pages 92 - 96

Alice was a cup being lifted off its saucer and sipped. Someone else’s unruly saliver slopped around her brittle edges. Her leaves were read as if they belonged to the person who had drunk the tea. Honestly!
She looked across to the far side of the table and there was Surrelia!
(Alice suddenly felt that she was no longer writing the script, she was just swept along as it happened to her. Which was funny because she was sure that she had been told that she could make her own decisions.)


What was she doing here? She had gone to school with Surrealia and Surrealia had been
Prefect
A perfect
Oh no, thought Alice and began to flush and turn her face away quickly, She’ll see that I’m still wearing puffed sleeves.
Even as a cup, Alice’s puffed sleeves pinned themselves to her, pale blue bouncy balloons. Two big breasts on a very small virgin.
Alice glanced stealthily behind her, but the dainty cup had gone. ( she had tipped herself off the table, having her own reasons for not wanting to see Alice.)

I picked up her pieces and stuck them to the wall.
“Waste not, want not!” cried the Duchess, who just happened to be walking by.
I tried to smash Alice but she was imaginary.


Alice peered into the window and she could see all the fairytale girls who ever wore puffed sleeves dancing around with the rabbit, the caterpillar and the chesire cat, amongst other undesirables. She yelled out “Don’t dance with them, they are not handsome princes”, but only snakes came out of her mouth.


“A sure sign of jealousy”, muttered the Duchess who was omnipotently standing nearby. . . . . herself spitting mice, which is a sure sign of not having made your bed this morning.


I’ve made a few mistakes thought Alice, and she hoped that they were not remembered. She was embarrassed just to think about them. This is the sort of baggage that she kept in her puffed sleeves.
She believed that all of her bad thoughts, let alone the other stuff, may have been kept note of in a ledger, along with the dirty washing and all the money that she never deserved and the interest that must have accrued in the past thirty five years. She had a sneaking suspicion that the ledger was written on the back of her dress for everyone to see and since she couldn’t remove the dress to have a look, she was deeply disturbed by the idea. Like when you think you haven’t locked the back door even though you remember doing it, but you can’t sleep because you need to check it again just in case tonight is the night that someone tries it so you have to get up and check, but Alice couldn’t because then she would know that she was paranoid, and besides, she couldn’t see.