Page 32 of The Vanishing Bookstore
Lenny did indeed lead Dora home, if that’s what it was. She was so confused and torn about what was happening to her that she couldn’t quite decide. They walked along quaint streets, and she noticed that some of the houses were decorated for Halloween with the craziest number of skeletons she’d ever seen. Many were almost as tall as the houses themselves. She paused outside a house that was lit up with pink and purple windows, gazing in awe. It was such a beautiful sight – there were so many pumpkins she couldn’t count them all. Despite everything that had happened, somehow, she felt at peace in Salem. Strange as all of this was, she thought she might be able to call it home. It felt like what she had been longing for back in London: her real home.
Lenny didn’t speak, as lost in her own thoughts as Dora was. They turned a corner onto a tree-lined street and Dora realised they were back at Sephy’s house. A loud squawk and flapping of wings above their heads made her look up in wonder as she watched Hades swoop over them and straight to an upstairs windowsill, the one he’d been perched on when they’d arrived earlier. Lenny tutted.
‘That bird is too nosy for his own good, he’s been following us since we left the house.’
‘He has, birds do that?’
‘Normal birds don’t, familiars have an annoying habit of it.’
Dora smiled up at him. She liked the thought of her crow following her, it was comforting. She wished she could remember him from her time before she arrived here. As Lenny pushed open the gate to the cottage she heard his high-pitched voice as he chattered to himself, ‘Dora’s home, Dora’s home.’
Lenny opened the front door and turned to her. ‘I will take you up to see Lucine and let the pair of you spend some time together. Try not to ask her too many questions, she is already tired.’
‘What’s wrong with her, Lenny?’
The warm light in the hall shone across her aunt’s glistening eyes, unshed tears pooling in the corners.
‘Cancer. Every single lifetime she gets it and dies before the rest of us. There is something else you should know too, Dora, seeing as how this has been a tell-it-how-it-is reunion. This curse means that you also die young. You always die before your thirty-fifth birthday.’
Dora’s mouth fell open. ‘I die? I’m thirty-three. How will I die… and why?’ Lenny shrugged. ‘I can’t begin to take all of this in, is there no way for you to cure my mother? There are all kinds of treatments and the ones over here are far more advanced than in the UK. And can’t you stop me from dying too? I’m far too young, I haven’t lived, Christ I don’t even have a boyfriend.’ Dora’s voice was getting higher with the panic that was rising inside of her.
Lenny held up her hand. ‘Dora, I’ve tried. Why do you think I trained in medicine? I’ve tried everything, over many lifetimes, to no avail. And that’s exactly why we kept you from Salem and from Lucine this time. We wanted to do something different –we’ve never, ever kept you away from your mother before. But we wondered if it might keep you safe.’ Dora looked downcast and Lenny reached over and stroked her face. She held Dora’s chin in her hand and Dora looked up at her. ‘I’m sorry it didn’t work. We didn’t know what else to try.’
Dora felt Lenny’s desperation. Somehow, she did understand. She couldn’t remember all those other lifetimes, but she believed Lenny’s heart. She must have done it for Dora’s own good.
She thought of Lucine upstairs. She found it hard to be sad for someone she didn’t know, who had never been a part of her life, and the shock of her looming mortality didn’t help either. This woman hadn’t taken her to school, picked her up, watched her terrible school plays, attended her parents’ evenings, arranged birthday parties, taught her all her life skills. If anything, Dora was annoyed that her own mother had been willing to give her up so easily. If it had been the other way around Dora would have fought with everything she had to protect her child and keep her close. What kind of woman sent her kid to the opposite side of the world and never spoke to her ever again?
Her aunt sighed. ‘The kind of woman who knows that to keep her only child safe she must sacrifice all of that.’ Dora’s suspicion was confirmed. Lenny could read her mind. ‘You don’t think your mother missed you, grieved over her loss of you, wanted to hug and kiss you good night? Lucine isn’t a monster, she is a woman who gave up the one true thing she loved to keep her safe, and every lifetime it kills her that little bit more. Give her a chance. I know things are different this time and you’re struggling to remember but please be kind to her, that’s all I ask.’
Dora felt the heat rising up her cheeks. How many times had Lenny read her mind?
‘I don’t make a habit of it, for one thing it’s rude to go probing inside someone else’s thoughts and I have enough problems of my own without worrying about everyone and their dogs. But sometimes the loudest thoughts break through, and you, Dora, practically screamed those words at me. Now go, that damn bird will have already told her you’re on your way to see her.’
‘What are you going to do? Lenny, I don’t want to die.’
‘Drink vodka. Sephy and I have been working on a plan.’ Lenny began muttering to herself. ‘Maybe see if I can conjure up a finders’ spell so you will remember where you hid that damn book back in 1692. I honestly thought that by keeping you in London it wouldn’t get to this, that Corwin wouldn’t find you. I should have known he would never give up that easily. Do you remember the book?’
Dora shrugged and Lenny turned and walked straight down to the kitchen, leaving Dora standing there staring after her, head spinning and stomach churning. She pushed the thought of her own predicament to the back of her mind; she would deal with that later.
She looked up the stairs and began to slowly climb them, her feet hesitant to get to the top. Before she knew it she was on the landing, walking towards the door she’d seen her aunts come out of earlier. Her heart was thumping so loud in her chest and there was a lump inside her throat. Suddenly she wasn’t angry, she was afraid. What if Lucine didn’t like her or was horrible to her, she wouldn’t know what to do.
Before she could knock, a voice that sounded just like Sephy’s called out, ‘Come in.’
Dora pursed her lips, blowing out the breath she’d been holding as she turned the handle and opened the door. This room was bigger than hers, it was huge, and in the middle of it was a massive bed, with a frail-looking woman who was the double of Lenny sitting propped up on a mountain of pillows.She smiled at Dora and opened her arms wide and every thought that had been rushing around inside her mind stopped and she saw them as little paper tickets twirling around in the wind that suddenly dropped and all of the papers fell to the floor at the same time. She was aware of Hades sitting inside the window watching the two women and, before she knew it, she was sitting on the bed with Lucine’s frail arms wrapped tightly around her. Tenderly pulling the woman close, Dora inhaled deeply. She smelled of jasmine and vanilla, but there was the scent of decay and illness lingering underneath the sweetness and she knew then that whatever her reason for sending her away, Dora would not question it too harshly. She wanted to make the most of the time that Lucine had left and get to know her. She felt the soft sobs against her chest and rubbed her back gently. She looked up to see fear in her mother’s eyes, and with a trembling voice Lucine whispered. ‘I’m so sorry to tell you this, but my life is in danger, and now so is yours. ’
Dora stared at Lucine, fear making it hard to breathe, unable to speak as Lucine took a deep breath then continued to talk as if she hadn’t just scared the life out of her.
‘I’ve waited so long to see you, Dora, and you look beautiful. You turned into quite the stunning young lady.’
Dora glanced up at the wall opposite them to try and calm herself down ignoring Lucine’s ominous words, it was covered in picture frames. In every picture was a photograph of Dora, from when she was a baby, and her toddler years, through to her teenage years where she was a full-on Goth, to recent photos of her with her black hair now chopped into a shoulder-length bob with a fringe, the delicate ring she wore through her nose and the tattoos on her arms. Not quite shedding her love of all things dark and punky. She pulled away from Lucine who was blotting her tears with the corner of a cotton handkerchief.
‘I don’t know what to say,’ Dora started. She took a deep breath. ‘I’m sorry, but this has all come as a bit of a shock.’
‘Yes, I can imagine it has. One moment there is just you and Lenny against the world, then she brings you here to introduce you to a whole new one with a talking pet crow, a curse on all of our lives and a failing mother you knew nothing about.’
Dora opened her mouth and Lucine gently touched her arm.
‘I am not some cold-hearted monster. I need you to know that I did what I had to in order to attempt to break the curse. If I had my time again and my strength then I wouldn’t have done that, you have no idea how much it pained me to say goodbye to you. A mother will give up everything for her child, even the child themselves if it means they get to be safe and live a happy life. I could not and would not let you stay here and endanger yourself, Dora. I love you far more than life itself and that will never change. We should have fought Corwin on home ground, but we didn’t, we ran and hid, scared of what he could do to us, but no more. Sephy has a plan, something about binding him which I think is nuts, but we have to give it a go to keep our future selves safe if not ourselves in this lifetime.’
