Page 144 of The Eighth Isle

“You were happy here, weren’t you? I know you were. We had a good time.” Amber’s eyes were wide and honest, and she had no clue about what really happened in the Burrow, either, even though Mama Si had used her to get me where she wanted me before. She’d used Amber to show me the fountain with the statues of the siren sisters, and the triangle room, and to kiss that glass so that I’d notice it was gone.

“We did, yes, but I couldn’t do it,” I told the girls, smiling at their curious eyes, at the way they looked at me. Like they werefascinated.Like I was a different Fall from the one they knew.

And I really was. A completely different person now. Grey’s wife.Pregnant.Possibly the cause of the end of the world—or the magical world on Earth, at least.

“You couldn’t do what—fuckhot strangers for money? That’s, like,the dream!” said Peanut, giggling with her hands in front of her mouth like she was trying to hide her smile.

“It isn’t necessarily sex,” said Amber, waving her off. “Mama Si could have given you other jobs instead.”

“I agree,” said Eva. “Not everyone has the stomach for it, but Mama Si would have set you up nicely.”

“She hasn’t stopped talking about you at all—Fall Doll this, Fall Doll that,blah blah blah,” Amber said, imitating Mama Si with her hand gestures.

“Stop it—she’ll hear you!” said Eva, turning to look behind us as if she expected Mama Si to appear out of thin air.

“It’s fine,” I reassured her. “And I had no idea she talked about me, to be honest.” I thought for sure Mama Si would have killed me that day if Shadow hadn’t bitten me and I hadn’t been chosen.

“She did,” Peanut said. “She would have given you another job. Just ask her, will you? Come back to us!”

“Yes, yes, come back!”

“It’s still as amazing as when you left, and summer is already here!”

“We’ll have so much fun. You’ll see—the parties arewild.”

They went on and on about what they did at night, all the pool parties and balls and masquerades and trips to the human world they had scheduled for this month. Just like in the old times, they were bickering and laughing and talking over one another, and I was right back to that first day I was invited to hang out with them by the heart-shaped pool, and life was so fucking simple. It had been so damn simple then and I hadn’trealized it, and now my eyes were full of tears and I loved these girls to death.

They begged me again to just talk to Mama Si, assured me that she would do anything to have me back here, and then we could all enjoy the summer properly. Together.

A part of me wanted nothing more than to be that girl again, to live that life. To only worry about what to wear and how to look and which fucking lotion to put on my body for the day.

Such a beautiful life it had been, albeit only an illusion, and for the first time since I set foot in the Paradise, I was thankful to Mama Si for giving it to me. I would carry the time I spent here as one of the dolls with me forever.

“Go on, dolls. Go have your breakfast. Leave my Fall Doll alone, won’t you?”

Mama Si’s voice pierced right through me, and the girls jumped to their feet so fast it was almost funny. I turned to look at her—a white sundress on her tall, thin frame, her lips painted red.

“Of course, Mama Si.”

“We were just catching up.”

“We miss her, that’s all,” the girls said, and I loved them a little more for it.

I stood up, too, and smiled at them. “It was so good to see you, dolls. Say hi to the others for me, will you? I’ll visit when I can.”

They made me promise that I would, that if I continued to stay in the Paradise I wouldn’tstick to the rooftops like a weirdo,Peanut whispered in my ear, but that I’d come down here and talk to them again. Hang out like in the old times.

Again, I said yes, and I would if we somehow survived this thing intact. I would definitely be coming back to the girls and sip colorful drinks through swirly straws near a pink heart-shaped pool.

After all, it had once been a dream of mine.

When they left, Mama Si remained. The sun fell on her face because Assa was not holding up an umbrella behind her like usual, so her eyes looked like miniature rainbows. I saw all the colors in them as clearly as I saw the sky.

“They do miss you,” Mama Si said as she slowly came closer to me.

“I miss them, too,” I said with a nod, then turned around and sat at the edge of the pool again, dipping my feet in the water. “Any news?”

“Still asleep,” she said, making my stomach twist. “Reeva is thinking about charging him with some magical electricity to see if that does the trick.”

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