Roland, fourteen again, nodded. “One of you needs to wake him up. I’m sorry,” he said as they turned to him, “but I’m just telling the story. You’re right—I have to finish it—but I have to do it with the characters I have, and that’s you. We have to go back to the logic of the story, or we’ll be playing into her hands.”
It was only then that Freddy really saw what Roland and Mel had kept trying to tell her about the story’s rules. Weave a circle round him thrice … the man in the poem wasn’t random at all. He was the poet. And he could imagine the hell out of the pleasure-dome, but he also had to be controlled. It was the most frustrating balancing act she had ever heard of. Like … like …
“Rope bridge,” said Freddy.
Roland spread his hands. “It’s never easy at the end.”
They approached the bridge. It was just three strands of rope at different heights. “If we fall in…?” said Freddy.
“You die.” Cuerva Lachance had slipped into existence beside the lake. “I don’t terribly badly want you to wake him up.”
“You’re cheating,” said Mel.
“I’m Cuerva Lachance,” said Cuerva Lachance. “And I do terribly badly want you to wake him up.”
“Which is it?” said Freddy.
“Both. Neither. Who can tell?”
Mel stared at the fire. Her eyes were so wide that Freddy could see the whites showing all around the irises. “I’ll do it,” she said in a trembling voice.
Freddy said, “Mel—”
“Everyone’s done something important but me. I should go,” said Mel, and moved towards the bridge.
Freddy shoved her sister aside.
Her heart was thundering in her ears. The rope bridge was scary, but it wasn’t anywhere near as scary as the thought of Mel falling into the fire. She could see a man lying dead in a jungle, bleeding into the undergrowth; she could see a boy lurking alone in a cave. She could see herself walking down that road with Roland, the funeral behind them. She could feel herself refusing to cry. She knew she took Mel for granted. Thinking of her dying made Freddy’s throat constrict, cutting off her breathing as completely as the rope had earlier.
“You stay back,” Freddy said. “I’ve travelled in time. This should be a cakewalk.” She didn’t believe that. She stepped onto the bridge.
Heat blasted up from below. It’s just a cliché, Freddy thought as she shuffled along the bottommost rope, her hands wrapped firmly around the topmost. Just a stupid cliché … the kind of thing you would find at the end of an action movie. You’ve survived wars. You can survive this. She wished she felt more in control. Roland had some control, and Cuerva Lachance, at the moment, had more. Freddy was just a character. She thought she might even be a character in a poem that didn’t have an ending. It was her fault it didn’t. And there’s another poem in here, too … the slimy things upon the slimy sea. Don’t think about the slimy things! Shuffle, slide, pause. Shuffle, slide, pause. She was about halfway across, and nothing terrible had happened yet.
“Freddy,” screamed Mel, “she’s burning the bridge! Hurry!”
Freddy risked a glance back. Cuerva Lachance was at war with herself. One hand was glowing with flame, the other glistening with water; she was flicking them at the rope bridge in turns. “I don’t know what I want! It’s worrying!” she said. Mel threw herself at Cuerva Lachance but went right through her. Freddy turned back to the task at hand. Shuffle, slide, shuffle, slide. No time for pauses now.
The middle rope fell away. Freddy hadn’t been using it, but she didn’t like to see it go. Roland was screaming now, too. They’re just kids, thought Freddy. They don’t need to see Cuerva Lachance burn me to death. The unexpected anger at this thought propelled her along through three more shuffle-slides. Her palms were slippery with sweat. She didn’t want to think about what would happen if one of the other ropes went.
“She’s almost through the bottom rope,” howled Roland. “Jump!”
Freddy looked. She was three feet from land. She took as firm a grip on the top strand as she could and sidled very quickly along the bottom one. A foot from the island, she felt it give.
Freddy swung herself awkwardly sideways and forward, crashing down onto the rock. Pain shot up her leg; her left foot had landed in the flames. Freddy pulled it quickly away.
The island was only big enough for about three people. Fire raged on every side. Freddy crawled up beside Josiah and shook him. He didn’t respond. “I think I’m going to sink the island,” Cuerva Lachance called across the lake, “though I’ll have you know I’m happy about this only on Tuesdays. Or maybe it should rain. It’s so hard not to decide!”
“Josiah, come on,” shouted Freddy, shaking him harder. His head lolled, and he slid down onto the ground.
Mel said suddenly, “It’s a story.” Her voice wasn’t loud, but sound here was as strange as it had been on the slimy sea. Distance didn’t seem to matter. The words carried easily across the flames.
“So?” said Freddy. She could feel the island beginning to shake beneath her.
“It’s a story,” said Mel. “How do you wake people up in stories?”
Time stopped briefly. Part of Freddy’s brain went, Oh, no, not that; we’ll never hear the end of it if we do that, but she knew Mel was right. “I hate you, Roland,” she said, and she kissed Josiah on the lips.
It was her first kiss. She didn’t enjoy it. Josiah opened his eyes.
*
Josiah said, “And they all lived slightly discontentedly ever after.”
They were sitting in the living room of the house on Grosvenor Street, neatly arranged on the couch and love seat. Freddy glanced down. She was holding a steaming mug of tea in her hands. Most of the chairs were gone. Cuerva Lachance wasn’t there.
“She’ll be off being nonsensical by herself for a bit,” said Josiah when he noticed them looking. “I don’t think it’s easy to mean nothing and everything all at once.”
Roland said, “Did anyone win? Is anything over?”
“Oh, you won,” said Josiah. “I would shake my fist at you if I wasn’t so tired.”
Mel got up from her seat, set down her own mug of tea, waddled over to where Freddy was sitting on the love seat alone, took Freddy’s mug of tea away and handed it to Roland, sat down beside Freddy, and wrapped her arms around her sister. She did it all in a completely matter-of-fact way, but Freddy could feel Mel’s tears trickling down onto her sleeve. She had scared Mel a lot at the fire lake. She had been thinking only of Mel scaring her.
No one said anything for a while. At last, Mel pulled away and took out her notebook, which she apparently kept in a pocket of her pyjamas. “I think we all won. No more forced choice for Three,” she said, making a note. “But no complete control for Three, either. Maybe you’re equals now. You’ve played it to a draw.”
Josiah pulled a sour face. “That’s one way of looking at it.”
“You should consider it,” said Mel, “just for fun.”
“You kissed me,” Josiah remarked to Freddy, who could feel herself turning what she suspected was a very deep red. “I expect it was equally unpleasant for both of us. Let’s blame the story and leave it at that.”