The Giving Store: an Ellery Companion

The tree was so happy she could hardly speak.
-The Giving Tree, Shel Silverstein

For Shelby
because sometimes Ella is you

Kate Castle leans over and takes the little hand in hers, fingers curling around Ellery's wrist to make sure she has a good hold on her. Ellery isn't at all like Dashiell was at this age - no dashing - but she's definitely sly and clever enough to look up at her mother as the subway doors open and then obstinately step right out as they close.

Ella is incorrigible like that. She's her own little person, knows her own mind, even if she's completely wrong.

"Remember, baby girl," Kate murmurs. She knows Ellery has to lean in to hear her over the sounds of the subway, but Kate has discovered that quietness is the fastest way to get both of her kids to listen. "We're going to meet Allie. You want to see Allie before she leaves, don't you?"

Ella lifts her chin and gives a nod, silent and watchful. Her eyes trail past Kate to look out the doors of the subway car as they open at the station. Kate keeps her hand firmly around Ellery's, projecting calm and control. Half the battle with Ella is maintaing confidence.

Kate eyes the crowded subway car, noting the busker who's coming through with a coffee cup. She shifts her free hand to her back pocket, searching for something to give even as Ellery tugs sharply on her coat. Fierce little Ella, whose scowling face is demanding attention even in her absolute silence. Demanding, up on her toes to get at her mother.

Kate finds a crumpled dollar - change from the bottle of water she bought at the corner store - and she slips it into Ellery's waiting hand. Ella gives her that pleased smile, eyes crinkling, and Kate crouches to scoop up her daughter into her arms so the girl can reach. She leans them both against the pole as the subway car swerves roughly around a corner.

The street person shuffles forward and commuters part automatically for him, most ignoring the cup. But Ellery leans out eagerly from Kate's hip, flapping the dollar in the man's direction, still not speaking but definitely drawing attention.

A few smiles, a few frowns, and the man is giving a gap-toothed grin to Ellery as he offers up the cup. Ella deposits the dollar with some ceremony, and then she leans back into Kate, clasping her hands together, her grin wide and proud.

The man tips his head at Kate, leans in and smiles at her daughter. "Thank you ever so much, little doll," he grumbles to Ella.

Ellery hugs herself, so pleased, and then - before Kate can move - leans out and pats the man's shoulder, as if sending him on his way.

He chuckles and goes, pushing through to the front end of the car, and Kate catches Ellery under the arm to bring her daughter back against her body before she can be over-balanced.

She sees a couple passengers frowning, displeased, passing judgment, but Kate brushes her lips across Ellery's cheek, nudging her nose into her daughter's. "You have a kind heart, Ella."

Ellery gives back a rare and precious, "Mommy." In it is the whole of the world and love itself, and Kate wraps her arm around Ella's neck.

She forces the girl into a hug, her daughter wriggling as she cuddles against her chest. Kate murmurs love in her ear, cupping the side of her face. "Volim te, mala svraka."

Ella doesn't say anything more, but she does start to hum against Kate's shoulder, settling in, little arms around her neck. Kate thinks she recognizes the song, wishes and stars, and she rubs her daughter's back, humming herself.

At the next station, the homeless man leaves, disappears, and Ellery, so proud, is still snuggled against her mother.

It's just outside the pharmacy on 68th Street that they meet up with Allie. She arrived first and is sheltered in a doorway, gaze on her phone, thumbs moving. Kate has spotted her before she's seen them. A darker lock of red hair has curled around her chin and brushes her lips so that Allie has to push it back, hook it behind her ear.

Ella is already leaning forward as if to urge her mother faster, faster. Kate wouldn't let her walk when they got off the subway, too crowded, but the girl has been content to be carried through the streets like the queen of the realm.

Castle really has to stop babying her. This total absorption with her needs might have worked as a parenting style for Alexis, but Kate can already tell that their baby girl has grown somewhat imperious. She'll never deign to talk if they carry on like this.

"Okay, okay," she murmurs near Ella's ear. "I see her. We have to wait for the light so we can cross safely."

Ellery grunts and slumps back into Kate's clasp, one arm hooked around Kate's neck, fingers up at the base of Kate's skull. Dashiell used to do that, curl his fingers in her hair. He still does even now when he's tired, but Ellery doesn't. Not usually. She hopes it's not a sign that the girl is cranky, ready to tantrum. Not when their day is so full.

The lights change and, across the street, Allie lifts her head at the movement, catches sight of them. The grin lights up her whole face and she winds her way right to them, stopping foot traffic as she takes Ellery.

"Hey, Ella-bug, oh. You've got such a fierce hug today. Thank you."

Kate smiles, nudges Allie out of the flow of pedestrians, lets them pause to one side so Ella can have the entirety of her big sister's attention.

Cheek to cheek with Ellery, Allie grins at Kate, offers an arm for a side-hug. Kate slips in beside her, hugs her back, and then steps away to give the girls room.

"So what are we doing on our girls' day out?" Allie asks, tugging down Ellery's purple shirt. "Is it a surprise, Ellery-Kate?"

"I not know," Ella whispers, leaning in close. She puts her hands to Allie's cheeks and blinks rapidly, exaggeratedly, but Allie must know exactly what the girl wants. Kate watches them give butterfly kisses until Ellery giggles and squirms, pushing her hands down between them and ducking her chin to her chest.

"It's a surprise," Kate tells her. "And it took some fast talking to get your dad to agree."

Allie lifts a stunned look to Kate. "Dad wouldn't care-"

"I mean - oh, no, that's not what it sounds like," Kate protests, chuckling at the girl's face. "He wanted to show you himself. He was going to take you before you went back to Chicago."

"Oh, that kind of thing. Then it's either a candy store or a bookstore," Allie laughs.

Kate wrinkles her nose. "Darn."

"It is. Oh, I'm guessing bookstore. Bookstore! Called it," Allie grins widely, turning to tickle Ellery with her fingers, their foreheads crashing together. Ella squirms and giggles, so very adoring of her seldom-seen big sister, and suddenly Kate is stupidly grateful that Castle let her have this one.

She's missed Allie too. She's missed what Allie does for Ellery, how happy the girl is to have her older sister.

"Bookstore," Kate confirms. "But it won't be anything you expect. You guys ready?"

"We're ready. Right, Ella-bean?"

Ella leans in and lays her head against Allie's shoulder. Poor Allie; she always has to entertain the kids, cater to them, pay attention, me next, Allie, me next. And Allie does, she gets right down on the floor with them, or she listens to their wild stories, or she nuzzles and cuddles until they feel important.

Kate is lucky to have a step-daughter like Alexis. Lucky that the girl didn't hold Kate's behavior against her when she was pregnant with Dashiell. Lucky that Allie needed someone to call mom almost as much as Kate needed to be needed.

She reaches out and smooths a strand of Ella's hair out of her eyes, realizing in that moment that Castle isn't the only one giving their baby a royal complex. "All right, then. Let's get going. It's only a few blocks."

She moves to lead the way, but at the last second, Ellery leans forward out of Allie's arms. She hold her hands out to Kate, pitiful pleading in those blue eyes. Mommy.

Stupid, stupid, but Kate's heart thumps and her breath catches at being her daughter's preference, and she takes Ella up into her arms, holding her too close, too tight.

Okay, they all might be guilty of being wrapped around Ella's little finger.

Brazen Head Books.

Allie has needed this.

A long, slow meander through this cramped apartment-turned-bookstore with her so-little sister before she heads back to Chicago. Ellery is quiet, and respectful - she gets that from Kate, Allie thinks, that instinctive posture of wonder before the written word - and it's easy to share books with her, despite her age.

"Oh, Ella, look at this one. I used to read this to Dashy when he was little." Allie slides the book off the shelf with two fingers, prying it from the crowded volumes. "See? Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus."

Ellery sneaks in under her arm to open the book, and Allie settles down on a wicker ottoman placed strategically between the cramped children's bookshelves. She gathers her sister onto her lap, spreads the book over Ellery's legs.

She reads in the same knowing, cheerful voice she read to Dash. "'Hi! I'm the bus driver. Listen, I've got to leave for a little while, so can you watch things for me until I get back? Thanks. Oh, and remember-'"

"'Don't let the pigeon drive the bus,'" a voice finishes.

Allie laughs and glances up to find Kate leaning against the taller bookshelf, lips curled in a smile. "You remember." She leans in over Ellery and hugs her closer. "Did you hear that, Ella-bug? Mommy knows this story really well."

"Dashiell wanted it every night for months," Kate smiles, straightening up and coming towards them. She dusts her fingers over Ellery's forehead and the girl, as usual, ducks out of her mother's touch.

Allie squeezes the girl's knees in retaliation, and Ella squirms, glances up at her mother in the only form of communication Ellery does these days: a penetrating stare. She's got curiously telling eyes and a mouth as wide and expressive as Kate's; she doesn't need words.

"I know, Ellery," Kate murmurs. "I'll leave you alone with Allie. She's not here much longer." Kate leans in and kisses Ella's cheeks, one after another with that smacking sound, being a little silly with it. It works, breaking Ellery's ferocity with giggles. Always so serious.

Kate lifts and touches her kiss to Allie's forehead, a brief glance of cool lips, shocking in its familiarity and yet - and yet, so foreign to her.

Allie has been in Chicago so long now, away from her family, that she's forgotten how Kate adopted her. Forgotten what it means to be one of Kate's.

"See you in an hour or so," her mother says quietly. "I'll be browsing, if you need me." Kate glances down at Ellery. "Though I know you, my stubborn girl, won't need me one bit. Have fun with Allie."