Page 128 of Fairy Godmothers Aren't Cheap

I blinked a few times. “Destiny?”

“You weren’t to blame.”

I sat in the new knowledge. My parents’ breakup had actually been fated or in the stars or whatever, meaning it was all going to happen somehow, with or without my wish?

“It wasn’t my fault?”

Estelle shook her head and softly whispered, “No. Not at all.”

I sat back, remembering the joy of sitting in that restaurant booth, the two people I loved most in the world singing to me around a candle-lit piece of cake. I wouldn’t take that moment back for anything, and it was so much sweeter now, knowing that I wasn’t truly to blame for the ensuing unravelling that had occurred. If I hadn’t made that wish, I might not have created that warm, fond memory.

“Now please do it!” Estelle said desperately, and I jumped.

“Oh! What? Right. The new chant thing.” I closed my eyes, concentrating on the new mantra to sever the connection between my good deeds and Estelle’s little karmic vacuuming system. I started to giggle, imagining flowers, rainbows and glitter hearts pouring into a dusty old 1950s Hoover that was all tubes and metal, making it bulge and groan, finally breaking open and sending love across the universe.

“You done?” Estelle asked dryly, like she’d been able to see what had been playing out in my imagination and found it less than amusing.

“Yes.”

“So here’s the problem.” She leaned forward, hands clasped on the table. “You’ve already paid back your debt by about three times.”

I blinked. Wait. No. That couldn’t be right. What were the implications of something like that?

“Everything compounded over the past day and a half. And we fairy godmothers make it a habit to never owe anyone anything.”

CHAPTER48

~ Estelle ~

Iclosed my eyes, wavering on the spot in front of Gram-Gram’s rosewood desk. Today, I didn’t want to even focus on its intricately carved flowers. I wanted to disappear. I wanted this hellish feeling of being between life and death to be over.

Minutes ago, Trish had found me in my cubicle, sipping Canada Dry and trying to settle my nerves after a little run-in with Igor.

He always drooled. And always licked his lips. It didn’t mean anything that he’d been doing thata lotduring our recent conversation.

Except then Trish had leaned over the back of my chair, whispering, “The head fairy wants to see you.”

And it wasn’t report time. And she never whispered unless it was something mean she didn’t want others to overhear. Then, when I’d turned around to face her, she’d lacked her usual too-sweet, slightly gloating look. But I hadn’t been able to put a pin in her emotion. Was it envy? No, why would she feel that? Was it defeat? It looked a lot like defeat. Defeat because her main rival was about to get fed to the ogre in accounting and who would she compete against if I was dead?

It was likely that. Especially since you couldn’t name a rule or regulation I hadn’t bent, broken or bastardized lately.

“Well,” the head fairy said calmly as I wavered in her office, eyes still closed, “Char is an adventure, isn’t she?”

I nodded mutely.

“Are you wishing right now?” Gram-Gram asked curiously.

I shook my head. We weren’t allowed to make wishes.

“Then why are your eyes closed?”

“So I don’t cry when you feed me to Igor.”

She let out a giant, very unladylike snort. “Estelle,” she reprimanded, “we have been through this. He’svegan.”

“Yes, but he licked his lips when he told me I fried the system.”

Gram-Gram laughed. “Yes. You did do that.”

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