We're all mad here

“Time is running out, running out, running out, and it’s time to go down, down, down, down, down the rabbit hole!” the twins sing, their voices weaving an incessant, maddening chant.

Alice clamps her hands over her ears, feeling loopy. The song, repeated endlessly over the past week, feels like it’s burrowing into her brain. At times, she even swears she’s seen white rabbits with pocket watches scurrying in her peripheral vision. Her imagination playing tricks and her hysteria taking hold of her.

“Will you lot just shut that bloody song up already?” Alice snaps, her voice sharp.

The twins fall silent, their rosy faces twisting into mock astonishment.

“Alice, language,” a familiar voice chides.

Alice turns, watching as her older sister, Charlotte, approaches with characteristic grace. She sits on the pasture next to her with her usual poise, the skirts of her emerald dress fanning out as she places a book in her lap.

“I didn’t say anything terrible,” Alice mutters.

“You know a lady’s tongue should remain as polished as her manners,” Charlotte reminds her earnestly. “Especially a Liddell’s tongue.”

"Especially a Liddell’s tongue,” she retorts, her annoyance bubbling over. “Who cares?”

“Everyone cares. Do you want people to whisper that Father’s daughters are ill-bred? He works too hard to maintain our reputation for you to ruin it with petty outbursts.”

Alice exhales, the weight of her sister’s scolding pressing down on her. “Fine. I’m sorry.”

“Good,” Charlotte says lightly, though a knowing smile tugs at her lips. She turns to the twins. “Go on with your game, girls. Alice won’t bother you again.”

Alice scowls. “Now I see whose side you’re on, Charlotte.”

“I’m not on anyone’s side,” she says and carelessly shrugs. “I just don’t think you should be so hard on them. They’re still too little for you to rain on their fun.” She glances over her shoulder at her. Alice’s curls bounce as she plops down on the grass. “And you’re too young to be so bitter.”

“I’m old enough.”

Charlotte hesitates, her serene expression faltering ever so slightly. But she recovers quickly, rushing off Alice’s defiance with a wave of her hand, so evidently trying to avoid an argument. “Mother wants to shop for dresses this afternoon,” she says, changing the subject.

Alice groans.

“You can’t skip it. Father’s taking us to a party outside Oxford tomorrow. He wants us to look our best.”

“Why?”

“I’ve been told it’s a surprise.”

“But you know.”

Charlotte presses her lips together, her gaze flitting away. “Only that Henry and Arthur will be there, along with their wives. And William too.”

Alice can only roll her eyes in silence at the mention of Charlotte’s husband. He has never been a delight to spend with, but Alice has learned to keep her disdain to herself. For her sister’s sake.

“And,” Charlotte continues, lowering her voice, “this arrived today. It’s for you.”

She hands Alice the book. At first, she takes it without a second thought, noticing the rough royal blue leather it’s made of, but when her eyes skim the cover, her heart stumbles, dropping at her heels, a wave of uncertainty snatching at her voice.

“Carroll’s?” she whispers. “I thought father had forbidden us to speak to him.”

“And that’s still on the table.”

“Then, why...?”

“I received it myself. I haven’t told anyone. Even Nani hasn’t heard about the delivery,” Charlotte replies, her demeanor suddenly cautions. “I thought you might like to have it.”

Alice can only consider it. “Not really.”

“Throw it away then,” Charlotte breathes out. “Do what you will with it. I’ll see you at teatime.”

Alice doesn’t know what else to say to her sister, so she just lets Charlotte rise from the ground, gathering the twins and shepherding them towards the house. Left alone, the silence of the garden wraps around her like a heavy quilt, letting her hear the singing of the wind and the dancing of the leaves on the treetops. Her gaze returns to the book, fingers tracing the edges despite her better judgment. It feels wrong just to hold it, just as she feels like nostalgia trickling through her fingers like cold sweat.

The last time Alice had seen Carroll, they had spent the afternoon under the shade of the trees, laughing at every word that came out of his mouth as he told his magical stories. But even so, it was half a memory. Incomplete. Details blurring like smudged ink. She couldn’t remember what day it was, where in the sky the sun was, or whether she was alone or accompanied by any of her sisters. As if somehow, her brain was trying to erase something she still wanted to hold on to.

But she could not. Her father had been clear about that. And without further ado, Alice never saw him again, not even by accident or by the vagaries of fate. It was as if the man had vanished from the world as soon as Mr. Liddell’s resounding ‘no’ came out from under his moustache. And now, just as he had vanished, he comes back to haunt her. To remind her of the old times, the old stories. The old world she had longed to live in but only had the right to hear without ever being able to set foot in that imaginary place.

Something akin to rage begins to scratch at the base of her throat. It was unfair that they had filled her head with absurd dreams. It was unfair that they had been taken away from her when they were all her little self knew. It was unfair that after seven years of leaving the past behind, it should appear once more, with neither warning nor mercy upon her. It was unfair that the man who gave her empty hopes would return to try his misdeeds with a book disguised as an attempt at an apology.

She squeezes the book until her fingertips lose color, her heart leaping as soon as she notices the end of an envelope poking through the pages of the book like a joke told at the worst of times.

Her fingers hover over it, uncertain. Alice could take the envelope and tear it into a thousand pieces, never knowing what words would be written on the paper. She could ignore it, leaving it unread to collect dust. Or she could open it, risking whatever emotions it might stir.

She stares at it. Debating the next step to take without noticing the time passing around her like warm breezes and changing skies of early May, until, at last, the distant sound of the old clock in the living room brings her back to the present. Teatime.

Finally, she lets her body act on its own. She crumples the letter in her fist, clenching the paper until she feels it digging into the flesh of her palm. With book in hand and the letter still being tortured by the pressure of past accounts, Alice shakes the grass off her dress and walks straight home. The breeze stirs the leaves of the freshly pruned bushes in the garden and carries with it the faint scent of the roses her mother had had planted a few summers ago when she first became fascinated by the scarlet color of their petals. She was so pleased that, as soon as the gardeners had finished their work, she had taken all her children to see them, and Alice had ended up with her finger pricked by the thorns, keeping her away from them ever since.

She moves on, through the wide-open doors and trailing her way into the parlor. Charlotte is in front of the fireplace, fixing her auburn curls in the mirror that extend almost to the ceiling. On the mantelpiece, the old clock complements several pictures of people Alice has never met in her life and various other porcelain and glass ornaments with a dull ticking sound.

Alice’s eyes fall on her sister Edith. She is sitting in her designated spot on one of the sofas that create a half-circle in the center of the room, her brother Albert next to her, and the twins, Violet and Caroline, sitting on the floor next to Frederick, who gobbles up a strawberry shortcake with singular glee. When Edith turns her attention away from one of the few paintings decorating the sand-lined walls and smiles at her, Alice has to hold back the urge to run to her side and tell her about the book still dangling from one of her hands.

“Alice.” Her attention drops to her mother now. The woman is wearing a vanilla dress that she keeps impeccable despite having baby Lionel on her lap with little hands full of sugar biscuit. “We’ve been waiting for you. Join us.”

Charlotte gives her a look through the mirror, causing Alice to hide the book behind her back as soon as she notices her sister’s eyes on it.

“I’m sorry,” she almost shrieks. “But I don’t have an appetite for tea at the moment.”

“Are you feeling all right?”

“I’m not quite myself.”

Before Alice can apologize, her mother insists. “Do you need anything? Do you want Nani to bring some fresh water?”

On cue, Nani appears from between the threshold separating the parlor and the kitchen, eyes fully alert and maid’s uniform smoother than the hair she keeps pulled back in a limp ponytail.

“There’s no need.” Alice insists. “I’ll just lie down on my bed for a few minutes.”

“Oh, well, perhaps you don’t feel quite up for tea, but you do feel up to going dress shopping this afternoon, don’t you?” presses the woman, exchanging glances between Charlotte and Alice. “Your sister told you, didn’t she? For the party.”

“Mother, I don’t think-”

Her mother gives her that impatient expression and holds up her hand to shush her. “I know you, Alice Liddell. Don’t make excuses just so you won’t join us. You need a new dress, and you’ll get a new dress like the rest of us.”

Alice can only lower her head. The gaze of her younger siblings being more unbearable than the weight of the book she still hides at her back.

“Now, go and lie down for a while.” Her mother continues. “I’ll send Nani to wake you up as soon as it’s time to go.”

“Yes, Mrs. Lorina.” Nina replies as soon as Alice refuses to produce words.

Alice knows she can’t win the battle against her mother, but at least she is relieved to be out of the situation and on her way to the safety of her bedroom. Once there, she glances at the book again. Seeing her name in the title brings extreme happiness to her eleven-year-old self, but a heavy feeling to her current self. A feeling that lingers with that of the letter still in her fist.

She goes to her wardrobe and opens the shoe box where she has always kept the low platform heels her mother gave her a few years ago, but which she has never worn. She tosses the letter inside and then the book, but the uncertainty doesn’t go away. Her fingers run over the spine, its edges and then its closed pages.

There is a tap on the door.

“Alice?” Her father’s voice sounds from behind the door. “May I come in?”

The girl hurries to close the shoebox and quickly closes the wardrobe. Her father pokes his head through the half-open door, announcing himself once more before entering fully and finding his daughter standing with her back to bed.

“Your mother told me you weren’t well enough to join us for tea.” He says in his gentle voice, as if speaking to a wounded animal he would like to help. “Is something wrong?”

Alice shakes her head slowly. “It’s nothing. I’m just not in a very good mood today. Although mother let me skip tea I wasn’t so lucky in convincing her not to join them dress shopping.”

Her father lets out a sugar-coated chuckle that sends Alice to muster a smile. “Your mother can be like that sometimes.”

“Sometimes?” the girl jokes and her father reciprocates with another giggle.

With a wave of his hand, he invites her to sit on the bed lined with embroidered cotton duvet. The bed is big enough for both of them to settle down and rest their backs on the headboard. Alice watches as her father glances around the bedroom. At the wardrobe doors painted with worn flowers, the embroidered lamp and music box on the bedside table, a shelf with all the books Alice has been able to devour since she was a little girl, a dressing table with silver brushes and bows that since she turned fifteen have served only to gather dust, and the seat under the window where on several occasions Alice has ended up sleeping after spending the day admiring the view of the garden on rainy days.

There is a low sigh from her father, a strangely nostalgic look on his face.

“Remember the day you moved into this bedroom?” He says quietly, still looking far away, to times long gone. “It was when Charlotte got married. You razed everything and changed this room to your liking only to change it again the next year.” He gives her a smile. “I can’t believe you’re seventeen already.”

It is strange of him to talk about the past. Henry Liddell is a man of the present. Even one of the futures if he could, always imagining the possibilities within his life and working hard to achieve them. And Alice is always the first person to support her father’s ideas, but this time something inside her feels unsure, unconsciously giving a brief glance at the wardrobe to her right.

“Father?”

As if pulled out of a reverie, the man blinks and rests his black eyes on those of his daughter. “What is it?”

“I’d like to skip the party, if I may.”

The man’s eyebrows sink like Alice’s tiny hopes of convincing him.

“Nonsense!” he exclaims with a finger in the air. “This party is very special. It is vital for you to be present.”

Alice opens her mouth to argue, but her father rises from the bed and straightens his suit.

“Rest and then join your sisters and your mother. I want you to buy the prettiest dress you can find.” He strides to the door, giving her one last look coupled with a half-smile. “Understood?”

Alice nods, standing alone once more.

...

Alice couldn’t rest. And by the time she realized what time it was, Nani was already knocking at her door. Sooner rather than later, the women of the Liddell family had climbed into the carriage and raided shop after shop until each of them possessed a dress worthy of their name and shoes to match that would add a few poor inches to their otherwise ordinary height.

In no mood for anything, Alice was the last to get a dress. Her mother had insisted on so many, but none caught her eye, until the woman had had enough and decided to buy one to her liking. The dress emanated clear skies, with that blue color Alice so loathed.

“I don’t like it.” Alice had said to her mother.

“Too bad. It’s the one you’ll be wearing. It’s perfect for the occasion.”

She had stressed the last words so much that they kept echoing in Alice’s head. Even now, with her mother endlessly admiring the dress, they echoed too loudly. The woman turns and the dress follows, the tulle dancing in the thin air of Alice’s bedroom.

“I don’t like the color.” Alice insists, receiving a disapproving look.

“Well, I do.” Her mother folds the dress delicately, placing it back in the box where the salesgirl has wrapped it with an overly large mustard-colored bow. “It’s perfect.”

“You already said that.”

“And I’ll say it again. It’s perfect.” She intones the word.

Alice’s heart does a backflip as soon as her mother’s hands grab the knobs of the wardrobe and pull it wide open. The sight of the shoebox makes her palms drop into a sweat.

“And it will look even more perfect with these shoes. You have never used them.”

Alice is waiting for her mother to open the box. For her to find the book and the letter and for the blush to fade from her features until she’s ghostly see-through. Instead, her mother places the box in her daughter’s pale hands, a small smile forming on her pink lips.

“You’ll look beautiful, Alice.”

The sun begins to paint shades of reds, purples, pinks, and oranges outside, tinting the sky with sunset from the window. Alice’s mouth tilts into a smile. Her mother can see that her daughter is trying to fight it, but then it becomes genuine. Alice could not be angry with her mother. The woman didn’t know what lurked in the depths of Alice’s thoughts, and she didn’t deserve the attitude born from it.

“See? Pretty.”

Her mother giggles until their laughter match, as if in that moment nothing had happened, and all the worries were just part of make-believe stories. Yet Alice holds the box tighter in her hands, reminding her the past and the heavy feeling of uncertainty.

Time indeed seemed to be running out.