“You’re like my fairy godmother, Esther,” the girl I loved softly said. It was an effortless sentiment exhaled with cheer, and a sureness I lacked. Then she handed me the needle I’d asked for.

The side of my mouth twisted at the very thought of me having any sort of connection to fairies. I wasn’t particularly slender or long of limb. Fairies, I’d wager, didn’t have needle-pricked working hands or a red nose from rubbing it too often. My face wasn’t soft or elegant or beautifully curved. I was just one of many commoners in our village. If I was in a crowd of the entire village, nothing would make me stand out. While my mother’s hair was full of rich coils if she let it down, mine laid straight and uninteresting. The one thing I can say I shared with my mother that I enjoyed was our shade of eye, a copper hue of brown. It may not have been exciting like emerald greens or the sapphire shade the royal family was said to have, but at least it was mine. 

This was the sixth time I’d pieced this particular dress of Elanora’s back together. At one point it had been brown with pleasant white stitching, but now it was faded to a muddy tone. The stitching was now just a mismatch of the tattered original thread and whatever colors I could find on that particular day. Grays, off-color whites, and some black thread I remember came from a mourning dress—the widow had lost so much weight we’d had to rip all the thread out and take it in smaller. Now the black tried desperately to keep Ella’s clothing together.

Each time she brought it, I told her that it was a lost cause and not worth the effort. It was completely worn through in places, and I’d already replaced the seams in both sleeves. But she’d shift her jaw, and her blue eyes shimmered with something in between shame and resignation. I always just snatched it from her without another word and set to work.

“Am I?” I mused back before I slipped the needle’s edge under the seams that hadn’t ripped yet. Most of the stitching in the waist had given way, and it wasn’t because Ella had gained any weight. Not many girls tried to wear the dresses they’d gotten at twelve when they were seventeen. I was going to have to pull out all the waist’s seams now and replace them somehow. Otherwise, who was going to buy her a new one for the coming winter? Her stepmother? “Move the candle closer, please.” 

Once she did, I felt her adjust herself next to me, and make sure the quilt was appropriately wrapped around both of us. Autumn was soon ending, and the main fireplace barely had the wood to keep the house above frosty. My fingertips were already numb, and I wanted to place them into the candle’s flame just to get some sensation back. But this wasn’t the first night I’d stayed up in the cold to finish a dress, and I doubted it would be the last. I just hoped it wasn’t too cold for Ella. While her own home was more a jailhouse than a refuge, at least her stepmother made sure it was kept warm.

The candle’s flickering light cast waltzing ghosts across my bed. They danced with much more vigor than either of us had left at this time in the evening. I’d already been seeing spots in my sight before I’d had to pick out the stained white seams against the tan fabric. Now I just wanted to close my eyes and dream that I didn’t have four more dresses to put together tomorrow. But wheat-colored strands of hair brushed against my cheek as Ella leaned in closer with the candle and quilt. Sun-bleached and low-pigment, her locks reminded me of daylight rising behind the farm fields. The peeking rays of the sun twinkling through the full spikes hinting at the promise of a new day. Similarly, it invigorated me as if breathing in that same morning’s crisp fresh air. 

“You are,” Ella said softly. The two words tickled the fringe that laid loose from my braid. I’d already forgotten her musing of magic for the presence of reality. “No one else would be able to fix this. Not even your mother.” That was just because my mother would never bother with this sort of charity. “Like magic.” 

When we were children, we’d both wished for that. For magic, that is. Ella had the brief bliss of stories her mother would tell her at bedtime. My mother hadn’t had the time for that sort of fanciful waste. So when we were older, Ella would sneak away with those same old books. She’d try to weave me those same stories the same way I’d weave thread. Dozens of tales about lives we could barely imagine. Princesses that kissed a helpless frog and broke the curse to find a handsome hero. A prince that drew a magic sword and used it to slay the dragon. Knights that quested for the grail that would save their kingdom. Sorcerers that slept locked away in untamed forests. What a dream we’d have, tucked inside my quilt with those worn story pages. A dream to run away someday and find those beautiful lives.

But all we had was a harsher, colorless truth. We had the stories of Old Maggie in the forest. The witch that killed her children to live forever, the local story went. So it wasn’t a magic that Ella or I thought to be worth it. And the only thing our king cared about was if the harvest season was fruitful and the taxes were paid. We both now had more tangible, though still seemingly unreachable, dreams as well. I just wanted to see the ocean. The endless blue crash of life that travelers always talked about. Ella just wanted any place that she could call her own. A home she didn’t have to fear anything in. 

 

“It’s just practice,” I said and sighed as I began pulling out the seams. It was tedious work, to say the least, as they were ripped in several places. So, I had to get the needle under the subsequent stitching to pull out the next section again. This was the best I could do with what I had.  

With the illumination of the candle, I could see my fingers through places in the dress where it’d worn away to nearly nothing. It’d be freezing in the winter. I stopped to stare at it and squeezed at the coarse material. 

My mother, at least, wouldn’t notice the missing thread. But she’d definitely notice if I took fabric. Maybe if I took the scraps from some of the latest commissions and stitched them together, it wouldn’t be pretty but I could—

“Sorry.” The word broke through images of patchwork and I let the dress sit in my lap as I looked back over at Ella. She’d leaned away to lay on her side and let the quilt drop from her shoulders. Her icy blue eyes reflected the dim flames perfectly, and they gazed at the candle instead of at me. 

Look at me, I wanted to say. If she looked at me, really looked at me, she’d understand. 

“For what?” I asked instead. Those eyes still wouldn’t look at me. I just watched them wrestle with whatever thoughts were going on behind them. 

“For making you worry.” She finally decided to say. “And taking up your night. It’s not like you have the time to do these kinds of things for free. It’s--” Before Ella had the time to say selfish, I bent forward to gently tap my head against hers. It was just enough to shut her up. I’d have thrown my pillow if there wasn’t a candle in her hand and a needle in mine.

Her eyes went wide for a moment. Her mouth hung open as our eyes remained locked and I refused to back away. 

“Oww,” She finally whined and rubbed the back of her free hand against her forehead. I sat back, but only by a little. I’d do it again if I thought she saw my actions as pity. I felt anything but pity. “What was that for?” The question was punctuated with her palm shoving playfully at my arm. 

The candlelight was harsh enough that I could easily see it emphasize the dark circles under her eyes. The chapping on her lips. The scar at the end of her jaw from her stepsister throwing a plate at her. She stared at me with a pout and an accusation, and I withdrew fully. It took some force to calm my racing heartbeat and refocus my attention on the stitching. 

“Don’t say sorry to me.” Maybe my words tasted harsher on my tongue than the thoughts in my head were. But I trusted Ella to understand my words would never be venomous towards her. I need her to know I never needed or wanted apologies or for her to make up for what she saw as inconveniences I was shouldering.   

I didn’t want her to be sorry. I wanted her to be happy. It was all I’d ever wanted.