It happened the summer Meggie turned sixteen: Farid broke her heart.
They hadn't been dating for long, only a couple months or so, but when you've been waiting for someone since fourteen, that's quite a while. That was the summer Meggie found a different use for her powers, a way to get Farid back. It was the year she started reading boys out of her books.
Meggie didn't have many romantic options at Aunt Elinor's, so she created her own. She read them aloud one at a time, boys and men alike. Harry Potter and Humbert Humbert, Jesse Tuck and Tarzan. She read them back, too. Harry was too concerned with the wizarding war and Humbert wouldn't stop talking about Lolita. Tarzan was too much work and Jesse was lost without his family. She read them back in, unless they wanted to stay, of course, but none of them did.
They all tried to talk her out of it, to make her understand, but no one could get across to the girl. To make matters worse, Meggie's plan had backfired and Farid himself was asking if she could read Jasmine out of the script for Aladdin. Meggie had lied, telling him it wasn't the same with movie scripts as it was books.
The only one who had kept quiet the entire time was Dustfinger, watching with a small frown. Finally, it was his turn.
Meggie was in the backyard, smiling and laughing with Dallas Winston. They finished their conversation quickly, and with a short, passionate kiss he walked away, towards town.
"Where's he going?" Dustfinger inquired, walking towards her.
"I'm through with him," She shrugged. "He didn't want to be read back in. He wanted to stay."
"Yeah, because in this world he doesn't die." Dustfinger laughed.
"Mo let you stay," Meggie shot back.
They were quiet for a moment, unsure of what to say.
"You can't keep doing this, Meggie. These people don't belong here."
"I want them here," She smiled. "Doesn't that make them belong as much as you and I do?"
"This isn't their world," He shook his head.
"It's not yours, either." Meggie said, quick with a comeback. All of that reading had certainly sharpened her wit.
"It's different, Meggie! I had Mo, and Resa, and mostly I had you. What do you think is going to happen to him when he walks into town and has no concept of money, huh? Or when someone pulls out a cell phone?"
"You got along fine for years without us."
"Meggie," He laughed. "I was a street performer. You call that getting along fine?"
Meggie kicked the dirt around at her feet while Dustfinger got a good look at her for the first time in months. She looked older to him, suddenly. Her innocent eyes were rimmed in Kohl and her nails were painted a faded black color. Gone were her childish sundresses; she was leaning against the tree in shorts and one of Mo's old Grateful Dead t-shirts that she cut to show her stomach last summer. He noticed something shimmering on her stomach.
"When did you get your belly button pierced?" Dustfinger asked, trying to hide his shock. Had it been that long since he'd looked at her, really looked at her?
"A couple months ago. I did it myself." She furrowed her brows, trying to find the meaning of all this. "Mo doesn't know yet."
How couldn't he have noticed? Dustfinger wondered. But then again, Mo probably didn't spend as much time studying his daughter's midriff as Dustfinger just had.
"Look Meggie, back to the subject here. Farid was wrong to break your heart like he did, but you bringing these boys into your world is selfish, alright? You've had your fun, now it needs to stop."
"You sound like my father." Meggie groaned. "Telling me not to be selfish and all. Did he send you out here?"
"No," Dustfinger said quickly. "I came out here because I wanted to, because I care about you."
He swallowed a lump in his throat as Meggie's eyes grew wide.
"You care about me, since when?"
Since the day I met you, he thought. since the day we were locked in that dungeon together and I got out and I came back for you, didn't I? Didn't you know I cared for you then?
But obviously she hadn't, because she moved closer to him. All of those boys had made her daring, he could see, as she leaned towards him, so close he could smell her shampoo.
"Since always," Dustfinger shrugged, moving away from her. She grabbed his arm, holding him back.
"I don't believe you," She smiled. It was the kind of smile that Lolita must give Humbert and Jane must give Tarzan. The kind of smile all boys dreamed about. Dustfinger wasn't a boy, but it made his stomach do flips. "Show me."
He glanced towards the house fleetingly, making sure he didn't catch Elinor's face in a window or Mo reading on the back patio. The place looked abandoned. He turned back towards Meggie as she leaned close to whisper in his ear.
"Show me that you care and there will be no more boys read out of books, I promise."
Dustfinger grabbed her face then, cupped it with both hands and pressed their mouths together. It was then that he wondered when she would tire of him, too, and read him back in.
Her mouth tasted like Cherry lip balm and altoids, the faint aftertaste of Dallas Winston's cigarettes. She didn't belong to him, or to any of the other boys she read out. It would always be Farid, always for him, but as long as she kept their lips pressed together, Dustfinger was okay with that.