Read Or Dream: Truth and fantasy.

Part Two

"Tell me about it," Nenene gently invited as she waved Maggie to sit on a open spot on the couch.

"Uhm," Maggie blushed charmingly once again, then she began to explain.

Back when the sisters had been living in Hong Kong Maggie had been out on a walk, lost in her thoughts. Passing by a house Maggie had been hit in the head by a paper airplane, one that had been created from a page torn from a book. Realizing they were coming from a second story window, Maggie had called up to whoever was making the planes, then surprisingly been invited inside. There she had met Fay, a blind young woman whom Maggie had found a almost instant rapport with.

"Only you could meet someone that way," Nenene shook her head with amusement.

"We talked, and she asked me to read to her," Maggie remembered. "I read books for her for awhile, even helped encourage her to have a operation to help her vision," Maggie mused as her expression became sad, "but..."

"Yeah?" Nenene prompted her, clearly quite engaged by the story.

"When my sisters and I found out our pasts were fiction created by Dokusensha, I thought that included my meeting Fay, too," Maggie said quietly, not wanting to dwell too much on that. Learning that much of their past was fiction had hurt Maggie deeply, and only the realization that the love of her sisters was a separate thing had helped them get through it.

"Obviously not all of it," Nenene gestured to the email.

"I should see her," Maggie got up then stiffened as she softly groaned, "but they're back in Hong Kong!" He eyes widened in horror as she remembered Dokusensha sinking the island, wondering if her friend had drowned with all the others....

"It's all right," Nenene took Maggie's hands, squeezing them in her own gently.

"Huh?" Maggie looked at her in surprise, startled out of her spiraling depression.

"Apparently Fay's mother moved them to Japan after the operation," Nenene revealed as she gestured to the email, "or so it says here."

"Right," Maggie sat back down to read.

Fay wrote about recovering from the operation, their visit afterwards and her leaving for a second set of treatments. 'That's why I didn't see her later,' Maggie thought. She was warmly surprised to hear that Fay missed her, she talked about moving to Japan and even...

"What?" Nenene noticed Maggie's sudden blush and glanced at the screen, seeing the section she just read. "Oooh, a kiss!" she teased.

"We nearly kissed the one time," Maggie blushed as she confessed, "Fay sort of wrote a script from the books I was reading to her."

"Clever girl," Nenene said admiringly, "I should have tried that with Yomiko back in the day." As Maggie blushed again she asked, "What are you going to do now?"

"I'd like to see her," Maggie admitted shyly, then scratched at her cheek nervously as she asked, "do you think she'd want me to?"

"Reading that email, yes," Nenene nodded firmly, looking rather amused by Maggie's bashfulness. Gazing up at Maggie sympathetically she offered, "Do you want me to help you write her a email back?"

"Please," Maggie smiled as she sighed in relief. She looked at the computer warily, "I know they're harmless but...."

With a spring in her step Maggie returned to their home, a smile tugging at her lips. She had told Fay her address and phone number, and felt reasonably certain that she'd contact her. Crossing the bridge and opening the door to their houseboat she called out, "I'm home!"

"Welcome back," Michelle called back, presumedly from the kitchen where she was washing up after dinner, "Junior is here, visiting with Anita."

"Hi," Junior looked up, the blue haired boy smiling at her shyly. The son of the 'evil' clone of Nancy Mukahari he had been raised by the British Library to be a agent and eventually the host to the spirit of Mr. Gentleman. He had started out as a enemy and ultimately became a friend, at least in part because of Anita's influence.

"I have some good news," Maggie said as she took off her shoes, "my friend Fay from Hong Kong contacted me, she's in Tokyo and wants to meet."

"I'm so happy," Maggie clapped her hands as she rushed out of the kitchen and gave Maggie a hug with soapy arms.

"I'm happy for you, Mags." Anita nodded seriously. "I'd like to meet her," Anita added thoughtfully, "we need to be sure she's right for you."

"Anita's right," Michelle nodded vigorously as she instructed Maggie, "you need to bring Fay over as soon as possible."

"Let's see how it goes," Maggie blushed brightly.

"Yeah, I remember bringing Hisami over," Anita smiled slightly.

"Was it bad?" Junior asked curiously.

"You have no idea," Anita sighed.

It had been pretty funny, Maggie remembered. Poor Hisami had been rather overwhelmed by how much Michelle liked her, even at one point asking if they could make Hisami a Paper Sister too. Poor Anita had to literally boot Michelle to get her to let Hisami go.

"It does make me wonder," Michelle said as she took Maggie's covered dinner out of the oven, "how many of our other adventures were real, and which were made up by Dokusensha." She carried it over to the table, "I wonder if there's any way we could find out?"

"Well, at least we can be sure that the whole writing on the Moon thing was false," Anita said to them firmly.

"Writing on the moon? You mean when it said," Junior frowned as he remembered, "See you later, Anita?" He looked at them curiously, "Do you know something about that?"

You could hear a pin drop as all three girls looked at him in shock. "Dwah?" Anita managed to get out, blinking.

"I always wondered if that had something to do with you," Junior admitted after a moment, still looking at the stunned girls curiously.

The three Paper Sisters mostly ignored him, looking at each other as their minds raced. "We never told him..." Anita began weakly.

"And there's no reason Dokusensha would let him know," Michelle continued with a cute frown, 'or implant the memory into him.'

"Which means it was real," Maggie whispered, her eyes wide as all of the possible implications began to sink in.

"What was real?" Junior asked impatiently.

"Hey!" Anita squealed in surprise as she was bodily picked up by Maggie and Michelle and then marched over to her school desk. "What's the big idea?!" she demanded.

"Start writing," Michelle handed her a pen while Maggie found a empty notebook and set in down in front of her.

"Why?" Anita blinked, not quite having caught up as fast as her sisters had..

"Ms Alien said she wanted to read your novel," Maggie reminded her patiently, "and we only have ninety eight years or so till she's coming back!"

Junior shook his head as he muttered, "I never know what's going on."

End

Notes: I LOVED the Fay/Maggie bit in Read or Dream the manga, and was very disapointed when I found out in ROD the TV that the manga series was a dream. So, I decided to write my way out of that...lol. The pairings are Anita/Hisami, Yomiko/Nenene and Maggie/Fay. Michelle is helping take care of Junior with Nancy, but mostly because she developed a maternal bond with him, not because she's dating Nancy.

Oh, about the alien bit... In Chapter 4 of Read or Dream Anita saves a girl whom it turns out is a alien. She's a inspector who's job is to destroy the Earth for not progressing fast enough. Maggie and Michelle try to talk her out of it with great books, while Anita uses force. Intrigued by Anita the alien girl challenges Anita to write a book, saying that she'll be back in 100 years. She also leaves a message on the moon saying "See you later, Anita."