Off the Page Read online

  It’s her mother.

  We are rusty. But we are professionals. I feel the words pulled from my throat, as if they are a ribbon. Save who? I say, scowling.

  Surreptitiously I glance at Mrs. McPhee and I see her eyes widen as she squints at my face. Oh God. She’s going to recognize me as Delilah’s boyfriend.

  It takes all the effort I can muster to angle my head against the illustration’s will so that she can only make out my profile instead of my full features.

  “What is inside this book that you can’t live without, Delilah?” Mrs. McPhee murmurs absently. She finishes the page and turns to the next. Suddenly I stand with Queen Maureen, trying to explain to her why I am about to embark on a mission to save this princess. Maureen’s lips tremble as I speak; I can register the fear on her face as she channels what it must be like as a mother to say goodbye to her son. She is doing an acting job better than I’ve ever seen, but then, so is everyone else. They are all bristling with energy, delighted to be read for the first time in months.

  All but me, that is.

  I am reliving a nightmare.

  I gallop through the Enchanted Forest and outwit the fairies, I nearly drown in the ocean, I cheat the trolls to ensure a safe passage, and all this I do while managing to keep my face turned away from the Reader. By the time I am on page 43, scaling the cliff wall, my body is shaking from exertion.

  When Rapscullio locks me in the dungeon, it’s almost a relief, because my face is drawn in shadow.

  Finally I am pulled to the white sand of Everafter Beach. Humphrey is trying to eat the wedding rings attached to his collar. The mermaids wave from the breakers; the trolls hold the poles of the bridal canopy; the fairies have twined ribbons around them. And Seraphima, as always, is in my embrace, wearing her silver wedding gown.

  And a pair of jeans underneath.

  As Mrs. McPhee’s eyes skim the last words of the fairy tale, I am drawn inexorably toward Seraphima.

  I think of Delilah, kissing Edgar.

  And just as Delilah said about that kiss, all I can think about is how Seraphima is the wrong size, the wrong shape, the wrong everything. How she isn’t Delilah.

  But my lips stay pressed to hers, glued by a happily-ever-after, until the back cover is closed.

  Around me, the other characters start to cheer.

  Well done! Bravo!

  That was excellent.

  Did you see the part where I—

  Oh, how I’ve missed performing. . . .

  I fall to my knees as if I’ve been punched, gasping for breath. Rapscullio claps me on the shoulder. “Just like old times, right, Oliver?” he says, smiling widely.

  His words are the match that ignites the fire within me. Staggering to my feet, I start to run as fast as I can. I move across the pages so quickly that the scenes blur behind me; I don’t stop to see where I am. I run until I pass my first scene, and the one before it, through the dedications, skittering past the copyright, until I skid into the great white morass of the title page. There, I hesitate, momentarily dizzied by the empty expanse.

  There’s nowhere else to go.

  But that isn’t going to stop me.

  I hurl myself headlong into the margin, bouncing back. I beat myself against the cardboard cover, over and over, until my hands come away bruised. And still I force myself upright again, launching my body against the boundaries of this book.

  Finally, battered, I fall backward on the frontispiece.

  My fists leave smudges of blood on the vast white surface.

  I stare up at the sky, at nothing.

  After a moment I come up on my elbows, still panting. I flex my aching fingers. I watch the bruises fade. I watch my blood vanish, as if it never existed.

  As if I never existed.

  All the world’s a stage, but actors aren’t the only ones who play roles.

  Even when you’re not following a script, you might as well be. You don’t behave the same way in front of everyone. You know what makes your friends laugh, and what makes your parents proud, and what makes your teachers respect you—and you have a different persona for each of them.

  Given all these performances . . . how do you ever know who you really are?

  Well, you have to find that rare someone for whom you’re not putting on a show. Someone who shines a spotlight in your direction—not because you’re who they need you to be, or who they want you to be . . . just because you’re you.

  DELILAH

  The really crappy thing about being a teenager is that even if you have a legitimate, monumental problem—the sky is falling or the zombie apocalypse has begun or you’ve contracted the plague—you still have to do your geometry homework. So in spite of the fact that I am having possibly the worst Tuesday of my life, and my boyfriend is trapped in a fairy tale, and my best friend is hooking up with his clone, I have to prove that two triangles are congruent.

  The way I am selling this to myself is a promise: if I finish this proof, I will let myself take an hour to talk to Oliver before I have to drag myself away to write an essay about the fall of Troy.

  Suddenly the door of my bedroom slams open. I turn, scowling, ready to lace into my mom again about privacy—but it’s Jules. “I can’t find him,” she says, completely on edge. “He’s not at home; he’s not answering his phone or his texts; it’s like he’s totally vanished.”

  “Who?”

  She blinks at me. “Edgar? Oh my God. Did you not even notice he wasn’t in school today? Seriously? You’re supposed to be his fake girlfriend.”

  “Maybe he’s just sick. He’s literally been in a bubble for the past three months.”

  “Or,” Jules says, her eyes flicking to the fairy tale on my dresser, “maybe he’s back in the bubble.”

  “What? No he’s not.”

  “Did you check?”

  “I don’t have to. Oliver’s in there, which means Edgar’s out here.”

  “When was the last time you talked to Oliver?” Jules asks.

  A cold panic settles over me. If Oliver had sprung from the book again, he’d come straight to me. I know he would.

  Wouldn’t he?

  Jules and I both scramble for the book at the same time. I fling it open to a random page—one where Oliver is riding Socks to Orville’s cottage, with his trusty dog trotting along beside them. But I do it so fast that the saddle is facing backward with Oliver in it, and Humphrey has a turkey leg clamped in his jaws that Socks is hissing at him to hide. As soon as they all see my face, however, they relax.

  “Thank goodness it’s you,” Oliver says.

  “Who else would it be?”

  “You’d be sur—”

  “Is Edgar in there?” Jules interrupts.

  “Unfortunately not,” Oliver mutters. “Why?”

  “Ughhh,” Jules groans. “You’re useless.”

  “I beg your pardon. . . .”

  “Sorry,” I murmur. “I’ll talk to you later, okay?” I lower my voice to a whisper. “She’s having boy problems.”

  I gently close the book, hugging it to my chest. “You seem awfully obsessed with Edgar, given the fact that less than twenty-four hours ago you were on a date with a different guy.”

  “That’s kind of why I need to find him.” Jules flops down on my bed. “I broke things off with Chris today.”

  My eyes widen. “Really?”

  “Chris is great. He’s smart, and funny, and cute. But Edgar told me that if you soak a body in pineapple juice for a week, all the skin will fall off it.”

  “Wow, he sounds dreamy,” I say.

  “He gets me. And he’s wicked hot. Well. You know.” She glances up. “How long till you can break up with him?”

  “How long till the gossip spreads that we’re sister wives?”

  I’m smiling, but I’m also thinking about how it’s going to feel when I watch Jules and Edgar walking down the hallways at school, holding hands. Whispering to each other. Existing in their own little world. As ha