The Secret Book of Flora Lea

by Patti Callahan Henry

War inched toward them and now they could smell its breath in the air.

The back garden’s flowers clung to late summer colors. The cornflowers and Queen Anne’s lace bowed close to the ground while the lettuces in Mum’s garden withered brown around the edges. Rose bushes spilled pink and red blossoms at the base of the brick wall they shared with neighbors on three sides. Hazel inhaled, feeling words growing and rising from within.

“The entry shimmers because light sneaks out around the doorway. The air quivers.”

what happened next in the plot came flying at her like a secret only she could hear. Other times the story hid in shadows, not ready to reveal itself.

Hazel realized that she’d found a never-ending tale that could be told again and again.

in the twenty years Hazel had been picking them out of her memory like pills off a sweater, she still believed she’d missed a hint, a clue, a footprint, a note—something that would one day surface and solve the mystery of Flora’s disappearance.

By changing the middle of these stories, the sisters made better endings. Endings they liked.

Hazel had often wondered if Whisperwood had gone on without her and Flora, if the land they’d made together had its own adventures while she lived her real life.

But Flora was the reason Hazel still listened to every whisper and goose-flesh moment, to the trill of something amiss or a magpie’s call, the way a friend stirred their tea clockwise or anticlockwise.

“It’s fascinating seeing the remnants of our literary heroes, isn’t it?” “It is,” she said. “Like digging up fossils to see how things developed.”

it is never, ever only a fairy tale.”

she’d realized that all she could do with the ache and the shame was to live with it, allow it to walk next to her like a shadow, a ghost, a living memory. Some days, she’d turn to that loss and acknowledge it, and sometimes, for blessed hours, she would forget, but then the shadow would fall long and fast onto her soul

bad things don’t always have a blaming place to land.”

Her past had tumbled into the present, blurring the lines.

Origin myths were the most important tales ever told: They were used to explain the creation of the world.

Sometimes we can’t wait around for someone to save us.”

Making stories brought misery but reading and studying them provided comfort. In the stories of others, there were endings without loose ends, those who were missing were found, and the world made sense.

“But if you aren’t living your life, whose life are you living?”

“Why do you have these parties?” Hazel asked, teeth chattering. “To honor the seasons, curious one. To honor each other. To gather. To remember that we are part of something much bigger than the petty things of today, bigger than gossip and—” “War.” “Yes, we are part of something even bigger than war. Something that goes on and on and was celebrated before us and will be celebrated after us.”

“Don’t let others take away good stories so they can feel better about themselves.”

“Telling stories is one of the greatest powers we possess. It’s like a dream you can fill with what you want. And the knight doesn’t always have to save the princess; sometimes she saves herself.”

“The best stories are soul-making. But stories we tell about ourselves, and even the harrowing ones told by others about us, can also be soul-destroying. We have to choose what is good and true, not what will destroy.”

She fought tears of hopelessness as she stared out the windshield to see a blurry view of the velvet-nosed cows at the fence’s edges, the lazy sheep dotting the fields like gardenia blooms, and the road winding back to Bloomsbury.

“Beautiful untrue things. We all know when we read about Narnia or Middle Earth or Wonderland—we know it’s not true but it’s so beautiful, so damn beautiful that we believe it while we’re there.” “And beautiful untrue things carry the truth,”

sometimes life breaks your heart to give you the best art.

“Sometimes the stars make me feel better, but not tonight.” “How?” he asked. “How do they make you feel better?” Hazel thought about this for a silent minute. “Maybe because they tell me that there is something more I can’t see. Or if I can see it, I can only see the littlest bit of it when there is much, much more.” “I like that,” he said, and rolled over. He let go of her hand and propped on his elbow, his chin in his palm. He faced Hazel, staring at her so intently she had to look away. “Or maybe they make me feel better because even though they hide all day, they always come out at night; they don’t go away.”