“Darya!” said the girl named Natasha, squealing and drawing back. “You’re splashing me!”
The third girl in Emily’s vision had her back toward Emily, her hands planted on her hips. Something about her made Emily’s heart leap, and Emily wanted to see her face. She suddenly and desperately wanted to see the third girl’s face, but before she did, the vision faded. Everything was obscured, as if by snow or static or a zillion mini-marshmallows raining from the sky, and Emily was back beneath the willow tree with Klara.
Goose bumps rose on Emily’s arms, and again she felt the rightness of Klara’s wish. To be a good mother implied growing up and being a mother, which underlined Klara’s desire for Ava to be safe. Also, good mothers were raised by good parents, which included mothers and fathers, as well as guardians of any sort. And since Klara included Emily in her wish . . .
Was this her way of honoring Emily’s request? Would Klara’s wish lend strength to Emily’s wishes, about both her mother and father?
Daddy, whispered eight-year-old Emily within Emily’s thirteen-year-old soul, and for an instant, Emily understood: All time was all time. It neither changed nor lent itself to explanation. It simply was.
She sensed her body rising into the air. She looked down at her hands, flexing her fingers. Each finger floated apart, cells scattering like birdseed.
She wiggled her feet—only she no longer had feet.
She smelled ocean spray and the tang of citrus. She saw a man in a sunlit kitchen, holding a phone to his ear.
“Yes, we just got back from the airport,” he said. “I’ll put her on the phone.” The man covered the speaker. “Emily? Emily! Your mom wants to talk to you!” He spoke again into the phone. “Tell Nate hi for me, and that I’m working on his plane ticket for summer break.” His voice broke. “And Rose? Thank you.”
Then that vision faded, and Emily saw Klara, small and far away.
Or maybe Emily was small and far away?
She heard Klara’s voice, just barely.
“And for my last wish, the deepest wish of my secret heart,” her best friend said, and her words were bubbles, balloons, sweetly buzzing honeybees. “I wish for us to remember. To remember just enough, but not too—”
Not too what? thought Emily. Just enough, but not . . . too much? Was that what Klara said?
Emily’s thoughts became bees.
They hummed and buzzed.
“Klara?” Emily tried to say.
Emily’s thoughts, her cells, her dreams, her soul—they were one, and they were all. They transported her to a land of milk and honey.
And orange juice.
I wish for mysteries: infinite, beautiful, and magical.
—GRACE
PROLOGUE: EUGOLORP
“Okay, open your eyes!” Natasha cried, moving her hands from Ava’s face.
Nine-year-old Ava blinked. She sat cross-legged on the picnic blanket Mama had thrown onto the grass for the kids, her elbows on her knees and her hair tickling her back. Her hair was long now, really and truly long. Longer, even, than her oldest sister’s hair, because last month Natasha had asked if she could get a fancy haircut for her sixth-grade graduation, and Mama had said yes.
Immediately after her fancy haircut, Natasha had burst into tears and implored Mama to glue her cut-off hair back on.
“Oh, baby,” Mama had said, tucking the strands of Natasha’s pixie cut behind her ears. “The world doesn’t work that way, I’m afraid. We can’t turn back time. But it’s just hair. It’ll grow back.”
And that was true. It would. But until then, ha! Until then, Ava got to be the Blok sister with the longest hair!
She smiled, remembering the time she’d gotten gum stuck in her hair. Mama had suggested cutting the gum out, maybe cutting all of Ava’s hair to chin length, but when Ava had protested, Papa had swooped in and saved the day. He’d smeared peanut butter on the gum, and in the process smeared peanut butter over her whole scalp, practically—gloopy and sticky and awesome.
Her sisters had thought it was hilarious, especially Darya, who was the middle sister of the three Blok girls. Darya and Natasha begged Ava to hold her big, gooey peanut-butter head still and pretend to be a squirrel feeder, so they could catch a squirrel. Ava refused. They begged her to hold still while they threw cotton balls at her, to see who could get the most to stick to her head. She refused. They threw cotton balls at her regardless, until her head was a massive, fluffy cotton-ball explosion. She was a walking Q-tip, and secretly, she loved it.
And eventually, Papa did get the gum out, as well as the cotton balls. Win-win for everyone.
“Ava,” she heard. “Ava!”
She returned to reality to see Darya’s face a foot away from her own.
“Oh,” said Ava. “Hi!”
Darya rolled her eyes. To the others, she said, “Omigosh. Ava went off with the fairies again, people.”
“Because fairies are awesome,” Ava retorted. “Except—oh yeah. You wouldn’t know, would you?”
Darya was ten and Natasha was eleven, but even so, the two of them were in the same grade at school, both one grade higher than Ava. While Natasha was all about studying and getting good grades, Darya’s world revolved around makeup, fashion, and saying things like “omigosh” and “dude, that’s so savage.”
On top of that, Darya pretended not to believe in fairies. Not just fairies, but any sort of magic, period. Which meant that honestly, Ava had no choice but to make fun of her.
Darya stuck her tongue out.
Ava batted her eyelashes and smiled.
“Well?” said Tally, who sat on her knees, her fingers curled in anticipation. Tally was the reason they played the “Ava and the Fairies” game. Tally loved the idea of fairies and unicorns and every sort of magic there was.
Ava tapped her chin and gazed at the clouds. “Hmm,” she said. “Hmm, hmm, hmm.”
Darya groaned.
Natasha said, “Ava.”
But drawing it out was part of the tradition, as Natasha and Darya knew. They were just playing their roles—although Ava wondered how much longer Darya would agree to be
