The Land of Yesterday

by K. A. Reynolds

  Crossing the foyer in water that had risen up to her waist, Cecelia’s joy was enormous, like a sunburst inside her heart. By the time she had arrived at the front door, her always-want-to-remember memories grew so enormous, she cried tears of joy at all the love within her. No longer blue like before, Cecelia tears were bright and luminous, and spread through the sea like a wave. Beams of light shot through the water—as if the sun had fallen into the sea, as if her happy memories had cracked open the pit of the world and found only light at its core.

  Then the seas fell quiet at once.

  Focus on where you wish to go, picture it clearly in your mind, and when you’re ready to leave, trust the sea to show you the way. . . .

  “This will work,” Cecelia said to her miraculously magical pen, which had filled itself with a phantasm of her happiest golden tears. “I believe, I believe, I believe.” Cecelia put her pen back together, set it in her pocket, and raised her face to the ceiling, toward the surface of the sea. “Okay, Captain Shim, I’m ready to leave Yesterday and return to Today.”

  Captain Shim’s voice echoed from somewhere above. “Farewell, Daughter of Paper and Tears. I always knew you’d find your answer. . . .”

  Smiling, Cecelia closed her eyes.

  She envisioned her home, back on their land in Hungrig, atop their lush green hill surrounded by grass and daisies. She imagined Widdendream restored to health and vigor, with a strong new cage, and fully functional burners. She pictured her mother and father as they were before this nightmare began, no longer paper dolls, back to their old happy selves. Cecelia had read that if someone died in Today, they couldn’t return to the land of the living. Even still, she visualized her brother anyway, at peace and at home with them, no longer a paper doll. And finally, she imagined herself a flesh-and-blood, nonpaper girl, back home where she belonged.

  The sunlight outside grew brighter, and then everything happened at once.

  Cecelia’s fingers prickled as if they were waking; when she held up her right hand, the tips of her fingers were no longer midnight blue but bronze, flesh, and real.

  “Oh souls.”

  Next, the floors rumbled. The walls heaved. The bowels of the house shook.

  “It’s working!”

  A beloved voice rang out just beyond the front door. “III reeepaaay giiift . . . dryyyyy yooourrr teeears aaand heeeellp Ceceeeeliaaa baaack hoooommme.”

  “Caterwaul?” Cecelia grabbed the handle of the front door as an evilly familiar thud, thud, THUD banged outside.

  Her pulse ticked. Her mind tocked. More prickles on skin, more light, more thuds.

  Three-fourths of a second later, the house lifted through the sea in a whoosh, into the starry night sky, and out the other side.

  Chapter 27

  The Beginning After the End

  The eerie white light of a full Hungrig moon flooded Cecelia’s bedroom. Her clock read 12:01 a.m. Dark shadows slipped across her walls like rowboats on rough seas. Outside, wind tossed dead leaves past her window; branches scratched Widdendream’s outer walls. The first thing Cecelia noticed was that she was shivering. Her clothes, the same ones she’d had on earlier—boots and all—were soaked, along with her hair. Like she’d taken a midnight swim in her clothes and forgotten.

  The second thing she noticed was—

  Thud.

  Thud.

  THUD.

  Cecelia froze.

  She’d thought she heard the same hair-raising noises moments ago, but these thuds were louder, closer.

  Maybe she had imagined it?

  Cecelia rolled over in bed. Bed. Why did it seem strange that she should be in bed? Cecelia contemplated going back to sleep until a soft but clear whimper floated into her room from downstairs.

  She definitely heard that.

  Cecelia noted the time again on her clock. Her pulse beat a symphony of blood: I am awake just after midnight, the exact time Celadon fell. Then she saw the date on her clock. It was the day her brother died. I heard a thud and a whimper. Just like the first evil Tuesday . . .

  Maybe Celadon is still alive!

  No time to waste, Cecelia threw off her covers. She leaped out of bed in such a hurry, she didn’t notice her soaking wet rug, the puddles of tears dotting her floor, or the daisies peeking out from under her bedding. She failed to witness the four paper dolls at rest atop her sheets before they vanished in a glimmer of motes: one of mazarine, one of aubergine, one of translucent celadon green, and one of the sunniest lemon. She ignored the clatter of her miraculous pen as it plunged from bed to ground, and completely missed the note that slipped from the tube.

  Dearest Cecelia,

  The gift of Yesterday is all I have to give. I did everything I could to guide your family back in time to when each Dahl was alive. But no matter how I tried to bring everyone back, the Law of Yesterday and Today would not bend: once a body dies in Today, it is Yesterday’s to claim, and there is no bringing it back. I am sorry. I hope, no matter what happens today, this note finds you smiling.

  Your friend beyond time,

  The Caterwaul

  P.S. Yesterday doesn’t like change, so things might be a bit . . . mixed up.

  As Cecelia rushed across her room, she paid no mind to the fiery warmth blazing within her, or the light shining through her odd freckles like stars. It wasn’t until real tears rolled down Cecelia’s real cheeks that the truth finally sank in.

  I was paper but now I’m real.

  Throwing open her bedroom door, Cecelia found the hallway black as pitch. She thought of her mother. How when she left for the Land of Yesterday, the lights wouldn’t work. Cecelia flipped on the lights. This time, they worked and shone brighter and sunnier than ever.

  “Widdendream?” Cecelia raced across the hall.

  “I’m here,” Widdendream replied with a soft and urgent voice. “Please, Cecelia, hurry.”

  Happy Widdendream’s soul was safe, Cecelia glanced at her parents’ bedroom door—closed. Unlike Celadon’s, which was flung wide. Waterlogged photographs, like those strewn about Widdendream’s attic, glazed the dripping wet floors. Several other items—baby clothes, old letters, broken lamps, and a decrepit stuffed bear of Celadon’s—lined the corridor, as if carried downstream from the attic. None of them were made of paper.

  Another whimper erupted downstairs.

  Heart in her throat, hair in a tizzy, Cecelia leaped over yesterday’s treasures on her way to the staircase. Except when she looked downstairs, it wasn’t her brother she found.

  “Oh souls!” Aubergine and Mazarine Dahl lay perfectly still at the bottom of the stairs. Surrounded by attic debris, it was as if the house had spit their bodies out. She looked everywhere but couldn’t see her brother.

  As impossible as it seemed that her brother could be brought back to life, Cecelia had secretly hoped it was true. She was sad, yet she let the sadness come. No matter where I am, little brother, she thought as she ran, I am never far from you.

  Grabbing the banister knob on instinct, Cecelia hurled herself downstairs. It held steady, good as new.

  In a pool of light and seawater tears, her parents rested, motionless. Cecelia knelt between them and shook them each gently in turn. “Mother, Father, wake up, we’re home!” A giant welt ballooned on her mother’s forehead. Cecelia’s hair spilled over her shoulders to caress Mazarine’s and Aubergine’s cheeks. “Talk to me. Are you all right?”

  Neither moved or made a sound. Their clothes and hair were saturated like hers, and their bodies, cold as ice.

  Finally, her father sputtered, coughed, and opened his eyes.

  Cecelia nearly burst with joy. “Father, you’re okay!” Quickly, she rolled him onto his side. He coughed water until he was done. Cecelia did the same for her mother, hoping she’d cough, too.

  Nothing happened at first. Cecelia stroked Mazarine’s wet hair and cried hot, stinging tears, afraid she’d lose her. “Please, please, don’t die.”

  Mazarine stiffened and
choked, fighting for air. Her midnight-blue eyes popped wide; her gaunt cheeks flushed and colored with life as she inhaled a ferocious breath.

  Cecelia grinned harder than she ever thought possible. “You’re safe, both of you. You’re real flesh-and-blood parents, and truly back home with me!”

  Cecelia helped them into a sitting position. Her father blinked at Cecelia while wearing a slightly confused expression. Her mother hunched over and rubbed the welt on her forehead.

  “We’re fine, thanks to you.” Mazarine gave her a sly grin. “Joan of Arc couldn’t have done any better.”

  “She’s right,” Aubergine said, brushing damp hair from Cecelia’s eyes. “I’m not sure how we got here exactly, but that lump on your mother’s forehead definitely needs to get checked out.” He shook his head; bits of soggy drywall plonked to the floor. “If you hadn’t found us when you did, who knows what might have happened?”

  Mazarine peered deeply into Cecelia’s eyes. “Do you . . . have any idea how we got here?”

  “I—” Cecelia glanced at her father, who seemed happier than he’d been in a long time. Smiling proudly, and bravely, Cecelia lifted her chin and proclaimed, “It appears you may have nearly drowned in tears, and almost certainly fell a long way down, but I heard you cry out, and came as fast as I could. You’re safe, and here, and that’s all that matters now.”

  The closer she inspected her parents, the realer everything became. Her father, still dressed in the dark purple suit he wore earlier when he picked her up from school, had bits of shredded paper sticking out of the collar. His skin bore a countless number of paper cuts. Daisy petals and seaweed poked from her mother’s dress pockets and boots, the same clothes she’d been wearing in Yesterday. Plus, Cecelia could’ve sworn that when she knelt at her parents’ sides, she heard a door creak inside herself.

  Curiously, neither parent commented on the strangeness of these events.

  “Well,” Mazarine said to her daughter, wearing a shining smile worth every one of Cecelia’s terrible yesterdays, “thank goodness you heard us, because I am a bit dizzy, and seeing a doctor is probably a good idea.”

  Aubergine and Cecelia helped Mazarine to her feet.

  “Yes indeed,” her father replied with a special twinkle in his eye—the twinkle of sharing a secret. “You saved us, Cecelia. Our daughter is a hero, Maz, don’t you think?”

  Mazarine hugged Cecelia fiercely. “That’s right, a true hero. And I couldn’t be more proud.”

  A flash of light from the windows at the front of the house stole Cecelia’s attention. They crinkled and shone like smiling eyes. The air warmed, and the walls glowed in that same pale-yellow light.

  Widdendream seemed happy at last.

  “Okay, love,” Aubergine said quietly to Mazarine while escorting her to the door. “Let’s get you to the hospital. Cecelia, you might want to grab a sweater. It seems a bit wet out tonight.”

  Cecelia smirked. “It does seem especially damp everywhere. How curious.”

  When her father opened the front door, a warm breeze poured inside. Night clouds danced across the heavens. Crickets chirped. The Dahls’ front yard bloomed with a fresh batch of daisies. The whole outdoors glistened with moonlit dew. Widdendream stood strong and fixed, shiny and pristine. The wrought-iron lantern alongside the walkway glowed more radiant than ever. So bright, in fact, the lone lantern illuminated not only their street, but the entire hill. Like a spotlight to the stars. Miraculously enough, the eyes of each Dahl glittered with that same fiery light.

  As grateful as Cecelia was to be home and to have her parents back at her side, she couldn’t help wishing her brother were here with them, too.

  They got in the car and drove. Gazing out the window from the back seat, Cecelia noticed a giant housecat crossing their lawn. It looked suspiciously like a miniature Caterwaul, and winked at her as it passed.

  She winked at it right back.

  Suddenly, a pale-green shiver of light appeared at Cecelia’s side.

  Her heart stopped. Her hair rose. Her eyes danced with joy as they settled on Celadon’s ghost. He was so faint she could barely see him, but he was here, and he was smiling.

  “Celadon,” she whispered. “You came back.”

  “If you hadn’t carried me out of the Land of Yesterday,” he spoke in near silence, as if calling from one mountain over, “I’d have stayed paper for eternity. You saved me, Cee-Cee, like you saved them.” He patted the space over his misty heart. “Thank you, big sister. Don’t forget, wherever I am, I’m never far from you.”

  Cecelia glanced at her parents in the front seat. They talked quietly to each other yet peered back more often than usual. She wondered briefly if they sensed him here, too. “Will you stay here, with us?”

  Celadon didn’t answer, too preoccupied in observing the sky. Cecelia followed his line of vision. Against a backdrop of silver night clouds, a rainbow-striped hot-air balloon drifted in and out of sight. Cecelia waved as it passed by.

  “Today is a good day,” Celadon replied at last, his voice soft as falling snow. “Don’t you think?”

  “Today is brilliant,” Cecelia whispered back as he blinked out of sight.

  Their parents cracked the windows. The scents of dampness and drying tears and Hungrig drifted around them. Together, Aubergine, Mazarine, and Cecelia inhaled deeply of the cool mountain air. The kind of breath you take to make sure you’re alive.

  Acknowledgments

  Hello, dear reader. I am so glad you’re here because before I acknowledge the many incredible people who helped bring this book to life, I want to thank you for reading (thank you so much!) and tell you a secret: the true story of how Cecelia’s story began many years ago with another girl who lost her mother to the Land of Yesterday, and the very real letter that started it all.

  My mother died suddenly when I was seven years old. After I found out, I went into the basement and wrote her a letter asking her why she left me and if she was coming back. I stuffed the note into an envelope I made myself, stood in the center of the room, and closed my eyes. A seven-year-old’s logic assured me that if I threw my letter into the air, my mother would catch it in heaven. She’d see how much I missed her and come home. But when I threw my note high, it hit the ceiling and floated back down unread. I remember falling to my knees in tears and burying my face in the carpet with the realization that she was never coming back. The memory of those tears and that letter stayed with me all this time. And though I don’t remember what happened to that letter, I’d like to think it found its way into my heart for safekeeping. For the day I was finally ready to write this book.

  Now, without further ado, let the festival of thanks begin!

  Endless thanks to my brilliant superhero agent, Thao Le, for loving this story from the beginning. You saw the heart of this book and worked with me through several revisions to help make it really shine. Every step of the way you were kind and generous and amazing, and each suggestion you made was right. Not only did you answer my million questions, but you found this book the perfect home. My dream truly began with you.

  So much gratitude to my kind and ingenious editor, Emilia Rhodes. I am eternally grateful that you saw something special in Cecelia’s story and knew just what needed to happen to make it even better. You could not be a lovelier human. Thank you with my whole heart for bringing my dream to life. I’d also love to thank the entire Harper team for championing this book. You’ve all helped make my dream come true.

  Eternal glory to Helen Musselwhite for creating the stunningly unique work of art that is the cover of this book. She truly brought Cecelia and the atmosphere of her world to life. I cried when I saw Cecelia’s face. Thank you for those happy, happy tears. Also, many thanks to Jensine Eckwall for the spectacular internal illustrations. They couldn’t be more perfect.

  A ginormous thank-you to my incomparable, all-powerful, superlative critique partners given to this earth by the gods. This book would be nowhere without you:r />
  First, to the exquisite Jennifer Hawkins. My friend and soul sister, there are not enough words or orange Starbursts in the world to thank you for all you’ve done for me. You kept me going when I wanted to quit. You reminded me to believe when my belief had run dry. You sent me inappropriate GIFs when I needed them most. Without your encouragement, humor, praise, and love, I would have quit years ago. Like I always say, I love you, Jennifer Hawkins!

  To Jaye Robin Brown, the first reader of this story, and Kim Graff and Sonia Hartl: without your constant insights, brilliance, and excitement, this book would not exist, and I wouldn’t be the writer I am today. I treasure you. Love and thanks also to April Rose Carter, Kristin Thorsness, Destiny Vandeput, Breeana Shields, Kari Mahara, Kip Rechea, P. J. Sheridan, Ron Walters, those who had eyes on this book in contests and helped me shape the first pages, and anyone else that my head-in-the-clouds brain may have forgotten. You each added something special to this story, and I’ll always be grateful for that.

  Thank you to my writers group, Querying Authors, and to my people, the 2014 Pitch Wars Mentees. My god, you guys, without you I’d have shriveled up into a husk from so many spent writer’s tears and eventually would have blown away in a sad, sad wind. You kept me sane during every Dark Night of the Soul. Heartfelt thanks to each of you for your friendship, faith, and unwavering support. And finally, a big group hug of gratitude to the Electric Eighteens, the most eclectic and seriously talented group of debuts ever!