Page 55 of Barbie: Dreamscape

I see her as a girl around my age, wearing the same necklace I have on, marching into the clearing and demanding to speak to the spiders. She wants to be trained by them.

They tell her they don’t speak to humans. Not anymore. And they certainly don’t train them.

But my mother doesn’t give up. She simply lifts her chin and, in her clear, strong voice, says, “Fine. By the end of the day, you will ask to work with me.”

And then she stands in the center of that clearing, takes a deep breath… and her necklace glows pink.

Magic used to work here, I think, watching. And my mother… she was able to use it.

The pieces come together. This necklace must have been her accessory from the Fates to help her design. That’s why it contains magic.

But why would Robin have one, too? She wasn’t a Designer; she doesn’t talk about her past, but that much I know. So why—

Then my mom begins to create, and I lose track of anything other than observing her in awe.

The leaves move in a rush around her, whirling and dancing, and she directs them with tiny flicks of her elegant fingers as though she’s conducting an orchestra, as if she’s painting a masterpiece with leaves as her colors and herself as her canvas, and she begins to create a gown made up of the forest itself.

She weaves branches into a bodice, she knits flowers into swaths of silky-soft fabric, she turns the leaves into a train that sweeps all the way through the clearing, the pink light from the necklace casting her in an almost otherworldly glow.

By the time her magic clears, the spiders are all hanging from their strings, watching. They look like ornaments, suspended in awe.

Then—

Your form is sloppy, one of them finally hisses.

My mother just smiles. “Good,” she says. “Teach me.”

I let out a choked laugh at her impishness, her refusal to be cowed by the spider’s critique. My mother—she was everything I thought she was. Confident. Bold. A little reckless.

When I was pronounced Fateless, I thought how disappointed my mother would be.

Now… seeing this… I know my mother would have done exactly what I’m doing now. She wouldn’t have accepted her Fateless Fate. She would have marched straight to Dreamland and demanded what she wanted.

Your mother was wondrous, the spiders say before disappearing into the trees again.

The darkness fades, just a little. It’s already afternoon. Almost time for the masquerade.

That’s when I realize I might have a dress… but I don’t have a mask.

Evalyn finally comes out into the clearing, sniffling.

“I recognized you immediately, you know. You really do look just like her. I just… I didn’t know how to say it.”

My breath stalls in my lungs.

My mother—

“The room you slept in—that was her room,” she says sadly. “She lived there while she trained with the spiders.”

The clothes that fit me perfectly, as if made specifically for my form—

“Everything in that wardrobe is hers. She made it all, even the quilt.”

My eyes burn, thinking about how safe and warm and comfortable it felt to be wrapped up in it. Now that I know my mother made it, it’s as though her arms were around me. As if she was singing me to sleep with that lullaby…

“Come on, then,” Evalyn says quickly, looking up at the sky, dotting her eyes with a handkerchief. “You don’t have much time to find a creature.”

I blink. “What?”