Alice

2. Wonderland

2. Wonderland

I kept falling, fast. I screamed, knowing that a fall from this height would be fatal. The darkness seemed to close in on me. Suddenly, I hit the hard ground.

I stood up, miraculously unhurt, and looked around. I was in a room with stone walls. The only light came from torches on the walls. There was nothing in the room except a tiny door. I walked over to it and yanked on the handle, but it was locked. I turned back around, and to my surprise there stood a glass table in the middle of the room. I knew that that hadn’t been there before. “This just keeps getting weirder and weirder,” I said to myself.

I walked over to the table and picked up a tiny gold key that could only fit into the small door behind me. I went back to the door and fit the key into the lock. I opened the door, and behind it, I could see trees, grass, and the blue sky. The way out! I was eager to get out of this strange place and back to the house. The sunshine outside confused me, though. I must have been falling for a long time, I thought, Mom must be freaking out.

I was sharply brought back to reality, however, when I realized that the door was way too small for me to fit through. My heart sank. I pulled away, and the door shut. I took the key out of the lock. My last hope was to see if there was anything else on the table. I walked over and set the key on the table. I saw a small bottle with a label. Written in fancy handwriting were the words:

Drink Me

The six-year-old version of me would’ve cried, “It’s a magic potion!” But I knew that there was no such thing as magic. Then again, there was supposed to be no such thing as pure white rabbits wearing waistcoats. So I uncorked the bottle and took a sip.

It tasted delicious. It tasted like Mom’s homemade chocolate chip cookies, popcorn, pretzels, chips, pecan pie, and some more yummy flavors that I couldn’t name. Suddenly, I got this weird feeling. Words can’t really describe it. Everything seemed to be getting larger, and before I knew it, I couldn’t see over the top of the table. I was shrinking. Soon, I was no more than ten inches tall. My clothes still fit me, which was surprising.

But then I realized that I’d left the key on the table. Great, I thought. Then something caught my eye: a little box set on the floor in front of me. I bent down and lifted the lid. Inside was a little white cake, with little black letters written in icing that spelled:

Eat Me

So I did. Suddenly, I felt like I was stretching. The world grew smaller as I went up and up and up, until I finally hit my head on the roof. I grabbed the now minuscule key, drank the potion again, and shrank once more. I set the potion down, no longer needing it.

I walked over to the door, which was now the perfect size for me. I walked through it and out into the bright sunlight.

I was so small that I couldn’t see anything. I took a tiny bite of the cake and I felt that strange stretching feeling, until I was normally sized again. I threw the cake over my shoulder, perfectly content with my regular height.

Then I looked around me, not believing my eyes.

This was definitely not my yard. This wasn’t even the woods behind my house, unless the woods had giant, colorful mushrooms, towering purple-and-red trees, and insects the size of me.

I pinched myself to make sure that I wasn’t dreaming. I didn’t wake up, so either I was impartial to pain, or this was real.

“Where am I?” I wondered aloud.

“Wonderland,” a voice said. It was a strange kind of a voice. It sounded very lazy, drawing out every word. There wasn’t much emotion in it.

I whirled around, startled. I saw no one, however, except for a very large blue caterpillar that was leaning against a mushroom and smoking a pipe. If I’d come across that caterpillar yesterday, I would’ve stopped and stared in wonder. But I’d seen so many unbelievable things already that I just passed the caterpillar by.

“Who said that?” I asked.

“Me,” the voice said.

I looked around quickly, hoping I could catch a glimpse of the speaker. Again, it was just that blue caterpillar. I stared at him for a long minute, but then I told myself, “No, that’s impossible. Insects don’t talk.”

“Oh, yes we can.” the voice said, and I saw that it came directly from the caterpillar.

I screamed, and backed away quickly. “You- You just-”

“Who are you?” the caterpillar asked with a puff of smoke that made me sneeze.

Coughing, I choked our, “Well, shouldn’t you tell me who you are first?”

“Why?”

“It’s polite.”

“Who are you?” he demanded again.

“I’m Alice,” I replied. “I came through the rabbit hole, following the white rabbit.” I looked around. “So you say this is Wonderland?”

“I don’t say this is Wonderland. This is Wonderland,”

“Okay…” I said, confused.

The caterpillar stared at me curiously for a few moments. Then he took a puff on his pipe and asked, “How did you get here?”

          “I fell down a rabbit hole,” I answered.

          He raised his eyebrows. “You fell, you say,” he said with another puff of smoke in my direction.

          I coughed, waving away the smoke with my hand. “Yes, I did.”

          “You did what? Fall, or say that you fell?”

          “What? Both!” This caterpillar was confusing me.

          “Peculiar….” he said to himself.

Just then, trumpets sounded. With a poof, the caterpillar disappeared. A procession marched into the clearing. Leading the way were.... cards?

They were people-sized playing cards. Their bodies were cards, and they had small heads perched on the top edge and skinny legs sticking out from the bottom two corners. They carried swords, so I guessed that they were soldiers. All ten of them were in the suit of hearts. Then came heralds, all dressed in red, carrying trumpets. They blew them a second time, and then one cried, “Make way for Her Majesty, the Queen of Hearts!”