Before we walked outside to the mailbox, my father rounded up some rope from the garage, and even though they weren’t very cooperative, managed to tie my wings to my back so I wouldn’t go flying away.
“They are like ghosts,” my mom explained. “They are both transparent and solid. They are their own energy. This is why you can fit your clothing around them, but they can still be tied down because they are, in actuality, as solid as your heart.”
“I don’t get it,” I said, as she wrapped one of her old shawls around my shoulders.
“You don’t have to.” She smiled, patting my arm.
As always, I needed to ensure that I was one step ahead of the plan, so I managed to run up to my room just before my mother and I headed out and jotted a few things down into one of my spare notebooks. This was going to be the list to beat all lists:
-Get into Garlandia.
-Meet birth parents. Hug.
-Learn a defensive spell or two. (This is for good measure, to make it look like I care. Because let’s face it—all of this sounds completely ridiculous. It doesn’t even sound like there’s a smidgen of evidence that anyone was ever after me to begin with. With names like Maude and Tanker, I don’t think it’s too far off to say that these people—or whatever they are—overreacted to something miniscule.)
-Remember initial defense spell to get rid of wings.
-Wave good-bye and get out of Garlandia.
-Forget all about this nonsense and apply to Yale.
-Send formal apology to Lucy Armstrong. (It is always good to set oneself up for acts of greatness.)
-Get back to the office and try to forget any of this ever happened.
-Show new designs to the team and launch new bag line before Fall.
-Go over to Cee-Cee’s house and watch season two of Grey’s Anatomy.
With the edge of my pencil at the next empty line under the last task, I tried to decide whether I should write down what I was thinking. In the end, my longing for the act and the fear of living a life without love won me over.
-Experience your first kiss before it’s too late . . . be it girl or boy . . . or whoever.
I’d been thinking over Jeremy and Cee-Cee’s rationale that I was a pan-sexual teenage girl. Honestly, I had no idea what or who I was attracted to. Though I had a feeling that when I met the soul my heart was meant to desire—I would know. And I wouldn’t care what sort or what gender that soul belonged to. Therefore, I guess I was pan-sexual. And I wasn’t bothered by this realization in the very least. If anything, it made me stronger.
A blue broom in his hand, preparing to sweep up the pieces of crystal, and no doubt tidy up the remnants of our living room area, I hugged my dad good-bye; ensuring him I would see him again very soon while ignoring the uncertainty lingering in his embrace—a squeeze that was just a little bit tighter than usual.
It was evening when we left our house, but the sun was still out as we walked up to the mailbox at the end of our driveway. Lucky for us, no one was outside.
“So, we just put those things inside and wait for this Mort character to come out?” I asked. “Doesn’t it look a little strange?”
“No one’s ever noticed,” my mom said, slipping the tray of mud cakes inside and putting up the little red flag. “You never noticed for that matter.”
I made a face, crossing my arms over my chest. My wings were getting anxious, and I was beginning to worry my dad hadn’t tied them down tight enough. I wondered what would happen if I lost control of them out here. Would I go galivanting up into the atmosphere—into space? I shuddered at the thought.
We stood there waiting for what began to feel like a very long time. I was about to open my mouth and ask where this little box dweller was, when the front flap fell open and a little man with a stout nose and a pot belly walked out—a glob of mud cake in his hand and a piece of moss hanging down from his bottom lip. I wasn’t one to be around babies all that often, but I could still assume that if a two-month-old baby could stand up and walk, and if it had dirt smeared across its face and was dressed in rags, that this is what it would look like. The whole thing was rather creepy.
“Oh, it’s you,” he said nasally and unenthusiastically. “What do you want?”
“We need to get in. Can you please take us to the Abberwockey’s home?”
The little gnome stuffed the rest of what was in his hand into his mouth and then licked his fingers. “You know, the Millers chop up earthworms and sauté ‘em with onions before bakin’ ther mud cakes.” He pointed a grubby finger at my mom. “Somethin’ you should think about. You always burn yers.”
“Mort, this is an emergency. We need to get in, right now,” my mother replied quietly, but with urgency.
The little man stuck a portly thumb into his mouth and picked at his teeth, looking from her to me.
“Who’s she?”
“My daughter—well, not by blood—”
“She’s fey. Why can’t she get ya in?”
“She doesn’t know how. It’s a long story, will you please just let us in?”
The little dweeb then proceeded to visually inspect me as though he wasn’t quite sure about my intentions.
“Is that an Erwain?”
“Mort,” my mom said sternly, “I don’t have the patience today to deal with you, and if you don’t let us in, I will use other transportation and deal with you once I’m inside.”
The gnome finally looked away from me. Then, what felt like ages later, he said halfheartedly, “Why do cats wear sweaters in Garlandia?”
“Because they don’t like short sleeves,” my mom answered.
“Fine. I’ll let ya in, but it’s curfew so get to where yer goin’ quick,” he retorted, turning around and starting to walk back into the box.
“Curfew?” my mom questioned, as though this was a new concept for her.
“Yeah,” he said without offering an explanation. Before he disappeared completely, he poked his head out and said in a threatening manner, “Next time, earthworms sautéed with onions . . . and pickles.” And then he was gone.
“What just happened?” I asked, watching the mailbox close on its own. But there wasn’t time for an answer, because in a matter of seconds everything around us transformed.
Ivy grew up around the mailbox, enormous trees sprouted from out of nowhere—our house disappeared and in its place was a stream surrounded by both large and small wildflowers, red and white mushrooms—and in the near distance I could see a medium-sized cottage. The sun was setting in this world, just as it had been in front of our house, so the windows inside the home were lit up.
As we stood there, a fluttering of butterflies swarmed passed us, a missing person’s photo floating along with them of what looked like a tiny faery, listed as: Vicky Rodgers, Gone Missing three weeks ago. I followed them with my eyes until they were gone, then continued to survey my surroundings. It was like an illustration straight out of a child’s storybook, except—I couldn’t quite put my finger on it—there was something strange lingering in the air. A kind of foreboding energy that didn’t match the magic of the forest.
A small pair of gnomes scurried off towards a log lying on its side and entered a small door.
“Garlandia?” I whispered.
My mom took my hand. “Yes.” She was frowning as though trying to figure something out. “I don’t remember there being a curfew before.”
“Great,” I said sarcastically. “So, is this it—where they live?” I nodded towards the cottage.
“Yes. 17 Serendipity Lane.”
“17?” A blockage manifested itself into my brain. I hated uneven numbers; they weren’t clean. This was already a bad sign.
Playing off the concern flowing from my mother’s energy, I said, “Maybe this was a mistake. We could just go back.”
“No.” She shook her head and began pulling me towards the cottage. “We must go in there. Hello Maynard.”
“Maynard? Who are you talking to—holy shit!” I exclaimed, watching as a tree to our left opened its eyes.
Speaking extremely slowly, frustratingly slowly, the tree said, “Always a pleasure, young Naomi. And who is this? Wait, don’t tell me that’s the—”
“Yes,” she answered. “She’s found her wings.”
“Wow,” the tree said, with way more expression showing than I’d ever thought I would see out of a tree.
Once we’d gotten out of ear shot, I whispered to my mother, “So, like, trees can talk here?”
“Yes. You’re going to find things are a little different in Garlandia.”
“I think that may be a bit of an understatement,” I retorted.
We were almost to the front door of the stony cottage when what looked like a large insect flew in front of me, levitating in front of my nose. It only took me a second to understand that this was a faery. A small one like the one in the missing person’s picture, except it was male. I had always only thought of faeries as females.
“What do you want?” I asked, swatting it away.
“Oh no you didn’t!” it squeaked, getting in my mom’s face. “Does she belong to you? She just swatted at me!”
My mom pulled me closer as she apologized profusely. “I am so sorry, this is her first time here, uh—what’s your name?”
“Larry!”
“I am so sorry, Larry. I’m Naomi and this is—”
But the faery was pissed off and had already flown away, a cacophony of curse words trailing behind him. “As if it wasn’t already bad enough—dark times I tell ya! Then those mindless gnomes just let anybody in . . .”
“What was that?” I asked.
“One of the grumpiest Ardeens I’ve ever met,” my mom retorted.
“Ardeen?” I repeated, but she wasn’t paying attention to me. Raising my eyebrows, I repeated the faery’s last words. “Dark times?”
Ignoring my comment, her voice raised about an octave too high as she said, “Tanker and Maude don’t know we’re coming. But I suspect they have had an idea this was going to happen sooner than later.” Before we stepped up to the door, she stopped me and squared my shoulders with hers. “Remember, these are the faeries who gave birth to you. They never stopped loving you. I need you to handle this situation with respect—no matter what.”
Temporarily forgetting the maddening situation I was in, I crossed my arms over my chest. “God, you have, like, no faith in me. I think you are forgetting that I deal with international business affairs daily—or I used to before you took away my life. I can handle meeting strangers.”
“They aren’t strangers.”
“Whatever,” I said, “let’s just get this over with.”
My mom opened her mouth as though she was preparing to say more but stopped herself. “Fine, let’s just do this.” And then she prematurely pasted a fake smile onto her face.
We walked up the porch steps and rang the doorbell, at which point an obnoxious bout of laughter bellowed from inside the house. Prejudging the kind of people who had such a doorbell, I scoffed and looked over at the sign next to the door. It said, “No soliciting. But you can talk to the frog. He enjoys debates.”
“The frog?” I questioned, but my query was left unanswered as the door swung open. Standing on the other side was a very well endowed, curvy, red-headed faery with purple butterfly wings, wearing a long, flowing dress that looked like something one might see at a renaissance festival—a dumbfounded look on her face.
Oh no, is that her? Please don’t let that be her.
But it was her. Maude Abberwockey. It took her only a second to gather her words; looking first at my mother, she then stared directly at me before framing her cheeks with her hands.
“Oh, my gawd!!!! Tanker!! Get your sweet bottom down here!!! It’s our Lala!!!”
My head ticked and my mouth twitched. “It—it’s Makayla,” I whispered. But I don’t think she heard me, because she’d already jumped through the door and was squeezing me so hard, I thought my insides would ooze out.