self_composed | i believe i can fly

Alice smiles and loves her for a moment, then turns his attention to what she's drawing.

Bella finally settles on a floor plan with a central room, radiating a bathroom and a kitchen and a bedroom and a sewing room. "Do you want the place to be accessible without using coins every time?" Bella asks. "You could make it person-specific, like the pillar and the fairy mound are specific to Elias's descendants. Or, you could just put in a staircase or an elevator and tuck the entrance away somewhere. In case anyone else ever earns the privilege of visiting."

"Well, I'll put in stairs," he says, "and make it so you'n'me are the only people who can get to 'em, and if I ever wanna bring anybody else in, I can wish 'em in then."

"Okay." Bella adds a stairwell that leads down to the central room, and moves the door to the kitchen so it's under the angle of the stairs. She starts drawing squares in the kitchen and labeling them - stove, double-decker oven, fridge and freezer, cupboards and counters and sink. "This is all gonna have to operate by magic. You're not going to be on the grid in your lair. Other furnishings that don't need electricity or water you can wish up separately after you have a feel for the space."

"Wonder how much magic it's gonna take," he says, thinking happily of what he might do to provide it.

"I think it might be possible that you could create an entire sufficiently-designed-in-advance lair with one hex," Bella laughs, "but maybe you'll have to outfit the kitchen and the bathroom with a few pentagons or something." She finishes tiling the kitchen with kitchen implements and moves on to the bathroom.

"Pentagons are easy," he says with a lingering look at her stove.

Bella is mildly amused.

"So, magic sewing machine, magic plumbing, magic kitchen appliances, magic ventilation not by means of device. Out of curiosity, are you planning to go grocery shopping or just wish yourself food?"

"Probably the wishing," he says. "Don't have to worry about money that way."

Bella nods. Of course saleable goods can be conjured even with mere squares, but she's not sure how to step that up in volume without attention.

She checks the time. "Angela'll be here soon. I'm not sure whether it's best for her to spot you or not, but I should start playing invalid."

"Yeah, good plan," he says. "Do you also wanna hide the..." with a gesture at the notebooks full of his childhood.

"Yeah, probably a good idea." Bella shuts all the notebooks on the table, stacks them, and takes them upstairs; then she flops onto the couch, illusions herself various casts, and says, "I'm actually not sure how I'd let her in if I were as beat up as I'm supposed to look, so maybe you'd better own up to being here after all. I don't want to make her just leave everything in the mailbox for Charlie to bring in."

"Sure," says Alice. "Do I need some kind of excuse to be here, or is 'skipping school to hang out with you because I care more about you than school' good enough?"

It has the advantage of being pretty much true, but true and plausible are not always the same thing.

"You are known to care almost zilch about school," Bella says. "I think it'll do. She might not even solicit an explanation."

"Awesome."

Bella lounges on the couch and practices wincing theatrically.

About twenty minutes after school ends, Angela rings the doorbell. "Bella? Bella, it's me!"

"Hang on!" Bella calls out the window. And to Alice, "Go let her in, would you?"

"'Kay," he says, and wonders idly if she shouldn't pentagon herself some acting skills just to make it easier, and goes to open the door.

That's a decent idea, and Bella has plenty of pentagons. She's Broadway quality before he gets to the door.

Angela's standing on the doorstep with her arms full of handouts and hand-copied descriptions of the day's assignments. "Oh! Hi, Delaney," she says politely. "You're visiting Bella too, that's sweet. Can I come in?"

"Yep," he says, stepping back out of her way. "Hi."

"Hi, Angela!" calls Bella with fake strain in her voice. "I'm in the living room." Weak smile. "Don't want to make Dad haul me up and down the stairs every day."

Angela tiptoes in. "Oh wow, Bella," she says, eyes wide at the imaginary casts. "Are you even going to be able to do the homework?"

"I bet the pinball wizard here'll take dictation for me if I ask him," Bella says, making a small gesture with her mostly-"unscathed" left hand. "Thanks so much for bringing everything."

Alice sits himself down on the floor in front of Bella and leans back against the couch. He doesn't consider it much beforehand; it's just, for him, the obvious place to sit.

Angela seems to consider the "pinball wizard" nickname cute if inscrutable. "Okay. That's really nice of you, Delaney." She reaches into her purse and pulls out a greeting card that says "Get Well Soon!" and is utterly crammed with well-wishes and signatures from dozens of people. "Here. Practically everybody signed this."

Bella reaches carefully, with very convincing winces, for the card, and smiles. "Thanks, this was really nice of you."

"Oh, Jessica went in half on the card," Angela says. "But she couldn't come with me here because she has her voice lesson after school Mondays."

"Well, tell her I said thanks, too," Bella says.

"All your friends are cute," Alice says to Bella, tipping his head back and grinning.

Angela looks confused. Bella sighs quietly.

"I don't wanna keep you," Bella tells Angela. "It means a lot to me that you came out here, though."

Angela takes that as a dismissal, and gracefully. "Okay. I'll be back tomorrow, Bella. Feel better!"

And she lets herself out.

"...Did I say something wrong?" he wonders. Wrong in the sense of confusing to Angela, that is.

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