Page 122 of Fairies Never Fall

“No.” They want to see me — they said so. Mom cried on the phone.

Nausea churns in my gut. I unbuckle my seatbelt and open the door before I can do the cowardly thing and turn around and go home. I shut them out for years because I was so scared they would reject me for all the ways I failed them. I can be better than that now.

Lysander hangs slightly behind me as we walk up the stairs to the porch. I ring the doorbell. The churning in my stomach comes to a peak and I fight back the urge to run. Or throw up.

The door opens. My dad’s familiar, warm face greets me first before his arms sweep me up and I can’t see, smothered in his coat.

“Ezra,” he chokes, squeezing me hard. “Son.”

“Is that —”

My mom stops short and her quick sob breaks my heart again. My dad lets go of me and she reels me in, her familiar smell filling my lungs. I have to bend down to hug her, a fact I’ve never forgotten, which hits me like a blow to the chest. She hugs me for a long time, until I’m fighting back my own tears, and then she lets me go.

“Come inside. Who’s your friend?” she asks, dashing at her eyes. She holds out her hand. “I’m Miriam Pine.”

“Lysander,” he says, taking her hand unflinchingly, which says something about how far he’s come. “It’s lovely to meet you, ma’am.”

“Lysander’s my boyfriend.”Partner. Forever person.I try to convey the rest silently.

My mom beams as Lysander bends over her hand in a full-out bow. “Gosh, you’re a charmer. Lysander is a gorgeous name. Is that Shakespeare?”

“My parents loved Shakespeare,” Lysander says with a smile as my mom takes his arm and leads him toward the kitchen.

My dad holds me back, a tiny furrow on his forehead. “He’s good for you, kiddo?”

I watch Lysander squeeze my mom’s hand and start telling her about Elsabeth’s namesake even as he looks around with wide eyes at the floral wallpaper and the shelves full of knick-knacks. I know he’s cataloging every piece of decor for his own nefarious goal of decorating my — our — apartment, since I stillrefuse to let him pay for a nicer place. I have a bit of spare cash these days, enough that I could probably afford to move, but I’m enjoying having savings instead. Anyway, the place isn’t so bad now that Lysander is in it.

“Yeah, dad. He’s really good for me.” The truth is warm and light on my tongue.

My dad nods approvingly. “Good.”

EPILOGUE

The suit clings just as tightly as it did the first time around. Now that I’ve squeezed into it, I wish I’d had the sense to ask Lysander to make adjustments before the show. I was too preoccupied at the dress rehearsal by his ethereally pretty — and extremely fucking sexy — gossamer robe-thing, which I told him in great detail later as I pushed it up his thighs and fucked him in the hallway of our apartment. He begged and whined and clung to me, thoroughly distracting me from the fit of the suit, and afterward I’d had to get everything dry cleaned at Fitzie’s building.

Again.

By the time it came back it was too late to get anything tailored. Now I’m paying the price of itchy balls and a too-cinched waist.

The music swells. Dark fog billows across the stage to simulate shadows. I adjust the crown and the pins holding it in place, wondering not for the first time how I got roped into this. I’ve always hated being the center of attention, so how the hell am I about to willingly step out on stage?

I can’t have anyone else play the Night Prince to my Fairy King,Lysander had said coaxingly, fluttering his pale eyelashes at me. He was also naked at the time. Maybe that’s what did it.

Maybe it’s just that his bravery has infected me.

The cymbal clashes, signaling my cue. I stride onto the stage, trying to project princeliness.Hah. Me, a prince.But the crowd whoops and cheers.

“What awful commotion do I hear?” I growl, lifting the heavy scepter in the air — I suspect it’s not a costume piece at all, just like the crown. I try to ignore that fact because I’m on stage in front of a hundred monstersand my goddamn parents. “What are these birds singing? This music playing? This warm laughter? It pierces the veil between worlds and infects my domain of shadow, withering my ears…”

The Night Prince gives a speech about how selfish the Fairy King is for making pretty things and inflicting them on others, then he curses the land to shadow and stabs his scepter into the ground, leaching all the green away. The huge wooden set pieces turn, the trees that Lilian painstakingly painted spinning from the green side to the black one. Fog swirls around me in a cool mist.

Lysander is lowered from the rafters in his swing, looking radiant. His silky robe billows around him as he touches down delicately. His hair ripples freely down his back.

“Who disturbs the beauty of my eternal summer?” His voice rings out bell-like over the stage, and the crowd hushes.

I step forward. “Tis I, the Night Prince.”

The monster kids titter as we circle each other with exaggerated steps. I have to concentrate to make sure my feet land on the beat of the music, but Lysander makes it look effortless. His eyes glitter and he improvises a little spin, showing off.

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