oak and climbed down to rejoin Chavisory. They stole one last look at the party, studied the characters
and scene for me, then re-turned home. When they told the story the next day, I was deeply pleased to
hear about my mother, as puzzling as the details might be. Who was this old man? Who were all these
other children? Even the tiniest scrap of news brought back that past. I hid in a hollow tree. She was
angry with me, and I would run away and never come back. Where are your sisters? Where are my
babies? I remembered that I had sat in the V made by her legs, listening to the story of the wanderings of
Oisín in Tír na nÓg. It is not fair to have to miss someone for so many years.
But this is a double life. I sat down to work on the true story of my world and the world of Henry
Day. The words flowed slowly, painfully, sometimes letter by letter. Whole mornings escaped without a
single sentence worth saving. I crumpled and threw away so many pages that I was forever popping up
into the library to steal more paper, and the pile of trash in the corner threatened to consume the whole
room. In assembling my tale, I found myself tiring easily, early in the day, so that if I could string together
five hun-dred words, writing had triumphed over uncertainty and procrastination.
At times I questioned my reasons for written proof of my own existence. When I was a boy, stories
were as real as any other part of life. I'd hear Jack climb the beanstalk, and later wonder how to climb
the tall poplars outside my window. Hansel and Gretel were brave heroes, and I shuddered at the
thought of the witch in her oven. In my daydreams, I fought dragons and rescued the girl trapped in her
tower. When I could not sleep for the wild doings and extravagant deeds of my own imagination, I'd
wake my father, who would invariably say, "It's only a story." As if such words made it less real. But I
did not believe him even then, for stories were written down, and the words on the page were proof
enough. Fixed and permanent in time, the words, if anything, made the people and places more real than
the ever-changing world. My life with the faeries is more real to me than my life as Henry Day. And I
wrote it down to show that we are more than a myth, a tale for children, a nightmare or daydream. Just
as we need their stories to exist, so do the humans need us to give shape to their lives. I wrote it to
create mean-ing for my change, for what happened with Speck. By saying this instead of that, I could
control what mattered. And show the truth that lies below the surface life.
I finally decided to meet the man face-to-face. I had seen Henry Day years before, but I now knew
that he had once been a changeling who had kid-napped me when I was a boy of seven. We had
uncovered him, followed him everywhere, and learned the outlines of his daily routine. The faeries had
been to his house, taken a random score of music he wrote, and left him with a sign of their mischief. But
I wanted to confront him, if only to say goodbye, through him, to my mother and sisters.
I was on my way to the library to finish my story. A man stepped out of a car and marched through
the front door of the building. He looked old and tired, worn by care. Nothing like me, or how I
imagined I would be. Ht walked with his head down, eyes on the ground, a slight stoop to his
shoul-ders, as if the simplest things gravely distracted him. He dropped an armful of papers and, bending
down to gather them, muttered a stream of curses I considered pouncing out of the woods, but he
looked too fragile to spook that night, so instead I squeezed through the crevice to go about my craft.
He had begun frequenting the library that summer, showing up several days in a row, humming
snatches of the symphony we had stolen from him. On hot and humid afternoons, when sensible people
were swimming or lying in bed with the shades drawn, Henry was often reading alone at a sun-splashed
table. I could sense his presence above, separated only by the thin ceiling, and when the library closed
for the night, I climbed through the trapdoor and investigated. He had been working in a quiet spot in the
back corner. Upon I desk, a stack of books lay undisturbed, with neat slips of paper sticking out like
tongues between the leaves. I sat where he had sat and looked at the mishmash of titles on everything
from imps and demons to a thick book on "idiots sa-vants." Nothing connected these titles, but he had
scribbled diminutive notes to himself on bookmarks:
Not fairy but hobgoblin.
Gustav— savant?
Ruined my life.
Find Henry Day.
The phrases were discarded pieces to different puzzles, and I pocketed the notes. In the morning,
the sounds of his dismay penetrated the floor. Henry muttered about the missing bookmarks, and I felt a