Daniel’s lips pressed. Children talking about fairies in the bleachers could be rationalized away, but it still made him uneasy. “Maybe you should leave,” he said as he used his sleeve to try to get the makeup off from behind his ears.
“I don’t want to leave,” she said petulantly as she took to the air again, hovering so she could watch. “And you can’t make me. Kal is an ass. His need to succeed has gone beyond the bounds of you and Trisk and him, and he hurt the world. It was my fault. I could have stopped him. But I didn’t know it would be this bad, and now he’s trying to make a profit on it. Besides, there are kids here.”
He started when she landed on his shoulder, bringing the scent of wildflowers to him. “You missed a spot,” she said, lifting off and hovering backward when he carefully cleaned it.
“Thanks.”
“Betty was right,” she said, hands on her hips as she hung before him, watching. “That stuff looked like cat puke.”
“Thanks,” he said again, more dryly. But he couldn’t help but feel special having her with him, like a powerful secret. “I have got to get out of here,” he said softly as he ran the water and tried to scrub the makeup off his sleeve. “You’re small. I bet you know all the ways out.”
“For me? Sure,” she said, inspecting the other side of his neck and giving him a thumbs-up. “For you?” She shrugged. “Hitching a ride on the truck headed for the hospital is still your best bet.”
“Not if I look like Frankenstein’s monster,” he muttered, eyeing his smooth face. He’d shaved only an hour ago so Betty would have an even surface to work with. Luxuriating under the locker room showers had been a welcome relief—until he realized he had nothing to put on but the same tired clothes, worn from surviving exploding trucks and hopping a train.
Orchid’s wings hummed an odd sound. “Do you trust me?” she said suddenly, and he raised an eyebrow. “Oh, don’t be a stick in the mud,” she cajoled, making him smile as she hovered before him, twin pixies facing him in the mirror. “I can help.”
Images of Kal waiting outside to kill him so they could blame him and Trisk for the plague drifted through his mind. Trisk was probably in jail, waiting for the same fate. He had to get her out. “I trust you,” he said warily, and she clapped her hands, her wings shedding a sudden gray dust that she waved into his face.
“Hey!” he said, coughing as he stumbled backward, eyes tearing and waving the dust away. “What am I supposed to do now?” he said sourly as he looked at her through his watering eyes. “Think happy thoughts and fly away?”
“You’re such the smart-ass when you’re depressed, you know that?” she said, apparently pleased with herself. “Give it a minute.”
“Give what a minute?” he said, then rubbed his neck where his collar met his skin.
Smirking, Orchid hovered right before him, a sassy half smile on her face. “If you take your shirt off, I can pix your back and chest, but seriously, you might want to just stick with your face. It looks like you might be sensitive to it.”
Daniel brushed the last of the dust off. “Sensitive to what?” he said, but the back of his neck was itching, and he rubbed the sensation away.
“Pixy dust,” Orchid said proudly.
He looked at her, then his reflection. There was a faint rising of skin where he’d scratched it. “You’re joking,” he said, angling to get closer to the mirror.
“Nope.” Orchid laughed. “Betcha didn’t know that we can change our dust. I can put out fires with it, or make them more intense. We can even pix people coming near our homes. It’s one heck of a passive deterrent. Most people think it’s poison ivy and never come back.” Hovering beside him, she slowly landed on the glass shelf under the mirror. “Most times,” she said, clearly remembering something sad.
Daniel drew back, concerned. “Your family?” he asked, and she shrugged.
“It happens,” she said. “You can’t pix a bulldozer.”
He ran a finger down the faint red patch, shocked when a series of swellings popped up. He couldn’t help but wonder if things would be different if people knew of pixies, if that would stop a bulldozer or money-hungry developer. Probably not. Knowledge never stopped them from destroying beaver dams or wildflower banks that fed bees, not to mention polluting streams with frogs and trout. But if the wildlife had a name, perhaps, and could smile and sing. And cry.
He looked at Orchid, not seeing the harm in people knowing about her. Maybe it would make a difference. Maybe bands of people would unite together. Flower power, they could call it.
“Go on, give it a good rub,” Orchid said as he gingerly touched the faint welts. “See what happens.”