I Wish

Chapter 50

Wonderful! All of this was just wonderful. Once again I had resolved to make things work with Ivy and she’d pulled something that makes me want to scream because I met her, period. It wasn’t like I hadn't quite literally  given her the opportunity to do this again, because I did. She stole my name, it was for a good reason, and I forgave her. Like an i***t, I had thought that it made sense. She said it was going to go badly, it did, and I was somewhat protected. I couldn’t even figure a point to this, besides the obvious. Nothing I ever ate in Fae land caused this. Human food was the problem, the only factor I needed to work out before things went epically and tragically involved a verdict on whether it just made everything taste like crap, or if I was going to starve even if I did choke it down. That would make more sense, the latter that is. If I needed fae food to live, then moving was no longer something that I had the luxury of thinking about. A downright do or die situation, and unfortunately for Ivy I think she misunderstood the damn assignment. I was stubborn. I would die on this hill, just as Candice…

“f**k,” I cursed, popping my eggs in the microwave and locking myself not in my room. My room didn’t have a lock, even as an adult, because we claimed to respect everyone's personal boundaries. Claimed, and for the most part it was true unless someone suspected emotional pain. We were all both nosey and unwilling to leave that to potentially fester. So I headed for the bathroom, which did have a lock, and slid down the door after it gave a satisfying click. We had now reached the part where I couldn’t distract myself anymore… from the fact that I was trapped in a world full of food I. COULDN’T EAT! 

****

It was three days after that before I was willing to acknowledge anything beyond the basics that get across why exactly that is. The days that had come previously…. Hmmn. I got to redefine my definition of the term starving. That was… that was something. If we still lived close enough to civilization, and I still possessed the ability to walk around like a normal functioning person, I would be feeding every homeless person I came across. Every single one, all of them. I had never been this hungry, and it was so terrible that I did lay down at night and cry. Dizzy, stomach cramping, exhausted no matter how much you sleep. I didn’t talk to Candice again in those three days either, not with voices, but we texted. The screen blurred, and the words moved in spinning unfocused circles. Actually typing messages back? I was impeded enough that it was hard enough for me to feel like an i***t, and Ivy? Don’t even get me started on Ivy. She wasn’t here. Ivy wasn’t here and the curtains of black clouds that blocked out almost everything because of this? It hurt. Alone in the dark with people carrying hacksaws, I’d thought at some point, that would be less worse than this. I remembered it like it was something I’d read, instead of lived. How I didn’t cry out my entire salt content and die is a mystery, and this is all I’ll ever say about any of it. 

On the third day I was laying on my bed in the half asleep state that had become normal. Eyes glazed over, and curled into a ball. When I suddenly sat right up, almost falling straight back down again and froze. Listening for something, waiting for it, I don’t know but after a moment I stood shakily and walked out of my room. I didn’t even stop to put on a dressing gown, or shoes, I just walked. Down the stairs, out the back door, and into the treeline. 

“I did wonder if I was going to die before you showed up again,” I said in scratchy voice, “I thought that once you went back you wouldn’t be able to see me until time catches up.” Her face was pale, and there were large dark circles under dulled green eyes. There was no sparkle left in them anymore. 

“I didn’t go back,” she admitted, hair hanging in a lank and unkempt mess around her. 

“Worried I’d die,” I said, and my tone had no inflection. I wasn’t really mad, actually, I wasn’t even asking. She winced anyway.

“No you could have survived that, it just… would have left you with no choice but to come home,” Ivy admitted softly, “I didn’t… I couldn’t go through with it though. Home is where you are so I came to you instead.” I was stamping down hard on the causal little observation that she was looking at me like a creature half starved. I sighed.

“You’re lucky I like you,” I said simply, and she gaped. 

“I’m not going to lie, I imagined this going far worse than it is,” she confessed in a small voice before it occurred to her that there might be a reason for that, “What’s changed? You never give in to this easily, what changed your perspective enough to… Who hurt you?” I gave a hysterical sounding laugh, and tipped forwards into her arms.

“An old friend of mine… they're really sick,” I said, hating the fact that I was sniffling all over her like a five year old. Her grip tightened, and I could actively feel all of my broken pieces be picked up and pushed together into something like their original shape. 

“And now you’re going to jump, just because they don’t have the opportunity,” Ivy said and it didn’t even sound bitter. Defeated yes, but defeated enough that she’d take it rather than resent it.

“No. They just reminded me who I was before all of this, and what I would have done without the bond. I’m fairly sure that the goal behind magical certainty in something is to inspire confidence, not p***y out because of it,” I explained while trying to detangle the knots in her hair with my fingers, “I had started to forget, but that’s okay. I’m sure if that starts to happen again they’re happy to remind me. They also said something else very interesting that I was too busy freaking out to appreciate.”

“And what was that?” she murmured, as though my presence was a balm against the horrifying days we’d been separated. The way I was bouncing back now that she was here? I’d believe it.

“I’m something that you want. I win,” I replied cheekily. 

“Yeah treasure, you really really do,” Ivy said, swaying us both.