by Cyn Balog
"I don't know. I can't tell."
"Well then, I'm eating it all," I say, shoving a piece into my mouth. Even if it did just come from his butt, I'm starving.
He ignores me, shakes the chopstick in his hand. "I'm not very good with this thing yet."
"This thing'?"
"My wand."
"Wand? Cam, it's a freaking chopstick."
"A chopstick that can make fortune cookies? Morg, think about it."
I inspect it, then say, dumbly, "But wands are pretty, and gold. With a star at the tip." At least, the one I got at Disney World when I was five was.
"It's a training wand."
Okay, right. So now he is just getting annoying. "Why do you have a wand? Are you a magician? Is Dawn your assistant? And you made her invisible?"
"No, she's my guide."
"Your… guide? Like a tour guide? For wherever you're being taken?"
"Right."
"Okay: So where are you being taken?"
"I'm not sure. To wherever it is that fairies go."
"You mean, like. Middle Earth or something?" I look down and see the broken remains of the fortune cookie, and I can't keep the sarcasm from creeping back into my voice. "So, um. Some fairies want to kidnap you. Why? Do you have the one ring to rule them all?"
"They've come to take me home " he says softly.
"Oh." This would be the time that I'd expect a camera crew to come bursting through the door, saying this is all a practical joke. But Cam doesn't joke like that. He's a terrible liar. I study the door, willing for it to open, for some peppy TV host to thrust a mike under my nose and ask me how it feels to know I fell for the stupidest and most unbelievable prank ever, but it never happens.
"Wait. Are you saying you're a fairy? Like Tinker Bell?"
"Well, not exactly. Tinker Bell was a pixie, and she isn't real."
I'm suddenly aware that my mouth is hanging open. I close it and firmly place my hand on his shoulder. "Listen to yourself. That's nuts. You got hit too hard last night, and-"
"I know it sounds crazy, but what about the fortune cookie?"
"Big deal." I point to the pimple budding from my chin. "Make this go away, and maybe I'll believe you."
"I can't. I told you, I'm not so good with the wand yet. I wouldn't want to turn you into anything."
I roll my eyes. "Fantastic. So, where are they taking you?" Since Cam has never wigged out on me like this before, I keep my lips zipped as to where I think he needs to go: the nearest mental institution.
"It's this kingdom, this whole other world" he says, his voice wavering. "I'm not sure. Dawn told me it exists alongside this world. I know, it's totally whacked, but I have to go there on my sixteenth birthday-"
"What do you mean by 'have to'?" My voice starts to do the same little dance that his is doing, rising and falling between a whisper and a nervous shriek. "Because we have this party, and everyone's going to be there, and…"
He's staring at me, and I know exactly what he's thinking: I just found out I’m not human, and you're worried about your sweet sixteen?
And yes, it may be a little callous of me, but please. A fairy? I know everything about this boy. He's always been completely levelheaded, never one to believe the latest gossip, no matter how true it seems. And there isn't anything about him that is a mystery to me. I know when he's angry, I know when he's nervous, I know when he's… lying.
And, looking at him now, I can tell one thing for certain.
He believes every word he is saying.
'This is crazy," I say, my voice hoarse. "You're telling me that a week from now, a bunch of fairies are going to steal you from me?"
He nods.
"For how long?"
He doesn't answer, just looks away. I take that as a "forever."
I bite my tongue. "This has got to be a dream. Wake up, Morgan," I mumble, pinching my arm through my cashmere sweater.
He ignores me, stands up, opens the door a crack, and peers out. "Look, we haven't got much time. Are you going to help me or not?"
My head is still throbbing, but I sit up and pull my knees under me. "What do you want me to do?"
He relaxes a little. "Do you remember how we learned, a few years back in world history, about those women in China? How the men liked small feet, so the women used to bind them?"
"Uh-huh," I say, flashing back to an image of a poor Chinese woman with feet that were no bigger than balled-up fists. They'd actually been able to stunt the growth of their feet by wrapping them tightly. Gross. "So what?"
"I figure it's worth a shot." He reaches into his bag again, and this time he produces a roll of white bandage. He looks around carefully, then, pulling up his T-shirt, whispers, "Will you wrap my wings?"
Chapter Fourteen
THE REST OF the day is a bit of a haze to me. I end up missing bio and most of lunch because of Cam. When I finish wrapping up Cam's wings-yes, you heard me right, wings-I skulk out of the shed, knowing something big, something life-altering, is happening but not being fully able to comprehend what that something is. I find myself so deep in confusion that I'm barely able to walk a straight line.
My boyfriend is a fairy. Cam has always been talented, almost superhuman, so I'd fully expected him to do something fantastic, like one day end up on the cover of SI, but flying around, painting rainbows, taking teeth away from under children's pillows in the night? I saw the wings, the fortune cookie that materialized out of nowhere, and yet… I've known this boy since we were in diapers. I know him and his family inside and out. It isn't as if he suddenly appeared in a flower bed one day after a thunder storm, or as if his parents are mysterious elvish royalty. And he burps and farts like any good human-in fact, quite a bit more than I'd like.
As I was wrapping the bandage around his shoulder blades, trying my best not to come into any contact with the growth, he told me that the wings are actually just for show; that, according to Dawn, he can fly. Which explains his Superman on the football field. Dawn had told him to be very careful, because the reason he blacked out last night is because his powers are not fully developed. He is just a newbie now, but on his sixteenth birthday, when he fully inherits his powers, he will have to leave this world.
Forever.
But if he is a fairy, and if he does have to leave, that would explain why I hardly ever see him in any visions of the future. His best friend Scab, is my biggest fan and best customer. I've seen almost all of his next five years: the game where he dislocates his shoulder, the graduation party where he eats sixty hot wings in twelve minutes, his college years in Miami. One would expect Cam to be somewhere in the background, but he never is. I hadn't realized it until today, but I haven't seen him in any visions further out than two weeks from now. As for my own future, I've tried to imagine it only a handful of times, and it's always been too fuzzy to comprehend. It's a close-up of my nostril, or a big shot of my butt, and the "camera," which obviously has a sense of humor, never pans out. Still, I've always felt lik
e Cam is somewhere nearby. He just has to be.
But maybe he isn't.
Oh, God.
After that realization, I end up spending much of my time in the third stall of the music-wing bathroom, having a minor mental breakdown and vowing never to wear my orange-sherbet-colored flip-flops again. If it weren't for them, Sierra Martin wouldn't have recognized my feet and begun peppering me with questions about her future while I was trying to stem the tide of tears that were majorly schlubbing up my complexion.
"No comprendo" I say in the best accent, my two years of Spanish will allow. "Soy una…" How the hell do you say "ESL student"? "Urn. Soy una biblioteca mas grande. "
Close enough.
"Hello, Morgan? Are you there?" she asks, after a moment of silence. I think the flu is easier to avoid.
"No! No Morgan. No comprendo. Baja en el ascnesor" I say combatively.
"Morgan, stop," she whines. "You're totally freaking me out. I just need to ask you a teensy-weensy favor."
"Fine." I give in. I flush a tear-soaked wad of TP and open the door, hoping that my face doesn't look as red and blotchy as a volcanic eruption. If it does, she doesn't seem to notice. Of course, I think she may be oblivious to anything other than her stupid future. "Great timing."
She examines her hair in the mirror and fluffs this giant, fluorescent-pink feather thing that's holding up her ponytail. "Well, what do you expect? I've been in agony. And you didn't return my calls."
"Calls?" I ask innocently, even though I programmed my phone to play "Super Freak" whenever her number pops up so that I can let it go right into voice mail. Which happened, in the past twenty-four hours, around fifty times.
"Yeah. This is important stuff."
"I know. I've just been…" I take a look in the mirror and gasp. I've just been auditioning for The New Addams Family? I think the school administration purposely installs fluorescent lighting that would make Heidi Klum look like the undead because they want to smoke us out of there as soon as possible. But I look more undead than usual, and I am not exaggerating. In the less than two hours since getting whopped on the head by that demented mosquito, I've transformed into something Frankensteiny I rub a smudge of black eyeliner that has somehow migrated to my lower cheek away. "Busy."
"Well. You know your 'vision'?" She says this with a roll of the eyes.
I nod, grabbing on to the comers of the sink for support, Here it comes.
"Well, I most definitely think you were thinking of the wrong person."
"I know. You told me that."
She holds up her finger. "I brought supporting evidence. If I am going to ever be an attorney with one of the top firms in New York, I should be able to argue this. Exhibit A." She reaches into her stack of books and pulls out a stub of paper. "Do you know what this is?"
God, no.
"It's a ticket from my trip to the Metuchen Fair. I went there this weekend. And I stopped by Madame Babuska's tent. And guess what she said?"
I sigh-. At least Madame Babuska is smart enough to charge twenty bucks for her fortunes, "That you're going to Harvard?"
"Yes!" She shrugs. "Well, no. She said that I am going to find the love of my life next year and his name is Harvey. I figure that's pretty close."
"Pretty…," I say. How can I think about this when my boyfriend is growing wings as we speak?
"But that's not all. Exhibit B." She waves her hands in front of her. "I totally wouldn't even go to MCC if my life depended on it. Like, if every other college in the world turned me down, I would just kill myself. See? It's virtually impossible for you to have envisioned that."
"What if your suicide attempt failed and left you brain damaged?" I ask. "It could happen. I saw it once on Oprah."
Oprah. Cam and I used to watch it together when he wasn't at practice. I would cry during all the inspirational stories, and he would make fun of me. Ah, the good old days. Sierra starts to pull out Exhibit C just as another tear starts to force its way out.
I stop her. "Yeah. You're right. I guess I was wrong!"
She smiles. "Really?"
No, not really, but I can't take it anymore: At this point, my mind is focused on only one thing. Well, three things. Cam. And his wings.
Anyway, something in my life goes right Sierra gives me an excited hug and prances out of the room, triumphant.
I miraculously manage to make it home without getting hit by a school bus. When I get there, though, I don't feel like going inside. Instead, I get this weird idea to lie on the grass and stare up at the sky. Maybe because this is something Cam and I used to do a lot when we were growing up, and I've been thinking about our past a lot today, trying to recollect if there had been signs of him not being of this world prior to last night. No, he had always been so normal. I can remember shouting out,
"Look! I see an angel!" and Cam, always practical, would say, "That's just a cumulus. There's a front moving in." I'd always thought he'd grow up to be a weatherman.
Well, today certainly threw a wrench into those plans. Fairies don't predict the weather. I think they make the weather. Or something.
I crawl into the grass, catlike, then flop over and stare. There are more clouds than peeks of blue sky, though I could really, really use that blue sky right now.
I hear the engine of a car, then look past my feet, to see my father's minivan rounding the corner into our driveway. A door slams and his voice calls, "What could be so bad that it's worth missing General Hospital for?"
My father loves the soaps. He watches General Hospital religiously and has molded his work schedule at the hospital so that he goes in at four in the morning and comes home right in time to watch his shows. Every Sunday, he reads Soap Opera Digest and inevitably will give me the latest update on his "retirement countdown," when he will finally be home to watch them all. What a glorious (for him) and altogether mortifying (for me) day it will be when my dad can sit at home in his boxers all day, watching the soaps. I am certain the garbage in the house would never get taken out if he knew that TiVo exists.
"Daddy," I complain, twisting a blade of glass between my fingers, "Ms. Simpson is probably going to call you about me missing bio. And Cam's a fairy. What do I do?"
I hear the screen door open and close. "It's on! It's on!" he shouts from inside.
I groan and close my eyes. "I'll be in, in a minute."
I hear the swish of grass as someone collapses next to me like a wounded cow. My suspicions are confirmed when I lift my head an inch from the ground and see the scuffed Keds, toes pointing to the sky in a V. Not exactly someone I want to talk to right now, but, for some reason, I can't move.
"What is the purpose of reclining here?" he asks me gently.
"Because I can't breathe. I think I'm going to die." I sit up, pull my knees to my chest, and look down at my ruined cashmere sweater, spattered with sticky pink
stains. "Are you a fairy, too? Is that why you appeared out of nowhere?"
He shakes his head. "I am the Brownes' son."
"You mean, you're Cam's brother?"
"No." He looks at the sky as if searching for the right words. "Fairies like to play tricks on humans. They're jealous. They like to steal human babies. On the night I was born, the hospital must have left a window open, because the fairies took me and left Cam."
"Why? Why would they leave him?"
"Cam was a changeling. A sickly fairy. He was supposed to die of illness before he reached adulthood."
"But he's not sick. Well, not anymore. He used to have bad asthma when he was younger, but he’s fine now."
"They do not understand why he recuperated. And they need him, as there has been a terrible tragedy. So they've come to take him back."
"Tragedy?"
"Yes, Cameron's older brother, Azizl, has been killed, and now his father has no true heir."
"So they want to trade you for an heir?"
He nods.
I exhale deeply. "Well, why are they- still here, then? Why didn't they just take him and get the hell out, like they- did the day he was born?"
"There is a portal between the two worlds," Pip explains. "Fairies-or anyone, for that matter-may always pass into this world. But the portal to the fairy world is open only at midnight on Day of Birth and Day of Becoming."
"Day of who?"
"Becoming. Their sixteenth birthday."
Blades of wet, green grass prick at my legs, but I can't feel a thing because I'm numb. "So you're the Brownes' consolation prize for losing Cam? That's-inhuman." I pause, realizing that, duh, it's probably inhuman because they're not human. "I mean, it must feel horrible."
"It did come as a shock to Mr, and Mrs. Browne."
"Well, obviously. But I'm talking about you. It must feel horrible for you."
