Page 15 of The Girl in the Forest

We had that in common, the loneliness… his, threading in and out of mine… and I thought about the special kind of awful in duplicating life. Living in the past while believing it was the present. I’d done it for most of my life, living through my camera lens. But I supposed wanting to escape had been more important than paying attention.

And didn’t we all have reasons for hiding from the world?

I certainly did.

After Effa left, I tried to settle in, finding it too easy to believe nothing had changed and I was still at home in Azul. When I entered the bedroom, the rumpled bed was the same as I’d left it that morning. In the bathroom, a mere thought had water gushing into the elegant marble tub. Steam fogged the air. Flowers floated in the water and the towels were fluffed and heated.

I knew that every flowing, gorgeous dress hanging in the closet would fit. I’d look beautiful, or elegant. Whatever style I wanted and whenever I wanted it. Even the casual clothes mimicked old favorites.

But my mother had known of this wrinkle. How the magic would soothe the ache of separation. And she’d been smart enough to see it as the lure it was, the faille’s delusions, wrapped up in luxury and fondness and longing, using memory and not the dark to trap me.

I made myself remember that when I tried to sleep in a bed softer than a cloud. When I looked toward the half-filled water glass sitting on the nightstand, in the exact place where I’d left it. Beside the glass were the wildflowers I’d picked for Halwyn’s rite, then left behind because I couldn’t think about Halwyn or any of the others without crying.

The flowers looked wilted enough to remind me that not everything in the wrinkle thrived. And as the hours passed, then the days—what became hard was dealing with magic that met every demand. I’d never prepared myself for food appearing on the table whenever I was hungry. Music drifted through hidden speakers the moment I disliked the silence.

I told myself there was a benefit. The magic would control the uncontrollable, give me what I wanted without the risk. And perhaps this was a better ending for me. Safer.

I could have Azul without the chance of turning feral, hurting those I wanted to protect.

I’d be alone, though.

Which didn’t seem so bad, not with the lazy monotony of blended days. I woke up and went to sleep. I was okay. I was fine. Until the morning when I found Hattie’s pancakes waiting on the table. Perfect, down to the maple syrup dripping off the plate.

But Hattie and Oscar weren’t there, and it made me angry enough to change the memory. I thought about cold cereal, and standing at the counter eating because the one kitchen chair I had in my Seattle apartment rocked on the uneven floor.

While my dingy kitchen did not appear, a bowl of cereal slapped down on the counter hard enough to slosh the milk. Then the pancakes disappeared, along with all the chairs.

Magic is like a puppy, Noa, slobbering over the toy.

Magic was also easy to offend, and I closed my eyes. Said I was sorry. The chairs reappeared, sliding into place as if the magic was sorry too.

We started over. I asked for coffee, cream, the croissants I’d eaten on Grayson’s glass deck, and then I took the food outside and didn’t stop walking until I was standing on the wooden boat dock.

The Adirondack chairs were there. I imagined Leo, sitting in one while we talked about the faille magic choosing me. How I wanted to reject it, and how Grayson was the same way when the alpha magic chose him.

The dock edge was beyond Leo’s chair, and my thoughts drifted to the night when I sat beside Grayson, telling him about the thing that hid in my dark abyss. How it responded to his energy.

I could almost feel his warm hand rubbing circles on my back while I talked.

Almost hear his voice, telling me how much trouble I was in. How he would protect me.

And the almost in that memory was shredding. Along with the sameness in this wrinkle, where the lake water lapped, and the birds sang on repeat. Where the grass looked dewy but never dampened my feet.

Magic is an illusion, Noa. Like the images through your camera lens. And believing the illusion is as pointless as wishing at midnight, with no one to hear but the restless wind.

I was like a shabby sweater fraying at the edges, lost and small, too afraid to wonder about the outside, to think about the lives going on without me. Or worry about how long before the wolves forgot me.

Before they all died of old age, and no one would ever remember.

Effa arrived while I was standing on the dock. It was well past noon, but I still gripped the coffee that had gone cold. Beneath my clenched fingers, the croissant was a collapsed mess. I brushed off her concerns, told her I was thinking, and lost track of time.

“Time loses meaning here,” the nymph agreed. Her dress today looked like a sunflower with a yellow petal hem. The brown leggings and green ankle boots reminded me of the stems I’d yanked from the ground in Grayson’s garden, and as we walked toward the house, the magic keyed in on that image, spreading wildflowers in great swaths.

I hated them. Instantly, they disappeared, and the suffocation in having every idea materialize edged a little closer to unbearable. If Effa hadn’t been holding my arm, I would have kept walking, past the house, back through the flawless, manicured gardens, searching for a way out.

Instead, I allowed her to lead me inside like an invalid, then to the chairs and the table where lemonade waited. And I wondered if that wasn’t a magical apology for the wildflowers, because I hadn’t thought about lemonade since I was ten.

“You get used to it after a while,” Effa said. “The way things appear out of nothing. It’s a little fish-eyed until you stop noticing.”

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