But Sage insisted on reminiscing about Fairyland and how it had a special place in his heart because his family used to go to Storytown when he was a kid, before he got famous. Before his parents got divorced and Michelle turned into the stage-manager mother from hell.
“Believe it or not, Mom used to take me here all the time when we were living outside Philly. She was like a big kid back then, loving Storytown as much as I did,” he said, resting his chin on his hand and gazing wistfully toward the park. “That’s why when I heard Fairyland wanted to make me a spokesperson, I was all gung ho, though Mom’s theory is that Fairyland’s best years are behind it. All the more reason, if you ask me.”
I was telling Sage how much Storytown had meant to me, too, when there was another knock at the door, followed by Ian’s voice. At the sound of it, my heart seized.
Sage whispered, “It’ll be okay.”
When Ian walked in, Sage held up his arms. “Don’t hit me.”
“I am sorry, man,” Ian said, extending his hand to shake Sage’s. “I came here to apologize. I acted like a jerk.”
“Forget it,” Sage said. “I was the one who started it. Unfortunately Zoe’s paying the price.”
Ian must not have noticed I was there, because as soon as he caught sight of me over Sage’s shoulder, his eyes shone with regret. “Oh, Zoe, I don’t know what to say.”
“Tell her you like her,” Sage said. “She obviously likes you.”
More embarrassment. I bowed my head as Ian came over and, kneeling next to me, repeated a line from his “audition” that day in the Queen’s office. “I am the worst guy ever.”
“No, you’re not.” In fact, secretly, I was kind of touched that he’d defended my honor. “Besides, Dash had it coming.”
Ian grinned. “Is all forgiven, dearest?” Complete with batting eyes, another repeat performance.
Again I couldn’t help but laugh.
“It was my fault!” Sage exclaimed. “Do you want me to do something? Call your boss?”
I said, “Agree to be the spokesperson.”
Sage slumped. “That I cannot do. Unfortunately, until I turn eighteen, my mother has control.”
So that was it. There was no solution. When I told Ian I’d been fired, he slapped his forehead and cursed.
“Too bad we can’t go back to Storytown and go through the Way Back Machine, eh, Zoe?” Sage asked, referring to a perennial Storytown favorite, an attraction where you could “go back in time,” even though all you did was walk through a sewer pipe lined with black-and-white spiraled rope lights—that is, if you could keep from being so dizzy that you fell down.
Ian said, “Let’s find out if it’s still around. They put up a wall around the ruins of Storytown but you can get in if you happen to know how. Which I do.”
Sage nodded. “Why not? I’ve got nothing else to do for the rest of the day and I’m bloody sick of hotel rooms. How about you, Zoe?”
“Sure. Why not? By tomorrow I’ll be back in Bridgewater anyway.”
Sage tossed his empty Coke can into the recycling bin. “Great. Let’s go.”
And that was that. I was about to commit the one sin the Queen had specifically requested I not do. But I suppose that’s what she got for firing me and, on the bright side, at least I hadn’t turned over the progress report to RJ.
Yet.
The evening parade was under way, so there wasn’t anyone in the Haunted Forest when Ian, Sage, and I emerged from the secret door by the Frog Prince’s Pond. Ian led the way, bushwhacking through underbrush until we found a worn path that snaked through a pine grove. Sage, in his pricey YMC suede boots, was slipping more than I was in my wedges, and he was complaining constantly. At last we came to a dark stone wall, the same wall I’d been examining when I’d fallen into the quicksand.
“You don’t want to go over there.” Ian pointed to some loose soil at the wall’s base. “As you can see, the wall dips down. It’s literally sinking. But there’s a way to get in right here.” He ripped down some vines to reveal a flimsy wooden door that opened with a mere push.
Sage went, “Whoa. This place is so overgrown, it’s like coming across some ruins in the jungle.” He went first. “You guys have gotta see this. It is sur-real.”
Which was his way of saying Storytown was a dump covered in weeds and littered with debris. No wonder the Queen had instructed me to keep Sage out of here at all costs, since many of the attractions had been left to simply rot.
The Old Woman’s Shoe had once been bright red, I recalled, with a ladder you could climb to the top and a slide that would take you to the inside. The ladder was gone, and most of the paint had peeled away, just like the merry-go-round that in better days had glittered with gold horses and intricately designed carriages. Someone had removed the horses and seats, leaving only the center. It was uniquely depressing.
As for the Way Back Machine, it was now just a dirty old sewer pipe filled with trash, leaves, and what appeared to be broken glass.
Sage stood by Peter Peter Pumpkin Eater’s oversize pumpkin, now defiled by black spray-painted graffiti that read Welcome to Zombie Land. He tossed me his cell. “Take a photo. I have to preserve this moment for posterity.”
A photo like that would be proof that we’d taken Sage to Storytown, and if it was posted online, it would seriously damage Fairyland’s rep. I tried explaining that to Sage, but he insisted.
“If anything, Storytown makes me love Fairyland more,” he said, posing with his arms straight out, like a zombie. “For some reason they saved it, and that tells me this park still has soul. It needs to be saved.”
Click! I took the photo.
“Cinderella’s Castle,” Sage said, taking the phone back so he could shoot his own picture of the fading pink fortress that wasn’t much bigger than our garage at home. “I remember that.” He jogged off to explore what was left inside.
Ian stood at the edge of an embankment. “The moat’s gone. Nothing but a ring of blue-painted concrete.”
But the willow tree was still there.
A lump rose to my throat. Storytown might have decayed into rust and witchgrass, but the tree remained steadfast, as proof that once upon a time there really had been a woman who so adored her daughter that she brought her to a special place where fairy tales and nursery rhymes came true.
I let the memories flood in: Mom running ahead of me in jean shorts and a red-checked top, her ponytail bouncing behind her as she led me through Mary, Mary Quite Contrary’s Garden.
I saw us paddling the swan boats, her lifting me up so I could see Cinderella on the drawbridge. Gently guiding my hand that was clutching the cracker for Little Bo Peep’s sheep. I could even feel the mounting trepidation as the sheep’s mouth got closer and closer and then stole the cracker from my tiny fingers.
“Mom,” I whispered, hoping maybe, wherever she was, she’d hear. Even though I knew that was silly, I couldn’t help it.
“Hey, what’s wrong?” Ian’s voice broke through my fog.
I didn’t want to tell him, because how would I explain that a willow tree just made me cry?
“Did your mom used to take you here?” he asked softly.
I nodded. “It’s been such a crappy day, getting fired and . . . other stuff . . . and then seeing this . . . I swear, I don’t cry all the time.”
He wiped away my tears with his thumbs as he had the night before when I’d broken down the first time. “Zoe, it’s okay. You loved your mom, and your mom used to bring you here.” He pulled me into him and rested my head on his chest. “It’d be weird if you didn’t cry.”
He stroked my hair and didn’t say anything as I let it all out, the stress of serving the Queen, trying so hard to be perfect, and then learning that I’d been nothing but a laughingstock all along.
If I’d had a mother, she’d be there in Bridgewater when I’d get home tomorrow to listen and understand and tell me that the Queen was a dried-up, two-bit theme-park manager. But there w
ould be only my dad, and even though he was a sweetheart and did everything he could for me, at the end of the day he wasn’t my mother.
“I should go,” Ian said, after a while. “Not that I’m not loving every aspect of this.” He looked down at me and smiled. “But, you know, the hot-dog-and-mac-and-cheese crowd awaits.”
I sniffed back the tears and said, “Yeah. I gotta pack.”
“Lemme go find Sage and tell him,” Ian said. “You wait here.”
While Ian crossed the drawbridge into Cinderella’s Castle, I walked over to the willow and knelt at its roots, focusing on what this place meant to Mom and me. Perhaps here, right at this spot, we’d leaned against this trunk and stuck our legs out over this cool, green grass and fed the ducks. Mom would have remembered; I’d been too young.
I fingered the willow’s brittle bark with the hope that by mere touch I could resurrect the past. But of course I couldn’t. So I did the next best thing.
Reaching into my shirt, I removed Mom’s single-pearl necklace, the one Dad had given her the day I was born, and dropped it in a small hole I dug with my finger. Patting over the dirt, I knelt there.
“I miss you, Mom.” My chest ached, and so did every muscle as I fought back another bout of sobs. I guess this was the release Ari had encouraged, the “letting go” that I didn’t want to do.
It’ll happen when you least expect it, he’d said at one of our last sessions. “Maybe in class or at the movies or while cleaning out your mother’s closet.”
Or at an abandoned nursery-rhyme theme park.
Didn’t think of that, did you, Ari?
I felt a touch and nearly leaped out of my skin, but it was only Ian.
“Sage is gonna stay here and keep looking around. You ready?” he asked, offering me his hand.
I took one last glance at the willow. Bye, Mom, I thought, running my finger over the disturbed dirt. See you later.
I stood and took Ian’s hand. “Ready as I’ll ever be.”
Twenty-seven
I spent the last night in Fairyland hanging out at the Frog Prince’s Pond with Ian and Jess and RJ, though I could barely look RJ in the eye.
There were a couple of times when I almost took Jess aside to tell her that her BF was not the dude he appeared to be. What worried me was that if he could live a lie, like being Mr. Fairyland, then what about his feelings toward Jess? RJ could have been lying about those, too.
But whenever I looked, they were holding hands or stealing quick kisses. She was obviously so freaking happy that no way was I going to be the messenger bearing bad news—and, besides, there was always the possibility that RJ really did like her. I hoped so, because Jess was too good a person to have her heart broken.
Meanwhile, Jess was irate over my shoddy treatment, since, apparently, I was the only one being punished. The Queen hadn’t so much as reprimanded her, Ian, or, according to all reports, Dash. It was so unfair.
“It’s because you’re expendable,” RJ said, when Jess and Ian were off swimming. “How does that make you feel?”
Perched on the lily pad, I hugged my knees. “How do you think it makes me feel? Like crud.”
“Then why don’t you give me that progress report?”
“Maybe I will,” I said, still unsure of what was right. “I’m not leaving until tomorrow.”
I did not want to think about tomorrow. After tomorrow I’d be in Bridgewater without Jess. Without Ian. It was a double blow.
Jess and RJ thoughtfully went on ahead on the way back to the dorm so Ian and I could be alone for the last time. I was determined not to cry again. Twice in twenty-four hours was over my limit.
We were walking hand in hand up the path through the Haunted Forest, neither of us knowing what to say. I wanted to tell Ian that I really, really liked him, that he was the best thing to have come into my life, ever, but it seemed ridiculous, considering that we’d just gotten together and we’d probably never see each other again.
Finally, Ian stopped right before we entered Fiddler’s Green. “Look. I want to say something.”
“Me too.”
He sighed. “Okay, that’s it. That’s all I came up with.”
“That you wanted to say something?” I laughed. “The entire summer you can’t shut up with your bad puns, and suddenly you’re speechless?”
He ran his finger along my chin. “That’s what happens when all that’s left is good-bye.” He cringed. “That sounds like a bad Sage Adams lyric, doesn’t it?”
“I’ve got news for you. All of Sage Adams’s lyrics are bad.”
“God, you’re great.” Ian bent down and kissed me slowly and softly. It was the kind of kiss you give someone when you’re pretty sure you’ll never see them again and you want to leave a lasting impression.
He hooked his arms around my neck. “I don’t want you to go.”
Understatement of the year. “If you’re ever back in Jersey . . .” I began.
“Oh, I’ll be back in Jersey. Didn’t I tell you? I’m moving in with you for senior year. I hope that’s not a problem, you know, now that I’ve seen your eye tis.”
Senioritis. “That pun is a fail on so many levels. I mean, the last part makes no sense.”
“It would if I were with a bunch of guys.”
I forced a smile. “Just don’t say this is the end, okay? Just say we’ll keep in touch and maybe run into each other, you know, in the near future.”
“Zoe.” Ian did his dead-serious thing. “You don’t understand. Nothing is going to keep me away from you, certainly not three thousand wimpy miles and definitely not the Queen. Don’t sell me short.” He gave me one last kiss. “It’s not over by a long shot.”
Because Jess is Jess, she insisted on spending the night with me in her old bed. I kept the mood light by going over all the crazy things that had happened at Fairyland, like my first and last performance as Cinderella and the time the Queen thought she had been blinded by a dust mote and Tinker Bell’s attempts to do me in.
We’d barely fallen asleep, it seemed, when the alarm rang. My last early morning to walk Tink, and even that chore was bittersweet. I let Jess snooze as I slipped into my shorts and hoodie, wrapped my hair in a band, grabbed my bag, and headed out into the park.
Now that it was mid-August, dawn came later, around six o’clock in the morning, for which I was extremely grateful as I trudged through an autumnal mist over the dew-soaked grass. I let myself into Tinker Bell’s boudoir, roused her out of bed, and snapped on her collar. Tricking myself into believing that this was any other morning and that I would be back doing the same thing tomorrow, I led her around her favorite bush, waving to the Maintenance guys inspecting the benches for gum and the gardeners searching for weeds among the petunias.
When I returned I found the Queen waiting in full regalia, arms crossed.
“I was prepared to exercise Precious myself,” she said. “As I must do tomorrow.”
I sadly hung up the leash.
The Queen flung out her hand. “ID, master key, and telephonic device. We might as well get this over with now.”
“Here?” I was expecting a more formal exit in her office. Not in the doghouse. Literally.
“Here.”
I reached into my bag, got my ID, and placed it in her hand along with the master key and iPhone. “That’s it. Can I go?”
“Hmm.” The Queen set aside my ID and master key, but, as I’d feared, she searched my phone.
“I thought so.” She frowned and flipped the phone around to show me RJ’s number. “Do you know what this is?”
“It’s RJ’s number. On speed dial.” I mean, really, what did I have to lose? I was already history.
“What’s RJ doing with a cell phone?”
I was tempted to tell her the truth. But then I realized that RJ was acting with good intentions. He was trying to save the Pinelands and the endangered amphibians and the spike-nosed whatnot, so I wasn’t about to turn him in for that. No reason both of
us had to lose our jobs.
“I have no idea, ma’am. But I can assure you that I never called him.” Or gave him the progress report.
“Then I will simply ask him himself.”
I braced for the worst as she pressed his number and put the phone to her ear. “No, RJ,” she snapped. “This is not Zoe. This is your boss.”
Crap!
There was some frantic mumbling on his end. The Queen straightened her posture, clearly not buying whatever excuse he’d invented.
“You have precisely five minutes to be out of bed and presentable,” she said. “A security patrol officer will escort you to my office, where I will hold an official inquiry. Don’t be tardy.”
Oh, god. This was going to be bad.
She slid the phone to Off and then unhooked the radio from her belt, the radio she used only to call the trolls. Speaking into it, she said, “I need you to bring RJ to my office posthaste. Also secure the perimeter and make sure no one exits or egresses until I give the command.”
Lifting her finger from the button of the radio, she turned to me with a sly smile. “Very good, Zoe. You have managed to trap our spy.”
Spy?
But Ian had been the spy—or, to be more accurate, the one who’d been crossing into the Forbidden Zone—and before that, Marcus.
Poor, innocent Marcus.
I rushed to keep up with her as the Queen sailed down the hall to her office, brimming with power. Two trolls on alert outside her door parted to let her in. The door slid open, and there, chilling with Andy over a couple of cups of coffee, was RJ wearing a huge grin.
The door slid closed, and the three of them erupted into enthusiastic applause.
“Brilliant!” The Queen clapped madly. “Simply brilliant, Zoe. With that kind of Wow! spirit, I knew you’d win.”
“What?” I said. “What did I win?”
The Queen placed her skeletal fingers on my shoulder and pushed me into a chair. “Why, the Dream and Do, my dear.”
But . . . but that was impossible. I was supposed to be on the bus back to Bridgewater in just a few hours. I’d been fired!
How Zoe Made Her Dreams (Mostly) Come True Page 18
