Between the Lines (40 page)

Oliver.

I feel around under the pillows, but the book is missing. Jumping out of bed, I look beneath its frame, and on the dresser. I rip the blankets and sheets off. I know I fell asleep with the fairy tale in my arms last night. I just know it.

“Where
is
it?” I mutter, and at that moment there is a knock at the door.

It swings open, and Edgar is standing on the threshold, book in hand. “Looking for this?” he asks, grinning.

“Yes!” I grab it out of his hands, angry. “You shouldn’t steal other people’s property.”

“Well, it’s not technically yours, is it? You stole it from your school library.”

“I’m the only person who ever checked this book out of—” I break off, my eyes narrowing. “How do
you
know that?”

“Because I listen,” Edgar says, coming closer. He takes the book from me and sets it on the bed, then holds my hands. “I listen to everything you say, Delilah.”

He’s staring at me as if he can see right inside me,
and that’s creepy, because this is Edgar, after all—Edgar, who locks himself in his room to play video games all day. Except his eyes are different. I can’t really describe it, but they look softer around the edges. Wiser. And maybe, a little amazed.

“Delilah,” he whispers. “It’s
me.
”

“Of course it’s you, Edgar. Who else would it be?”

“Oliver. It
worked,
Delilah. It actually worked.” He smiles, and for a moment, I almost believe him. The way his mouth tips up on one side. The way his voice has the gentlest hint of a British accent.

But it
didn’t
work. I saw that with my own eyes. I take a step backward, shaking my head.

“I can prove it,” Edgar says, and he picks up the book. Pinching one page with two fingers, he slides his palm across the sharp edge, giving himself an inch-long paper cut.

“Stop that!” I grab his hand, but it’s too late. The book drops to the bed again, closed, as I turn his palm over to see how deep the cut is.

He’s bleeding, but the blood isn’t red.

It’s black as ink.

page 60

H
urtling toward the churning seas, Prince Oliver closed his eyes and prepared to die. The wind and the spray lashed his cheeks; the shreds of Seraphima’s gown flew behind him like a banner. He heard Rapscullio’s scream, and knew that his own moment of impact was seconds away.

As he fell, the chain around his neck worked its way free, floating delicately upward, over his head. His father’s compass. Oliver reached out, wrapping his fingers tightly around the small disk, hoping for just an ounce or two of his father’s legendary bravery at this moment.

The brass hinge popped open, and the needle of the compass spun wildly. With his last breath on Earth, Oliver thought of home.

The world was suddenly blindingly white. Oliver winced as his vision slowly came back.

He was not falling anymore. He was not broken into pieces across the jagged rocks in the pounding surf. Instead, he was whole and safe and wrapped in Seraphima’s arms.

At that moment Oliver realized that home is not a place, but rather, the people who love you.

Which means, of course, that Prince Oliver and the girl he adored lived happily ever after.

I CAN TELL THE MOMENT SHE BELIEVES ME. HER
whole face changes, like the sky after a storm, open to possibility. “But Edgar… ?” she says.

“It was his idea,” I tell her. This time,
I’m
the one opening the book. It feels odd, as if I’ve suddenly been granted a phenomenal amount of power.

The story falls open to the illustration on the final page. All the characters are gathered on Everafter Beach, but there are some significant changes. For example, Seraphima is wearing a form-fitting suit of galactic armor. Frump—now human—is wielding a laser
beam. And standing in the middle of the fray is someone who looks a great deal like Prince Oliver, holding a sword in one hand and the severed head of the mighty Zorg in the other.

“How fortunate they were to have learned that the intruder in their midst had never really been a royal prince at all—but actually, a seasoned soldier from the future,”
Delilah reads out loud.
“Once the last Galactoid from Planet Zugon was dispatched by the guerrilla fighters of the kingdom, Edgar swung his blade and with one mighty blow brought down the monstrous Zorg.
‘
Victory!’ he cried.”

I am pretty sure that both Delilah and I see Edgar wink at us.

Gently, I close the book, imagining Frump yelling “Cut!” and everyone grinning and congratulating each other on a job well done.

“Funny,” she says, “that’s not quite how I remember the story.”

“Oh really?” I clasp my hands behind her back and draw her closer. “How
do
you remember it?”

“Something like this,” Delilah says, and she reaches up on her tiptoes and kisses me.

She’s right. This is exactly the way the fairy tale was supposed to go. Except this time, when I glance up, I don’t see the words
THE END
written above my head.

I guess that’s because it’s just the beginning.

Just like it takes a cast of characters behind the scenes to bring a fairy tale to life every time a reader opens a book, there are a vast number of people who helped us create our story as well. We’d like to thank all the people at Emily Bestler Books and Simon Pulse who got just as excited about
Between the Lines
as we were: Kate Cetrulo, Caroline Porter, Judith Curr, Carolyn Reidy, David Brown, Ariele Fredman, Mellony Torres, Jon Anderson, Bethany Buck, Mara Anastas, Michael Strother, Lucille Rettino, Sooji Kim, Carolyn Swerdloff, Dawn Ryan, Lauren Forte, Jessica Handelman, Mike Rosamilia, Russell Gordon, Julie Doebler, Paul Crichton, Nicole Russo, Michelle Fadlalla, Laura Antonacci, and Venessa Williams. Thanks also to Camille McDuffie and Kathleen Carter Zrelak for their assistance in spreading the word!

Special thanks go to Emily Bestler and Jen Klonsky, for helping us define our imaginary world better, and for agreeing when we wanted to create a final product that was a little “out of the box” for a normal YA novel. In this ever-changing world of electronic books, we wanted to create a story that was a keepsake—one you’d pass down to your children because of its beauty and design—much like the fairy tale in the story is to Delilah. Just like those gorgeous picture books from the turn of the century with colored plates by Arthur Rackham, we wanted a novel that took one’s breath away. Thanks to the spirited support of Emily and Jen, we got exactly that.

Which is why we also must thank Yvonne Gilbert, who
brought our handsome prince to life, and Scott M. Fischer, whose silhouettes still astound us. Quite simply, you blew us away with your vision and your passion for this project.

Thanks, too, to Laura Gross, who encouraged us to take Sammy’s idea and run with it; and to Tim van Leer and Jane Picoult, who read the early drafts and laughed in all the right places.

Finally, thanks to all the readers of Jodi’s books, who have asked her for years for a story they could use to introduce her writing to their children—some of whom were too young to address the issues in her adult novels. We hope they enjoy sharing this with their kids as much as we enjoyed working together to create it.