by M Sawyer
She locked eyes with herself. Her emerald eyes burned brighter. She searched her own wild face for some shred of humanity. Someone she recognized.
Now she understood why the woods fascinated her, why they called to her. That was why she’d fled to them that day on the playground. The shadow that had followed her all her life, the face in her dreams, the face that stared into hers when she woke up under the tree all those years ago wasn’t her imagination.
Without meaning to, without knowing it, she’d stolen someone’s life. Someone’s child.
Melissa wasn’t crazy—she’d lost her baby. Nolin, the real Nolin, now lurked on the edges of their lives.
Chapter 34
THE SHADOW FUMBLED with the thin branches that hung under the Claw Tree. Thoughts rolled through her head, none of them actually hers. There were fewer and fewer thoughts to sort through these past few years. The tree was getting quiet. The humans and goblins who were connected were dying out.
Though it was night, it didn’t take her long to realize Nolin wasn’t asleep. No dreams to shape.
Nolin didn’t sleep often. The Shadow wondered if she avoided her dreams on purpose. Most nights, Nolin would drift into slumber for a few minutes at a time. Her dreams would flow through the tree into the Shadow’s mind and back again, but tonight there was nothing. Nolin was stark awake, not even trying to sleep.
Something was keeping her awake.
Something had happened; the Shadow was sure of it.
***
The faucet dripped. For the entire night, Nolin didn’t move from where she lay in the fetal position on the bathroom floor. The steady drip marched along with her slow heartbeat, her even breathing. Her eyes focused on a single crack on the wall until her vision blurred. Her eyes felt dry. She’d forgotten to blink.
So what now?
She could stick around and try to get Melissa out of this mess.
Or, she could return to the forest.
Maybe she could find her real family, the goblins or fairies or whatever she was.
Nolin smirked bitterly, shaking her head. No way was she a fairy. She thought of herself as a child, a wild little thing with dirty feet and a hot temper, digging holes in the schoolyard just to feel the soil between her fingers. How could she be anything else but a goblin?
Nolin pulled herself into a sitting position. The knobs of her spine dug into the drywall. She tilted her head back and let her hair cover her face like a shroud.
Melissa wasn’t her mother, so was Nolin obligated to help her? Nolin could pretend this never happened, go back to the forest, and forget everything about her human life, the way she did before when she fled into the woods.
Nolin hugged her arms around her knees, trying to make herself small enough to disappear. Tears spilled from her eyes and burned trails down her swollen cheeks.
No, she couldn’t leave.
As much as she wanted to be free, she couldn’t abandon Melissa now. She had burdened her. She’d driven Paul away, then left Melissa alone to manage herself. Human or goblin, she couldn’t leave now. She didn’t know how to be a goblin, anyway. She only knew how to be Nolin, whoever that was.
Her joints cracked as she clambered to her feet and to the living room. Slowly, she laced her sneakers and tied her hair back, all sound and feeling muffled as if she were underwater. She needed a walk.
Quietly, Nolin slipped out the front door.
How strange that the trees, the houses, the sky, everything about the quiet street in the small town was exactly the same as the day before. And yet the trees felt different. The sky felt different. She felt like she was seeing everything for the first time, through different eyes that didn’t view trees and the sky as something outside of her, but something inside of her, part of her. She was part of the earth and the forest, just like the trees.
In a daze, she rounded corners, marching in a solid rhythm though she gave her body no orders. She realized she was still avoiding the cracks in the sidewalk. Don’t step on a crack or you’ll break your mother’s back. Biting her lip, Nolin planted her foot over a crack in the sidewalk. She’s not my mother. I don’t know my mother.
Once she finally looked up to see where she’d wandered, she realized she was at the end of town, on the road that wound into the hills where she’d found Melissa the day before, where the trail she’d run with Drew snaked through the trees and up the hillside.
She broke into a run. The muscles in her legs screamed as she propelled herself up the steep hill, pumping her arms to the sound of her breath, the rhythm of her pulse thrumming in her ears. She’d never run so fast in her life.
Within minutes, she reached the top of the hill. Thick trees gave way to the open clearing bathed in morning sunlight. Startled, she paused at the edge of the trees, because she wasn’t alone.
Drew sat on the same rock where they’d sat together only days before, or was it a lifetime ago? He leaned forward on his elbows and watched the sunrise.
He turned when he heard her coming and beamed at her.
“Hey!” he called. “Sorry, I ran by your house this morning, but you weren’t outside, and I didn’t want to knock in case you were asleep.” His smile faded and his words trailed away. “Are you okay?”
Nolin’s limbs shook from the run, so she hobbled forward and clumsily dropped down next to him. She opened her mouth to speak. Nothing came out. For a moment, Nolin forgot how to speak, as if losing her human identity had also cost her human speech. She dropped her head into her hands. Her hair curtained her face, wrapping her in a dark cocoon that blocked out the sunrise completely. She didn’t want to talk. She didn’t want to see. She just wanted to sit there and know he was beside her, not requiring her to do or be anything, except be there.
“I don’t think I can do this anymore,” she said. “Any of it.”
She felt his large hand on her back between her shoulder blades. He inhaled to say something, then thought better of it. Nolin was grateful. She didn’t have the energy for words—for speaking them or for listening.
His arm wrapped around her. She leaned into him. The thoughts that had been blowing around her head like a tornado slowed.
“Whatever it is, it’ll be okay,” he said softly. “You’re tough enough to get through anything.” Nolin felt herself smile, though she wasn’t sure she believed him. She appreciated it all the same.
Did it matter if she was not human? What if she chose humanity—was that the same thing? Melissa, Rebecca, Drew, people she’d cared about as much as a human could. Nothing had changed, in reality. Just her perspective. Perhaps she could choose to belong, choose to be what nature had decided she was not.
Nolin’s hands slipped away from her face. She opened her eyes, gazing into the blazing sunrise. Her muscles stopped twitching, and a heavy sleepiness overtook her. Maybe she’d sleep later.
For now, she would sit and watch the sunrise in Drew’s arms and welcome a new day, this new discovery, and watch the world go on.
Chapter 35
THEY WALKED HOME together. Nolin watched the ground while Drew looked straight ahead. Occasionally she’d glance up at him and find him looking at her. She’d smile. He’d smile back.
Just do it, she thought.
She took his hand. It was so much larger than hers, warm against her cool fingers. Rough in some places. He squeezed her hand gently, ran his thumb over her knuckles. Nolin’s heart thudded. Could he feel her pulse in her hand? She looked up at Drew, at the gentle smile that could mean anything.
He had no idea. No clue what she was. Would he care? Did it matter?
No, she thought defiantly, I don’t care what I am. Something at the back of her mind flickered in protest. She snuffed it out, like kicking dirt over a stray spark from a campfire.
It doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter. The thought ran through her head until it carved grooves in her mind.
“You don’t have to go home, you know,” Drew said. “Whatever happened, you don’t have
to go back.”
“No,” Nolin responded, her voice calm. “It’s all right.”
She understood now; she wasn’t afraid of Melissa, or the house. She was afraid of herself.
***
When Nolin walked into the house, Melissa was standing in the kitchen clutching a steaming mug. Nolin startled; she hadn’t expected Melissa to be up, much less in the kitchen, making tea as if this were a lazy Sunday morning. Another mug sat on the counter with the tag hanging over the side, the vapor rising in curls.
“I made you some tea.” Melissa stared out the living room window at the woods. There was no wind outside. The tops of the trees were still for once, fluffy and green with new spring leaves.
“Thanks,” Nolin said. She watched Melissa take a tiny sip of tea. A strange cocktail of emotions stirred deep in Nolin’s stomach. Anger, pity, sadness, fear, and relief twisted into a heavy wad in her gut. This was the woman she’d grown up believing was her mother, who’d raised her, but never treated her as a daughter. This broken shell of a woman, whose love she’d always desperately wanted.
Melissa took a slow sip from her mug. “I’m going to look for a job today,” she said quietly.
Nolin took in Melissa’s clothes for the first time, her neat sweater and skirt. Too big, but clean and unwrinkled at least.
“Oh, good.” Nolin said. Really, she was happy for her, also glad she’d be leaving for a while. “Good luck. I’ll stay here and clean some more.” Nolin smiled tightly, reaching for the extra mug of tea on the counter and raising it to her mouth, inhaling deeply before taking the first sip.
Nolin slipped into Melissa’s room once she’d gone.
She’d never seen any baby pictures of herself. She dug through the bookshelf in Melissa’s room, but she couldn’t find any photo albums. There had to be pictures somewhere.
Nolin found boxes under the bed, stacked to the brim with papers and folders. Financial records; college and high school transcripts; a high school diploma; a few award certificates from art shows. Things that any normal person would keep in a filing cabinet. Melissa must have shoved her entire life under that bed. It was interesting how she and Melissa dealt with things they didn’t want to face: Nolin ran, Melissa hid. Run and hide. Both cowards.
She looked under the bed. Nothing left.
She swore as she grabbed handfuls of papers and dumped them back into random boxes, not caring if she crumpled or tore anything. She slid a box under the bed, stretching her arm to shove it to the far side. The underside of the box spring sagged. In the far corner, she noticed the gauzy material that was was ripped and held together with safety pins. Something poked through the fabric. It felt like a book. There were other shapes poking through the fabric, more corners and edges.
Nolin wriggled under the bed and unhooked the safety pins, then reached through the tear.
One by one, she pulled out book after book, nearly a dozen. Then, she realized they were journals, ranging from cheap ones with pastel art printed on cardboard covers to soft, leather-bound notebooks. Nolin spread them out on the floor and picked what looked like the oldest of the lot, patterned with kitschy pink flowers. She flipped the pages; it was filled.
The inside cover even had a This book belongs to… stamp, under which was Melissa Michaels printed in blue pen. She recognized Melissa’s unfeminine scrawl. Nolin started at the first page.
April 17, 1979
I’ve never kept a journal before. Mom says if I don’t, no one will know about my life after I die. I don’t care if no one knows. She bought journals for everyone from the dollar bin at the grocery store, and now every night after dinner is “journal time.” Most families watch TV together in the evening, or just do their own thing. Mine spreads out over the living room and writes in cheap notebooks for an hour.
My life isn’t very interesting anyway. I’m eleven years old, I have long blond hair, and I’m supposed to wear glasses, which I hate. I always take them off before I get on the school bus. I have a grumpy dad, a mean mom, and a stupid little brother named Donald. We call him Donny. Sometimes I call him Donald Duck, mostly when he’s being annoying. Then he cries and Mom yells at me to be nice to my little brother. Ugh.
My best friend’s name is Alexa. She comes over a lot because she doesn’t like her foster mom, but she likes my family for some reason. Mom just loves her. She makes treats every time she comes over and offers to let her spend the night. I’ve never been to Alexa’s house. She says they’re not allowed to have friends over. Alexa doesn’t think she’ll ever get adopted; she just wants to wait till she’s eighteen so she can move out. Oh good, journal time’s over.
The margins were filled with scribbles and doodle of curling vines, echoes of the Melissa’s adult illustrations.
Nolin turned another page and skimmed the entry. Every day, Melissa wrote and mentioned how stupid she thought it was. Stupid Donny this, Mom yelled at me for that. Alexa’s name appeared on nearly every page. Nolin stopped turning halfway through the book, when Alexa’s name caught her eye.
August 8, 1979
Alexa came over for dinner tonight because Mom told her she’s getting too skinny. She worries she doesn’t get enough to eat at home. Of course, if she eats with us, she gets to stay for journal time. Mom even bought her a nice journal, a nice black one instead of one like mine that looks like a Kleenex box. Alexa likes writing. Mom tells her what pretty handwriting she has, and how pretty she is. Mom never tells me I’m pretty. I look so boring. Alexa has long, dark curly hair and brown eyes. I’m just boring dishwater blond with blue eyes.
Alexa is spending the night. It’s been really warm at night, so we like to sleep outside. Sometimes, after my parents are asleep, we sneak into the woods a little ways. Alexa loves the woods. She says she feels like an animal when she runs through the trees. She doesn’t even use a flashlight. It’s like she can see in the dark while I’m always tripping over something. It scares me sometimes.
Last week, she took me into the woods because she said she wanted to show me something. I was scared and I didn’t want to go. She went anyway. I didn’t want her to go alone, so I followed. She’s so fast; I fell down a few times and scratched up my legs. She finally stopped in a little clearing. The moon was out, and it lit everything up.
“Right here!” she told me. She was standing by a hole in the ground, and she stepped in when I came over. She told me to go down with her. The opening of the hole was as big around as a hula hoop and led to a little underground cave big enough for both of us to lie down in. It smelled amazing, like rain and fresh-cut grass. Like earth.
“Did you dig this?”
“With my own hands. Do you like it?”
We were lying on our backs, looking up at the sky though the hole. It was like putting the sky in a frame, so it felt right on top of us instead of millions of miles away.
“It’s incredible,” I told her. I don’t know how long we lay there, just watching the sky. I even reached up to touch it. It looked so close, and I thought maybe I could. If I held my finger just right over the edge of the moon, it looked like I was touching it. I imagined I could feel it. What would the moon feel like?
“I sleep in here sometimes. When I don’t want to be home.” Alexa said.
“You sneak out? You’d get in so much trouble!”
“I’ve never been caught. No one cares anyway; I come back long before anyone knows I’m gone.”
I told her I wanted to go home. I was starting to get scared, and I wanted to go home. I didn’t even want to sleep outside anymore, so we slept in the living room. Alexa was grumpy the rest of the night.
That was the end of the first journal. Nolin sat back on her heels, her feet almost numb from sitting for so long. How strange that Melissa was best friends with someone so similar to her daughter, who loved to dig and be in the woods, who lived in a home where she wasn’t wanted.
She shivered and ran her hand down Melissa’s words. A strange thought entered her mind.
Was Alexa a changeling?
Chapter 36
A STACK OF finished journals grew at Nolin’s side. A picture formed in her mind—a movie reel of Melissa’s childhood, full of constant family rifts and a strange girl who was so much like Nolin, and with whom Nolin was becoming more and more fascinated.
This girl was wild as the woods, brilliant, and reckless. Though Melissa called Alexa her best friend, Nolin couldn’t ignore the bitterness in Melissa’s descriptions, or how her handwriting became less neat and more jagged when she wrote about Alexa.
Nolin noticed the time when she finished the fifth journal, right when Melissa and Alexa were entering high school. The sun was now making its way to the west horizon. She replaced the journals in the box spring.
Nolin was cooking dinner when she heard the door open and Melissa’s light footsteps in the hall.
“How’d it go?” Nolin asked casually. She pushed the stir-fry around the pan. Melissa sat at the bar.
“Fine.” Melissa’s eyes were glazed like those of a dead fish. Clearly, she didn’t want to talk. Nolin didn’t push it.
Nolin dumped the stir-fry over the rice waiting in two bowls on the counter and slid one across the bar to Melissa, who didn’t acknowledge it at all.
Nolin leaned against the counter and stabbed her food with her fork. “Have you drawn anything lately?” she asked lightly. Melissa didn’t seem to hear her at first, then blinked.
“What? Oh, no. It’s been years.”
“Why don’t you get back into it?” Nolin suggested. “This seems like a good time. Maybe you could do some freelancing.”
“Huh,” Melissa responded. She still didn’t touch the food. Her eyes slid back into focus, though she still looked deep in thought.
