OLIVER
THE NEXT MORNING, I ARRANGE FOR A PICNICbreakfast with Delilah in the tower where I rescue Seraphima. I figure that before we start out to Orville’s cottage, we should be fortified.
And I kind of want to spend a few more minutes alone with her, instead of letting Queen Maureen grill her over the banquet table.
I thought I’d memorized everything there was to know about Delilah—from her freckles to her favorite blouse to the way she always gives her goldfish an extra helping of food—but as it turned out, there was so much left to learn. Like the fact that her skin is as soft as a feather, and that her hair smells of apples.Her hand fits mine like the last piece of a jigsaw puzzle.
Delilah scrambles up the tower steps ahead of me, kicking her skirts out of the way. “Stupid dress,” she mutters.
“It may be stupid,” I reply, “but it looks quite nice on you.”
She looks over her shoulder at me. “I bet you’d feel different ifyouwere the one wearing it. Have you ever traipsed through a meadow in heels? I thinknot.…”
“I don’t traipse. Men don’t traipse. We… swagger.”
Delilah bursts out laughing. “Swagger? You?”
Affronted, I pause on the steps. “What? What’s the matter with the way I walk?”
But before Delilah can answer, she reaches the top of the tower and gasps. “Oliver,” she says, “when did you do all this?”
“Every now and then, having a castle full of servants is a real perk,” I say. I peek over her shoulder and see that they have exceeded my expectations. A sheepskin blanket has been draped over the middle of the floor, and a feast is spread across it. There’s an entire roast turkey, and apricot chutney, and stuffed figs. There are olives and grapes and plums piled high in the queen’s best china bowls. A carafe of blackberry cider sits beside two golden chalices.
“I’m going to gain ten pounds before I leave this place,” Delilah mutters. “A piece of toast would have been fine.”
Doves coo in the rafters above us as she sits down on the blanket, her loathed dress whispering around her. She pops a grape into her mouth and sighs. “This is so unreal. I feel like a princess.”
She couldn’t have given me a better opening for the conversation I’ve been hoping to have.
“Funny,” I say. “I was thinking the same thing.”
Delilah frowns. “You feel like a princess too?”
“No!” I shake my head. “I just… well, I thinkyou’dmake a wonderful one.” I force myself to meet her gaze. “I’ve never done this before. I mean, not for real, anyway.” Swallowing hard, I get down on one knee and take her hand in mine. “Delilah, will you marry me?”
“What? What!Whatare you doing?” She shoves me backward, so that I topple over. “Oliver, I’m fifteen! I’m not getting married before I even go to prom!”
“Maybe we could travel there on our honeymoon?” I suggest.
She stands up, frustrated. “You don’t understand.”
“I thought you wanted us to be together,” I say.
She moves to the open window, a flashback to the climax of this fairy tale. “In my world, you don’t get married when you’re fifteen,” she says. “Unless you’re pregnant andhave been on an MTV show. I want a boyfriend. I want to go to movies and hold hands and have inside jokes. I want to take silly pictures with the camera on my phone. I want to get a Valentine’s Day card that’s not from my mother.” Delilah looks up at me. “I want a date with you.”
“A date. You mean like… the first Thursday in July?”
She smiles. “Not quite. It’s when you go somewhere and get to know the other person a little better.”
The picnic suddenly seems garish, over the top, a lousy idea. “We don’t have to get married,” I say. “All I really ever wanted was to be with you.”
“I thought that was all I wanted too—but it turns out, I was wrong,” Delilah admits. “I also want to wake up in my own bed. And wear pants. And—oh my gosh, I can’t believe I’m saying this—go to school.” She puts her hands on either side of my face. “I want you in my life. But I want it to bemylife.”
Guilty, I break away from her. “I know it’s all my fault. But when I realized that I was never going to be able to leave the book, I couldn’t stand the thought of—”
“Back up,” Delilah says. “What do you mean, you were never going to be able to leave the book?”
My face turns red. “I saw my future, when I was with Orville,” I whisper. “And you weren’t part of it.” I hesitate. “There was another girl in the vision he showed me.”
