Ironside (Modern Faerie Tales 3)

Smirking, Corny took the piece of paper and wrote on it, pressing hard enough that the letters were fat and smudgy. He spun the slip in her direction. "'Cause I know you're going to read it anyway.”

"I won't if you say not to.”

"Just read it.”

Kaye picked up the paper and saw the words: I would do anything not to be human.

She took the eye pencil and wrote hers: I stole someone else's life. She turned it toward Corny.

He slid them both into the drawer without comment. The waitress came with silverware, coffee, and cream. Kaye busied herself making her coffee as light and sweet as she could.

"You thinking about the quest?" Corny asked.

She'd been thinking about what he'd written, but she said, "I just wish I could talk to Roiben one more time. Just hear him say that he doesn't want me. It feels like I got broken up with in a dream.”

"You could send him a letter or something, couldn't you? That's not technically seeing him.”

"Sure," Kaye said. "If he got mail that wasn't, like, acorn-based.”

"There's stuff you still don't understand about faerie customs. Everything that happened—it might not mean what you think it means.”

Kaye shook her head, shaking off Corny's words. "Maybe it's good that we split up. I mean, as boyfriends go, he was always busy working. Running an evil court takes a lot of time.”

"And he's too old for you," Corny said.

"And moping around all the time," Kaye said. "Too emo.”

"No car, either. What's the point of an older boyfriend with no car?”>"Okay, okay. I get it—what if I didn't want to look like me anymore?”

Kaye paused for a moment, looking up from smudging her eyelid. She heard a longing in his voice that troubled her. She wondered what he would do with a power like hers, wondered if he wondered about it.

Ellen came out of the bathroom with a comb, scissors, a small set of clippers, and a water-stained paper box. "How about some hair dye? I found a box that Robert was going to use before he decided to bleach. Black. Would look cute on you.”

"Who's Robert?" Kaye asked.

Corny glanced at his reflection in the greasy door of the microwave. He turned his face to the side. "I guess I couldn't look any worse.”

Ellen blew out a thin stream of blue smoke, tapped off the ash, and set her cigarette firmly on her lip. "Okay, sit on the chair.”

Corny sat down awkwardly. Kaye pulled herself up onto the counter and finished off her mother's beer. Ellen handed her the cord for the clippers.

"Plug that in, sweetheart." Draping a bleach-stained towel around Corny's shoulders, Ellen began to buzz off the back of his hair. "Better already.”

"Hey, Mom," Kaye said. "Can I ask you something?”

"Must be bad," Ellen said.

"Why do you say that?”

"Well, you don't usually call me 'Mom.'" She abandoned the clippers, took a deep drag on her cigarette, and started chopping at the top of Corny's hair with manicuring scissors. "Go ahead. You can ask me anything, kiddo.”

The smoke burned Kaye's eyes. "Have you ever thought about me not being your daughter? Like if I was switched at birth." As the words came out of her mouth, her hand came up involuntarily, fingers curving as if she could snatch the words out of the air.

"Wow. Weird question.”

Kaye said nothing. She just waited. She wasn't sure she could bring herself to say anything else.

"It's funny. There was this one time." Running her fingers through Corny's hair, Ellen found stray pieces and cut them. "God, you were not even two, toddling around. I'd stacked up a bunch of books on a chair so you could sit at the table at your grandmother's house. It wasn't real safe, but I wasn't real smart, either. Anyway, I go out to the kitchen, and when I come back, you're on the floor and the pile of books is all over the place. I mean, clearly you fell and clearly I am a terrible mother. But you're not crying. Instead, you have one of the books open and you're reading out of it—clear as a bell. And I thought: My child is a genius. And then I thought: This is not my child.”