Waking Rose: A Fairy Tale Retold Read Online Free

hint. But apparently, she had forgotten again. Fish began to be slightly annoyed with her.
     
    Hers
     
    Rose pondered once again the strange roller coaster of the heart of a girl as she ate her dinner during the reception. She had been in the heights of joy during the Mass, seeing the world of real things, as she called it, and the physical world in an unexpected convergence in the wedding ceremony. Bear and Blanche were almost more than themselves—they were Love and Beloved made manifest, something bigger, something beyond the world, and everyone present in the church could see it. It was as though the wedding Mass had been a metaphysical magnifying glass, where even the words were real words, communicating what was really going on, instead of a babble of syllables.
    She had been in a rapture of contemplation, weeping openly and unselfconsciously. She was the sister of the bride. She could do that.
    And after this transcendent experience, she had switched planes abruptly when she took Fish’s arm to leave the church. She had been so far above the earth that she hadn’t even noticed him, relatively speaking. “You look very nice,” he observed as he held out his arm.
    And there she was, back on earth and bounding towards the sky again. A more familiar kind of rapture. And Fish in typical fashion was now starting to ignore her. He must have sensed her pleasure, and pulled back hastily. She was trying hard not to let it bother her.
    She watched him out of the corner of her eye as she nibbled on the little quiches and puff pastries, leftover appetizers she was eating instead of dinner. Fish was sitting on the edge of the stage, allowing himself to be teased by some of the flower girls, the younger Kovachs.
    Why did she like him? It was so irrational. She counted on her fingers the things she particularly liked about him again, trying to analyze that curious feeling. The way he moved—he walked smoothly, like a lean jaguar. And his thin frame hid his muscles, which were strong. She had once been foolish enough to arm-wrestle him, which had been barely a contest. She had known she would lose as soon as she touched his hand. And the fact that he was just an inch above her height—as though they were a matched set. His profile was striking, sharper than Bear’s. And his eyes, light brown, almost bronze. Unusually good eyes, but she had never had the opportunity to study them closely, of course. Fish seemed to know whenever someone was looking at him, and shied away. He probably knew she was watching him now.
    She wondered if he would ask her to dance again, and tried to convince herself that it wouldn’t matter if he wouldn’t.
    “You okay, Rose?” The bride had returned to the head table to sit down for a rare break, smoothing her skirts as she slid into her seat. Blanche had been out talking to the guests for most of the dinner.
    “Yes, everything’s wonderful,” Rose said, speaking the general truth. But her eyes lingered on Fish.
    Her sister knew everything. “Is he avoiding you again?”
    “Yes,” Rose sighed. “I wish, I wish, I wish I could pretend I don’t care the smallest whit for him. Then he wouldn’t be so edgy around me. But I can’t seem to help myself.”
    Blanche shook her head, with a small smile. “You do seem to make your own trouble, Rose.”
    “I bet he’s not going to dance with me again,” Rose said. “I just feel it. I’ve driven him away. He’s going to complain about silly girls and wish aloud for a rational intelligent female to converse with.”
    They were both silent. Rose knew that Fish had been friends with a girl at NYU who seemed to match that description, a foreign girl who had been a top scholar. She and Blanche didn’t know if he was pursuing her or not.
    “Well, you’re going to college this fall with Kateri Kovach,” Blanche said, indicating Rose’s best friend from her younger years. “Maybe you’ll be able to get over him.”
    “We must be optimistic,”