Wonderland - Prologue - All in the Golden Afternoon

Wonderland - Prologue - All in the Golden Afternoon

A cool breeze caught the hillside. The scent of grass wafted up Alice’s nose which sniffed then wrinkled and in turn sent joy to her lips, resulting in a smile. The sun, high in a cloud-free sky, reflected purple off her smooth black hair. She shielded her hazel eyes. On the opposite hillside stood Shiroi.
“Shiroi!” shouted Alice as she started down the hill, “Shiroi I –!”
“Alice!”
Shiroi’s voice floated across the valley and grew louder with every call.
“Alice! Alice!”


“Alice!”
Alice woke with a start, nearly falling back on her chair.
Miss Sato stood at the front of the class, her arms folded. Her eyes narrowed and her thin lips curled as she continued her tirade, “Alice Tabiawa – do you plan on sleeping through English Literature for the second time too?”
Everyone, including Shiroi, turned on their seats to get the best view of Alice. Alice was not hard to miss. Tall for her age, she was also the only nineteen year old retaking English Literature in a class of seventeen to eighteen year olds. She blushed and sank into her striped blouse. Her voice, in comparison, was small.
“No Miss.”
“Good.”
Miss Sato turned to write on the whiteboard. As she did the class turned with her.
“Your presentation will be on one of the following titles based on the female authors you have read this semester…”
Alice tuned out of Radio Retake and attempted to tune back into Loved-Up Teen Fantasy FM. Easy when the item of her fascination was in front of her 9am-4pm every working day excluding holidays. The item? The back of Shiroi’s head. Yes, the front of Shiroi’s head would have been favourable however Alice didn’t want to push things.
In Alice’s mind Shiroi Imouto was the most wonderful girl at college. Her long, golden curls; her large, deep, summer sky blue eyes; her precarious curves hidden teasingly by a neat, tailored uniform of dark green blazer, pleated skirt and white knee socks; her pale skin; her peach fuzz soft voice and her endless intellect. To everyone else she was just the shy brainy kid in the corner.
“…okay here are your partners,” Miss Sato continued.
I hope I get someone nice, Alice thought, also clever – clever is definitely a preference.
“…Lee with Haruko, Miyuki with Choi, Nanase with Mokona, Alice with Shiroi…”
Alice with Shiroi? Alice with Shiroi!
Shiroi turned on her seat again and beamed at Alice.
“Hello.”
“Hi!” Alice gasped back.


The end of day bell rang. Miss Sato grabbed her bag, called, “Home time!” and ran, elbows pushing, to be first out.
Shiroi rose from her desk with the grace of a blonde, curvaceous swan. Alice managed to scrape the legs of her chair across the old wooden floor with the grace of a raspberry being crushed on an elastic band. As Alice blushed Shiroi handed her a page from her notebook with a home and email address neatly written on it. Whilst Shiroi spoke Alice took up gawping to perhaps draw attention away from the blushing.
“I thought it would be a good idea if we spent tonight and Saturday –” Shiroi started.
Together! Alice’s mind raced.
“– doing independent study then meet up on Sunday to combine ideas.”
“Yes and we can go to ‘Café Rendezvous’,” Alice ventured, the fact that she had never studied that hard in her life failing to register.
Shiroi nodded and left.
Alice grinned and waved frantically. She continued to grin and wave for another minute as the room emptied, only stopping when the cleaning lady entered and plugged in the buffer.


Alice spilled out of college, past Tottenham Court Road Tube Station and into Soho.
I’m going on a date with Shiroi! Alice thought as she weaved through tourists contemplating which of the fifty Chinese restaurants they would eat duck pancakes in and dodged into ‘Tabiawa’s Japanese Restaurant’.

* * *

Her sleeves smelt like miso. That was the problem with bell sleeves – they looked authentic enough when teamed up with the gold brocading and the butterfly bow at the back of her pink kimono but always ended up in the soup. Whilst the banker prodded at his menu Alice took the time to wring them out and roll them up.
“Do they contain dairy?” he eventually ventured.
Alice paused for a moment to pretend to consider the question then replied, “All the sushi is dairy-free but the raspberry filled pancakes come with custard.”
Unable to contain his befuddlement and determined to order the most extravagant, non-raw, non-dairy item on the menu (he had overheard the interns ribbing his lack of ‘cool’ and had gone to a sushi restaurant out of spite – he had plans of keeping the fortune cookie as evidence) he folded the menu and said, “I’ll have the eel and avocado California rolls – do they really come from California?”
Alice smiled and pointed at her father, complete with samurai headband and over sized machete, removing the guts from a salmon at the sushi counter next to the gold fish bowl. “No, they come from over there.”
She took the menu and moved on. She didn’t mind the silly questions. After her first week waitressing she realised there would be no point taking exception to the silly questions as they were most definitely not going to take exception to her. She had also come to the conclusion that she had probably asked and would continue to ask more than her fair share of silly questions in her own lifetime.
“Excuse me miss,” came a Texan voice, “did you say your name was Alice?”
Alice stopped and bobbed at a large lady, dressed in a Hawaiian shirt.
“Yes, how can I help you?”
“Oh that’s a shame,” the Hawaiian Texan lady sighed, “you seemed so real.”
This one actually got Alice thinking.
“Er…I am real.”
“No, I mean genuine.”
“Genuine?”
“Genuine Japanese!” the lady snapped.
“Oh! Well I am half.”
“Oh I see.”
The lady leaned back and winked.
“You’re using an English name for us tourists – well don’t you worry – I’m taking Japanese lesson back at home!”
Alice twitched.
“My name’s still Alice.”
“’Arisu’ isn’t it?”
“No…definitely Alice.”
“Oh, so you lied to me.”
The woman folded her arms.
Alice panicked. She didn’t fancy having to refund someone because she wasn’t Japanese enough to work in her family’s own Japanese restaurant.
“No! My father’s Japanese and my mother’s English – so I’m Alice.”
The woman narrowed her eyes.
“Fine.”
Alice tried to salvage the situation with, “Can I help you?”
“I’ll have a tap water.”


“And what do you think you’re doing?” Alice’s mother called as Alice skulked up the stairs.
Somehow considering whether fitting every household in the Northern hemisphere with dimmer switches would solve the world energy crisis didn’t seem like a reasonable answer.
“Calling it a day,” Alice replied as she pulled off her apron and hung it on the banister.
Mrs Tabiawa leaned out from the living room, which she had recently claimed as her office. An ex City accountant, now victim of company cut backs, decided to offer her expertise solely to her husband’s restaurant which happened to be conveniently situated below the living room (as did the rest of their flat).
“This is your job young lady,” she snapped.
“You’re not paying me!” Alice snapped back.
“We’re putting you through college again, we don’t charge rent –”
And we pay for all your food so you’ve –
“– and we pay for all your food so you’ve got a lot to be grateful for young lady!” Mrs Tabiawa recited. It was a well used speech, much like that first pair of socks you receive one Christmas and wear everyday of winter, only to find that the next Christmas you receive twenty pair more.
“Yeah but I’ve been partnered with the cleverest girl in college and want to study hard to make a good impression.”
“Oh!”
Alice’s mother clapped her hands and ran to her darling daughter’s side.
“How wonderful! At last you’re being given the chance to bloom! They have finally realised your true potential!”
“I think it was just random,” Alice said as her mother put an arm around her and guided Alice to her room.
Wow, Alice thought, working with Shiroi is having its perks already.


Somewhere on the other side of London Shiroi was not thinking how wonderful it would be to work with the girl who sat behind her. Shiroi did not have a remarkable life so there was little point looking forward to things. She didn’t even get letters. Not even junk letters. Not even spam.

* * *

Sunday morning Alice weaved through the crowd at Leicester Square.
A film was premiering that evening so the square had been decorated with cows painted like wizards. Diehard fans had already begun to crowd the Odeon. A roving radio presenter randomly accosted people outside of the Capital Radio building and street artists had already begun to set up their chairs and easels against the park railings. Alice could not help but grin at anyone who looked her way. Inside her heart beat faster than a hummingbird’s.
Alice took a shortcut through the park. A Polish mother read on a bench whilst her children fed sandwiches to the pigeons. An old couple bickered over a tube map. A drunk held the statue of William Shakespeare hostage with a banana. On the other side, next to the Swiss Centre clock stood Café Rendezvous.
Alice took a moment to admire the neon ‘frozen yoghurt’ sign, the rainbow of swirling plastic ice creams and the carousel horses that inhabited the café’s front window. She entered.
Behind the counter a coffee percolator bubbled away. In front of the counter a little girl picked out a banana boat the size of her head while her mother flicked through her purse and frowned at the increasing price. Alice stared at the rows of frozen yoghurt. They were every colour and flavour imaginable, garnished with slices of citrus fruits, berries, crumbled nuts and chunks of chocolate, which made them seem even brighter and more unrealistic than the window display. Alice walked away with scoops of chocolate, watermelon and raspberry in a pink plastic bowl shaped like carnival glass. She sat by the window, unpacked her notes and checked her phone.
Fifteen minutes early, Alice thought as she sucked watermelon off her spoon, Shiroi will be totally impressed!


Forty-five minutes, a Belgium waffle, a tropical soda float and a carnival glass shaped bowl of chocolate, watermelon and raspberry frozen yoghurt later Alice stared at the space where Shiroi should have sat.
Half an hour late, Alice deluded herself, I hope Shiroi’s okay.
Shiroi didn’t strike Alice as the type of person who made a business of being late to things.
An hour and a tremendous tummy ache after that Alice slumped to the table and watched the world blur by through empty sundae glasses.
She’s not coming, Alice thought. She felt her heart rise and lump up in her throat.