Godmother (23 page)

“It's fine,” I said, touching his arm. “I appreciate how concerned you were. And for inviting me. I hope I didn't embarrass you too much. Your friends seemed lovely.”

“I am not embarrassed, Lil,” he said. “You are a dear friend. Don't think I don't appreciate what you're doing for me, too.”

“That's right,” I said. “And when you meet your date and have the best night of your life, you'll be in my debt eternally.”

He laughed. “Let's get this place open,” he said. “There are millions of aimless book lovers wandering around out there needing a fix.”

“Yes, sir,” I said.

He had no idea, I realized. All those feathers, his palm on
wing and barb, and he had no idea. It was astonishing. Maybe in New York nothing could surprise anyone anymore.

I unlocked the front door and switched the Closed sign to Open.

I CALLED
Veronica just after lunch.

“Okay, my friend,” I said. “I think someone needs a proper ball gown. An ice blue silk, maybe?”

“And what is it that you are suggesting?”

“Aren't you some kind of gifted seamstress?” I asked. “Or is that just a rumor?”

Chapter Twelve

H
ER HAIR FELL INTO HER FACE AND OVER HER
shoulders, glittering in the fading light, shifting from white to cream to a pale gold. Her feet were bare, delicate. I watched the silk of her dress rubbing into the grass, the wrinkles creasing it, the straps slipping over her smooth shoulders. She was a mess. Tears fell down her reddening face. The glitter I had spread over her, the kohl around her eyes, her red lips—it was all rubbing off, streaking her face in lines.

I looked away. Then back again.

She hunched down on her elbows, her legs crossed, her hands buried in her hair.

“I'm sorry,” she wailed, wiping her face even as more tears streamed down it. Next to her the shoes lay in the grass. The sun hit them as it sank and turned them briefly to flame, then back again. Behind, the horses flared up, growing impatient, their muscles rippling under their smooth black coats.

I knew I should be fixing it all: the horses, who threatened to bolt away at any moment; the coach that was losing
its luster every minute that went by; her. But it was so beautiful, all of it, the mess of the human world. I couldn't understand the feelings moving through me. How full I felt.

For a second the world stood still and I could see my future—her future—stretching in front of us, wide open, like fate didn't matter, like anything at all could happen and the future was a giant wave carrying us both forward.

She stretched her arm in the grass and I saw then, just barely, the red line etched across her wrist. A scar.

“Don't be sorry,” I said, but my voice seemed stilted and false. My words hung in the early night air. “What happened to you? Who did this to you?”

She didn't look up. I wasn't sure if I'd even spoken out loud. I needed to move into her, understand her, fix her, but the feelings moving over me were so new and acute. The hatred and jealousy pierced into and through me, a long line, like silver. At the same time my heart opened to her. I wanted so badly to erase the pain that racked her body. The line across her wrist. She didn't deserve any of it, not these moments, not all the moments she'd been made to suffer.

And then part of me wanted something else. To bend down into the grass, and feel her silk starlight hair, smell the ash on her, all the days huddled under the chimney with a broom in her hand. I wanted to touch her pale, perfect skin, her fragile wrist, the line snaking and twisting across it, her wound.

I didn't know what to feel or think. I watched the tears run into the grass and stay there. She dragged the back of her hand across her face and looked up at me.

“I feel so stupid,” she said. “I ruin everything.”

I stood there, hesitating. All the feelings passing through me. I felt as if I could stand there forever, watching her.

“Please don't make me go,” she whispered.

Before I knew what I was doing, I dropped down next to her. For the moment, sympathy won out, erased the other emotions seesawing through me. She was
supposed
to go. It was supposed to be the night of her life.

“It's your destiny,” I said. “Don't you understand? It will be everything you ever wanted.”

She was sobbing now. I didn't know if she could even hear me.

“It's the ball,” I said. “It is all arranged. He will see you and fall in love with you. Do you hear me? You were made for him. It's your destiny.”

“No,” she said, into her hands. “I can't go. Look at me. I am not supposed to go to balls.” She kicked out her foot, and I watched one of the slippers fall to its side. She pulled the diamonds from her ears and dropped them into the grass. I watched them sink into the ground.

“Why are you like this?” I whispered. I was truly stunned. The ball, the prince—it was all I had thought about for weeks now. His hands on my waist and his mouth on my neck. The way I had felt whole, fully myself, when I was near him. I thought of the prince from her own dreams, standing in the field, walking toward her. Toward me. I knew he was all she had been thinking of, too.

She pulled her hands from her face and just looked at me.

“I know you dream of him,” I said. “I've seen what you dream of. And now it's here. This night. It's what you've always wanted.”

“No,” she said, staring at me. “I just want to be alone. I want to be someone new.”

I leaned in and touched her face. A wave of tenderness passed over me. I couldn't tell where I began and she ended. “He will make you into someone new,” I said. “He can make you whole. He can make all this disappear. The hole in your gut. This.” I picked up her hand, ran my fingers down to the scar on her wrist.

“HELLO!” VERONICA
called out, her knee-high vinyl boots clacking across the wooden floor. She walked up to the counter, smiling. Her features were delicate under her multicolored makeup, and her eyes were like flowers, large and thickly fringed. A dark, glittering blue. I heard George draw in his breath. She looked stunning in her forties-style burgundy dress, her bright orange hair pulled back from her face.

I thought of Maybeth shrieking, hurling herself into the lake and then up out of it.

She noticed him then, stopping in her tracks. “You're George,” she said. “Aren't you?”

“Yes?” he said, looking from her to me.

“I'm Veronica,” she said, extending her hand to him, batting her eyes. I couldn't believe it: for a moment, she looked almost bashful. “Your date to the ball.”

“Veronica,” he repeated.

“I recognize you from your photo.”

“I didn't realize …” George stumbled closer to the counter and bumped into it. When he reached out to shake her hand, she laughed and tilted her wrist, bending it up farther so that he had no choice but to kiss her hand.

“I showed her the photo of you and your father,” I said to
him, “back in the office. The Cary Grant one.” I smiled, enjoying his embarrassment. “We're actually going shopping so she doesn't show up to the ball in rags.”

“So … you actually go to balls, then?” she asked. “For fun?”

He looked horrified. “It's a charity event my parents are involved in. It's not really my …”

“I'm kidding,” she said. “It sounds nice. The idea is growing on me, I'm not gonna lie.” She smiled, her blue eyes glowing, and I could feel him relax beside me.

“George owns this place,” I said. “He's a real book lover.”

“Oh, I am, too,” she said. “I read all the time, always have. You know what I studied in school?”

“What?”

“Franch litrature,”
she said, making a silly snooty face.

“I was a French-lit major, too,” George said. “I was obsessed with Mallarmé and Proust.” He paused, self-conscious. “I was a bit of a nerd, I suppose.”

“I don't believe it for a second,” she said, winking. “I, on the other hand, dropped out. In my senior year. I'm smart like that. And I barely even remember French. Lil showed me a line in one of your books here and had to translate for me. I should never admit all this, should I?”

“Let me guess:
All my old loves will be returned to me.”

I turned and looked at him—at his flushed cheeks, dark hair and eyebrows, his hands stained with ink. I wanted to clap out loud and felt a laugh rise in my throat, but I restrained myself. He will calm her, I thought. And she will make him feel alive. All of a sudden I could see them: their thin, pale limbs twisted together, the two of them sipping cider next to a fire, the snow falling outside.

“Yes, that's right,” I whispered, the way I used to whisper back when I was the fairy godmother, at that exact moment when the eyes turned soft and mouth cracked open and I had those humans right where I wanted them. I practically laughed out loud, remembering.

“What did you say?” Veronica asked, turning to me. She smiled, raising her eyebrows at George, and mouthed “Thanks,” even though he could see what she was doing.

“Did I tell you that George is an amazing cook?” I asked, reaching out and tapping his back affectionately. George looked at me. I didn't know where the words had come from. It could be true, I thought.

He cleared his throat, and his hands flew to his mouth for no reason at all. The next second he threw them back down at his sides and then, a moment later, onto the coun-tertop. “Well, I can make soup, lots of soups,” he said. “Squash, broccoli, split pea.”

My heart twisted up for one second, and then Veronica said, “Mmm. Butternut squash soup is my favorite. It's almost that time of year, isn't it? Squash and apples and pumpkins. I love it.”

Despite everything, every ounce of fairy blood still in me sprang to life. I hadn't forgotten the pleasures of bringing together two young lovers, of figuring out exactly what one human needed from another. Not once, even after all these years and years of human life. I too can be a genius sometimes, I thought as I grabbed my purse. Even now. I walked out from behind the counter. “All yours,” I said to George.

Veronica smiled at him. Then she reached down and plucked George's right hand off the counter, pulled it to her
mouth, and kissed it, leaving a dark red stain. I could hear his throat catch.

“So I'll see you soon,” she said, waving at him sweetly with her black-nailed hand, turning to the door. “I can't wait.”

I walked out behind her, then acted as if I'd forgotten something “One second,” I said.

“Where did you meet her?” George asked as I walked toward him. “My God.” He looked as if he'd just seen a mermaid. His face was red and ragged, as if he'd been smacked.

“You don't think I get around?” I asked, indulging myself. “Well, I have news for you. I do get around. I get around a lot!” I looked at him, smiled, and let the world settle back into place. “She's a great girl, George.”

“Well, I … I look forward to getting to know her.”

As I walked out the door, onto the street, Veronica grabbed my arm and squeezed.

“Lil, he's adorable,” she said. “Totally my type. At least, he is now.”

The way she looked at me broke my heart slightly. Wistful.

I laughed. “Yes,” I said softly. “He's a very good man. Honorable. He's a bit shy, but it's endearing, I think. He just lives so much in his head. There's something of the old world in him.”

“Oh, absolutely,” she said. “He seems like a real … gentleman. It's almost weird. But I love weird. Not to mention tall and smoking hot. Spill it, Lil. Tell me more about him!”

We turned on Cornelia Street, heading up to West Fourth. She towered over me in her boots.

“Well, he was divorced, just last year. I think that made him turn more inward. It was pretty painful for him.”

“What was his wife like?”

“A socialite type. She never came in the store, and he didn't talk about her much. Blond, a bit prim maybe. I think their families were close. I never understood the connection, but I guess that's why it didn't last.”

“Sounds awful,” she said. “Um. Not that I'm typecasting. Does he come from a lot of money or something? I'm always amazed by these urbane, Manhattan types. It's still so foreign to me.”

“I think so. His mother, yes. His father, less so.”

“Oh, God. I'm going to feel like a weirdo at this ball, aren't I? Not that I'm not used to it.”

“You'll be wonderful,” I said. “You'll be the most beautiful girl there.”

“You're sweet,” she said. “I don't mind, though. Seriously. It'll be a blast. And I'm excited about this dress! I've really wanted a new project. And now I'm thinking of the ice blue. I mean, I'd been thinking of using black fabric, you know, maybe with touches of pink, but that's what I always do. I like your idea, doing something softer.”

A leaf skittered across the sidewalk in front of us. I imagined picking it up and dropping it, having an ice blue silk gown appear before us. The look on her face as she turned toward the mirror, transformed. I bent down and snatched up the leaf, crumpled it in my hand.

“Ethereal,” I said. “It will suit you, with your pale skin and those blue eyes.”

“Yeah. And I just want to go all-out princess if I'm doing the blue. I was thinking a corset top, silk ribbons lacing up
the back. For the lower half, maybe a petticoat, like in a darker blue, with a couple of layers of silk on top.”