She sat down on the tree trunk that she had when she was a girl, but now she was no longer a child, she was fifteen. She enjoyed not being a little girl, now the queen had to find something else to shout in her face.

It was a warm, sunny morning. She lit her blunt and blew some smoke rings. The rings blurred and her mind was reminiscent of her yesteryears. The gray carbon cloud hovered briefly in the air like a mirror of lang syne. Stupid caterpillar. She waved her hand through the smoke ring and continued to sit in silence.

“Bored, Alice?” a familiar voice rang from a branch above.

“I told you, I don’t go by that name anymore.”

“Oh, that’s right. It’s Malice now, isn’t it?”

A pair of azure eyes met those of gold and dementia, but they were not the same. There was a lack of balance. The psychosis was unbalanced by the presence of sagacity.

“Shouldn’t you be off trying to piss the queen off or teasing the Tweedle brothers? Isn’t there some myriad of freak creatures that you can go harass?”

“I thought that is what I was doing.”

“Ha, ha, you are so funny,” she sneered as she took a long drag from her blunt.

“Ah, Alice, what happened to you?”

“Hmm, let me think. Maybe the queen tried cutting my bloody head off one too many times. Or maybe it was all the near death experiences by fire, drowning, or almost getting eaten by the Jabberwock…Or maybe I am just fed to the teeth with Wonderland and the world behind the looking glass all together.”

“You have always been such a lost child, Alice.”

“Well, if you haven’t noticed yet, I am not a child anymore, and since when did you become a psychologist?”

“You think you are no longer a child because you drink booze and smoke cannabis all day long?”

“Why not? The Hatter thinks he is a genius because he can shove three cubes of sugar up his nose while singing his unbirthday song.”

The Cheshire cat chuckled. “Well do you blame him?”

“Don’t bother sitting around, talking to me of the ways of the real world when the world you live in is nothing but a bunch of nonsense.”

“Oh, but I do not live there. You do.”

“Sorry, I was under the impression I lived the real world.”

“No, Alice, you never have lived in the real world.”

Looking up into those glowing yellow orbs, Alice thought it was odd that the Cheshire cat suddenly seemed more sensible, if that was even possible, or maybe it was the cannabis. Perhaps the cat had always been high while she was sober and now that she was high and he was sober, it was she who did not make sense, right? But that was impossible. The world briefly flashed and she saw Tulgey Wood from beyong the looking glass.

“Ah, maybe there is still some of the Alice we know in there.”

“Yea, that is about as likely as Dodo paying a visit to the Gravedigger’s house.”

“But we all must pay a visit to the Gravedigger’s someday.”

“Maybe creatures from Wonderland, but here, it is called insurance.”

“What did I tell you, Alice? You do not exist in the real world. Those concepts do not apply to you.”

“How can I not live in the real world? Aren’t you being a hypocrite, being a creature of Wonderland?”

“No, I actually exist in a real world.”

“A real world?”

“Yes.”

“So then I live in a real world? Is that it?”

“No.”

“So where am I if not in the real world or a real world?”

“You are just part of my imagination. How do you think you were able to cross the boundaries of both worlds? Not everyone is welcome in Wonderland.”

“Oh, this is just more of you mad talk.”

“Aren’t you being a hypocrite now? I think we established long ago that you were mad too. All those who find their way into Wonderland are.”

“Well we can’t both be mad if I think you are mad and you think me mad. If you are mad in my mind and I mad in your mind then don’t they cancels out? Because if two people think the other is mad, then either one of them is mad and the other sane or both are sane and cannot be mad.”

“No, my dear, we are just two different kinds of madness,” the cat grinned.

“Well you are mad indeed if you think I am part of your imagination.”

“But you are, you just haven’t realized it yet.”

“If I am part of your imagination, then how do I exist in this world? What about the life I have been living? My family and friends?”

“It is part of my imagination too. I created it all just for you.”

The young teen rolled her eyes and sat up. She threw what was left of her blunt on the ground and stomped it out with her shoe.

“I am tired of your nonsensical prattling.”

“I suppose you would be, after all you are just a destitute little girl, forever searching for an escape from the reality you live in, yet once given that haven, you deny it and return home, just to return again and again, just like you dependence on cannabis and alcohol. Poor, lost Alice.”

The teen paused a moment and turned to look back at the Cheshire cat.

“Will you take me to Wonderland one last time?”

“No.”

“Please?”

“Why do you want to go back to the world you find so nonsensical?”

“Nostalgia.”

“Find your own way in.”

“But I have forgotten.”

“Alice, Alice, you are already stumbling down the rabbit hole."