Catherine already knew what her fatal flaw was, although she didn't actually expect it to ever be fatal. In fact, she didn't really even think of it as a flaw. Being inquisitive was a good thing, as far as she was concerned. It was a sign of an active, intelligent mind. And it had never really gotten her into too much trouble. Sure, she'd gotten a few scoldings as a kid for trying to find out what her Christmas and birthday presents were--she remembered her dad saying, "Curiosity killed the cat...Cat," and the two of them bursting into giggles as he couldn't hold his frown. But apart from giving her an interesting nickname, Cat had always thought of her curiosity as, at worst, an endearing quirk. She never tried too hard to repress it, and loved to indulge it.
All of which explained why she couldn't help but stop, that warm summer day as she biked through the forest. It wasn't that it was so unusual to see someone sitting by the side of the bike path, although you didn't get many people this deep in the trails. It wasn't that the person she saw appeared to be a little girl, sitting under a tree with her knees drawn almost all the way up to her chin, staring intensely at Cat as she approached. It was that the girl had a box balanced on her knees, an ornate wooden box with beautiful baroque carvings, and she held it tightly with both hands as if to keep it safe, even this far away from any potential thieves.
As soon as she saw it, Cat wondered what had to be inside the box to make the little girl so protective, and she knew she'd never get any peace until she found out. And if that wasn't a fatal flaw, it was near enough.
She brought her bike to a skidding stop just a few feet past the girl and leaned it against a tree, then turned back to the girl. "Hello!" she said brightly, just before her voice froze in her throat. Not out of fear, merely out of embarrassment--up close, the 'little girl' looked to be about Cat's age. She was slender and willowy, with barely any breasts to speak of, but Cat could tell that it had just been the girl's clothing and body language that had suggested youth. Her eyes told a different story. Nobody looking this girl in the eyes could mistake her for a child, even if her long black hair was done up in pigtails and she had a little pink ribbon in her hair. Cat felt silly for greeting her in the kind of tones you reserved for talking to very small children.
"Um, hi," she said casually, trying to salvage her pride. "My name's Cat. What's yours?"
The girl looked up at Cat, her face slightly glum. Cat couldn't quite shake that impression of the girl as child-like, and her voice didn't help. "Zoe," she said, sounding every inch the bored child humoring a grown-up.
"Hi, Zoe," Cat said, trying not to sound like Mister Rogers when she said it. "That's a really interesting box you have, there."
"S'a birfday present," Zoe said. It sounded almost affected, like she was a grown-up impersonating a child. Which, Cat reminded herself, she clearly was. But why come out here, all the way to the middle of the woods, and impersonate a little girl for the benefit of a chance passer-by? "It's magic," Zoe added after a moment.
"Magic, huh?" Cat said, sitting down next to Zoe. "What's inside it?" She'd meant to ask, 'What's magic about it?' But the desire to know what was under the lid that Zoe held so tightly shut could only be forestalled for so long, and Cat had never been known for her patience.
Zoe scooted around so that she was facing Cat. "Take a look for yourself," she said, handing the box to Cat.
Cat hadn't really expected it to be that easy. From the way Zoe was holding the box, she'd expected to have to do some serious cajoling to get the girl to let her see the contents of the 'magic' box. Still, not one to look a gift horse in the mouth, Cat set the box on her knees (sliding her feet forward a little to lower the box so she could look into it more easily) and opened it up.
She was more than a little disappointed at what she saw. "It's empty," she said.
