Godmother (2 page)

The bell tinkled, and a customer came in. I moved away.

A young man, a college student obviously, came up and asked for Shakespeare and Chaucer.
“Cadbury Tales,”
he pronounced it. I found the books for him and rang him up. Another group of customers swept in—more college students, looking for records and graphic novels—followed by a dreamy young woman who went straight to the poetry section, browsed the Baudelaire and the Lorca.

Once the store cleared out, I poured a fresh cup of coffee for George, adding in one teaspoon of milk, one packet of sugar, and went to the room in back. He had left. The computer was dimmed, but when I tapped the keyboard, it sprang to life again. I was tempted to sit down, retrace his steps, but I could hear the door opening and shutting out front, the bell tinkling, books falling from the shelves and to the floor, the dust multiplying. The hours stretching out before me.

BY SEVEN P.M.
I was exhausted. I took care of the till, shut off every light, and locked the door.

The sky was still bright, as if it were the middle of the day, as if it were right on top of you.

I stepped into the street. The West Village, right here, was the part of the city that was most like the old world: the cobblestone streets with trees hanging over them, the
balconies and wrought iron, the rustling leaves. Brown-stones with bright flower boxes and glittering windows, ivy lacing up the shutters. Stone steps leading to arched wooden doorways that opened into secret, unknown worlds. You could see the odd framed picture or chandelier through open curtains, an occasional cat curled and sleeping in the sunlight. A man stood cooking at a stove, oblivious to the people walking by.

I turned and trudged up Hudson, past all the strolling couples, the outdoor cafés packed with people talking and laughing. Thin women with bare shoulders and dangling earrings, men who looked like they could be in cologne ads, baring their teeth. Hudson turned to Eighth, and I walked until I couldn't feel my legs anymore—through Chelsea, past Madison Square Garden and Penn Station, past the fabric stores and office buildings, the pizza shops and hardware stores, up to Thirty-eighth Street. My favorite diner was in the middle of the block, an unassuming place I'd been coming to for as long as I could remember. I sat down at the counter, at my usual seat by the swinging kitchen doors, where I couldn't see myself in the mirror behind the counter. The fan blasted on me, mercifully, almost making me shiver. There was only one other person at the counter. A teenage boy sipping coffee across from me and looking around nervously. His glance met mine and then he looked through me, as if I weren't there.

“Hey, Lil,” Mike said, walking up to me in his white apron. “You want the usual?”

I nodded. “And just water, please.”

A second later he set a glass beside me. I picked it up and
took a long swallow. The clink of spoons against mugs, forks against plates, made me feel safe and warm.

I devoured my burger when it arrived, letting the thick grease and meat collect in my mouth, then ate the french fries one by one, drowning them in ketchup. I paid and headed home, walking back to Eighth Avenue. The street-lamps lit the sidewalks. If you squinted, you would never think you were in this massive, breathing city. The buildings like mountains, the water towers on top of them like island huts. I liked to play this game, to make the city into something else, to seek out the places that didn't fit. I walked past the corner bodega, turned onto Thirty-sixth Street. Past “Non Stop Fashion,” through the door, and up the flight of stairs. I locked the front door after me and one by one clicked the dead bolts shut, then leaned into them, letting relief pour through me. I was safe.

I shrugged out of my clothes, unwrapped the bandages from around my chest, and drew a bath, pouring in the mixture of herbs I kept on the shelf in a jar—eucalyptus oil and wintergreen oil, rosemary and thyme and dried mustard. A film of sweat stuck to my skin. The fragrance wafted up to me, sent a tingling through me. I let the potion spread out and cloud over, then leaned down and dunked my hands in, making circles in the water. Steam filled the bathroom. I stared and stared into the water, as if it were fire. With the potion suffusing it, the water was the color of a river, a deep yellowish green. I breathed in. The scent curled around me.

I stepped into the tub, lowered myself in. Instantly I felt better.

All my old loves will be returned to me,
I thought.

I relaxed and lifted my arms out of the water, one at a time, to watch it drip down my skin. I moved my palms across the surface and over my stomach, up my breastbone and to my neck. Everything seemed to slow down. The water pressed into me, filled every pore.

I was alone, finally, completely free. I leaned forward and unclenched my back. A pure feeling of bliss moved through me.

My wings unfurled. White feather by white feather, curving out and up toward the ceiling, spreading to their full span, like two halves to one heart, until they tapped the walls.

Chapter Two

T
he water was bright blue and tasted of berries. Far above us, I could see rays of light cutting through the lowest of the tangled branches dipping through the lake's surface. We were half in shadow. I stretched out my arms. Maybeth, my sister, slept next to me, wrapped in a yellow water lily and her own wings. I reached over and shook her awake. Her eyes flung open— bright blue eyes, water eyes. She unwrapped herself from the thick petals and kicked herself up toward the surface. I spread out my wings and drifted up behind her. On the lake floor our friends were still sleeping, tiny lights like stars nestled among the roots and flora and waving grass.

We floated up past the elders in their thrones, the gnarled branches swaying back and forth in the water. Quiet, we made our way through the vines that stretched out on every side of us, until we broke through the surface into air.

I opened my eyes. The trunk of the great tree stretched in front of us, bathed in sunlight. From a distance I could see the storm that was hovering over the kingdom of humans. “Look.”

“What?”

“Rain. The sky's gone dark.”

“Oh,” Maybeth said, flipping herself into the air. “I guess you'll just have to stay with me, then.”

I clutched the wooden pier and pulled myself onto it. “I have work to do,” I said. “Plus what's a little rain?”

“Do it later!”

“I can't do it later!” I laughed at her, flicking my hand and spraying her with water. A scented breeze whispered through the trees that lined the lake, rippling through the leaves. The water shone in the light, and the rocks and pebbles gleamed like gems. On the bank, two human men lay sleeping, enchanted. A few fairies stood around them, poking at their armor.

She flicked a few droplets back at me. “But I hate it there,” she said. “Hate it hate it hate it.”

“You don't have to come.”

“Oh, fine,” she said. “Just leave me all alone.”

“Leave who all alone?”

I turned and our friend Gladys was hovering behind us, her wings shimmering out behind her, fluttering like a hummingbird's.

“Lil's going into the human kingdom today,” Maybeth said, folding her arms.

“Oh, really? How fun! Let's go turn a lady into a frog!”

“Gladys,” I said, “this is important.”

“How important can it be?” Maybeth said. “Kings, queens, they all get old and die, anyway.”

“We need to make this girl a queen before she can die as one,” I said. “I told you what the elders said.”

“I think it sounds marvelous,” Gladys said. She caught
sight of herself in the surface of the water and peered in, moving her face back and forth. “I hear she cries all day long every day. Poor girl.”

“They say she is the most beautiful girl in the land,” I said. “With hair like starlight.”

Maybeth made a great show of stretching up her arms and yawning as wide as she could.

“I'm sure she is simply dazzling,” Gladys said. “But can she do this?” She flipped her body over and balanced herself on the water with one finger. Her wings pulled her up into the air behind her. “And won't she turn old in seconds, practically?”

“Get old and die, you mean,” Maybeth said.

“I think you're just jealous,” I said.

“Of a human?”

“No,” I said. “Of me.”

Right then Lucibell emerged from the water and threw her arms around Maybeth, knocking her over and into the lake. They were both laughing so loudly I covered my ears.

“What are you thinking about?” Gladys asked in her soft voice, almost a whisper. Suddenly she was right next to me, leaning into me.

“The work I have to do,” I said.

“I did like Cinderella's mother.”

“Me too.”

“I was sorry when she died. I saw it written in the leaves and I wished I could change it.”

“Don't say that,” I whispered.

“It was just a thought, that's all.”

I looked back at the other world, their world. The dark sky in the distance, curling in on itself, the light shooting
down through it. It was our job to make sure that everything happened as it was supposed to happen, the way it was written in the branches and vines of the great tree, the way the elders interpreted. When necessary, the young fairies, like me, who still left the water, helped humans meet the fates the elders decreed. We were inextricably bound to humans, no matter what we thought of them.

“Lil thinks I'm jealous of Cinderella,” Maybeth said.

“Well, I am,” Lucibell said. “I'm going to change my hair into pearls. Then the prince will marry me instead of her! What will you do then, Lil?”

“Ha,” Maybeth said. “You won't be able to compete with my golden breasts!”

“Lucibell! May!” I said.

“You should not even kid about that,” Gladys said, gasping exaggeratedly.

“Thank you,” I said.

Gladys left my side and spread her crazy butterfly wings with the bright blue markings on the sides. “Because we all know that no human can resist these lustrous wings coupled with my violet eyes. What do I need with gold or pearls?”

I sighed as they burst into laughter, but it was true: Gladys was the most beautiful of us, and took great joy in appearing in rivers and in sunlight to human men, who would write reams of poetry and sometimes even go mad altogether as a result. Still, it was not a proper topic for conversation. Cinderella was not an ordinary human. She was destined to become queen, and it was my task to ensure it.

Just then the sky lit up in the distance. Lightning.

“I need to go,” I said, standing up on the pier. “Much as I am enjoying this stimulating conversation.”

“I'm coming, too,” Gladys said. “I can help.”

“Oh, a great help you'll be,” I said.

“We're coming, too,” Maybeth said, dragging Lucibell behind her.

“Don't you have work to do?”

“We can work later,” she said, waving her hand. “For now, we might as well see our
competition.”

They all laughed, but I stayed silent. They were starting to annoy me. The elders had chosen me for this task, not them. I was the one who was to get Cinderella to the ball now that human vanity had conspired against it.

It had been a dark, wintry night when the elders summoned me to the court. Ice dripped from the trees and every creature in the forest was in hiding. Snow and ice had coated the lake's surface, icicles breaking off and falling into the grass at the bottom of the lake as we slept. I had thought I was in trouble when the message came, as if the elders could sense my desire to be out in the world, to run through the snow, but then I found myself in front of the council. Prince Theodore, they told me, was going to throw a ball and pick a wife. It was important, they said, that Cinderella attend, and yet her stepsisters and stepmother were going to prevent it. It was a great honor for me to have been chosen. For my sensitivity, the feather wings that marked me.

Now I spread my wings and flew up into the wind and beyond the fairy lake, which was in the center of the dark forest. The others flew close behind, and the air against my face was like mist. My whole body relaxed into it. We passed over the ancient trees, the secret hovels of elves and witches and gnomes, and a group of men searching for their
two lost companions, whom they would never find—I could feel the fear coursing through them—and headed toward the palace in the distance, rising up into the storm clouds. Slowly my annoyance disappeared. There was nothing like the feeling of flight, of navigating whole worlds with one's heart and body.

I pushed myself into it, faster and faster, and soon the rain lashed against my skin, the temperature dropping to a heavy coldness. I gave myself over to it, all of it. I laughed with the others, screaming against the rain and thunder.

We landed in the field of a large estate on the outskirts of the kingdom. Gladys dropped into an upturned leaf that was filling with rain. “I'm drowning!” she cried, as Maybeth flopped into the mud and covered her skin with it.

“I believe I have turned to chocolate!” Maybeth called out.

I laughed, then looked up at the huge black horse in front of us, quivering as thunder shattered the air behind it. He stamped at the ground.