Fit For a Queen: a Loveless Letters Short Story - Preview
Share
With the flick of a wrist she could rip a hole in space, time, and imagination. With the nod of her head she could cast magical spells in foreign realms. She was human and not, all at once and almost anything seemed possible when she put her mind to it. Everything except telling Sandra how she really felt.
It seemed so easy the first time they met. It was easy to reach out for her hand; to smile and nod and let that disarming twinkle sparkle in the corner of her eye as they hopped through the portal from the Ashen Afterworld. But charm was always easy for her. It came almost as naturally to Lindsay as confidence. Well, at least it did most days. Not today. Today she spent over an hour trying to talk herself into sending a simple text message. Today she paced back and forth in her bedroom so many times she nearly wore a groove in the carpet. Today she poured her heart into the pages of her journal in an unguarded way that made her feel naked in front of the world - even if what she’d written was just fantasy.
“What’s your problem?” Curtis pushed his way into Lindsay’s room, toppling over a tower of books precariously stacked behind her door.
She narrowed her eyes as she glared at him over the edge of her journal. She was in no mood for him today. She let her face do the talking.
He wrinkled his nose at her reaction. “Whatever.” He turned his back and started to pull the door closed behind him. “I just wanted to know if you’re OK.”
Lindsay scoffed, “Hell of a way to imply you care.”
He whipped his head back in her direction. “What do you mean? I literally asked what was wrong.”
“No, you - ” she almost launched into explaining that his demeanour was anything but caring when she remembered that it was of literally no use. He would defend himself until the end of time. Maybe he really had no idea how he came across to people. But how couldn’t he?
“Hello? Earth to Lindsay.” Curtis waved his hands in the air like he was signaling a plane for rescue.
She blinked hard and brought herself back to the moment.

“Seriously, though. Are you OK? You’ve been acting… well… I dunno kind of spacey lately. And you're always scribbling in your diary,” he clasped his hands under his chin and looked dreamily into the distance.
Lindsay hurled a stuffed pig at his head. “It’s a journal. And yeah, I’m fine. What do you want?” She suddenly wished their dad hadn’t gone to visit their mom in England where she was helping Nana Rose. What had felt like freedom became a stifling prison when she found herself trapped in the apartment with Curtis during what the news outlets were calling the “storm of the decade.”
Curtis’s shoulders slumped as he realised she wasn’t into their usual game of sibling bickering. “I’m bored,” he said, pushing her books around the floor with his foot.
“It’s only 10:30 in the morning. How are you bored?” She closed her journal and slipped it under her pillow.
“I don’t know. I just am. I don’t wanna play video games or watch TV and what’s left to do? It’s snowing so hard you can’t see the street from the window and everything is closed.”
She tilted her head down and looked at him from the very top of her eyes. “You realise how whiney you sound, right?” She motioned to the pile of literature he was swirling around the floor. “Read a book.”
Curtis looked at the books with a fresh pout that almost made him look ten years old. “Books aren’t fun unless you’re in them, Linds.”
“Oh my God. I have nothing for you. I literally cannot help you.” She pulled her journal back out from under her pillow and began flipping through its pages, pretending to read so he would go away.
“Do you wanna portal hop?” he asked.
Lindsay felt the loneliness in her brother’s voice and she truly wanted to want to spend time with him. But she had her own things to sort out and she was tired of being his only friend. She decided to soften the blow a little. “Maybe tomorrow?”
She wasn’t sure how, but his shoulders slumped even more as he turned to leave. If he could crumple any further he’d probably fold himself so tightly he’d become a black hole. “Yeah. Sure. Tomorrow sounds good.”
He slipped quietly down the hall.
Her heart hurt a little to see him feel so down but she reminded herself that it wasn’t her job to always be with him. He needed a life of his own. And so did she. Their lives had become so entangled since the incident with Peggy Sue Whittaker. Curtis just wasn’t the same after that. Honestly, it surprised her that he still portal hopped. But, if she tried to actually understand him, she’d probably drive herself mad. Besides, that was years ago; she was getting older, now. She needed to start building her life. A life that wasn’t tied to his every moment of the day.
She exhaled sharply and picked up her phone.
“You can do this, Lindsay,” she told herself out loud.
She opened a text conversation she’d started with Sandra the week before and felt a wave of embarrassment flood her almost immediately as she read it back.
Lindsay: Hey girl 👋 I hope you’re good. I just wanted to say thanks for being such a regular customer at our store. I’m so glad things worked out well when we “read that book” together 😉 Let me know if you ever wanna hang or, like, talk about books and stuff.
Sandra: Hi. Thanks. I don’t spend much money there, but I try when I can. Sure. Hanging sounds good.
Lindsay: Awesome. Cool. Sounds great.
She dropped the phone on her bed and let her face fall into her hands. “How could I be such a weirdo?” she asked herself, outloud. She never talked like that. “Hey girl.” Who was she pretending to be? And then she didn’t even propose a time or a place or anything for this so-called “hang.” She felt nauseous as she remembered the three dots pop up and then disappear after her last message.
A full week had gone by and she still hadn’t heard from Sandra. Should she message her? She wanted to invite her for coffee.
She picked up her phone and started typing. Hey. Just wondering if you’re still up for hanging out. Sorry I was so weird.
“Ugh,” she flopped back on her bed and erased what she’d typed. She couldn’t do it. And she had no idea why. “Why are you being such a weirdo?” she frustratedly asked herself.
Suddenly, she felt like her room was growing smaller. As though the walls were closing in on her and choking the air from her lungs. Her frustration turned to panic. She needed to get out of the apartment. In the very rare moments that Lindsay actually felt herself growing overwhelmed she usually went for a jog. Two feet of snow was probably too many for jogging. But she could try to get to the coffee shop by herself. Assuming it was open.
—
“I don’t need her,” Curtis mumbled to himself as he shuffled about in the apartment’s library. It would strike his friends as odd that his apartment had a library. Well, it would if he had friends. And he would want to tell them that it’s because they are so incredibly rich that their apartment was really three floors of prime real estate in the most upper class area of the city. But, if he was so lucky as to have friends who actually wanted to visit he would have to be more truthful than that. Perhaps not so truthful, though, as to tell them that his parents sectioned the living room with a wall to build a small library and an even smaller living space, just so they could house their most prized possessions. Because, after all, their books were more than just their business. They were the family business going back decades and some of these books even housed the last whispers of the souls of his ancestors. Yes. He certainly couldn’t be that truthful.
He walked the shelves of books, all set out along the edges of the small square room. He let his fingers touch every book that he passed at elbow height. The stories inside called to him. He wanted to open a portal, toss in a book, and disappear into an imaginary world. Perhaps one where he could proclaim himself king. Because if he were king he would never be alone. There would always be someone to talk to. Someone to be with. Someone to ask him how his day went.
But Curtis remembered the pact he’d made with Lindsay after they’d broken their last promise to Nana Rose. He really shouldn’t portal hop into another book. Not after what happened to Peggy Sue and certainly not after what almost happened to Sandra.
But then he started to think about his sister. She was always stronger than him. Cooler than him. She had more friends. She wasn’t afraid of anything and her confidence meant that she could do anything. And it always went so well for her. It was his hesitation - his fear - that screwed everything up. It was his fear that made Peggy Sue get lost in the abyss. And, if he was honest, it was his fear that made him forget to close the portal that allowed Sandra to hop into the Ashen Afterworld. If he hadn’t let himself get nervous about the Death Stampedes he wouldn’t have run off before making sure it sealed behind him.
Lindsay wouldn’t care.
So, Curtis shouldn’t care.
And he wouldn’t care.
He selected a book from the shelf and started to turn his wrist to open a portal. He stopped for a moment when he heard his sister’s footsteps in the hallway. Maybe she’d come to hop with him after all. Curtis let himself feel a rush of excitement as her footsteps approached. It extinguished as she passed by the library without so much as a glance in his direction. As he heard the apartment door click shut behind her, an even better idea jumped to mind.
He stuffed the book back on the shelf and hurried to his sister’s bedroom.
—
The snow was falling silently in the street as Lindsay pushed open the heavy glass doors of the apartment building. The city was buried under a blanket of cottony coldness that dampened all sounds and kept most of the would-be traffic at home. She paused as she stood in the open doorway, soaking in the last bit of warmth at her back as she took in the eerie but oddly satisfying stillness that surrounded her.
Snow was already making its way behind the faux fur ruffle at the tops of her boots and she knew it would be a long and strenuous walk to the coffee shop. “If it’s even open,” she mumbled to herself. She lugged her legs through the heavy drifts, stopping every twenty or so feet to rest and listen to the silence. The coffee shop appeared in sight as she rounded the corner beside the apartment building and as she looked toward its window she immediately felt as stupid as she undoubtedly looked.
“Of course, it’s closed.” She plunked herself into the snow in an awkward teenage tantrum and leaned backward to let the snowflakes drift gently down onto her face.
“Professor Whiskerface McHappypants,” a crackly old voice called in the distance. “Here kitty kitty.”
A smile crept its way across Lindsay’s face. There was only one person who would name a cat something so outlandish. She pushed herself up out of the snow and moved to the alleyway behind her apartment building.
Aunt Cleo was standing on top of a dumpster trying to reach a cat that walked back and forth above her on a balcony as though it were taunting her.
“Get down,” Aunt Cleo called as she waved her arms toward the cat. “I’ll catch you if you promise not to scratch me.” She teetered and tottered and almost slipped off the dumpster lid.
Lindsay couldn’t help but snicker a bit to herself. Aunt Cleo had been her favourite aunt for as long as she could remember. A “surprise” baby when Nana Rose was fresh out of high school, Aunt Cleo was about 15 years older than Lindsay’s mom but infinitely cooler, even as she approached 65 years old and teetered on top of a back alley dumpster. Or, perhaps, especially because she was approaching 65 years old and teetering on top of a back alley dumpster. It helped that she was the only person, other than Nana Rose, who actually believed Lindsay and Curtis could portal hop at such young ages.
“Who’s there?” Aunt Cleo called as she heard Lindsay’s snicker. She turned swifter than a nearly 65 year old should and tumbled off the dumpster into a puffy pile of snow.
Lindsay rushed to her side. “Oh my God. Aunt Cleo. Are you ok?”
Cleo leaned back, spread her arms and legs out, and made an awkward snow angel in the mounds of fluffy snow around her. She giggled to herself as she stood to look at its terrible form. “Well, I think I’m ok, but that angel looks like she’s got broken wings.”
Lindsay laughed with her. “It definitely does. But what were you doing on top of a freakin’ dumpster, Aunt Cleo? You’re not exactly - ” she stopped herself short.
“Not exactly, what Lindsay?” Aunt Cleo challenged as she raised an eyebrow and curled up a smile.
“Not exactly known for dumpster climbing?” Lindsay tried.
Aunt Cleo looked down and shook her head. “That was a terrible recovery, my lady.”
Lindsay jumped back as the balcony cat lept straight down toward her.
“Wow,” Aunt Cleo gasped as she watched the cat weave its way through Lindsay’s ankles. “Professor Whiskerface McHappypants doesn’t like anyone,” she proclaimed. “Not even me, most days.”
Lindsay crouched down to pet the cat. “He seems fine to me,” she shrugged.
“She does seem just fine. Doesn’t she?”
“What was she doing up there?” Lindsay asked.
“Your guess is as good as mine, little lady.” Aunt Cleo scooped the cat up into her arms and caressed it into a purring frenzy. “I woke up and the balcony door was open. I haven’t the faintest idea why. But there it was, wide open. Snow drifting up into my living room. And the professor was nowhere in sight.”
Lindsay laughed. Aunt Cleo was known for leaving doors open, and lights on, and losing her keys, never answering her phone, and adopting strange cats she claimed named themselves. So, while it made no sense at all to ignore a literal snow drift in her living room in favour of finding her cat and making snow angels - it also made entirely perfect sense, for Aunt Cleo.
“What are you doing wandering about in the snow, child?”
Lindsay shrugged and shifted her weight from foot to foot. “I dunno,” she answered, avoiding eye contact. “Had to get out of the apartment, I guess.”
“And clear your head.” Aunt Cleo never was one for leaving things unsaid. And, she had a wonderful, if not sometimes annoying, knack for knowing precisely what someone else had neglected to say.
Lindsay sighed. She hadn’t spoken to anyone about Sandra. Not her friends at school. Not her mom during their weekly phone calls. The stress of it all was building inside her like a pressure cooker. And it burst.
“There’s this girl that I met at the bookstore who, I guess, comes there like every week and I’ve seen her every week but she’s quiet and seems shy so I never talked to her. But I talk to everyone. So, that’s kind of weird, right? Anyway, she comes in the store every week but, this one week, I didn’t notice her come in. And I always notice her come in. Because she’s really pretty. But I didn’t see her. And Curtis and I were fighting because - well, I forget why - but we were and we ended up portal hopping into a book which I know we told Nana Rose we wouldn’t do and I’m really sorry. But anyway, Curtis forgot to close the portal, since it was just the two of us. And, I guess Sandra saw it. That’s her name, Sandra. Did I say that already? Anyway, Sandra jumped through and long story short she ended up invisible but we saved her, or whatever, and we got back home. And I texted her to hang out but forgot to set a time. And I feel, like, stupid. And I just get all nervous and stuff. And that’s just not like me.” Lindsay stopped to catch her breath, suddenly aware of how quickly she was talking.
Aunt Cleo waited, patiently, petting the cat who’d found its way to her arms. “You like this girl,” she said, softly; confidently.
Lindsay let out a deep breath. “Yeah,” she answered, looking down at the snow.
“So, what’s the problem?”
“I don’t know. I’ve never really liked a girl before. What if I say the wrong thing? What if she doesn’t like me? What if she’s not even into girls? I know exactly what guys wanna hear. But, this is different.” Lindsay’s shoulders slumped and she wondered if this was how her brother felt a lot of the time.
“Maybe different is good, child. Maybe you shouldn’t be telling anyone what you think they want to hear. Maybe you should just be yourself.” Aunt Cleo winked and turned to walk the long way back to her apartment.
“Maybe,” Lindsay mumbled.
—
“Let’s see what we have in here,” Curtis snickered to himself as he opened his sister’s diary. A quick pang of guilt shot through him as his inner voice told him it was wrong. “But she did leave it out on her bed,” he reasoned with himself out loud. “And she did ditch me for literally no reason at all.”
His logic was faulty, but there was no one to judge it, so he carried on.
He flipped past ramblings about school and the store. He skipped over parts where she complained about him and wondered when her mom would be back from visiting Nana Rose in England. “Boring. Boring. Boring.” He sighed. “Where’s the good stuff?”
Then he remembered how frustrated she seemed earlier and flipped to the very last entry.
Lindsay stood, looking over her loyal subjects as her co-queen Sandra bestowed a blessing over the Lost Souls of the Ashen Afterworld. Their spines unfurled and the Lost Souls began to look human once more. She knew then that it was only together that they could lead the Ashen Afterworld into being a place of peace and beauty.
Curtis couldn’t help but laugh out loud at the way his sister had re-written their adventures in the Ashen Afterworld to proclaim herself queen of the realm with Sandra by her side as her bride.
“Fat chance you’d ever be queen,” he snickered to himself. “Let’s see what we can do to set this story straight.”
He lifted his hands in front of himself and swirled his wrists in large circles as he recited the ancient mantra that had been passed down through generations of his family. A glimmering green swirl of light appeared as he opened a portal to a land of imagination.
He lifted his sister’s diary in his right hand as his left held steady to keep the portal open. “Here goes nothing.” He tossed the book into the open space and watched as the Ashen Afterworld appeared inside the swirling green oval.
He drew in a deep breath and hesitated for just a moment. He’d never portal hopped into a story by himself before. Especially since, they were still forbidden to hop into stories at all after the incident with Peggy Sue Whittaker. And then after Sandra… His left wrist twitched, just a little, as he considered closing the portal without jumping through. But then he remembered how Lindsay had spoken to him earlier that day - how she always spoke to him. And the way his parents looked at him differently, now, even though they didn’t know about Peggy Sue. And all the mean things the kids at school said in voices hushed just enough that the teachers couldn’t hear.
Curtis nodded to himself and jumped through the portal with two feet.