Page 2 of Just Right
Her answering smile doesn’t quite reach her eyes. “Yes, dear?”
I use the point of the pen to tap on the paper. “Um. Sorry, but I just noticed something… I went through the last week of filling out forms, talking to the entire council… and then the interview with you today… I thought I was agreeing to three days. This says ‘weeks’ here.”
She doesn’t even look at the contract. “Is that a problem?”
Is it?
With all of the vacation time I’ve racked up since I first interned at my company before being hired on full-time at nineteen, I was approved for a month’s leave. I thought I would need it to recover from the heartbreak of another failed search for Charlotte, but if shedidgo into the forest… if there’s a chance someone in there might know where she is or what happened to her… if I need to survive threeweeksin there to earn a wish that could give me that closure… three weeks. Can I really survive a magical forest for three weeks?
I believe in magic. At least, I believe that there are things out there that I can’t explain, or that I don’t understand. Aliens or monsters… the idea that there’smoreto the world than the ordinary humdrum existence we all seem to lead was something else that Charlotte and I had in common.
If there was a chance to prove it, and maybe even get a wish out of it? I have no doubt in my mind that my best friend would eagerly walk into a ‘mythical’ forest and try her best against any sort of beast or monster that called it home.
The question is: will I?
Feeling a little nervous, and not so sure why, I lick my lips. My tongue is dry, and I’m wishing that I’d grabbed one of the water bottles from my room before I met Sandy at the town hall for today’s final interview.
I still haven’t signed. I was actually a little surprised when Sandy finished the interview by presenting me with the contract in the first place even if that’s what I wanted, but putting some legalese into something that’s supposed to be so fantastical? It just seemed… odd.
The sudden bait-and-switch doesn’t make it any better.
“I didn’t bring enough supplies with me for three weeks,” I admit at last.
She taps a lower paragraph with her fingertip. “You won’t be allowed to enter the forest without anything more than the dressprovided for you. So even if you had other items from the outside world, the council wouldn’t allow them in Blackmoor.”
Blackmoor… it didn’t take long for me to realize that this isn’t just a small European village full of people with thick accents who, luckily, speak fluent English. They’re the guardians to this forest, and the forest itselfisBlackmoor.
And I’m walking into a supposedly monster-infested woods withnothing? For threeweeks?
“What do I eat?” I ask. “Or drink?” I thought I would at least be able to pack a bag for three days… “I’ll never survive three weeks.”
“A resourceful girl like you, Ms. Holloway… I think you would. The forest provides, after all. It welcomes its challengers. But if you’d prefer to refuse…” Sandy’s eyes darken notably as she purses her lips. “Jemma’s hair isn’t quite as gold as yours, but she might work in a pinch.”
Jemma. I’m not sure why the council seem so obsessed with finding a blonde, but I noticed that my fellow petitioner looked enough like me that it was a little eerie. She came from California, I’m from New Jersey, but apart from her summer tan setting her apart from my pasty white skin during these last few dreary September days, we could pass for sisters.
We’ve met for dinner at the hostel a couple of times, each of us keeping the reason we’re here close to our chest. The only thing I can say is that Jemma is one hundred percent convinced that earning a wish… that’s true. It’s real.
And she wants it.
But you know what? I want it more. It looks like, of the two of us, I’m the one that got the first nod since every council member I’ve spoken to after my arrival has made it clear that, no matter how many people find their way to Blackmoor at a given moment, they only allow one petitioner in (if any). I got picked,but if I don’t agree to spending twenty-one days inside instead of just the three, everything I’ve done so far was for nothing.
The research. The plane tickets. The countless hours online, poring over the messages, trying to reach a Charlotte that doesn’t exist anymore. Figuring out how to make it to the small town in the first place, then jumping through every hoop the village council put in front of me to be given the chance to enter the forest… no.
I’ll do it. For more than twenty years, Charlotte was there for me. Even if the last thing she did was walk into Blackmoor, I owe it to her to find out what she wanted so desperately, she’d give up her life for it.
And if I can’t? Then at least I’ll know I tried, and is there anything else I can ask for?
I don’t have any living family. I’ve jumped from relationship to relationship, never finding someone that felt just right to me. There was always something wrong. Too cocky, too loud, too shy, too rough… I never wanted to think I was picky, but when I ended every single relationship because of some flaw… who knows? Maybe I just can’t be satisfied.
Or maybe I’ve had so much loss in my thirty-two years that I’m guarded against anything less than forever.
For me, Charlotte was that one constant in my life. I loved her like a sister, and I just can’t accept that she disappeared. I tried, but I couldn’t, and this is the last lead that I have, fantastical as it is.
Let Jemma fight for her wish instead of me?
Sorry, girl.
I scrawl my legal name—Aurelia Holloway—onto the line at the bottom of the contract.
