How Zoe Made Her Dreams (Mostly) Come True Page 3

  Then he explained why princes and princesses needed to learn to look, act, talk, and—when it came to autographs—even write alike so kids wouldn’t figure out that, for example, the Cinderella greeting them in the park in the morning was different from the one waving good-bye at night.

  “Think back to that awful day when you first realized the Santa Claus at the mall wasn’t the same as the Santa Claus on TV.” Andy shook his head as if this were a tragedy of epic proportions. “We don’t want that to happen with our young guests. Ever. We want them to leave convinced that all their favorite fairy-tale characters really do live happily ever after in Fairyland. And that this is the only place they call home.”

  A dig, I assumed, at the Mouse who ruled over the “other theme park.”

  The rest of the rules could be found in the handbook. There were 270, according to Andy, and it was in our best interest to memorize them all.

  With orientation over, it was the moment we’d all been waiting for: casting. Andy read through the list starting with the least desirable characters: the animals—aka furries, like Karl—and working his way up the Fairyland pecking order. Jess and a girl named Alice were the two Red Riding Hoods. Ian was the only Puss ’n Boots, which was a surprise, since I’d pegged him for a prince.

  When they got to royalty, I started to panic, since I knew I couldn’t be one of the “Fab Four”—Cinderella, Snow White, Rapunzel, or Sleeping Beauty—and that my friendship with Jess would be forever ruined if I were. And yet what else could I be?

  I watched Dash take his place as a Prince Charming for Sleeping Beauty, and finally the Cinderellas were named—Simone and Adele, two blondes who, in my opinion, were not nearly as pretty as Jess.

  And that was it. Apparently my character was still being determined.

  “Okay, people, grab your packets,” Andy was saying.

  I raised my hand. “Um. You didn’t call me.”

  “Zoe Kiefer, right?” Andy brought out an iPad and began typing rapidly. “Oh my. It says here you’ve been designated as the lady-in-waiting.”

  Was that even a legit character? I turned to Jess, who had no clue. “What’s a lady-in-waiting do?”

  “Only everything.” Andy pulled out a radio and said something about me going to see the Queen. “Didn’t you receive the memo in your email?”

  “What memo?” I hadn’t been sent anything besides a stack of waivers promising not to drink or take drugs or “publicly disclose, disseminate, or disperse” details about the internship, whatever the heck that meant.

  Beads of perspiration sprang from Andy’s forehead. “Okay, okay. We can deal.” He put his hands on my shoulders and physically rotated me toward the Princess Palace. “Just go see her now in her office. She’s waiting.” He rattled off reminders as he escorted me down the sparkling fairy path. “It’s best not to sit unless she tells you to. Or speak until spoken to. And when she does speak, address her as ma’am.”

  “Ma’am,” I repeated, totally baffled by this entity called the Queen. Surely he couldn’t have meant Snow White’s evil stepmother, who dressed in purple robes and whom everyone booed in the daily parade.

  “Her dog is Tinker Bell.” He closed his eyes prayerfully. “Tinker Bell is her pride and joy. We all love Tinker Bell.”

  I made a mental note.

  “You might think your job in the parade is to toss candy, but really it’s to guard Her Majesty from tossed apples that are thrown by”—he made a face—“ingrates who don’t know any better. Remember, don’t duck, catch.”

  “Don’t duck, catch. Got it.”

  “And whatever you do, don’t mention the Mouse.”

  We got to the drawbridge over the moat that ringed the gigantic, glittering, purple palace with its colorful flags against the brilliant blue sky. Andy pointed (two fingers, one thumb up) to the far turret, where supposedly the Queen sat in her office. My heart fluttered at the prospect of what lay ahead.

  “Just tell the trolls I sent you, and you’ll be fine.”

  Trolls. There were trolls?

  “Good luck,” Andy said, with an encouraging pat. “The Queen chose you herself, which means she must have been struck by something in your application. All you have to do is what she says, on time and cheerfully, and never, ever, ever break the most important rule—to Fairyland always be true!”

  “What does that even mean?” I asked, but it was too late. Andy had hurried off, and I was on my own.

  Three

  Trolls turned out to be shorthand for patrols, Fairyland’s in-house rent-a-cops, who perused the park in dark-green jumpsuits and snappy caps on the lookout for lost kids, dropped gum wrappers, and, I suppose, the occasional Mouse Mole (spies who worked for the Mouse). Not for nothing was Fairyland rated #1 in Safe Theme Parks, though after the hassle the trolls gave me at the elevator to the Queen’s office, it seemed they might have had a leeeetle too much power in their white-gloved hands.

  I took the elevator to the fourth floor. It opened to a stark white hallway at the end of which was a frosted-glass door marked simply:

  FAIRYLAND KINGDOM INC.

  PINELAND, NEW JERSEY

  Behind the door was your average, everyday office painted a calming sage green and with three chairs, a coffee table littered with magazines, a potted fern, and a blue watercooler.

  The only difference from my dad’s boring accounting office was that here the walls were lined with framed photos of park highlights—the princes and princesses dancing on the stage outside the Princess Palace; Humpty Dumpty sitting on his wall talking to a group of children; Hansel and Gretel pushing a witch into the oven; all seven of the dwarfs hugging Snow White at her cottage; and, front and center, Cinderella and her Prince Charming, cheek to cheek.

  A huge plaque that read Fairyland Kingdom . . . Wow!™ in glittering gold letters hung over the large desk where a woman with short brown hair and a flowered shirt sat picking at a blueberry muffin on a napkin. She was the spitting image of Mrs. Herman, our high school’s attendance person.

  “Excuse me. I’m Zoe Kiefer,” I said, unsure as to whether this was the dreaded Queen. “Andy told me I should see you.”

  The woman brushed crumbs from her desk. “I didn’t ask to see you. You probably mean . . . her. Let me buzz.”

  “So you’re not—”

  “Lord, no. I’m just Evelyn, her secretary.” She emitted a light titter and said into the phone, “Ma’am, I have someone here to see you. A Zoe . . . Yes. I’ll send her right in.”

  There was a buzzzz, and a part of the wall slid open. The door had been completely hidden, like something out of a spy movie.

  “Good luck!” Evelyn said.

  I wish people would stop saying that, I thought as the hidden door closed behind me and I stepped into mission control. That was what popped into my brain when I saw the wall of monitors displaying every aspect of the park in black-and-white. Five rows of ten. Fifty in all. And in front of them sat the strangest figure in a high-backed, black chair poring over a stack of papers at her glass desk.

  She said nothing, and I remained standing with my hands behind my back, since Andy had said I shouldn’t sit until she gave me permission, though that didn’t seem to be coming any time soon. In fact, it was difficult to discern if this creature knew I was there, so engrossed was she in sorting through the piles of paperwork, her spidery fingers slipping in and out of the pages as if she were spinning a web.

  Her gown was a luminescent shade of deep violet. A gold crown was perched on a tasseled red pillow nearby. Her hair, sleek and black like a cat’s, had been cut in a downward bob probably to minimize her freakishly long white neck on top of her stick-thin body. The room smelled oddly of overheated electronics, tea, and rosewater perfume.

  I cleared my throat, and she lifted a finger. At last she went, “A-ha!” and removed a manila file marked Kiefer, Zoe. She flipped it open and ran her black lacquered nail over what I recognized with some trepidation as my application. Now and
then she’d go, “Hmmm” or make a note with a red pen in the margins. Every two seconds she twirled to check the screens before twirling back to her desk, whereupon she continued to read. It was very unnerving because she was reading about me.

  There was a tiny yip! from a fluffy white dog no bigger than a hand puppet that was curled on a purple satin pillow with a matching purple bow in her hair. This must have been the famous Tinker Bell.

  The Queen snapped the file shut and whipped off her half glasses to reveal a pair of black eyes under similarly black arched eyebrows. Her lips were painted in two tones of crimson and violet. “Zoe Kiefer, let me have a look at you.”

  I stepped back and she said, “Hmm, hmm. Do you exercise?”

  “Not lately. Except for gym class.” (And not even then if I can help it.)

  “Lately. You mean since your mother died.” This was said matter-of-factly, as if we were discussing that it might rain.

  “Yes . . . ma’am.”

  “Pity, that.” She bit the end of her glasses, scrutinizing. “It says in your application that when you were small, your mother took you to Storytown, and that it was your most favorite place on earth. Is that true?”

  Before there was Fairyland Kingdom, there was Storytown, a rinky-dink nursery-rhyme theme park with a petting zoo and swan boats for the juice-box-and-animal-cracker set. We’d go on Wednesday afternoons when New Jersey residents could get in free, and Mom would read me fairy tales by a willow overlooking the moat around Cinderella’s Castle. I’d written my application essay on those trips and how I remembered them as the happiest moments with my mother before she got ill. It was sappy, but there you have it. Storytown would always hold a treasured place in my heart, even though it had been bulldozed over long ago.

  I nodded. “Yes. I loved that place. I’m sorry that it’s gone.”

  She pointed at the gold necklace at my throat with its single pearl. “Is that your mother’s?”

  Absently I reached for the chain. “Yes. My father gave it to her the day I was born.”

  “Hmm, hmm.” She nodded and stood. I was surprised to see she had me by a good two inches. “Zoe Kiefer, I approve. You will be my lady-in-waiting or, in the bland vernacular of the hoi polloi, my personal assistant. Each morning you shall fetch me my breakfast and newspapers, filter my mail, retrieve the complaints, and do whatever bidding I decree.”

  I swallowed hard, since this was not exactly how I’d envisioned spending my summer, in a darkened control room acting like Igor serving some evil master. Also, the dog. Nevertheless, I said, “Yes, ma’am.”

  “It is a great honor and privilege to be my assistant, Zoe.” She winked at her reflection in an ornate mirror that hung on the opposite wall. “As such, you will be present among my closest circle of advisers and therefore part of an elite club that is privy to restricted information. I will need assurances that you can maintain my strictest confidence.”

  I couldn’t keep a secret to save my life. “Yes, ma’am.”

  “Of course you will be required to read, understand, and commit to memory all two hundred and seventy Fairyland rules.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “Finally, you will accompany me daily in the four o’clock parade dispensing sugar-based snack products to the clamoring juveniles while deflecting any perishable produce that may or may not be thrown in my direction.”

  Catch, don’t duck. “I understand.”

  “I will need you to proceed posthaste to Wardrobe so you may be fitted with the appropriate gown. As perhaps you have learned during orientation, Rule Number Six states that no cast members may be present in the park during hours of operation sans costume, and with all your upcoming running hither and thither, you will be no exception. Are we clear?”

  I nodded.

  “You may go. I expect to see you at eight a.m. tomorrow with my breakfast and newspapers. In the meantime do devote yourself to memorizing the rules.”

  She returned to her monitors and said nothing else. It was unclear if I was truly free to go.

  “Wait. I nearly forgot!” She opened a drawer and rummaged around until she found an iPhone. Clicking it on to make sure it was charged, she nodded in satisfaction and handed it to me along with a heavy brass key.

  “This is a master,” she said, referring to the key. “It opens any door in the park. Use it with discretion. And this is your telephonic device.”

  “But I thought we weren’t allowed to have anything electronic.” That was one of the more disturbing revelations of the internship—no Wi-Fi, no phones, no laptops. In other words, nothing that could be used to communicate with the outside world aside from pen and paper.

  “Tut, tut! No arguing.” She tick-tocked her index finger. “I do not suffer truculence lightly.”

  “But I wasn’t—”

  “This handheld telephonic device is so I may contact you at any hour wherever and whenever I am in need. This summer you will not be your own person, Zoe Kiefer. You will be mine, and the sooner you come to terms with that, the better.”

  The door slid open, and I was officially dismissed. When I looked back, I could have sworn she was kissing Tinker Bell. On the lips.

  Four

  Shortly after Jess and I had received our “Wow!™ You’re a Summer Cast Member!” acceptances, my grief counselor, Ari, asked if I’d have been as excited about working at a fairy-tale theme park if Mom were healthy and alive. Talk about raining on the proverbial parade.

  But that’s Ari’s job, to urge me to “be mindful” of my actions so I’m “acting in the best interests of Zoe” instead of simply “acting out.” At least, that’s the party line. Anyway, after I’d quit silently cursing him for being a stinker, I’d tried to think if I would have applied to Fairyland if I’d had a normal upbringing. Really, though, that’s like asking a cat if she would have preferred to have been born a dog. I only knew one reality—mine.

  Well, mine and Karolynne’s from Teenage Pregnant Nightmare, but I guess that doesn’t count.

  Mom got sick when I was eight and died when I was fifteen, so most of my growing up involved emergency trips to the hospital and chemo weeks where all our plans were put on hold while Dad and I tiptoed around the house to keep quiet. Neighbors had to shuttle me back and forth to field-hockey practice. Sleepovers were rare, if ever, except at Jess’s.

  Meanwhile, Mom got weaker and weaker, and it got harder and harder to remember when she’d been the most popular English teacher at our high school, bopping around her classroom in heavy Doc Martens and flowing skirts, her blond hair flying as she passionately discussed To Kill a Mockingbird and quoted Dylan (Bob, not Thomas).

  I wished I could have taken one of her classes, because everyone who had her claims she was one of the most fun teachers. There’s a plaque now on the blue tiled wall outside her old office dedicated to Mrs. Lisa Kiefer with one line underneath—It ain’t me, babe. That always tears me up, not just because of the oblique reference to overcoming death, but because I’m reminded that strangers knew her better than I did.

  Jess tells me that’s not true and prods my memory with stories about strawberry picking and how Mom once literally sewed me into a mermaid costume for Halloween and how we Christmas caroled out of tune. Still, I draw a blank.

  That’s one of the reasons why I wanted to work at Fairyland for the summer, because Mom used to take me here when I was little and I have this strange feeling that if I stick around, I just might run into her. Not in a ghostly way, more like in a spiritual sense.

  Naturally I didn’t tell Ari that. I’d just said, “Yes, I’d be excited to work at a fairy-tale theme park, even if Mom were healthy and alive.”

  And we left it at that.

  Jess and I leaned against our door and gave it a shove, practically tumbling over each other when it finally gave way. Our white-painted dorm room was tiny, not much bigger than my walk-in closet at home, and hot and stuffy, with one window that clearly had been locked since last year’s interns
left in August.

  “Oxygen!” Jess panted from her spot on the floor.

  Climbing over one of the two beds, I undid the latch and with a Herculean push managed to unstick it. We pressed our faces to the screen, inhaling the sweet, fresh air wafting up from Fiddler’s Green below.

  “We should have brought a fan,” Jess said, taking another breath. “This place is going to be sweltering in July.”

  I’d see if I could wheedle one out of maintenance. Or maybe Jess’s parents could bring one when they stopped by next week to retrieve the Bobmobile, because she was right. No way would we survive a heat wave in these conditions.

  The room was barely big enough for a closet and two single beds with drawers underneath. Amenities were few—an electric alarm clock, an overhead light, a smoke detector, two sets of stiff white sheets, two scratchy green blankets, and two rather lumpy pillows. So much for the glamour of living in a wing of the Princess Palace.

  “I’m surprised it’s not air-conditioned,” I said, claiming the bed against the wall so Jess could have the window. Having suffered from asthma as a kid, Jess needed all the extra ventilation she could get.

  Jess got down the sheets and blankets from the top shelf in the closet. “It’s only the Ordinary Cast Members dorms that don’t have air. Every other building in the park does, including the royal turrets. I was talking to Simone at lunch, and she said her room was huge, with a window seat and even her own TV.”

  “That hardly seems fair,” I said, trying to decide which sheet to use on the bottom, since neither was fitted. Already, I could picture us tossing and turning as the sheets bunched around our ankles while the princes and princesses slept soundly in the cool comfort of sixty-eight degrees.

  “They have maid service, too. People who pick up their socks and make their beds. Also, huge bathrooms with cut flowers and free hair spray and great lighting.”

  Jess kept her head down, neatly tucking in the corners of her blanket just so. She was trying to be a good sport about not being a princess, but I could tell that even after RJ’s motivational speech, she was still bummed. Not exactly the joyful kickoff I’d hoped for.