I pass the day with my family in Faerie. And really, were it not for the fact that my death is imminent, it feels like a vacation of the kind I'd always dreamed as children that we'd have: luxurious accommodations, all the food we could want, servers and helpers to tend to our every wish, and the loveliest weather imaginable.

Add to that the slightly surreal realization that this - this palace hidden behind the mortal veil that is Central Park - is my home. And, somewhere in its innards, running the place, is my husband, who is my best friend, and who still makes my heart speed up when he walks into the room.

Dream come true flits into my thoughts as I smile around at my family.

Followed immediately by the much more pragmatic pity it isn't going to last.

I squash the thought. Realist that I am, for the moment, I am going to bask in the now for as long as I am given time to.

Daphne drags me to the library while Mom, Dad and Basil head off to talk with Gossamer. Along the way, she keeps up her steady stream of happy chatter.

"So, Bradley."

"So, Brian," I throw back at her. "And Ronan. And Jonathan. And Jason. And Will. And - what's that boy who was in your Bad Apples class, the one who was really tall?"

"James."

"Yeah, James."

"What about them? They're all real!"

"Yes, but so many of them in just a year - sounds like you're looking for something and they weren't it."

"A year and a half, actually. And they were all, you know, really nice."

"But . . .?"

She doesn't say anything as we enter the library, and for a moment, I, too, am awed into silence: it is a huge, carpeted and furnished room, filled from floor to ceiling with beautifully bound books.

Well, at least one side of it is; as my gaze carries across to the other walls, the books become newer, with more modern bindings and varying heights, so that their organization on the shelves looks increasingly eclectic. Finally, in the far corner, there are a few carts stacked higgledy-piggledy with paperbacks in pristine condition, as if someone had just unpacked them out of shipping boxes but hadn't taken the time to shelve them.

Or read them.

I wonder if the state of the library is a reflection of the fondness of reading of the long line of Fae monarchs - it seems to indicate that it isn't high on the priority list of the most recent of them, or else he was just too busy fighting battles to curl up in front of the fireplace for more academic pursuits.

Daphne walks over to one of the shelves and pulls out a large, leather-bound album.

"Here you go. Best day of your life."

I take it, feeling its weight, realizing that it contains proof of a part of my life that I still cannot believe is real. I sit on one of the plush couches and open it. Daphne collapses into an armchair and watches me.

The first few photographs are artistic shots of lace on a dress, a bouquet of white calla lilies, the gardens of Faerie, a glittering tiara - typical preview images of a wedding day.

I turn the page: a bar of soap and a golden comb.

Daphne must have seen my astonishment, because she guffaws.

"Puck didn't care for those," she giggles when she has at last composed herself. "But you insisted."

I turn another page, and another, and another, and my heart stops.

There I am, in all the classic behind-the-scenes bridal shots: me staring into a mirror while Mom fixes my hair; me hugging Basil, who is clutching some kind of electronic device in one hand; me standing in front of a French window in one of Faerie's resplendent rooms, looking out into the sunshine.

Me in a white column gown. Not jeans (I exhale; I'd been half-afraid).

I follow the pictures of the sunny gardens, of the guests seated in chairs - guests of all kinds - faces of friends from Ferryport Landing, and faces I don't recognize: stately Everafter lords and ladies, Fae and dryad and naiad and chimaera; gay and solemn, young and old and every age in between. And - peppered throughout each photograph, like living confetti - the bright dots of pixies. It is absolutely beautiful, and takes my breath away.

Then there I am, among the crowds, walking toward a young man in a long fitted coat layered over a suit of green and gold and white, his golden hair cropped short and bright in the sunlight, revealing the pointed tips of his ears. He is smirking at me. And I am smiling at him, looking nowhere else, not even at our parents, who are seated an arm's length from where he stands: Mom and Dad, looking glad and proud, and Titania, Queen of Faerie, elegant as always, leaning on Mustardseed and dabbing her eyes with a lace handkerchief fragile as a skeleton leaf.

The photographs progress throughout the ceremony - shots of us exchanging our vows, with the officiating Fae priestess looping strands of silk over our clasped hands, conjuring blessings and sealing covenants with a flick of her wrist and the promises of our lips.

A kiss - the kiss - itself captured perfectly on film, but which pales in comparison to the looks on our faces in the very next shot as we break away in all but our eyes.

The remainder of the album is filled with scenes from the party afterwards: dancing, cake (eaten the usual way as well as decorating our faces), enjoying our guests. It is at once easy and difficult to pick my favorites - Puck stopping mid-dance with his mother to wipe a tear from her cheek with his thumb; Dad telling me something so hilarious that my head is thrown back in raucous laughter; Daphne spinning a tornado of sparkling rose petals with her wand around a group of Fae children.

I come to the last picture - of me collapsed in Puck's lap on the grass, his hand on my cheek, wiping away frosting, his other arm slung around my shoulders as if, rather than having just gotten married, we'd fought a battle and he was checking me for injuries.

It is a masterful piece of art, this album.

"Who took these photos?" I wonder aloud.

"Goldie. She always had an eye for things."

I smile at Daphne. "Her work is amazing. And I'm glad she was there."

Her own smile stays slightly wistful. "Do you remember any of it?"

I shake my head, heartsick.

"It's like looking at my twin," I wave my hand at the photographs. "She looks like me, but she isn't me, because this me has no memory of this wedding."

Daphne hands me her iPhone, sliding next to me on the couch. "More pictures and a couple videos."

I scroll through pictures of our family doing things together - grilling outdoors with Dad while Basil guzzles down soda in the background, Daphne and me in a seaside selfie which Puck photobombs, Puck with his ear on my belly, showing a thumbs-up to the camera.

I swallow.

I'd been barely showing, but it was clear what he'd been so thrilled about.

There are no photos after that one. The videos, Daphne announces, were the notorious cake-mashing wedding ones I'd heard so much about. I tell Daphne I'll pass, having already seen enough photo evidence in the album to damn me for a lifetime, but it isn't the real reason I suddenly feel done.

She must sense it too, because she changes the subject.

"So, Pinocchio." She returns to our original conversation.

I lift my eyes back to her face, waiting. Daphne has been on-and-off with the wooden boy-turned-man from the time she was old enough to date.

"We finally broke it off. For good this time."

"Oh, Daph, I'm sorry."

She shrugs and makes a meh face. "Yeah, it's sad, but I think we were done for a while already. And we're still good friends, so that's something, at least."

"Even then, you were together for -what - eight years? That's gotta be hard to end."

She exhales into a sigh. "We got together at first because we had a connection, ya know? I mean, he really got me."

"Got you?"

"Mmm. Like, this whole thing about being taken seriously. People always saw him as just a wooden boy. And people always saw me as -"

"My younger sister."

She smiles. "See - you get me, too."

"You are my better half," I tell her honestly. "You've always had your head screwed on your shoulders a whole lot tighter than mine. It was hard to say that to your face when we were younger, but I can now."

"It got a lot easier after you moved out," she muses. "Not that I ever hated you or anything, but it was hard to always be in your shadow. You're Sabrina Grimm, the girl who saved the world, the girl who made the Trickster King grow up, the girl who took care of her younger sister and rescued her baby brother when their parents were out cold. And now you're Queen of Faerie and Everafter lawyer extraordinaire and you married the boy of your dreams and everything. I'm just Daphne, the bubbly kid sister, stuck in a tragic love story with a puppet and not quite sure what she wants to do with her life and . . . terrified of losing that beautiful, amazing older sister that she loves so much."

"Oh, Daph." I squeeze her tight, trying to find the words for how amazing she is, what I wouldn't give to be comfortable and competent at magic like she is, how perfect her joyful brilliance is for my angry, sullen seriousness, how she was the only thing that gave me strength and purpose in those dark orphanage years.

But she is speaking again, so I listen.

"After you got your own place, I got to be the oldest. And I realized what a load of responsibility you had to shoulder while we were growing up. And what a hard job it was to keep me - keep us - safe. I get it now. And Pinocchio - he was there when I was trying to figure it all out, ya know? Then we both grew up - me more easily than him, to be honest - and we didn't need each other like that anymore. So I'm moving on. It feels good. Maybe that's why I've liked all those different boys. I think I am looking for something now. And I'll know it when I see it."

I smile at her, something I've been doing a lot more now than when we were younger. I'm so proud of her.

"Well, you're not losing me. I'm not giving up."

Then I laugh, and continue. "But look at us - the sisters Grimm, in love with boys with age complexes - mine didn't want to grow up, and yours did, but couldn't."

Daphne chuckles. "All we need now is Peter Pan to complete the happy threesome."

I shudder. "Don't even suggest it. Puck will blow a gasket."

I tell Daphne about Puck's prank in Disneyworld that had so hilariously backfired, and she bellows in laughter.

When we are calm again, Daphne says, "Birth order - it's a fascinating thing."

"What about it?"

"Well, look at you and Puck - typical Oldest Children, with your traditional, protective, bossy ways. No wonder you were always fighting."

I swat her. "Huh. And what are your lovely flaws?"

"I'm the mediating Middle Child! I just want everyone to be on good terms with everyone else. I don't want a legacy or a kingdom, although I will admit that a little magic is fun to have. And Basil's so much younger that he doesn't count as a Youngest - he's more like an Only. Have you noticed? He's all independent and speaks like a professor and everything."

"A particularly snarky professor," I note pointedly, although I'm processing her observations with some awe. Daphne's always been perceptive but how does she know all this?

She lifts her nose in a superior manner when I ask her.

"I've been reading! I use stuff like this to make sense of you and Puck and Basil all the time. You're all so incredibly textbook."

I stare at her in surprise, and suddenly, something clicks into place as I look at her warm brown eyes and cheerful smile.

"You're Marian!" I almost shout, pointing at her.

Daphne stares back, stunned.

"You're Marian!" I repeat, dumbly. "My therapist! My imaginary therapist, I mean. The one my brain made up. You're her! Or she's you. Whatever."

She pulls back. "That's so creepy."

"Is it? I didn't think so. I remember thinking how much she reminded me of you, and how kind and open she was. And how I didn't want to tell her the truly crazy stuff going on in my life because I didn't think she could take it."

Daphne purses her lips. "Still filtering your information to protect people, huh? Okay - she sounds like me, if only for the bit about filtering info."

But I'm not listening. I'm wondering if any of the other imaginary people in my life are inspired by real ones. Who's Bradley impersonating? Puck? Surely not!

"Earth to Sabrina." Daphne's voice shakes me out of my frantic thoughts.

"I was just thinking of Bradley," I tell her.

"Not still! After you got back with Puck?"

"No, I was just thinking - if Marian's supposed to be you, who's Bradley supposed to be?"

"What's he like?" Daphne pauses. "And, mind you, I'm fully aware of how weird it is that we're talking about your imaginary lover when you're married to a real life hottie."

"Who still smells like rancid meat."

"Beside the point. This Bradley had better be some kind of god."

I am oddly embarrassed to describe Bradley to my sister, as if, because my mind has created him, I am revealing subconscious fantasies in the process.

But Daphne listens quietly, her legs curled under her, her toes wiggling in her stockings.

When I have run out of adjectives, she blinks and says, "He sounds like the good parts of Puck with all the bad parts left out. He doesn't sound like a real person at all. Nobody could be that nice. Especially to you."

My mouth gapes and it takes me a few seconds to realize she's joking. I throw one of the couch pillows at her and she guffaws.

"I got you that time! Oh, you shoulda seen your face, Sabrina!" She collapses in helpless mirth. I want to be mad at her for not taking me seriously but her laughter is so contagious, and so good at a time when my future is so desperately bleak, that I grin, too.

"Seriously, though," I say when the mania has simmered down, "The big thing about him was that he was there for me in all the ways Puck wasn't. Or at least that's how I saw it."

"Like how?"

"Like . . . well . . . like Granny's funeral. Puck wasn't there, but Bradley was. And you told me not to break his heart. Didn't you?"

"What are you talking about? Puck was at the funeral! You were married but the baby hadn't come yet, so you were . . . still yourself, and still together. He said such sweet things about Granny, but in Puck style, you know?"

I stare at her again. Something wasn't adding up.

"When did Granny die?" I finally ask. I don't trust myself to know anything for sure anymore.

"September, six years ago. You were 23 and I was 19."

"And I was married?"

She nods, her brow furrowed.

But Granny wasn't at the wedding. Or was she?

I reach for the album lying on the table and flip it open, scanning the pictures for Granny's face. I didn't see her earlier and I still don't see her. Why hadn't she come to my wedding?

Then I blink, and there she is, seated with Dad and Mom, wearing the hat with the sunflower, watching Puck and me say our vows.

I blink again, and she's gone.

With my stomach roiling, I turn to page after page. Sometimes she's there - standing bent and frail with me in my dressing room, sipping tea at the reception, dancing with Uncle Jake - and sometimes she isn't, fading in and out of existence with a shutter of my eyelids.

And then I see something else that makes me inhale sharply.

"What is it, sis?" Daphne asks, worried at my change of mood.

Bradley.

I see Bradley's face in the crowd, an onlooker. And I see the faces of my Psychology classmates, scattered among the guests. One blink, and they're gone.

The lines are blurring.

Being in Faerie - the seat of Puck's magic - has not slowed down this awful thing that is stealing my soul. I am getting worse.

"Sabrina! What is it?"

"I just wanted to see her face again." Again, I lie to protect my sister.

"I miss her." Daphne sighs, satisfied and unsuspecting.

"I hate being crazy. I can't even remember when things happened and who's real and who's not. And I hate that I have to depend on you guys to tell me."

She puts her hand on my arm.

"We'll find a way to cure this. If only Baba Yaga were still here. We could resurrect the coven!"

"Why? What happened to her? Did she die, too?"

"No - oh, you won't remember because it happened when you were off the grid. She left. According to her, with the barrier down and all the Everafters coming and going, Ferryport Landing was like a refugee town. She said she needed a quiet place to retire. Last we heard, she was in the mountains somewhere."

"You couldn't be a coven anyway," I reason. "Who'd be in it? Bunny traded in her magic with her eyes, remember?"

"We could ask Gossamer."

"Gossamer's Fae! She's not a witch!"

"But she has powers." Daphne pouts stubbornly, and just like that, we are eleven and seven again, clutching at straws in the face of insurmountable obstacles.

"I think," I begin again, "that I wouldn't mind dying as long as I knew for sure that I wouldn't be losing any more of my real memories. I think it would be horrible if I died believing all the wrong things about you, or Mom or Dad, or Basil, or Puck."

Daphne's eyes suddenly swim with tears. "Don't say that."

"I wish I could talk to somebody who's been through this. Or who knows what it's like to live with this kind of madness and not give in."

My sister's eyes suddenly light up, just as a person pops into my mind. We both say her name at the same time.

"Red!"

"She's in town!" Daphne scrubs the tears from her face and pulls out her phone. "What are the chances? I'll text her right now!"

And within minutes, we've set up a meeting with one of our favorite people and dearest friends. Why exactly she's in NYC now Daphne refuses to say. Instead, she smiles smugly and says she'll let Red tell me herself. Then she exclaims at a message on her phone and announces that she should squeeze in a call before dinner.

"You'll be okay?" She asks, concerned. "Think you can find your way to the dining room?"

"I live here! And, supposedly, I'm the Queen; I should have servants to carry me to the dining room if I so desire."

She laughs. "Puck's rubbed off on you, Your Uppity Highness."

"Daph," I stop her. "What kind of queen was I? Was I half-decent, at least? And be honest."

She is quiet for a while, collecting her thoughts, and I brace myself for the worst.

"Actually . . . you're a really good queen," she says at last. "You're just not, you know, a regular queen."

"What's that mean?"

"Like . . . you didn't look like a queen . . . I mean, you always wore jeans and T-shirts, even here in Faerie with Puck. Not that he dressed any more kingly - hoodies and maybe the occasional shirt. Mind you, that suit he wore at the wedding? That was the one time I ever saw him dressed up. Ever! But back to you. You didn't run Faerie the way Titania did - I mean Puck runs it, mostly. But you did wonderful things for the people - got them jobs and fought for their rights and lobbied for laws that actually made sense; practical things. Like what Mom started, remember? Except in a bigger way . . . a much, much bigger way, because you're Queen, and you had all that clout and all. The people really liked you. Puck, too."

"You're not just saying that because I'm dying, are you?"

She grins. "You'll never know, will you?"

I watch her stride across the library towards the door. I have so many more questions, about so many things that I don't know that I don't know. But one - the most important - rises to the top of the list and lands on the tip of my tongue.

"What about Puck? Were we . . . was I . . . were we happy together?"

And Daphne turns back to me with a huge smile, her eyes saying what her words don't need to: I told you so.

A/N: A little wedding backstory, because I'd always wondered what that would've been like for P+S.

And some sister love, because S and D are just awesome together, and I wanted to explore that living in-the-older-sibling's-shadow-dynamic a little, particularly how D came into her own as she got older and more independent.

I hope you liked it!