Mirrored (29 page)

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Violet

Something is burning. It’s my house. It’s burning down. I myself struck the match, a wooden match from a restaurant matchbox, someplace Greg and I used to go.
Greg! Did you ever love me? Or was I just a poor substitute for someone else? Did you ever even love her?
A sob escapes my throat, or perhaps I’m choking. I am lying in the bed I used to share with my husband, waiting. If I rest my nose on his pillow, I can still smell him, barely. Except it’s hard to breathe. I stare into the silver mirror in my lap, expecting to see the girl I was, the ugly girl. I’m still beautiful, but all I want is to die. What the dwarf said was right. Everyone hates me. It isn’t my face, not anymore, but me. And yet, as the flames lap closer and closer to the bed, the mirror in one hand, my wedding photo of Greg and me in the other, I can’t help but wonder if that could change. Maybe there is another way, another place. I could do as Kendra said, go somewhere else where
no one knows me, start over as many times as I need to. Change my appearance and fly like a crow to faraway places.

The room is hot. A window breaks, and I am sweating, blinking my eyes against the gray smoke. A mortal would have succumbed to it long ago, but I am no mortal and can only die from the pain of the flame. I dread it, coward that I am. I squint at the silver mirror. “Show me Celine,” I tell it.

There she is, black hair and white skin, a beautiful girl, a girl who once loved me. A girl I loved. She’s with the dwarf, sitting in a car holding his hand. Her eyes widen, and she leans to embrace him, gazing at him as if he is the most beautiful man she has ever seen. He turns and smiles, and suddenly, he is beautiful, dark brown eyes shining from a handsome face. I see his beauty as I wished others would see mine. I know I was wrong about Celine. I was wrong about so many things. Was I wrong about myself too? Can there be hope for me?

I feel a spark on my shoulder. The bedsheet has caught fire, and soon, I will be consumed by it. I am not tied to this bed, though. I can still flee. I make my decision. I take one final look at the photo, at Greg. Greg, who never loved me at all, not really. I feed it to the flames. I watch it burn.

There is nothing left of Greg but Celine. There is nothing at all left of Violet. Violet is dead. Quickly, I manufacture something, a dummy version of the girl I was, the ugly girl. I remember reading
The Picture of Dorian Gray.
In the end, when the beautiful main character died, he became the hideous old man in the picture. That was how they found him. They could only recognize him by the rings on his hand. That is how they will find me—or think they did—my charred remains lying on the bed. But I will be gone, far, far away from all of them.

Then, I make my escape, flying on jet-black wings out the window and away, into the warm summer night.

I will begin again . . . somewhere!

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Celine

February, the next year

“You know we don’t actually need to go shopping,” Kendra says as we pull into the Target parking lot where it all began. I’m driving the red VW Bug Jorge helped me buy with money from the trust he set up for me out of my father’s estate. Goose taught me to drive because Kendra definitely didn’t know how. “That’s one of the great things about being a witch, no money needed.”

“I know,” I tell her. “But you know you like shopping. It gives you ideas.”

Boy, does it give Kendra ideas. Since I’ve started taking her on weekly shopping trips, our entire house has gone from French provincial to Early College Dormitory with every kind of thing Target sells, all in pastel polka dots. Kendra buys none of it. It all just appears. “You know you love the dollar section.”

“That’s true. You think they have that mint foot rub?” She exits
the car, fluffing her purple tulle bustle. “Maybe I should get a job there.”

Goose and I exchange a look. Kendra, work? Kendra, wear a uniform? Kendra deal with the public?

“What?” She looks from one of us to the other. “It would be easy for me and give me something to do when you go away to college.”

We start toward the shopping carts. There are tons of black birds, crows, or grackles on the lights overhead, and they’re cawing and chirping so loud it makes my head hurt. I’m freaked out by birds, have been ever since we had to read “The Birds” in English class this fall. Goose loves that and loves to mess with me. “They’re gathering, Celine,” he says in a creepy voice. “They’re making plans.”

“Quit it!” I slap his shoulder. He recoils like I’ve hurt him, but I know he’s messing with me. I hit like a girl. Still, I give his shoulder a pat.

Kendra has also been staring at the birds, but now, she says, “Come along, children.” She grabs a cart and starts booking it to the entrance.

“Maybe you should take Kendra to some higher-end places,” Goose says, yelling over the cawing. “Get ideas for a prom dress.”

“Splendid idea,” Kendra says, still walking extra fast.

I love Kendra, but since I’ve been living with her, she has this great idea I should dress like her. I’m more of a prep, but I’ll occasionally let her design a dress for me. Just not for prom.

I try to change the subject. “Is that your way of inviting me to prom?” I ask Goose.

“I sort of thought it was a given we were going together, since I’m the love of your life.”

“It is, and you are. But it’s still nice to be asked.” I was sort of expecting an elaborate “prom-posal” out of him. He’s theatrical, after all. He’s left roses in my locker twice, and once planned an elaborate
scavenger hunt, involving teachers, students, even the football coach, all to give me my birthday present, a bracelet with charms representing both our families, and us. So I was expecting at least a song with the lyrics changed to include my name, sung at a pep rally. Which would be super-embarrassing, actually.

We’ve reached the entrance. I’m ready to go in, to get away from the birds. But Goose takes my hand and gets down on one knee. “Celine, my darling, will you accompany me to the prom?”

I laugh. “Of course I will.” And part of me is thinking,
Get up.
But the other part of me knows he’s perfect, that I need someone just like him, someone who doesn’t mind being stared at, who helps me get out of myself. Who loves me for me. Finally. So I wiggle my fingers. “Now, kiss my hand.”

He does. The birds are screeching, cawing. I tug at his hand to help him up. “Let’s go in. The birds are freaking me out.”

Just as I say that, one bird swoops down from the rest. It’s a big one, and flying sideways, it looks like a black kite. It flaps its wings right in my face. I run behind Kendra and Goose, remembering my mother, her fear of animals. But the bird doesn’t peck or attack me. Instead, it flutters down and rests on the shopping cart handle, right by Kendra’s hand. It stands there, staring at me. I grab Goose’s hand at the same time Kendra grabs my other one. So we form a weird human chain, me and the two people I love best. No one can hurt me, not with love and magic on my side.

The bird cocks its head to one side, watching us.

It blinks, then flies away.

I stand, holding Goose’s and Kendra’s hands, and watch it disappear into the sky.

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4

Goose

And we live happily ever after.

Really. That’s all.

The End

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About the Author

ALEX FLINN
is the author of the #1
New York Times
bestselling
Beastly
, a spin on
Beauty and the Beast
and a major motion picture starring Vanessa Hudgens. Alex also wrote A
Kiss in Time
, a modern retelling of
Sleeping Beauty
;
Cloaked
, a humorous fairy-tale mash-up;
Bewitching
, a reimagining of fairy-tale favorites, including
Hansel and Gretel, Cinderella, The Princess and the Pea
, and
The Little Mermaid
, all told by Kendra, the witch from
Beastly
; and
Towering
, a darkly romantic take on
Rapunzel
. Her other books for teens include
Breathing Underwater, Breaking Point, Nothing to Lose, Fade to Black
, and
Diva
. She lives in Miami with her family. Visit her online at www.alexflinn.com.

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Copyright

HarperTeen is an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers.

MIRRORED
. Copyright © 2015 by Alex Flinn. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

www.epicreads.com

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

ISBN 978-0-06-213451-6

EPub Edition April 2015 ISBN 9780062408112

15 16 17 18 19
XXXXXX
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

FIRST EDITION

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