“Okay,” I tell him. “The truth is I’m scared to go back and be, you know, the Broken Girl again.”
Joe shakes his head. “It doesn’t have to be that way. Since you got rid of the crap that was stopping them, the healers can fix you up now, good as new.”
“So, it’s like in the fairy tales.”
“What is?”
“You know,” I say. “Magic can’t ever fix the real problems. In the stories, all the real problems are solved by kindness and pluck, or with a true love’s kiss, with all that kiss means.”
I find myself remembering a line from one of the Jewel CDs that Sophie often plays in the Greenhouse Studio while she’s working. Something about how in the end, there was only kindness.
Kindness implied no expectation of reward, or even necessarily thanks.
It was simply the doing of it that mattered.
“But mostly the kindness,” I say.
“Sure,” Joe says. “I get that. But there’s nothing wrong with using medicine when it can help. There’s no good reason in turning down a helping hand, magical or otherwise.”
Jack nods. “You didn’t see Joe turning Anwatan down when she brought him back from the dead.”
I just look at Joe, speechless for a long moment.
“You . . . you were dead?” I finally manage.
“Yeah, but it didn’t take.”
He’s trying to be all jokey about it, but I can tell he knows it was as big a deal as I think it was.
“Anwatan brought him back,” Jack says, “and the crow girls tidied up his death wound. They can fix you up, as well.”
“But why me?” I say. “I can get around as I am. Why not go to the terminal ward of Newford General and help the people there? There are all sorts of people way worse off than me.”
Jack shrugs. “I could say that maybe it has to do with preserving that light inside you—making sure it gets to shine on the way it’s supposed to. Or maybe it’s only because the crow girls like you. You’ll have to ask them. But me? I’d just let it be done. Change the wheel I was on and get on a new one that makes sure I was worth the fixing up.”
There’s no shame in reclaiming the health you once had, Honey says. You’ve had more than your fair share of suffering.
“But I’ve had more than my share of good, too—like all the friends I’ve got. Some people don’t get even one.”
“Yeah,” Joe says. “And somewhere out there, one of those people will get you for a friend, and it might just save their life. But they might not survive if you’re not healthy enough to go out and make your rounds the way you used to.”
Before the accident, I spent a lot of time volunteering at the food bank and the old folks home and anyplace else where I thought I might do some good. Joe’s right. I haven’t done any of that for way too long.
“And then there’s your art,” Geordie says. “I know how much you miss it. Maybe what you don’t realize is how much everybody else does, too. I’ve talked to people who say it changed their life. Once a girl told me it saved her life. Having this poster on her wall from one of your shows reminded her every day of how important it was to connect to people, instead of hiding from them.”
“You never told me that.”
“Doesn’t make it not true,” he says. “And then there’s—”
“Okay, okay. I get the picture. I’m a saint.”
“You’re no saint,” Joe says, “but you’re good people. Take the gift that’s offered to you.”
If you need to bargain with the idea of it, Honey adds, consider this healing as payment for all the hurt that was done to you as a child.
I give her a slow nod. “I guess I can do that.”
Farewell and Remember Me
Geordie
It was so weird to be back in our hotel room in Sweetwater. Jilly sat in her wheelchair, the young twenty-something she’d been in the otherworld replaced once more by what she called the Broken Girl. Her gaze was on something on the other side of the window, but I don’t think she actually saw anything out there in the growing darkness.
It was Monday evening. Hard to believe that it had been only a day since all of this started—or at least since Jilly and I fell down a rabbit hole into boganland and had our lives turned upside down.
Neither of us had much to say about it. We hadn’t much to say about anything since we came up to shower and get changed. We were supposed to meet Lizzie and the others downstairs, but while we each had a shower and changed into fresh clothes, we made no move to leave the room.
In the old days, we could be together for hours and never need to say a word. Maybe we’d get that back, but right now the silence had a weight for me, and I felt I needed to break it. I stood up and came to stand beside her. The last of the day was leaking out of the sky, glowing a hundred shades of mauve and pink behind the tall pines.
“You must be relieved,” I said.
Jilly looked up at me from the wheelchair.
“What do you mean?” she asked.
I shrugged. “You know. You’ve finally got the last of Tyson County behind you.”
“It doesn’t feel any different,” she said. “Not now that we’re back. It’s . . . there’s no magic here.”
“Maybe not right here, but we both know it exists in this world.”
She smiled. “It’s still funny hearing you say that.”
“You mean when I’ve spent so long denying it and finding more rational reasons for what couldn’t really be explained except as magic?”
“Pretty much.”
“Well, you know us Riddells. Bang either one of us along the side of the head with something for long enough, and we’ll eventually sit up and pay attention.”
“Yeah, neither you nor Christy is big in the change department.”
“Some people would say that’s part of our charm.”
“Some people would only be you and Christy.”
I smiled. “That was almost sassy.”
“It was, wasn’t it?”
I sat down on the bed, and she turned the wheelchair so that she was facing me.
“So, what was with that business back on the mesa?” I asked. “About your not wanting the crow girls’ help? Ever since the accident, you’ve been all into self-healing meditations and alternative medicine to get your strength and mobility back. Why don’t you want to try this?”
“I don’t know. It seems too easy. Like I didn’t earn it.”
“Didn’t you once tell me how wrong it was for people to think the only wisdom or help they could appreciate was if they paid something for it?”
“There’s always a payment.”
“You know what I mean,” I told her. “And besides, if you’re going to talk about things being earned, you didn’t earn the crap you’ve had to deal with in your life.”
“Everybody has that—to some degree or other,” she added before I could say anything about how being abused as a kid, or crippled by a hit-and-run driver, doesn’t exactly happen to everybody, thank God.
“But still . . .”
She nodded. “I know. I guess it’s just some kind of weird guilt. Why me and not someone else?”
“It’s not being offered to someone else.”
“But why?”
She had me there. The difference was, for me it didn’t matter. I wanted her to have everything that had been taken away from her. I wanted to see her dancing and running and painting and living large the way she loved to live. What happened to her as a kid—that couldn’t be changed. But these physical holdovers from the accident. They could.
“Like Jack said,” I told her. “You’ll have to ask the crow girls that question.”
She smiled. “Yeah, and off they’ll go talking about cups of sugar and the colour of fish smiles or some such thing.”
“But you’re going to do it?”
“Ask them?”
“To see if they can heal you now.”
“Absolutely.”
&
nbsp; We fell silent again. After awhile, Jilly reached over and took my hand.
“So all this talk about healing and the like,” she asked. “Is that you circling around us talking about our relationship?”
“No. Yes. Maybe.”
“If you’re having second thoughts . . .”
She started to pull her hand away, but I tightened my fingers around it. Not hard. Just enough to let her know that I didn’t want to let go.
“I did have second thoughts,” I told her, “but that was only when you left us on the mesa. When we’re together, I don’t have the slightest doubt that being with you is what I want. What I’ve maybe always wanted, except I was just too blind or stupid or both to figure it out.”
“Me, too.”
“But when you went away, I got . . . scared, I guess is the only way to put it.”
“Scared of what?”
“Well, neither of us is much good at making a relationship work.”
“Though you’re usually the one who gets dumped,” she said.
“I know. But that was still because it wasn’t working out.”
“So you’re afraid that’ll happen with us?”
I shook my head. “I don’t think so. It’s just . . . what if it did happen? What happens to us being best friends? I can’t even imagine a world without you in it. You know, when I first heard about the accident, I could feel a piece of myself just go so still inside me. It was like something collapsed in my chest, and all I could do was sit there holding the phone and wonder if I’d ever be able to breathe again.”
Her fingers tightened on mine.
“We just have to make that not happen,” she said.
“Can we do that?”
She smiled. “We can do anything—isn’t that how it goes in the fairy tales? We’ve made it to the other side of the woods. All that’s left for us now is our happy ending.”
“I’d like that.”
“Joe’s always telling me,” she said, “that there are some things you need to decide with your head, and others that you can only decide with your heart.”
“My heart’s definitely saying yes.”
She lowered her eyes for a moment, and I realized that she was feeling shy. Jilly, of all people. And that shyness filled me with the courage to listen to my heart.
I stood up and helped her to her feet. She looked up into my face.
“You know what?” she said. “I’m tired of talking. I feel like I’ve been talking forever. To Del. To Mattie. To everybody.”
I got the message and leaned down to kiss her. It was long and sweet and got a tingle started up way down inside me.
“Wow,” she said when we came up for air. “How come nobody ever told me you’re such a good kisser?”
I didn’t answer. Instead, I scooped her in my arms and laid her carefully on the bed. Then I lay down beside her, my head propped on my arm so that I could look at her face. I reached out and followed the contour of her jaw with a finger.
“Maybe . . . “ she started, her voice husky. “Maybe we should wait until the crow girls get me fixed up.”
“I don’t want to wait.”
Those startling blue eyes of hers had a sheen, but she was smiling.
“Me, neither,” she said.
And pulled me over on top of her.
Lizzie
“So,” Siobhan said, “I’m guessing the lovebirds aren’t leaving their room.”
The band was sitting downstairs in the hotel’s bar. They had commandeered one of the large booths—big enough for six—and they each had a whiskey and a pint of beer on the table in front of them. Con and Lizzie sat on one of the benches, Siobhan and Andy across from them.
Lizzie smiled. “You think?”
Con put his arm around her shoulders.
“Maybe we should all pair up,” he said.
Lizzie pushed him away and punched him in the arm.
“Ow! What was that for?”
“Your endless flirting. You know, if it hadn’t been for you, I would never have driven off the other night and none of this would have happened.” He started to protest, but she held up a hand. “No, I just need to say this. If I ever decide to drive off by myself in the middle of the night again, you all know to just shoot me or something, right?”
“Except . . . “ Andy began, but then he let his voice trail off.
“Except what?” Lizzie asked him.
“I don’t know. It was all pretty amazing.”
“Except for those of us who got pushed down the stairs,” Siobhan said, “and had their arms broken.”
“Sprained.”
“But still . . .”
Andy grinned at her.
“Okay,” she said. “It was pretty amazing. Scary, but amazing.” She looked across the table to Lizzie. “Who knew that all those old fairy tales of Pappy’s were true?”
“Pappy?” Con asked.
“My grandfather,” Lizzie and Siobhan said at the same time, then laughed.
He nodded. “I keep forgetting you guys are cousins.”
“Wait’ll we introduce him to Timony,” Lizzie said.
The doonie had gone back to the Aisling’s Wood, but had promised to visit as soon as everything had settled down.
“Pappy probably already knows hundreds of fairy folk,” Siobhan said. “I mean, just think about the way he told those stories.”
“I just hope the ones he knows are all nice ones like Timony.”
“No kidding,” Con said. “Man, if you could have seen these buffalo guys. There were millions of them and talk about your heavy-looking dudes.”
Andy nodded. “They made gangsta rappers look like boy scouts.”
“I could do without ever meeting any of those heavy ones again,” Siobhan said.
And then off the conversation went as they all traded stories about the various wonders they’d been witness to. At one point, Andy got up and fetched them all another round and while Lizzie knew the smart thing would be to not have another whiskey and beer chaser, what the hell? She’d earned it.
She knew she should be tired, but she’d never felt more wide-awake in her life.
While the talk went on, she noticed that Con had moved closer to her again. When he rubbed his leg up against hers, she turned around sharply.
“Okay,” he said. “I get the message.”
He started to scoot back along the bench, but she grabbed him by the shirt, pulled him close, and then kissed him. Seriously kissed him. Hard and long, like that fairy woman had done with Geordie on the mesa.
“What was that for?” Con asked when they came up for air.
Lizzie glanced at her cousin and Andy across the table. Andy looked surprised, but Siobhan had a smile in her eyes. Lizzie turned back to Con.
“You’re always flirting with me,” she said. “What do you think it was for?”
“But you’re always saying the one rule you have is you won’t date anybody you play with.”
“So, maybe it was a stupid rule.”
He shook his head. “No, it was a good rule.”
“Are you turning me down?”
He grinned. “Hell, no. I like to break the rules.”
Siobhan turned to Andy. “Looks like we’re sharing a room, but I’ll warn you right now. No funny stuff.”
He gave her a look as though she’d just suggested he sleep with his sister.
“Oh, for God’s sake,” Lizzie said. “We’re not going to . . .”
But her voice trailed off when she looked back at Con. He was so handsome. Flirty, but always nice. And look where she’d ended up the last time she’d run away from him.
“Well,” she added. “It might be nice to have somewhere private where we could . . . you know, talk about stuff.”
Siobhan laughed. She downed her whiskey and slid out of the booth. When she was standing, she gave Andy a pointed look.
“What?” he said.
“Come on,” she said. “I need a hand moving my
stuff.”
Lizzie waited until the two of them had left the booth and started for the door, before she turned back to Con.
“So,” she said. “Do you want to go talk somewhere private?”
He laid a hand on hers and smiled.
“Wherever you lead,” he told her, “I will follow.”
“Oh, please.”
But when he leaned forward to kiss her, she let him.
Joe
“I’ve just got one more thing I need to do,” Joe told Cassie when the two of them and Jack got back to the city.
Cassie sighed. Before she turned back to him, she gave a longing look to the front of their apartment building. Which Joe didn’t miss.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “But it can’t wait.”
“Is it dangerous?” she asked.
“Don’t think so. I just need to deal with the last of the bogans—the one those crow boys didn’t find.”
“Oh, Joe, you’re not going to . . .” she began, then caught herself. “What am I saying? Of course, you wouldn’t. You’re just going to take him to Raven, right?”
He shook his head. “No, I made a promise to Anwatan to keep him away from the corbae. She says he’s basically a good kid who got dragged along on the hunts against his will.”
“Like there’s any such thing as a good bogan,” Jack said.
Joe shrugged. “I gave Anwatan my word.”
“So that was the price for her bringing you back?” Jack asked.
“You know I don’t work that way. Once she told me her need, once she explained about the kid to me, I would’ve done it whether she brought me back or not.”
Jack gave him a coyote’s grin. “Helps that you’d have to be alive to do that.”
“I could’ve got around it.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Cassie asked.
“Spirits can get things done before they move on. Especially in the otherworld.”
Cassie shook her head. “I don’t believe you. What about me? What about us? How could I go on without you?”
Joe reached up and touched her cheek with his palm.
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