The Wishing Thread

by Van Allen, Lisa

  “But … why?”

  “I just can’t.”

  He didn’t speak.

  “I know it seems like a surprise,” she said. “But I have responsibilities. Grown-up stuff.”

  “I understand,” he said, and though his voice was a thin thread he did not cry. “When are you going?”

  She pulled him a little closer. “Today.”

  “Today?”

  “Yes.”

  “How come you didn’t tell me before?”

  “Nobody knows,” she said. “And I need you to keep this a secret just between us. You can’t go telling your mom or sister or Aunt Aubrey.”

  “Will they yell at you?”

  “Yes. And I don’t really want to be yelled at. So, can you promise? Can you promise me you won’t tell?”

  He gave a sigh, deep and long, and his small body in his old man’s clothes was so replete with pathos that Meggie might have laughed if she wasn’t so sad.

  “Hey, don’t worry,” she said. “We’ll see each other again soon. You have my absolute word that I’ll be back again, and I’ll find you, wherever you are.”

  He blinked up at her; she saw his eyes were swimming, though tears did not fall. “But I won’t get to pick out your costume.”

  “Still. You have a great costume, and that’s the important thing. You’re going to have a fantastic Halloween.”

  He seemed to grow smaller inside his cravat.

  “Now let’s get you back into your regular clothes so your costume can be a surprise for everyone on Halloween,” Meggie said with all the false cheer she could drum up.

  “Okay,” Carson said.

  Nessa lay on the scuffed and scarred floor near the stairs at the top of the tower. She knew for certain she was going to get in trouble for what she was about to do; the question was, How much? She’d read deeply into the night from the giant beast of a book that she’d found in Aubrey’s room, and she knew now that it was only a matter of time before she attempted to conquer the unconquerable with her own magic spell. But because she did not yet know how to do magic and because she did not have much time, she was stuck with her usual, non-magical methods for fixing things that went wrong.

  She adjusted her leg so it jutted more vulnerably. She pulled a blue plastic jar from her sweatshirt pocket and smeared its contents under her eyes. She heard her mother pounding heavy and fast up the tower stairs, followed closely by Aubrey and Meggie. She drew in a breath just as her mother appeared around the sharp corner of the stairs below her.

  “Are you okay?” Bitty asked. “What happened?”

  “I’m sorry,” she said. “I know I’m not supposed to be up here. I just—”

  “Tell me what happened,” Bitty said. “What’s hurt?”

  Nessa sniffled and rubbed at the tear that slid down her cheek. She’d learned the trick about smearing vapor rub under her eyes from a TV show, and she was surprised at how well it worked. She was perched at an awkward angle, her left shoulder against the wall joint at the top of the tower stairs, her right leg stuck out and her knee bent inward. The outside of her ankle bone was a hard white knob where she’d taken off her sock.

  “I was only going to be up here for a second,” she sniveled. It sounded very convincing to her own ears. “I swear, Mom. I’m really sorry.”

  “Is it your ankle?” Meggie asked, crouching beside her.

  Nessa nodded. “I know Mom told me not to, but I had to come, and then when I started to go back down the stairs I just stepped on my foot the wrong way.” As she spoke, she began to imagine the scene exactly as she’d described it, and the vision of herself tumbling, gasping in surprise and pain, made her eyes sprout fresh tears—real tears, having nothing to do with vapor rub—even though her fall hadn’t actually happened. She squeaked: “Is it … do you think it’s broken?”

  “Can you move it?” Aubrey asked.

  “I don’t know.” Nessa feigned experimentation, the slightest flex of her toes. She sucked air hard between her teeth, then gave a little cry.

  “Shoot.” Bitty raised herself up to stand and Aubrey did the same. “I guess we have to go to the emergency room.”

  “No! No emergency room. I’m fine. I’ll be okay. I just need a minute.” Nessa lifted her eyes to her mother with what she hoped looked like suffering bravery. This next line she was about to speak was the most important line of all. If anything was going to make or break the charade, it would be this. She let a tear fall. “Could you guys, like, give me a little air? I just—I can stand up. I just need everybody to give me a little room.”

  “Let me help you,” Bitty said. “Here, take my hand.”

  Nessa shot her an angry look.

  “Okay, okay,” Bitty said. And she took a few steps back with her ten fingers lifted as if Nessa had pointed a gun. Aubrey backed up with her. The tower room was not especially large and was packed with stuff, and so there wasn’t a lot of space between Nessa and her mother—just a few feet. Hopefully it would be enough.

  Only Meggie hesitated where she was squatting beside Nessa. Meggie’s eyes were sharp and suspicious. Nessa felt a little watery snot dripping from the tip of her nose, and rather than wipe it off, she let it be. She hoped it was the finishing touch.

  Wordless, Meggie pushed her body up with her hands on her knees, then stepped away.

  Here we go, Nessa coached herself. Tentatively, she wiggled her foot. Her mother and sisters were watching her like hawks: Bitty’s arms crossed in disapproval, Aubrey’s face contorted with worry, Meggie’s hands on her hips and a wary glint in her eye. Slowly, Nessa got to her feet without touching her sore foot to the floor. Her mother started toward her.

  “No!” Nessa shouted. “Stay back.”

  She pivoted on one foot until she was facing the hard darkness of the stairs. The smell was familiar, musty and old; she’d smelled it once before when she’d stuck her face against the bars of a mausoleum.

  “Okay?” Aubrey asked.

  “I think …” Nessa put her foot on the first stair that led down into the dark. Then, after only the slightest pause—which stretched to eternity—she began to run. She took the stairs two at a time, her footfalls booming. She registered the sounds behind her, shouts of disbelief, dismay. She counted on shock to give her the few seconds she needed to get ahead of them. She reached the open door at the bottom of the stairs and turned around as fast as she could to throw her weight against it.

  “Go go go!” she shouted to Carson, who was waiting for her. He stared at her stupidly for a second that was nearly a second too long. “Come on!”

  Jolted, he dragged a solid wooden chair up against the door. They wedged it under the old glass knob just a fraction of a second before it turned. She heard her mother, drumming the flat of her hands on the wood.

  “Nessa! Nessa, you let us out of here right this instant! Nessa—you’re in a lot of trouble for this!”

  “No!” she shouted at the closed door. “You’re in time-out.”

  She heard her mother pause. “Nessa—I’m not joking. You better unlock this door right this second!”

  “Or else you’ll do what?”

  Her mother growled, a sound Nessa hadn’t known she could make. “Let us out! I said, right now!”

  Nessa walked herself closer to the door so that she could talk through it without yelling. “Okay. I’ll let you out. No problem. But first, you guys have a lot of talking to do. And we’re not opening this door until it’s done.”

  “What are you talking about?” Bitty said.

  “You’re not coming out until you’re not fighting anymore.”

  “What fighting?” Bitty said. “Nobody’s fighting.”

  “But you’re not getting along all the way,” Nessa said.

  “Sure we are.”

  Nessa rolled her eyes “Okay. So then I’m sure you know that Meggie is planning to sneak out later today? Like, leaving and not even telling you?”

  There was no reply.

&nbs
p; “That’s what I thought,” Nessa said.

  “You are so grounded,” Bitty said. She banged the door. “You’re grounded until you’re eighteen. No—until you’re old enough to be tormented by kids of your own! Nessa? Nessa!”

  Nessa took in a shaky breath. There was nothing more that needed to be said. She looked at her brother, whose big eyes were wide and mousy. Okay? she mouthed. He stuck up his thumb. She knew she was going to get in trouble—this had been her plan, after all. But it was worth it. Carson had come to her an hour ago, blubbering and snotting on his sleeves because Aunt Meggie was planning to run away. Nessa sometimes wondered if she was the only grown-up she knew.

  “How long do we leave them in there?” Carson whispered.

  “You’re asking me?” she scoffed. “I have no idea.”

  Her brother’s eyes were beginning to water again.

  “It’s fine,” she told him sharply. “If anybody’s going to get in trouble here, it’s me.” She heard her mother yelling behind the door, making pathetic threats about Nessa’s cell phone and mall privileges and driver’s license and college and whatever other things she could think to name. Nessa pulled herself up straight, looked at her brother, and spoke loudly. “It’s getting a little noisy. Let’s go downstairs.”

  * * *

  By the time Bitty emerged from the thicket of shadow in the tower stairwell, Aubrey knew that something was wrong—something more than a child playing a prank. Bitty’s eyes were full of apology; her mouth was drawn.

  “Let me guess,” Meggie said. “We’re locked in.”

  “What? Why?” Aubrey scowled in worry. “Are the kids okay?”

  “Oh, they’re fine,” Bitty said. “They’re perfect little angels.”

  Meggie snorted.

  “I don’t understand this,” Aubrey murmured.

  “I’ll explain it,” Bitty said. “Our friend Meggie here decided that she would take off without telling anyone. And it ticked off my kids.”

  “It’s not my fault you can’t control your monsters,” Meggie said. She was leaning against the Stitchery wall, her posture slumping, her arms crossed.

  “And it’s not their fault or mine that you don’t give a thought to anyone but yourself!” Bitty said. “Those kids love you, Meggie. You can’t just take off out of the blue. I mean, what was I supposed to tell them when you were gone?”

  Evening was falling, and a hard chill came through the Stitchery’s rattling boards. The air was freezing cold, as cold as if they were standing directly outside in the twilight without so much as a light jacket to warm them. Aubrey began to shiver. When she spoke, her breath was faintly white. “Let’s back up a sec,” she said. “Meggie—is that true? Were you going to leave today without telling us?”

  Meggie glowered.

  “Again,” Bitty said. “She’s leaving again.”

  “Knock it off, Bit,” Meggie said. “Like you’re some kind of saint or something. Like you didn’t leave the Stitchery, too.”

  “I at least had the decency to say good-bye. To say where I was going.”

  “So you have better manners than me,” Meggie said. “Big deal. You deserve a medal, and I should go to hell.”

  “Let’s give Meggie a little credit,” Aubrey said. “I’m sure if she was going to leave without telling us, she must have had a really good reason. Right, Meggie? I’m sure you had a reason.”

  “Yeah—” Bitty said. “Just like you had a good reason for leaving the first time.”

  “I do what I have to do,” Meggie said through clenched teeth.

  Bitty laughed. “By screwing over your family? Sorry if I don’t think that’s high on the list of honorable intentions.”

  “Me screwing over the family?”

  “Stop it,” Aubrey said. “Just stop!”

  She looked at her sisters, who—although they stood on opposite sides of the little room—seemed to be ready for a prizefight. Bitty was taut as a bow, practically on her toes, her hands clenched. Her muscles trembled faintly with cold. Meggie was deceptively still beneath the heavy hood of her sweatshirt, her eyes narrowed, her body bent into the dangerous slouch of a person about to explode.

  “Everybody just calm down!” Aubrey said. She stood in the room between them. “Bitty—I’m sure Meggie didn’t realize the position she put you in with the children by leaving. And Meggie—I’m sure Bitty doesn’t mean to sound so … insensitive. Right, Bit?”

  Bitty exhaled loudly. “I don’t need to accuse anybody of anything. Meggie knows what she did—and she knew damn well how much it was going to hurt my kids, how much it was going to hurt us, if she just took off again. This was flat-out punishment for something—her punishing us. The question, obviously, is what is she trying to punish us for?”

  “Is that true?” Aubrey asked.

  Meggie was hunched deep in her hoodie. “I think a better question is, How the hell are we going to get out of here? Apparently Bit’s kids don’t know the word hypothermia yet.”

  “At least you have a sweatshirt,” Bitty said. Her nose was beginning to redden, and her eyes had glazed.

  Aubrey glanced around. She opened a trunk and dug in it until she found a blanket. It was old and smelled like mothballs, but it was relatively un-dusty. “Here,” she told Bitty.

  Bitty moved closer, and Aubrey draped the blanket around both of their shoulders. Together they sat down on the floor, draped in a quilt of fire trucks, and rubber duckies, and green dinosaurs.

  “Are you coming?” Aubrey said.

  Meggie just scowled.

  “Suit yourself,” Bitty said. “You always do anyway.”

  “Get over it,” Meggie said. And she walked herself to a corner and plopped down.

  “Stop it, guys. This isn’t helping. Meggie—” Aubrey’s teeth chattered. “I don’t believe for one second that you would do something that might intentionally hurt Nessa and Carson. There must have been a reason you had to leave so abruptly. A very good reason. Whatever it is you’re not saying, I bet it will feel really good to get it out in the open, once and for all.”

  Meggie shook her head. Maybe she wanted to yell. Maybe she wanted to cry. Instead she sat there with her knees drawn to her chest, her lips pressed tight, and her face turning hot red under her translucent spikes.

  “Aubrey’s right,” Bitty said. “What’s going on? Why didn’t you clue us in?”

  “Because. I’ve been looking for someone,” she said, each word carefully measured out and dispensed.

  “Who?” Bitty asked.

  Meggie was silent.

  “They’re not going to let us out of here until we know the whole story,” Bitty said.

  “Well—who do you think I was looking for?” Meggie said. “Hello? Mom.”

  “Our mom?” Aubrey said.

  Meggie rolled her eyes.

  “I don’t understand,” Bitty said. “Mom’s been dead for a long time.”

  Meggie shook her head. “I don’t believe that. That’s a story that Mariah made up and that everybody else started to believe because it was convenient.”

  “Why do you think she’s not dead?” Aubrey asked. “Do you know something we don’t?”

  “I know a lot of things you don’t. You might have known Mom better than me, but I know things, too. Things I found out about her when I was out there.”

  “What things?” Bitty asked.

  “She’s alive?” Aubrey said.

  “I found hints. Proof of her. In places she’d been.”

  Her sisters looked at her as if she’d lost her mind.

  “People don’t just go missing. Not these days.” Meggie crossed her legs in front of her, sitting upright despite the damp, raw cold. “I’ve been everywhere. A hundred cities you can think of and a thousand towns you can’t.”

  “How did you know where to look?” Bitty asked.

  “When I first started, I had leads to track down. But these days, I mostly just have to follow my heart,” Meggie said. “It’s a s
hot in the dark, but once in a while something turns up.”

  “Why didn’t you tell us what you were doing?” Aubrey asked.

  “Because I knew you would try to stop me. And I thought—I thought you’d make fun of me. Or tell me I was wasting my time.”

  “I would never do that,” Aubrey said. “Your heart was in the right place. And Mom would have been honored, and proud of you.”

  “Would have been?” Meggie scoffed. “Would have? She will be proud—when I find her. For all we know, she forgot who she is or where she comes from, and she needs us to bring her back.”

  Aubrey glanced up at Bitty—a look that made Meggie feel horribly, miserably left out. She rubbed at her nose with her knuckles; the tip was cold. “It’s not that I didn’t want to tell you. It’s not that I didn’t want to come back. A thousand times a day I thought, maybe I’ll just go to the Stitchery for a visit. Maybe I’ll just stop by. But I knew that if I stayed for a second, it would be really, really hard to leave again.”

  “But you were going to leave today,” Bitty pointed out.

  “Not because it was going to be easy.”

  “Then why?” Aubrey asked.

  “There was no choice. Somebody’s got to be out there looking for her. Somebody owes her that.”

  Aubrey stared at the spot on the floor. She adjusted the quilt around her shoulders. “I wish I knew this before. I would have tried to help.”

  “You couldn’t,” Meggie said. “You had to stay here, right? That’s your thing. To hide out like a nun in the Stitchery for your whole life?”

  Aubrey didn’t answer.

  Bitty let out a long breath. “Meggie, you were really young when Lila vanished. You might not remember everything. Maybe, in your head, you made Lila out to be some kind of better mother than she actually was.”

  “I know what she was,” Meggie said. “For the most part.”

  “But do you remember how she was in the end? Do you remember the time she threw away every left shoe in the house—every one she could find? Do you remember the time she got arrested trying to carry a lawn chair out of a store without bothering to pay for it? Not something she could fit in her pocket, but a lawn chair?”