

The 13th Month

Jon Jacks

Other New Adult and Children's books by Jon Jacks

The Caught – The Rules – Chapter One – The Changes – Sleeping Ugly

The Barking Detective Agency – The Healing – The Lost Fairy Tale

A Horse for a Kingdom – Charity – The Most Beautiful Things (Now includes The Last Train)

The Dream Swallowers – Nyx; Granddaughter of the Night – Jonah and the Alligator

Glastonbury Sirens – Dr Jekyll's Maid – The 500-Year Circus – The Desire: Class of 666

P – The Endless Game – DoriaN A – Wyrd Girl – The Wicker Slippers – Gorgesque

Heartache High (Vol I) – Heartache High: The Primer (Vol II) – Heartache High: The Wakening (Vol III)

Miss Terry Charm, Merry Kris Mouse & The Silver Egg – The Last Angel – Eve of the Serpent

Seecrets – The Cull – Dragonsapien – The Boy in White Linen – Porcelain Princess – Freaking Freak

Died Blondes – Queen of all the Knowing World – The Truth About Fairies – Lowlife

Elm of False Dreams – God of the 4th Sun – A Guide for Young Wytches – Lady of the Wasteland

The Wendygo House – Americarnie Trash – An Incomparable Pearl – We Three Queens – Cygnet Czarinas

Memesis – April Queen, May Fool – Sick Teen – Thrice Born – Self-Assembled Girl – Love Poison No. 13

Whatever happened to Cinderella's Slipper? – AmeriChristmas – The Vitch's Kat in Hollywoodland

Blood of Angels, Wings of Men – Patchwork Quest – The World Turns on A Card – Palace of Lace

Text copyright© 2018 Jon Jacks

All rights reserved

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# Chapter 1

Now, just what do you do when you've got your eye on a boy your best friend says she's got first claims on?

Poor dear; she sniffs she'll be broken-hearted if any one stole him away from her. Not that he's hers to lose anyway, of course.

As she says it, her eyes are all wide, innocent, teary – but you know what she's saying with that look, don't you?

Hands off – and that means you!

Yeah, like I'm so dumb I couldn't possibly figure out that's how she's playing this.

Thing is, is she considering that I might just be a little broken-hearted too if she ends up with him and I'm the one left on the shelf?

You can bet your life she ain't!

For me, it's got to be I lose even if I win; I get him, I lose a friend, and suffer a lot of back biting to boot.

I'll have ruined her life.

Call yourself a friend?

Only for her can it be win win; she gets him, and I've still got to be a friend, making out life's all peachy and perfect.

Happily discussing what a wonderful life she's living now she's caught the boy of her dreams. Maybe if I'm lucky, she'll throw in a few hints I've got to lower my sights a bit if I want to be in a successful relationship like she is.

Maybe, you know, I should consider asking Mickey Davis out; give him a couple of years and his skin won't be breaking out so bad, right?

Yeah, and with any luck, he might lose that weird wiry hair too.

So basically, my life is screwed no matter which way I play it.

*

Ain't life wonderful?

Leon, who Sue's already unfairly claimed as hers, just made one of the most obvious plays for me that any boy's tried.

You know; out in the school corridor, coming directly up to me like he's been forced by the other crowding kids to send us just about crashing into each other.

'Sorry,' he says, all smiles rather than displaying even a hint of apologetic embarrassment.

Thinks he's God's gift, see?

Thinks no girl could possibly mind being barged into by him.

Me, I just let my eyes roll heavenwards.

I could say I was at fault too, off course; that's what he's expecting.

What most girls would do; all nervous giggles, that kind of thing.

Apologising, in other words, because this guy's a jerk who can't just approach a girl and start up a conversation; he has to make out it's all an accident – maybe even Fate's taken a hand.

'Maybe if you were watching where you were going...' I scoff.

If I hadn't promised Sue I'd help her get a date with Leon, maybe I'd've behaved differently.

Maybe.

*

# Chapter 2

Had I promised Sue I'd help her date Leon Sharps?

She says I did.

Buy why would I do that; you know, promise, I mean?

It's a big word, isn't it: promise?

It implies it's up to me to make sure she lives happily ever after.

I really really don't think I'd be so stupid as to promise her anything! Least of all that I'd help her start dating Leon.

I mean, let's face it; her and Leon?

It just ain't gonna happen.

Don't get me wrong: Sue's got the looks – all the things in all the right places.

But then, so have I – and then some, too. And, dare I say it, I'm not as heavy about the hips as Sue is.

Hey, I'm not expecting you to take my word for it!

Ask any boy round here – Sue'll maybe get an eight, maybe even a nine: but I'll be nine each time, sometimes a ten.

Okay, okay; so I'm talking here like us girls are just lumps of meat, parading ourselves in front of some whooping morons on the Miss World panel – but come on, you know full well that boys are like that.

Sure, I agree with you; they really really shouldn't be like that.

But they are: so what're you gonna do about it?

Tell them off?

Tell them they're just pigs who deserve to end up wallowing in slop?

Yeah, you go and do that girl.

If you fancy spending your life knitting jumpers for the Third World, as you merrily rock back and forth in your little wooden chair.

I ain't gonna be the one who's gonna stop you.

*

Sue's heard 'from a friend' about my encounter with Leon in the school corridor.

I can't be sure who's told her, but her grasp on reality's wearing pretty thin, it seems to me.

'You deliberately walked right into Leon in the corridor, Kelly!'

'Sue, Sue!' I exclaim, holding my hands out in front of me, like I'm really worried she's gonna take a swipe at me any minute now. 'He bumped into me! I hardly talked to him!'

'Playing hard to get, Jackie said!'

'Jackie? Jackie Yorao? She wasn't even there, Sue!'

Is that right?

I don't think she was there; but hey, it was a crowded school corridor. The Dalia Lama could've been there, and I wouldn't have noticed him.

'Sue, I more or less told the poor guy I thought he was a jerk!'

'Oh, and how's that supposed to help me date him, Kelly? My supposed best friend, telling him he's a jerk? Have you already forgotten how you promised me you'd help me go out with him?'

There it is again, see?

That awful word: promised.

'Jackie says he's impressed you're playing hard to get,' Sue snaps, glaring at me like I'm involved in some sort of nefarious plot to take over the whole world unless my demands are met. 'He says you wouldn't have bumped into him if you weren't really interested in him!'

'It was an accident!'

'Oh yeah? He's talking like it was fate or something!'

See; what did I tell you?

*

# Chapter 3

Let me guess; you're above all this foolishness of ogling boys, dreaming about what it would be like to date them, and all that kind of thing, right?

So what's with all the expensive shampoos, the diligently applied spot creams, the avid reading of articles like 'The Ten Things You're Doing Wrong That Turns Him Off'?

I get it; you just put yourself through all that so you can feel good about yourself.

That's right, isn't it?

Sure girl, sure you do.

You just keep on lying to yourself if it makes you feel any better.

What's with this Leon anyway, you might be asking.

Well, what's with any boy you've got your eye on?

You can't quite figure it out yourself sometimes, can you?'

I mean, we're kidding ourselves, ain't we girls, if we're telling ourselves our favourite beau of the mo has movie star looks?

Maybe, yeah, he has, if you're watching the kinda movie that used to have you hiding behind the sofa when you were little.

Otherwise, let's face it; boys at school aren't really all that great, are they?

I mean, have you ever had the misfortune to walk past the boy's changing rooms down at the gym?

What the heck do they get up to to create such a god awful smell?

Do any of them bother taking a shower anyway?

Cheesy doesn't come close to describing the weird odour they give off.

Honestly, a wet dog smells better.

Better hair too. And breath.

On TV, of course, we get all these programmes set in high schools, where every kid but the deliberately geeky looks super hot.

Mainly because they aren't really kids; they're twenty five, if they're a day.

Then they've got all the expensive, professionally applied makeup. The personal trainers.

How are we mere kids supposed to compete with such an idealised image of what a schoolkid's supposed to look like?

Even the geeks have hearts of gold, or can sing like an angel.

We've got to look beneath the surface, see? See them for who they really are.

I do, I do!

I see them for the ridiculously good-looking actors they really are.

Promoting this idea that we all should look like walking goddesses while berating us at the same time for not realising the ugly kid's amazing too.

And, you know, I'm sure he is.

But does that mean you'd really go out with him?

*

Sue's still giving me the glares.

Like I'm the one at fault that Leon ain't got around to noticing her yet.

'You know, maybe I should just sort of casually bump into him...' she says, all innocent like, even though all the barbs are there.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I can't be bothered making another apology. Another explanation of what really happened.

What's the point, right?

She doesn't want to know; she's formed her own idea of what happened, and she's sticking to it.

Shhesssh!

If I'm getting all this aggravation just because Leon collided into me in the corridor, what's it gonna be like when he asks me out?

She's gonna jump off a cliff.

Or push me off one, more like.

*

# Chapter 4

Jackie's right though.

Leon is interested.

He's hanging around me like I'm throwing fish out to the penguins.

You know; making out he just happens to be there, glancing my way every now and again but pretending he isn't.

If I catch him staring, he quickly averts his eyes.

Yeah, like that works!

I could give him a smile, a bit more of a come on; that's what he's expecting, isn't it?

Instead, I just give him the scowls. It worries me a little that he can't help but think I'm in prime position for the school's 'Most Likely to End Up Living With Cats' award.

Despite this, I'm still getting regularly eyeballed by Sue.

Just what've I gotta do to please that girl?

Jackie says this, Jackie says that!

Has Jackie got nothing better to do than keep an eye on me and Leon?

Here's me going overboard in giving poor little Leon the brush off, and all Jackie sees is me trying to lead him on by making out I'm not interested.

Go figure.

How am I supposed to help it if I've just made Leon all the more curious by more or less turning him down flat?

Truth is, Sue owes me for this.

Truth is, yeah, I wouldn't mind one bit giving Leon his longed for smile. I'd combine it, too, with a warm and friendly glint of the eyes.

It always works.

We'd make a good match, me and Leon.

The fact is, Sue's wishful thinking is spoiling it all for me.

But does she see it that way?

Course not!

Well, it's time Sue had the facts spelt out to her.

Because it's time for me to call in my favours.

*

It's that time of year when the school play comes around.

Sleeping Beauty.

Now I ain't much of an actress, I'll grant you that: but what sort of skill does it take to play a beautiful girl who likes staying in bed?

It could've been written for me.

I'm a natural for the role.

While all those girls who normally love getting up there on the boards and boring us to tears with their soliloquies, well; they're definitely lacking in the looks department.

Who'd wanna bother waking them?

So, that means there are just three of us in the whole school who could make the role believable.

Me. (Obviously!)

Mary Ainsworth – who has that kind of look that old granny's weirdly seem to think is the ideal of beauty we should all be aspiring to: all big soppy eyes, sweet wouldn't-hurt-a-fly demeanour, absolutely no fashion sense at all. A cuddly puppy made human, basically.

And Sue –as long as she has the good sense to insist on a dress that hides her hip problem. And, to give her her fair dues, I'm sure she would insist on being given the right dress to wear.

Then again, what would be the point in old friends like me and Sue pitting ourselves against each other just, so Quite Contrary ends up winning the role?

But putting our heads together and working towards one common goal – ensuring I land the role of Aurora – we've just gotta be unbeatable!

Quite Contrary can play one of the sisters, or whoever else it is who's in the story.

(Yeah, yeah, I know, I know; the ugly sisters are Cinderella, right? But Aurora can have a sister too, can't she?)

So, all I've gotta do now is accidentally bump into Sue, the way I supposedly accidentally bumped into Leon, and I can make out this all suddenly occurred to me; you know, sort of, 'Sue, I was just thinking; with me kind of giving you a free pass on Leon, right, could–'

'Kelly, I'm sorry; I'm really really sorry!'

Sue's right by me; I don't need to go seeking her out after all, thank goodness,

'Look, you're right about Leon,' she continues apologetically. 'I get it that Jackie has just been trying to stir things up between us; she's jealous of our close friendship – us being the very best of friends and all that! – but I can see that, Kelly, honestly I can!'

Wow!

Could Sue be anymore repentant than this?

I doubt it.

Go girl; strike while the iron's hot!

'Sue, you don't need to apologise, silly girl!' I give her a warm, thankful hug. 'We all know what Jackie's like, don't we? I'm always here for you, you know that; that's what best friends are for, yeah? Actually, I was naturally thinking of you when I saw they were asking for girls to put their names forward to play Aurora–'

Sue leans back a little, giving herself space to run a hand through her long, blonde tresses; to shake her head, so her locks tumble like a golden waterfall down her back.

'Yes, yes: I'd be a natural to play her, wouldn't I?' she says excitedly, adding as she thankfully throws her arms about me, 'Oh, I just knew you'd help me get to play her!'

*

# Chapter 5

Well, what could I say?

I said Yes!

Fool, fool, fool!

Why couldn't I say No?

No way!

No chance!

No, no, no!

But no; I said Yes!

I went and said Yes!

How does she do this to me?

Why does she do this to me?

Why do I let her do this to me?

Idiot, idiot, idiot!

Course, I hummed and hawed at first.

But what did she do?

Pick up on the vibe that, you know, maybe, just maybe, I'd already made way too many sacrifices for her?

That maybe, you know, I wouldn't mind playing Sleeping Beauty?

No, course she doesn't; what she gives me is the sorrowful, hurt look that I even had to think about how I'd like to answer.

Like I'm the one being selfish!

Me!

Like I'm being unfair to her.

Unfair to her!

Did I point out that she's hardly a natural to play Aurora on the account of the fact that her hair's less to do with nature and more to do with Have More Fun Shades and Toners?

Course I didn't!

Who says Aurora has to be a blonde anyway?

Disney?

I mean, we're talking movies again here, not Brothers Grimm.

How many blondes were walking around in King Arthur's times, or whenever it is this story's meant to be set?

I mean, okay, so there would be girls with blonde hair; but not the just-about-fluorescent blonde Sue likes to think is her natural colour.

'Oh Kelly; you really really are the best friend anyone could hope for!' she gushes when I finally force that anguished Yes outta my stupid mouth.

How did I do it? I mean, how did I hold my tongue and stop myself from blurting out what I really wanted to say?

'What would I ever do without you?' Sue simpers.

Yeah, what would you do, Sue?

See; I should've said that, shouldn't I?

But I didn't.

Old fat mouth keeps it shut rather than letting it out.

There's no Leon for me; I'd accepted that.

But now there's also going to be no Aurora for me either.

*

There; I've promised.

Sue's told me that.

Apparently, I'd promised to help her.

She just deftly slips the word promise in the next time she brings up entering her name for the role of Aurora.

'Oh Kelly, I'm so pleased you promised to help me win this!'

Did I say that?

Would I really be that stupid?

But what am I supposed to say when she says that?

'Ah, well, actually, it wasn't a promise...'

Just how does that sound?

Like I'm going back on my offer to help.

Yeah; like I'm going back on a promise.

How can you break a promise to a friend?

If it ever got around that I'd promised to help and then let her down, then my name would be mud all round school.

And Sue would make sure it got around all right, naturally.

So I'm stuck.

Held to account by the promise of a promise I never actually made.

The question is, how do I fulfil that promise anyway?

It isn't like Mary isn't serious competition.

There are plenty of guys who find that butter-wouldn't-melt mouth of hers very kissable.

While Sue – if she's gotta insist on wearing overly tight skirts or jeans – is only making her hips look far worse than she has to.

Maybe she's playing to lose, I don't know.

Maybe it's just that she doesn't want me to get the role.

Just like she doesn't want me to end up with Leon.

This hip thing, you see, is bound to give us far more problems than I'd originally envisaged.

See, Miss Kemsley, who's organising the play, has just gone and introduced a dance element to the story.

Miss won't admit it, naturally, but I reckon she's mixing in a bit of Swan Lake.

The beautiful white swan, that's Sleeping Beauty.

The evil black swan, then, is the thirteenth fairy.

That's the one who puts the wicked spell on the young Aurora. All because the king and queen stupidly forget to send out a christening invitation to the kingdom's most badass fairy; which, surely, has just gotta be asking for trouble?

Mary's prancing around school like Snow White going about her house cleaning; all tra la la la and a ballet Pointe technique as she reaches up to take down a school book from a high shelf.

If I were the one seeking Aurora's role, it would bring me pretty close to vomiting, really.

As it is, I've gotta hand it to her. She'd never really struck me as being graceful, but this chance to play a lithely dancing Sleeping Beauty seems to be bringing out qualities in her that I bet even she hadn't been aware of.

Sue's coming across as a clumsy numbskull by comparison.

I mean, I doubt even Beyoncé could do little more than wince in pain in clothes as tight as Sue's wearing.

I say Sue should count herself as being lucky if she ends up as the thirteenth fairy.

*

# Chapter 6

Despite my reservations, over the next few weeks I put my whole heart into helping Sue win the role of Aurora.

Even though, yeah, I know it's never really gonna happen for Sue.

I go around, dropping little nuggets in the conversation implying that I reckon Sue's a natural for the role.

I mean, all that wonderful blonde hair...

At least, no one laughs when I say that. Although I'm pretty close.

All right; I sound mean.

Really mean.

Female dog kinda mean.

Sue is a friend, and normally, yes...I would really put myself out for her.

But this time, I just feel I've been tricked into standing aside for her one too many times.

The last straw, kinda thing.

You know, okay, so she wants this role

And she wants Leon.

Like, how come I don't get to say I want both of these things too?

How come we can't share it out a bit more fairly; you have Aurora, I'll take Leon.

That would be fairer, wouldn't it?

Is that really too much to ask for?

Surely it ain't, is it?

Yet just a moment ago – admit it now! – you were thinking I was being one heck of a witch, weren't you?

*

Sue stoically smiles, like it's what she wanted all along.

Miss Kemsley's just announced that Sue's our thirteenth fairy.

Whoopee!

You can see it on her face.

Hot diggerty dog!

She's hiding the anguish pretty damn well, of course. No one wants to come across as a bad loser. Especially in class: one of the cruellest emotional environments ever developed by man.

Later, it'll be tears, resentful recriminations, sneers and snarls as we have to go over and over the unfairness of it all once again.

Yeah, I know Sue.

Even though Sue has gotta know it's coming, Miss Kemsley's next announcement just about knocks her over the edge.

Mary gets to be Aurora.

Hip hiphooraaayyyy!

Who'd've thought it?

I've gotta feel for Sue.

She'd look happier if she were being torn apart from inside by a whole nest of Aliens.

Then again, if she's not happy about all this, how's she think I'm feeling regarding Leon?

She never had any hope of landing him.

She never had any hope of landing the role of Aurora.

Now she's just about handed them both on a plate to Quite Contrary. She's grown into this role of a beauty, has our Mary; and so she's naturally ended up gaining the attention of Leon, who's still smarting at my refusal to give him any encouragement.

Naturally, Mary can't believe her luck.

Not that she ever needed any luck, once I – at Sue's instigation, of course – had declared myself out of the running.

Mary knows full well that if I'd been the one going for the role rather than 'Hipsister' Sue, she'd be the one now contemplating playing the evil fairy.

And without the attendant glamour of the role of Aurora, she wouldn't have ended up in Leon's arms either. Especially if I'd already responded to his many woeful attempts to impress me.

I'd've been the one carrying off both prizes.

Honestly; sometimes, it's your friends who are your worst enemies, isn't it?

*

# Chapter 7

Hardly anyone can believe that Mary's ended up dating Leon.

There's not even that many who think she deserves to be playing Aurora.

I've got just about everyone coming up to me in the break periods, asking why I hadn't put myself forward for the role.

Why, too, I hadn't seen that Leon was interested in me; was I blind?

You'd've been perfect together, they say.

You'd've been perfect for the role; you're just how I imagine Sleeping Beauty would look!

Well, it's all too late now.

There's no going back.

Mary's grabbed all the spoils; and it's all thanks to Sue holding me to promises I'd never, ever really made.

*

Come the weekend, Sue, as per usual, is all let's go into town, let's hang out down the mall, have a coffee, maybe take in a movie later.

I'm not in the mood, to be honest.

Not that I tell her that.

Well, the coffee, the mall, the movie – all that sounds fine to me.

Just not with Sue, thanks.

I've had it with hearing once again about how unfair life is.

Like she's not the cause of her own problems!

Me, I've gotta sit there snarling and sneering along with her, like Mary has somehow beaten us both to the post.

Hang on Sue; she wasn't in a race against me!

You put yourself forward as the only competitor, remember?

I was just supposed to cheer along from the sidelines. Give moral support, supply strategic advice, offer assistance wherever necessary (and boy, was it necessary!).

Now I've gotta act like I feel every bit as hurt and cheated as Sue feels.

It's all Mary that, Mary this; like Jackie all over again. Only this time I'm expected to join in the pulling apart of the scapegoat for all Sue's woes.

I tell Sue I'm tired, what with all the hard work we put in trying to help her land the role of Aurora.

Maybe tomorrow? Maybe Sunday we take in the mall?

Soon as she's off the phone, I get Dad to drop me off in one of the areas where I know I'm unlikely to meet anyone from school.

I don't want to see anyone I know.

I don't want any reminders what I've just been through.

It could've been win win for me.

It wasn't even win lose for Sue.

'Where's Sue?' Dad asks innocently, like we're joined at one of her large hips or something. 'You don't usually come out this way?' he adds, peering warily out of the car window at the surrounding houses.

'Sue's a bit down at the moment,' I tell him. 'I do have other friends, Dad!'

Then I'm outta the car before he can quiz me anymore.

*

From this part of town, it's a short walk into the poorer end of the shopping district.

Here it's all two storey ancient brick buildings that look like they've been around since Aurora's time.

The frames of the shop windows are painted in what someone wearing filthy glasses might call rainbow colours. Shops selling the kind of things people might have actually wanted to buy at one time; step ladders, mops, unwrapped groceries, warm but incredibly colourless and boring coats.

Well, someone must still be buying this sort of stuff, right?

The displays behind the glass aren't there to entice window shoppers, I'd guess. But I can't see how they're supposed to prompt any kind of shopping. It's gotta be the prices that are the attraction here, as the labelling's bigger and brighter than the merchandise.

No matter how cheap these things are, though, I can't see how anyone would want them.

I'd set out here dressed way down (such that even Dad had raised his eyebrows in surprise at how dowdy I looked), knowing this wasn't the sort of area where you want to draw attention to yourself; but in comparison to the dull clothes on display here, I must look like I've just stepped out of a paint factory explosion.

No wonder no one I know ever comes down here.

They've have to be crazy; or at least, mad with a best friend.

Realising I've made a mistake coming to this mind-numbingly boring part of town, I'm about to give up any hope of finding anything of interest to me when – just as I'm sort of half way through turning around – I catch out of the corner of an eye the brightest flash of red I've ever seen.

Well, I say it's the brightest flash; but, of course, in dullsville even a small patch of grass would undoubtedly shimmer like an emerald.

Even so, it is bright enough to stop me from completely turning around. It's piqued my interest; I've just gotta see what it could be, as absolutely nothing else around here comes even close to matching it for its sheer brilliance.

Even more remarkably, perhaps, it's been granted prime position in the very middle of an otherwise all black window display.

It could be a searing hot flame rising up from a pile of coal.

It could be the flickering of a real fire, lit by a shopkeeper who's finally cottoned on that he ain't ever gonna sell any of this dull crap in his window.

Either way, it's worth a look.

And the closer I draw towards the shop, the more enticed I become.

It's the red of the glistening apple Snow White, or even Eve, couldn't resist.

It's the red of sparkling blood, spilled because Aurora couldn't contain her curiosity.

No, no; it's better, much better, than these.

It's shoes.

Shoes that would make even Dorothy stamp her tiny little feet in envy.

*

# Chapter 8

Meme.

The shop's called Meme.

That's something to do with trending, isn't it?

Something highly popular?

Maybe it's also a play on me me: like, yeah, that's exactly my kind of style.

I want, I want, I want!

I go to the shop's door, open it, step inside.

There's a clattering like a whole herd of Swiss cows have just made their escape, an old brass bell hanging above the door clanging away like it's the first time it's been allowed to do this in ages.

Inside, it's as dark as the window display. Like no one can be bothered paying the electricity bill. Or maybe it's where vampires hangout.

There's no sign of any sales counter, or shelves with other shoes delectably laid out. There are drapes hanging everywhere though, a labyrinth of rich, thick velvet flowing down from what I presume is a ceiling hidden in the darkness. As my eyes gradually adjust to the abrupt change in light they'd suffered, I at last being to pick out odd glimmers of bright colour, the dark sapphire, ruby, and emerald of the velvet's sheen.

What I don't pick out, however, is any shoes.

Nope, not even the ones I saw in the window, seeing as how the display is blocked off from the rest of the shop's interior.

A shoe shop, selling one pair of shoes?

Business has gotta be booming, right?

Unless what they're really selling here is velvet drapes.

In which case, I'm outta here, until maybe I'm thirty four.

'Hello; can I help you?'

The woman who says this, I don't know how she does it, right, but she suddenly appears right alongside me; and wouldn't you know it, despite her question, she's holding in her hands the very shoes I'd come into see.

Then again, what else would I have come into the shop for?

Her skin is velvety black, her eyes emeralds in their green intensity.

Her dress is, naturally, of midnight blue velvet, the shoes she holds glittering as if formed of magically transfigured rubies.

Yeah, I get it; the shop's décor is a reflection of her. Or she's decided she likes the style so much, she's got the interior designer to give her a makeover .

'How much are they? The red shoes, I mean.'

Yeah, like I could mean anything else?

'Beautiful, aren't they?'

Yep, I can see that; what I can't see is the price. This being the only shop in this part of town that hasn't covered everything in Low Low Price tags.

'How much?' I ask again.

'You like them, I see.'

You know, this girl could really do with perfecting her selling technique.

Or, maybe, these shoes are so expensive, she's gotta hold out from telling me the price for as long as she can. On account of the fact the cost is gonna floor me.

'Have you got any in my size?' I ask, trying another tack.

I've been looking at these gorgeous shoes so lustfully it's only just dawned on me that they look a tad small for me.

'They're dancing shoes,' she replies, making me seriously wonder if we're conversing in completely different languages here.

I mean, not just because 'dancing' has got nothing to do with 'size', but also because there's no way these are dancing shoes.

I've seen stilts with shorter heels than these.

Ginger Rodgers would've permanently crippled Fred Astaire in the first few minutes if she'd ever tried wearing shoes like these.

'I'm not much of a dancer,' I admit.

Not that it matters; I'd never intended going dancing in these shoes anyway. I value my legs too much.

Now she tells me the price.

What?

I can't believe it; they're the only shoes I know of that you'd take out a mortgage on.

I thought they'd be expensive, but that's just ridiculous – I might as well buy a car!

I shake my head sadly.

'Sorry,' I say. 'They're beyond my means.'

And those of Jackie Onassis. Elizabeth Taylor. Queen Cleopatra.

'Shame,' she says with a bright smile, 'I think they're just right for you.'

I shrug; sure, they'd be just right for me if I had the sort of bank balance that would be of interest to both the CIA and MI5.

She turns away, taking the beautiful shoes with her.

You know, with an attitude like that, she's never going to sell these shoes, is she?

*

When I'd thought of Dorothy stamping her tiny little feet, maybe I was mixing up my fairytales a touch.

No, not with Rumpelstiltskin; I mean, wasn't there some tale or other about a girl going to church in her dancing shoes, only to find she can't stop dancing, literally digging herself into an early grave?

Thinking about the shoes in that way, then chances are it's a good thing I couldn't afford them.

A good thing I didn't buy those gorgeous shoes. Shoes that I would've looked absolutely fabulous in.

I mean, no matter how wonderful I'd've looked, what would be the point of that if they'd made me dance and dance and dance? Which, of course, they could very well have done, if they really were dancing shoes, just as that woman back there had claimed.

But...what if she'd been lying?

Well, then they'd've been perfectly safe to wear, wouldn't they?

*

# Chapter 9

I Googled it; meme greek

I added greek because I'm more or less sure it's originally a Greek word.

Wow; there's Goddess...'presiding over the lunar months'.

What?

No, wait; my thumb must have slipped when I was trying to do the second m.

Mene.

That's what I've ended up searching for.

So, this time I take a little more care and get what I was originally looking for: meme. This time, too, I don't bother with the greek.

Yeah, just as I thought; meme means something more or less copied and spread on the Internet. Passed on from one person to another with maybe a few slight variations.

Actually, that bit about mene and the goddess and the moon was all far more interesting;

That great big white disc hovering serenely up there – all the time, of course, not just on a night, when we can see it – well, it can drag up immense seas, can make wolves howl at it, can cause outbursts of complete craziness amongst both men and animals.

So, what's it doing to all those fluids in your relatively tiny, amazingly unimportant body, do you think?

What is it they say we're mostly made up of?

Water.

Right down to the molecular level.

See, way I reckon it is; if the moon can send the Pacific Ocean into a frenzy, what the heck sort of influence does it hold over me?

Hey, maybe I've finally figured out why I feel like I don't really belong in this world.

There are only twelve months in the year.

See, my body's always screaming at me that it should be thirteen, yeah? Like the moon months?

It's gotta be a man who came up with that, right – twelve months?

It means I'm – just about any woman, or any girl, once you reach a certain age – is cursed with feeling out of rhythm with the whole of life.

I'd quite like my lost month, my stolen thirteenth month, back, thank you very much!

When you think about it, it would have made a far better name for a shoe shop too: Goddess Mene.

Well, you know what it's like when you've just bought a really gorgeous pair of shoes. Don't you just feel like a goddess when you're wearing a pair that makes you feel like your legs go on for ever?

If you don't, all I can say is; what's wrong with you?

You really should be getting out more.

*

Rehearsals are over; tomorrow night, it's the show itself.

Mary is going to shine, that's all way too obvious.

As for poor old Sue, well; even as the thirteenth fairy, she doesn't impress.

Her dancing just doesn't have the necessary flow, the ease of movement required to make every action seem seamless and natural,

If anyone could do with those red 'dancing' shoes, it's Sue I'm afraid.

No matter how much they cost, Sue should try and figure out some way of affording them.

Maybe she should sell all the rest of her clothes. Not that she'll get all that much for them, of course.

Okay, yeah; I'm being really mean again, aren't I?

As it's my friend who's going to be up there tomorrow night making a fool of herself in front of everyone, I should be helping her out; at least tying to help her improve her dance moves. You know, just like you see in the movies, where we spend all night practising until she can suddenly dance like she's got wings on her feet.

Yeah; the movies.

It always works out in the movies, doesn't it?

Truth is, I have been helping Sue as much as I can.

Truth is, even if we had a whole other month to fit in practice, Sue still wouldn't be able to impress a gawky seven-year-old with her dance moves.

All that effort, all that time – all completely wasted on someone who never had a hope of coming up to a standard where she won't make a complete fool of herself.

It should be me up there tomorrow night, not Sue.

And I'd've been playing Aurora too – with Mary as the thirteenth fairy

I know, I know; I'm Little Miss Mean once again, with a gigantic head to boot.

But why did Sue insist on making me make that stupid promise?

If she hadn't done that, then everything would be perfect, wouldn't it?

*

# Chapter 10

I wake up miserable.

Tonight's the night.

The night of the show.

What's not to look forward to, right?

Knowing it should be me up there.

Knowing Sue's going to embarrass herself. And she'll be so ashamed, she'll find some way to blame me for her humiliation.

I hadn't given her enough support, that kinda thing.

I'd been willing her to fail, simply because I was jealous.

Downstairs, Mum and Dad are going through their well-choreographed breakfast routine.

Mum asking if he'd like two eggs or one.

Dad mumbling that he's going to be late setting off, complaining that he'll get stuck behind that idiot from up the road, who seems to have a hairdryer's motor powering his car.

Mum pointing out that she's got to get to work too. And it's all a bit antediluvian that Dad seems to thinks the cooking should all be her responsibility.

Today seems even more bizarrely predictable than normal.

Dad quickly flicking through the newspaper as he eats, moaning that the government doesn't know what it's doing.

Mum listening to the radio, trying to sing along to the songs she likes, correcting any guest being interviewed with her own far more valuable insights into how to lead the perfect life.

She's the prime example of how well her system works, yeah?

Dad's bête noire this morning is the proposal for a new housing estate that threatens to swamp the last of the fields 'Kelly used to play on'.

Mum's pointing out that the actress talking about how to have a blissful marriage has already got three failed ones under her belt.

It's supposed be a conversation they're having, weirdly enough, but each seems locked into their own strange little world, where they're actually talking to someone who's agreeing with everything they say.

Thing is, I've got so used to all this, I usually completely tune out myself too. Let it all flow over me, accepting that it's just the background music to my boring life.

Only today, well; it's like déjà vu all over again, as they say.

'Where are Kelly's children going to play?'

'Marriages these days don't last much longer than a loaf of bread with a short sell-by date.'

I mean, sure, Mum and dad are as predictable as the sun coming up each morning; but in this case it all seems far too weirdly precise.

In a moment, Dad's going to say, 'Kelly's going to be a mum at a time when kids will have no choice but to hang around on street corners.' While Mum's going to add, as if she believes I'm actually interested, 'Kelly, I hope you don't have to go through all this.'

'Kelly's going to be a mum at a time when kids will have no choice but to hang around on street corners.'

'Kelly, I hope you don't have to go through all this.'

Yeah, there it is, see?

What's that movie?

It's like Groundhog Day all over again.

*

I get out my phone, check the date.

That's how weirded out I am by all this.

The 2nd.

Ah, that's right after all; for a moment, I actually had high hopes something truly bizarre had just occurred in my otherwise boringly predictable life.

Not that another extra day would've been any use for–

Wait a minute. The month's wrong!

That was last month – wasn't it?

'Mum, Dad; what's today's date?' I blurt out, without really thinking how stupid I'm going to look, seeing as how I've got the phone in my hand.

They both turn to look at me like I'm really stupid.

'The second,' Dad says, like it's obvious.

'The month,' I say, 'I mean, what month is it?'

Now they really give me the looks like I've must've really lost it; how can I not know what the month is?

'April,' Mum says.

'Not March?' I ask, even though I know it's all just making me appear even more stupid to my parents.

Mum and Dad both shake their heads, chuckle a bit too, if a touch nervously.

'Kelly: it's April,' Mum assures me.

'Definitely,' Dad agrees.

That's...just not possible!

I've lived through a whole month my Mum and Dad seem to think has never happened.

'Kelly? Are you okay?' Mum worriedly asks, no doubt seeing the confusion on my face.

So, what happened to that month?

Did I just dream it all?

Is that it?

It was all nothing but a weird nightmare?

*

# Chapter 11

On the way to school, I keep telling myself that there's no way I could've dreamt a whole month's worth of happenings.

I've just got my months mixed up, that's all.

Obviously, I've gone through a whole month fooling myself into thinking it was April when it had been February all along.

That would explain it, right?

Glancing out through the windows of Mum's car, I notice that a few of the things going on around me are all perfectly weirdly familiar; but then, isn't that just down to the fact we all go through exactly the same tedious routines each morning?

You know; we have to wait at a crossing, while some old guy in an overly large overcoat slowly shuffles across like his highlight of the day is keeping us all waiting.

We have to give way to a bus pulling out, then spend the rest of our journey stopping every now and again as it drops off or picks up passengers.

We at last begin to pass a groups of kids walking to school, almost knocking over a couple of them, as they just about tumble into the road in front of us – seeing as how they're larking around, and think of themselves as being pretty much invulnerable.

Besides, it's not all completely the same as I remember it being from a month ago.

As Mum drops me off, she turns to me.

'You sure you're okay, Kelly?' she asks anxiously.

'Sure; why shouldn't I be?'

I mean; April, March – what's the difference, right?

I walk in through the front doors into my school, just as I do just about every day of my life.

And there on the main wall of the entrance lobby, just as it should be, there's our art department's garish poster promoting tonight's play, Sleeping Beauty.

Only it's not a call to buy tickets.

It's a call to put your name forward to play the lead roles.

*

# Chapter 12

Wow, so if I have had a dream, it just so happens that I dreamt Miss Kemsley would be putting on a production of Sleeping Beauty; and whaddya know, she really, really is!

Suddenly, I figure out what it is that's happening to me.

It's like in Mission Impossible, right, where an entire town is brought together to fool some poor sap they've woken up in Cuba or somewhere. And it's all an elaborate hoax to get them to reveal everything they know about Russo-American relationships.

Which in my case is zilch, basically; so no, that can't be it.

Nope; the only thing that can explain all this is that I really have dreamt it all – don't they say your subconscious sort of knows your future, somehow? And so it can sort of forewarn you of problems you should be avoiding, through highly realistic dreams?

I'm sure I read something like that in Heat magazine, so it's gotta be right.

So, instead of worrying my pretty little head about all this, I should be accepting it, and trying to work out what it is that my subconscious could be trying to warn me about.

That way, I can turn this totally weird experience to my advantage.

I mean, it's not like the month in my dream turned out great, is it?

So how do I go about changing it so – for instance – I end up as Aurora?

*

Now, this is the right place, right?

Off to my left, what passes for the school laboratory. Leading out before me, the corridor leading back to the school's main entrance.

Yeah, I'm sure this is where I was standing when I sorta bumped into Sue...

Yep, I was right! Here she is now.

This time, I've got to get in first with the request!

She's right by me now.

'Kelly, I'm sorry; I'm really–'

'Sue: it's okay, it's okay! I know what you're going to say!'

I cut her off sharply, lessening the blow a touch with a gracious smile. Not that she likes it anymore, of course; she grimaces, with a hurt, pouting mouth, like all her carefully thought out speal has just gone out of the window.

Now, this time; really strike while the iron's hot!

'Kelly, as we're such good friends–'

'I know, I know,' I urgently interrupt, almost missing my opportunity because I once again underestimated Sue's amazing ability to play these scenes to her advantage every time, 'you want to help me win the role of Aurora in the school play!'

Her face falls. Her mouth hangs open; for once, she's lost for words.

In her eyes, there's anger, frustration, hurt – they're welling up a little too, I reckon.

You know, she really could be a great little actress if she could put all these emotions across in any role she was playing.

Before she can come up with a response that's going to ruin all of this for me, I give her the warmest, friendliest of hugs.

'Thank you so, so much Sue!' I say happily, adding in a triumphant gush, 'Oh Sue; you really really are the best friend anyone could hope for!'

*

# Chapter 13

Sue isn't at all happy, of course, at the way things have turned out.

It didn't go to plan at all, did it, her accidentally bumping into me in the corridor?

'What would I ever do without you, Sue?' I'd simpered, recalling all the clever little tricks she'd play on me to sucker me in.

Naturally, she hadn't given up easily. She'd mumbled something about hair, about how, maybe, my hair wasn't the right colour; that, you know, that maybe it was a role more suited to someone with naturally blonde hair.

'Oh, there are plenty of dyes around at the moment, Sue!' I'd replied cheerfully. 'Do you know of any I could use, maybe?'

Wow, pass me the saucer of milk, eh?

But come on; admit it now – aren't there plenty of occasions when you've fumed when a so-called best friend has taken advantage of you one too many times? And you'd just love to be able to turn the tables on her?

Precisely!

So, just let me enjoy my moment, right?

*

Well, knock me down with a feather, but all that stuff about the subconscious we were told about in one of our classes turns out to be true!

Who'd've thought it, right?

Somehow, this clever, devious little brain of mine had made sure I was prepared for one of Sue's wily ways to entrap me in some ridiculous promise.

And whaddya know, she didn't like being on the receiving end of one of her own ploys one bit!

Who'd've thought that too, right?

You can see it even now, in her crestfallen face; like she's still shocked that it had all turned out this way.

Like she's trying to figure out where it all went wrong for her.

Like she's playing it over and over in her mind, wondering how she could have played it better.

Yeah, I know she's going through all this because I've been there myself so many times before.

Thing is, unlike when it happened so many time before to me, I don't think she's fully accepted that she's made a promise that she now has to keep.

I'm sure I'm detecting odd twinges of rebellion in the wide range of irate expressions she's always casting my way these days.

'You know, Kelly,' she says to me one day, sauntering up to me like this is all casual, spur of the moment stuff rather than something's she's probably been carefully rehearsing in front of the mirror, 'I've been thinking, you know, well: just how much more fun it would be if we both applied for roles in the play, yeah? Wouldn't that be wonderful?'

*

# Chapter 14

So, that's how you get out a promise

If only I'd known!

You just pretend you never, ever made it!

Make out, too, what great fun we're going to have together if Sue doesn't have to keep her promise!

Well, how come it never worked this way with Leon, Sue?

'I've been thinking, you know, well: just how much more fun it would be if we both tried to date him, yeah? Wouldn't that be wonderful?'

Funnily enough, I figure she'd hit the roof if I tried that on with her.

So, instead – me being shy, demure little me – I try to sweeten the bitter pill.

'Well, to be honest, Sue, seeing as how I left the field open regarding Leon, I was hoping–'

Sue sniggers.

'Left the field open?' she repeats mockingly. 'Kelly, let's face it; he was never, ever really interested in you anyway. I'd thought you'd come up with all that just to give yourself an excuse for why he'd never approach you!'

What?

And this – this! – is the girl I'd called my friend?

How stupid have I been?

Well – stupid no longer!

'So, Sue,' I say sternly. 'Let's go for it; and may the best girl win!'

*

Which is the most important to me?

Landing the role of Aurora? Or dating Leon?

Well, if my dream was right – and so far it has been pretty nearly spot on in so many of its predictions – then winning the role also gets you Leon.

I mean, if Mary could pull off the double, then I'm sure as heck than I can too.

Why, suddenly, do I want both?

Do I want to really rub Sue's face in it so badly?

No, not really; I'm sure I don't.

Leon, the role; they were both things I'd always wanted all along, weren't they?

It was simply Sue's devious, nasty little tricks that were keeping me from dating the first and landing the second.

So why should I give up on them both now to simply stop her from being hurt, now she's revealed herself to be a false friend anyway?

If I did that, would she thank me anyway?

Whaddya think?

Course she wouldn't!

If she wins either the role or Leon, she'll be crowing about how she won the real prize.

If she gets both; then she'll make sure my life ain't worth living!

*

# Chapter 15

As in my dream, Mary also applies for the role of Aurora.

Just like the dream too, she suddenly starts cavorting around the classrooms and corridors like she's been overdosing on movies like Black Swan. Like, too, she's crammed some invisible ballet slippers into her shoes, and these have quite magically granted her an ability she'd never previously displayed in the slightest.

Now, that wasn't in my dream, but maybe it should've been.

Then I'd know how to bring her down a touch. See?

Another way my dream had it right is the dance element.

Miss Kemsley's gone for the furtive Swan Lake amalgamation.

In this respect, I've gotta admit, I'd hoped my dream maybe had it wrong.

My dancing is a bit...well, I'm okay on the dance floor, as we all are, more or less, right?

That, well, it's just a bit of feet shuffling, combined with a slight swaying of the hips, and a few half-hearted twirls.

Dirty Dancing it ain't.

Sooo...I've got a problem on my hands.

Or, rather, on my feet.

Now if I had Mary's magic ballet slippers, or maybe better still those completely unaffordable dancing shoes I'd seen in that shop...

Wait a minute though.

The shoes, the shop; it was all in my dream, wasn't it?

So how much of all that really exists?

It's highly likely, I suppose, that all that really weird part of my dream was just that; a dream, a fantasy, not my subconscious replaying some real form of life out before me.

No shoes, then.

No shop.

Unless; the only thing fantastic about my dream was that totally unreasonable price...

*

Trouble is, I'm no longer sure just how much of my dream continues to reflect reality.

Think about it; as soon as I'd gone off script, and asked Sue for her support, I was setting in motion a new way for all this to play out.

Sure, Sue, of course, decided she'd apply for the role anyway; but without my help, and setting us up against each other.

That, of course, wasn't how it happened in my dream.

And so the times we were together in my dream – well, naturally, we're apart.

And when we're apart, we're with different people, affecting them and their own lives in a totally different way to how it happened – off screen, as it were – within my dream.

The knock-on effects just keep on accumulating, creating a whole new version of my life.

So far, that's all been to my advantage,

The disadvantage of all this, though, is that it gets harder and harder to predict what's going to happen to me next.

*

# Chapter 16

There's one thing in particular my dream got entirely wrong.

Sue's dancing.

She can dance!

How, I don't know; I just really, really don't know!

Like Mary, she'd never shown any ability approaching anything like this before this role as Aurora came up.

But up onstage, she gracefully throws herself around as if she's been having lessons on the sly.

Has Mary told Sue her secret?

Have they both got magical ballet slippers slipped into their shoes?

Or...no!

That can't be possible!

How would she know about the red shoes?

She can't have had a dream too – can she?

No way!

Even so, I check.

Every time I can, I try and get a peek into her locker, or her school bag.

But there's nothing there; no red shoes, least ways.

Of course, she could just be wearing them at home; practising there, picking up all the right moves, the flow of the movement.

I even contemplated following her home once; but I thought that was pushing it, driving me way too close to being some weird obsessive.

But how am I going to find out otherwise?

Unless I beg her to be friends again?

Or, unless I see for myself if that shop really exists.

*

Seeing me dressed down like this, Dad's giving me the wholly expected curious looks.

Yeah, there's that déjà vu again.

'Sue's tired,' I tell him, almost answering him before he's asked. 'I've got some new friends out here I wanna see.'

This time, there's quite a sprinkling of truth in what I'm telling him.

Sue, she's gotta be tried, the effort she's putting into winning this role for herself.

Unlike in my dream, she's front runner to land the lead role, putting even poor little Quite Contrary in the shade.

As for the friends; well, that woman in the shop had seemed friendly enough, right?

Apart from when we had to breach the awkward subject of price, of course.

I'd certainly pulled a hurt face at that point.

This time, naturally, I'll be expecting it.

I won't look so shocked.

How that helps me afford them though...ah well, that's a different matter entirely.

Maybe at this point I just fall on my knees and beg her for mercy.

Tell her I'm an orphan, or something.

Pluck at her heart strings.

Failing that, I could promise I'll work in her shop without wages for, let me see...well, basically the rest of my life and a few years of my daughter's too, if I ever get chance to have any kids.

Then again, how hard can it be working in a shop with only one pair of shoes to sell? And I'd've bought them anyway!

*

# Chapter 17

The street's there, just as it was in my dream.

Slumsville, only with slightly better shops.

There's only one shop I need, of course.

And there it is; a purely pitch black window display, apart from the flame of the red shoes.

Meme.

The shop that's going to help me feel like a goddess.

*

It's only as I step inside the darkened interior of the shop that it abruptly dawns on me; how would my subconscious know of this shop?

I mean, I could be wrong, I've never been one for totally following my lessons, but – isn't your subconscious supposed to work by registering things you've failed to pay close attention to?

See, if that's the case, then how does it conjure up a shop and a pair of shoes I've never, ever come across at any time in my life before?

Besides, if I had come across these shoes...well, I'd hardly be likely to ignore them, would I?

Could it be, though, I had seen them, and the shop, maybe in the background of a TV show, or a commercial, or a magazine photograph; yeah, that could've happened, couldn't it?

My subconscious lusting after shoes I'd been too ridiculously oblivious to notice!

So your subconscious does have an important role to play after all, right?

As before, as in my dream, the woman with deliciously velvety black is suddenly alongside me.

And, naturally, she's holding in her hands the very shoes I'd come into see.

'You're back!' she says.

*

# Chapter 18

Back?

Has she mixed me up with some other girl who's been in this shop?

It's not like she could remember me from my visit in a dream, is it?

Then again, maybe the real reason my subconscious remembers all this is because I visited it long ago as a child...

But how would she recognise me after all that time?

And would the very same shoes be still in the window?

Well, at that price, they probably would.

She smiles like she knows me. So I ask her.

'Back?' I say. 'So I've been here before? When, exactly?'

'Well,' she replies, holding up the shoes a touch higher, letting them sparkle like a treasure trove of rubies even in this dim light, 'I can see you like them.'

Like them isn't the word I'd use.

I'm just about letting my tongue drool all over them.

This time, though, I won't be shocked when she tells me the price.

'I'm not much of a dancer,' I admit, remembering that I'd only managed to get the price out of her by saying this.

She tells me the price.

I'm shocked.

*

I must've walked in on an Everything Must Go Sale.

Not that there's much else but these shoes to go in here.

Whatever the reason, the price has come tumbling down. I've paid more for a coffee and sandwich.

It's probably dawned on her that she was never, ever going to sell these shoes as long as she was asking for the kind of money usually shelled out for an ocean-going yacht.

It doesn't make the slightest bit of sense, but who am I to complain?

'They're too small for me,' I point out miserably, noting that even Dorothy would struggle to get her tiny, envious little feet in these things. 'Have you got them in another size?'

I forlornly glance about the empty shop.

Need I ask?

The woman glances down at my feet.

She looks up, smiles.

'They're the correct size,' she says, surprising me.

For a brief moment there, I'd actually considered a quick course of foot binding, or maybe slicing off an unneeded toe or two.

With a nod of her head towards a chair and stool patiently waiting for me in the darkness, she indicates that I should sit down and try them on.

'They're too small,' I wail dejectedly as the first shoe she tries to slip onto my foot more or less just hangs there on the tip of my toe.

The woman shakes her head.

No, no,' she insists. 'The shoes are the correct size; it's your feet that are too big!'

Wow! This woman's sales patter should serve as a lesson to everyone who's looking forward to a career in road sweeping.

'Let me get you another pair,' the woman says, her smile returning.

Once again, I peer into the enveloping darkness, hoping to see other signs of life somewhere out there in the apparently endless ether. Obviously, there are other forms of shoes lying outside my own limits of vision.

She swings around on the foot stool she's sitting on, as if to put the too-small shoes aside. Then she swings back, smiling brightly even though she's presenting me with the very same pair of minute shoes.

'Here we are!' she exclaims happily. 'These are much better!'

I frown, wondering if she's just one of these people who get their kicks out of humiliating others.

'They're the same shoes,' I point out sourly.

She rewards my honesty with an aggrieved pout.

'You're trying to make the shoes fit your feet!' she scolds me.

I think about this for a moment; I think, did I hear her correctly there?

She looks at me like I'm the crazy one for not understanding her complete rewriting of the laws of physics.

'As the shoes are the correct size,' I say, making sure I've heard her correctly, 'I obviously have to let my feet fit the shoes?'

She nods, smiles, like she's overjoyed that I get it at last.

'Don't think of them as shoes,' she says excitedly, 'think of them as another skin!'

*

# Chapter 19

They fit me!

The red shoes are the most comfortable shoes I've ever worn.

I really can't believe it!

It's not possible; is it?

Unless...I'm still caught up in my dream!

The shoes don't come with any box.

Or any guarantee.

Or, for that matter, any label notifying you of their manufacture, or were to return them if they need repairing.

Who cares?

I walk out of the shop in the red shoes like I weigh hardly anything at all. In fact, the heaviest thing about me seems to be my old shoes, which I have to carry.

Could I dance in them though?

Listen, in these shoes I could perform a waltz on top of the Eiffel Tower.

*

It's crazy but, just like Mary, just like Sue, suddenly I've got a feeling for rhythm and flow that had always previously eluded me.

The shoes weirdly seem to be supporting my every move, like they've got some kind of anti-gravitational device installed in there.

Maybe if they'd come with a manufacture's label it would have been Stark Enterprises, right?

Whatever it is, I no longer feel like a gawky, clumsy teenager who's trying to pass herself off as way more sophisticated than she actually feels inside.

Didn't I read somewhere kids are like that, their bodies growing at a rate their brains can't keep up with, leaving them feeling weirdly like a fish out of water; but hey, who's going to admit that to their friends, or even themselves?

Somehow, just like every other dumbly confused kid, I'd kidded myself I was fine, that I'd got everything together, that I was, you know, as close to being an adult as any kid could hope to be.

Sparkling like freshly spilled blood, my shoes are a shout in the silence, a bold statement I'd once have held back from expressing, fearing embarrassment, ridicule.

Yeah, that's right; even me.

Underneath it all, all that bravado, there was always a timid little girl hiding away, worried that she might be pushing it too far today, might be caught out or called out, forced to reveal the anxieties I've kept bottled up for so long.

You do know what I mean, don't you?

See, we all do it; put on an act, hope no one notices. Hope we can just bluff our way through what could be even worse events if anyone realised we were trembling inside.

No one likes to be hurt, no matter how tough they play it.

Fact is, if they're playing tough, chances are they fear being hurt more than anyone; why else do you think they've created these hard, defensive walls?

And the best form of defence is attack, right?

All that life out there, out there beyond our incredibly thin layer of skin; it's all so perplexing, isn't it?

Whenever you begin to flatter yourself you've begun to get a steer on things; wham! Something intrudes into your life showing you what a weak-minded fool you are to think so highly of yourself.

It brings you down, back to the base level, from where you've got to begin to claw your way upwards once more.

You'd like to tell yourself you don't care what people think about you, wouldn't you?

But you'd only be lying to yourself; so what's the good of that?

So as long as you give into these fears, you're letting life pummel away at you; imposing its innumerable and sometimes virtually invisible, unrecognised constraints upon you.

Holding you back.

Stopping you dancing in the street.

So let go of that shameful feeling.

And dance!

*

# Chapter 20

There, see – what did I tell you?

I'm Aurora.

I landed the role.

Not that it came that easy, of course.

Wearing my shoes, I was practically dancing everywhere all the time, until it became second nature to me.

It all instilled within me a sense of flawless grace I'd never have believed I possessed.

Oh, and I didn't need to dye my hair either!

'Oh, Sue,' Miss Kemsley had sighed when my one time friend had attempted to insist that Aurora had to be blonde, 'have you considered that your view of life has been tainted by watching nothing but Disney films?'

Right on, Miss Kemsley! You tell her gal.

Sue had also uncannily sensed that my new found confidence somehow stemmed from my brightly glittering shoes.

'Should Kelly be wearing shoes like that to school, Miss?' she had whined.

'They give me confidence, Miss,' I admitted. 'They help me, what is it; you know, sort of inhabit the role of being a princess? What's it called? Method acting?'

For a brief moment, the look on Miss Kemsley's face told me she wasn't buying into my idea that I was hoping to follow in the footsteps of the greats like Brando and Monroe. But she had seen for herself how I had literally come on in leaps and bounds since the opening for the role of Aurora had been announced.

She nodded sagely, noting with approval and bringing everyone's attention to my mention of Method Acting (good old Wikipedia!). She even managed to talk the rest of the teachers into accepting that I should be allowed to wear the shoes while I prepared for the roles on offer.

So, although Mary's reasonably happy – but not, thankfully, ecstatically so, like she was as Aurora in my dream – on being informed that she will be the thirteenth fairy, Sue's completely mortified when the roles are announced.

'Some lousy bit part!' she scowls afterwards, glancing my way with a full rainstorm of daggers as she complains to a group of her friends. 'And all because Kelly somehow managed to cheat her way into the main role!'

*

Cheat?

I wouldn't call it cheating; dancing my way through most of the day, even though I realise I'm starting to get more than the odd odd look my way.

Let them wonder what the heck is going on; the fact is, I'm Aurora, and I feel like I was made for this role.

Besides, I'm also getting looks my way of the far more interesting kind.

Leon's interest in me had already been piqued by my apparent indifference to his overtures. Now that he's seen me land the plum role in the school play – a role demanding a high degree of effortless elegance and poise – he's hanging around me like he's some lost little puppy who's desperate to find his way home.

Truth is, at the moment he'd only cramp my style; I mean, he really would think I was just a little short of being a whole bag of nuts if everywhere we went I'd keep breaking into some kind of pasodoble or foxtrot, as I'd make my way to a seat in the coffee bar, or as I hopped onto a bus.

After the night of my triumph; well, then, who knows? Right?

*

# Chapter 21

'The shoes, Kelly,' Miss Kemsley says to me as I slip out of Aurora's gown following one of our last evening dress rehearsals, 'On the night, of course, they'll have to go.'

She peers down at my gorgeously sparkling shoes like they're the most disgusting things she has ever seen.

'But Miss!' I protest. 'You said yourself that I could, wear them!'

'I said you could wear them as long as you were preparing for your role, Kelly!' Miss Kemsley reminds me a touch sourly. 'But they clash with the dress, Kelly: it's a light blue dress you're wearing as Aurora!'

'But Miss!' I wail again. 'The shoe's help me inhabit the role.'

It had worked before; why shouldn't it work again?

'They're far, far too bright!' Miss Kemsley complains. 'I've noticed it in every dress rehearsal; they attract all the attention of anybody watching!'

'They give me confidence, Miss!' I try again. 'I'm...I'm not sure I could dance so smoothly without them!'

In fact, I have absolutely no doubt about it; without the shoes, I'm a stroppy, gawky teenager once more.

I'll be totally humiliated when I come out on stage just about tripping over my skirt hems!

'Oh, Kelly, this is all nonsense, and you know it!' Miss Kemsley snorts dismissively. 'How many movies have you seen where someone's fooled into thinking all their natural skills come from some magical device or other? Surely you've seen Dumbo? You know, where the "magic feather" slips from his trunk? And the mouse has to confess it's his large ears that enable him to fly!'

Is Miss Kemsley implying my ears are too big? No, no; course she's not, silly!

Truth is, I've been completely unnerved by the way this whole dreadful conversation is progressing.

'The truth is, Kelly,' Miss Kemsley states baldly, 'those shoes are so painfully high, they've probably been holding you back from more freely expressing yourself.'

'But Miss–'

'No more buts, Kelly!'

Miss Kemsley peers sternly into my almost tearful eyes.

'No more red shoes; you got that?'

*

# Chapter 22

No more red shoes!

No more red shoes.

What if they were blue?

The problem, then, would instantly vanish, wouldn't it?

How could Miss Kemsley complain if I turned up in blue shoes?

They'd go with the dress, wouldn't they?

All I need is some kinda dye...and everything's solved!

*

Come to think of it, dying these shoes is hardly a great idea after all, is it?

I mean, they already look like Dorothy had persuaded a couple of Munchkins to cobble them together for her; and can't dye end up shrinking things, if you're not careful?

I could end up with a pair even Barbie would struggle to get into.

Besides, who knows what kind of side effects you'd get from all those chemicals swirling around in a powerful dye? Would it destroy the shoe's own powers?

Powers?

As in magical powers?

Am I seriously considering now that my shoes have magical powers?

Well, yeah; I suppose I am really.

Crazy as it sounds, they've brought out abilities in me that I'd never have known were there.

Sure, it's like believing in fairy stories; but what's not to like about believing in such things anyway?

Which means...

If I dye them, I end up with shoes that are too small to wear or no longer have the magical powers enabling me to dance.

If I don't dye them, I can't wear them anyway.

The result being...

Absolute humiliation when I stumble out onto the stage two nights from now.

Maybe I'd better ask that woman at the shop what she thinks.

*

# Chapter 23

Dad once again drops me off in the less salubrious part of town.

'Take care,' he says, glancing down at my sparkling shoes like he sees them as red rags to the kind of bulls who carry knives.

I've told him to drop me off here rather than at school as we've been allowed to get in later this morning, on account of me and my friends needing to go one more time over a part in the play.

I'll take a taxi back, using the money I've saved up thanks to me and Sue seeing so little of each other. Then, when I'm back at school, it's just one more lie I need; such as Dad slept in, sorry – and I'm off scot free.

I don't so much walk down to the shops as cha cha and tango my way down there.

Sure, people stare; but let them.

Who cares?

The street of shops if just how I remember from a few days ago apart from one glaring omission.

Meme.

The shop isn't there anymore.

*

# Chapter 24

When I say the shop isn't there, maybe what I should really be saying is; was it ever here?

It sure as heck doesn't look like it.

I mean, it could be it's gone out of business, now it's finally managed to sell its only pair of shoes, and then only by reducing the price by 99.999999999%.

Maybe the woman's taken early retirement to the Bahamans on all the spectacular proceeds.

But how does that explain the shop that's taken its place, a shop that looks like it's been here since Columbus first landed in the Americas?

It's also just another one of those shops selling mops, buckets, stepladders; all those things only certain kinds of people could ever want.

I mean, I really can't see how someone like me would ever have any need for things like this.

Ah, wait...

It also sells shoe dye.

And at a specially discounted price too.

*

The shop is packed from floor to ceiling with shovels, rakes, wheelbarrows. Hanging from walls, from the ceiling, from the staircase rail.

It's an impenetrable tropical forest, with great termite mounds of tins of varnish, paint, and the thinners you'll need to remove the varnish and paint as soon as you're tired of it.

Like, who buys all this junk?

Where's it all come from?

I mean, not who bothers manufacturing this stuff; but how did it all get here since I last visited this place?

It would take months to put all this on display.

It would probably take a month just to write out all the 'Special Discount' labels.

Maybe it's always been here all along, hidden away in the darkness of the shoe shop I'd visited.

If it wasn't for the fact that I'm wearing the shoes I'd bought here, I'd seriously start worrying that I could only have imagined it all.

I'd have to tell myself it could only have been just another weird dream.

Looking for the shop counter in here is a bit like trying to discover the source of the Nile; all pushing creeper-like hose and ropes and chains aside, until you at last come across a desk and till that looks for all the world like it's for sale too.

The only clue that it's not just one more pile of merchandise is the black guy patiently standing behind it.

'Can I help you, Miss?' he asks cheerfully enough, giving me a beaming smile that could only have been achieved using the cleaners and bleach he's got stacked up everywhere about him.

I'm tempted to ask him if he knows what happened to the shop that used to stand here.

Then again, he doesn't look much like the kind of guy who'd be interested in a boutique shoe shop.

If he'd ever been aware of Meme, chances are he's glad it's gone.

Not just because his shop is now standing here, but also because he probably thought it was lowering the tone of his neighbourhood.

Who'd want gorgeous shoes after all, when you could buy boots from him that you could ascend the Eiger in?

'Your shoe dyes,' I say brightly, hoping to give the impression that I regularly grace establishments like his, 'do you have one in light blue?'

He twists about his hips a little, leaning and reaching out behind him to pull out a small tub from a nearby display, like my request is one he hears so frequently he keeps the dyes close to hand.

He smiles again as he proudly hands me the little tub.

'Guaranteed to make your shoes look brand new; well, as far as the colour's concerned, anyway!'

I look at the instructions on the tub doubtfully. Not that I'm reading them; I'm just wondering if all this is really such a good idea after all.

'Would it work on these shoes,' I ask him, lithely lifting up a leg so he can clearly see my ruby shoes.

He takes in the glistening shoes with what might pass for an admiring gaze if I didn't know his idea of a shoe is one that could have been made from old tractor tyres.

As he looks back to me, I realise his raised eyebrows were more to do with the fact that – like me, weirdly enough – he doesn't think dying these shoes is such a good idea.

It's sacrilege, I know, I feel like saying.

'I could sell you some blue shoes?' he suggests, giving a nod of his head to draw my attention to a shelf of 'Ladies Shoes' that an army major would turn down as being too ugly.

'I'd rather dye,' I say.

*

# Chapter 25

Our last dress rehearsal.

I've put off dying the shoes until afterwards.

That way, they can dry out overnight.

Miss Kemsley's none too pleased that I've turned up wearing the red shoes once again.

'Kelly, you know I really had hoped you'd turn up tonight in some other shoes!'

'I've got a blue pair, Miss,' I kinda only half lie. 'I'll be wearing them tomorrow night; honest.'

She nods, but she hardly appears happy about all this.

'Well, I can't help but think it would still have been better for us all if you'd also come in them tonight, Kelly! As you know, we can't fit in anymore rehearsals around your classes, but I was hoping that would mean we arrive for the show all entirely refreshed and prepared!'

'I've already tried them out, Miss,' I lie again, only totally this time. 'I'll be fine, don't you worry!'

She pouts doubtfully, like she's not too sure that I will be fine.

'I've practised and practised until I know every move and line off by heart,' I remind her, which for once is completely and absolutely true.

Mary's thrown herself into the role of the thirteenth fairy, threatening to upstage me unless I get it right on the night itself. You ask me, she's better in this stage production than she was when she played Aurora in my dream.

Even Leon's glancing her way quite avidly these days whenever she appears near him in the school corridors. Maybe I've put on this show of disinterest for too long; after tomorrow night's performance, I'll have to find some reason to strike before I end up losing him to my supporting actress.

Sue's so low, however, that even I'm beginning to feel a little sorry for her.

In my dream she at least got to play the thirteenth fairy; in the actual production, it's just one of the other twelve, and then not one of those with a major role in the plot. All she's got to say, while attending my supposed christening, is that she's granting me the gift of charm; but even delivering this simple line, she's all choked up, like she feels she's actually instilling this quality within me and she'd far rather hold back from offering it, thank you very much.

Thing is, it's all her own fault that she wasn't given the role of one of the three fairies who take a much bigger part in the story. She's coming across as so miserable, so embittered, that it would be impossible for her to play these caring, chirpier characters.

Ironically, with this attitude she'd have made a completely believable thirteenth fairy.

She'd've gone down a storm; and would probably have been better playing her than she had in my dream.

*

'Perfect results, every time!'

So says the little blurb on the tub of dye.

Yeah, well; it had better be, or else.

Or else I make a complete fool of myself tomorrow night.

Then again, what is it I'm worrying about?

Miss Kemsley's right when she says I must've seen enough movies by now to realise there's no such things as magic slippers and what have you; the ability of the person comes from within. All the supposed magic object does is grant a person enough confidence to realise this and bring out those natural abilities.

So how can something as simple as a shoe dye possibly have any negative effect on my natural ability to dance?

So...why ruin a perfectly good pair of shoes when I could dance tomorrow night away in just about any old shoes?

Because...because...

Because I'm not anywhere near so confident in my supposed natural abilities that I seriously believe I can go out there tomorrow night and dance in front of everyone like I'm the feminine reincarnation of Michael Jackson!

There; I said it.

I admitted it.

I was absolutely hopeless at dancing until I started wearing these fabulous shoes!

I have to dye them; even though it breaks my heart to spoil their beauty.

Before I can think about this anymore, tying myself up in unravelable knots, I open the tub, pull the lid clear, see it has a brush attached already dripping in blue dye.

I paint a wide, wet band of blue fully across my gorgeously red shoes.

There's no going back now.

*

# Chapter 26

I've hardly slept.

How many times did I anxiously slip out of bed to check on the progress of my shoes?

Even as I'd fearfully stared at them in the dark, I hadn't dared reach out to touch them to see if they were dry; I thought, what if they're only half dry, what if they're sticky?

I'll not only end up with a blue finger, but also an ugly mark on my shoes.

Three hours; on the tub, it said they should be dry in three hours.

Unless it was a particularly unusual material.

In which case 'you might have to give them longer to achieve perfect results'.

They still look wet.

They still glisten, like wet paint.

Now my alarm's about to go off. I switch it off, make my way once more towards the dressing table where I've left my shoes standing on a sheet of newspaper.

They still look wet.

I tentatively reach out to lightly touch the back of one of the shoes with the tip of my little finger.

They are still wet!

*

The good thing, however, is that they haven't shrunk!

They're not wrinkled, either, like old prunes.

And they are blue; which was the whole point of this exercise after all, right?

It's a shame they're not still brilliantly red, like they were, like they're supposed to be.

But in all other ways, they still look like the shoes I'd fallen in love with.

They're just, well – wet!

*

# Chapter 27

I'd considered putting the dyed shoes by the radiator overnight to ensure they dried out.

Only I'd realised, thankfully, that that was probably also a way of ensuring they shrank; or dried out; or cracked.

Now I'm tempted once again to put them somewhere warm.

Then I dismiss the idea almost straight away, for the very same reasons I refused to try and dry them out quickly last night.

Instead, I carefully cram tissue after tissue inside each shoe, until they're almost spilling out of the sides like I'm some poor kid who's got the wrong idea about padding out a bra. If there's any extra moisture seeping through the leather, the tissue will soak it up.

That way, by this evening, the shoes are bound to be dry enough for me to wear for the performance.

*

Downstairs, Mum and Dad have abandoned their usual, well-choreographed breakfast routine.

They're standing by the table, waiting for me to enter the kitchen like this is the proudest moment of their lives.

'Good luck tonight, dear!' Mum says.

'We're wishing you luck,' Dad gushes even more excitedly. 'Not that you really need it, being first choice to play this role!'

'You've done ever so well; we're really, really proud of you!'

'When it's all over, we'll have to invite Sue round for dinner or something; we've noticed it's ages since you've been able to hang out together. You've both been so busy!'

'Well, er...'

'Are you nervous?' Mum asks anxiously, mistaking my hesitation for fretfulness.

'Well, just a little...' I confess.

'Oh, there's no need to be nervous,' Dad says. 'You wouldn't have been chosen if Miss Kemsley didn't think you were capable of pulling this off!'

It dawns on me that I not only need to explain my nervousness, but also need their help if I'm going to leave my shoes at home to completely dry out.

'It's my favourite shoes,' I say, glancing over my shoulder, looking back up the stairs to my bedroom. 'My dancing shoes; I've dyed them a colour to match Aurora's dress, but I'd like to leave them a little longer to dry. Could you come early to the play so you could drop them off with me, please?'

'Of course, of course!' Mum beams.

'Sure, sure!' Dad agrees. 'They're your good luck shoes, yeah?'

*

# Chapter 28

I spend most of my day more or less like I spent most of the night; wishing I could use every minute checking on how close my shoes are to drying out.

In class, Sue's glaring at me even more intently than usual, which is quite an achievement seeing as how I didn't think it was possible. Then again, I could be imagining it, but there seems to be a hint of triumphant pleasure in her grimaces; like when someone's being tortured on the rack, but they're managing to hang onto the secrets you're hoping to ply out of them.

In the first break, I get an inkling of the reasoning behind her look of sheer tortured triumph.

Mary.

Or, more precisely, Mary and Leon.

Not that they're actually together, as yet, as they were in my dream.

But you ask me, they're pretty close to getting there.

Leon's no longer hanging about my skirt tails; he's lingering ever closer to Mary.

You know; making out he and his friends just happen to be larking around together wherever Mary happens to be.

Ho ho ho – just look at all the fun we're having.

Wouldn't you like to be having fun like us?

What is it with boys? Why do they always act at least three years younger than any girl of the same age?

In Leon's case, remarkably, he seems to have lost somewhere round about six years as far as his mental capabilities are concerned.

How else do you explain, anyway, his sudden interest in Mary over me?

Now he's the gawky, awkward–

The shoes!

I'm not wearing the shoes, am I?

I was so intent on making sure they would be dry for tonight's show, I'd completely forgotten that I'd come to rely on the way they granted me a sense of effortless grace.

Does it show?

Has my gawkiness returned?

Why shouldn't it?

Drat, drat, drat!

Why hadn't I thought of this when I'd foolishly decided to dye the shoes?

Okay, okay – calm down, Kelly, calm down!

This isn't helping, panicking like this.

What's wrong with you?

Have you really become so reliant on a pair of shoes?

I mean, you weren't ever, really gawky where you?

Not like most of the kids around you, leastways.

It's just that once you'd put on those shoes for the first time, well; you just seemed to flow a little more easily from one move into another, didn't you?

Now you just feel, well – maybe a bit graceless?

But that's crazy, isn't it?

It's just like Miss Kemsley says; it's all down to your own natural ability.

The shoes, well, they just helped you recognise those inherent skills and qualities.

Just like in all those movies, like...well, er, there's... there's...

Dumbo, right?

He was plummeting down towards all those panicking clowns and what have you. And everyone's thinking, Yeah, he's gonna go splat! Then the mouse says 'It was all a lie, you can fly, you can fly' – or something like that; that was the gist of it all anyway – and Dumbo flies! Because it's really his wings–

Yeah, it's his wings that are magical, right?

Which is like me having magical feet!

Some hope!

Without those shoes, I'm gonna go splat!

*

# Chapter 29

Where are Mum and Dad?

Okay, so I know I said before the show opens; but now I know I'm missing my shoes already, I need them to come as soon as possible!

I could call them, tell them to bring them now and–

No, no!

They'll start worrying, wondering why I sound so panicked.

Besides, the most important thing is to shine in tonight's show!

I need to be sure the shoes have completely dried out!

A day of gawkiness in class; well, I can put up with that a while longer, can't I?

Even if it means risking losing Leon to Mary.

What's gonna happen in a day, right?

Then when I put on a triumphant show tonight; well then I can make my play for Leon.

Tell him I'm sorry for being so standoffish, but it was all this preparing for the role, see, all this putting myself in Aurora's shoes...

The shoes!

Where are my shoes!

*

# Chapter 30

When Mum and Dad at last pull up in the car, I just about sprint out of the school lobby to greet them.

They're happy to see me, of course; and I'm eager to see my shoes.

'The shoes, the shoes; where are they?' I wail miserably as I urgently wrench open the car's nearside rear door, hoping to see the shoes safely sitting on the back seat.

'They're in here,' Mum says, nodding towards two cardboard shoe boxes she's holding on her knee. 'I had to put them in these because they're still wet, dear.'

'What have you dyed them with?' Dad asks half seriously, 'That non-drying anti-burglar paint?'

*

I wave Mum and Dad off with a reassuring smile, having told them the shoes aren't really that important to me; I don't want them to worry unnecessarily, after all.

I'm completely capable of worrying for myself, thank you very much. And all very necessarily too!

As soon as I reckon I'm out of sight, should they look back, I let my smile drop, my face fall.

Just why the heck won't these shoes dry out?

Carefully placing the two boxes on the floor by my feet, I lift off the lid of the uppermost one, take a peek inside, hoping Mum and Dad are wrong and that the shoes have now finally dried out.

No such luck; the shoes are still wet.

But...is that really such a problem?

What could be wrong with wearing wet shoes anyway?

The worst that can happen is that I get dye on the hem of Aurora's dress, on my stockings, maybe on the boards of the stage.

I can live with that.

What I can't live with is making a fool of myself in front of every kid in school and their parents.

I joyfully slip out of my normal shoes, quickly slip on my red – blue – shoes.

To be honest, I'm still just about shaking with nervousness, fearing that the dye – maybe even just the colour change itself – has somehow destroyed the shoe's magic.

I try a twirl, a leap, a salsa wiggling of the hips and body.

Some kids are watching, giggling a little even.

I don't care.

I gleefully dance my way back towards the school entrance.

*

# Chapter 31

As Miss Kemsley quickly puts us through a final inspection – making sure the long, flowing black gown of the thirteenth fairy isn't going to trip Mary up, ensuring Sue clearly remembers her line, that kind of thing – she finally gets around to approaching me, caressing my hair back into place, checking that the glittering tiara is firmly in place and isn't going to come crashing down about my eyes as I dance.

As I stand there accepting all this elaborate ritual of fussing and tutting and carefully replacing, I slightly pull up the low-hanging hems of my gown, solely with the intention of allowing Miss a view of my matching blue shoes.

Rather than being pleased, however, Miss Kemsley's face warps into one of absolute horror.

'Kelly!' she storms, just about trembling with fury. 'How many times did I tell you you couldn't wear those shoes tonight?'

'What? But Miss–'

'Didn't I say no more "buts", Kelly?' Miss Kemsley snaps irately, her eyes ablaze with anger.' Get rid of those shoes now! Even if you have to borrow some others: you can't go out in those shoes!'

Whirling around theatrically upon her heels, as if she were the one playing the thirteenth fairy tonight, Miss Kemsley imperiously strides away from me, seething silently.

How did she know?

I raise a leg a little, pull back a touch on my dress, revealing a shoe.

It's not a blue shoe.

It's a bright, sparkling red once more.

*

# Chapter 32

All that dye; all that waiting – and all for nothing!

What is it with these shoes, anyway? Have they got a life of their own, or something?

I have to run back to my school locker, where I'd dumped my other shoes earlier. The red shoes forlornly take their place; ah well, at least they're dry at last!

It must look a bit odd, Princess Aurora dashing about the corridors like this; I hope no one sees me.

I slip on my older shoes, instantly feeling that I've lost that natural sense of elegance the red ones had somehow instilled within me. Maybe it's down to the fact That I seem to have abruptly lost about a foot in height, but I'm sure it's gotta be half that.

I dash back to the theatre, daintily holding up the hems of my skirt, frightened I'm going to trip and be sent sprawling otherwise. I get there hot and flustered, my heart beating as if it's decided it's had more than enough exercise today.

'You're on soon, you're on in a moment,' Miss Kemsley irately hisses at me as I join her in the darkness of the wings. 'And get someone to wipe that sheen of sweat of your face, Kelly!'

Wow, can you believe the cheek of the woman?

All that urgent running about, and she hasn't even checked if I've changed my shoes or not!

Out on the stage, Sue is just about snarling her way through granting me the gift of charm.

*

Mary was amazing, I'll give her that.

All spooky renderings of her lines, like she really means it when she's threatening to send me – or, rather, Aurora – off to an early death. Course, the baby, ably played by some old ugly doll of Miss Kemsley's, doesn't get to reply to this threat, but a handful of the fairies (sadly not including Sue) do.

Now, at last, as a mere sixteen years suddenly whirl by, it's time for the heroine's grand entrance. Aurora, all grown up and graceful, is happily preparing to celebrate her birthday, remaining completely unaware of the spinning wheel lying in the darkened room of a 'tower' projecting up from a corner of the stage.

When I'm out there, though, I suddenly realise they might as well have cast a wooden puppet in my role.

My legs feel like they've been injected with lead, now I'm no longer wearing the red shoes that made me feel so incredibly weightless.

Fortunately, this being the bit where I'm dancing around a table and chairs as if I'm setting the room out for the arrival of my friends, I haven't had to speak any lines as yet. Unlike the red shoes, which were still wet after almost a whole day, my mouth is instantly dry with fear and embarrassment.

Everything seems to be getting in my way, even though it's all been carefully positioned on chalk markers so I can supposedly flow from one move to another. I'm not exactly tripping, or stumbling yet, but I sense it's only a matter of time before I crash into a chair, or drop a plate.

This is agony!

Agony for me – and agony for the audience too!

Even though the glare of the stage lights stops me from seeing everyone seated out there, I realise Mum and Dad must be squirming in their seats with shame.

And what of Leon – is he out there too, sniggering at my ludicrous performance?

Of course he is, girl!

As for Sue, she must be watching all this from the wings, relishing the humiliation I'm putting myself through.

When will this torture end?

Then, suddenly, long before they're supposed to, the curtains swing together to a muted, confused spattering of applause from the audience.

*

# Chapter 33

Even before the curtains have fully come together, Miss Kemsley has dashed out onto the stage, taking me firmly by the arm to just about drag me off into the wings.

'Don't worry, don't worry,' she snaps urgently. 'It's just stage nerves; we can all suffer them, Kelly!'

'Oh, thanks Miss: I just need to–'

'Can you remember what you learnt in the earlier auditions?'

'Of course, I–'

I halt mid-sentence when it dawns on me that Miss Kemsley isn't talking to me; she's talking to Sue.

Sue nods excitedly.

'Yes, yes,' she replies. 'And with all the rehearsals we've been having, I've picked up everything Aurora needs to do!'

'Good, good!' Miss Kemsley sighs in relief.

For the first time in ages, she's smiling. Her scowl only returns as she whirls back to me.

'Kelly; out of your dress – let Sue have it.'

Sue smiles, like she's not taking any joy out of this at all.

Before I can complain, Miss Kemsley has spun about again. She's off, issuing instructions to the people controlling the curtains.

'As soon as Sue's ready, get those things open!'

Lifting up the hem of my dress so I don't add to my disgrace by tripping up, I rush over towards her.

'Don't you think people will notice we've swapped roles?' I protest.

Miss Kemsley glowers back at me.

'Oh, I certainly hope so, Kelly!'

*

# Chapter 34

I wake up miserable.

Last night was the worst of all possible nights.

It was all so bad, it could well have been a nightmare; only I know it all really happened, because I was there!

Because as Mum and Dad had driven back home, they'd had no idea how to console me.

Or how to admit what they had really thought of my thankfully brief appearance on stage.

To make everything completely and utterly worse, Sue had somehow willed to the fore acting and dancing skills nobody – least of all herself – had known she'd possessed, and given the performance of her life.

From the covering darkness of the wings, I could make out the reaction of the crowd; and they loved every minute of the show.

Even my own Mum and Dad continued to give Sue a rousing burst of applause as she answered her third curtain call.

And as for Leon...

Just how fickle is that guy?

*

# Chapter 35

Downstairs, Mum and Dad have once again abandoned their usual, well-choreographed breakfast routine.

They're standing by the table, just like yesterday; although today it will be consolations and recriminations they'll be offering me.

'Good luck tonight, dear!' Mum says.

What?

Is she kidding me?

'We're wishing you luck,' Dad gushes even more excitedly. 'Not that you really need it, it being such a choice role!'

Wow! They've both completely lost it, haven't they?

'You've both done ever so well; we're really, really proud of you!'

'When it's all over, we'll have to invite Sue round for dinner or–'

'Wait, wait, sorry!' I urgently interrupt. 'What day is this?'

Even as I ask this, my head's a whirl as I try and find some way of checking what day this is.

Could it really be that I've been given another chance?

That this is going to be a replay of the day of the play?

'What?' says Mum, a little worriedly, swapping concerned looks with Dad. 'Kelly, how could you have forgotten?'

'It's the play tonight, remember?' Dad adds proudly.

I'm so overjoyed, I give them both the most tremendously warm hugs they've received from me since from I don't know when.

'It's yesterday once more,' as the Carpenters sang.

*

# Chapter 36

So, I've been given another chance to make sure everything works out as it should be.

What is it I need to do to make sure the shoes' dye fixes this time rather tha-

The shoes!

I didn't see any shoes on my dresser when I woke up this morning!

I run back up the stairs, without bothering to explain anything to Mom and Dad.

How would they have a hope of understanding anyway?

I hadn't really taken any interest in my dresser top when I woke up because I wasn't expecting the shoes to be there of course; I'd left them in my school locker, hadn't I?

But if the whole day is being replayed out for me, then the shoes should still be there, still supposedly drying out.

I dash into my bedroom, almost slipping to the floor in my urgency as I wheel around through the doorway.

My dresser top is empty – well, excluding all the paraphernalia any growing girl counts as essentials, right?

The shoes aren't there.

Which means; this brand new day is already panning out completely differently to yesterday's version.

*

The shoes aren't in my school locker either.

That would make sense, naturally, if I were completely reliving the previous day.

But that raises the question; what the heck's happened to the shoes?

Why weren't they drying out on my dresser this morning, like they should have been?

I try and go over everything that had happened throughout the original version of yesterday, attempting to recall anything that could explain why the shoes wouldn't be there.

Nothing.

I can't think of any reason for the shoes to have vanished.

Rushing out of the school entrance towards the road, I get out my cellphone, call a local taxi firm I know.

I haven't got anywhere near as much money on me as I thought I had, but I need to get back to the shop where I bought the dye.

And this time, I'm not leaving that guy's shop until he tells me some way of contacting that woman who'd sold me the shoes!

*

# Chapter 37

The shop selling mops, mountain boots, and absolutely useless shoes dyes is still here.

I've got to admit, I was hoping it wouldn't be.

I was hoping that, as this is all a brand new day, somehow Meme would've magically reappeared.

That's how it happens in the movies, right?

Regulation Eshu.

That's what the shop's called, like the guy always got an F at school for spelling.

Says the girl who's going to be a massive failure as Aurora all over again.

*

Maybe, if I can't get any help outta this guy, I'm just going to have to face up to my problems and tell Miss Kemsley I've broken a foot or something.

If necessary, before I leave the shop, I can make sure one of the wheelbarrows falls on me; anything but go through that awful play once more!

Maybe I say I'm ill; as Sue's going to get the role anyway, maybe I can at least look gracious about it all and suggest she takes over?

All right, all right; so I know all this is really, really underhand.

So okay, Miss-Goody-Two-Shoes, you tell me; what would you do in my shoes, eh?

*

# Chapter 38

Inside the shop, the guy behind the counter isn't smiling.

He's laughing

Laughing at me.

Like he knows the turmoil I'm going through; the humiliation I suffered.

But how can he possibly know?

I've got to be imagining it, right?

Then again, he's laughing like he's just heard the world's best joke.

And the only thing approaching a really good joke in this shop is me.

*

'What's so funny?' I snap, certain now that it's me he's laughing at.

'It's your feet!' he says, chortling so much now he's having to wipe tears away from his eyes.

'My feet?'

I look down at my feet. There's nothing funny about them at all, as far as I can see.

Sure, I'm wearing my old school shoes. But they're not that bad.

Nothing near as bad as the shoes he's hoping to sell!

'What's wrong with them?' I demand tartly.

'They're too big!' he replies rudely.

'They're not too big!' I insist irately.

'Oh,' he says, his laugh at last calming, his look now suddenly conspiratorial, 'so are you saying you haven't come looking for shoes that are the correct size?'

*

# Chapter 39

'The shop: Meme,' I ask the guy directly. 'Do you know of it?'

'What does anyone know if it?' he replies with a grin and a casual shrug of his shoulders. 'Only what they themselves have experienced; for it is different for everyone.'

I give him one of my well-practised, dissatisfied frowns.

Then again, what he says does make sense in its way.

'Then...who is she?' I ask next, trying to think of a kind of universal question that even he might see his way clear to answering honestly. 'The woman who served me?'

'Didn't she tell you?' he answers innocently.

'Obviously not,' I point out brusquely.

He shrugs his shoulders once more, this time in a way implying all this has quite obviously got nothing to do with him.

'Well, then maybe she didn't want you to know?'

He glances down at my feet again, pouting like there's something he can't quite figure out.

'What's a girl like you want a dance shoe shop for anyway?' he asks matter-of-factly.

'My feet aren't...that...big!' I spell out slowly and intently, just to make sure he's getting the message this time that he's pushing his rudeness way too far.

'Maybe not for most things, girl,' he admits. 'But, when it comes to dancing...'

He fades off towards the end, like he's letting me work out the fact that I can hardly call myself a natural dancer.

'Is everybody around here rude?' I ask, recalling that the woman in the shoe shop was hardly any better when it came to the mores of social etiquette.

'I suppose that depends where here actually is.'

He glances everywhere about him, the actions of someone who has to check where they've ended up after being thrown off a bus for paying the wrong fare.

'You sound like you're from wherever she came from, at least!' I point out, recalling once more that, just like him, she couldn't hold a decent conversation.

'And where's that?'

'Where's what?'

'Where she came from? I mean, how can I tell you if I came from the same place if you can't tell me where that same place is?'

'I thought you might know her; seeing as how you mentioned shoes of the "correct" size.'

'Ah, now I can see where you're coming from! So I suppose, yes, you can say I came from there too!'

Is everybody crazy around here? Is it something in the water?

'So wherever it is you both come from, I'd be considered as having big feet, right?'

'Sorry? Where we're from?'

He frowns, like he's the one who's totally confused.

'I mean, that's what she said too; that my feet are too big!'

'Ah, well, there you have it, see!' he announces triumphantly. 'She's the expert on these matters; she must know!'

'But my feet aren't too big at all!' I just about scream out in frustration.

'Did I say that? That you have big feet?' he asks all innocently, even a touch shocked by the accusation.

'Yes! Just like her, you said I have big feet!'

'I did not!' he insists, his expression now one of complete surprise that he could be accused of such a dreadful thing. 'Now you're just putting words in my mouth, girl!'

'That's exactly what you said!'

'See, there you are doing it again, girl! I did not say, "They're big". Did I not say, "They're too big"?

'Oh, so there's a difference is there?' I scoff.

He nods in reply.

'There's a big difference, girl!' he says brightly. 'Didn't I know you had come in looking for shoes of the "correct" size? Correct?'

'Well, yes, but–'

'So, wasn't that an admission that you also thought your feet were too big?'

'Not too big, but–'

'Too big for the dancing shoes, right? That's what you thought, isn't it?'

'Well, they fitted me,' I declare jubilantly.

'But why did they fit you? Didn't you think they were too small? Come on, admit it now, girl'

I nod a little ashamedly.

'Yes, but–'

'No more buts, girl! You ain't got feet for dancing; we all know that!'

*

We all know that!

Yeah; everyone at school, every parent.

So why can't I admit it?

Course, that hasn't all actually happened yet, thank goodness.

But it will; unless I sort something out quick.

I sigh.

'You're right,' I admit. 'When it comes to dancing, my feet are too big!'

'Well there you are girl!' the guy says cheerfully, giving me a light, reassuring punch to the shoulder. 'Now you've admitted it, maybe, at last, you can do something about it!'

I forlornly look over towards the piles of ugly shoes.

'Are you saying you've got just the thing in my size?' I ask worriedly.

'You're size? What is your size, girl? Isn't that where you're getting it all wrong? Trying to fit yourself into everybody else's idea of what you should be?'

'But the shoes; they were the correct size...'

Is he saying the woman was wrong? Was she trying to force me into being something I could never be?

'The shoes were the correct size because they were your shoes, girl! You were the one worrying you weren't good enough to wear them!'

'The shoes were too small–'

'You're too grounded girl; that's your real problem! Grounded in the apparent safety of the material world, rather than letting yourself go in that frighteningly uncontrollable and unpredictable realm of the spirit: of emotions, and real joy!'

'Then...you're saying I don't need the shoes?' I say hesitantly, glancing away from him in embarrassment, as I still can't see how all this can really help me in anyway.

It's all just new age philosophy, ain't it?

How's that gonna help you get on in life?

'Girl, if you can't accept the natural rhythms of your life; then how can I be expected to...

'...help you?'

His voice has changed.

No; he's changed.

Some other guy is there, politely asking if he can help me.

'Oh, your owner; I was just talking to your owner?' I say, looking about me, wondering where the guy could have so suddenly gone to .

'Owner?' the guy replies curiously. 'I'm the owner, Miss!' he adds with a satisfied smile.

'Oh, your assistant then...'

I see it on his face; he thinks I'm just a touch whacko and he's wondering what the heck he's going to have to do about it.

I answer for him.

'You don't have an assistant, do you?'

He smiles gratefully, as if he's glad I've admitted that it's me who's the crazy one here.

*

# Chapter 40

What an utterly miserable world this is!

Tonight, I'm going to make a compete fool of myself in front of the whole school.

Will my life actually be worth living after that?

I doubt it.

Maybe I just shouldn't go into school today?

Maybe I could vanish completely from everybody's lives.

At least one thing's been put right in my life.

The shop's name.

Somebody's finally realised it should be Regulation Issue.

*

The taxi back to school leaves me with little more than loose change.

What the heck happened to all that money I saved through not going out with Sue over the last month?

Speak of the Devil...

As I miserably make my way along the corridor, Sue rushes up to me like all the anguish that's passed between us over the past month has all been suddenly forgotten.

She's smiling ecstatically, like she somehow already knows I'm going to be a complete disaster tonight.

She excitedly throws her arms about me, just about kisses me in her happiness to hug me, like we're still the very best of friends.

'Sue, are you okay?' I ask, not a little unconcernedly, wondering what it is that could have brought about this complete change within her. 'I mean, it hasn't exactly been all sweetness and love between us recently, what with–'

'I know, I know: you have every right to be angry with me, Kelly!'

'Well...'

I'm completely taken aback by Sue's apology. As she pulls apart from me, she seems pretty close to weeping.

I feel like hugging her tight and hard, telling her not to be so silly.

It's not as if I haven't got a whole lot of things to apologise for too, is it?

In some ways, I suppose, you could say I started all this.

I mean, Sue has been selfish and all that – but wasn't I the one who took it all up to DEFCON 2 levels?

'I do really really appreciate all you've done for me!' Sue says, hers eyes now just about welling up with...well, what exactly?

Regret? Sadness? Joy?

I can't figure it out.

'Done for you?' I repeat dazedly.

What have I done for her?

Is she really saying that every effort I've made to undermine her has really ended up helping her in some weird way?

Now she's nervously giggling, just like she used to do when we were the closest of friends, arranged together against a cruel, cruel world.

'Oh, I've been so unfairly miserable, I know, I know!' she sort of half chuckles, half chokes through tears that are nearly falling. 'Unfair on you; unfair on me! Sure, I wanted so badly to be Aurora, and when I got to be the thirteenth fairy instead, well I jus–'

What?

Wait!

'Sorry – what did you just say then, Sue?

'Huh? What? Which bit, Kelly? The thirteenth fairy?'

'The thirteenth fairy? But I thoug–'

'Sure, sure; I know I was disappointed and miserable and unthankful – but I do realise now that I was being so, so stupid. I mean, what's wrong with being the thirteenth fairy, eh? It's the second most impor–'

I let her gabble on.

She means well, of course; full of apologies, accepting the role she's been given, realising there's not much she can do about it, and so she's just going to have to make the best of it.

But me, I've got other, more important things to think about.

Like, just where the heck have I ended up this time?

If she's the thirteenth fairy, then...

...then does that mean I'm back where I was before?

Back to a point before I'd bought the red shoes?

*

# Chapter 41

The last month; the month I've just run through for the second time.

Was that the dream?

The month with the red shoes – that had to be the imaginary one, right?

The vanishing shops.

The weirdly rude people.

The magic dancing shoes.

And yet – haven't I just come from one of those shops?

Yeah; the shop where the owner thought I was just a little crazed.

*

It seems Sue's come to the conclusion that the thirteenth fairy ain't such a bad character after all.

And no, I don't just mean in the sense of being either a bad or a good character to play.

It seems she's been reading up a little on Sleeping Beauty and come to the mind blowing conclusion that the thirteenth fairy just suffers from being misunderstood.

'Yeah?' I say like I'm really, really surprised by this whole new insight into Maleficent, or whatever it was that movie was called.

'No, no; not like the Disney version!' she says, like she knows me so well she couldn't fail to spot the sarcasm. 'I mean, like, even when you read about the allusions behind the original story!'

Allusions?

Wow, Sue really has been reading, hasn't she?

'It's the thirteenth fairy,' she says, adding emphasis to the name as if this explains it all. 'She's been forgotten because we no longer have thirteen lunar months; we just have the twelve months.'

I nod, having read something similar about the thirteen months myself, of course.

'Yeah, yeah; that is a bit odd, isn't it, the way we changed things around like that?' I say. 'When you think, as well, of the power of the moon; how it draws up the oceans. Well, what kind of effect is it going to have on us when we're – what is it – ninety percent water or something? And then there's all that blood rushing around inside us!'

'Yes, yes: that's precisely my point!' Sue agrees excitedly. 'It's all our natural rhythms; tied into the thirteen months, not the twelve!'

'Soooo...so why's she want to kill the princess, then? I mean, if all she is is this allusion to the thirteenth month?'

'Well, don't you still get it, Kelly?' Sue says like she's a touch embarrassed that she has to explain the details to me. 'You know; monthly rhythms? The way the princess – now she's sixteen – pricks herself and draws blood on a spinning wheel's spindle?'

'Sure; but if it wasn't for the good fairy, instead of falling sleep she'd die there and then – and all thanks to the thirteenth fairy!'

'It's her childhood that she has to leave behind; the sleep just delays it. She's not waking up to the changes naturally taking place within her.'

'Really, Sue; and how's some poor kid supposed to take all this deep meaning out of some kiddies tale?'

She shrugs, giggles.

'Well, when I saw the story could be explained in this way, it suddenly made a whole lot more sense to me!'

I laugh along with her.

'It's all a bit gross, though, isn't it?'

'Makes you wonder, doesn't it,' Sue replies, this time with a chuckle closely approaching a wicked cackle, 'what some of those other fairy stories are really trying to tell us!'

'Yeah!' I say, briefly pausing to think about this. 'Red Riding Hood – what's that about, then?

'Search me,' Sue admits. 'I haven't read up on that one yet!'

'You know though, Sue,' I say, thinking she deserves a friendly warning, 'I don't think it would really be a good idea to play this thirteenth fairy as the good one!'

'Oh, don't get me wrong, Kelly!' Sue replies with a mischievous chortle. 'Went I went through it, I went through hell!'

*

# Chapter 42

The main thing is, I suppose; I don't get to make a complete fool of myself after all.

There's no panicked rushing around trying to get my red shoes to dry: no even more panicked dash to dump them and slip on in their place my regular shoes.

All I do is sit out in the audience with Mum and Dad. Watching Sue make a triumph of being the thirteenth fairy.

And I throw myself into clapping her efforts just as much as everyone else around me.

She's good! I've got to admit it.

She's brilliant, in fact.

All moaning and shrieking like she's this evil goddess, so, so furious that she's been forgotten, ignored, and eventually thwarted in her attempt to take over the whole realm.

Flowing everywhere about the stage as if she's on ice skates.

Go for it girl – you've got it!

Mary's amazing too. Leon's out here in the audience, of course, looking up at her on stage as if he's the prince who has to leap up there and revive her with a longing, full on kiss.

Then again, maybe it's Sue he's got his eyes on.

Didn't I say he was fickle?

Me, I don't seem to have come out of all this too well, do I?

No Leon.

No Aurora.

But if you think I'm thinking that I've lost out, you'd be wrong.

I've come out of it with my reputation intact.

And I've got my friend back.

Sure, Sue's not perfect.

But then, neither are my feet; and I manage well enough with them.

*

# Chapter 43

Just for the hell of it, just to see if I can come across the chortling guy again and get some kind of real answer outta him, in the morning I ask Dad to drop me off in that less salubrious part of town where I first came across those weird shops.

I'm so confused, I can't remember if I've ever really asked Dad to give me a lift out here before or not.

Certainly, Dad doesn't seem surprised either way by my request to be dropped off here; from the casual way he responds, I can't figure out if he's done this before or not. And I don't want to ask him, as no matter what his answer will be, it makes me look a touch crazed to be asking, doesn't it?

I wave Dad off, telling him I'll be all right here, not to worry.

I set off walking down the street, wondering, maybe, if I should've just asked Dad to drive past, while I just stared outta the window, looking out for the guy.

But wouldn't that have made me look a little weird too?

Apart from the different people walking by me, or stopping to take a brief gander into a shop window, the street – of course – looks pretty much the same as it did yesterday morning

Is that the only time I've really visited here then?

As I say, I'm just not sure where reality and my dreams overlap or match up anymore.

The red shoes; they were part of the dream, I suppose.

As was the brusque woman; the chuckling man probably too.

Or at least, I'm thinking this way until I see it.

The shop.

Meme.

*

# Chapter 44

They're there too.

The red shoes.

Back in the centre of the otherwise entirely black window.

I don't need them now, of course.

There was just that one, important part of my life when I believed I just had to have them.

Now that time has passed.

Even so...I'd like to see if the interior of the shop is exactly as how I remembered it.

*

Inside, it's as dark as the window display.

Just as it was last time I was here.

Yes; I've been here before, haven't I?

When, I'm no longer too sure.

I'm not even sure about the where.

The velvet drapes hang about me in the darkness like captured and solidified rainbows.

'Hello; is anyone here?' I ask, trying as hard as I can to peer into that thickly concealing gloom.

As before, I can't see any shoes.

Any shelves.

Any counter.

What I can see, however, is the woman.

'Hello,' she says, suddenly standing so close by me that she can only have appeared out of the darkness itself.

*

# Chapter 45

This time, the woman isn't holding the shoes.

'How can I help you?' she asks, her tone so curious and surprised that, if I didn't know better, I'd seriously believe I must have accidentally walked into her home rather than a shop.

Where does she end and the shop begin? It's so hard to tell because, once again, she's wearing the richly coloured velvets that make her as one with her store.

Her skin is silkily black, her eyes sapphires in their blue intensity.

'I'm...not sure,' I reply hesitantly. 'Do you know me?'

'That's an odd question,' the woman frowns suspiciously. 'Usually, people who come into my world tend to ask how much the red shoes in the window are; that kind of thing.'

Does everyone on this street have to play these odd word games?

Okay, so I'll play along.

'How much are they?'

'Shouldn't you ask if they'll fit you first?'

See what I mean about these word games?

Shheessshhh!

'They're the correct size, I'm sure,' I declare confidently.

She glances down at my feet, shakes her head despondently.

'No: they're not right for you,' she insists adamantly.

There it is again: has this woman never read any article about closing the deal?

*

'I get it,' I say, having become used to what passes for friendly conversation around here, 'my feet are too big, right? And so I can't dance, yeah?'

The woman shakes her head once more.

'It's because you don't need them!'

'Last time I was here, you didn't say that!' I point out.

'Last time was obviously another time.'

'Ah, then you do remember me!' I almost cry out in triumph, overjoyed to have at last found a chink in her otherwise impregnable armour.

She gives me a puzzled look; but I'm not going to get away so easily.

'I bought those shoes last time I was here!'

'Didn't we just agree that last time was another time?' she coolly replies.

I groan in exasperation.

How hard is it not to buy a pair of shoes in here?

'You must remember...can't you really recall me ever buying anything from you?'

She regards me carefully, taking in everything about me while frowning studiously.

'I...don't think so,' she assuredly declares, despite the doubt in her words. 'I'm sure I'd remember!'

She glances down at my feet once more.

'Yes; I'd definitely remember!'

'How can you definitely remember; just by looking at my feet?' I wail irritably.

With an airy wave of her hand, she indicates the surrounding darkness.

'I run a shoe shop, remember?' she says with absolutely no hint of irony.

'How can you be so sure of that?' I demand. 'Why can't you just admit you've forgotten me? How hard is that, eh?'

She smiles, a highly satisfied smile, like she's somehow convinced herself she's just won whatever argument we were having.

'Nobody likes being forgotten, ignored, do they?' she says, as if we've suddenly moved onto a whole new field of scintillating conversation.

And yet, as she says it, it sounds for the very first time as if she's hurt, wounded.

As if she's experienced being forgotten, ignored.

And, oddly, it reminds me of something...something important that I should never, ever have forgotten...

*

# Chapter 46

The thirteenth fairy.

She was forgotten.

Ignored.

But that's all just a character in a fairy story, isn't it?

Whereas this is...

Well, what?

Real life?

(I've been here before, haven't I? Recognising that magic shoes and shops that vanish and reappear aren't really anything to do with the real world.)

Yet...she can't be the thirteenth fairy, right?

For one thing, I couldn't go calling this woman evil, could I?

I mean, sure, it's pretty damn hard to get a straight answer out of her, but...

Well, that's hardly the same as trying to kill a princess, is it?

'Are you saying you've really forgotten me?' I ask. 'Or is it that I've forgotten you?'

She smiles, satisfied, it seems, with my question.

Not that she answers.

She appears to think her satisfied smile is the only reply I need.

So, either I have to figure out myself; or she believes I've already got it figured.

She sees the light of understanding in my eyes.

'As I said, girl,' she says, 'you don't need those red shoes no more.'

She glances back, as if towards the sparkling red shoes hidden away in the window display.

'You ask me,' she continues with a grin, drawing my own gaze towards the darkness veiling the shoes, 'they look to me like they were made to fit a child; know what I'm saying?'

'Yes, yes; I was just a child, wasn't I?'

'Ah, yes, I remember you!'

'You do?'

'Yes; but it was only yesterday – I wouldn't say you were a child, Miss!'

'What do you mea–'

I turn back towards her; but she's no longer there.

It's the shopkeeper; the man who runs Regulation Issue.

*

# Chapter 47

'Is there anything I can get you, Miss?'

With an airy wave of a hand, he proudly draws my attention to his jungle of merchandise as if it were an Aladdin's cave of treasure.

It's a reasonable question.

I am back in his store, only a day after my first visit here

As if I can't wait to purchase something, anything from his ridiculously well-stocked shop.

I can't bear to disappoint the poor guy.

I glance down at my shoes.

'Yes,' I say brightly, 'have you any shoe dye; red shoe dye?'

*

Back out on the street, the people passing me by are a regular mix of characters, indefinable in their many differences.

There's a laugh, like someone's just heard the world's best joke.

'When you gonna wake up girl? You don't need no red dye!'

I whirl about, expecting the chuckling man to be right by my side.

He's not there.

It's just the crowd, walking past me, ignoring me as if I'm not really there.

I toss the tub of dye into a nearby waste bin.

My shoes are fine, just the way they are.

I smile.

Laugh.

Someone stares, but I don't care.

When they see I don't care, they look away again, ignoring me once more.

I break into a run, chuckling now like I've overdosed on helium.

I feel so light on my feet, like I'm no longer weighed down; no longer constrained by rules telling me this really, really ain't the way to behave.

I can dance.

And when I glance down at my shoes, they sparkle like the bloodiest red rubies.

End

If you enjoyed reading this book, you might also enjoy (or you may know someone else who might enjoy) these other books by Jon Jacks.

The Caught – The Rules – Chapter One – The Changes – Sleeping Ugly

The Barking Detective Agency – The Healing – The Lost Fairy Tale

A Horse for a Kingdom – Charity – The Most Beautiful Things (Now includes The Last Train)

The Dream Swallowers – Nyx; Granddaughter of the Night – Jonah and the Alligator

Glastonbury Sirens – Dr Jekyll's Maid – The 500-Year Circus – The Desire: Class of 666

P – The Endless Game – DoriaN A – Wyrd Girl – The Wicker Slippers – Gorgesque

Heartache High (Vol I) – Heartache High: The Primer (Vol II) – Heartache High: The Wakening (Vol III)

Miss Terry Charm, Merry Kris Mouse & The Silver Egg – The Last Angel – Eve of the Serpent

Seecrets – The Cull – Dragonsapien – The Boy in White Linen – Porcelain Princess – Freaking Freak

Died Blondes – Queen of all the Knowing World – The Truth About Fairies – Lowlife

Elm of False Dreams – God of the 4th Sun – A Guide for Young Wytches – Lady of the Wasteland

The Wendygo House – Americarnie Trash – An Incomparable Pearl – We Three Queens – Cygnet Czarinas

Memesis – April Queen, May Fool – Sick Teen – Thrice Born – Self-Assembled Girl – Love Poison No. 13

Whatever happened to Cinderella's Slipper? – AmeriChristmas – The Vitch's Kat in Hollywoodland

Blood of Angels, Wings of Men – Patchwork Quest – The World Turns on A Card – Palace of Lace

