The Rose Necklace

Chapter 2

Chapter 2

A few months passed, and Adam kept his promise to Lilly. Whenever his mother visited Ivy, Adam accompanied her. The two of them had finished their castle, and now Lilly insisted on playing in it whenever he came. He was to be the handsome prince, and she the fair princess. Adam thought she was perfect for the role.

On one snowy winter day, the Winter Solstice, Adam again accompanied his mother to see Ivy and Lilly. Now, instead of a wagon, Adam helped pull a sled; it was much better suited to the deep snow. They walked quickly on their snowshoes to help keep warm, but also because they knew that darkness would come quickly on this, the shortest day of the year. Adam didn't need to worry too much about the cold; one thought of Lilly and her rosy cheeks, and he was warm from head to toe.

No one was outside when Adam and his mother arrived, but that was not unusual now. The snow forced Lilly to stay inside more often, which she absolutely hated. When he had visited after the first snowfall, she had run out to greet him, dragging him over to the flower patch to prove that the lilies and single rose were magic. Though it was well below freezing, the flowers looked as they would on a warm summer day. Adam had shaken his head in disbelief at first, and still went over to see them every time he visited, just to make sure they were really magical.

When he walked toward them today, he noticed immediately that there was something different. It took him a moment to distinguish the difference, but a quick count of the lilies revealed that one had withered. He could see the wilted petals lying under a thin layer of snow. It puzzled him, as the other nine were still healthy and beautiful as ever. He would have to ask Lilly what had happened. As he was starting to trudge toward the door, another flower caught his eye. Instead of one sad and lonely rosebud, there were now two clinging to the vine. The new flower reminded Adam a bit of Lilly's necklace; it didn't seem quite real. He was working up the nerve to touch it when his mother called for him to come inside, breaking his concentration. He ran toward her, anxious to play with Lilly and forget all the about the other flowers.

When he walked in, Lilly was nowhere to be seen in the cramped, yet cozy, kitchen. His mother leaned down and whispered in his ear, "Today is Lilly's birthday. Ivy let her sleep in as a special treat; she has gone to fetch her now. When she comes in we're to sing happy birthday for her, understand?"

"Yes, Momma. So that means she's seven now?"

"Yes, she is."

Ivy poked her head around the doorway, signaling them to get ready. When Lilly came around the corner, her hair a mess from sleep and rubbing her tired eyes, Ivy, Adam, and Aster all began to sing. Lilly stopped and stared at Adam for a minute, before turning and running back out the doorway to her room. They quit singing, and looked at each other, unsure of what had happened.

"I'm sure she's just gone to fix her hair," Ivy assured them. "We just startled her, is all. I'll go help her and we'll be back in a bit."

"Oh, I do hope we didn't scare her too much, the poor thing," Aster worried after Ivy had gone.

Adam was still standing there shocked. Lilly had never cared about her hair around him before; why would she start now? It was strange and out of character for her to care about her appearance so much.

When Ivy and Lilly reappeared, Lilly was properly dressed, but looked no less grumpy. She barely said a word when Ivy told her to greet her guests. After a brief hello to Adam's mother, she ignored Adam entirely and sat down at the kitchen table. "I'm hungry," she announced. Her voice sounded a bit different. At first Adam thought it was his imagination, but there was something in her face that was different too. It took him a moment to identify the change; it was her eyes. The beautiful brown eyes Adam loved so much were streaked with bright green. The change was so odd and unfamiliar that Adam was sure there was something wrong with his eyes. He had seen Lilly's eyes only a few weeks ago; certainly they couldn't change that much that quickly. But the green was there, nonetheless, and so was the odd note in her voice. It sounded a little higher pitched than normal, and much whinier than anyone was used to.

When she finished eating, Adam suggested they go outside; maybe that would snap her out of this odd mood. Instead of immediately running to their castle like she usually did, she wandered over to the flower garden. She stared at the withered lily and the new rose for a moment before finally turning to the castle.

"May I escort you to your castle, my lady?" Adam said, offering her his arm. She loved when he acted the part of the chivalrous prince, immediately transforming into the distressed damsel. But today, she ignored his proffered arm, instead marching toward the castle by herself.

"This whole entire thing is a mess," she declared. "And so childish too. While I may be a princess, you, Adam, are clearly not a prince. This whole entire thing is stupid."

Adam felt as if she had slapped him; it might have been less painful if she had. "But- you love the castle," he said slowly, trying not to let his hurt show.

"I used to love the castle. And only because I couldn't see how pathetic it was. A castle is not made of sticks and moss and rocks, all held together by weird-looking knots of rope. Why, the knots aren't even very strong!" With that, she proceeded to kick one of the walls, knocking it down. She picked up a fair sized rock and lobbed it toward another wall. Adam's feeble efforts to stop her did no good. Soon, all that remained of their castle was a pile of tinder.

Adam wasn't the only one who was shocked. Lilly seemed to have come to her senses for a moment, and was staring at the destruction around her. She looked at Adam with tearful brown eyes. "I-I'm s-so s-sorry! I couldn't- I didn't mean- Please Adam!"

He stared at her like she was a stranger. He felt like she was a stranger; the Lilly he knew would have never done something like that. "Why? Why did you do it?" he asked in a small voice.

"I don't know," she answered slowly. "Adam, I'm so afraid."

This made him forget his hurt and anger for a minute. He couldn't stand the thought of Lilly being afraid. "Of what?"

She made sure Ivy and his mother weren't watching before pulling the rose necklace from its hiding place under her dress. Adam stared at it, unsure at first why she was showing it to him. As he stared at it, he noticed a nearly imperceptible difference. He would have never noticed if he hadn't been looking for it. The necklace had darkened in color, become a bit more solid. While it still gave the impression that it was made of mist, the impression was less than when Adam had first seen it. He looked up at Lilly, horrified, unsure what he should, or could, do. He glanced at the cottage, wondering if he should tell his mother, and when he looked at Lilly again, the green was back in her eyes.

"If you tell anyone, your mother included, you will leave me no choice. I will kill you." Her eyes flashed even darker as she said it, so dark they appeared to be black.
"Adam! We need to go, dear. It's going to be dark soon." Both Lilly and Adam jumped at the sound of Aster's voice. Adam turned from the castle ruins, running to his mother. He knew that she had seen the heap of broken sticks, but she said nothing on their walk home.

By the time they arrived at home, Adam's lips were blue with cold and his teeth wouldn't stop chattering. Without happy thoughts of Lilly to keep him warm, he was frozen inside. He was not looking forward to the next trip to visit Ivy. Nonetheless, a few weeks later, he escorted his mother through the woods. Lilly ran to greet them, her eyes the familiar chocolate brown.

It was as if her birthday had never happened. She didn't speak of it and neither did he. If not for the demolished castle, which Lilly avoided while they were outside, and the changes in the flowers, Adam would have thought he imagined the entire thing. In fact, in following years, he often thought that he must have imagined parts of it, for surely Lilly would have never said such horrid things, and surely her eyes couldn't change colors. Never again did he and his mother visit on her birthday, but in the years that followed, Adam noticed that the same pattern continued with the flowers. Every visit after her birthday, one more rose had bloomed, and one more lily had shriveled.