Page 54 of Dreams Come True at the Fairytale Museu
‘That’s really sweet.’
‘What would you have wished for as a kid?’ I give his fingers a squeeze because I haven’t let go of his hand yet, but I’m hyperaware that I’m edging around the wish he made on his first day here – the one he doesn’t know I read. I can’t openly ask him why he doesn’t find any meaning in life, but the more I get to know him, the more obvious the answer is becoming.
‘Honestly?’
I nod.
‘I don’t know. I never believed in things like magic and wishes and fairytales. If I wanted something, my parents tried to “instil a good work ethic” by making me earn it in one way or another – household chores or good marks at school or something. Christmas and birthday gifts were always of the practical variety – never toys. Everything was very sensible. I can’t imagine what the young me would have made of a supposedly magical wishing well or what I would possibly have asked of it. I guess if I could go back now, I’d ask for a childhood where wishes and fairytales were commonplace and to grow up knowing what it felt like to believe in magic. To feel like I feel right now, but thirty years ago. How’s that?’
I can barely speak around the lump in my throat. ‘The perfect answer.Youare exactly why it’s so important that we get to do this.’
‘So kids don’t turn out like me?’
I know he’s winding me up, but I give him a scathing look anyway. ‘Exactly. Not that how you turned out is a bad thing, obviously.’
‘Ah, so you wantmorekids to grow up to be evil gerbils without souls?’
I blush at how harshly I judged him at first and his grin gets even wider because that’s exactly what he was aiming for. ‘Every child should get to experience hunting for fairies and looking for magical lands at the top of big trees, and believing in whimsy and daydreams and letting their imaginations run wild.’
He uses his grip on my hand to tug me closer and then turns and falls into step beside me, finally facing the right way again. He drops an arm around my shoulders and leans his head towards mine. ‘Agree. Very much agree.’
The closeness shuts out the chill in the breeze of the November night, and I’m quite disappointed when it’s only a few more minutes before we reach the street of the boy who wished for the cape, identify the right house, and re-do the knotted tangle of our face coverings again.
At least the second house has got a wall, and a creaky gate that announces our arrival like a Tannoy system, and a dog inside that starts barking instantly. Warren insists on taking the package to the door again, so I crouch behind the wall and watch as he runs up the path, presses the doorbell, and I can’t help giggling at how much the barking dog makes his pace quicken as he flails out of the gate and scrambles into a hiding spot beside me just as the door opens and a little boy comes out, picks up the package with an ‘Oooooooooh!’ and takes it back inside.
‘Not gonna lie, I hoped he was going to open it and try it on right there and then.’
‘Why, so you could compare capes?’ I tug his playfully where it’s starting to unravel from the knot hiding his face.
‘Mine is better, obviously.’ He leans down to whisper to me. ‘I’ve always thought capes were more becoming on people who are thirty-something years too old to wear them.’
I’m fighting off an increasingly familiar urge to hug him again. How could an evil gerbil with no soul turn out to bethisadorable?
We’re on the right side of the house for a quick getaway, but the curtains are open and the lights are on in the living room, and within minutes, we’re able to see the boy inside, zooming around with the cape flapping behind him and an excitable Labrador jumping up at him, barking loudly, and probably wondering what the heck is going on.
‘Best night ever.’ Warren pushes himself up and holds a hand out to pull me up too, and even though I’m quite capable of getting up from a crouching position on my own, I give in to the temptation to touch him again.
He doesn’t let go until we get safely out of sight and drop hands to pull our face coverings down. As soon as his cape is back to being over his shoulders, he holds his hand out again and I take it instantly.
He walks beside me this time, swinging our hands between us, but we’re both meandering, wandering slowly, putting off heading back towards the museum because that will mean saying goodnight and not holding his hand any longer.
‘I don’t want to go back to work,’ he says eventually. ‘Can we just stay out here giving presents to kids all night?’
‘I’d like that, but we’re all out of nearby wishes.’ As I say it, my eyes fall on a streetside hot drinks van at the edge of a park, and I nudge him to look in the right direction. ‘However, wecouldreward ourselves with a hot drink and take the scenic route through the park… If you weren’t in any rush to get back.’
‘You had me at hot drink on a cold autumn night… It’s freezing out here. Someone needs to teach Disney princes to wear scarves and warm coats.’
We left in such a hurry that he hasn’t got his wallet with him, which gives me free rein to choose the most autumnal drink possible, and I order us a Black Forest hot chocolate each, and we head through the iron gates of the park and meander along a leaf-strewn path in comfortable silence.
‘It’s going to get worse as you get older?’ I say eventually, and he groans.
‘When we agreed to leave it “for now”, what I really meant was “for forever”.’ He automatically knows I’m talking about his hearing and I’m pretty sure he knew I was never going to leave it very long before questioning him again, and he probably would have refused the drink if hereallyminded.
He sips his hot chocolate and looks over at me contemplatively. ‘If you hadn’t just bought me the most autumnal drink of all time, I’d tell you to shut up.’
‘No, you wouldn’t.’
‘No, I wouldn’t.’ His laugh turns into a long sigh. ‘Ithasgot worse as I’ve got older, I know that. When I was in my twenties, apart from a few rounds of vertigo, it barely made an impact on my life, but now I’m in my forties, the hearing in my left ear has slowly declined, and there’s no cure, nothing that can improve things.’
