Stella sits on my hip, sucking her thumb. She’s tall for her age, like I was, but she’s still a toddler. My little girl is growing up too fast. She’s already getting heavy when I carry her. Soon I’ll be teaching her spells. As we walk across the front lawn toward Norrell, I gently dislodge her thumb and hold her hand in mine. “Daddy’s almost finished with the stairs. Are you excited to go play up there?” I ask her, pointing both our hands toward the project Walt, Acton, and Norrell spent over a month building. Well, years, considering the tree itself.
“Why is there a house in the tree, Mommy?” Her eyes are wide as she looks at it. She’s asked this question many times. I hope Norrell doesn’t hear her say it again, but his ears pick up everything. He shakes his head, but there’s a crooked smile curling past his tusk as he descends the spiral staircase they ingeniously built. It’s amazing what they accomplished, often after long days spent on their thriving landscaping design business.
“It’s a treehouse. A place your daddy and uncles built just for you. We’ll play in it together for now. And then in a couple of years, you and your friends can play there all by yourselves. We climb up these stairs to reach it.”
“Aubin won’t need to when he’s bigger,” she remarks with a tiny frown.
“In a few years he might not. But he can’t fly yet, sweet pea. He’ll have to use the stairs just like you for a while,” I explain. Cara and Ben’s son, Aubin, is a few months younger than Stella. They are adorable playmates, the best of friends, but sometimes she shows some sibling-like jealousy toward Aubin’s wings, even though he’s much too young to fly. “You will both have amazing talents. Remember, you will wield magick one day.”
“I guess,” she concedes. She doesn’t look satisfied, but she’s no longer frowning.
Norrell watches us from where he’s testing the enchanted staircase’s strength one last time before we take her up with us. “Alright, Snow Angel, are you ready?” Norrell asks.
I’m about to tell him to wait when I hear Walt and Acton step outside the front door.
“She’s a beaut,” Walt admires as they walk over to us. “I can’t get over how you twisted those branches to create a fence around the platform.” Acton volunteered his magick to help the now mighty live oak tree grow from a sapling to full maturity in only a few years. Taking the process slowly ensured the tree developed as strong and sturdy as possible. He also shaped its growth to hold a platform and treehouse without damaging the fork where the branches grow from the trunk. Only at that point did the three of them start building.
“The tree senses the profound changes in the earth where it grew. It eagerly fills that space with life again. Its noble purpose,” Acton remarks.
When I was pregnant with Stella, a notion popped in my head that we should plant a tree where the carriage house once stood. From there, the idea of the treehouse came together when the four of us talked about it.
“That will be a well-loved tree, especially as Stella gets older. I think Elgar and his folks are going to love seeing it when they visit next month,” Walt agrees.
“That’s too tall for Mommy,” Stella declares to them, gesturing toward the platform. When she’s satisfied that her uncles heard her, she lifts her head to look up toward the top of the tree.
“It’s perfectly safe. I used magick to make sure of it. We’ll all go up together.” I borrowed a spell to cushion any falls under the tree that the parks department uses at Howling Woods Canopy Park. I hope it’s overkill, but Norrell and I agree we should keep it in place indefinitely.
“Okay,” she blurts out, then squirms to get out of my hold. I put her down and she runs straight to Norrell. She’s a daddy’s girl at heart. He smooths her wispy white hair—the same color as Norrell’s—out of her face and then holds her hand to help her walk up the spiral stairs.
“She had me worried for a second she wouldn’t go up,” Walt whispers to me. I hum my agreement, but her curiosity would win out fast enough. Especially if Norrell reminds her that he and her uncles built it for her.
“Moon and stars, I’m so glad you remembered,” I tell Acton as he hands me our picnic basket I left in the kitchen. A little tea set and a bottle of juice are packed inside. All the necessities to host an afternoon “tea party” to celebrate the completion of the new treehouse.
“Knock knock!” Cara announces from the foyer. Aubin’s soft voice mumbles something I don’t catch while they walk toward the kitchen.
“Sounds like Aubin wants his own treehouse,” Norrell whispers, his eyebrows raised.
“Well, this one is as good as his anyway.” I crack a smile, remembering the last time he was here and couldn’t stop staring at Walt and Norrell as they worked on it.
Ben, Cara, and Aubin noisily enter the kitchen, with Aubin impatiently tugging Ben’s hand, trying to move him faster. When he spots Stella coloring at the table, he lets go and runs over to join in.
“Aubin’s in a mood today. Terrible threes and all,” Cara murmurs.
“We could play with them outside in the treehouse until dinner is ready,” I suggest.
“He would love that. He hasn’t stopped talking about it all weekend.” The tension leaves Cara’s body.
Something pokes my leg. I turn around and two sets of big, round baby eyes look up at me—one violet and one hazel. They must be ninjas, silently sneaking up on me like that. “May we play in thetweehouse now, please?” Aubin asks in his gruff little voice.
I press my lips together to hold back a giggle. He’s already losing his baby teeth, and the big gap in front leaves him with the cutest lisp. I’ll miss it when they grow back. “Mmm-hmm,” I agree, nodding my head.
“Yes!” His lisp is on display again as Aubin gives a little fist pump. They dash toward the front door. Norrell and Ben follow them out.
“I know he’s not human, but I can’t get over how big he is already. And his teeth! Don’t even get me started. I asked Ben if the tooth fairy should visit, and he didn’t know what I was talking about.” She chuckles, shaking her head. “There are days Aubin reminds me of a teenager, even though he’s only a toddler.I can’t even think about when he starts to fly.” Cara exhales loudly, giving me a look.
“Their development can be faster than humans’. But time moves differently watching them grow up. Sometimes I still see Stella as a baby. Other times she’s like a little adult,” I agree.
“Are you thinking about having another?” she asks abruptly. Without letting me answer, she continues, “I do, often, but Aubin’s quite a handful. Ben and I talk about it, and he tells me our son is a normal, healthy gargoyle, growing right on track. Ben issucha good dad. He makes everything easier. But wow, that little guy keeps me on my toes. No wonder Nicolas and Lillian waited a decade between kids.”
