And then, before it could even register, I was on the ground, on my side, one of my wings smashed and twisted between my body and the grass. I looked around and realized: I had barely moved. I stared up at the sky, and for a moment I was sure I saw a flicker, a glance.
"Help me," I whispered. "I'm sorry. Come back to me." I blinked, and the sky was dark again, completely still.
I tried again. I pulled myself to my feet and ran forward, letting my wings spread out on either side and lift me into the air.
But they didn't. I couldn't go anywhere. I ran forward and pushed myself into empty space, only to end up on the ground again, my cheek pressing into earth.
I must have stayed there for hours, curled up, the dark like a blanket over me and the grass pressing into my arms. The pain in my back moved up and down in waves. When I shifted, there was blood in the grass. I pulled my wings in, close to my skin, but they jutted out all wrong. Pain shot through me, like needles, where wing met bone. Feathers fell to the ground. I moved my body. Feathers covered the ground, mixed in with grass and blood. I closed my eyes. Sobs racked my body, and I just pushed my face into the earth, let them pass through me.
I did not want to ever move, ever get up again. I could not fly, and yet the memory of flight was inscribed in my bones. I thought of the photographs of the fairies, pale and ghostlike, fluttering in the frame.
I lay on my stomach, clutching the ground, and let all the
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memories wash over me. All of us sitting around the fairy lake, the leaves sprinkling down over us, the water the color of berries. How all I could think about was his face, the feel of his skin on mine. How I had longed, for the first time, to be somewhere else, to be someone else entirely.
There was a pain in me as heavy as a universe, it seemed, as I remembered. I did this, I thought then. I had entered her dream, taken on her desire until I forgot my own place completely. Who I was, and was meant to be. What I was supposed to do. I wanted to stop everything, and die. I had done this to myself. There was no relief for me.
Get up, a voice said. I lifted my head and looked around. Even that movement sent pain shooting down my back. Get up now.
I thought I heard voices, in the distance.
"Maybeth?" I whispered. I listened, but all I heard was a faint sound of wind. And then, from far away, voices again.
"Lucibell?"
I tried to pull my body up. Gasping with pain, I burrowed my palms into the earth and pushed, inching my back into the air. But all I could think was, There's someone here.
I felt something wet trickling down my back. My wing jutted out and brushed my arm in a way it had never done before. There was a searing pain, a feeling as if I'd been ripped through.
I blinked and felt someone there, dashing past me. "Hello?" A wing to my right. I turned my head but saw only empty space and blackness. I stopped and listened again. "Maybeth?" The wind whooshed through the leaves and grass, my bent feathers. Tears streamed down my cheeks
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but I forced myself to ignore the pain and sit up. I had no idea how long they would wait for me.
"I'm here!" I said, making my voice as loud as I could. "I'm ready to go home!" As if they couldn't see me. As if I couldn't remember what it had been like, fluttering next to someone's ear and whispering into it. How the whole earth was like a musical instrument that we could play effortlessly. Sliding down leaves and through people's hair. Flipping from a stone to a fingertip to a peach. Making the wind shift with our wings, a heart swell or break with one whispered word.
"I'm right here!!" I shouted. "Maybeth! I know you're still here! I saw you in photographs!"
I grasped the tree next to me, a branch poking out, and pulled myself to my feet. Wobbling, I leaned into the bark to steady myself. The breeze pushed past again, and I shivered, startled to realize that I was almost naked.
It was beginning to grow light. I heard a thumping, thumping and then breath. A jogger was close enough for me to hear the rhythm of his feet and heart.
I could not fly. My sister was not there. My heart was broken.
Steeling myself against the pain, I pulled my wings in and in again, tightening all my muscles, and then reached my hand back to feel the damp feathers. My left wing seemed to be okay. My right one was twisted and wrong, angling out and hanging down. I crawled back through the grass, feeling for my towel and my shirt.
I wrapped the shirt around me the way I'd done earlier, but this time I had to force my right wing down, wrapping it
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in the shredded garment. I had never felt so raw in my life, my wing mangled and throbbing under the fabric. I tied the shirt in front and reached for the towel, pulling it across my shoulders.
I looked around one last time, but the presence I'd felt a few moments earlier was gone. In the tree above me, I thought I caught a shadow, a flicker of white, but I realized a moment later that it was only a bird returning to its nest.
I stumbled into the open then, out from under the tree, and surveyed the park in front of me. The hills and pathways in the distance. I moved toward them, and it was as if there were razor blades tied to my shoulders, cutting into my back. Just get to the street, I kept saying to myself, and I moved in what I hoped was the right direction, toward the twisting pathways.
When I finally caught a glimpse of concrete, I started to run. All I could think of was getting home. A salt bath, I hoped, would heal me.
I stepped out into the street and lifted my hand into the air. A taxi stopped, and I climbed into it, slid onto the leather, and winced as my back hit the seat. "Thirty-sixth, between Seventh and Eighth," I said. I tightened the towel around my shoulders. Outside, the park whizzed past, a blur of green. I tilted my head against the glass and looked up at the branches and leaves, the benches and railings in front of them, the people stopping to talk or browse at one of the sidewalk displays of photographs or drawings. A carriage clomped by next to us, and I watched a man and woman inside, laughing, with their arms around each other.
Leaning forward, I pressed my forehead into the clear plastic window and shut my eyes.
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"Are you okay, lady?"
"What?"
I looked up. I hadn't realized I was still crying.
"You don't look too hot. Maybe you need a doctor?"
I sat up and focused in on his face in the rearview mirror. His black eyes stared back at me.
"You're bleeding," he said. "It's not any of my business, but you look like you need help."
I looked down then and saw that blood had caked along my forearms, was sticking to my neck and dripping onto the leather seat.
"I'm okay," I said, wiping my face. "I just need to get where I'm going."
"If you're sure," he said, flicking his eyes from me to the street ahead.
I sat back and closed my eyes again.
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Chapter Eleven
WE CIRCLED DOWN AND AROUND AND CAME TO the upstairs hallway, which led to the main stairs and front entrance. The rest of the house was ornate, heavy, imposing, in sharp contrast to Cinderella's barren quarters. I almost felt a twinge of sympathy for her, but there was too much else happening inside me. The emotions running through me felt like rivers, like changing seasons, like entire worlds. I felt as if I would be sick. Suddenly I longed for the fairy lake. How calm we all were there. The flat surface of the water and the smooth feeling as we pressed in.
Rushing now, we passed the open doors to her stepsisters' chambers, glimpsing the opened drawers and wrecked wardrobes, the gowns strewn across the elaborate beds and carpets, the servants rushing around, desperately trying to clean the ephemera that clung to everything. I took it all in at a glance: stray buttons and fake jewels, the powder sprinkled across the vanity, the open vials and spilled beads and discarded shoes and hair clips. The house was still buzzing with the excitement and hope that had occupied
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the room, the fierce, beating heart
s now rushing across the kingdom to the giant silver palace. The house was full of their dreaming, of him.
We came to the front stairs.
She looked back at me and smiled. "I hope he will like me," she said as she stepped down.
"Of course he'll like you," I began. "I've made you--"
Distracted, she started to fall. I watched, in slow motion it seemed, as her heel caught on the side of the thick Oriental runner that led down the stairs. I watched her face change, the look of fear that passed over her.
I could have reached out and stilled her. I could have put out one hand in plenty of time--my reflexes were far beyond those of humans. Or I could have just willed her to stop. But I didn't. I stood in place and stared at her as she slipped down. Help her, a voice said inside me, but something in me froze. I waited to step forward until she was already down.
And in that moment my heart opened, slammed open, as if someone had punched right through it. Everything I wanted was right in front of me, I thought. I could put on a dress and conjure the golden coaches, go right to him. I could pull the glass slippers from her feet and put them on my own. I don't know that I had ever felt anything close to what I felt in that moment. Not happiness. Triumph. Desire. Hate.
She only slid down a couple of stairs before she came to a stop, grabbing the banister and pulling herself up, looking back at me and laughing. It seemed to take a whole hour, those few moments. It was as if someone had raked their nails across my face.
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Her laughter tinkled up to me. "I am so clumsy!" she said, stilling herself. "I have to be more careful in these shoes!"
I shook with anger. I did not say a word. I walked ahead, down the stairs.
"I'm sorry," she said, rushing after me, nervous now, her hands running along the railing, careful to stay upright. "I'm not deserving, Godmother, I know. Please don't be mad at me."
I ignored her. I reached the bottom of the stairs and strode out into the wet night. The wild tangle of plants and flowers outside the door--her mother's work, long ago-- infused the air with perfume. The night was warm, sultry. Soon enough I would be back in the cool air of the lake and leave all this behind. I would ask to stay away from humans, I thought, from now on. Angrily, I leaned down and plucked a huge bluebell from a stem, then tossed it to the ground. In its place appeared a gleaming golden coach.
"Oh!" I heard her stopping behind me. She was not afraid anymore.
I turned and glared. "Hand me a batch of leaves," I commanded, pointing, "from that bush there."
She leaned down and obeyed, passing me the leaves with shaking hands.
I threw them in front of the carriage with all my strength, and up sprang a quartet of horses, tied to the carriage with long, ribbonlike harnesses that glittered in the night air.
"Now," I said, stepping closer, grabbing her wrist with my palm, so hard it might have snapped off--I could feel it, how delicate her bones were--"I want you to hand me a
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twig. From the ground." My teeth were gritted, my free hand in the shape of a fist. "Now."
She stood and stared at me. Her eyes huge and wide.
The moment opened up, and waited. It seemed to stretch the length of the palace steps, the forest leading to them. And then she dropped her eyes and rushed away.
"Here, Godmother," she said, what seemed like seconds later, and I turned to her, almost surprised. I could feel that my cheeks had flushed, my body gone warm.
She was staring at me nervously, holding out a twig. Her face was radiant, despite the worry that creased it. I snatched the twig out of her hand.
"Have I made you angry, Godmother?" she asked then, her voice low and trembling.
"No," I snapped. And then, more quietly, "No."
I tossed the twig to the ground, and a coachman sprang up in its place. Without a word he took his place behind the whinnying horses and grabbed the reins. This is destiny, I thought. This is how it is all supposed to happen, just like this. The gleaming coach ready to whisk her into the night.
"It is time for you to go," I said softly. "It's your time."
She didn't move. Her eyes were filling with tears.
"Go," I said. I reached out my hand and touched her face. "They are waiting for you."
"Are you sure it is okay?" she asked. "Are you sure it is right for me to go?"
"It's the wish of the fairies," I said, smiling at her. I felt, then, all the grief that lay buried in her, and my heart softened. I was supposed to be her guardian. I had been made to feel her pain, her lost, grief-stricken nights, the straw mattress that dug into her back and left red lines across her
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skin. I had been made to feel all of it, the same way she had been made to fall in love with him.
I could barely hear her when she spoke next. "But why me, Godmother?"
I touched her shoulder. "You were chosen," I whispered. I ignored the sliver of pain that shot through me. I forced my hand to stay gentle and light. "For him. He is going to pick a wife tonight, and you, my child, have been chosen."
I watched my words wind their way into her, making her whole face shift, her expression go soft. My own pain widened then, to a long stream. It was hard, I realized, to know where my pain stopped and hers started. I could feel it coming off her, as my words sank in.
It slipped into me then: All those nights she'd spent by herself, with no one to talk to. The grief she felt when her mother drowned herself in the lake, when her father remarried, when her father died soon after, leaving her, a girl who was all light, in a dark sprawling house where she was hidden away from the world, where her beauty was wasted, and where her dreams grew so intense that she practically lived inside them, never quite knowing what was real and what wasn't. I felt her callused hands, the ache in her body, the future that yawned before her in that house, waiting on her stepmother and stepsisters hand and foot, never knowing what beat within her, what other selves she could be and worlds she could live in. Never knowing that she had been made to be a princess, to go to a ball that people would still talk about centuries later, one that all girls would dream about when they dreamed of falling in love.
She deserves this, I thought. Suddenly I wanted, more than anything, for this girl to find relief. She had been made for 189 him. I was a fairy. I could close my eyes, stretch out my wings, and be back by the lake within moments. The coach was ready, the horses stamping their feet furiously, anxious to fulfill the duty I'd conjured them for. The coachman sat with the reins in his hand. And Cinderella radiated pure light. She would be the most beautiful woman at the ball.
Everything was in its place.
I closed my eyes and breathed in. "It is time," I said. I ignored the pain pounding through me. In a few more minutes, it would all be over.
I snapped my fingers, and the coachman jumped to the ground and opened the carriage door. Inside, the velvet seats were as red as blood. I turned to Cinderella and watched the dying light on her face, her skin, the ice blue of her dress.
He would take one look at her and forget me.
"Come," I said.
She did not move. My own emotions were too strong, too ferocious, for me to read what was happening within her. Just go, I thought. Go! I forced myself to think of the fairy lake. The water that wrapped around me like a pair of arms. The way we never felt anything at all resembling longing, because our world was already perfect, so full it brimmed over. In moments I would be there.
Cinderella still stood, and I saw she was shaking.
She reached up just as I was about to go to her. She ripped her hair out of the swept-up bun I had conjured for her. I watched, unmoving, as the diamonds scattered down into the grass. Watched her kick off the glass slippers. They tipped over into the grass. I couldn't take my eyes off them.
"I am not going," she said.
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THE NEXT morning I woke up slowly, painfully. My wings were bunched up behind me in my bed. There was a burning in my shoulders.
Every muscle hurt.
The sun was bright on my face. Hazy images, of trees and grass and forest paths, scattered across my mind.
I remembered then, and it was like a blade cutting through me: I could not fly. The desire stretched from my wings down into my bones, into every vein. But I could not fly.
I curled up, into myself. My face burned with embarrassment, even though I was alone. George must think I'm out of my mind, I thought.
Was I? After so many years of wandering the earth, had I finally lost it completely?
I had thought the prince was in front of me, leading me into the flower shop. I had seen him at the diner. The same voice. The same way of looking at me. It had felt as if no time had passed at all, as if I were a fairy again and he was the only one who could see me. Me, who had always fluttered above humans, made my way into their thoughts and dreams, whispered advice into their ears, changed their hearts. I who was a wisp of a thing, dangling in the air and floating above them. Always on the outside, in the periphery. Invisible. To be in that body pressed up against him ... Tasting his lips, feeling his tongue and hands, his eyelashes as they tapped my cheeks.
He had seemed so close. My world had seemed so close. How could I feel flight through every inch of me, have these appendages that ached for the air, and not be able to fly?
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Maybe they were never coming back. Maybe they had abandoned me to this world for what I had done and were never, ever planning to forgive me. The photos, the prince at the diner ... Was it all just in my head? Wishful thinking, as they say?
I was homesick. My chest ached. So many years, I realized, I had been quietly waiting, wishing I could change history, suffering but not putting a name to it. It was amazing how a person could opt out of his or her own life. Follow a routine. Go to work in the morning, come home in the evening. Turn on the television, take a hot bath. Forget. You could get through so many days and nights that way. I had done it for years, barely acknowledging the terrible emptiness inside me, like a tide always trying to pull me out to sea.