Eve and All Saints’ Day. The first day shaped by darkness and demons, the second by light and saints.
However, Halloween was when we celebrated—if a small gift and single cupcake could be called celebrating—since that was the date the midwife officially recorded, being forced by convention to pick.
Secretly, I observed my birthday on both days. I sang to myself both mornings and gave myself extra treats in the afternoons: more pudding at lunchtime, then purloining two chocolate bars from Mrs. Patel’s on the way home. Each evening, I munched my contraband, ignored my homework, and wondered, once I started reading the Bible and the Greek myths, if my birthdays meant that I was a half demon, half saint.
Leo
“What do you want to be when you grow up?” Christopher asked.
“I thought we were going to be soldiers.”
Christopher laughed. “Only once a month. Anyway, you won’t get paid for that. You’ll have to be something else too.”
“Oh.”
“So, what will you be?”
“Dunno,” Leo said, since he’d not given it a moment’s thought. They lay on the forbidden grass of the headmaster’s garden, an after-midnight summer ritual. “Do you?”
Christopher nodded. “Prime minister.”
Leo laughed, until he realized that his friend wasn’t laughing with him. “Seriously?”
“Sure.” Christopher shrugged. “Why not?”
As the moon slid behind the clouds, Leo cast a covert glance at his friend. In the darkness, he felt a surge of feeling he couldn’t understand or explain: admiration, adoration, gratitude . . . In that moment, if someone had asked, Leo would’ve said he was happier than he’d ever been. He’d found a friend who believed in Everwhere (their great and glorious secret) and also that anything on Earth was possible too. And, in his presence, Leo believed that too.
23rd October
Nine days . . .
9:28 a.m.—Goldie
“There’s something else I need to tell you,” Leo says, after we’ve been walking for a while, turning down streets at random, emerging onto the banks of the river behind Trinity College.
“O-kay.”
I wonder if this something is good or bad. I’m not sure I can handle much more of the latter. The fact of Everwhere, or, hopefully, the fantasy of it, sits between us like an elephant made of mists and moonlight.
“So, what is it?” I ask, since Leo’s fallen silent. “Tell me. You’re making me nervous.”
“I’m sorry,” he says, “it’s just hard for me to . . .”
He sits on a bench by the river. I sit beside him.
Suddenly, something awful occurs to me. “Is it that you don’t . . . you don’t . . .”
“What?”
I shake my head, unable to get the words out.
Leo takes my hand. “What is it?”
“I don’t know,” I mumble. “Is it that you don’t”—I drop the words into my lap—“Love me anymore.”
“No, no.” Leo laughs. “I love you, of course I love you. I can’t remember a time I didn’t love you, even despite myself.” He reaches up to wipe his finger under my eyes. “Don’t cry—why are you crying?”
“I—I d-didn’t . . .” I shake my head. “I—I’m fine.”
“It’s not that,” Leo says, brushing his hand along my cheek. “I mean, it’s a lot of things.”
I smile, flushed with relief. If he’s not leaving me then I don’t care. He can tell me what he likes. I’m getting used to it now. Another world beyond a gate. Levitating leaves. Sisters. Mists and fog and moonlight. Bring it on.
Leo takes a deep breath. “I . . . I’m not entirely normal.”
I laugh. “No kidding.”
“Hey,” he says. “That’s hardly—nor are you.”
I know I’m not, I could say, except I’m not quite yet ready to admit this out loud. Instead, I give him a wry smile. “So you say.” I think of the dreams, of the flowers, of Liyana. I want to talk about it and I don’t. “So we’re both abnormal. But we weren’t talking about me, you were going to tell me about you.”
I see Leo steel himself. “I’m, well, not entirely . . . human.”
“Oh, God,” I say, dearly hoping he’s not about to tell me he’s a vampire. I’m starting to suspect that Everwhere might be real, and I know that I’m able to do inexplicable things. But a delusional persona is a step too far. Please don’t let the man I love be a lunatic.
Leo exhales. “Well, technically, I am, or at least I was, a . . . star.”
I frown. As revelations go, this is an improvement on vampire. “A star? As in the ones who shine onstage or hang in the sky?”
He glances down at the ground.