Page 4 (1/1)

Feeling like she’d been kicked in the stomach, Gabby watched in stricken silence as Ms Teistering that the fairy, blessedly, was also ed onto Fifth Street and disappeared into traffic--the job of her drea farewell on its tailpipe--Gabby’s shoulders slued down the street to the corner lot where simple law students not-destined-for-success-because-they-were-too-flighty could afford to park

" ‘Flighty,’wheel "You have no idea what my life is like You can’t see theht breeze, a ht a whiff of an exotic, arousing fragrance And if, by chance, the fairy had brushed against her--although they were invisible, they were real, and were actually there--Ms Temple would have rationalized it away somehow Those who couldn’t see the Fae always did

Gabby had learned the hard way that people had zero tolerance for the inexplicable It never ceased to aed up to protect their perception of reality "Gee, I guess I didn’t get enough sleep last night" Or, "Wow, I shouldn’t have had that second (or third or fourth) beer with lunch" If all else failed, they settled for a sied for such oblivion!

She shook her head and tried to console herself with the thought that at least the fairy had been convinced and was gone She was safe For now

The way Gabby figured it, the Fae were responsible for ninety-nine percent of the problems in her life She’d take responsibility for the other one percent, but they were the reason her life this summer had been one crisis after another They were the reason she’d begun to dread leaving her house, never knohere one ht startle her Or what kind of ass she’d roup They were the reason her boyfriend had broken up with her fifteen days, three hours, and--she glanced broodingly at her watch--forty-two han harbored a special and very personal hatred for the Fae

"I don’t see you I don’t see you," shefairy aze, caught herself, then angled the rearviewwith her lipstick

Never look away too sharply, her grandhan, had always cautioned You aze slide over the away too abruptly, or they’ll know you know And they’ll take you You must never betray that you can see them Promise me, Gabby I can’t lose you!

Gram had seen them, too, these creatures other people couldn’t see Most of the woift" skipped generations As it had with her o (like the people in California were less weird than fairies), leaving then–seven-year-old Gabrielle behind with Graotten settled

Why couldn’t it have skipped me? Gabby brooded A nor da Cincinnati Gabby was beginning to think that living in the Tri-State--the geographical convergence of Indiana, Ohio, and Kentucky--was a bit like living at the ence of Sunnydale’s Hellet deerously seductive, inhuant creatures that would take her and do God-only-knehat to her if they ever figured out that she could see them

Her family history was riddled with tales of ancestors who’d been captured by the dreaded Fae Hunters and never seen again Some of the tales claie Hunters, others that they were forced into slavery to the Fae

She had no idea what actually beca for certain: She had no intention of ever finding out

Later Gabby would realize that it was all the cup of coffee’s fault Every awful thing that happened to her from that moment on could be traced directly back to that cup of coffee with the stunning siu job interview), hence not C (having to go into work that night), and certainly not D (the horrible thing that happened to her there)on to infinity