If Lily noticed my inner battle, she said nothing. Instead, she curled up against me again and held me close. I couldn’t bear it. Not with the way the self-loathing churned within me. I extricated myself from her arms and got out of bed.
“You don’t want to stay?” she asked.
“I have classes, Lily.”
“You are a studious one, aren’t you?”
“It’s what I do. I’m a student with my classes, just like you’re a Guardian with your eggs.”
The shocked and wounded look on her face slapped me with the reality of what I’d just said. Shit. Just lovely. It really was a perfect time to remind her of what she’d given up for me by telling her what I would not give up for her. “I’m sorry, Lily.”
“It’s fine.” She pulled the blankets up over her head, and when she emerged again a few seconds later, she was back to her teeny, fairy-sized self. “When will you be back?”
“I’ll be done by late afternoon.”
“Then I’ll see you then.” She flew up to my face, gave me a peck on the cheek, and then flew back to the bed and dove under the covers.
I had never in my life wanted to leave my room so quickly.
I was afraid Lily wouldn’t be in my room when I came back that afternoon— and honestly, I wouldn’t have held it against her if she wasn’t— but she was there, munching away on one of Jake’s bananas. She smiled when I walked in, but her usual frenetic enthusiasm was gone, and she stayed sitting right where she was on Jake’s desk. “Hi,” she greeted me around a mouthful of banana.
I dropped my backpack by the door and walked over to sit in my desk chair. “Can I say something about this morning?”
“I scared you, didn’t I?” There was resignation in her voice.
“What? No,” I protested. “I—”
“Yes,” she interrupted. “I think I did. I said too much.”
“And I didn’t say enough,” I countered. “Look, Lily. All of this is new for both of us. We’re still feeling things out. I know for sure that I don’t have a clue what I am doing.” I sighed. “And, yes. I was probably scared. Too much happened all at once, and what you said tipped things over the edge. Can we just agree to forget everything that happened this morning and just kind of start over? Can you forgive me for being a walnut?” I reached my hand out to her and rested it next to her, palm up.
She smiled a little and climbed into my hand. “I can forgive you for being a walnut,” she conceded. “And I can pretend this morning didn’t happen.” She wrapped my thumb in a tight embrace. “Don’t ask me to forget about last night, though.”
“Never. I’ll remember last night until the day I die.”
And so it was. She pretended she’d never confessed how she felt, and I pretended that I hadn’t been too afraid to do the same. And we continued on in that way as the winter days grew longer and the first hints of spring appeared around campus.
I continued trying to be a responsible college student, and Lily tried her best to come to terms with no longer being a Guardian. She played hermit in my dorm room for a long time— hiding whenever Jake was there— but I could tell that being cooped up for so long wasn’t good for her. She grew bored and despondent, and whenever she was in her tiny fairy-form— which was most of the time— her formerly bright purple aura faded to practically nothing. I finally grabbed her one day and carried her outside.
“Out,” I insisted. “Out into the fresh air. Find fairy things to do.”
She scowled at me at first, but she finally stood up on my shoulder, stretched, and took a deep breath that seemed to fill her tiny body all of the way to her toes. A grin curled her lips as she looked out at the budding trees and flowers in bloom. “I’ve missed this,” she breathed.
“I know.” I smiled back at her. “Now, go. Enjoy being out in the sun while I’m stuck in a classroom.”
She squeezed my cheek and gave me a quick kiss before she flew away with more zeal than I had seen in a long time. It made me happy. I hoped she could find something to help fill the hole that no longer being a Guardian had left. As much as she may protest otherwise, I knew that I alone was not enough. I was too different. Not fairy enough. No matter how close the two of us became, there would always be parts of our lives that would not and could not intersect. It was just a reality we would have to learn to accept.
I cherished the parts where we could connect, though. We were both misfits among our own kind, and that gave us a new foundation and a place to build our relationship. Neither of us needed to be lonely as long as the other was near. No matter how difficult a day I endured— if I bombed a test, or botched an assignment, or just got fed up with people in general— her natural joy and optimism always helped make me feel better. I often stressed myself out worrying over what it was she gained from her interactions with me— I knew it had to be more than chocolate, but I just couldn’t figure out what. Still, she came back to the dorm day after day, every evening, and told me all about what she had done in our hours apart— about the other fairies around campus and in the woods she was befriending, about the flowers she had adopted as her own in the beds outside our window, about the squirrel she had defended from a hunting fox. And later, we’d settle into bed, she’d nestle into the crook of my neck— I’d learned not to squash her— and we’d sleep. Or not. Jake wasn’t always in the room, after all.
If I’d thought she was important to me before, it paled in comparison with what she came to mean to me over those months. Just thinking about her made my heart race and my mouth smile in the most idiotic way. She made me soar.
Which is why I really didn’t want to leave her behind again when I went home for spring break. I just couldn’t bear the thought of it.
“Lily,” I asked about a week before I was scheduled to leave, “how would you like to come home with me?”
“To where you grew up?” That seemed to hold a great deal of appeal to her for some reason.
“Yes. To the same home I lived in when I was an obnoxious little boy.”
“I’d get to see your family?”
“Yes, of course.” Neither one of us mentioned her actually meeting anyone in my family. I think we both knew that that could be a very bad idea. “We’ll be staying with them. You’ll even get to see my grandma. We’re going out to her place for Easter.”
“I would love to go with you, Grant-Man.” She fluttered in excitement. “How will be get there?”
“We’ll fly.”
She squinted her eyes at me, no doubt trying to determine if I was being facetious with her. “You don’t have wings.”
I grinned. “I don’t,” I admitted. “But the airplane does. It’s finally time for you to experience how people fly.”
7
Encountering Pierce
She didn’t care for air travel much, as it turned out. For starters, she got jammed in my pocket to make it through security and onto the plane. She did not find it amusing when I told her that she was the first live contraband I’d ever smuggled while traveling. And then, when I was finally able to take her out when I was reasonably sure that no one would see her, she took one look through the window and darted back into my pocket so fast she collided with my side and left a bruise. She was trembling so much, I was surprised no one noticed me shaking. Who knew a fairy could be afraid of heights?
By the time the plane landed and we grabbed our luggage, met up with my parents, and rode home, I was pretty sure I had permanently scarred my sweet little fairy. As soon as we were safely shut up in my bedroom, she lurched out of my pocket, flitted drunkenly over to my bed, and crawled under the covers.
“I am never doing that again,” she moaned.
“Not until next week, anyway,” I observed helpfully. “That’s when we go back.”
“Do not ever say that again in my hearing,” she threatened, although she didn’t bother to list what the consequences would be if I did.
She didn’t move around much the next day, but finally seem
ed to be feeling more like herself on the day after that. I took her outside that afternoon and swung in my parents’ hammock while she explored around their backyard. Mom and Dad were at work, so I wasn’t concerned that they would see something they shouldn’t.
I’d forgotten about Pierce, though. He walked home from school— the high school wasn’t on break yet— and came straight out into the backyard to say hi. He could immediately tell I was nervous about something.
“What’s up, bro?” he asked as he walked over to me.
“Nothing.” I sat up in the hammock and tried not to glance in Lily’s direction. Much easier said than done.
“Right.” The sarcasm was thick. “I guess you won’t mind if I hang out with you for a while, then.” He sat down next to me. After a minute or two of uncomfortable silence, he continued, “Sure you don’t want to tell me what you’re worried about?”
“He’s worried you’ll see me.”
Pierce popped straight up to his feet. Lily hovered in the air in front of him, and for a long few moments, they did nothing but stare at each other. Finally, Pierce found his voice again. “A fairy!” He sounded almost angry about it, but I’m pretty sure he was just so completely flabbergasted that he couldn’t properly express it. I knew the feeling well.
“You must be Pierce,” she stated. “My name is Moonlily.”
Pierce glanced rapidly back and forth between me and Lily, his mouth agape. His movements were so exaggerated, it was easy to envision him as a cartoon character bamboozled by his nemesis’s antics. My amusement at his expense was the only thing that kept me from freaking out about Lily revealing herself.
“Do you know this fairy?” Pierce demanded.
“I do.”
“For how long?”
“Several months.”
“And you didn’t tell me?” He seemed genuinely wounded by the slight. “You had to have known how excited I’d be!”
“I’m sorry, Pierce.” But his attention had already abandoned me and come back full-force on Lily.
He was holding back his enthusiasm, but only barely. He bounced a little on his toes while he watched her. Lily bore the attention patiently. I had told her about Pierce and his passions, so she had to have had at least an inkling of an idea about how he’d react. Finally, he could hold it all in no longer, and he shot a hand out at her. “May I?” he asked anxiously.
Lily obliged him and landed on his outstretched palm. Gingerly, he brought her closer. The sheer joy in his smile elicited a grin from Lily, as well. “I knew it,” he breathed. “I knew that fantasy beings had to be real. Too many of you show up in too many cultures’ mythologies. The stories couldn’t all be entirely made up.”
“You and your brother are quite unlike each other,” Lily laughed. “He barely believed I was real even when I was right in front of him.” She grabbed hold of one of Pierce’s fingers and gave it a gentle kiss. It was a decidedly different reaction than what she’d done to my finger the first time we met. “You’re a sweet boy,” she gushed.
I jabbed Pierce in the ribs with my elbow. Playfully— or so I told myself. “Okay, time to break it up.” Lily threw a coy smile at me and flew over to my shoulder, where she gave my earlobe a reassuring nibble.
Pierce saw it. “Okay,” he said uncomfortably. “That’s just weird.”
Lily and I burst out laughing. “Pierce,” I said. “You are wonderful.”
“Whatever you say, you nut.”
That did me in. I lost control completely. I laughed so hard tears streamed down my face and the muscles in my belly cried out in protest.
“I think you mean a walnut,” Lily observed dryly.
Meeting Pierce had gone so well that Lily insisted she be introduced to the rest of my family, as well. As much as I tried to tell her that they were not all as open-minded about the reality of the fey as he was, she refused to hear it. She was absolutely adamant about seeing them— my mom, my dad, even my grandmother— face to face.
“I’m telling you, Lily,” I explained for the hundredth time, “it will not go over well. They’re likely to hit you with a fly-swatter.”
“What if I change to my human size?”
“You can do that?” Pierce had walked in uninvited on this particular iteration of the argument and proceeded to make himself at home. When I nodded, he added, “If she can do that, then what’s the problem?”
“You haven’t seen her at that size,” I said. “She’d never pass as human.”
“Can I at least offer a second opinion on that?” He looked over at Lily. “Do you mind showing me?”
“Sure.”
“Face the wall, Pierce,” I ordered. No way was I going to let him watch her change. He wasn’t going to get a look until I got some clothes on her.
Once Lily put on one of my t-shirts and a pair of sweatpants, I let Pierce turn back around. He got one good look at her and frowned. “Well,” he sighed. “You were right.” We both just stared at her for a minute before Pierce suggested, “What if we just buy some of that fancy makeup that’s made to cover up tattoos? That’ll fix her skin. Then we could just do her hair up to cover her ears. And there are plenty of girls around with their hair dyed in rainbow colors. Her purple would stand out, but it wouldn’t be too unusual.”
“And what would she wear?”
Pierce shrugged. “We could go and buy her some clothes.”
Lily patted her palms together in approval. “I like that idea.”
“How are we going to pay for it all?” I questioned, taking on the unhappy role of the realist amidst all the daydreaming.
“You have money in your savings, don’t you?” Pierce asked. “I’ve got some left over from my summer job, too. I bet we’d have enough, don’t you think?”
“Probably.” I sighed in resignation. It was clear I wasn’t going to win this fight, not with both Lily and Pierce against me. “Fine. But I am not going to buy makeup and women’s clothing by myself. So, buck up, dear brother. This was your idea. Now you get to help execute it.”
8
Rose Street Fire
It only took most of the next day to find everything we needed. Browsing through makeup departments and women’s clothing stores was not how I wanted to spend my spring break, but I got it done. For Lily, I told myself near to a hundred times. It was certainly not the first time I’d done something against my better instincts for her, and I could guarantee it wouldn’t be my last, either.
To minimize the amount of foundation she’d have to wear, we bought her a dress with long sleeves and a long skirt— and a neckline that fell right at her collarbones. She also got leggings and nice, closed-toe shoes. She hated it.
“It’s too much,” she complained. “I feel like I’m suffocating.”
That was to be expected, considering she spent most of her life wearing next to nothing.
“I know, Lily,” I tried to sympathize. “But if you want to meet my family, then this is how it has to be done.”
She grunted in displeasure and snatched up the bottle of foundation like it had personally offended her. Her transformation was remarkable, once she had her makeup on and her hair pulled up. She appeared nothing like the free-spirited, unintentionally provocative fey woman and looked— aside from her hair— like a well put-together and very modest girl. My grandmother was going to love her.
“What do we do about her eyes?” Pierce suddenly asked.
I took a closer look at them. To anyone who decided to look at her for longer than two seconds, there would be no hiding their bright violet color. I cringed. “Hope that no one notices? Pray they decide she’s wearing contacts if they do?” It was the best we could hope for. It was too late to buy normal colored contact lenses for her. I doubted she would have worn them, anyway.
As it turned out, the hardest part of the whole scheme was convincing my parents that I had a girlfriend— one that I had never mentioned but who suddenly wanted to travel all the way from our university to meet the
m. The disbelieving looks they gave me when I told them bordered on pity. I tried not to take it personally. I would have been skeptical, too, in their positions. Still, it stung.
On the day before Easter, Pierce sneaked Lily out of the house so that I could drive off and pretend to pick her up from the airport. It was hard for me to keep from shaking my head through all the shenanigans, but Pierce absolutely loved it. I was afraid he was going to give everything away with his obvious delight in the scheme.
We were trying to keep the time Lily would have to act human down to as little as possible. My grandmother’s house— where we were going to celebrate Easter the next day— was a two-hour drive from ours, so I told my parents that I’d be taking Lily straight there from the airport and that we’d see them in the morning. It was inevitable that my parents and grandma would talk to each other and discover that I’d lied about my overnight whereabouts, but at that point in the charade, that was the least of my worries. They were more than welcome to draw their own conclusions about what I’d been doing. They couldn’t be anywhere near as bizarre as the truth.
We woke up early in our hotel room that Sunday morning and spent the hour or so it took to get Lily presentable. Lily kept chewing on her lip in uneasiness, making it so that we had to reapply her lipstick every few minutes. I finally gave up. Her natural purple lips were just going to have to do. Maybe people would think she’d matched them to her hair.
“I’m nervous, Grant-Man,” she admitted just before we left the room to head to the car.
“So am I.”
“What if they don’t like me?”
“They will,” I tried reassuring her. “And if they don’t, that just means I get to spend more time with you alone, and I don’t have to share you as much.”
A Paranormal Easter: 14 Paranormal & Fantasy Romance Novellas Page 49