The Thirteenth Fairy

by Melissa de la Cruz

  “Filly?” her mother calls from downstairs. “Honey, are you up?”

  “Yes, Mum!” Filomena yells back, trying to hide the horror in her voice. “I’ll be right down!” At least it’s Saturday and she doesn’t have to go to school.

  She looks for something to cover up her forehead, rummaging in her closet for a hat or a headband—anything to hide the fairy mark from the world. Finally she finds an old beanie and pulls it on her head low. She inspects herself in the mirror multiple times before deciding it’ll have to do for now, until she figures out what in the other-world is going on.

  If the mark is real, then it means everything that happened to her was real.

  Let’s please not have this argument about what’s real and what’s not again, she remembers Jack saying.

  Okay, then.

  No argument there. The fairy mark on her forehead is definitely as real as the sunshine through the blinds.

  She walks downstairs, trying to appear cool, calm, and collected. Turns out she wasn’t sleeping in so late after all, as her parents are still seated at the table with breakfast ready. The delivery bag sits on the counter, just as it always does. But then she looks at the time and sees it’s almost noon.

  “Morning, sweetheart,” her father says. “We’ve been waiting for you to eat. You slept in awfully late today. Everything okay?”

  Filomena sees the concern in his eyes, and he and her mother await her answer with the patience they’ve always had with her, even in her bratty moments.

  She pulls her chair out and sits down slowly, hesitating to respond. She wonders how she can ask them what she’s about to ask them without hurting their feelings or causing them undue concern.

  “Mum, Dad, I have to ask you something,” she finally says.

  Her mother looks at her affectionately. “Of course. You can ask us anything.”

  “What is it, baby?” her dad asks. “We’re all ears.”

  “I know you guys adopted me when I was a baby, but do you know anything about my birth parents and where they were from?” she asks. Filomena holds her breath, anxious about what they’ll say. What do they know? Do they know? About Never After? About what’s hidden beneath this beanie she’s wearing?

  Her parents exchange meaningful, troubled looks, and it’s quiet for a moment before they both shake their heads.

  “No, honey, we don’t know anything about them at all.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  SCHOOL DAZE

  The rest of the weekend is the same. On Sunday she sleeps restlessly, and when she wakes up, the fairy mark is still there. On Monday morning she once again bolts upright, sweating and shaking. Adelina Jefferson-Cho looks up at her, alarmed. Filomena exhales, telling her pup it’s okay, and lies back down for a few moments, reflecting on her most recent nightmare.

  She dreamed she was back at school, wearing her beanie—the same one she’d been wearing when she asked her parents about her biological parents. When the bell for the first period rang, signaling that it was time for everyone to be in class, she was still at her locker, surrounded by the Fettucine Alfredos. They were teasing and taunting her as usual, saying mean things and pushing her to the point of frustrated and tearful rage.

  One of them ripped the beanie from her head, revealing Carabosse’s mark. They all gasped, looking at her with revulsion, telling her they always knew she was a total loser. They said they were going to tell everyone, and one of Posy’s minions snapped several quick photos for proof. Filomena screamed in response, begging them not to. She didn’t even want to believe it herself, let alone have the entire school know.

  But the mark was already glowing, and once Posy’s minion Petunia had added a filter to it, it was even brighter, blazing in the image like some sort of blasphemous disfigurement. The photo was shared everywhere, going viral before the end of the day. Her secret was out.

  Everyone knew.

  Word had gotten back to her parents. In her dream, they’d taken her first to a priest and then to a doctor to be evaluated.

  Luckily, she woke up to find it had been just a nightmare. But the mark on her forehead is definitely still there. She grimaces as she stares at it, wondering whether, if she wishes hard enough, it will disappear. She just wants her normal, boring life back in sunny, sleepy North Pasadena.

  She runs through her usual morning routine, taking a shower, brushing her teeth. She feeds her beta fish, Serafina Jefferson-Cho, squatting down to wave hello to her. Then she gets dressed in her usual school uniform: white shirt, green plaid skirt, oversized hoodie. Today she puts her combat boots on. Just in case she winds up at war with someone. The black beanie goes on last. And she adjusts it while looking in the mirror, ensuring it covers every part of the fairy mark. She considers cutting herself some bangs, but the kind of hair she has would never allow them to be easy to manage.

  “Come on, Filomena,” her dad yells up the stairs. “We gotta get going or you’ll be late for school.”

  “Be right there!” she yells back, grabbing her jacket and backpack and heading downstairs.

  They leave the house together after she kisses her mother goodbye, and as they walk down the driveway to his car, her father looks at her curiously.

  “Still wearing that beanie, huh?” he asks. “I mean, I like it, but are you allowed to wear hats in school?”

  She gulps. They both know the answer to that is no. “I’ll take it off if I have to,” she says.

  He shrugs in response, and they hop into the car. When he pulls up to the school and drops her off at the curb where he always does, she gives him a goodbye peck on the cheek, and he reminds her that he loves her.

  “I love you, too,” she says before she gets out of the car, adding, “Get your word count in today,” before she closes the door and waves him off.

  She takes a long breath, squares her shoulders, and stares ahead at the school, praying that no one will rip this beanie off her head like in her nightmare.

  But to her surprise, when she walks inside and approaches her locker, the Garganelli Gang is nowhere to be found. She wrinkles her face, wondering if they’ve chosen to torment someone else today. Odd, she thinks as she dials her locker combination and opens it up.

  Once she has the books and notebooks she needs for her first few classes, she closes her locker and sees the Ravioli Rodeo round the corner into the hallway. Oh great. Here they come, she thinks, swallowing hard in preparation for the verbal, and possibly physical, assault. If her dream wasn’t a dream, are they going to kill her for what happened last time—when she led them on a chase and wound up in a magic tree, out of their reach? Or was that part of the dream, too? It’s hard to tell anymore.

  As they approach, Posy and her minions stare at her, only it’s a new kind of stare. One she hasn’t seen from them before. They eye her cautiously, keeping their distance. They’re quiet as they pass by her and wiggle their way down the hall like the noodles they are.

  She watches them in confusion, wondering why they’re not bullying her as usual. Then she realizes it’s because today they can hurt her without a word.

  Her best friend, Maggie Martin, is alongside them. And as Maggie’s eyes meet Filomena’s, she whispers something to Posy and breaks away from the group. The rest of the noodles wait and watch.

  Maggie grimaces awkwardly, a not-quite smile on her lips as she keeps about six feet of distance between herself and Filomena. “Hey…”

  “Hey,” says Filomena. She hadn’t realized how much she missed Maggie until she saw her. Maggie is a big fan of the Never After books, too. There’s so much Filomena wants to tell her! But she can’t, not with Posy and her trolls watching them. “So, uh, you’re one of the Alfredos now?”

  Maggie shrugs. “They’re not as bad as I thought they were. Actually, they’ve been really nice to me.”

  “Oh,” says Filomena, because that’s all she can say.

  “I mean, everyone has to grow up, right? We can’t just spend all our days read
ing books and writing fan fiction and wearing Stalker hats,” says Maggie in a somewhat exhausted tone, as if Filomena is a child and Maggie is not just three months older.

  Ouch.

  “Why not?”

  “I mean, everyone has to grow up sometime, Filomena. We’re in middle school now.”

  “Right,” says Filomena, since this is obvious.

  “Okay, then,” says Maggie.

  “That’s it?”

  “What do you want me to say? They told me some pretty crazy things about what happened on Friday. They said you cursed them or something. Everyone’s a little scared of you now. But that’s good, right? At least they won’t bother you anymore.”

  “I didn’t curse them. I didn’t do anything!” says Filomena. All she did was stop time! That wasn’t a curse, was it? she wondered, thinking of what Zera had told her—that she carried the mark of Carabosse—and then how Jack had reacted to the news, how repulsed he was all of a sudden.

  It’s so confusing.

  “Bye, Filomena.” But before walking away, Maggie takes one last look. “Oh, and I’m sorry about the thirteenth book. I heard it didn’t come out. You must be pretty bummed.”

  “Come on, Mags,” says Posy, pulling on Maggie’s sleeve. “Let’s go watch the boys play basketball.”

  With that, Maggie offers an apologetic look and walks away, back to the Penne Posse. The group looks at Filomena suspiciously, like they know something is up, and Filomena gets another knot in her stomach, only this time she wonders if she’s going to be sick.

  They start walking down the hall again, Maggie in tow. Filomena stands there, alone, watching her now ex-best-friend walk away with her sworn enemies. She tries not to cry, at least not until they’re out of sight, promising herself she’ll make it to the bathroom before she’s too late for class.

  “Stay away from us, witch,” Posy tosses over her shoulder, and Filomena tugs the beanie farther down over her forehead as she watches them disappear.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  BACK TO THE BOOKS

  At least Filomena survived the school day without having to remove her beanie. Her teachers didn’t seem to mind, except for one who eyed her accusingly but didn’t say anything. Mr. Hernandez, her math teacher, probably assumed she had lice. She saw him scratching his head during the remainder of the class, like he was paranoid he’d somehow caught the critters. But she’d rather have her teachers think she has something wildly contagious than have the entire school and world know about her fairy mark, or curse, or whatever it is.

  After taking Maggie away, the Linguine Losers left her alone for the rest of the day. They kept a close eye on her, though. At first Filomena briefly wondered if she was just being paranoid. No, she wasn’t. Every time she looked up from her work or her book, there they were, staring at her. She glared back. They didn’t stop staring.

  To make matters more uncomfortable, she spent the whole day looking over her shoulder, half expecting Jack or Alistair to pop out and force her to go back to Never After. But they never appeared.

  At long last the bell rings and school is done for the day. Dad picks her up as usual, and the minute they pull into the driveway, she races out of the car and to the front door before he even shuts the engine off. “What’s the big hurry?” he calls out.

  “Oh, nothing!” she yells back. “I just have a lot of homework to do!”

  Before he can respond, she’s already inside, closing the front door swiftly behind her so that the puppy can’t escape.

  Dad looks baffled for a moment. He’s probably wondering why Filomena is acting this way, whether something happened at school or with her friends—make that friend, singular. She only ever had Maggie, and now she has nobody. Filomena knows she’s been unlike herself the last couple of days, and Dad will probably ask her about her behavior later, as he’s really into being a good parent.

  Filomena quickly says hello to her mother on the way in, then takes the steps two at a time until she’s upstairs and in her bedroom. She slams her door behind her and locks it. She can’t wait to get this beanie off her head! It’s been itching her almost all day, and she wants to see if, by some miracle, the fairy mark is gone.

  She tears off the hat and throws it on the floor, where it lands on Adelina, who is trailing behind her, tail wagging. The pup lets out a small and surprised whimper as the item softly lands on her little body, and then she runs in a circle and barks at it like it’s a threat.

  Filomena stands in front of the mirror, tracing her fingertips along the mark that is very much still there, and very much still real.

  There has to be a way to get rid of it! She can’t wear a beanie for the rest of her life, like some emo dude! Then she has an idea. She runs over to her bookcase, looking at the top shelf, where the books in the series are lined up. She riffles through them until she finds the very first book about Never After.

  If there’s something—anything—she’s missed, it’ll be in there, and she decides to read all the books again, starting with volume one, to search for a spell or something to get rid of this mark on her head.

  Just as she settles into bed, her doorknob starts turning.

  “Fil?” her dad asks. “Honey, why is the door locked?”

  “Um, no reason!” she answers nervously, rising from the bed and grabbing for the beanie on the floor. She puts it back on her head and checks the mirror, making sure the entire glowing mark is covered before seeing what her father wants.

  Filomena takes a deep breath to calm her pounding heart, pasting on a fake smile and trying for a somewhat-normal demeanor. “What’s up?” she asks too cheerfully as she swings the door open and leans against the doorframe. Here it comes. Concerned parenting. She braces herself.

  Dad stands outside her room with a perplexed look on his face. “Um, can we talk for a minute?” he asks.

  “Sure,” she says, moving aside. He walks in and takes the seat at her desk, shifting her backpack out of the way. “What’s up?”

  “I was going to ask you that,” he says. “Something on your mind? The other day you asked about your biological parents out of the blue, for the first time in twelve years. I just wanted to make sure everything’s okay. Is there something going on you’d like to talk about, sweetie?”

  Yes.

  So much. Let’s start with the fairy mark on my head.

  Then we can move on to how fiction isn’t fiction at all.

  Yes.

  “No,” she says, after a moment. “Everything’s fine. I swear.”

  “Really?” he prods.

  She sits on her bed and looks down, fidgeting with her pillow. She can’t look him in the eye and lie. “I was just curious. You know I love you and Mum, but, um … it’d be nice to know where I came from.”

  He moves to sit next to her on the bed, putting his arm around her. “I know, sweetheart. Mum and I love you, too. So much. You are the greatest gift we could have ever received. I wish we could tell you more, but we just don’t know anything.” He removes his glasses and starts wiping them with his flannel shirt.

  “It’s okay.”

  “Are you sure? I wish we had the answers, I really do,” her dad tells her sadly.

  “No, it’s all right. I promise.”

  “No matter where you came from, you’re ours. You’re Filomena Jefferson-Cho.”

  “Of North Pasadena,” Filomena adds. “I know.” She smiles.

  “You’re our baby.”

  “I know I am.”

  After a parting hug, he leaves the room, and she locks the door behind him, taking the beanie off once more.

  Filomena exhales. She loves her parents, but she can’t burden them with the truth. Or put them in any sort of danger. The ogre queen was able to send her wrath to this side of the portal. What if her parents were attacked?

  She kicks off her combat boots and cozies up in bed, starting with page one of volume one. She even reads the stuff she normally skips, like the copyright page and pr
inting information. She pets her puppy with her free hand as she turns the pages, and the dog snuggles up next to her. They’re very cozy. No one would think there was anything wrong with this scene, or that one of them might be sporting a glow-in-the-dark evil-fairy mark.

  Sometime later, after Filomena has read a decent chunk of the first book, she pauses and puts it down, scrambling through memories of previous reads. This book seems to be … different. She notices small discrepancies as she goes, and questions whether her recollection is simply off or if something strange is going on. The little instances are not enough to confirm or deny, though. She knows certain things get forgotten over time, especially when someone reads as often as she does. She’s read many books since this one. She’s just mixing up details in her mind, confusing them with other books, or possibly melding all the stories into one.

  But the more she reads, the more she notices. She sits up, changes position, reading the book so closely that her nose is nearly pressed to the page.

  Unless she’s somehow lost her mind, she’s pretty sure this isn’t how the story goes.

  The first book is the story of Jack the Giant Stalker. But somehow, as she rereads it, it’s not.

  The book couldn’t possibly rewrite itself … could it? she wonders. Because when she reaches the part about how Jack gets his name, the story is not at all how she remembers it.

  In the previous version she read—although it’s the same copy she’s always had—Jack defeats the giant. He conquers the giant, thereby receiving the nickname Jack the Giant Stalker.

  She is certain about this; she would stake her life on it. Jack Stalker is the hero of the story. But in this version, this strange and unexplainable new one, the tale is changed for the worse. Jack never even overpowers the giant. Instead, he falls out of the sky. Jack dies.

  Wait! Jack dies! What?!

  When she finishes the passage, she gasps and covers her mouth. She puts the book down and shakes her head, trying to make sense of this. The original story is gone, erased, rewritten. It’s been replaced with an entirely different version.