Between the lines

“No… I mean, do you ever wish you were inside the game?”

At first I am afraid to look him in the eye, but when I do, I find Edgar staring at me intently. “Sometimes,” he admits quietly, “it’s like I can hear the commanders talking to me, telling me what to do next.”

I put my hand on his arm. “Edgar, can I show you something?”

I run to the room next door and crawl onto the guest bed. The book is still open to page 43, and Oliver is lying on his back, snoring. “Oliver,” I whisper, leaning close to the binding, and then I shout, “Get up!”

He startles, smacking his head on a low branch jutting out of the cliff. Rubbing it, he winces and looks up at me. “Just for clarification, when you say you’ll be right back, then you mean sometime in the next millennium?”

“I got distracted. But Oliver, listen, there’s someone I want you to meet.” I grab the book and carry it toward Edgar’s bedroom.

“What? Do you really think this is a good idea? No one ever sees me, and it just makes you look even more insane.”

“Thanks,” I say sarcastically. I turn the corner and enter Edgar’s room again. “I have a gut feeling about this.”

“About what?” Edgar asks.

I set the book on the desk. “I wasn’t talking to you,” I explain. “I was talking to him.” I point to Oliver, who smiles.

Edgar glances at the book, and then up at me. “Seriously? You think my mom’s fairy tale is talking to you?”

“Just wait a second,” I urge. “No one ever hears him talk-but that’s because no one ever listens hard enough. But based on what you told me about your video game, I think you might be different. Please? Can’t you try?”

“He’s not very attractive,” Oliver says, miffed.

“Oliver, he looks identical to you,” I murmur.

Edgar folds his arms. “Look, pretty boy, my mother drew you based off of me-”

I gasp. “You heard him? You heard Oliver speak?”

Edgar’s eyes widen, and he steps away from the book as if he doesn’t want to get too close to it. He hits the side of his head with the flat of his hand, as if he’s gotten water in his ear and is trying to shake it out. “No no no no no,” he says, under his breath. “That didn’t just happen.”

“It did,” I say, grasping his arm. “I know it seems crazy and impossible, but you have to believe me-it’s real. He’s real. And I promised I’d help him get out of this book.”

This is huge. If I’m not the only person who can hear Oliver, then there’s somebody else in this world who can help me save him. And yet, I feel the tiniest twinge in my chest, thinking that if I’m not the only person who hears Oliver, it makes the connection between us a little less special.

“What is that?” Oliver’s eyes gleam. I follow his gaze off the edge of the page to the computer screen, which has rebooted and shows a massive army of aliens attacking Earth.

“Battle Zorg 2000,” I reply. “It’s a computer game.”

“How did all those little people get inside the box?”

I’m not about to give Oliver a tutorial on electronics. “I’ll explain it later. All you need to know is that that little box is the machine Jessamyn Jacobs used when she wrote Between the Lines. The original story is still in there.”

“So what?” Edgar and Oliver speak simultaneously-and then look at each other.

“Oliver, you couldn’t change the ending of the book. And Jessamyn Jacobs may not be willing to change the ending of the book.” I wait for him to meet my gaze. “But I’m going to try.”

***

page 52

In the dungeon below Timble Tower, with rats running over his boots and bats screeching past his face in the dark, Oliver thought this was a rather ignominious way to end one’s life story.

That is: failing in one’s attempt to rescue a potential bride.

He felt sorry for Seraphima, but he felt even sorrier for himself.

He would never ride Socks again at breakneck speed across a meadow.

He’d never throw a stick for Frump to fetch.

He’d never rule a kingdom.

He’d never feel the rain on his face.

He’d never kiss his true love.

Think on the bright side, Oliver, he schooled himself. He’d never have to worry about going bald. He’d never have to suffer through another meal of liver and onions. He’d never get chicken pox.

He wouldn’t have to feel that horrible little itch on the small of his back, which he couldn’t reach because his hands were tied behind him.

Frustrated, he tried to inch his bound hands up toward the itch, but instead, he only managed to jostle his tunic.

Something clattered to the stone floor.

In the dim light, Oliver squinted. The shark’s tooth that the mermaids had given him. He’d kept it, like a good- luck amulet, in his pocket. After all, it didn’t have much use, unless you were a shark in need of dentures.

Or, perhaps, tied up in the dungeon of a tower.

Falling to his knees, Oliver fumbled for the tooth and managed to roll over it. With careful, small movements, he started to saw through the ropes that were binding him. It felt like it would take forever, and Seraphima didn’t have forever. Any minute now, Rapscullio was going to take her as his own bride.

Oliver felt something scramble up his boot and then along his leg. One of the rats. The rodent, hearing some movement, had decided to get in on the action. Amazed, Oliver held still while the rat chewed through the rope enough for him to use his own strength to burst free.

The tower was too old to have formal cells, so Oliver only had to hoist himself out of the dank, fetid pit where he’d been dumped. Silently, he climbed the circular stone stairs, listening for the sound of Rapscullio’s voice. When he reached the tower room and poked his head inside, however, it was empty.

Or so he thought, until someone leaped onto his back from behind and started beating him around the ears.

In a cloud of tulle and taffeta, he wrestled Seraphima to the ground, pinning her by her wrists. “You’re not Rapscullio!” she gasped.

He grinned. “Disappointed, are you?”

Seraphima shook her head and smiled. She was beautiful when she smiled. Then again, Oliver thought, she was beautiful when she didn’t smile too. “I knew you’d come for me,” she said.

Oliver stared down at her, suddenly convinced that he could slay a hundred men, if necessary. Was that all it took to be brave? Knowing that someone believed in you?

“I have a plan,” Oliver whispered, pulling her to her feet. “But I need your dress to make it work.”

OLIVER

I’M NOT SO SURE I AGREE WITH DELILAH.