Wish

by Alexandra Bullen

  “So last night’s dress was real?” Olivia asked, a heavy sadness returning to her voice.

  “Afraid so,” Posey said.

  “But,” Olivia said, beginning to work things out, “if the dress I wore at the museum wasn’t really magic, then that means I still have one dress left.”

  Posey nodded.

  “Exactly,” she said, the word hardly out of her mouth before Olivia had hopped up to her feet.

  “This is perfect!” Olivia shouted. “I can wish for Violet back again!”

  Posey sat quietly, her gaze shifting to the ground.

  “What’s wrong?” Olivia asked.

  “There’s still the bad news,” Posey said. “Remember the rules?”

  Olivia closed her eyes, remembered that morning with Violet and the dusty diary.

  “Sure,” Olivia said. “No telling anyone about the dresses, no wishing for world peace, no wishing for more wishes…”

  Posey sat patiently and Olivia felt her face falling. They spoke at the same time:

  “No wishing the same wish twice.”

  “You already wished for Violet once,” Posey explained slowly. “I’m sorry.”

  Olivia scanned Posey’s face, her small, doll-like features, as if searching for a clue.

  “Wait,” Olivia gasped. “What about the wishing-from-the-heart thing? Wasn’t that a rule, too?”

  “Yes.” Posey nodded uncertainly. “But—”

  “But in my heart,” Olivia continued eagerly, “I never would have wanted Violet gone.”

  Posey shrugged sadly. “I’m sorry, Olivia,” she said, “but in that moment, you did. Or else the wish wouldn’t have come true.”

  Olivia’s eyes were frantic, her fingers trembling in her lap.

  “Maybe,” she said quietly. “But I was so upset. And everything she was saying was just making me feel worse.”

  Posey smiled, her eyes warm and sympathetic.

  “Nobody knows how to push our buttons better than family.” She smiled.

  Olivia sat back onto the couch, her eyes glazing over. She felt as if she’d been punched in the gut, her breathing choppy, her knees wobbling and falling in toward each other.

  Posey stood and crossed the room to an old armoire. She opened the door and pulled out a garment bag, identical in shape and color to the others Olivia had received. She laid the bag gently over the back of the couch. “Here you go,” she said. “Your third and final dress.”

  “I don’t want it,” Olivia mumbled under her breath.

  “What’s that?” Posey asked.

  “I’m sorry,” Olivia said. “I don’t mean to sound ungrateful. It’s just, if I can’t wish for Violet back, there’s nothing else worth wishing for.”

  Posey shrugged. “Well, it’s up to you whether you use it or not,” she said, settling behind the desk, feeling for something in a low drawer. She pulled out the faded leather journal and opened it in her lap. “But the dress is yours. I said three dresses, and I keep my word.”

  Olivia scooped the bag into her arms and started for the door.

  “Olivia, wait,” Posey called out to her.

  Olivia turned back as Posey ducked under the table, rummaging through a collection of shopping bags and holding one out for Olivia to grab.

  “What’s this?” Olivia asked.

  “Something else that belongs to you,” Posey replied mysteriously.

  Olivia opened the bag and reached inside, catching a familiar handful of satiny fabric. The colorful kaleidoscope of Violet’s secondhand dress peeked up from between the bag’s rope handles, and Olivia’s breath caught in the back of her throat.

  “I’m sorry I’ve kept it so long,” Posey said. “I didn’t know if you still wanted it mended or not.”

  “That’s okay,” Olivia said, her fingers landing comfortably on the still-torn seam. “I like it the way it is.”

  Posey smiled and nodded, settling back into her tattered armchair and taking the journal from the desk. She uncapped a pen and scribbled something on one of the worn yellow pages.

  “Thanks, Posey,” Olivia said softly as she opened the door. “For everything.” She stepped out into the bright afternoon sunlight and headed for home.

  40

  Olivia stared at the blinking numbers of her alarm clock on Monday morning, the first rays of morning light peeking through the blinds and falling in narrow stripes across her swaddled frame.

  She had spent much of the night chasing sleep, tumbling in and out of memories and dreams, her mind catching and turning over recent events: the fashion show, the fight with Violet, the fight with her parents, and everything that Posey had said.

  The alarm went off, a sudden, staccato series of beeps, and Olivia slapped at the clock with her hand. Earlier, she’d heard her mother’s footsteps on the stairs and felt Bridget pause on the landing. She’d done the same thing the night before, standing outside of Olivia’s door, the shadow of her high heels hovering in the narrow strip of light above the floor.

  Olivia had held her breath both times, waiting for the knock that never came.

  From the kitchen, she could hear Mac shuffling around, making coffee, the refrigerator door suctioning open and shut. She knew she’d have to talk to her parents eventually, but had no idea what she would say. Where would she start? Where would they?

  She let one arm flop down over her tired eyes, red and puffy from the lack of sleep and crying. The idea of getting up, of even moving her legs to get out of bed, knowing that she wouldn’t see Violet today, or tomorrow, or ever again…

  Violet.

  Just thinking her sister’s name sent waves of grief through her arms and legs, as if pieces of her were missing, her body aching for lost, phantom limbs.

  How was she supposed to go to school? She’d had enough trouble getting people to notice her in the first place, and now she was somehow expected to show her face again, after what had happened at the fashion show? Calla would never forgive her, and had undoubtedly already spread the word. Olivia suspected that most of the Bay Area was aware of her scandalous affair with Soren by now.

  Olivia’s heart tightened. In all of the drama with Violet, she’d practically forgotten all about Soren. She’d heard what Posey had said: The second wish never came true. Soren had truly cared about her all along. But what did that mean now? What could it mean, now that Calla, and probably everyone else, knew about them?

  The window was open a crack, and a sharp early-morning breeze gusted across the room, rattling Violet’s door against the frame. Olivia groaned, dropping her heavy arms back down to her sides and heaving herself up on the bed. She untangled her legs from the sheets and lowered her feet to the floor, each movement feeling separate and exhausting. Walking slowly to the door, she pulled it open, and took a few tentative steps inside, half hoping to find Violet waiting for her at the windowsill, as she’d been that first early morning, weeks before. She closed her eyes and tried to feel her sister in the room, tried to smell her shampoo, or hear her rolling laugh. But all she smelled was stale, trapped air, and all she heard was stuffy silence.

  She lunged for first one window, then the next, throwing them open and welcoming the cooling cross-breeze as it whooshed around the room.

  At least there was some air in here now.

  Back in her own room, Olivia’s eyes landed on her curtains, billowing white clouds in the corner by the window. She could barely make out a strange noise coming from behind them, a hollow fluttering sound, and she followed it across the room.

  Propped between a pane of glass and the screen was Olivia’s favorite photograph, the family shot on the boat that Violet had been looking at that afternoon.

  “Huh,” Olivia said out loud, wondering how the picture had gotten there. Hadn’t she put it back in her desk?

  Olivia forced the window shut and lowered down in the chair behind her desk, the bordered edges of the photograph curling up in her palms. She studied the smiling faces on the water, the girls ar
m in arm, sandwiched between their parents on the back of Mac’s boat, remembering back to that warm summer day.

  Her father had been driving the boat, her mother sitting beside him in her navy and white striped one-piece, the big straw hat she always wore in the sun covering one half of her face. Not long after the automatic timer had gone off, the hat had blown out across the water. Mac had swung the boat around to retrieve it, dragging his hand along the surface until he scooped the soggy hat back up, holding it high over his head, their hero.

  He’d asked who wanted to drive the boat home, and for some reason, Violet had been adamant that Olivia have a turn. Olivia had insisted she didn’t want to—they were nearing the harbor and she was nervous about being so close to the other boats. But Violet wouldn’t let it go.

  Olivia remembered the way her sister’s features had changed, darkening as her voice grew louder, her stubborn pleas more intense.

  Just do it, she’d coaxed. Come on. Live a little.

  Olivia could feel how mad she’d been. How frustrated and spent, fuming at her sister for making her do something she was afraid to do. It was exactly the same way she’d felt after Violet had pushed her into admitting she had a crush on Soren. And exactly how she’d felt the night before, after Violet had said all of those horrible things.

  At least I lived.

  Olivia looked back down at the photo on the boat, remembering what had happened next. Tired of listening to Violet’s nagging, she’d grabbed the wheel and guided the boat home, into the harbor and all the way up onto the landing, all by herself, all on her own.

  Olivia smiled, shaking her head clear of the memory.

  Nobody knows how to push our buttons like family…

  Posey’s voice was suddenly ringing in Olivia’s ears. Then she heard Violet, that evening on their grandfather’s yacht.

  You’re going to need friends, after…

  Olivia pressed the photograph between her fingers.

  Violet had known.

  She’d known Olivia could never make the wish on her own, even if it was time. She’d known her sister needed that little extra shove to start living on her own. And maybe, just maybe, she’d pushed Olivia on purpose.

  Olivia leaned back on her bed, her head heavy, her eyes tired and raw. Was she really ready to be on her own?

  There was only one way to find out.

  Olivia found a pushpin rolling around in her top desk drawer, and tacked the photo up onto the wall beside her bed, smoothing the edges and pressing it in place.

  41

  Olivia stood lingering outside the People’s Republic, anxiously checking her watch as the minutes ticked by. She didn’t have much time before the homeroom bell, and she had been hoping to catch Miles on his coffee run before class. There was a chill in the early-morning air, and Olivia was back to wearing her old favorite fleece, the soft gray collar zipped high under her chin.

  That morning on the bus, Olivia had considered her options for dealing with the disaster that was sure to await her at school. The idea of using her last wish to straighten everything out—with Calla, with Soren, with Miles—crossed her mind once or twice. But she knew that Violet had been right: Olivia needed to face her own problems, even when those problems were piled so high that she could hardly see beyond them, or begin to imagine a potential road across.

  Olivia was about to give up and head toward school, when the glass door, plastered with flyers for local bands and art openings, swung open. Bowie skipped out onto the sidewalk, a vegan no-cheese cheese Danish in one hand and a steaming thermos of fragrant black coffee in the other. Her hair was loose and much longer than Olivia had expected, flipping up in a little curl at her shoulders. She looked uncharacteristically cute, and Olivia had the sudden urge to pick her up and hug her.

  “Bowie,” Olivia said quickly, her voice fake-chipper and high. “I’m so glad you’re here. Is Miles inside? I stopped by your house but your mom said you’d both left early.”

  Bowie shifted her weight from one metallic green combat boot to the other, unwrapping the wax paper from her sticky pastry and nibbling at one corner.

  “Yeah,” Bowie said quickly, offering the Danish to Olivia as an afterthought. “I think he said he was going to the computer lab to do edits on your scene. He’s been at it all weekend. I had to lend him one of my wigs, you know, so he could read the rest of your lines convincingly.”

  Bowie glared at Olivia dramatically before taking a sip of her coffee, gasping as she burned the pink tip of her tongue.

  “I know,” Olivia said, talking more to herself than to Bowie. “I feel awful. I can’t believe I did this.”

  Bowie stared at her, her round blue eyes blinking behind the thick rims of her retro glasses.

  “Did what?” she asked innocently.

  “I don’t know,” Olivia said, hugging her arms to her waist against a sudden gust of wind. “Flaked out on something for school. I never used to do things like that.”

  “Oh,” Bowie said, nodding with exaggerated empathy. “You mean, have fun?”

  Olivia stalled for a moment, before realizing that Bowie’s painted red lips were stretching into a wide, teasing grin. The way the sun was bouncing off the mischievous little twinkle in her clear blue eyes reminded Olivia suddenly of Violet. She couldn’t believe she hadn’t seen it before.

  “I wouldn’t worry too much about it,” Bowie said. “It’s just school. And Miles is kind of a control freak. He’s probably happy he got to do the whole thing by himself.”

  Olivia smiled gratefully as Bowie lifted her bag, a worn men’s briefcase that appeared to weigh more than she did, over her shoulder and waved to one of her friends on the corner.

  “I gotta run,” she said to Olivia. “Come over for dinner again sometime. Caroline’s always looking for another sous chef.”

  Olivia nodded and picked up her own bag from where it had been resting on the tops of her feet.

  “Thanks, Bowie,” she said, stepping off the sidewalk and preparing to cross the street.

  “Godspeed,” Bowie called, tossing Olivia a wink from over her shoulder.

  Olivia found Miles holed up in one of the far cubicles in the upper-school computer lounge, dragging his finger over a mouse pad and scanning images of choppy ocean waves on the flickering screen of a shiny MacBook Pro.

  “Hey,” Olivia started gently, touching the shoulder of his moth-eaten brown and tan striped sweater.

  Miles jumped at her touch and recoiled into the cubby, his long legs knocking clumsily against the underside of the desk.

  “Sorry.” Olivia smiled. “Didn’t mean to scare you.”

  Miles looked quickly back to the glowing screen and shrugged as fingers of blushing rage crawled up both sides of his neck. Olivia settled awkwardly into the adjacent cubby, leaning her head over and around the woven partition separating the two plastic chairs.

  “Listen,” she whispered, the corners of her eyes peeled for the computer aide, a student teacher with colored contacts and a fauxhawk, expecting a disciplinary hush at any moment. “I’m really sorry about the way I’ve been acting.”

  “Don’t worry about it,” Miles said automatically, clicking the mouse pad and dragging images with exaggerated effort, his eyes unmoving and attached to a spot in the center of the screen.

  “I just wanted you to know that I feel horrible,” Olivia said quietly. “Really. There’s no way to really explain it, but I haven’t been totally…myself…since I moved here. And I don’t want to bore you with all kinds of excuses, but if you’re ever interested in hearing them, or, I don’t know, maybe even being my friend again…”

  Suddenly, the student teacher’s birdlike head appeared from over the top of his desk.

  “Excuse me,” he stuttered, indicating a sign hanging on the back of the door. “This is a noise-free zone.”

  Miles’s eyes drifted back down toward Olivia’s face, and they shared a quick, eye-rolling smirk. “Really,” he said. “Don’t worry about i
t. I’m sure you had a lot of family stuff going on.”

  Olivia nodded and looked down at her hands, remembering when Miles had tried to talk to her about Violet, and wishing she had let him.

  “I remember what it was like when my parents split up,” he said quietly into the cubby. “And then when my mom and Caroline got together…I didn’t want to think about it. I just wanted it all to go away.” His profile was lit up by the glowing screen, his eyes blinking and faraway. “I was convinced it was just a phase, you know?” He laughed. “I thought everything would go back to the way it was supposed to be.”

  Olivia smiled. “Did it?” she asked.

  Miles stared at her with mock frustration. “Clearly, no,” he deadpanned. “But it did turn into something else. We’re not the family we were before, but we’re definitely a family.”

  Olivia thought back to chopping vegetables with Miles and his family in the kitchen. Everything had seemed so happy and comfortable, it was hard to imagine a time when things weren’t so easy.

  “Besides,” he said, “family’s not family unless it’s totally messing you up. I’m pretty sure that’s the point.”

  Olivia smiled. “I guess that’s why it’s so nice to have friends,” she said. Miles hunched forward, red patches growing underneath the smooth dark skin of his cheeks.

  “True,” he agreed. “But I didn’t want to just be your friend. You know that.”

  Olivia sat up a bit straighter, surprised to hear Miles be so abrupt. As awkward as it was, it was also the first time he’d really said anything so direct, or with this much authority. It looked good on him, Olivia thought.

  She looked down at her hands in her lap, searching for something not totally lame or meaningless to say.

  “Please.” Miles smirked. “Spare me the I’m just not that into you speech.”

  “Okay.” Olivia nodded. “But, I do want you to know that it’s not that I’m not into you, it’s just—well, I was kind of already into someone else.” Olivia braced herself for more questions, but Miles only tucked a cowlicky tuft of thick brown hair behind his ear, tapping the eraser side of his mechanical pencil against the keyboard.