Page 109 of Mad Mabel

“How did you get in here, anyway?”

“My mum has a key,” she admits. “I took it.”

I’d given Roxanne a key a couple of weeks ago when she’d knocked and I hadn’t heard. She’d panicked and thought I’d “done an Ishaan” (aka keeled over and was lying dead on the kitchen floor). I’d agreed to give her a key so she could investigate under such circumstances, which this most certainly is not.

Lucky for Roxanne, I like this circumstance much more, not that I’ll ever admit it.

“Elsie,” Persephone says. “Why did you choose the name Daphne for your imaginary friend?”

I am impressed. “You’ve been reading the newspapers?”

“I watched the YouTube documentary,” she says.

“Did you?” I say. “Doesn’t seem like ideal viewing for a seven-year-old.”

“If you tell my mum, you’re not coming to my birthday party.”

Jeez. Kids can be so snotty sometimes.

“Fine,” I say. “I guess the damage is done anyway.”

“As I was saying,” Persephone says, “I think Daphne is a stupid name. I would have called her Daisy.”

“As would be your right,” I say, “if she wasyourfriend.”

She looks thoughtful. “Why did you have an imaginary friend anyway?”

“Well,” I say, “when I was a child, I didn’t have any friends of my own. Not a single one.”

Persephone looks at me, her eyes wide and appalled. “Seriously?”

“Seriously,” I say. “And… I read a lot of books. I had a good imagination. So I made one up.”

Persephone is uncharacteristically impressed. “What a good idea.”

“I thought so.”

“Do you still talk to her?”

“Sometimes. Less and less, lately.”

I can see the cogs turning in her brain. “So… you don’t talk to her as much anymore because of me? Because I am your friend so you don’t need her anymore?”

I roll my eyes. The narcissism of children.

She flashes me a self-satisfied grin, and I feel something move in my chest. Looking at her now, the morning sun catching her hair, I can’t believe I never noticed how pretty she is. How precious.

“Off with you,” I say. “You’re going to be late for school.”

She glances at the clock on the wall and then scrambles off the bed. “Bye, Elsie. See you after school.”

“Not if I can help it,” I say.

On the way to the door, she pauses at my feet. “Cool socks,” she says, and runs outside.

I look down at my feet. Theyarelovely, it’s true. They’re maroon with gray diamonds. Pure wool.

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