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He finds her in the last place he expects and yet he definitely should have.
Smoking a joint while reading a worn copy of Alice in Wonderland.
“Alice?” he gasps at the sight of the friend he never thought he’d see again.
She jolts up, nearly dropping the joint onto her face. “Pardon?”
He realizes his mistake, no recognition in her eyes but a slight panic that one would have if a stranger knew their name. “Your book. Alice in Wonderland.”
She chuckles with a sigh of relief. “Ah. Right. Sorry. Weed must be making me more paranoid than usual.” He holds up the blunt as a peace offering. “Care to join me?”
“Sure,” he says because what else can he say? He takes a long drag and fights back the cough, trying to impress her, though he suspects his face has gone bright red from his attempts from the way she laughs at him. "I see you don't do this much."
"Unfortunately not." The words unleash a cough he can’t stop, doubling over as he tries to catch his breath. "And unfortunately for my lungs."
"You'll get better at it. You know, there's a way to get the smoke without breathing it straight from source." She takes a drag and leans closer to him, cupping his cheek.
And something in him, a century old and two lifetimes of faraway dreaming, gasps as she draws nearer and their lips finally meet how they never were able.
Her lips part and he sucks in her air and she pulls away far too soon, Alfred chasing her lips as she pulls away.
"Wow," she says. "Hit you fast. Your pupils are like fuckin' saucers."
And then he remembers that this is not his Alice.
"Do you kiss every stranger you meet?" Alfred asks, trying to mask the hurt in his words.
"I don't," Alice says. "But there's something about you that... that makes me want to kiss you."
His heart lurches at her words, his body pulling towards her, like she is his gravity and he is but a moon that revolves around her.
"Do I know you?"
Alfred stills. "No. Not in this lifetime."
"You're odd." She smiles. "I like you."
"I'm Alfred," he says.
”Alice. Though, I guess I said that already."
"Alice," he repeats, her name spoken reverently as it passes his lips as it always does. "It suits you."
"Alfred doesn't suit you." Her bluntness makes him laugh. "So old-timey. What, were you born in the 1930s?"
"The 20s actually."
"Hm. Curiouser and curiouser." She lies in the grass and Alfred follows her. "So what brings you here?" She motions vaguely to the park.
"I like the fresh air. I didn't have much of it growing up."
"Where'd you live?"
"Not around here." His lips twist into a sardonic smile. "But, uhm. When I wasn't living there, I was in London."
"Me too," she says. "I'd ask how we haven't crossed paths yet, but London's a big place."
"Who knows," he says. "Maybe we have."
"I think I'd remember you."
"I don't think you would."
Her brows furrow. "Have we met?"
He shakes his head. "No. I wish we had sooner than this. I think I'd like to have had a friend like you."
"You know, I think I would've liked a friend like you too. Though, I can't imagine what you were like as a kid. Were you as gangly and weird then?"
He laughs. "Yes. Quite."
"Yes. Quite," she mocks. "You're so proper. A cotillion boy?"
"Just old fashioned, I suppose."
She squints him. "It's like you're telling a joke that I don't know the punchline to."
"Well if I am, it's not a funny joke."
She humphs and plops further into the grass. "I feel like that all the time. Like there's something I'm supposed to know but I don't. Like something's on the tip of my tongue or I've forgotten something but I remember that I've forgotten it."
"What do you think it is?"
"I don't know," she says quietly, brow pinched as she looks at him with a lost expression. "I've forgotten it. And I feel it now more than ever. Like... like you're what I've forgotten but I don't remember you."
He takes in the words, unable to come up with a response that wouldn't make him sound mad. “Sometimes I feel like I’m a dead man walking. Like I was never meant to make it this long. It’s like I’m constantly waiting for the necrosis to set in and to be a corpse buried underground again.”
“Again?”
“Metaphorically.”
“Right.” She takes a slow drag of her blunt. “You’re depressing high, has anyone ever told you that?”
He laughs, slightly hysterical and half a sob. “Yeah. Something of the sentiment.”
“You a more fun drunk?”
“Can’t say I drink enough to know.”
She grins. “Oh we gotta try that next time.”
“There’s going to be a next time?”
Her smile falters slightly, self conscious in a way that only Alfred would be able to see. “I mean, you’re not all that bad.”
“Then I guess your standards are far too low.”
Her head snaps up, almost with alarm at the thought that he could think lowly of himself. “You’re… alright. I guess.”
He smiles fondly at her, taking in her familiar yet so different features. “Read to me?”
Her face lights up, beaming at him as he says the perfect words that she always wants to hear. “I am not your typical storyteller. What I am about to unleash is the never heard before, exclusive, Alice in Wonderland as told by Alice Spencer.”
“I can’t wait.”
“All in the golden afternoon full leisurely we glide…”