With a Kiss (Twisted Tales) (8 page)

“I should’ve known I was crazy.” I kept my voice down so it didn’t look like I was talking to myself. “The fact that I actually thought you were cute should’ve tipped me off that you weren’t real. How unoriginal can I get? I couldn’t even come up with a name for you.”

He looked pleased, and too late, I realized I had called him cute. Even invisible guys had inflated heads. He let me walk ahead, and after messing with the candy machine in the entryway, he caught up to me in the parking lot, throwing some mints into his mouth. “Oh, c’mon, don’t be like that. I can’t give my name out to just
anybody
. That’s how you call faeries. You say a name and poof, they have to go wherever you are, just like a genie. Except if you call them, they won’t feel like granting you any wishes, not that you’d want them to. They might even curse you for it . . . it’s really
that
annoying to be ripped from place to place.”

I headed for my car, having every intention of ditching him, except it was impossible since he was in my mind. I wondered if I was glad about that.

Studying my resolute face, he sighed. “Why don’t you call me Hobs, then? It’s short for hobgoblin, and since that’s what I am . . .”

I unlocked my trunk and threw the completely weird and unsuitable groceries in. Besides the diapers, I felt like an idiot for buying them. “Aren’t hobgoblins supposed to have horns or something?”

“I’ve chiseled mine down.” Apparently he was matching my sarcasm with some of his own. “Hey, I’m the real thing. Heard of RobGoblin? Robin Goodfellow?”

I blanched, recognizing the reference. So, it was the rascal of
Midsummer Night’s Dream
himself? I should’ve known. He was
that
naughty. Shakespeare really knew what he was talking about. “Puck?” I asked.

Hobs gave me a wry look. “Don’t! Don’t even think about using that name. I’d give you my real name over letting you use that one.”

“Why? Is it a swear word?” He snickered and I slammed the trunk shut. “Hobs, it is,” I said. He was right—it was better than Puck. Or jerk. Because of him I had to do some major damage control. I tried to remember everyone I talked to when Hobs was around. I had looked like a raving lunatic and he knew
exactly
what he was doing to me. I looked from him to the baby. She was sucking on her fingers, staring up at me with huge, worried eyes. How was I going to get rid of these two? The problem was that I actually liked them. And anyone who knew me would know that was weirder than any faery sighting.

Chapter Seven

Scarce set on shore but therewithal
He meeteth Puck, which most men call
Hobgoblin, and on him doth fall
With words from frenzy spoken.
“Ho, Ho!” quoth Hob,
“God save thy grace,
Who dressed thee in this piteous case?”

—Michael Drayton,
Nymphedia

“I
’m babysitting, Mom.” I slipped over the polished checkered floor in our kitchen and quickly righted myself so I wouldn’t drop the baby. My parents weren’t the kind to ask questions where cute, fat babies were concerned. They loved babies. But I couldn’t act like I was babysitting
all
the time. My senior year was starting in a few months. It would be too strange.

Hobs dropped the groceries on the flowered tablecloth. I stared at him. It was one thing to hide a baby and my shadow’s unusual behavior, but now I had to hide an invisible hobgoblin too. You’d think invisibility wouldn’t be a problem, but it was.

Hobs roamed around the kitchen, opening the fridge and then all the cupboards. I didn’t know what he was looking for, but he flipped over our cute little strawberry-and-lemon-covered dishtowels to search under them too. I sat the baby on the floor. The kitchen tiles were relatively free of crumbs, and it left me free to follow Hobs around, slamming everything shut after him.

This weird sleepy disease would be hard to keep from my already concerned parents. I felt like I was trudging through thick honey. And buying diapers? How long would my allowance last before it ran out, especially after buying all that candy?

“Hey, Halley.” Daphne wandered into the kitchen, wearing her pink shirt and flannel pajama bottoms. She was pretending to get a glass of water, but I knew it was just an excuse. Kolby must’ve gone home tonight. Daphne heard me drive in and wanted to talk. She always wanted to talk and I never had anything to say. I mean, now I did, but it wasn’t very believable. “Where did you go?” she asked.

I attempted a smile. “I had to get diapers. I’m a new mom.”

The moment Daphne saw the baby on the floor, she let out a squeal and plopped down next to the kid, smoothing back her fuzzy hair. The baby was like one of those Troll dolls. No one could resist the hair. “For how long?”

“I’m not sure actually.” Daphne looked concerned, the glass of water motionless in her hand. “There was an emergency,” I tried to repair the damage my story had caused, but it wasn’t working. “The mom’s sick,” I said. Daphne looked even more concerned and I knew I had to get rid of the suspense and fast. I always had to spoil the ending when we were watching an episode of the
Hot Club
, too. “She’ll be okay, the doctor said. Just a few days or so.”

Her face relaxed. “I hope so. Poor baby. What did Mom and Dad say?”

“Uh . . . nothing yet.”

She let out a giggle. “They won’t be able to say no. She’s adorable. What’s her name?”

I hesitated. I was never good at twenty questions. “Baby.” Daphne’s face registered surprise. “We actually didn’t get to that part,” I admitted.

She choked on her glass of water, laughing again. “Only you would do something like that, Halley. Well, we have to call her something, huh, sweetie?” She gathered the baby from the floor and instead of choosing a chair like any normal person would, she sat on the table instead. Giving the baby her biggest, googliest eyes, she set her on her lap to bounce her. The little girl shook the swirly toy at her, looking very grave. “How about Babs? It’s short for baby, huh baby girl?”

“No, that’s short for Barbara,” I said.

“Is it?”

“I like it.” Hobs sat next to them both. The table groaned under their combined weights. I watched the three nervously. Daphne took Babs’ hands and played patty cake into the air. Hobs met Babs’ hands gamely. “How about it, Babs?” he asked. “You want that to be your name?” She blinked up at him and tried to grab the medallion around his neck with her chubby fingers. My sister just smiled. Babies always stared off into space. I had no idea they could actually be looking at something.

Hobs tilted his head at the two girls. “Babs has your eyes.”

What? My forehead wrinkled.
I had gray eyes.
“No, she doesn’t. She has my sister’s . . .” I said it without thinking, and Hobs chuckled when Daphne looked up at me. He had gotten me to
talk to myself
again. Daphne watched me expectantly. “Babs,” I tried to explain, “has your eyes.”

Daphne leaned her forehead against the baby’s, and the baby hit her on the shoulder with that crazy swirly toy. “Oh yeah, I see it,” she humored me.

And that’s when my shadow slipped away from me to get a closer look. I gawked, but I couldn’t call out a warning as I watched it sneak up on Daphne. Nothing that would make any sense would come out of my mouth anyway, so I closed it firmly. I tensed and I got ready to tackle my shadow. It peered over Daphne’s shoulder, staring at Babs. No wonder Peter Pan had been so upset with his wandering shadow. Sure, it was just curious now, but what would happen if Daphne noticed it was moving? Or if it tried to attack?

I tried to follow it, completely reversing our roles to make my shadow look somewhat attached to me. When that failed, I pulled Babs from Daphne, trying to distract my sister. “She needs a diaper change.” I closed the fridge door on my way out of the kitchen. “Stay out of the food,” I growled low to Hobs.

Daphne stood up in a rush. “Hey Halley, I was wondering . . . uh, have you seen my purse?”

I held Babs close to me and gave the living room a quick scan as I walked through. Just like usual, everything was perfectly in place. The TV had been pushed out of sight, letting the fireplace take center stage. The only thing a tad unsightly was the weekly paper scattered across the couches. The wall was covered with the miniature clocks my mother had collected from Leavenworth a few cities away from us. I listened to the ticking sound, and gasped when I saw something from the corner of my eye. It was the last time I looked too closely at
anything
in our house. Some weird slimy thing scurried across the grandfather clock, dragging Daphne’s purse behind him. It looked like a rat man. I teetered backwards, screaming.

Daphne rushed over to me. “Oh, there it is. Thanks.” She tugged her purse from the sinister looking creature. Its mouth and fangs blew up to abnormal size, and it hissed at her, but Daphne wasn’t scrambling into the nearest corner to suck her thumb—the lucky girl couldn’t see it. Rat man finally had to give up her purse. How frustrating to be beaten by such a sweet little thing.

“I was looking for that . . .” Her voice trailed off when she saw how scared I was. I tried to shrug it off and stepped closer to Hobs for protection, all the while forcing out my most casual smile. “What’s the matter?” Daphne asked.

My mom came out from one of the back rooms in her checkered pajamas. “Halley?”

“Yeah,” I said. “I thought I saw a . . . a . . .”
Monster?
“. . . some sort of . . . pest.” I glanced at Hobs.

“Gremlins,” he said with a careless lift of his shoulders. “Your house is infested with them, that and brownies.”

My sister looked revolted. “Oh, I hope not. What was it? A mouse?”

“Get used to it. You’ve got faery vision now,” Hobs told me. “You can see everything.” Another
gift
from the faery queen.

“Halley,” my mom said. “You still have the baby!”

I heard more grumbling from behind the couches and noticed my shadow take off to go check it out. I turned tail, rushing for my room before I became completely unglued.

“Wait,” Daphne shouted after me. “Are you okay?”

“Fine, fine.” I ran down the plush-carpeted hallway past my surprised dad, knocking the remote from his hand on his way to the living room. “Sorry, Dad!”

“Hi honey. Still in character, huh?” He patted his head where my tiara would be.

“Yes!”

His eyes went to the baby. Before he could ask me about her, I turned and saw my shadow chasing after me. I wasn’t sure if that was a good thing. I ripped open the door to escape it. Well, I tried to, but there were a lot of clothes in the way. They covered the ground like leaves in the fall. I kicked them free with some difficulty and managed to get the door shut. I listened to the creaks in the house—I hadn’t been aware of them before. We were surrounded.

 “I think you need to clean up in here . . . or rake or something.” Hobs glanced around, gingerly lifting a plaid jacket off the ground with his foot. I hadn’t seen him come into my room.

“What’s the matter?” my dad asked through the door.

“Fine, fine, I’m fine!”

“Are you sure?”

I shook my head, watching my shadow skip across my dirty room. It knocked into my bead curtains over the window then tripped over the pink fur rug. It really wasn’t one for brains, was it? And yet it was a part of me, just this afternoon I had been tripping over those too. I took a deep breath. “Please tell me that’s just my shadow,” I whispered to Hobs.

He sat heavily on the end of my unmade bed. “It’s a Fylgia, a sprite formed from your membrane.”

I couldn’t even pretend to know what he was saying. “What’s wrong with it?”

“It’s fine, just fine. Pretty hot actually.” He was mocking me.

 “Are you alright, honey?” My mom jiggled the door handle.

Great, the whole family brigade was outside. “Just getting dressed,” I sang.

 “With me in here?” Hobs gave me an arch look. I shrugged. He took Babs from me and smiled brightly at her. “Scandalous.”

I cast him an annoyed look. “They’re a little protective. I was sick, um . . . when I was a kid and they can’t leave me alone. Even the twins think they have to take care of me.”

“Were you cursed as a child?”

“No!” I remembered the hands, and shook my head. “I’m over it.”

Dad wasn’t through with me yet. “Why do you still have that baby from the play, honey?”

“I . . . I’m babysitting.”

“Still? It’s a little late for that, isn’t it?”

I took the baby from Hobs and ripped open the door to see my concerned dad in the hallway. His eyes moved to the baby and I gave him my most pleading expression. “Dad, it’s a huge emergency. The parents are in the hospital. Nobody else can take care of her. I
have
to take her overnight.”