Leena and the Giant
Tales from Seelie High #2
by Aubrey Fredrickson
Copyright 2015 by Aubrey Fredrickson
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Table of Contents
Story
Leena and the Giant
Bonus Material
The Door Opens – New Elphame
The Door Opens – The Otherworld
Interview with Leena
New Boy: The Next Story
Information
About the Author
About Tales from Seelie High
Connect with the Author
Discover other titles by Aubrey Fredrickson
Leena and the Giant
September 5, 2014
Leena bent over the chipped porcelain sink and applied a generous layer of lip gloss. The only mirror in the pub’s one stall bathroom was cracked down the center and so the face that stared back at her was split down the middle, as if she were two separate people. Part of her was saying that she should wash off the makeup and go sit with her mother, be the dutiful daughter that she had always been. But another part said that tonight she wanted to be someone else. Just for this one night, she wanted to be something more than dutiful.
Beautiful, for one thing. She wanted to be beautiful so that when Barry saw her he would...what? Want to kiss her, maybe? She blushed at the thought, but knew that it was true. She was sixteen and had never been kissed. Tonight she wanted to be the girl who got kissed.
And she wanted to be more like Caitlin, she decided.
Maybe she already was. Staring into the broken mirror, she found herself believing, for the first time in a very long time, that she and Caitlin were actually identical twins. Caitlin had always been so effortlessly beautiful, so smooth and put together. Leena was…well, frizzy. Not just her reddish blond hair, but all over. Everything about her, from her freckles to her incurable tendency to say the wrong thing, was the opposite of her sophisticated twin.
But not tonight. Tonight she was beautiful. Now that she was starting to calm down, she could even admit that borrowing some of Caitlin’s clothes—a long flowing cream skirt and a tight fitting green top that matched her eyes perfectly—had been a good idea. Tonight she would be someone different. The two halves of her reflection nodded in agreement.
As she walked out into the crowded pub, Leena’s confidence began to falter again. She had never felt comfortable in the Giant’s Head. Of course, as a minor, she wasn’t really supposed to be there. Mr. Shanachie was very strict about that. There was a diner on the other side of the building and kids were allowed in there, but the pub itself was strictly for adults.
Except for when her mother called one of these little “town meetings” and even then Leena was usually the only kid who ever came. Caitlin had been a few times, but usually it was just Leena. For some reason her mother insisted on bringing her every time. Mr. Shanachie, who owned the pub, frowned and tugged at his mustache, but he never kicked Leena out.
Tonight he was probably going to pull his mustache out altogether because her mother had told everyone to bring their kids—at least the ones who went to Seelie High. Everywhere she looked, Leena saw kids from school.
“Caitlin!” Jasmine, her sister’s best friend, was plowing her way through the crowd toward her. As Jasmine got closer, her eyes widened in surprise. “Leena? Oh, wow! I’m sorry, but you look just like Caitlin tonight!” Jasmine said, yelling the words as she tried to be heard over the noise of the crowded pub.
Leena couldn’t remember the last time someone had mistaken her for Caitlin. It had taken quite a lot of makeup, a long struggle with the curling iron, and the borrowed clothes, of course, to accomplish the miracle that had smoothed out her frizz. At least on the outside. Leena knew that inside she was still her same old frizzy self. But at least she looked different. That was a start.
So, she smiled broadly at Jasmine and said, “It’s okay. Caitlin was outside talking on her phone when I came in.”
Jasmine nodded to show that she understood and grabbed Leena’s hand. “Come on! We’ve got a table at the back!” She began to tug Leena toward the back of the pub.
As they threaded their way through the crowd, Leena couldn’t help but notice the other reason she didn’t like the pub very much. One wall was almost completely taken up by a ten foot high wooden head. According to the town history, the Giant had been the masthead on the ship that brought the town’s founders over from Ireland. The homeless immigrants carried it from place to place as a reminder of their homeland. When they eventually settled in New Elphame, they built it into the pub.
It was a nice story, but there was nothing nice about the head itself.
As she followed in Jasmine’s wake, Leena was struck again by how gruesome and garish it was. Its eyes scowled maliciously out from beneath a thick forehead and bushy eyebrows. A fierce, toothy grin was half obscured by the beard, which was matted and tangled like the coat of a wild animal. She thought that the Giant must have been some kind of bloodthirsty warrior in life.
And that was part of it as well. The thing was only a wooden carving and yet it was so lifelike that she always felt as though it were a real head, grotesque in its hugeness, hung up like a trophy. It made her shiver.
Trying to avoid the Giant’s gaze, she slipped into the booth where several of Caitlin’s friends were talking and sipping sodas. She knew them as well, of course. Everyone knew everyone else in New Elphame and since they were all about the same age, they had more or less grown up together. Except that somewhere along the way, Caitlin and her friends had seemed to grow up a little bit more. Or at least in a different direction. The girls had started wearing makeup and worrying about their clothes, while the boys had tried out for football and started paying a lot more attention to the girls.
And then there was Leena. Sometimes she felt like she hadn’t grown up at all, but had somehow gotten stuck back in the fourth grade. Until tonight.
She smiled self-consciously as Caitlin’s friends exclaimed over her transformation.
“Wow! Leena, you look great!”
“Is that’s Caitlin’s top? Don’t tell her, but it looks way better on you.”
Jeremy, who was Caitlin’s on-again-off-again boyfriend, eyed her in a speculative way that made Leena want to slide under the table. It was one thing for her sister’s friends to tell her she looked great; it was something else entirely to be checked out by her sister’s boyfriend. Or temporarily ex-boyfriend, she remembered. They had had another fight earlier in the week and were currently “seeing other people.” But they would definitely get back together because they always did.
And even if they didn’t, she was with Barry.
As if reading her mind, Nessa leaned across the table and asked, “Is Barry coming tonight? I haven’t seen him yet.”
Leena felt her cheeks growing warm. “Um...No, he’s not coming to the meeting.”
“Barry didn’t make the list,” said Caitlin. Leena turned to see her twin standing next to the table. She smiled at Leena and slid in next to Jeremy. They were definitely getting back together.
“What list?” Nessa asked.
“The list of people who know about this little meeting. Mom’s very particular about who she invites,” Caitlin explained, rolling her eyes. “You know the family trees at the back of The Annals of the Blessed and all that stuff about royal bloodlines Mr. Kelley talked about last year? Mom takes it seriously. If you??
?re not from one of the original fae families, you can’t get in.”
“Fae families?” Doug asked. “She doesn’t really believe your ancestors were fairies, does she?”
Caitlin nodded. “Yup and not just any fairies, either. We,” she said, nodding to Leena, “are descended from the fairy queen. We’re royalty.” She elbowed Jeremy and added with a grin, “That means you have to be nice to us.”
Everyone laughed, but Leena felt uneasy. She wished Caitlin wouldn’t make fun of their mother. “I don’t think she really believes they were fairies,” she started.
Before she could continue, Nessa interrupted by saying, “But what if they were? I mean, look at everything that’s happened this week. All of it had to come from somewhere, right? What if the town really was settled by fairies?”
They were quiet for a few moments, staring at each other as they considered the possibility.
Doug broke the silence by asking, “So what about us? Are we all descended from fairies too?”
Laughing again, Caitlin said, “Yes. That’s why you’re on the list. Or at least, your parents are, and apparently tonight is bring-your-kid-to-the-secret-town-meeting night.”
Leena was about to say something—she didn’t know what, but she still felt like she ought to defend their mother somehow. Before she could come up with anything, however, their mother herself swept up to the table.
Surprised, Leena stood up and said, “Hi,