by Caleb James
We approached.
He looked from Marilyn to me. “IDs, please.”
I pulled out my student card and Mom’s driver’s license and handed them over.
“I’ll need to go through that.” He pointed at the garbage bag. “… and your pocketbook too, ma’am.”
I pulled out the folder of documents and handed the bag to the guard. I watched as he pulled on gloves, patted the bag, and searched through its little-girl contents.
“Sign in.” He examined both our names, looked closely at make-believe Mom, and then at me. He handed back our IDs with two plastic visitor tags. “Wear these at all times and give them back when you leave. She’s on the third floor. Take the elevator. It’ll be on your right.”
I gave a polite smile, and Mom did the same. It was creepy, the way she mimicked me, but the guard didn’t notice.
I said nothing as we rode up. There was a camera in the elevator, and I knew everything that happened in tonight’s visit would be recorded. The doors slid open. “Come on, Mom… let’s go see Alice.”
“Yes.”
I had an awful thought, and clearly I was out of the running for son of the year, but changeling Mom was a hell of a lot easier than the real one. At least so far. We found the ward… or whatever they called it at the end of the hall. I read the sign over a telephone handset hanging on the wall. I picked it up, told them who we were, and the door clicked open.
“Alex!”
“Alice!”
She ran toward us. “I knew you’d come.”
Her face was tear streaked and she was still in her school uniform. I hugged her, smelling the shampoo we both used, wanting her to know that I’d figure this out.
“You’re safe,” I whispered, burying my face in her hair.
She sobbed against my chest. Which, considering how infrequently Alice let others see her emotions… I knew she was freaked. “It’s okay. Everything is going to be okay,” I said. We both knew that was a fat lie, but it sounded good. I felt Mom’s presence and braced myself. If it were real Mom, she would have said something bizarre. But make-believe Mom was smiling up at a sandy-haired woman heading toward us.
“I’m Marilyn Nevus,” she said. “Alice is my daughter.”
The sandy-haired woman stopped and looked from Mom and then to Alice and me. “I’m Lydia Green…. I’ll be your caseworker.”
Mom extended her hand. “Pleased to make your acquaintance.”
The caseworker seemed taken aback. “Likewise….” She shook Mom’s hand.
“Alex,” Mom said, “introduce yourself.”
I let go of Alice. “Hi,” I said. I tried to get a feel for this Lydia, one of the two who’d snatched Alice. Her eyes seemed tired, and I had the sense that we were keeping her from something. The other strong impression I got—she was suspicious.
“You know I can’t let her leave with you?” she said, looking first at Mom and then at me.
“We know,” I said. “We brought her clothes.”
“This is a nice place,” Mom said, taking in the homey surroundings. At least that’s what someone had been shooting for, with child-sized furniture and a living room set in front of a bank of wire-laced windows with bars on the outside. The only other kid was a little boy staring at a TV, and behind him was a young aide chatting on her cell.
“We try,” Lydia Green said. “Would you like to look around?”
“I would. Thank you,” Mom said.
Alice gave me a funny look, and tugged my hand as the social worker took Mom for the tour. “What did you do to Mom?” Alice whispered. “It looks like her.” She stared after them. “A pocketbook? She never wears a.… It’s not Mom.” Her mouth was agape. “Alex? Who… what?”
“It’s okay.” Continuing with my stream of lies. “Just go with it.” The thought of explaining was more than I could handle. Alice couldn’t even see Nimby, which had always added to my fear that I was a lunatic in training. She’d say she believed me… but right up there with Santa and the Easter Bunny—the fairy on my shoulder.
“Get me out of here,” she begged. “I want to go home.”
“I know.” And Mom and the caseworker headed back toward us. I shot them a nervous glance, looking first at the worker’s expression and then Mom’s.
“Not what I was expecting,” Mom said. “Clearly, thought has gone into making this feel like a child’s home.”
The worker’s wariness was gone. “I could say the same.… You’re not what they’d told me to expect.”
“I know,” Mom said. She was much more than a tape recorder. All the things I’d thrown at her on the subway ride, she’d taken in and put back together. “I have schizophrenia. It’s a serious illness. I have to take medication every day.”
The worker listened attentively. “You seem pretty together. They said you left an emergency room against medical advice.”
I held my breath.… The fey didn’t lie… it was apparently a rule. Like the rule that Lydia the OCFS worker did not have the authority to release Alice… but she would have input into the hearing for emergency custody that would take place in the morning.
Make-believe Marilyn smiled. “I let my temper get the better of me at a disability hearing. Alex was there.… They sent me to the emergency room, and then they over-sedated me.”
Alice squeezed my hand as we watched and listened. I kept waiting for bad things to shoot out of her mouth… the Mom things, or something about me having a fairy… or God knows what.
“It’s what happens to people with mental illness,” Mom said. “But when I woke up and realized they were going to let me go anyway… I left. Those places take forever. I realize now it was a mistake. I just wanted to get home to my children.”
“And you take your medication?” Lydia asked.
“Of course. It’s not a cure for schizophrenia.” She sounded like a public service announcement. “But it keeps my symptoms down.”
I hated to break into Mom’s stellar performance, but I needed information. “There’ll be a hearing tomorrow?” I asked.
“Yes.” The worker looked from me and then to Mom. “If you get here at nine, Judge Lawrence only has two cases.… Do you have a lawyer?”
“I have Alex,” Mom said. “He goes to Stuyvesant.”
The worker smiled. “Smart kid.”
“He’s a genius,” Mom said. “Straight As.”
“I brought copies of some paperwork,” I said. “If you’re going to be our caseworker, you might want these.” I needed this woman to like us, to not break us up. I was having a hard time reading her.… She seemed less suspicious, but exhausted. “You’ll be here in the morning?” I asked.
“Oh yeah.” She took the thick folder and looked in.
It was nearly seven… great… a caseworker who took her job seriously. Her partner from earlier had obviously gone home. “You’re working a double?” I asked.
“No.” She stared up at me. It was an awkward moment, like being at the pediatrician. She was studying me. I never knew how to behave around these people, so I stood and let her look. I wanted to tell her how desperate I was to get Alice home… but that could work against you. I didn’t know if she was friend or foe. Considering what had just happened with Lorraine, I wasn’t going to risk it. Finally, she spoke. “You manage.”
“Yes.” I wasn’t entirely certain what she meant by that.
“Okay. Then I’ll see the two of you in the morning.”
“No!” Alice gasped. “I want to go home!”
Her voice ripped into me.
“Please.” She was begging the caseworker. “Please don’t make me stay. Something bad is going to happen.”
Her words were like ice in my veins. So similar to what she’s said when we’d arrived at the McGuires’.
Make-believe Mom sank to her knees in front of Alice. She hugged her. “Sweetie. You have to stay tonight. I’m sorry.”
I watched Alice tense, and then something gave way and she collapsed
into Mom’s arms, sobs wracking her little body. I put my hand on the back of her head and stroked her hair.
“It’s going to be okay,” changeling Mom said. The slightly flat tone to her voice was gone. She repeated my words… only from her, they didn’t sound like a lie. “It’s okay, Alice. Everything is going to be okay.”
Twenty
IT TOOK everything I had to leave Alice there. The Nevus children don’t cry… and we were both doing more than our share. As make-believe Mom and I headed toward the door, I heard Alice beg, “Don’t leave me here.” She sounded exhausted and numb. I remembered her prophetic words our first day at the McGuires’—“These are bad people.” Just like then, there was nothing I could do.
And then we were outside, and Jerod was on the curb reading a big children’s book, Clay’s skateboard on the sidewalk. He looked up. Nimby was on his shoulder, staring at the open book. They turned and looked at us.
I couldn’t speak, scared I’d start bawling.
“We’ll come back in the morning,” changeling Mom said. “There’ll be a judge. Lydia said we’d go first. It’s okay. It’s going to be okay, Alex.”
Jerod put the book on top of the skateboard and came toward us. He brushed his bangs off his forehead. He stared at me, and before I knew it, his arms were around my shoulders and he was holding me. He felt solid and safe.
“It’s going to be okay,” make-believe Mom repeated as she hugged the two of us.
I knew she was parroting what I’d said… but the fey can’t lie… so maybe it was the truth. Or maybe changelings weren’t technically fey. And I guessed the Nevus kids did cry… because I couldn’t stop.
“Ssh.” Jerod’s breath was in my ear. He kissed the side of my face.
But something was off, and not just the fact that the woman who looked exactly like my Mom wasn’t her, or that my fairy seemed to like Jerod best. Something shivered down my back. I batted away my tears and broke away. I turned toward the OCFS building and looked up. There was someone in the third-floor window watching us. It was Lydia. Our eyes met. Okay, I thought, she’s seen Jerod. Big deal… she’s just doing her job. I gave a small wave, which she returned, and then she vanished from the window. I couldn’t read her, and it bothered me. Because I knew that in the morning, things could go for or against us. Having Alice’s OCFS worker on our side would be huge.
“Let’s get out of here,” I said.
“Check this out.” Jerod grabbed Clay’s skateboard and the picture book. He showed me the cover. May, Queen of the Fey.
On the cover was a beautiful blonde fairy with a crown and wand against a background of lush foliage. On the bottom it read Katherine Summer, and there were three gold stickers for awards it had won. “It’s a hell of a coincidence… but.”
“I think we’re catching a break,” he said. “While you were inside, I checked out a few things. I went to the book’s website, nothing’s been added for years, but there was a link to another site. Katherine Summer is still writing, romances… lots of them.”
“With the fey?”
“No, chick lit.… Secretaries, a nun who falls for the pizza delivery guy… who turns out to be a super-wealthy computer geek. That kind of stuff. She’s got a Facebook page and half a million followers on Twitter. She’s written a lot of books.”
“Your mother is in love,” changeling Mom said.
“Huh.” I wondered where that came from.
“I feel it,” she said, patting her hand against the skin of her other arm. “Your mother and father love each other.” She was grinning.
She was no tape recorder. This was real thought; she was piecing things together. “What does that have to do with what we’re talking about?” I asked.
“It’s a romance. That’s what you’re saying.”
I had no idea where this was going. “I guess.”
“It’s a big romance,” she said. “Filled with drama and sacrifice. It ripples through her flesh… my flesh. It makes her whole.”
“It ripped her apart,” Nimby added, having settled on my shoulder, her butt pointed at my face as she stared at Jerod.
“Stop.” I looked at Nimby and felt blood rush to my cheeks. “You said love protects.” I didn’t want to go further, still feeling the tingle of Jerod’s embrace. He was being a stand-up guy, and maybe he kind of liked me in that way. “If Mom… and Cedric are in love, why didn’t that keep her whole?”
Nimby stared back at me. A wicked smile crossed her face. “You’d think this was difficult to understand. Cedric was a trap set by May. He lured her into Fey with the promise of love. Yes, later he fell in love with Marilyn, but by then the damage was done. It binds him to your mother, and May uses it to her advantage. He is sorry, as much as any fey can feel guilt… and there’s no turning back.”
“I get it.” I felt a weight and shame for all the bad things I’d thought about Mom. “So where’s the break?” I asked Jerod.
“Katherine Summer lives in Manhattan.”
“You found an address?”
“Not yet, but maybe better.… She’s on a book tour and speaking at the midtown library… tonight. We can make it.”
“Too easy,” I said, already figuring the most direct route to the library. It would take us back by the OCFS building, and I didn’t want to bump into Lydia. She’d probably think we were planning to spring Alice. Which, if that had been a realistic option, I’d be on it. Getting Alice home meant playing by the rules, playing smart, and playing better than anything and anyone they threw at us. So we turned up Eighth Avenue and doubled back on Twenty-Third Street.
Nimby hopped to Jerod’s shoulder and said, “It’s not easy. It’s fey way.”
I realized that, like Mom’s gibberish, there was a logic in here, a different language, like knowing the OCFS statutes and being able to kind of speak schizophrenic…. “It’s fey because it looks like a coincidence, but it’s not.”
Nimby flitted back to my shoulder. “Yes. Katherine Summer is waiting for you, although she will not know that. It’s no coincidence—it’s synchronicity.”
There were layers of meaning… and a lot of garbage in Nimby’s words.
“Let me tell you about the book,” Jerod said. Holding it in front of us as we walked, he flipped the pages. The illustrations were gorgeous, and I could see why it had been popular. Lots of cute elves and pixies, a villainous queen who hid her evil behind a beautiful face as she plotted the overthrow of the human world. It ended as Queen May was foiled in her plot to possess a little blonde girl.… Alice, who looked like my sister. It was clear that it had been meant to be the start of a series. The fairy queen vowed to return, stronger and more beautiful. Her final words were, “You will worship me. You cannot vanquish me, for I am May, Queen of the Fey.” In the end, she was imprisoned in a peanut butter jar and hurled by Alice into a frightening mist.
“That’s not how it happened,” Nimby said as she hovered in front of the book.
“Which part?” I asked.
“The jar… that wouldn’t hold her. The fey love glass… and water.”
“Why?” Jerod and I asked at the same time.
Nimby turned in midair and looked between us. “Good. Glass and water are transparent. You can slip between them and see into them.”
“The ogres with the water mirrors,” I said.
“Like the statue in Tompkins Square Park,” Jerod added.
I looked at him.
“There’s a statue,” he continued. “A woman staring into a bowl of water.” He looked at Nimby. “Is that what you mean?”
She kissed him on the cheek. “So smart. Yes, she is skrying.” She turned to look at me. “It’s how Cedric seduced your mother. It’s an old story. She gazed into a mirror, and he was there…. Mirror, mirror on the wall….”
“Why her?” I asked, picturing the antique-looking glass on my mother’s worktable. I had a memory of being a little kid and watching her stare into it as she was working on a series of self-p
ortraits. Was that how all of this started? One day she looked in, and there was Cedric looking back?
Nimby pondered. “I do not know. Clearly she has the sight, but so do others. It is a good question, Alex. Perhaps we shall find the answer.”
Our walk took us to Bryant Park. The historic library with the marble lions was on our left, and across the street was the newer and taller main branch. In the lobby, before going through security, was a poster on an easel:
Best Selling Romance novelist Katherine Summer
on
Addicted to Love.
The program was to start at eight.… It was ten to.
“This is creepy,” Jerod said as he opened his book bag for the security officer to inspect.
“Yeah, not coincidence, but synchronicity.… Any clues?”
“How crazy do you want me to get?” he asked.
I stayed next to make-believe Mom in case she needed help. She didn’t, opening her purse like she’d been dozens of times, and letting the security lady look in and then clicking it shut. “It’s on the sixth floor,” she said.
“You can read?” I asked.
A sandy-haired man behind her in line looked at me, and then at her.
She smiled back and shook her head. “My son thinks his mother is an idiot. He’s making fun of me.”
The man chuckled. “Kids. You can’t live with them, and if you try to drown them they stick you in jail.”
“So true. You have some of your own?”
“Three,” he said.
“No wedding ring,” she commented.
“Mom!”
The man, who seemed around her age and was kind of attractive, chuckled. He looked at me. “You’re sixteen, right?”
“It’s the voice, isn’t it?” make-believe Mom asked.
“Absolutely. There’s a tone that only sixteen-year-old boys can get when they’re embarrassed by their parents.”