I crawled up the stairs to the house my eardrums aching from Aunt Camilla’s never ending chatter and Potassium’s obvious dislike towards me. I thought I might die if I heard another story about what Cynthia said about so and so person I don’t care about at all. God, I hate this. I hate this house. I hate my Aunt’s gossiping, I hate Cynthia, I hate my parents for sending me here, I hate myself for getting me here, I hate Potassium, and I really hate bananas. I walked down the banana art decorated hallway and stopped at my room when the attic stair case caught my eye. I wish Aunt Camilla had closed it, the big gaping whole leading into the attic was very creepy. I walked over to see if I could close it myself but almost tripped over a cardboard box before I could get much further. Getting my footing again I looked at the box ready to kick it or hiss some curse at it but again something else caught my eye. I leaned down balancing on my toes to see the pile of books inside the box. They were all very dusty and old books. I took out one to see that the corner was burnt off, the title read, Words Written: A Novel. I set it down next to me and took out the next book. This one I recognized, Frankenstein. The old yellowed book had a toddler like drawing of what could have been Frankenstein or Shrek on the cover, it really could have gone either way. I set it down as well and pulled out another, this one was a red book with white lettering. The Three Musketeers. Boring! A bunch of guys running around in capes with big feathery hats, no thank you. I pulled out the next book was big, it had a dark green cover with gold ivy all over it. I flipped it over to read, Grimm’s Complete Fairy Tale. This one was not boring. I flipped to the first couple pages until I found a black ink illustration of a very pretty girl in a ridiculous puffy gown holding a severed head in one hand and a magic wand thing in the other. Definitely not boring. The caption below the picture said,

“The maiden fetched the magic wand and she took the dead girl’s head and dropped three drops of blood on the ground”
I scrolled back a page or two to the beginning of the story, Sweetheart Roland. Cradling the book in my lap I read through the story. Basically this chick, who was beautiful and kind, lived with her evil step mother and her fugly evil step sister. For some reason her step mom wanted to kill her so she tricked the evil witch lady into killing her own daughter instead of our damsel in distress. Like a damsel in distress she has a knight in shining armor which would be, Roland. After stealing her step mom’s magic wand she and her boyfriend fled the country. Of course the witch followed and they come up with all these clever tricks to get rid of the witch. In the end, Roland’s mad fiddling skills kill off the witch and he and his girlfriend live happily ever after. The End. I crawled to my feet and tucked the book under my arm before heading into my room. Once inside, I closed the door and fluffed up my bed so it would be much comfier then the walls of the hallway. Then again I opened the book. I read Rose Red and Snow White, The Singing Bone, The Robber Bridegroom, The Shoes that Where Danced to Pieces, The Hut in the Forest, Little Red Riding Hood, The Nix of the Mill Pond, The Master Thief, The Grave Mound, and many other horrifying children’s stories that really should never be read to a little kid. As I was flipping back to the story of The Riddle something slipped out of the book. A scrap of wrinkled old paper. I looked closely at the little yellowed slip and saw the words,
BEWARE DO NOT READ OUTLOUD FOR THE CONSEQUENCE IS DIRE
I laughed, what kind of joke was this? I flipped the paper over where in loopy old fashioned cursive some stuff was written which, of course I read aloud because I have problems with people telling me what to do,
“Fair volume of tale I bring the a key to a world where your fictions may becometh fact. Mei voti factus estverbis ad veneficas ” as I finished a shiver went up my spine. I frowned slightly and put the little slip of paper back in the book. Did it feel colder in here? Naw…I was just imagining it.

“And so Cynthia told me all about Mr. Warburton’s scandalous garden! Can you believe he planted Pansies in the spring! You don’t plant pansies in the spring!” Aunt Camilla laughed wildly as we drifted through the frozen section. I pulled my hoodie over my face and followed her past the frozen produce to the ice cream section where I grabbed some Haagen-Dazs Carmel Cone, one of my secret addictions. I figure that if I’m going to be miserable I might as well be miserable with a tub of ice cream. I threw it in the basket as we turned the corner to the snack section. “Let’s see….aha here they are” Aunt Camilla announced beaming as she grabbed a yellow bag of plantain chips of the shelf. I sighed and pulled the hoodie even more over my face. We walked to the cookie section where a group of teens was planted. It was the kind of group that all are captains of some sports team and all the girls have the same kind of hair and the guys are wearing fancy sneakers that always look new. “Ok that’s off the list… all I need now is foot cream, some carrots, and bananas” she said in a sing song voice. The group of teens looked over and laughed quietly. Then they spotted me. The girls with perfect straight hair started whispering with each other and smiling wickedly and the guys laughed too loudly and talked with their friends. As we passed by them I stuck my tongue out at them, not my best move but hey, it worked. The guys started talking about how I was some messed up emo chick and the girls probably were insulting my clothes.

“Hey Aunt Camilla I’m….going to do some shopping” I lied considering that I really didn’t want to watch Aunt Camilla hunt for foot creams. Aunt Camilla smiled and pushed back the peacock feather that was strapped to her green sunhat.

“Of course my little plantain” she turned around green Mumu billowing behind her and left me in the produce section. I sighed and started to waft around the fruit section. Playing with two pears I pretended that I was really thinking hard about the pears when I was really watching all the people. There was a mom with three little kids who were throwing grapes at each other, an old man who was grumbling to himself over the bell peppers, a lady in a gray blazer with a matching pencil skirt who was balancing a watermelon in one hand while talking on the phone with the other, two girls in medieval dresses by the apple section, a couple arguing in the juice isle…wait medieval dresses? I set down my pears and peered over the fruit. Yeah….I wasn’t imagining it, two girls a bit younger than me were shopping for apples in medieval gowns. The girl in the white dress had red curls of hair vs. the girl in the baby blue dress had almost white, platinum blonde hair. I was too curious, why would two girls go shopping dressed like that? Then I little bell rang in my head….where have I seen this before? Then that bell turned into a siren. Oh crap. I walked around the pears to the apple section and stopped in front of the girls. “Hi I’m Andie what’s your name?” I asked a little firmer then I probably should have asked. The two girls smiled and bowed, like for real….they bowed and held their skirts like they do in the movies.

“Our deepest pleasure to meet you Andie I am Rose Red….” The red headed one paused,

“and I am Snow White but I prefer to go by my given name Bianca” finished the blonde. They bowed again. I stood there in awe. Again, Oh crap.

“Your not screwing with me right?” I asked looking around for the hidden camera crew. They both looked completely confused.

“We do not…” said Rose

“Understand” finished Bianca completing her sister sentence. I looked at them both wildly. They looked just like the illustrations in the fairy tale book.

“Ummm…. How are you here?” I asked. They frowned at each other.

“We wouldn’t know, we were just picking flowers when suddenly….” Bianca started,
“A great sleep over came us and when we awoke we were in a different forest!” finished Rose. I nodded numbly.
“Right….” I murmured. The nodded eagerly.

“We were so scared but the miller found us in the woods!” exclaimed Bianca,

“And he took us to the camp were the others were” said Rose. My mouth hung open.

“Others?” I breathed. I had somehow brought characters from the book out into the real world.

“Yes they were all as surprised as we were! Dark magic some of them told us…” said Rose her eyes wide.
“but others said it was a gift from the lord above that brought us to this strange place” continued Bianca. “You know, you are the first person to greet us here”
“Yes the people in this place have been quit rude, really” said Rose frowning. Her frown quickly turned into a beaming smile though, “But you, Miss Andie have been so kind to us”
“Yes, so kind…Sister mine, do you think….?” Started Bianca
“Yes I do think so, don’t you…?” said Rose.
“Absolutely sister dear” Bianca turned back to me and smiled. “Miss Andie we would be so pleased to offer you some tea, it’s the most….” She ended,
“We can do to thank you for your kindness” finished Rose with the same smile. I nodded slowly. Two fairy tale characters were offering me tea….
“Ummmm well I guess I could…let me just tell my aunt that I’m having tea with Rose Red and Snow White”