The Jennifer McMahon E-Book Bundle (91 page)

CHAPTER 22

Lisa

JUNE 12, FIFTEEN YEARS AGO

I
n all the stories, it’s the same. The girl is ordinary. The girl is dull. But she is kind, has a good heart. Maybe she’s got a wicked stepmother. Maybe her stepsisters are fat and ugly and have dresses much fancier than hers. Maybe her father’s taken her deep into the heart of the forest and left her there.

Lisa knew her own story started just like theirs:
Once upon a time
.

Once upon a time there was a girl who could talk to the animals. A girl who lived next to a village where all of the people had disappeared. All but her great-grandfather, a tiny squalling baby left behind, tears and snot running rivers down his pink piggy face. His blood was in her veins. The salt inside it lucky somehow.

And she was a lucky girl. She knew that now, more than ever. Because she’d been given a magical gift, something straight out of a fairy tale: a book written by the King of the Fairies himself.

“Y
ou put the book there yourself,” Sammy said.

“How can you say that?” Lisa demanded. “Just look at it! Look how old it is.”

“You told us you wouldn’t go back there on your own,” Evie said. “You promised!” Her voice crackled, and for the first time ever, Lisa thought Evie might swing out and hit her. She waited for it, bracing herself, but Evie stood still, her breathing getting louder and louder.

Lisa had found the book down in the cellar hole that morning: a gift wrapped in wide green leaves, bound with thin vines, a purple foxglove with a spotted throat on top.

The note she’d left the fairies was gone.

Lisa had opened the package and found a book inside with a worn and tattered green cover. The paper looked old, the cover stitched on with heavy black thread. She ran her fingers over the letters on the cover:
The Book of Fairies
. Above it, a strange symbol painted in gold—an upside-down number 4 with a circle at the bottom.

She opened the book, squinted in the early morning light to make out the words. Flipping through, she found sections called “Fairy History,” “Fairy Legends,” “Fairies and Humans.” At the end of the book there was a page that began,
If you wish to cross over to the land of the fairies. . .

There was a recipe for fairy tea that involved steeping the flowers and leaves of foxglove, adding honey, and letting the mixture sit for several days.

Lisa had closed the book and climbed out of the cellar hole, heart pounding because she knew that now she had it: proof that the fairies existed.

“T
hat’s easy to fake,” Sammy said. “Stain the paper, singe the edges. You’ve taken this fairy crap too far, Lisa.”

“So I went to the trouble of writing the book myself, making up page after page, carefully putting it all down in handwriting that looks nothing like my own? Right. Come on, Mr. Logic. Be logical, would ya?”

Sam shook his head.

“Just look at the book, Sam. It’s full of all kinds of stuff. The King of the Fairies, his name is Teilo. He’s been here a long, long time. And I know what we have to do next. It says right here in the book what we have to do if we want to meet him.”

Evie’s face twisted into a pained expression. “What?”

“We just have to promise him something—you know, to prove we’re taking it seriously. And he’ll grant our wishes. And let us see him. Can you believe it? Can you believe how lucky we are?”

Sammy shook his head. “What I can’t believe is how nuts you are. No way am I promising anything to one of your invisible friends!”

“What do you think, Evie?” Lisa asked. “You’d do it, wouldn’t you? He’s offering to grant us any wish, and to let us see him.”

“Oh great. Ask her,” Sammy said. He stormed off through the tall grass, which moved like waves in the wind.

“I think we should tell people about the fairies,” Evie said, making a determined bulldog face with her lower jaw jutted out. “Show them the book.”

“No,” Lisa argued. “The book says we have to keep all this a secret. If we tell, they’ll go away and never come back. And if we don’t keep it a secret, bad things might happen.”

Evie raised her eyebrows. “Bad things?”

“I don’t know exactly, but the book warns not to cross them. The fairies can grant wishes, bring good luck, but if you get on their bad side . . .”

Evie shivered. “But Lisa, if there is this whole other race of beings living on the back of this hill, that’s like the greatest discovery of all time. And this, right here,” she said, shaking the book, “this is proof! We could be famous all over the world.”

“I don’t want to be famous,” Lisa said, snatching the book back from Evie.

“What do you want?” she asked.

Lisa thought a minute. “I want to know what it’s like there. On the other side. In Teilo’s world.”

And maybe, she thought, maybe this book is the key. Maybe the fairies have a potion that could bring Da back. There were directions at the end for crossing over to the Fairy Realm, weren’t there? Would she ever have the guts to follow them? The courage to leave behind everything she knew and loved?

“Promise me,” Lisa said. “Swear you won’t breathe a word of this to anyone.”

Evie nodded solemnly.

“And think about what I said. With one little promise to Teilo, we can get anything we ask for.”

Evie chewed her lip.

“If you could wish for anything,” Lisa said, “no matter how big, how impossible, what would you wish for?”

Evie didn’t answer. She kicked at the ground with her huge work boot. Lisa hugged
The Book of Fairies
to her chest.

The question hung in the air between them like a golden bubble, all shiny and radiant, neither of them daring to answer out loud.

CHAPTER 23

Phoebe

JUNE 11, PRESENT DAY

“I
thought she couldn’t go outside,” Sam said, eyes straight ahead on the road.

“She can’t. Couldn’t. I’m trying to help her, Sam. I’ve been doing some research on agoraphobia.”

“Great, Bee. That’s just great.” He gripped the wheel tighter, rubbed it hard with his thumbs. The cab of Sam’s truck was tidy—no crumbs or food wrappers. His travel mug with the Vermont Public Radio logo was resting in the cup holder. Phoebe knew without opening it that the glove box was neat and organized—insurance and registration on top, manual and maps underneath. Hers was stuffed full of leaking ketchup packets, napkins, and receipts.

They traveled in silence a few minutes, passing the Maple Hills Credit Union and Al’s Quality Southern Used Cars. Phoebe wondered what they’d find when they got to Reliance—if it was really possible that Lisa would be there, waiting. The full moon was just up over the mountains, bright and reddish. Like blood, Phoebe thought, then stopped herself. Raspberries, she decided. Currants. Cranberries maybe. The moons all have names, she knew, but which one was this? The planter’s moon? Strawberry moon?

She touched her belly.

Tell him
, she begged herself.
Open your goddamn mouth and speak.

She reached over and took his hand, which rested on the shift lever. She gave it a squeeze. “I love you, you know,” she said. He grunted, kept his eyes on the road.

It was no secret that everyone had expected Sam to do better than a woman like Phoebe. And she sensed that some—Sam’s mother in particular (though Phoebe knew Phyllis would never come right out and say it)—blamed Phoebe for Sam’s apparent inability to live up to his potential. He’d gone to college after all, studied philosophy and art, and yet here he was cutting trees for a living. Phoebe herself was no great success story, having barely graduated from high school, then taken a string of low-wage service jobs, scooping ice cream, waiting tables, answering telephones. When they had dinner with his college friends and they all got to talking about French philosophers and politics, her mind went numb.

“Well, what do you think, Bee?” some well-meaning girl in natural fiber clothing would ask. Phoebe would shrug or give some totally inconclusive answer that made everyone in the room look at her with their isn’t-it-a-shame-bright-Sam-ended-up-with-a-complete-dolt looks. Then, if she’d had enough to drink, she’d play it up, act like some dumb hick—cussing up a storm, saying “ain’t” and dropping the
g
’s at the end of words:
I ain’t foolin’
. Sam would roll his eyes, amused and irritated all at once, but he never really got why she did it. She was not from their world and never would be. Sam said it didn’t matter—that he loved her for who she was, but she knew better. One day he’d wake up and realize she was ten years older and light-years behind. And telling him she was pregnant could be viewed as just a sad and desperate attempt to hold on to him, to get him to commit to a relationship that was obviously beneath him.

“Pathetic,” she mumbled out loud.

“What?” he asked.

“Nothin’,” she said, dropping the
g
on purpose, slouching down into the seat.

They were coming into Harmony now. Sam’s headlights illuminated the Lord’s Prayer rock.

Sam turned right onto Main Street. They passed the general store with the neon
CLOSED
sign lit. The letter board in front of the Methodist Church said
STRAWBERRY FEST SAT 9–1. SHORTCAKE, PIES, MRS LAROUCHES WORLD-FAMOUS JAM!

“Thanks,” Phoebe said, sitting up straight again, fiddling with her trucker belt buckle for luck with all this, “for coming to pick me up. I thought maybe you’d gone alone.”

Sam didn’t respond. Just drove in silence, chewing his lower lip—a boyish gesture that reminded Phoebe of Evie. Then she remembered Evie’s description of Sam.

Excited all the time, talking nonstop about whatever came into his head. He couldn’t keep a secret if you paid him. Until the fairies came.

They turned onto Spruce Street.

“So what’s the plan?” Phoebe asked.

“Plan?”

“You’re not going to park near your mom’s place, are you?”

They were just passing it now. The lights were all out, the curtains drawn. Phoebe remembered little Sam’s face in the upper window all those years ago. The girl in pink asking, “Are you here to see the fairies?” She remembered the glove she’d been shown—the leather stained, an extra finger sewn on with heavy black thread.

“Nah. I thought I’d circle around and park along Rangley Road. We’ll have to cut through the woods, but I think we can find our way.”

And what’ll we do if we find her?
she wanted to ask.

S
am had a flashlight, but it did little good. The woods were thick, dark, and impenetrable. The moon above them seemed nearly as bright as the sun, but little of the light was able to make it through the thick canopy of leaves above. Phoebe held on to the back of Sam’s T-shirt, sure that if she let go, she’d be left behind, lost.

“Are you sure this is right?” Phoebe asked, her ankle slamming against yet another rock. She hated what a girly girl she acted like sometimes when she was with him.
Brave strong man, please put my simple mind at ease and reassure me that you’ve got it under control.
It made her want to gag.

“No, Bee, I’m not sure. I think so.”

“It feels like we’re lost.”

Sam gave an exasperated sigh. “We’re headed in the right direction. The hill is in front of us, and Reliance is somewhere on this side of it. I’ve never come at it from this direction before. And Christ, I haven’t been here in fifteen years! Things have grown in a little since then. It looks totally different.”

If he’d had a map and compass, Phoebe knew he’d be checking them now.

“You never came back? After Lisa disappeared?”

He stopped walking, sighed. “Not really. I tried a couple of times, but it felt all wrong. Like trespassing.” He started walking again, the beam of the flashlight moving from tree to tree. Paper birches stood like ghosts. An owl let out a chortling cry.

“Barred owl,” Sam said, because that was the thing with Sam, wasn’t it? He was always teaching her things, filling her head with these golden nuggets.

She thought of the owl he’d carried in to the clinic, limp and full of buckshot. Sam’s arm was a mess of cuts and scratches from the owl fighting him, not understanding he was trying to save it. He still had the faintest scar by his right elbow, if you knew right where to look.

She thought of Becca’s advice:
Ask Sam what he saw in the woods that night. Ask him how he got that big old scar on his chest.

Had Sam really been out here the night Lisa was taken?

What had he seen?

“It’s hard to imagine a town ever having been here,” Phoebe said, looking around at the dense forest.

What she was really thinking was, it’s hard to imagine that she’d ever been anywhere near there. Hard to imagine herself at twenty, being led through the woods by a girl in pink with scabby arms. Hard to believe any of it was real—the yellow police tape, the strange six-fingered glove inside the paper sack.

She had her secrets. Sam had his. And it seemed like it was too late to start fessing up now.

“It was a long time ago,” Sam said. “And it was hardly a town by today’s standards. More like a little village. Half a dozen houses, some barns, a blacksmith shop, and a church. There’s an old well out here, too. We have to be careful where we step.”

Great
, Phoebe thought. As if she could even see where she was stepping.

She thought of the rumors about Reliance: the whole town being swallowed up, people losing dogs, the music and voices people said they heard from deep in the woods.

Was it possible for a place to be evil?

Were there really doors to other worlds?

It didn’t seem likely, but the idea caught in her brain like a hamster in a wheel spinning around and around.

“So what exactly are we looking for?” Phoebe asked.

“Rocks. Some big squarish pits in the ground, where the foundations of the buildings used to be. That’s about it.”

“Jesus,” Phoebe said. “I don’t think—”

“Shh!” Sam hissed, coming to a dead halt, making Phoebe run into him. “Listen.”

Gripping his bunched-up shirttail with one hand, wrapping the other around his chest, she clung to him, listening. The owl was silent now. She heard crickets. The high-pitched trill of a toad. But there was something else off in the distance, something that didn’t belong.

“Bells,” she said. Sam’s body grew rigid.

“This way,” he said, and he took off quickly, breaking her hold, the T-shirt slipping out of her hand.

“Wait,” she hissed, scrambling behind him, her eyes on the swath of light cutting through the darkness as he ran.

Her toe caught a root and she nearly lost her balance, saving herself by blindly reaching out and grabbing a spindly tree that bent with her weight. The beam from Sam’s flashlight was farther ahead now, a shimmering mirage through the trees.

“Sam!” Phoebe called. “Slow down!” She pushed off and fumbled slowly through the darkness, feeling her way. She shuffled her feet carefully, feeling for stones and trees, her arms swinging in great arcs in front of her as she struggled to keep her eyes on Sam’s light, now farther away than ever.

The bell sound got louder.

She remembered Sam’s words:
We saw something
.

But what?

And what would she see when and if she finally caught up with him?

And what, she wondered in a moment of blind panic, would she do if she never caught up with him? If she got to Reliance and found him gone? His flashlight and shoe left behind at the bottom of an old cellar hole.

“Sam,” she moaned. “Please.”

Don’t leave me.

She touched her belly.

Don’t leave us.

Phoebe stumbled forward, branches clawing at her bare arms and face, as she moved toward the sound of the bells, toward the faint light dancing on the trees. It looked greenish. Was it Sam’s flashlight? Or something else?

Up ahead, the forest was brighter, glowing and shimmering. She moved toward it, saw that the trees were thinning. She remembered the stories she’d heard of the green mist in Reliance, how some people claimed they’d seen a man walking out of it.

Once more, she caught her foot on a rock and stumbled, but this time there was nothing to stop her fall.

“Shit!” she yelped. She’d skinned her elbows and bashed her left knee hard against something. Looking around, she saw there were several tall, thin rocks jutting out of the ground around her. But these weren’t just rocks. They were gravestones.

“Sam!” she called, scrambling desperately to her feet.

The little cemetery was at the edge of a small clearing, the moon bright above her, illuminating the landscape. A breeze blew, and the shadows of the trees played in the moonlight at her feet. About ten yards to her left was Sam, holding the flashlight, pointing it down. She ran to him, carefully avoiding holes, ditches, mounds of rock, and trees.

“Sam!” she said throwing her arms around him, his back still to her, damp through his T-shirt. Sam. Her Sam. He wasn’t lost forever. She peeked over his shoulder, saw that the beam of the flashlight was pointed down, into a cellar hole lined in rocks. There, crouched in the corner like an animal caught in a trap, was a woman with a pale face and dark, tangled hair. She stared up, eyes round, black, and hollow. Around her neck was a string of bells with a ratty old fabric pouch tied on at the bottom.

“Lisa?” Phoebe breathed the word and the woman smiled but didn’t answer. She reached up and continued shaking the bells.