I wake up shaking in my seat. Yes, I am in a seat, and on a bus. Not the one in my dream, but a real one, outside of the asylum.
“Bad dreams?” the Pillar rests both his hands on a cane next to me. We’re sitting in the front seat of the bus. I crane my head to see the driver. He isn't a rabbit. Instead, it's that mouse-looking dude who must be working for the Pillar. He is wearing an Irish hat this time.
The sun is shining feebly outside. I think it’s the next day already.
“I dreamt of a school bus,” I rub my eyes, checking out my modern Alice outfit. “Am I still dreaming?”
“Hit the brakes, please!” he shouts at the bus driver, who hits the breaks abruptly. Cars screech and people honk their horns behind us, as I almost bang my head on the pole.
“Does this feel like a dream to you?” the Pillar says, and signals for the driver to proceed.
“You stole a public bus?” I furrow my eyebrows.
“Rich people steal poor people’s houses and lives. I can’t borrow a public bus?” he shakes his shoulder, sincerely annoyed by my remark.
“How did I get here?” I mop my head. I am not hurt.
“I had to sedate you, and dress you up,” the Pillar looks out of the window. “The Mushroomers helped me.”
“Why would you do something like that?” I am dizzy and enraged by the Pillar dragging me out here. "I told you, I am done with the world outside. I am not the Alice you think I am."
“There is something you have to see.” The Pillar knocks his cane on the floor. “Stop here!” he raises his cane. I notice he never addresses the chauffeur by name. “Take this,” he tucks a notebook in my lap. It looks like it belongs to a child, with pink and yellow roses on the cover. It’s a little smeared with ashes or something though.
“What’s this?” I open it up and flip through it. The notebook is girlish. Its pages are filled with drawings of a young girl in a blue-and-white dress. At one point, the girl is fighting a Cheshire Cat, then the Mad Hatter, and the Jabberwocky. It’s basically a young girl's re-imagining of a twisted Wonderland. The Alice in the drawing looks uncannily like me.
“It’s Constance’s notebook,” the Pillar explains. “She drew all this three years ago, when she was seven years old.”
“So what? The girl looks a little like me. It doesn’t mean I am the Alice she wants. I look pretty ordinary, like any other girl on the street.”
“That’s not the point. Constance had this book with her when the Cheshire kidnapped her. Her mother called and asked for it, since it was left in the fireplace in Christ Church.”
“Her mother called who?” I wonder.
“Doesn’t matter. She said Constance asked for you to deliver it. The girl wants to see you one last time. That’s her house.” He points at a two-story middle-class house. It’s mostly gray, but in a lovely way.
I stare at the house and then at the notebook. The truth is, I love Constance. I actually miss her, and it’s only been a day, when I only talked to her for ten minutes.
“Alright,” I sigh. “If that’s all, I will deliver it.”
Chapter 31
Constance's House
The doorbell to Constance’s house is a cuckoo's voice. I try not to laugh at the irony.
“Just a minute,” a woman’s voice calls from inside. A moment later, she opens the door.
“Hi,” I bend my head slightly. “My name is…”
“Alice,” the woman says. She looks like Constance's grandmother, but she must be her mother. Her eyes are moistened. Was she crying? “I know.” She pulls me closer, and hugs me. Actually, she is squeezing me, and her armpits smell. I expect more hygiene from sane people, but I say nothing. “We were waiting for you.”
“I brought you this,” I show her the notebook.
Constance’s mother stares at the notebook for a while, then breaks into tears. It’s the kind of sniffling tears that make you think the person is sneezing in your face. I understand she is emotional, but I am bringing her the notebook. She should be happy.
“It’s Constance,” she holds it in her hands. Constance is the kind of word that is pretty good for spitting. She almost drenches me.
“I know,” I smile. “Can I see her? I was told…”
The mother breaks into tears again. She needs a handkerchief and I have none. Why does she keep crying? “Come in,” she ushers me inside. Finally.
I walk into the modest house, but don’t get to look around, since the mother pulls me by the hand to Constance's room.
Constance’s room is all about Alice in Wonderland. All kinds of wallpapers, toys… even the carpet has one big Humpty Dumpty on it. In between, there is always Alice, fighting dragons, wolves, and human-sized spiders. All the Alices are me. If I had doubts about the notebook, I can’t escape a wall-size portrait of me.
This isn’t happening. How could it be?