Delilah #3
Jessamyn follows my glance. “Page fifty-nine,” she confirms. “When I was painting the illustrations, I used all sorts of familiar places. The castle dining room is an exact image of the estate where I got married. Everafter Beach looks like the island where I went on my honeymoon.” She gazes down at her lap.
“I wrote the story after my husband died of cancer. He fought so hard for a year, but ultimately, he lost the battle. The fairy tale was my way of getting through that. And helping my son get through it too.”
Suddenly I feel uncomfortable. Whatever the book has meant to me, it’s meant so much more to Jessamyn. “I’m really sorry,” I say.
“Don’t be. It was a long time ago. It’s why, in a way, having the book out of my house was a relief. As if it meant that part of my life—the sad part—was finished.” She reaches for the book. “It’s been a while since I read this,” she says, and opens to page 43.
Oliver looks up, expecting me as the Reader. But then he notices Jessamyn. I see his eyes widen—he recognizes her as the woman in the vision.
Jessamyn touches her finger to the crown of Oliver’s head. I feel an actual ache in my gut, remembering what his hair felt like—the texture, the thickness. “Amazing,” she breathes. “He looks exactly the way I imagined he would.”
This doesn’t make sense to me—since she was the one who drew Oliver in the first place. Obviously he’d look the way she imagined.
Jessamyn glances up at me. “You’re not really here to do an interview for school, are you.” It is not a question, but a statement.
“No,” I admit. I take a deep breath. “I came to ask you if you’d ever consider rewriting the ending.”
She smiles faintly. “Are you a writer, Delilah?” she asks.
“I’m more of a reader.”
“Ah,” Jessamyn replies. “Then I can see why you wouldn’t understand.”
“Understand what?”
“That the story isn’t mine to change anymore. Maybe it belonged to me at first, but now it belongs to you. And to everyone else who’s ever read it. The act of reading is a partnership. The author builds a house, but the reader makes it a home.”
“But if you created it, you have to be the one to change it.”
“Why should it be changed?”
“Because,” I say, “it’s not a happy ending. I can’t explain why.”
“Try me.”
“One of the characters told me.” I shut my eyes, certain that Jessamyn Jacobs officially thinks I’ve gone crazy. But to my surprise, when I open my eyes again, she just nods.
“The characters used to talk to me too,” Jessamyn agrees. “I think any writer would say the same thing. But Delilah, even if I changed the ending, the story already exists in the world in the memories of all of its readers. Once a story is told to someone, it can’t be erased.”
What she’s telling me is that I’ve hit a dead end. And I can’t let that be true. “But you have to try!” I burst out.
She hesitates. “How would you have ended the book?”
Embarrassed, I mumble, “Oliver gets to leave the story.”
She raises her eyebrows. “Ah. I think I’m starting to understand. He is quite good-looking. I used to develop crushes on characters. There was one detective in my murder series who had the dreamiest smile—”
Tears fill my eyes. “It’s not a crush,” I tell her. “He’s alive, to me.”
“And he always will be,” Jessamyn says kindly. “Every time you open the book. That’s the beauty of reading, isn’t it?”
If I can’t make the author understand, then surely I have run out of options. I’m certain she thinks I’m nuts—some delusional girl who shows up unannounced, talking about a fictional character as if he might be sitting in the room sipping tea.
But how will I break this news to Oliver?
Suddenly, it’s just too much. I thought if anyone was ever going to understand the things I felt for this story, it would be the author herself, and yet here she is telling me—like everyone else—that I’m wrong. That what’s between me and Oliver is impossible.
I start sobbing. I get to my feet, embarrassed, suddenly intent on leaving as quickly as possible. I’ve been an idiot to think that real life could have a happy ending.
“Delilah! Are you all right?” Concerned (and who wouldn’t be if a crazy girl was hysterical in the living room?), Jessamyn puts her hand on my arm. “Is there someone I can call for you? Your mother, maybe?”
This makes me cry even harder, as I think about how frantic my mom must be by now. During our car ride I had checked the messages on my cell phone; I stopped listening at number twenty-three.
Jessamyn leads me to a couch. “I’m going to go get a glass of water for you,” she says. “And then we’ll figure out what to do next.”
She leaves the room, and I take deep breaths, trying to calm myself down enough to at least be capable of opening the book and telling Oliver it’s over.
I hear footsteps and look up, but it’s not Jessamyn returning from the kitchen. Instead, standing in the doorway that leads to the front hall, is Oliver.
At first I think I am hallucinating. But then he glances at me. I would know those eyes anywhere. “Hey,” he says.
Leaping up, I throw my arms around him. “Oliver! How did you get here?”
He shoves me backward, looking at me as if he’s never seen me in his life. “I walked downstairs,” he says. “And the name’s Edgar.”
My jaw drops just as Jessamyn enters, carrying a tall glass of water. She glances from Oliver to me. “Delilah,” she says, “I see you’ve met my son.”
And at that moment, everything goes black.
* * *
I’m not a fainter. I’m unfazed by the sight of blood, and I can watch horror movies without wincing.
And granted, I apparently took a massive conk to my head when I fell yesterday—and then traveled 230 miles without eating anything but Cheetos.
But all the same, I’m pretty embarrassed to find myself lying on a stranger’s couch with a cold, wet washcloth on my head and a boy who looks just like Oliver but isn’t, staring down at me with absolute revulsion. “You’re drooling,” he says.
Mortified, I wipe my hand across my mouth.
“She’s awake,” Not-Oliver says. “Can I go now?”
He is speaking to Jessamyn, who carries a bowl of soup from the kitchen. Why does everyone keep feeding me soup?
“Thanks for watching her, Edgar,” Jessamyn says.
“Whatever,” Edgar replies. He rolls his eyes and trudges out of the room.
“All right.” Jessamyn sits on the edge of the couch. “It’s time to tell me the truth. Are you in trouble, Delilah? Did you run away from home?”
“No!” I answer. “I mean, I did run away, but only temporarily. Only to find you.” I take the bowl she offers me. Broccoli cheddar. It smells delicious.
“And I’m guessing you have a mother somewhere who has no idea where you are right now?”
I can feel my cell phone vibrate in my pocket with yet another message. “Um,” I say. “Yeah.”
Jessamyn hands me the phone. “Call her.”
Reluctantly, I dial the numbers. It hasn’t even rung once when my mother picks up.
“Hi, Mom!” I say, as cheerful as possible.
I have to hold the phone away from my ear as she shouts at me in reply. Wincing, I wait till there’s a break in the wall of sound and speak again. “I’m really sorry—”
“Delilah Eve, do you have any idea how worried I’ve been? Where are you? What were you thinking?!”
“I just had to do something and I knew you wouldn’t let me leave if I asked first.”
“Tell me where you are. I’m going to come get you. And then I’m going to ground you for life.”
“I’m kind of in Massachusetts. On Cape Cod.”
There is another torrent of angry sound as my mother yells her response. Again, I hold the phone away from my ear.
“Maybe I can help,” Jessamyn says, and she reaches out her hand for the phone.
“Hello? Is this Delilah’s mother? I’m Jessamyn Jacobs.
” She hesitates. “Yes. Well, I used to be an author, anyway. Oh, that’s very kind.
I’m so glad you were a fan.” Another pause.
“Believe me, it was quite a surprise for me too…. No, no. It’s far too late for you to make that kind of trip.
Why don’t you just let me host Delilah overnight, and you can be here bright and early in the morning. She can stay in our guest room.”
I hear the buzzy warble of my mother’s voice in return, and then Jessamyn gives her an address. She holds the phone out to me when she’s through. “She’d like to speak to you again.”
“Just so we’re on the same page, you are still grounded until you hit menopause,” my mother repeats.
“But at least I know you’re not wandering around on a street somewhere at night.
You’ve caused this woman a great deal of disruption, so you’d better be the best guest she’s ever had in her home. Am I clear?”
“Yes, Mom,” I mutter. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”
“Delilah?” my mother says.
“Yeah?”
“I love you, you know.”
I look down into my lap. I’ve created so much trouble—for my mother and for Jessamyn Jacobs, all in the hope that I can make the impossible possible and turn a fictional character real. Suddenly, I’m ashamed for being so selfish. “I love you too,” I whisper.
I hang up the phone and hand it back to Jessamyn. “Thank you. For letting me stay here.”
“It’s no problem. It’s nice for Edgar to have someone his age around. He doesn’t make friends very easily.”
I sit up. “Can I ask you a question? How come Oliver looks just like your son?”
“Because he is my son.” Jessamyn looks up at me.
“After Edgar’s father died, he was so afraid of everything.
I wanted to create a role model for him—someone who maybe wasn’t the bravest or strongest boy in the kingdom but who managed to always triumph by using his brain.
Edgar was younger then—I had to imagine the boy I thought he’d grow up to look like—and that was how I painted Oliver. ”
“Well, they’re identical.”