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He would come to her mother’s house, and they would lie on the wooden floor of her room, making up games. Once, Lila took out her old book of fairy tales to show him a picture of a dragon that she wanted to draw on his arm like a tattoo.
“Wouldn’t it be great if bears and foxes could really talk?” he said, half kidding, pushing a lock of hair back from his eyes.
“I could give you a dream where they did,” she said.
He looked away from her quickly, like he didn’t want her to see his face. His family was full of workers, but he wasn’t one.
“Thanks,” he said. “But no thanks.”
There was a silence between them, a silence that hadn’t been there when they were younger. She wondered if he was afraid. She wondered if he was jealous that she had magic and he didn’t. She wondered if he wanted to kiss her.
“If you had a million dollars, what would you do with it?” he asked her.
She leaned back. “I don’t know. Maybe get a car. A really fast red one.”
He laughed. “You couldn’t drive it.”
“I could buy a fake ID too! I’d have a bajillion dollars. I could bribe everyone.”
He shrugged his shoulders, but he was still grinning. There was something about the curve of his mouth, something lurking behind his eyes that made her want to touch him, made her want to strip off her glove and feel the warmth of his skin against hers.
“I’d get out of here,” he said. “Go someplace where no one knew me. Start over. Go to Paris like you did or go to—I don’t know—Prague. Somewhere.” He looked toward the window, like he could already see himself gone.
“Oh,” she said, because it hurt that he was thinking about that when she was thinking about him. She narrowed her eyes. “What’s stopping you?”
The boy looked down at the book of fairy tales. “Nothing,” he said.
Lila wanted to be the one to stop him.
He reached between them and tucked a strand of her long blond hair behind her ear with one gloved finger. The shiver that started at the base of her spine felt like a warning.
* * *
When Lila Zacharov was eight, she dressed up in one of her mother’s long beaded dresses and clasped a diamond necklace around her forehead, like it was a crown. Then she stood in front of the huge gilt mirror in her parents’ bedroom to look at herself. Her hair was a tangle of pale curls, and the dress was so long that it trailed behind her like a train, but if she squinted, she could almost see someone else—a mysterious shadow self—reflected back at her.
“I’m a princess,” she told her grandmother, whom she called Babchi. Babchi had lived in the apartment with Lila and Father and Mother ever since Grandpa died. Each night Babchi sat at the end of Lila’s bed, telling her stories about firebirds and white bears, while Mother went out to plays or fancy dinners and Father did business.
“Yes,” said Babchi, coming to stand behind Lila. “My princess. The princess of a land of ice and snow. With icicles as sharp as knives.”
“I’m a fairy,” Lila said, spinning in circles until she tripped on the edge of her mother’s dress and fell.
“Yes,” said Babchi. “My fairy. You aren’t like other girls. You will laugh when others weep. Your heart will be a riddle.”
“Someday, I will fall in love with a boy,” Lila said, pursing her lips. “And he will be a prince.”
“If you fall in love, little one, there is a cure for that,” Babchi told her. “You—and you must do this yourself—you cut out his heart and eat it. Then you won’t love him anymore.”
Lila made a face and stuck out her tongue. Babchi laughed.
“I won’t want to be cured,” Lila insisted. It was her story and she wanted Babchi to understand, to get it right. The fairy princess met a prince and then they were happy. That’s how the story went. Lila had a book to prove it—a book so covered in glitter that flecks of it came off on her hands when she read about their wedding. Her mother had bought it for Lila’s birthday.
“That is very true and that is exactly what makes it so hard,” Babchi said, nodding. “If you wanted to, it would be easy. But you’ll do it anyway. You’re my princess, and when the time comes, you’ll know what you have to do.”
Lila nodded too, because Babchi had that tone in her voice that said that she would be sad if Lila didn’t agree, and if Babchi was sad, she might not want to play anymore. She might go in the other room and watch television.
Lila had lots of other costumes to try on. She wanted Babchi to stay and see them all.
* * *
