“Well, I’m sorry. Youshouldbe able to share this with your family. You should be immensely proud of yourself because this is tremendous. Ah, what is it you write that’s so unfit for the family?”
“It’s fit for most families, just not mine. I write children’sstories.”
“Good Lord. Really?” Gideon cocked his head. “Actually, I can see that, now you say it. That’s marvellous. My sister’s twins are six now, and I’d love to find them a new favourite book because we’ve all read them their current obsession to the point of nausea. Might they like your work?”
“Possibly. The first one is calledThe Fairies of Faraway Meadow.”
Gideon’s mouth dropped open. “What,” he said with force. “What?What the—Youwrote that?Youare Zinnia Waters?”
“You know it?”
“Know it? I can recite it!” Gideon yelped. “‘Around the corner, down the lane, and just a little way out of sight lies the doorway to Faraway Meadow’—I have read that more times than I want to remember. I can’t take the twins on a walk without them spotting a dozen corners, lanes, and doorways that might lead to your blasted fairyland! My brother-in-law says he forced himself back to work just so he wasn’t at home being ordered to readFaraway Meadowtwice a day!”
It was always nice to hear one’s work had caused significant anguish. Zeb beamed. “He’ll be horrified to know the third one comes out in February, then. And I’ve signed a contract for another three.”
“My nieces will be overjoyed. They eat, sleep, play, and liveFaraway Meadow. You can have no idea how they love it. Or do you? I suppose England is full of similarly possessed children.”
“The publisher does receive quite a lot of letters.”
“I imagine they do. Good God almighty, Zinnia Waters. I don’t suppose you’d sign my nieces’ books for them?”
“I’ve actually just got early copies of the new one. They could have it for Christmas? One each to avoid fighting?”
“My nieces will adore me,” Gideon said. “Oh good Lord.”
“What?”
“I was just imagining telling the girls that I know Zinnia Waters and how excited they would be. And then I thought about trying to explainhowI know her.”
“You will need a story,” Zeb agreed.
“I don’t want a story. I want to tell them at the very least that Zinnia Waters is my friend and I am immensely proud of that. Proud of her. I don’t know if I have the right to say I’m proud of you, but I really am.”
“Well.” Zeb could feel himself going pink. “It’s just books.”
“It’s not just books. You’ve obviously worked extremely hard, for a long time, and—” He stilled, then went on, slower. “And you didn’t just hide that from your family. You hid it from me.”
Zeb’s stomach dropped. “It wasn’t a secret. I just—well, I didn’t know if it would come to anything. It might very well have failed, and I didn’t want to have to tell you about another failure.”
“God,” Gideon said. “You should not have felt like that. I shouldn’t have made you feel like that.”
He had, though. There had always been that element of Gideon the sensible one, wearily dealing with Zeb’s disorganisation, reminding him of things to be done, finding things he’d put downsomewhere, coping with another job of work undone. Zeb hadn’t minded, precisely, or if he had minded, that was his problem. Gideon was competent and organised; naturally it was tiresome for him to deal with habitual chaos. Zeb had grown up used to endless exasperation from his father and brother, and Gideon had been infinitely more tolerant than either of them. All the same, Zeb had undeniably wanted to show him a proven success, rather than a manuscript he hadn’t finished, a dream that might founder.
“I wanted to see if it would go anywhere before I told you, that’s all,” he said. “I wanted to get something right.”
“You got so much right.” Gideon’s voice was aching. “So much. I’d never kissed a man before you, and you made me fit into my own life. You were endlessly patient with me. You made me laugh. You made mehappy. And in return, I didn’t make you feel you could trust me with your dreams, or your trouble with your brother, or—Jesus, did I do anything at all for you?”
“You bent over backwards for me at work. You sorted out a thousand problems. You took out spiders and never laughed at me for it. For God’s sake, I still use the magic box!”
Gideon had instituted the magic box. If Zeb emptied his pockets into the box by the door when he came home then, as if by magic, things would be there when he looked for them. It was a ridiculously simple idea—perhaps one he might have or should have thought up for himself, but he was never terribly good at that sort of thing. In any case, it had worked like, well, magic. Gideon had bought him a lovely carved wooden box for the purpose, and then a second one that lived by his armchair,and repeatedMagic box!every time he saw Zeb with unconsidered things in his hands until it had become habit. He still heard Gideon’s voice in his ears every time he came home and had got really quite good at not losing his keys.
“That’s still working?” Gideon said. “Oh, good. I did think—wait. Wait. The magic box. As in, thequeen’smagic box?”
“Oh. Um.”
“The Queen of the Fairies’ magic box, which contains whatever you need when you open it?”
That magic box had been stolen by goblins in the second Faraway Meadow book, thus putting the plot in motion. Zeb realised he was flushing. “Well, it gave me the idea.”
