Kill Me Softly (13 page)

He squeezed her hand in lieu of a reply.

Blue released her hand eventually—it would have been weird if he hadn't, though she noted its absence—but he grabbed it again as the streets grew more crowded, people spilling out of doorways and forming a snaking mob that allowed only foot traffic to pass through. Touristy shops had closed their doors, bars and restaurants had opened them, and a street fair had sprung up: kiosks and food carts filled the streets.

The air was thick with the scents of sugar and exhaust, fumes from roasted nuts and cotton candy machines, salt water and shrimp, sweat and perfume.

“Let's go this way,” Blue said, tugging her down the packed street.

“Through the fair?” Layla called, grasping Mira's shirt to keep from being separated. “Why?”

“I want to show Mira.”

“Show me what?” Mira asked.

“Things you didn't see before. Look between the cracks.”

Mira studied the crowd before her, not sure what she was looking for. A band played at one end of the street, and little kids danced to the music, waving balloon animals and toy swords. There were couples out on dates, hands creeping up the backs of T-shirts to fondle bare skin. Vendors hawked nylon fairy wings, funnel cakes, lemonade, art. Men and women lingered on the thresholds of bars, calling to friends, cozying up to strangers.

It seemed like any other place.

But then a pair of twenty-something girls caught her eye. Sisters, maybe? They walked with the same awkward gait—a kind of limping sashay—and had the same pert noses and cascading dark curls. They limped along in open-toed sandals, perfect pedicures marred by the white bandages they wore.

One girl's heel was wrapped—and oddly shaped, like part of it was missing. The other girl wore a thick bandage where her big toe should have been.

They were Cinderella's stepsisters, Mira realized—and this was the aftermath of their curse. In the tale, each stepsister cut off part of her foot in hopes of fitting into Cinderella's tiny slipper. Mira hadn't thought anyone would actually do that—but the sisters flaunted their injured feet like they were proud of them.

The sisters sensed her staring and glanced over, their eyes narrowing in unison. Blue waved hello, but instead of acknowledging him, they turned up their noses and hobbled away.

“They're still so snobby!” Layla exclaimed. “You'd think that amputation would have humbled them a bit.”

“They think they're special because they avoided getting their eyes pecked out,” Blue said. “But really, it was just their stepsister being nice to them. She let them wear goggles to the wedding. It's not that the birds didn't try.”

“Of course not.” Layla sniffed. “Birds are diligent.”

“You know those girls?” Mira asked.

“Not exactly,” Blue said. “We know
of
them.”

Blue stopped on a corner where the crowd had opened up, outside a Mexican restaurant advertising a happy hour that had long passed. The door was propped open and the buzz of conversation floated out, along with the clink of silverware against dinner plates.

“There are a lot of cursed people we're not friends with,” Blue continued, still peering ahead, his eyes seeking familiar faces in the crowd. “But we usually recognize an insider when we see one. There are things that make us stand out. Things normal people dismiss, because people believe what they want to believe. The difference with us is that we believe in everything.

“Occasionally we get surprises,” Blue went on. “People who were raised outside and show up unexpectedly—like you. Like Viv's prince, probably, since there's no Snow White prince in our generation here.”

“Speak of the devil,” Layla murmured.

Mira stiffened, glancing around apprehensively. What now?

Blue caught her eye and nodded toward a family of four that was ambling through the fair. At first glance, they were beautiful—eyes bright like laughter, summer clothes in sherbet colors. The little boy and girl bounded ahead of their parents—then circled back so as not to lose them. Their handsome father was the picture of contentment. He kept one arm curved lovingly around his wife's waist. Supporting her, Mira realized. Because the woman was tilting. She could barely stay upright.

The woman shuffled forward like a sleepwalker. Her eyelids drooped; her ruby mouth hung slack. Her skin was the color of ginger, and beaded with sweat. She was still lovely—but it was a cold, sickly loveliness.

“Who is that?” Mira asked. “What's wrong with her?”

“That's Gwen,” Blue said. “Another Snow White Somnolent.”

Layla leaned closer to confide the details. “Prince Charming—that's him—fell in love with her when he saw her in her coffin. But after he woke her and they were married, things weren't the same. She wasn't the girl he'd fallen in love with.”

“Yeah, because she was alive,” Blue snorted.

At first, Mira thought he was being flippant. But when his expression stayed hard, she wasn't so sure. “Tell me you're joking.”

“Mira, it was an accident that he woke her at all.” Blue stared after Gwen, dark blue brows furrowing. “The prince thought she was beautiful, posed and frozen in her crystal coffin, and he decided to take her home—to keep her, just like she was. But then one of his attendants tripped while they were carrying the coffin, and the jolt dislodged the poison apple that was stuck in her throat—which broke the enchantment. That's how she woke up.”

“Supposedly,” Layla said, “once Gwen was herself again, the prince found her effervescence unbearable. And Gwen couldn't deal with losing him; she was already in love with him because he'd saved her. She had a pretty messed-up home life, like most Snow White Somnolents; she didn't have anyone else. So she let him drug her, to recapture his interest. Because he prefers her barely conscious.”

“Oh god,” Mira said, so stunned she felt sick. “That's not a life.”

“That's the point,” Blue said, looking uneasy, too.

Mira watched, helpless to tear herself away, as Gwen and her family disappeared into the crowd. For those few moments that Gwen was still in sight, Mira felt like she was watching a funeral procession: a woman carrying her body to its grave, with the short, shuffling steps of a bride.

“I need to sit down,” Mira said.

Blue cleared a spot for her on the sidewalk and she lowered herself to the concrete, sucking in deep breaths of steamy air. Blue crouched in front of her, a penitent look on his face.

“Should I not have showed you that?” he asked.

“I don't know,” she said. “Maybe I wasn't ready to know that things could be that bad. Like, before, I just thought I had to worry about my curse. Pricking my finger, falling asleep.”

“Not how twisted your curse might be.”

Mira nodded. Her lungs felt cottony, full of fear instead of air.

“It won't be like that for you,” Blue insisted. “Don't worry. We're going to find your trigger. You won't even get that far.”

“And you know Freddie,” Layla said soothingly. “He's not a bad guy, not even close.”

“But what if I fall asleep somewhere else? Some other prince could wake me. Decades later, even—right?”

Neither Blue nor Layla answered at first. Then they nodded reluctantly and spoke over each other.

“That's right,” Layla said.

“Right,” Blue said.

“And I'd be asleep. Love at first sight—with an almost dead girl. Delilah mentioned my birthday. That's
so soon
. What if something horrible—”

Blue cupped her face in his hands. His skin was hot, snapping her out of her hysteria.

“Hey.
Hey,”
he said, until she looked at him. Her gaze dragged up from the ground and met his eyes, which were staring into hers like he was trying to reach her—to snatch her back from whatever dark dream she'd fallen into. “That's not going to happen.”

“You promise?” she whispered, not even sure why she'd said it. Just that she felt vulnerable, and needed someone to reassure her.

Blue laughed good-naturedly, caught off guard. “What good is my promise going to do?” Then he seemed to realize she was serious. “All right,” he said. “I promise.” He glanced at Layla. “Layla—what's the penalty for breaking a promise? Is there one?”

“Not for promises like this,” Layla said with a smile, like she thought it was sweet.

Mira got to her feet then, embarrassed that she'd come apart. She felt so much younger than everyone here, so naïve. Seeing a sedated princess was nothing new to Blue and Layla. They dealt with this messed-up world every day.

Around them, the mundane world had surged forward to fill in the gaps. A mother struggled to tie a bouquet of helium balloons to her son's wrist. A girl licked a dot of mustard off her boyfriend's cheek, and laughed, like she'd surprised herself.

There were nods to the city's fairy-tale history—a candy apple stand selling apples that had been dipped in glistening red candy on one side, white chocolate on the other, like the half-red, half-white poison apple in the Snow White tale. There was an artist selling bejeweled nightingales in wire cages, and paper-doll ballerinas and tiny tin soldiers. But there were no more scarred beautiful people in view, spreading their pain for everyone to see.

Blue took her hand again—loosely, so she could pull away if she wanted—and she held on like he was her anchor in a world that was swiftly spinning out of her control. She clung to him, damp and heat sealing their palms together, so, so grateful not to be alone.

It was only once they had walked Layla home, and the last light of twilight had faded, that Mira realized how late it was. She and Felix had made plans to search that night—and she'd inadvertently stood him up. She wondered what time he'd given up on her, and whether he'd filled his night with someone else.

There was something about being near Felix that made her feel happier, more alive. So much had changed and become uncertain today; she wanted to talk to him. To feel that good again. She missed him—and while he had every right to be annoyed with her, she hoped he'd understand. This discovery today was bigger than her parents, bigger than romance. It had pushed everything else out of her mind.

She walked nearly shoulder to shoulder with Blue. He was quiet, too—as if he'd had the life-shattering revelation tonight. The lights of the Dream glittered in the distance, and they followed them like two explorers following the North Star.

Muggy, polluted air swirled around them each time a car sped by. On the other side of the four-lane highway, the Palace Casino flashed an incessant neon assault, signs promising entertainment, money to be won, cheap food. Its gaudy pink façade was stacked with turrets and pocked with heart-shaped windows, making it look more like a Japanese love hotel than a casino. Mira recalled Blue's earlier threat to dump her there. He certainly wasn't threatening her now.

“You're not being a jerk,” she said. “You haven't been for a while.”

Blue's steps thudded heavily beside hers. His hands were in his pockets, his head bowed. “I guess I lost my enthusiasm for it.”

“It stopped being fun?” She nudged him with her shoulder, not used to his acting so serious.

“Stopped being useful. I don't know.” He sighed. “I guess I'm confused. I don't know what to do with you now. How to treat you. You're not what I thought.”

Mira's silver flats crunched over a fast-food wrapper.
I'm not what I thought either.
“What was I before?”

“A normal girl. Someone who was leaving. And I wanted to make sure that you did. That you had a chance to. But now, who knows? You might stay. You want to know things. And I don't want you to know what I am.”

“You can tell me,” she said. “You can trust me. Or if it's too hard for you, I can ask Felix.” She meant it as a way to make things easier for him—but he grimaced at the mention of his brother.

“Felix won't tell you.”

“Yes, he will. Once he knows about me.”

Blue just shook his head. “You don't know Felix.”

She thought about reminding him that
he
didn't know Felix, that the two barely got along—but it seemed pointless. As futile as everything else she tried to tell him about his brother.

When they finally reached the Dream, neither one of them headed toward the doors. Instead, they stood before the Dream's white marble fountain. Three cupid statues shot arrows of water into the pool below, which was illuminated by pink and red lights. The water splashed down like music, and a subtle melody crept from speakers hidden in the flower beds.

“I used to write songs out here,” Blue said.

“You write songs?” Mira said. “But you can't even play anything.”

“Of course I can play. I just suck at the drums.”

“You're …” She shook her head. He just … baffled her.

“What?”

“I was going to say
an idiot
, but that seemed rude.”

Blue smiled. “I guess. I mean, sometimes I am.”

“Why play an instrument—
publicly
, in a
band
—if you're horrible at it? Don't you feel like you're shortchanging people?”

“Not really. I feel like I'm doing them a favor. Freddie has his way of dealing with the groupie situation—being polite and terrified, basically—and I have mine.”

“You're that worried about groupies? You're worried too many girls will be obsessed with you? No offense—”

Blue feigned shock. “Did I just hear you say
no offense
?”

She swatted his arm. “Let me finish.
No offense
, but isn't that a little conceited?”

“I'm not worried about girls liking me. I'm worried I'll like one of them back.”