“Mr. Dingsworth, sir, have you ever thought about writing a book?” Merlin supplied, peering up at the man.
“I… yes. Yes, I have thought about it. I’ve just never had the time or any real idea what I’d write about. My granddaughter just turned five, and she’s readin’ up a storm. I’ve been tryin’ to get her into horticulture, see. But there aren’t any books she likes about plants.
“How’d you know I’ve been thinkin’ about it? Are y’all friends of Seth’s?”
“Mr. Dingsworth,” Merlin pulled his backpack around from his shoulder, unzipped the top, and removed a thick, manila envelope. “I think you might want to sit down for this. May I offer you some tea?”
Four thousand miles away in London it was not mid-morning, but 4:30 in the afternoon. It was not a beautiful, if not a chilly, fall day, but a cold and rainy one and the sun already seemed to be disappearing. Outside people were huddled underneath umbrellas, moving from shop to taxi, taxi to awning, shop to shop, doing their best to keep their walking time outside to a minimum, it seemed. Even so, the streets were busy—people were already out doing their holiday shopping. Two rather determined shoppers, in fact, had just gotten their umbrellas tangled trying to hurriedly enter the Nike Store, and when one mentioned the other’s mother, things got ugly quickly. It wasn’t the first umbrella fight on this busy and rainy day.
Down the street, though, in a little internet café on King’s Boulevard, four companions had no idea about the fight going on or even how hard it was beginning to rain, because at that moment, Kiki, Phil, Willy, and Nilly were staring in awe at one of the laptops on the wooden table.
“I can’t believe you did this,” Kiki said for the ninth time in an hour. The previous night they’d gone back to the hotel to get at least a few hours of sleep, after posting the following on Reddit:
Looking for James M. Hardon. Any ideas?
And at Kiki’s insistence,
Reward!
In just hours, the post received hundreds of responses. Many of them were replying about other James M. Hardons, some of them were in regards to a musician named James M. Hartan, and a small handful gleaned some truly useful information; the most succinct of which simply said,
Dead.
One of the comments, from someone simply going by “Anonymous123” expounded upon this:
Do you mean James Hardon of the Yorkshire Hardons? His sister is a good friend. I’m sad to say that these rumors are true; James died just months after his falling out with Bea. He was mugged and shot on a visit to Paris. The family, of course, kept it quiet. As a friend of the family’s, I request that you don’t go poking around and bringing up bad memories. There was a police report afterward, but nothing else. It was a small ceremony. If you were a friend of James’, I’m sorry to have to tell you this. XX – K
After about twenty minutes of Google searching, sure enough, they had found the was-soon-to-be-now-never-would-be-author’s record of death. It was a blow; but it wasn’t what had the four characters staring open-mouthed at the computer screen that rainy afternoon.
There on the front page of Reddit, at the very top, with over 20,000 comments, was this:
We’re fictional characters from the world of books, and we need your help. Ask us anything!
They watched, silently, as the number of comments grew before their eyes—20,020, 20,021; a moment later it seemed, 20,530. The only one who didn’t seem too fussed about it was Phil who was no longer staring at the computer, but was now looking down at his phone, texting away.
“Wait, what are you doing, Phil? Are you answering their questions??”
“Course I am. It’s an Ask Me Anything. People get mad if you don’t answer their questions.”
“Who cares?! We can’t be telling people we’re Fictional characters. They’re… well, they’re not supposed to know! And they’ll think you’re just joking—or crazy.”
Phil shrugged. “Yeah, some a them do, for sure. But most of ‘em actually believe me. It’s just they got this thing going on where they kinda remember something, ya know? Like a dream. But they can’t quite put their fingers on it. Ya know that feeling?”
Nilly and Willy nodded together. Kiki knew it, too. It was the same feeling most everyone in Fiction had when Peter told them all about the erased characters: Bill the Banana Tree, the three fairies, Cinderella, Pinocchio, Aladdin, Peter Pan, and Gorndalf. They couldn’t quite remember them, but they knew something was missing.
“‘Sides, if anything, it seems like this is helpin’. Look here,” Phil leaned in toward the screen and refreshed the browser, then scrolled down to a string of comments by someone named “DreamsOfFlight”.
I’ve never told anyone this, because they’ll think I’m crazy—and I’m an English Professor at an Ivy League school, for goodness sakes—but for several months now, I have felt… that there has been something not quite right. And I know it has something to do with Fiction. I get these flashes of images: a puppet made of wood, or a brightly colored cartoonish tree? It’s maddening. I know it might sound crazy, but can you tell me about them?
And a few comments down, from the same professor,
Which characters are you?
And then below that,
Can we see a picture?
“This is nuts. Of course we’re not going to, like, show them a picture of us; this has gotten out of hand. We’re just out here to— Phil!” Kiki squealed, for at that moment, at the top of the page, appeared a picture of the four of them. It was one Nilly had snapped on the train to London.
“Wadn’t me,” Phil protested. Kiki turned around to see both Nilly and Willy on their phones.
“Listen Kiki, you might know how to romance, but we know how to drum up excitement,” Nilly said proudly, showing Kiki her phone’s screen. In response to her posted photo, there were more comments than ever filling the bottom of the page.
OMG – Kiki from the Kisses Over Coffee and Lust over Love?? I ❤ U!
I haven’t read the Phil, Willy, and Nilly books since I was a kid. You guys look so grown up!
What are you guys doing out here?
How did you get here?
Why are you so shiny looking? Is that a character thing?
On and on they went.
“You know how to drum up trouble,” Kiki said. She was still staring at the picture of the four of them on the larger computer. They did look noticeably different from the background of the picture; they were slightly less detailed and more colorful; shiny. But still, she couldn’t help but notice the slight bags under her eyes, the freckles, and the few hairs sticking up here and there. If she stayed out here much longer, she’d look like a Real Worlder, and that just wouldn’t work for her. “What’s the point of all this anyway? If you ask me, we need to cut tail and run, or whatever. We’ve already found out this Hardon guy is dead, so—sorry no Gorndalf series, you know? I want to get back to Fiction before it’s too late.” At this, she looked up at the clock on the wall, as though in five minutes it might really be too late.
“The point, Miss Romance,” Nilly said to Kiki’s annoyance, “is that this is helping. We’re helpin’ people remember, not just the characters who are missing, but we’re helpin’ em remember Fiction! They’ve kinda forgotten about books out here.”
“Yeah,” Philly said, summing things up.
Sure enough, when Kiki looked back at the page (32,433 comments and counting), it was filled with things that weren’t even questions. Things like:
Like so many people on this thread, I’ve been feeling lately like something was missing. I know it sounds crazy, but I’ve had these dreams about a young man with a magic lamp, about a wooden puppet who becomes a real boy, and even three fairy sisters who live in a tree in the woods together. They’ve always felt more pressing than my other dreams somehow. I always remember them. And then I read all these other people’s comments about those same characters… I don’t know who you all are, but whether you’re from Fiction or not, t
hank you for bringing this out into the open. I hope the Psychological Associate of America looks into this…
and
I’m not crazy! You guys have been feeling this missing thing too? You’ve been imagining this characters? Whoo hooo!
And
Fascinating! I am a scientist at CERN and we have been experimenting for years with the probability of alternate realities and overlapping dimensions. I don’t know if you are genuinely from this alternate dimension as you say, but you certainly do look slightly out of place in this one, according to your photo! Of course there is photoshop…
What I mean is, I certainly hope it is true. Please contact me directly, I’d love to find out more about how you came to be here. (Was it quantum teleportation? Don’t tell me!) [email protected]. Get in touch!
and
Don’t know who u all are, but i’d love to believe their’s really a Fiction out there. Gives me hope in a world full of wars and suffering. Thnx for this thread.
And even a few along the lines of this:
I’m a reporter for The Morning Show on NBC. Please send me a Private Message. We’d love to talk to you. And thanks for reminding us all about Fiction.
Nearly six hours later, eight sandwiches, and twelve cups of coffee later, the four characters closed the laptops and waved goodbye to the café owners—who at this point, had of course heard what was going on, and called back “Bye then, Kiki, Phil, Willy, and Nilly. Do come back to see us next time you’re in town, won’t you?” For the next morning, the four characters had a very early flight to catch to New York.
*Just a cool little trick I picked up in Book One. Useful, isn’t it?
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
I suppose now’s a good time to bring you up to speed on what I was up to during all of this. Randy, Long John, Jerry, and I had, in fact, flown to Los Angeles on the next available flight from London. Two buses, two trains, two flights, and one long layover in New York later we landed in the very same airport, at the very same gate where Princess Badroulbadour, Geppetto, and the Lost Boys had been whisked away to their hotel. Of course, I didn’t know that at the time; it was only later that I found out how their trip had gone. But you know, putting the story together and all that.
At the time, the only thing I knew was that we had landed in what, to me, just seemed like dirtier and more confusing Fictional L.A. And I suppose it was. In Fictional L.A., celebrities with perfectly flowing blonde hair and sunglasses walk along Rodeo Drive; the Hollywood sign is giant and glistening white in the sun, and the mansions all have things like helipads and like six pools. L.A.X. is sometimes mentioned in books, to be sure, but only as busy, hectic, etc. It’s mostly a stop off point on the way to plot.
It was only in arriving in the actual Los Angeles International Airport, and then shortly thereafter, Los Angeles, did I realize why the Real World details are so often skimmed over—there are simply too many. As I walked toward baggage claim, and then the airport’s shuttle service, I noticed the way the carpet was worn and browned from so many shoes; how the overhead lights flickered, just barely; there was gum stuck underneath a sink; a paper towel in the bathroom, torn crookedly and left hanging from the dispenser; people wearing high heels, boots, sandals, sneakers, worn sneakers, white sneakers, black sneakers, no shoes, jeans, slacks, men in dresses, women in dresses, dogs in sweaters—I mean, it was endless. So let’s just say, we walked as quickly through the airport as we could, and all piled into the rental car: a red Ford Expedition. Randy was in the driver’s seat, holding the wheel rather tighter than necessary.
“Whew,” he said like a character in the Real World might say. “That was a lot of detail. I mean. Wow.” I could only see the side of Long John’s face from where I sat in the backseat, but it looked a little green. Beside me, Jerry was taking deep calming breaths.
After a moment of getting our bearings and figuring out the car’s navigation system (GPS in Fiction is terrible, so this was a real treat), we were on the road, slowly, slowly moving toward our hotel to get some sleep.
The highway inched along underneath the car; beside us, people were driving and talking on their phones, looking in their rearview mirrors and shaving, eating apples, sandwiches, and one woman, what appeared to be a steak. Everyone here was so busy. Even Fictional L.A. wasn’t this hurried.
I glanced at the GPS and saw that with traffic, we still had another forty-five minutes to go. So I leaned my head against the window and closed my eyes.
Sleep was no good, of course; my mind was too busy. (Is this what it’s like in the Real World? Thoughts racing all the time? No wonder you guys write so many books on meditation.) I kept coming back to that image of Jenny: the perfect detail of her face, all drawn from a dream. I wondered what she was doing in Albert’s dreams. Was she saying look out for Peter! Was she saying, Write me! I’m real somewhere! Or was she saying Let me go?
I couldn’t help but wonder if Jenny would want this or not. Any of it. For us to be out here, for us to be trying so hard to bring her and the other erased characters back.
She’ll worse than kill you.
And then I remembered Bob and Alan, just waiting somewhere deep inside the depths of their bodies, looking out, vaguely registering the world through their own eyes. Worse than dead.
We had to do something.
Before we left the house, Randy, Long John, and Jerry had scoured the basement for anything that looked like it might be an antidote for characters turned Real, and after nearly an hour of looking, they found a small metal box about the size of a tool box. Inside it, they found several small bottles of liquids ranging from syrup-like brown to turquoise to thick and white. They were all labeled, not that it helped any. Things like: PAS and PAH; we couldn’t make heads or tails of it. But it was the closest we had to anything worthwhile, so we took the box with us when we left (packing it carefully and checking it at the airport—where, surprisingly, they didn’t ask any questions). And now here we were, just sixteen minutes away from Albert Stein’s house, and I suspected, from Destiny herself.
“Hello?” The old man answered the door like he was answering the phone. We were all standing there in front of him on his wide, wooden porch, but he still peered out through the screen door blearily as though he couldn’t see us.
“Uh, hello. Mr. Stein?” I asked. I wanted to open the screen door so he could see us better, but I thought that might give the wrong impression: four guys coming to your home and opening your door to let themselves in. I didn’t know much about the Real World, but this struck me as markedly bad manners.
“Yes, I’m Albert Stein. And you—why you must be Peter Able.” At this point, Albert did open the screen door. He was shorter than me and had white, cotton-candy-like hair, and thick glasses atop his round, red nose. He was adorable. “And you must be Randy Potts. And you, of course, are Long John Silver, and you—I can’t believe it.” He stopped when he looked at Jerry. We were all staring back at him in disbelief. This isn’t how it was supposed to go. “You’re my Jerry. My very own. I had no idea… but… seeing you in real life. It must mean… Oh my.”
And then, the adorable, little man fainted.
A few minutes later, we had Albert laid out on his living room couch, an old plaid 1970s number with wooden armrests. I put a cold cloth on his head and had some leftover chocolate at the ready while Randy and Long John searched the house for anyone else—namely, Destiny. But the house was empty. Jerry sat on the coffee table looking at the man, not saying a word.
When he woke up, Randy and Long John were back and had pulled up an old rickety wooden chair from the kitchen and the floral and cat-hair-coated armchair from across the room. Albert graciously took some chocolate and a glass of water, and after a few bites, started crying.
“I just can’t believe. I never thought—I never really thought it was real. After all those years of writing little stories about magic, about adventure, family; the life I wished I’d had growing up. I never knew I was creatin
g it. But look at you,” he said, tears still streaming down his face as he looked at Jerry. “I can’t believe it.”
The men stared at each other for a long while before Albert turned to the rest of us. “Jerry here was one of my characters in a short story, years and years ago, you know. It was the only thing I’ve ever had published. I’d once dreamed of becoming an author, you know, and I thought it might even be an expansion of Jerry’s short story, maybe something about his later years with his own family… But my wife; she hated my writing. Hated it.
“Seeing you all here is just outstanding. I, of course, was starting to suspect you’d come. But I just couldn’t have—”
“Sorry,” Randy said politely as he stood up. He was looking around the room furtively. “Did you say you were expecting us to come? Did Destiny tip you off?” he asked more forcefully.
“Destiny…? Heavens no! I, well, it’s just, haven’t you seen?” Albert sat up on the couch and gestured for Jerry to hand him the remote on the table next to him. A moment later, he’d turned the ancient, little box-like television on.
There on the screen were pictures of all of us; illustrations or photos from our books. Long John was grizzled and more cartoonish; this was in his previous literary life, before his wooden leg had been replaced with a Louisville Slugger in this new series. I was there. It was me, not from my first series as a child, but from this one: tall, lanky, brown mussed hair, gray eyes, a bit unkempt and unshaven; about nineteen. A drawing of Jerry, much like the one we’d found of Jenny. Randy from the cover of his previous series, before he was both a wizard and detective. The pictures shifted, and were replaced with several more, this time of Mattie, Merlin, the Lost Boys, and then finally, Princess Badroulbadour’s beautiful face, and Geppetto’s crinkled and warm one. And even though they were just drawings and in some cases cover photos, there was no mistaking it, they were us. It was a wonder more people hadn’t recognized us.
The Actual Account of Peter Able Page 15
