The Inside Story

by Michael Buckley

  The crowd eyed them quietly as if afraid to answer. Finally, one of the little old men nodded subtly and whispered, “Please, we beg you. Just say the line.”

  Sabrina threw up her hands in frustration and turned to her sister. “I feel like I’m trapped in a second-grade play. They’re going to have to spoon-feed us every line of dialogue unless you’ve got this story memorized from beginning to end.”

  Daphne ignored her and recited the line the Munchkin had given to her. “‘Oh gracious! Are you a real witch?’”

  “Yes indeed,” the woman in white said. “But I am a good witch, and the people love me. I am not as powerful as the Wicked Witch was who ruled here, or I should have set the people free myself.”

  Sabrina groaned. “Enough! We’re not here to be part of your story. We’re looking for a man who is traveling with a toddler—a little boy. Have you seen them or not?”

  The Munchkins leaped back in fright.

  “He’s short and balding and wearing a black suit,” Daphne added.

  A rosy-cheeked man in the back of the crowd made his way to the front. “I have seen him.”

  The rest of the Munchkins broke into excited complaints, begging their friend to be quiet and not change the story. He spat on the ground and refused. “It’s best to just get them out of here as soon as possible,” he said. “They’re just like the last fellow. He wouldn’t follow the story either.”

  “Mirror was here? Are you sure?”

  “Didn’t ask his name, young lady, but there was a man this way not long ago,” the Munchkin said. “He took off down the Yellow Brick Road in search of the magic door.”

  “Magic door?”

  “It pops up at the end of the story. Never seen it myself, but I’ve heard rumors it can take you out of this story and into the next.”

  Sabrina turned to her sister. “Then we have to stop him. If he gets to the door, who knows where he’ll end up next.”

  “How do we find this door?” Daphne said.

  The nervous crowd looked at one another. After several moments of talking amongst themselves, the woman in white stepped close.

  “You have to clean those ears of yours. The man said it pops up at the end of the story. The best way to find it is to just do everything that happened the first time, like it was when the real Dorothy did it. Go down the Yellow Brick Road, find your companions, enter the Emerald City, and meet the great and terrible Wizard of Oz. He’ll send you to kill the Wicked Witch of the West. Once that’s done, the door should appear.”

  “That will take forever,” Sabrina complained.

  “Isn’t there another way?” Daphne asked the Witch.

  The old woman shook her head violently. “I’ve said too much already. I’ll anger the Editor.”

  “The Editor?” Daphne asked.

  Everyone shushed her at once. “Don’t say his name! You’ll call attention to us!”

  Sabrina rolled her eyes. “C’mon. We’re wasting time with these nutcases. Let’s go.”

  Daphne nodded. “Well, nice to meet you all. Sorry to kill that witch and just run off, but we’re really in a hurry.”

  With that, the girls turned and headed toward the square and the winding Yellow Brick Road beyond. But it wasn’t long before they were stopped in their tracks by angry shouts.

  When they spun around, the girls found a stout Munchkin with a red face and a long beard, which he repeatedly tripped over as he rushed in their direction. When he finally reached them, he bent over to catch his breath and handed Daphne the silver slippers that were previously on the Witch’s feet.

  “You forgot these,” he gasped. “They’re a big part of this story, you know.”

  “Thanks,” Daphne said sheepishly.

  “Oh, and do yourself a favor—stay inside the margins,” he said.

  “The margins?”

  “Yes, you know, stay in the story. Don’t wander around in parts that weren’t written down.”

  “Why?” Sabrina said.

  “Because . . . it’s dangerous!” the little man shouted. “Do you need an explanation for everything? Stay inside the story and you’ll be safe.”

  Before Daphne could thank him for his advice, he turned and stomped back to the village, muttering insults.

  “He’s so pleasant,” Sabrina said.

  “C’mon, Toto,” Daphne said with a wink. “We’ve got a bad guy to catch and a little brother to rescue. Be a good dog and I’ll scratch your belly later.”

  “Keep it up and I swear I’ll dig a hole and bury you in it,” Sabrina grumbled.

  Daphne grinned. “Bad dog. I might have to swat you with a rolled-up newspaper.”

  The countryside of Oz was both spectacular and strange. Ancient trees lined the roads, each with burly knots and cracks that gave them the appearance of faces. Wild birds of unusual colors flew overhead. One bird’s plumage had a black-and-white checkered pattern. It landed on the path and eyed them curiously, as if they were the peculiar ones. Each bend in the road brought a new strange animal or freckling of unfamiliar flowers. Sabrina enjoyed the light breeze—it was the cleanest she had ever smelled. It had a calm, warm flavor like fresh oatmeal cookies and vanilla, and it swept across fields lush with wild grasses.

  The scenery helped pass the time, though its strange colors and somewhat unreal appearance started to give Sabrina a headache. They walked on for the better part of a day, keeping careful eyes on the Yellow Brick Road for signs that Mirror had passed ahead of them. Their former friend left nothing obvious, which made Sabrina quietly fret that he had taken their little brother off the path to hide inside the ancient woods that lined the road. She didn’t know much about Oz, but she sensed it was big. Mirror and the baby could be anywhere.

  By dusk, their first sign of intelligent life came into view—a family of Munchkins living in one of the now-familiar circular houses. The man of the house was a short, shiny-faced fellow named Boq. He invited them to dinner. Though the two girls were famished, they declined. Daphne tried to explain their need to find Mirror, but like the others they had met, he was intent on keeping to the story. After much arguing, he informed the girls that Dorothy and Toto were supposed to eat and stay the night. When they refused, again, he chased them down the road for a mile and a half, begging them to return. Eventually, he gave up and walked back the way he had come with a defeated and worried expression.

  “They’re all freaked out about this Editor dude,” Daphne said. Sabrina didn’t recall a character named the Editor in any of L. Frank Baum’s famous accounts of the Land of Oz, but then again, she barely knew the first book, and there were thirteen more she had just flipped through.

  Soon the setting sun turned the sky into a canvas of crimsons, rusts, and tangerines. The girls found a clear space beneath a fruit tree. Ravenous, they shook at its limbs and collected the plump and curious fruits that fell. There were apples and oranges, but also many bizarre fruits Sabrina had never seen. Daphne happily munched on them all, but Sabrina turned her nose up at the most strange.

  “I wasn’t sure we could eat these,” Daphne said between bites. “I thought maybe they weren’t real.”

  “It’s funny what’s real and what’s not. These taste just like fruit from Granny’s kitchen. But look around. It’s like we’re walking through a painting or the illustrations in a book.”

  “Like someone else’s memory,” Daphne said.

  Sabrina agreed. That was exactly the best way to explain how everything looked. It was like strolling around in someone’s distant memory. Perhaps that’s why everything felt strange and a little incomplete.

  The girls ate until their bellies were full. Then they lay down under the tree and looked up at the unfamiliar constellations in Oz’s sky, another reminder of their strange environment.

  “I’m worried about Puck,” Daphne said.

  Sabrina grunted, not wanting her sister to suspect her concern about the boy fairy.

  “I keep having this terrible thought,�
� Daphne continued. “If the Book has turned me into Dorothy and you’re Toto, what if that dead witch back in Munchkinland was him?”

  “That wasn’t him. We would have recognized his stink. Even a dead witch’s corpse smells better than Puck. If we’re lucky, that was Pinocchio sticking out from under that house.”

  Daphne hissed. “I can’t believe he was working with the Master. I mean, Mirror. Whoever.”

  “It makes me wonder who I can trust,” Sabrina whispered. She felt her sister’s hand slide into her own. It helped unravel the knot of worry in Sabrina’s belly a little.

  “You can trust me,” Daphne said. “And you can trust Sammy.”

  Sabrina’s heart sank a little. Whenever she thought about the little boy and Mirror’s cruel plans, she felt ill. “I doubt he has a name,” she replied. “Mirror doesn’t see him as a person. He’s just a body. To him, our little brother is nothing more than a box for his soul. Don’t forget, he let Red Riding Hood babysit when she was at her craziest.”

  “Well, I’m naming him. Do you think Mom and Dad will mind?”

  Sabrina chuckled. “Probably. I think that’s one of the perks of having kids. You get to name them.”

  Daphne sighed. “You’re probably right. Still, he needs a name. Mom and Dad can rename him when we get him home.”

  “Fine, but I vote against Sammy Grimm,” Sabrina said. “You remember Sammy from the orphanage?”

  Sammy Cartwright was a bed-wetter, but not, unfortunately, when he was in his own bed. Sabrina could still remember leaping into her cot only to find herself swimming in damp sheets.

  Daphne cringed. “How could I forget Soggy Sammy? I’ll get to work on a better name.”

  A moment later, she was sleeping deeply, the hum of her snoring drifting into the tree branches above. Sabrina closed her eyes and tried to imagine her brother. He would have red hair, like her grandmother Relda, and round cheeks, like her father and Daphne. But he would also have her mother’s eyes; eyes like Sabrina had too. Sadly, it was impossible to imagine his innocent little face without Mirror holding him in his arms. She had only met the boy once, and for only a brief moment, but losing him felt like losing a limb.

  But Mirror had stolen more than her baby brother. His betrayal had robbed her of her best friend, too. With monsters, madmen, and mermaids running around the town, there had been one constant—one confidant—for Sabrina: Mirror. Sabrina had turned to him more times than she could count. He had always been happy to see her and had been quick with good advice. He was, she thought, her one true friend, but it had all been a lie. With every smile and kind word, he had been plotting and scheming against her and her family—every betrayal and attack the Grimms faced could be traced back to Mirror.

  What hurt more was that Sabrina hadn’t seen it coming. She prided herself on her instincts. She could smell a rotten egg long before anyone else, but she had been wrong about Mirror. Now every decision she had made in the last two years was in doubt. All of the responsibility she had—taking care of Daphne, keeping them safe, and now saving her brother—it was all too much. She was just a kid! How could she stop Mirror’s plan? He was so powerful and clever.

  She knew she needed a plan, but thinking about it made her nauseated. Her heart beat too rapidly and she felt as if she couldn’t get enough air into her lungs. How could she lead when nearly every choice she had made in recent history had been a horrible mistake?

  The morning arrived sooner than expected. Sleeping on the ground had made the girls achy and stiff, but they knew there was no time to complain. They collected more of the weird fruit and shoved as much as they could into their pockets. Daphne found a stream and the girls drank greedily and washed their faces and hands. Then they were off, once more, down the Yellow Brick Road.

  “We’ve been here a whole day,” Sabrina said as she eyed the rising sun. “Everyone out there in the real world is going to freak out. They have no idea where we are. It could take weeks to search every room in the Hall of Wonders before they find the Book of Everafter. And then what if they don’t figure out how to get into the stories?”

  “You forget we come from a very smart family,” Daphne said. “Granny Relda will figure it out in no time, and Mom and Dad are like geniuses. I wouldn’t be surprised if we ran into them on the way to the Emerald City.”

  Sabrina shook her head. “I think smarts don’t count for much in this book—what they need is a whole lot of luck. It seems pretty random. When you step into the Book, you could literally end up anywhere. That might explain where Puck and Pinocchio are—they may have been dropped into a completely different story. The same thing could happen to our family. I hate to say it, but I think it would be best if they just stayed where they are. The last thing we need is our whole family as lost as we are.”

  “I wouldn’t count on that,” Daphne said. “Our family isn’t known for its patience.”

  They walked for hours until finally coming across a farm bordered by a picket fence. Not far from the road, mounted on a large pole, was a scarecrow. He had a friendly face painted on an old burlap sack, and he wore a goofy blue hat like so many of the Munchkins had been wearing. A crow was perched on his head, pecking at his face. Sabrina recognized the scarecrow at once. She knew his real-life alter ego. The Scarecrow was Ferryport Landing’s librarian, and he was also a walking disaster. His klutzy behavior and accident-prone nature drove Sabrina crazy. She expected no different from his storybook twin.

  He sprang to life and shooed the pesky bird away, then smiled and waved at the girls.

  “Good day,” he said as he lifted his head to speak to them.

  “Just ignore him,” Sabrina said as she tried to usher her sister along.

  Daphne stopped. “We can’t ignore him. We need to get him down. You heard the Munchkins. We’re supposed to stick to the story. He’s supposed to come with us.”

  Sabrina shook her head. “Absolutely not! We’re not making a lot of progress as it is, and this idiot will slow us to a crawl. Besides, you know how he is.”

  The Scarecrow looked confused by their conversation. “You’re supposed to say—”

  “Yeah, we know what we’re supposed to say,” Sabrina said.

  The Scarecrow’s painted eyes grew wide with astonishment. “Would you help me down?” he asked shyly.

  Daphne gave Sabrina a pleading look, but she shook her head. The little girl frowned and stepped closer to the fence. “I’m sorry, Mr. Scarecrow, but we can’t. We’re trying to rescue our brother and you, well, how can I put this—”

  “What?”

  “You’re a royal pain in the behind,” Sabrina interrupted.

  “Your dog is quite noisy,” the Scarecrow said.

  “Toto says you’re a pain in the behind,” Daphne said.

  “You dirty little fleabag!” The Scarecrow squirmed and struggled, but could not free himself from his post.

  Sabrina took her sister by the hand and pulled her down the road. “You’re on your own, Scarecrow. Good luck!”

  “Wait!” he cried. “I didn’t mean it.”

  “See you later,” Sabrina said.

  “You need me for the rest of the story,” he cried, but Sabrina was determined to put as much distance between them and the insufferable stuffed man as she could. His desperate cries lingered for another ten minutes, and then he was silent.

  “We should have helped him,” Daphne grumbled.

  “Daphne, he’s not real. This whole world and everyone in it is just magic. A spell.”

  “Real or not, we weren’t very nice to him.” Her little sister was fuming. She crossed her arms in disgust and marched along in silence.

  They moved away from the farmland and into a forest landscape. It wasn’t long before they heard a loud groan from the trees on the side of the road.

  “Did you hear that?” Daphne asked, peering through the dense trees for the source of the pained cry.

  Sabrina sighed. She knew the story well enough to know who
it was. “It’s the Tin Man. I’m sure of it.”

  Daphne put her palm into her mouth and bit down. “The Tin Man is my favorite.”

  Sabrina shook her head. “Don’t even think about it. If we left the Scarecrow, we can leave this guy too.”

  “We have to rescue him,” the little girl cried, and then raced into the woods.

  “Daphne, no!” Sabrina chased after her and soon the two girls stumbled upon a cabin in the woods. Standing nearby was the Tin Man, stiff and rusting beneath a half-chopped tree with his ax in hand. He mumbled something unintelligible, but Daphne didn’t stop to try to listen. She raced into the cabin and reappeared with an oilcan in her hand. In a flash, she was squeezing black grease into the metal man’s joints, and soon he was moving about freely, if not a bit awkwardly. Daphne finished her good deed with a healthy squeeze into his jaw sockets.

  “I might have stood there always if you had not come along,” the Tin Man said. “So you have saved my life—wait . . . someone’s missing. Where’s the Scarecrow?”

  The girls shared a knowing look.

  “Back on that pole, I suspect,” Daphne said.

  “You left him?” the Tin Man cried.

  “We can’t go through this again,” Sabrina groaned. “Let’s go.”

  “Not before I get an autograph. Do you happen to have a pen?” Daphne said to the strange man. Sabrina snatched her sister by the hand and started back to the road.

  The Tin Man followed behind them. “Uh, how did you come to be here?” he sputtered.

  “We’re going to see the Wizard so we can kill the Wicked Witch,” Daphne said.

  The Tin Man stopped in his tracks. “That’s not what you’re supposed to say.”

  “We’re doing things a little differently this time,” Sabrina said.

  “Come on, Tin Man. Come with us,” Daphne pleaded.

  The Tin Man reeled back on his heels. “Uh, you know, I don’t really feel comfortable with that. You’re not following the rules.”

  “Well, don’t let us keep you,” Sabrina called over her shoulder. She didn’t bother to hide her relief.