Her Every Wish by Courtney Milan Read Free Book Online

way another man might stand up from a seat on an omnibus. It used to make her feel as if he were making room for her.
    This quiet felt disapproving.
    â€œOh, shut up, Crash,” she said, even though he hadn’t said anything at all. “I’m sure you had a jolly day making wagers on my eventual public embarrassment and searching for your…balls.”
    He made a little choking sound. “My carbolic smoke ball, you mean?”
    â€œI spent my day at honest labor.” Her voice shook. “Honest labor where every man who found me alone felt it was his right to pinch my behind.”
    â€œSo why is getting your behind considered honest labor, while—” He cut himself off. “Never mind. I’m not arguing with you.” He glanced at her and shook his head. “Walk faster. We’re almost there.”
    She trotted after him. They turned a corner and traversed a street. He dragged his velocipede through the mud of a park before he turned to look at her.
    â€œWhere are we going?” she asked.
    He gestured to an abandoned gravel footpath that followed the line of a canal. The waters were brown and stagnant, running sullenly through the gray warehouses on either side. “Here.”
    â€œHere?” She chafed her hands together. “What are we doing here? Could we not go somewhere warmer?”
    â€œNo.” He gave her a not-quite friendly smile. “We can’t. You see, I’m going to teach you how to ride my velocipede.”
    For a second, she had an image of herself hurtling into the canal at full speed. She flinched back. “Oh no. No. There isn’t a chance of it. That is not at all what I had in mind.”
    He pushed the contraption toward her. “Oh, yes,” he countered. “You are going to learn.”
    She shook her head more violently. “First, your stupid veloci-whatever has nothing to do with the competition. Second, I could not walk on a fence rail without falling off, ever. I have no balance to speak of, let alone enough to manage that—thing. I’m not here to ride your da—your dratted veloci…tastrophe. You said you were going to help me win.”
    â€œI did,” he said. “And this is how you’re going to do it. You’re going to—”
    â€œLet me guess: I’m going to wear a revealing outfit, come flying through the crowd on a velocicylsm, hurtle through a flaming hoop, and land on the stage to tumultuous applause.”
    He blinked and looked at her. “Well, that would be one way to manage it. But I had quite a different idea in mind. See, there’s a trick to riding a velocipede.”
    â€œYou have to be a lunatic.” Daisy sniffed.
    â€œCorrect,” Crash said. “You have to be a lunatic, although that is rather unkind to the lunatics, don’t you think?”
    She made a noise in her throat in response.
    â€œHere’s the trick: you have to not care. Our bodies learn motion from walking. When you’re walking, you learn to balance on your feet, to stay upright as you move. Height frightens us; speed more so. But all the rules we’ve told ourselves must be true about motion in general? They’re wrong when we’re on a velocipede.”
    He was warming to his subject matter. He leaned the contraption against a bench and began to use his hands to demonstrate.
    â€œOn a velocipede,” he told her, “you don’t need to balance.”
    â€œHow do you stay upright?”
    â€œThe faster you go, the more stable you are.”
    She snorted in disbelief.
    â€œI know it sounds unlikely, but it’s true. When you turn, you might be afraid that you’ll fall. You won’t—but to make sure, you should lean into the direction you’re turning.”
    â€œPoppycock.” She swallowed. “You’re trying to get your revenge. You’re trying to kill me.”
    He gave her an unreadable look. “You