by Diana Wagman
“Hello, Oberon,” I said. “Thank you.”
“Hi, October. Didn’t I do a good job? Didn’t I? Pet me! Pet me!”
I patted his head, scratched behind his ears. His tail wagged, making a swooshing noise against the backseat. He licked my hand. I thought of where that tongue had just been. Yuk. Oberon wiggled up between the seats and licked my face.
“Is that necessary?” I asked.
“Guess we both like kissing you,” Walker said.
“Very funny.”
“Love me, love my dog.”
I started to laugh, then I remembered the Shoe Fairy, and she led to Luisa and Jed, and then Trevor beaten almost to death, and of course finally to my poor demented dad, and I started to cry instead. Oberon whined and licked me again. Walker took me in his arms. He patted my back and smoothed my hair off my wet face.
“It’s okay,” he said. “It’s okay. A week ago you thought you were an average, human, high school senior. Now you’re one of a kind, half troll, half fairy, and Queen of two kingdoms. Crows are chasing you, your dad’s a zombie, and we’re trying to find your mom. To say nothing of some fairy showing up who just wants to kiss you all the time.” He demonstrated, kissing my forehead, my eyes, my cheeks. “You’re amazing. I wanted to quit, but you’re still fighting, still thinking, still wanting to save everybody else. You’re incredible.”
I buried my face in his blue shirt. I wanted him to keep talking. I wanted to be with him forever. It was more than just his blue eyes and curly blond hair. More than the way he kissed. It was the way I felt when I was with him, both protected and strong. He helped me feel as if I could do anything. He had so much confidence in me that I almost believed it myself. The tears stopped and my shoulders straightened. I could do this. I sat up and told him I was fine. Walker pulled a U-turn and we headed toward the river.
“Thank you for finding me,” I said.
“I didn’t find you. You found me.”
“But you came to the mall.”
“Because you sent me a message.”
“I did?”
I tried to remember sending anything. I didn’t even have a cell phone.
He gently touched my forehead. “You have a power,” he said. “A very strong power. And you have been thinking about me.”
I squirmed, thinking of some of the things I’d just been thinking. “Really?”
“I can’t get the specifics.” He smiled at me and raised his eyebrows. “Too bad.” He took my hand. “But when you want to see me, it’s clear.”
I thought of Trevor and the way he’d felt me watching him. It was wild to think that my thoughts could travel. “Can all fairies do that?”
“We have some ability. Nothing like what you can do. You can call us, and I bet you can see us and even communicate with us.”
He was right; I saw my mother as clearly as if I was standing next to her.
Walker said, “I’ve never felt the call so strong and so unmistakable. You just have to practice.”
“What about trolls?”
“Definitely not a troll trait.”
I wanted to try it out. I closed my eyes and pictured my dad. Instantly I saw him in an industrial warehouse of some kind, subdued with his head bowed. Last I’d seen him, he’d been coming for me at school. I’d known exactly how determined he was. Now his thoughts were confused, in a swirl of muddy water. I couldn’t send him a clear message. He was standing beside Madame Gold. My thoughts went to her, but she felt me looking and her head came up and I felt her mind drilling into mine. I shut down. Thought about school. Homework. WWI. “Madame Gold,” I said.
“Did you see her?”
“Worse. She saw me.” I tried not to think of her. “She’s very powerful. What is she? She can’t be a fairy.”
“There have been a few Red Fairies in the past,” Walker said. “Also what they call White Trolls, trolls with potent magical capabilities. Neither are the good guys.”
“So which is she?”
“We don’t know. She appeared in our world fully grown. She attached herself to Trevor, so we all assumed she was a troll of some kind. But her powers, using the crows, the hypnosis, are more like the abilities of fairies. She tried to ingratiate herself with both worlds, but once she learned about you everything changed. Plus she’s crazed about those mushrooms. She wants more, more, more.”
“There has to be something she’s not good at. Some way we can beat her.”
“For now,” he said, “better not to think about her.”
Of course the minute you’re told not to think about something, it’s all you can think of. An orange car reminded me of her orange dress. A driver with red hair reminded me of her red hair. I forced myself to think of something else. I tried a technique they’d taught us in Sex Ed class: every time you think about the bad thing (i.e. sex), immediately replace it with a picture of something good (i.e. not sex). So when I thought of Madame Gold, I pictured ice cream cones. I was thinking about it so hard, I expected ice cream to be falling from the sky. And I couldn’t be sure it was because of me, but as we passed the frozen yogurt place there was a line of people out the door. At the same time, I tried to find my mom. The L.A. River is forty-eight miles long.
But then I saw her in the rain. Standing among giant rocks. She was thinking of me, hoping I wouldn’t come to wherever she was. She was hurt. Her face was bruised and she was limping. It wasn’t just raining, it was pouring. That couldn’t be. I looked out the car window. There was not a single cloud in the southern California sky.
“Walker,” I said. He heard the change in my voice. “My mom is somewhere rocky and it’s raining. And she’s hurt.”
He put one hand on my thigh. “I think your mother has been captured. I figured it was just a matter of time.”
First my dad. Now my mom. I would kill Madame Gold. I really would. And the moment I thought about her, she thought about me. I saw her smile her evil, sick smile. Ice cream. Ice cream. Ice cream.
We had arrived at the L.A. River. We parked and I jumped out. Walker and Oberon followed me through the gate and down to the river. I had no problem going down the retaining wall and this time I actually sort of flew over the trash in the water to the other side. Oberon bounded across. I turned to ask Walker if I was able to fly and saw him hopping clumsily from piece of trash to piece of trash. One foot splashed into the water.
“What’s up with you?”
He didn’t answer. I strolled as he slipped and slid and clambered up to the closed portal door.
“You okay?” I asked.
Again he didn’t answer. He stood before the enormous circular iron door. He touched it with both hands and shut his eyes. Nothing happened that I could see. His eyes opened wide and his face went whiter than it already was.
“Do we need a key?” I asked.
“It’s the way home. Fairies have instant access.”
“Maybe it’s because you were forbidden to come out here.”
“No. I’m still a fairy. This can’t be.” He banged on the door. “I’m still a fairy.” For the first time he looked rattled, desperate, and even afraid. “I’m still a fairy.”
Oberon nuzzled up against his leg. “You are, you are,” the dog said. “And I’m your bird—uh—dog.”
“Of course you’re a fairy. We’ll just transplant.”
“What if it doesn’t work?”
If it didn’t work, it would hurt. A lot. I had transplanted to the mall so I knew it was possible for me. I had promised not to return, but it didn’t seem as if my promises meant anything. Or maybe Madame Gold wanted me to come find her. I was happy to oblige. Time was wasting. “I’ll go through and then open it for you. How does it work?”
“A fairy just has to close his eyes and press on it. You’ll go right through. But you—you’re not a fairy.”
“Hey. I’m the flipping Queen. That’s what you said.” I tried to make him laugh. He didn’t. I stepped close to the door, put my hands on it.
“Wait,” Walker said. “You don’t know the way. You don’t know what’s down there.”
He’d forgotten I’d been there before. The only way was down. I pressed hard on the door, closed my eyes—and opened them inside the tunnel. Easy as pie. I could see fine in the dark, even without the fireflies. My eyes had definitely gained more troll abilities when I turned eighteen. I tried to turn around and open the door for Walker, but first I couldn’t find a knob, then I realized the door wasn’t there. It was just another wall of rock. I tried closing my eyes, pressing hard, and going back through it the way I had come. It didn’t work. I should have asked him how to get out.
“Walker!” I shouted. “Walker!” I pounded on the rock.
Fairyland was so difficult it was beginning to get to me. There were too many rules and too many odd magical stupidities. No, I told myself, no. I only had to follow the tunnel down and when I got the forest I would find a way to bring Walker in. There was another way in and out, Trevor had taken me back that way. I turned and started walking quickly down. The tunnel got smaller and narrower, just as I remembered. The walls were rough as I remembered. The only thing missing was the light I’d seen at the end. I assumed it was because my eyes were doing so much better in the dark and therefore the contrast was not as great. I had to crouch lower and lower. I couldn’t really look over my shoulder. Just as I remembered.
And then there was water under my feet that I knew had not been there the last time. I continued. The water got deeper and deeper until I was splashing through it up to my knees. Not good. What was going on?
I tried to find Walker in my mind, or my mother, or even Trevor, but it was like the line was busy. I couldn’t get through. Walker couldn’t hear me and I had no idea where I was. I stopped but the water kept getting deeper. Up to my thighs. Up to my waist. Up to my chest. I wasn’t a very good swimmer and there was barely room to swim anyway. The water kept rising. It was up to my neck. I tried to turn around and go back up to higher ground, but there wasn’t room. The tunnel was like a terrible capsule, holding me, preparing me to drown.
I tried to scream for Walker one last time, and the water rushed into my open mouth and filled my nostrils and I went completely under.
21.
I came up sputtering and choking in a deep crevasse filled with water. It was pouring rain and sheer rock walls surrounded me. “Help,” I called out weakly. I treaded water, but I wasn’t very good at it and I knew I wouldn’t last long. Fairies and trolls are not water entities. Or at least it was not my strength. I paddled over to one side and felt my way along it, searching for a ledge where I could get a grip. I went all the way around looking for any place I could hold on. I would not allow myself to cry. I had come so far and I was not going to let a little water pull me under. Ha ha ha. That was a Dad joke. I wished he were there, my old dad, not the new one. I tried to imagine him throwing me a rope, lowering a ladder, reaching his long arm over the side, but I couldn’t feel him or see him in my mind at all. It was as if someone had unplugged my Internet. My inter-mind connection had gone black, blacker than the tunnel had been. I continued around the perimeter of the water-filled chasm. There had to be a way out. In Ms. Tannenbaum’s P.E. class we had done a rope climb that at the time seemed impossible. We tried it every single class, day after day, week after week, until one by one each and every girl figured it out. It took strength, sure, but also balance and determination and optimism. If I could do that, I could climb up these stupid rocks. Rocks had to be easier than a rope. I went slowly around the edge again and again and on the third time around, as my arms were just about to give out, my fingers found the tiniest of outcroppings above me. I held on. I pressed my waterlogged shoes against the rock below and pulled myself up. I reached with my other hand to find another place, no matter how tiny, where I could hold on. There. My toes found an indentation. I pushed with my legs. I was climbing. I was doing it. Hand over hand, achingly slowly, my arms screaming with pain, slipping and sliding and almost falling back in, I made it up the side. Luckily it wasn’t very high. I made the final ascent over the edge and onto my belly. I lay there panting. I had done it and I didn’t think I could stand up, but I was exhilarated.
I lifted my head. I had climbed to nowhere. Nothing in any direction but black rocks and piles of black rocks. The rain continued, the drops enormous, each one like a cup of water falling on my head and shoulders. The sky was an awful shade of greenish gray, like the ocean under an oil spill.
“Walker!” I shouted, but my voice was swallowed, as if I was shouting inside a helmet. All the sounds were very strange. I knocked my fist on a rock and it thudded as softly as if I had knocked on a carpet.
I turned slowly, looking for a flat, wall-like surface. Transplanting seemed the only reasonable way out. I concentrated on a boulder with a mostly smooth side. I could definitely run into that. I took off, but the wet rocks beneath me were slippery and I couldn’t get up any speed. My feet kept sliding out from under me. It was like running in a nightmare, jogging through peanut butter, working so hard and getting nowhere. I headed for the flat side of the rock as quickly as I could, but it wasn’t fast enough. At the last moment, I put my hands out to protect my face and sure enough, BAM! I smacked into the rock. I bit my tongue and my mouth filled with blood as I fell backwards.
Oh man, that hurt. I’d worried if Walker couldn’t transplant running into the portal would hurt him and I was right. I hoped he wasn’t trying it on his own. Okay. I blinked back the tears. I could figure this out. There had to be another way out and I was going to find it. If I couldn’t transplant through the big boulder, I could still climb it and get a look around. I stood up on top and spit out a mouthful of blood. The rain instantly washed it away. It was a silly thought, given everything, but I was sorry my clothes were ruined, my shoes were a soggy mess, my new sweater had stretched down below my butt, and my cute skirt was clinging to my thighs. I wiped the water out of my eyes and searched through the rain. Nothing as far as I could see except rocks. Piles of rocks. I turned slowly and saw nothing. And turned again. Still nothing.
But wait! There in the distance were lights. I blinked and wiped the water from my eyes for the umpteenth time and stared. Yes! Warm, inviting yellow lights just forty or fifty rock piles away.
I didn’t want to scoot off the boulder on my butt and damage my skirt more than it already was, so I tried to climb down and I slipped and landed hard on my right ankle. Hard enough so it buckled beneath me. When I stood up, it hurt a lot to put any weight on it. Again, I refused to cry. “You’re wet enough already,” I said out loud. Ha ha ha. I wasn’t laughing as I limped toward the lights. Or in the direction I thought they were. Unfortunately, I couldn’t see the lights from the ground.
Thirty minutes later, I still hadn’t reached anything but more rocks. I had to stop frequently and rest my ankle. I found a place to sit on the nearest rock. I was tired and tired of the rain and tired of the pain in my ankle. I wished I were home in bed—but when I thought about home and my dad-not-dad I knew it was no refuge. Really, I wanted to be back in that dirty little car with Walker. Walker. Where was he? Why hadn’t I listened when he told me to wait? So much for my good, quick mind. “Pride goeth before destruction, a haughty spirit before a fall.”
Shakespeare had used that proverb in Macbeth and I actually remembered it from English class. I hadn’t known how true it was. My pride had brought me here and thanks to my haughty spirit I had both literally and figuratively fallen.
I picked myself up. I had to get to those lights. I climbed to the top of another pile of rocks to see where I’d gotten off track. I felt Madame Gold searching for me. I felt her laughing at me. I concentrated on Walker. That would make me feel better and maybe some tiny bit of my thinking would get through the rain and the rocks to him. I thought of his warm arms around me. The way he kissed me. The way he looked into my eyes.
Then I thought about how he had to give up being a fairy for me. How his
friends, Luisa and Jed, had been hurt. How he no longer could fly or transplant or do any of his fairy things. That was my fault. And I felt terrible.
But then I wondered how he had already known my dad was still a zombie. How did he know Jed and Luisa were in jail? Why, when we met her on the path, had he bowed to Madame Gold? I wondered why he had let me go through the portal. He could have stopped me. He could have grabbed me and pulled me away from the door.
He wanted me to be in here. Without him.
If pride is bad, self-doubt is worse. My heart shrank in my chest. That’s what it felt like, as if it had turned into a small, hard, rock—like any of the rocks surrounding me. I was a fool to believe Walker loved me. What an absurd idea. Gorgeous fairy him and half-breed me. Never! He hated trolls so much. He had to hate the troll in me.
I crumpled and sank to my knees on top of the rock. He was a liar and a manipulator and I had bought every line he’d thrown at me. Fairies don’t fall in love, he said, but I fell in love with you. I was an idiot. A complete idiot. I shouted “Idiot!” as loud as I could, even though I knew no one would hear me. “I hate you!” I yelled. But I wasn’t sure if I hated him, or myself.
I crawled to the edge and looked down twenty feet to the rocky ground. I would dive headfirst. If I landed right I could definitely break my neck. What difference did it make? Nobody cared. My dad was brain dead, my mother was hurt and jailed somewhere, and I had no friends. If I was gone Madame Gold could make everything right again. My tears were almost as large as the drops of rain falling on my back. I allowed myself to cry and I sobbed and sobbed.
Oh my God, I was making myself sick. “Snap out of it,” I hollered. I was having a big stupid pity party and letting a guy ruin my life. I had sworn I would never do that, never be like a girl on a television teen melodrama beating herself up over some boy. “I am not that girl.” I said that out loud too, although I didn’t shout it.
Gingerly, I stood up on my sore ankle and slowly turned searching the distance. There they were! I gave myself a virtual pat on the back. I was going in the right direction. I could see the lights. I was doing something right. I even laughed a little. I’d show Walker. I would do this by myself. Only a few more piles and I would be there. I marked the piles, memorizing unusual features of each one that I was sure I could see from the ground. I sat down and very carefully, not caring about my skirt or sweater, slid down the rock and landed gently on the ground. My ankle felt a little better. Maybe. Even if it didn’t, I was going to keep walking. I had no choice.
