''She generally gave herself very good advice, (though she very seldom followed it), and sometimes she scolded her-self so severely as to bring tears into her eyes; and once she remembered trying to box her own ears for having cheated herself in a game of croquet she was playing against herself, for this curious child was very fond of pretending to be two people. 'But it's no use now,' thought poor Alice, 'to pretend to be two people! Why, there's hardly enough of me left to make one respectable person!'"
Lewis Carroll - Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
Anaïs was beginning to get very tired of having it all. She had two beautiful children, a nice house with roses in the garden, a dog, and a man who loved her. At least, he said he loved her. This not being enough for the greedy girl, she had become weary and won-dered how it would be to have an adventure. One dreamy summers day, as she sat on a tartan picnic rug making daisy chains while her children watched canal boats drift slowly along the river, she felt very warm and a little bit sleepy…
'I'm drunk I'm drunk' muttered the White Rabbit and scampered off, in a slightly hap-hazard fashion, down a rabbit hole. 'Hmmn,' thought Anaïs 'maybe I'll follow him and see where I end up!'
Down, down, down the rabbit hole she fell. 'Heavens!' she exclaimed, "I wonder where I'll end up next! This is probably very dangerous indeed, but there's not much I can do about it now.' Down. Down. Down. The tumble continued for a very long time, until Anaïs finally landed on a picnic bench in what appeared to be a pub garden. The White Rabbit hopped out from behind a hedge and sat down next to Anaïs, holding a pint of Guinness and a bottle of orange liquid, with a label on the front, which said (in Helvetica Bold) 'DRINK ME'.
'Well,' thought Anaïs 'I am very thirsty, and it can't do me that much harm, surely.' She downed the drink and noticed that the White Rabbit was still sitting beside her. Sud-denly, quite surprising herself, she kissed him. And kissed him, and kissed him, for what seemed to be quite an eternity. It didn't occur to her for one moment that it was an odd thing to do, though of course it was.
Then, all of a sudden, he got up and scampered off. 'Oh,' thought Anaïs 'whatever shall I do now? I've no idea how to get back to where I was before.'
She looked about and then down to where the Rabbit had been sitting, and noticed that he had left behind a packet with the words (in Gill Sans) 'EAT ME' on the front. Anaïs, feeling quite at a loss, opened the packet, which seemed to contain cheese and onion crisps. 'Hmmmn,' she thought, 'maybe if I eat these crisps I'll go back to normal again. I certainly can't sit here all day.' As she began to eat, she shrank to the size of a thimble. At least it felt that way.
Anaïs began to think she should never have followed the White Rabbit down the hole in the first place. 'Oh my goodness,' she declared, 'I can't just sit here and be small for the rest of my life! I'm going to find that Rabbit, and demand to know what's going on.' But there seemed to be no way of getting back to where she had come from, the Rabbit had vanished, and being barely an inch tall felt to be quite a handicap. She set off to find help.
Just then, she came to a clearing in the road, and there on a mushroom sat a Caterpillar. 'Excuse me,' she said politely, 'I think I need some help.' '
'Sit down.' offered the Caterpillar with a German accent.
'Why thank you.' said Anaïs, and sat her self down on a nearby mushroom. The Cater-pillar turned over an egg timer, which seemed to indicate that Anaïs had precisely one hour of time, in which to get its advice. She blurted out exactly what had happened, how she had followed the White Rabbit down the hole, kissed him, and ended up barely one inch tall in Wonderland.
'And so,' said Anaïs, 'I need to know how to get back to where I was, and how to get back to my normal size.'
'Impossible,' remarked the Caterpillar, who looked completely unmoved by the story. 'You can never get back to where you were, which was clearly not where you wanted to be in any case. And as for returning to your normal size, well, define 'normal' for me.' With that, the egg timer ran out of sand, and the Caterpillar gestured for Anaïs to get down off her mushroom and be on her way.
Anaïs huffed and started off again, back to the picnic bench. 'If only I had a cigarette!' she thought. Then she remembered that she had in fact been smoking before she had shrunk. Looking about her she noticed the butt of a roll up cigarette she had thrown on the ground when she had been normal sized. 'I wonder if I smoke this whether that will make me big again.' She took a drag on the huge cigarette and, indeed, did feel to be growing taller. She grew and grew and grew until she felt fifty foot high. 'Nice,' thought Anaïs, 'I feel like a very big girl now.' She felt very cocky indeed.
'It's no good trying to go back I suppose,' said Anaïs to herself, 'maybe I'll have to try going in a different direction.' and she set off again until she came to a House party.
'Oh good!' she thought, 'I love parties.' However, as she drew closer, poor Anaïs did not like the look of any of the guests, except for the Mad Hatter, who was seated at a table next to a Dormouse. The Dormouse kept rubbing its nose and sniffing, much as Dormice do. 'No room! No room!' it cried as it saw Anaïs coming.
'There's plenty of fucking room!' said Anaïs indignantly, which was very true.
'Then why are you not sitting down?' asked the Hatter.
'I am' she replied.
'Well you can't swear or smoke, young lady, otherwise we won't have you' he con-tinued.
'But that Dormouse is smoking,' pointed out Anaïs truthfully. 'And in fact, so are you!!'
'Don't be rude,' said the Hatter extinguishing his cigarette, 'sit down and be quiet girl.' Anaïs quite liked his strictness, having seldom been challenged by anyone before she fell down the rabbit hole, and obeyed demurely.
'Everybody move round!' shouted the Hatter suddenly.
'But I've only just sat down', said Anaïs, who was beginning to wonder whether she was coming or going, or if, in fact she had already been. The Dormouse was the only one at the table who refused to budge, uttering a string of profanities that the Hatter did not ap-pear to mind, or even notice. So move she did, and it was rather a shame as her new chair was most uncomfortable being very hard. A short while passed, during which the guests at the table were moved around so much that Anaïs came to sit by the Hatter. It had to be said that they had a lovely time together; they indulged in all kinds of amusing conversa-tion and the sexual chemistry was undeniable. Anaïs found herself rather falling in love. 'Oh I do hope he doesn't get us to move around again.' she thought, and the Dormouse seemed to hear this thought, or maybe she even said it aloud.
'Oh, he will' it mumbled incoherently, 'He'll never sit next to the same person for very long. Your days are numbered.'
Suddenly, the Hatter took out his iphone and checked the time.
'Everybody move round!' he shrieked.
Poor Anaïs was most dismayed, and couldn't help saying 'But I liked sitting with you.'
At that, the Hatter looked at her as if she were the mad one. 'Well I very much enjoyed sitting with you dear girl, but what's that got to do with anything? Move around!!'
The other guests at the table dutifully began the commotion of moving, but Anaïs could bear no more of it. She got up from her seat and ran away, as fast as she could, until she came to a soft bank, where she cried and cried and cried until she had cried a great pool of tears…
'Oh, for heavens sake stop crying!' Anaïs scolded herself. However, it was no good, her tears would simply not subside. She must have sobbed herself to sleep for when she awoke, she found herself in the arms of the White Rabbit. 'There, there' he said, squeez-ing her tightly, 'dry your tears.'
'You could have warned me,' gulped Anaïs who usually tried to be brave, 'I followed you here to Wonderland, then you left me all alone and now I can't get back home.'
'Just try to have some fun, beautiful girl.' whispered the Rabbit and held her close. She snuggled into his soft furry belly, and for a matter of seconds she felt safe again. She was just going to ask the Rabbit whether he was drunk or sober when -
Anaïs must have fallen asleep again, for when she woke up, she was alone on the bank. Next to her had been placed an old Sony Walkman and inside was a cassette tape tagged (in graffiti style writing) 'PLAY ME'. She put the headphones on and pressed 'Play'. It was just her favourite type of groove and Anaïs simply had to dance. Losing herself in the music, she thought of the White Rabbit's words and it occurred to her that until she could find a way out of Wonderland, she might as well enjoy the adventure.
to be continued