Behind Sanity

Chapter Two

                                                                      Behind Sanity 

                                                                       Chapter Two

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                Everything I can think of, I have done.  Treatments, remedies, disciplines, and pleasures – nothing makes a difference.  Alice speaks when and about what she wants, recites poetry on a seeming whim., draws pictures at her own pleasure.  She does nothing at my command, instruction, entreaty or request.  She’s become very willful, and nothing I do or say makes a difference.

                I truly do, however, become immersed in her fantastic tales of Wonderland.  Sometimes I feel that I too will go tumbling down that dark rabbit hole.  While I know that is impossible, I still await the day when she claims victory over the Red Queen and her minions, when Wonderland will be restored.  Perhaps by this Alice will cure herself, regain her balance, and leave this place of her own volition.

                 Sometimes she appears to be so close, but at other times I’m certain that it will never happen and she’ll spend the rest of her life housed behind Rutledge’s gaunt brown walls…with me.

                 - Heironymous Q. Wilson

                 Rutledge Private Clinic and Asylum Casebook, 13 August 1864*  

                                                                                2 

                                                                  Three years later… 

                Wendy had forged her husband’s name to the last of the faded parchment.  There had been weeks of meeting with doctors and making arrangements at her home, but her toils and days of heartache would prove fruitful now.  It had been so long of dreaming of finishing this out, and finally today was the day.  She was, after six years, finally going to be with her sister again.  Her baby sister was coming home!  Alice was well, or at least, was well enough to be taken from the clinic – as Wendy always forced herself to refer to it.  By her doctor’s admittance, Alice was ready to go back into the world – to live a normal life. 

                Wendy Madison breathed a sigh and tugged at the fingers of her gloves nervously as the nurse across the desk reviewed the papers.  She wondered suddenly if the woman could tell that her husband hadn’t actually signed and that it had been Wendy’s own hand pretending, but finally the nurse looked up at her and smiled.

                 “You are the sister of Alice Liddell, Mrs. Madison?” the nurse asked, saying it for no reason better than for conversation’s sake.  Still, it struck a cord with Wendy.

                 She smiled meekly, knowing full well she hadn’t been able to give herself that title for years – visits had always been left as fleeting thoughts – but there was not a day that passed that she didn’t think of Alice in some way.

                 “Yes.  I haven’t seen her in so very long.  I’m very excited, as you can imagine,” Wendy said, brushing a few strands of red hair away from her cheek that had fallen loose from under her hat.  She’d not secured it properly because of this morning’s rush to get to Rutledge’s, but she didn’t care much how she looked today.  “The doctor has assured me – oh! Elliot is his name – that she’s sorted through her troubles.  He says that over the past few months, Alice has made more progress than he’s ever seen.”