Storytelling Theme Analysis

Bedtime stories were a group activity. And because showing the pictures all around to everyone involved a great deal of squirming and shoving and pinching and pushing and get-outta-my-ways and he-farted-on-mes and you-got-to-look-longer-than-I-dids, Penn often resorted to telling stories rather than reading them. He had a magic book he read from. It was an empty spiral notebook. He showed the boys it was blank so that there was no clamoring to see. And then he read it to them. Like magic.

“Girls in fairy tales are losers,” said Roo.

“No they aren't,” said Claude.

“Yes they are. Not like losers. Losers. Girls in fairy tales are always losing stuff.”

“Nuh-uh,” said Claude.

“Yuh-huh. They lose their way in the woods or their shoe on the step or their hair even though they're in a tower with no door and their hair is like literally attached to their head.”

“Or their voice,” Ben put in. “Or their freedom or their family or their name. Or their identity. Like she can't be a mermaid anymore.”

“Or they lose being awake,” said Roo. “And then they just sleep and sleep and sleep. Boooring.”

Claude started crying. “A princess could do cool stuff. A princess could be better than Grumwald. She wouldn't have to sleep or lose her shoe.”

“Poppy,” he said. “I want my new name to be Poppy.”

“Poppy?” Rosie whispered.

“Carmy says Jews name their babies after dead people they love. I never met Poppy, but I love her anyway.”

“You do?” Rosie was full of wonder.

“Yeah. Because she liked dolls. And because she was your favorite. I like dolls. And I want to be your favorite.”

“You are my favorite.” She nuzzled into his neck.

“Do you think Poppy is a good name?”

“I think Poppy is a perfect name.”

“I don’t want anything. I want . . . I only want to do whatever’s best for her.”

“Me too. Of course mc too. If we knew what that was. But unfortunately that exceeds my skill set. That's not prognosis. That's prognostication. We need a seer, not a doctor.”

“Then that’s my skill set,” said Penn.

“You can see the future?”

“It's the stuff of fairy tales, not hospitals.”

“That's a nice place to be,” Rosie admitted, “but it’s not real.”

“Sure it is,” said Penn. But Rosic rolled over and went to sleep.

But Claude felt better. He realized this was what his father had been up to all these years, not entertaining his children but perfecting his world. If you wrote your own characters, they didn’t disappoint you like real people did. If you told your own story you got to pick your ending. Just being yourself never worked, but if you made yourself up, you got to be exactly who you knew yourself to be.

“Very shelter life in palace so ignorant of poverty, sickness, old age, death. Then he go out into world and learn. Then he help. That is important part. Once he learn, he listen and tell, he help. He leave family, leave palace, leave being a prince.” Rosie nodded along. This part sounded familiar. “He learn about the world and the people. He meditate to learn to be. He give up all food and water and house, but then his body too loud to achieve peace so he learn again: too little as bad as too much. He teach, tell his story, help people see truth. He say be kind and forgive, honest and share. He say everything change so okay. He say middle way. He enlighten. That is the story. Learn mistake and fix and tell. Not-knowing to knowing. Even the Buddha You see?”

What was clear, however, was that the Buddha was born male, then cut off all his hair one day and got enlightened, then ended up looking like a girl. And as if that weren’t enough, the Buddha also seemed to feel that even things as unalterable as bodies were temporary, and what mattered was if you were good and honest, and forgiveness solved everything. That was how, whatever else they were, Claude and Poppy became Buddhists for life.

“Betwixt?” Grumwald was skeptical. “Isn't betwixt just a witchy way of saying in between?”

“Betwixt is more complex, more twisted threads, more layers than in between.” She smiled at him through rheumy eyes. “Betwixt a Prince and a night fairy is neither-nor as much as both-and. You see? Something new. Something more. Something better.”

“You have to tell. It can’t be a secret. Secrets make everyone alone. Secrets lead to panic like that night at the restaurant. When you keep it a secret, you get hysterical. You get to thinking you’re the only one there is who’s like you, who’s both and neither and betwixt, who forges a path every day between selves, but that's not so. When you're alone keeping secrets, you get fear. When you tell, you get magic. Twice.”

“Twice?”

“You find out you're not alone. And so does everyone else. That’s how everything gets better. You share your secret, and I'll do the rest. You share your secret, and you change the world.”