The Art of Wishing (22 page)

He spoke slowly and evenly, and for a moment I was silent, letting his words settle into the space around us, absolving me.

“You want a million things from me, too?” I asked. He nodded. “Like what?”

“Well, you already know the big ones,” he replied with a smile.

That was probably true, at least after our last conversation at Tom’s. He wanted acceptance. Love. A girlfriend who didn’t abuse her wishes. “The little ones, then,” I pressed. “Tell me one.”

“Hmm,” he said, narrowing his eyes in thought. “Here’s one: I’d very much like to take you on a picnic. In summer, so you could wear a pretty sundress.”

“A sundress?” I said. I was pretty sure I hadn’t owned a sundress since fifth grade.

“So I could ogle your legs,” he explained. “And we’d go somewhere with a river, so we could dangle our feet in the water.”

“And then, let me guess,” I said, grinning at him. “We planned to go swimming but, oops, we forgot our bathing suits, so we have to go skinny-dipping instead?”

“If you like,” he said, returning my grin. “Although if you want the X-rated picnic, I can do way better than skinny-dipping.”

“Yikes,” I said, as a little thrill raced up my spine.

“You asked,” he said sweetly. Turning his head to the side, he nodded at one of my hands, which still held his wrists in place. “Now, are you gonna let me up? Or should we bust out the handcuffs?”

I pulled my hands off him like he’d scalded me, and he laughed softly as he sat up. I watched him, thinking about what he’d just said.
Nobody ever feels just one way about another person
. I wondered if that included Xavier, Oliver’s friend-turned-assassin. How many things did Oliver feel about him?

Oliver looked up at me, his brow furrowed. “Something about Xavier?” he asked. “What is it?”

“It’s just, the way he talked about you. There was something . . .” I frowned at him. “What were you like, back then? When you and he were . . . when you were Ciarán?”

He looked surprised at the question, but didn’t hesitate before answering. “Still me. I just looked different.”

“Okay, then what did you look like?”

“Shorter,” he said, which made me smile. “My face was . . . I mean, just different.” He paused. Swallowed. “I could show you. Do you want me to?”

Something fluttered in my chest. Apprehensive but insanely curious, I nodded.

As he stood, he flicked his fingers again, and all the drapes and pillows disappeared, replaced by my familiar room. But then Oliver himself began to change. The air shimmered around him. His face grew tight with concentration, and he began to go blurry . . .

And then, someone new was standing in his place.

“Ta-dah,” said Oliver. Ciarán. Holding out his arms, he stepped back so I could get the full picture.

Ciarán was shorter than Oliver, just like he’d said. It was only a difference of an inch or two, but it was enough. He had a similar build, slender and strong—but instead of Oliver’s usual jeans-shirt-hoodie combination, Ciarán wore brown pants with a loose-fitting white shirt. The clothes were simple enough, but even with my limited fashion sense, I could tell they hadn’t been in style for at least a hundred years. And that wasn’t even counting his hat, which made me want to put on a production of
Brigadoon
and cast him in the lead.

His face was different: slightly longer and thinner than Oliver’s, with a nose that turned up ever so slightly at the end. A casual scattering of freckles emphasized the incredibly pale skin of his cheeks. His hair was lighter and wavier than Oliver’s, but the way it fell into his eyes was pleasantly familiar.

Looking at Ciarán and knowing that he was Oliver wasn’t nearly as jarring as I’d thought it would be. In fact, he looked like he could be Oliver’s cousin or something . . . except for the eyes. His eyes were exactly the same. Bright green and shadowed by dark lashes, they shone as they looked at me.

“Ohhh,” I said.

“Oh good, or oh bad?” he asked. A thick Irish accent curled comfortably around the words.

“Oh
oh,
” I said. “You’re more the same than I thought you’d be.”

“I am?” He looked down at himself, uncertain.

I frowned, stepping toward him and touching one hand lightly to the front of his shirt. He felt warm underneath, just like before. “I mean, obviously you don’t look the same. But there’s a certain . . . I don’t know. The way you look at
me
is the same.”

“That’s because it’s still me. Like I told you. Just a slightly different version.” He leaned down, and I soon discovered that the way he kissed me was the same, too.

A few minutes later, my computer made a little noise, and Oliver, still looking like Ciarán, got up to check on his pictures.

His hand worked the mouse, and his eyes darted to and fro across the computer screen that lit his face. He moved like Oliver did. It relieved me to know that he could look so different, but still be the person I thought he was—not the person Xavier wanted me to believe he was.

And then there was Xavier, who adopted the bodies of living people without thinking twice. Who changed faces on a whim, just to mess with my head. Who wouldn’t tell me his real name.

But he’d told me the name of the persona he’d adopted for his current master. Shen. Maybe there was a way to find this Shen and track him back to his master. If only I could do it without Xavier overhearing, before sunset tomorrow. . . .

“Margo,” came Oliver’s soft voice, cutting into my thoughts. I looked up: Ciarán was gone, and Oliver was slumped in my chair, watching me with tired eyes. “I can hear you. Please, just stop.”

“But why?” I said. “Just give me time. I’ll think of something.”

He took a deep breath. “I already told you, there’s nothing—”

“Don’t give me that ‘nothing I can do’ crap. Remember my idea? Making him change his mind? You already said it was brilliant, and I saw the look on your face when you said it. You wanted me to do it.”

He pressed his lips into a thin line, but he didn’t deny it.

“And if I find his master, I’ll be able to. I just need to keep him from overhearing me.”

“He can probably overhear you right now, you know.”

That shut me up.

“And what’s more,” Oliver continued, resting his elbows on his knees and leaning forward, “he won’t let you anywhere near his master. Whoever it is, he’s been protecting them ever since the initial binding.”

I frowned. “What do you mean?”

“You think I haven’t wondered who his master is?” he said. “I’ve looked, believe me. Do you remember that day in the park? I told you I felt something, like a call?” I nodded. “Normally, I’d be able to feel it every time Xavier’s master called him, or made a wish. But ever since that first call, it’s been nothing but radio silence. No calls. No wishes. No anything. I don’t know how he’s kept his master from using any magic, but as long as this goes on, I could stand face-to-face with Xavier’s master and never know it.”

“Is that how he found me?” I asked. “By following your magic?”

He hesitated, then nodded. “But it should have taken him a lot longer than it did. The last time he tracked me down, it took him a solid month. Feeling another genie’s magic is easy, but following it is quite the opposite. And I’ve been keeping a pretty low profile. Even when I went to school for Vicky, I was just the kid in the corner that nobody noticed, you know? And now that I’ve stopped going, I don’t see much of anyone except you. I come when you call, and aside from your wishes, that’s pretty much it.”

“Could he have spotted you at school?”

He shook his head. “Nope. If he were hanging around the school, I’d know it. Even without his master making wishes, he’d need to draw on his magic to create and maintain a human body. And that magic would be visible, at least to me.”

“Wait, wait, wait,” I said. “Hold on. What if it’s his
master
hanging around the school, not him? What if it’s a student who helped him track us down?”

He looked as stricken as I felt. “That does make sense,” he said slowly.

“It does, doesn’t it,” I said, feeling my heart begin to race as I began to piece it together. “Someone at school. Someone who isn’t using magic, so you’d never know it was them. God. Whoever this guy is, I will find him and I swear I will kill him. I’ll kill him right in his stupid face.”

“Will you please calm down?” Oliver said. He moved to the floor, sat back on his heels, and rested a hand on my knee. “You’re not killing anybody, in the face or otherwise. Look what he did to you on Saturday, Margo. Look what he did to you
today
. If he thinks you’re going after him again, he won’t hesitate to do even worse next time.”

I tensed, but forced myself to hold Oliver’s gaze. “Not if I get to him first.
Or,
and let’s not forget this one, I could do nothing, and we could live one more day like everything’s all kittens and rainbows, until he comes and wishes you free and you
die,
and in case that’s not bad enough, I’ll have to live knowing that I could have done something about it, but I didn’t.” Oliver looked down, and I heard him take a ragged breath.

“Come on, Oliver,” I said, as gently as I could. I slid to the floor too, positioning myself in front of him so our knees were touching. “You don’t want Xavier to decide whether you live or die. You said so yourself. Your magic might be bound by other people’s wishes, but your life is your own.”

“You’re right,” he said, a sudden intensity in his eyes as they met mine again. “My life is my own, which means nobody else gets to control it. Not even you. I love you, Margo, and if I have one day left, I want to spend it with you. Not playing spy, or trying to track Xavier’s master down, or complaining about how life isn’t fair. Just . . . living. With you.”

It was a moment before I realized my jaw was hanging slack. “You love me?”

“I thought I’d made it kind of obvious,” he replied with a wry little laugh.

I lowered my gaze, feeling suddenly shy, and he reached for my hand. Magic zinged up my arm, but he remained silent, waiting patiently for me.

“One day,” I said after a moment. “Okay. What do you want to do? We should make a list. Here, I’ll get a notebook, and we can write everything down and make sure we fit it all in before, um . . . before the deadline.”

But Oliver squeezed my hand harder, keeping me from going to my desk. “I don’t want a list. Let’s just see what we feel like doing.”

“But—”

“One last day of spontaneity,” he said with a grin, “and then you can go back to being your adorable little control-freak self.”

“But what if there’s something you really want to do, and we forget, and I only remember when it’s too late, and then—” I looked at Oliver’s face, and stopped myself. Took a breath. “Sure. I can do that.”

“Excellent!” he said, clasping his hands together. “How about if you start by skipping school tomorrow? That’d give us more time together, since I’m a dropout and all.”

I couldn’t skip school. I’d
never
skipped school, except when I was sick. Besides, there was an English essay I needed to turn in, and I was pretty sure we were having a quiz in chemistry, and . . .

And I stopped myself again. I had one day left with Oliver. One day of being spontaneous. Worrying about school would just have to wait.

“Skip school,” I said. “No problem. And . . . and you could stay here tonight, if you want. Not like that,” I added quickly when his eyebrows shot up. “I didn’t mean that. Not that I don’t want—I mean it’s just so—um, unless
you
want . . . ?”

And if he did want to sleep with me, would I say yes? Apparently I was about to find out. Three cheers for spontaneity!

A touch of color crept into his cheeks. “I do want,” he said, “or I
would
want, if it weren’t like this. If it weren’t because it’s our last chance, you know? I don’t want to be with you like that when I’d just be thinking about the why of it—about the . . . the deadline. Um. You know what I mean?”

“Oh,” I said, halfway between relief and disappointment. “Yeah. I know what you mean.”

“But I’d still love to stay,” he said, “if you want me to.”

Of course I wanted him to. He would sleep over, I would ditch school in the morning, and we would spend the rest of the day doing . . . whatever we wanted. Without a plan. And after that, I would sink back into the safe, comfortable life that I’d always known. A life without magic, and without Oliver. The thought of it broke my heart.

It also brought me a small, secret measure of relief, though I knew I could never tell Oliver that.

But maybe he already knew.

“Oliver?” I whispered, a little while later.

“Mm-hmm?” he replied.

I wriggled a little, adjusting myself in his arms. “Before, when Xavier found me, he . . . you died. He made me watch you die.”

“What do you mean?” His body was still, and his voice was calm. Too calm.

“It was an illusion,” I explained, still trying not to replay it in my mind. “An illusion of you, that he created. And I—I mean he, pretending he was me—he had that knife again and, and he used it. He killed you. And you just let him do it.”