off the desk and making a note on it. "I'll have to give you a 'zero' for participation for the day then. I would suggest you not forget such important things again."

Alice decided it would be best not to say anything. She practiced being invisible for the rest of the lesson.

Alice was lying lazily in a garden picking petals off a daisy. The weather was perfect, the sky blue and cloudless, and she had found a perfect bit of shade to shelter her from the hot sun. She had thought she was alone, when she saw a boy a few yards away. She squinted and stood, dropping the flower—who was that? As she came closer, she saw that he was quite cute, though somewhat generic-looking. Once she was near him, he spoke—but not to her.

"She speaks!" he said.

"That's a curious thing to say," Alice said, only loudly enough for herself to hear. "I hadn't spoken at all."

"O, speak again, bright angel! For thou art as glorious to this night, being o'er my head as is a winged messenger of heaven unto the white-upturned wondering eyes of mortals that fall back to gaze on him when he bestrides the lazy-pacing clouds and sails upon the bosom of the air," he said dramatically.

"Why, this is utter nonsense," Alice shook her head.

"O Romeo, Romeo!"

Alice turned—the voice coming from behind her belonged to a girl, also generically pretty. Her voice, however, left something to be desired—it sounded a bit old and not particularly pleasant. Alice was sure the girl hadn't been there before. But she must have. There hadn't been any noise.

"Wherefore art thou Romeo?" she said. "Deny thy father and refuse thy name; or, if thou wilt not, be but sworn my love, and I'll no longer be a Capulet."

"This is Romeo and Juliet, isn't it?" Alice exclaimed. "We're reading that in my English class—a bit odd to be reciting it in a garden though, isn't it?"

"Shall I hear more, or shall I speak at this?" the Romeo said.

"Oh, that wasn't a very good aside," Alice said in a scolding voice. "I'm sure Juliet can hear you clearly."

"'Tis but thy name that is my enemy—" the Juliet began, then stopped. "Alice."

"No, no, that's not how it goes at all," Alice said. "At least—I don't think that's how it goes. I should have paid more attention in English. But I'm quite sure they never said my name—no that can't be right."

"Alice," she said, more sternly, then shouted, "Alice!"

Alice awoke to a classroom full of faces turned, looking right at her.

"Oh dear…" Alice whispered, realizing she must have fallen asleep in the middle of English Lit.

Mrs. Tremaine began writing furiously on a small piece of paper, her face contorted into an expression that could only mean bad things. Alice slumped down in her chair, prepared for the worst. Mrs. Tremaine ripped the paper violently off of its notepad and held it out for Alice to retrieve. Alice slowly got up and walked towards the front of the room.

"Principal's office. Now," Mrs. Tremaine said, and Alice nodded nervously before going out into the hallway.

She headed slowly for the stairs. She determined to walk as slowly as possible to postpone her fate as long as possible. She got a couple of weird stares from students passing by. She passed a tall, dark-haired boy in the stairwell as she was going down. He nearly passed her by, but he stopped and backed up a few steps.

"Hey, are you okay?" he asked, probably worried by her extremely slow pace—she didn't look disabled in any way.

"Hm?" Alice said sluggishly. "Oh… yeah, I'm fine."

"Why the long face?" the boy asked, looking genuinely concerned.

Alice showed him her pass sheepishly.

"Fall asleep in class, eh?" he asked. "I've done it before—I'm sure we all have. Trick is to not get caught. Freshman?"

"Yeah," Alice said.

"Thought so—hadn't seen you around before," he said. "I'm Aladdin."

"Alice," she said, smiling politely.

"Well, good luck with Mr. Minpejrabah," said Aladdin. "I've got to get going or else I'll be going to visit him too. Don't worry too much, he won't care enough to punish you too badly. Just don't draw too much attention to yourself."

Alice thanked him for the advice then continued downwards to her doom. She reached the principal's office and found a skinny boy with copper skin sitting in one of the chairs outside. She looked from the door to him questioningly.

"Someone's in there already," the boy said, answering the unspoken question. "I knocked and—well, you don't want to try."

Alice took the seat next to the boy, as it was the only other seat.

"Are you in trouble too?" Alice asked, her curiosity getting the best of her, as usual.

"Yeah," the boy said.

"What for?" Alice asked.

The boy shrugged earnestly, then looked at Alice, "You?"

"I fell asleep," Alice said, blushing a little. "I guess I'm not used to high school classes. They're so boring."

"You're a freshman?" the boy asked, and Alice nodded. "Me too. I'm Mowgli."

"I'm Alice," she responded. "What class were you in?"

"History."

"With Mr. Ratcliffe?"

"Yeah."

"Oh, he is awful," Alice said pityingly. "Just this morning he scolded me in front of the whole class about my homework—oh, it was so embarrassing."

"The same thing happened to me yesterday," Mowgli said, giving a shy smile. "What class were you in just now?"

"Tremaine's Lit class," Alice said, the misery clear in her voice.

"I've got that first block," Mowgli said.

"Our first and second blocks are switched around—too bad," Alice said. "It would be nice to have a friend in either of those classes."

Mowgli gave her a strange look and she wondered if it was too soon to be using the word "friend" with someone she'd just met. But if he thought it strange, he didn't say anything about it. Instead, he agreed.

"Those classes are miserable," he said. "Do you have any good classes?"

"Well—French seems okay," Alice said. "The subject matter is a bit dull, but Monsieur Chandelle is nice. And funny."

"Lucky," Mowgli said. "I took Spanish—it's a nightmare."

The door to Mr. Minpejrabah's office opened and a boy sulked out, shaking, with a look of terror on his face. He made his way down the hallway without a word. Mr. Minpejrabah himself stepped out a few moments later, fiddling with his moustache. He looked at the clipboard he was holding, his expression one of sheer boredom.

"Mowgli Bachchan?" he said in a voice that sounded a bit like a yawn.

"Wish me luck," Mowgli whispered to Alice.

"Good luck," she said.

Mr. Minpejrabah looked amused and Alice wondered if he had heard. Mowgli stepped into the office and Mr. Minpejrabah closed the door. Sitting there alone was dreadfully boring. Alice tried counting the bricks in the wall across from her, but that only came close to putting her to sleep—again. She wondered if she would get in even more trouble if she happened to fall asleep here on these chairs. It didn't seem terribly comfortable, but Alice didn't doubt that she could manage it.

Luckily—or was it unlucky?—Mr. Minpejrabah didn't keep Mowgli for long. Less than ten minutes later, Mr. Minpejrabah was sending the boy away, seemingly unscathed, and beaconing for Alice to come into his office. He sat down at his desk, seeming annoyed with having to deal with so many students.

"So what did you do?" he hissed.

Alice handed him the pass Mrs. Tremaine had given her wordlessly. Mr. Minpejrabah looked at the piece of paper, clicking his tongue. He sighed and sat back in his chair, closing his eyes and rubbing his head as if he had a headache.

"I don't know why these teachers can't solve their own problems," the principal lamented. "They can't handle their students, so they send them all to me. I should just fire them all. Except— Well. What'll it be for you, then? I suppose I should give you a detention?"

"Oh, please don't, sir," Alice begged, leaning forward and sitting on the edge of her chair. "I didn't mean to—"

"Oh, you want to talk about it?" Mr. Minpejrabah rolled his eyes and sighed.

"Well sir, I—"

"I suppose you have a lot of feelings don't you?"

Alice was puzzled but tried to speak up, "Well, I—"

"You want me to sit here and solve all your problems? You think I have time for that nonsense?"

"I—"

"Go to the guidance office."

"Sir?"

"Go to guidance," Mr. Minpejrabah repeated firmly. "Speak to Ms. Fee. I don't need your problems in my office. They bore me."

"O-okay," Alice said, standing confusedly.

"Ms. Fee's office is right next door," Mr. Minpejrabah said impatiently. "Go."

Alice nodded and hurried out of the office. The next door over had a plaque on it which read:

Blue Fee
Guidance Counselor

"Blue?" Alice muttered to herself. "What an odd name…"

She wondered if the guidance counselor would be as unpleasant as the principal was—or worse. She briefly considered just leaving and hoping Mr. Minpejrabah wouldn't check to make sure she'd visited the guidance counselor. But she couldn't do that—she was in enough trouble already. Taking a deep breath, she knocked lightly on the door.

"Come in," a soft voice called—Alice hoped the personality would match the voice.

She pushed the door open slowly and carefully. Behind the desk was a petite woman with wavy, shoulder-length light blonde hair and pale skin. She was dressed all in blue—blue dress, blue headband, and, Alice imagined, blue shoes. Alice thought to herself that if she were named Blue, she would do anything in her power not to remind people of that. But apparently the counselor embraced her namesake.

"Hello," she said softly, looking at Alice with kind eyes. "What can I help you with today?"

"Um…" Alice stepped into the room and closed the door. "Mr. Minpejrabah sent me here. I'm… actually not sure why."

"Oh, he does that quite a lot," the counselor said, laughing. "Why don't you have a seat? I'm Ms. Fee, by the way. What's your name?"

"Alice Liddell," she said as she took the seat across from Ms. Fee—it was surprisingly comfortable.

Ms. Fee typed something into her computer, then waited for a moment.

"Ah, so you're a freshman," Ms. Fee nodded. "I take it you were coming from Mrs. Tremaine's class to Mr. Minpejrabah's?"

Alice nodded.

"Yes, she's always sending students away," Ms. Fee shook her head. "Can't control her temper—that seems to be a problem for a lot of the teachers here. Oh! Excuse me. That's not very professional."

"I won't tell," Alice smiled.

"Did she give you a reason for sending you away?"

"Well—yes," Alice said, embarrassed. "I suppose it was a good reason, too. I fell asleep."

"I can't say that I blame you," Ms. Fee said sympathetically. "Oh, but… in high school, it's a lot different from middle school, obviously. Do you have trouble concentrating?"

Alice nodded, "I suppose I daydream a lot… There's a lot going on in my head and… I don't quite know how to stop it."

Ms. Fee nodded, then looked back at the screen, "It sounds like you need an outlet for all these… ideas, don't you?"

"I… suppose," Alice said. "I'm not quite sure what you mean, though."

"Well, I see here you're in Ms. Gothel's Fiction Writing course—how's that going?" Ms. Fee asked.

"Um, fine, I guess," Alice shrugged. "Same as most of my classes—although Ms. Gothel's scary in kind of a… different way. I don't know."

"Well, a daydreamer like you—I bet you're great at writing," Ms. Fee said.

"I never really tried," Alice said. "I didn't much like books as a child—well, I don't like them much now either."

"Perhaps that's just because the books aren't telling you the stories you're interested in reading," Ms. Fee said. "I bet if you wrote stories of your own, you'd like to read those."

"Well… that's different," Alice said.

"Yes, I suppose," Ms. Fee said, and the bell rang. "I don't see any reason to keep you hear, unless you have something else you'd like to talk about. If not, you can go ahead to your next class."

"Thank you, Ms. Fee," Alice said, standing.

"If you ever want or need to talk about anything, I'm always available," Ms. Fee said, smiling.

Alice nodded, although she doubted she would ever be back here. Ms. Fee was certainly very kind, but Alice didn't foresee herself needing any guidance. Once in the hallway, she yawned and stretched. Well, that was certainly an interesting diversion from the normal daily routine… She took the schedule she had folded in her pocket and checked the room number for French class, then skipped off on her way down the hallway.