“It’s like—” said Molly. “It’s like this is where everything comes from.”
But there was something else that struck me about the place, something I couldn’t figure out at first. Something that reminded me of home. At last it hit me. In the hotel, and on all the streets we’d driven past, all the blocks we’d walked, everyone had been white. White everywhere.
Here the world was teeming with people speaking different languages, in all kinds of clothes. It was like the breadline. The farther we got from the hotel, the bigger the world felt, and the more I remembered.
Molly was staring every which way to take it all in. “I never thought,” she said. “I never knew there was so much out here, all of this.” Her eyes were shining. She was smiling. “Oh, Annie—it’s like from a story. But bigger than a story. It’s been here all this time. I never knew.”
As we headed away from the market, toward the fair, the smells and the sounds began to change. Music drowned the market noise, and the odor of fish was replaced with the scent of popping corn and burnt sugar. My steps grew quicker. We sped through the rows of houses. Then I noticed something. “Look at those!” I said, pointing.
We were passing tiny houses now, with low roofs. They looked ancient, made of dark cracked bricks. Some of the houses had hitching posts, and some had window boxes full of flowers. But the doors were the best. They had colorful pictures painted right onto their screens, landscapes of villages, dotted with red-roofed villas and trees. I stopped and ran my fingers along a screen.
“Why do you think they paint them? They can’t see the picture from inside.”
“No,” said Molly. “But when they’re coming home at the end of the day, they can. It’s like they’re walking into someplace else. I think it’s nice!”
I did too, but just then we turned a corner and arrived under the Ferris wheel. Here was the fair! Off in the distance, on the grandstand, a band was playing waltzy happy music. Up and down the brick streets all around us were brightly striped tents covered with big posters that advertised amazing sights, stupendous acts, and otherworldly creatures, painted in such bright colors it was hard to imagine any of it was real. All except the bearded lady, who didn’t look all that amazing to me. We had one of those working at our grocery store in Atlanta. Best of all was a picture of two beautiful Siamese sisters with long golden curls, connected at the back.
Molly stopped and stared at that painting. “It’s good, isn’t it?” she said.
“Good?”
“I mean—it’s good that they have each other. The girl with four arms and the man with none. The mermaid and the alligator man. And these twins—they must never get lonely. It’s good.”
“I guess,” I said. “I never thought about it like that.”
When we turned and walked deeper into the fair, things got louder, wilder. People shouted from every booth, calling out the great value of their delicious treats or their spangled dancers. An organ grinder’s tune competed with the songs from the bandstand, and kids rode around in circles on metal fire trucks, then stumbled off dizzy.
We watched a man hurl ball after ball at a pyramid of bottles, but try as he might, the bottles never fell. At last the man frowned and quit. The guy operating the game appeared to feel bad. He gave the loser a cigar and a pat on the back. But as the man walked away, I noticed there was a white handprint on the back of his shirt. I whispered to Molly, “What do you think that means?”
“I think it means we shouldn’t try to knock over any bottles,” she said.
Before long, we found ourselves in front of a stand where the smell of sugar was overpowering. It had been a while since breakfast.
“Cotton candy!” I said.
“What’s that?” asked Molly.
“Straight sugar! Mom always says if I’m going to rot my teeth out, I might as well eat cotton candy and get it done fast. You have to try it!”
Molly laughed as a woman swirled a mass of whispery pink strands onto a paper cone. “We’ll have one,” she said eagerly to the woman, “to share.” Then, with the candy in hand, she turned back to me and said, “I’d like to try everything!”
“Everything?”
Molly laughed. “I have a lot of catching up to do.”
I grinned. “Lead the way.”
First we made our way to the fried dough counter and bought one of those. Then we headed for the caramel popcorn stand, where we purchased a small paper bag of the treat.
“Hey, I’m going to drop something if I’m not careful,” I said. “How about I sit down over …” I turned around in a circle, looking for a good place to sit. “There!” I motioned with my head to an old tree with a tangled system of roots.
Molly nodded, and then ran off. She bought a hot dog, a lemonade, and a candy apple. One at a time she deposited them with me, until I was surrounded by an amazing junkfest. All of it identical to the fair food back home, in 1987.
I resisted the impulse to start eating until Molly came back, holding something funny. “What’s that?” I asked.
Molly shrugged. “I don’t know what most of these things are,” she said. She handed me the item in question, which appeared to be half a lemon with a broken candy cane jammed in it, then reached for the popcorn.
“What do I do with it?” I asked, nibbling at the rind and making a face.
Molly sat down. “Eat it, I suppose.”
“Eat a raw lemon?” I wrinkled my nose.
That was when a high voice piped up from behind the tree. “A lemon stick. Ain’t yous guys never seen a lemon stick?” A small face peered out at us from a long fall of dirty blond hair, and then a body in a stained dress joined the face. The girl looked six. “You suck it, like a straw.”
“Like this?” I asked. I put my mouth on the top of the broken candy cane and drew a long gulp. My mouth shot through with a zing of cold mint and tart lemon. “Yow!” I grinned.
“Yer welcome,” said the girl, her hands behind her back, eyeing our feast.
Molly, the candy apple stuck to her front teeth, looked the girl up and down. “Would you like something?” she asked the kid.
A smile split the girl’s face. “Would I ever!” she shouted, squatting down and grabbing for the fried dough. “Thanks, lady!”
I laughed. “She called you lady.”
In about two seconds, the dough was gone.
“Oh!” said Molly, setting down her apple. “Would you like another?”
The girl’s eyes widened. “My sister would too, I bet! She’s Olivia. I’m Annika. We’re twins. Livi!”
From behind the tree another girl, identical to the first, popped out. “Yup?” They were like two really filthy elves.
“All right,” said Molly. “Just wait. I’ll be back before you can say ‘Jack Robinson.’ ”
“Jack Robinson,” I said. But the elves didn’t laugh at my joke. They were too busy eating.
The girls gobbled up everything but my lemon stick, which I sucked slowly. By the time Molly returned, more dirty kids had joined us in the nest of tree roots. I wondered where their parents were. They looked awfully little to be alone.
“I suppose we’ll need some more!” said Molly. She left again.
But while she was gone, a police officer strolled up. I could feel his shadow over me, even before I turned around. He wasn’t the same guy from Woolworth’s, of course, but it still made me nervous. His nose glistened in the summer sun as he squinted down at us.
“What’ve we got here, kids?” he asked. “What’ve you all been up to, hey?”
For no reason, my heart began to race. I wished Molly would hurry back.
“Nuffin,” said Annika. “We ain’t doin’ nuffin wrong. These ladies just bought us lunch.”
“They did, did they?” The policeman crossed his arms over his chest. “And where have you been getting all this money from, miss?” he asked me.
“I—umm.” I looked up at his blue uniform, with all those shiny buttons, and though I
knew we hadn’t done anything wrong, I felt instantly flushed. Pictures flashed through my head of the smashing, crashing lamp disaster, and then of the girls’ home. I gulped. “Umm. My friend has an allowan—”
Just then Molly returned with a plate of hot dogs in each hand. I scrambled to my feet and ran over to her. “Hey, Molly, I think it’s time we left, don’t you? We’re … umm, meeting your mom at the Ferris wheel, remember?” I tried to wink so that the policeman wouldn’t see me.
At first Molly was baffled. She looked at the policeman, and then at me. “But—but I wanted to try the cotton—”
I took the cone of cotton candy from the boy who’d buried his face in the sticky pink cloud. “Here you go,” I said with a cheery fake smile, grabbing her hand. Hot dogs fell to the ground and rolled from their buns. I ignored them.
“All right, all right,” said Molly as she let me push her. “Goodbye, everyone, goodbye!” She waved to all the other kids as we walked away. They scurried to pick up the hot dogs.
The policeman watched us walk away. Each time I turned to look back over my shoulder, he was still there, staring at me. I willed myself to face forward as we made our way to the Ferris wheel, bought our tickets, and climbed into the hot metal bucket.
Once we were up in the sky, with the fair spread out below us, I lost sight of him, and everything melted away. It was just me and Molly, our legs dangling over the booths and the water. It was like any Ferris wheel, every Ferris wheel. It was like the Georgia State Fair, with Mom. We rocked back and forth, and the bucket rocked with us.
“Look.” Molly pointed at Annika and Olivia off in the distance, beneath their tree. We rode up and down and around and around.
After the Ferris wheel, we wandered for a bit. A lot of the fair was just beer tents and grown-ups dancing, which didn’t interest us. As the church bells above us rang out, we realized it was time to meet Frank. Of course, that was when we passed a small tent that made us stop and stare. Sitting in front of the tent flap was a table covered in tiny glass bottles and a sign that read:
As we stood there, a man stepped from inside the tent. “May I help you?” he asked.
Fortunata wasn’t what I’d expected at all. I’d pictured an old Gypsy-looking lady with big earrings and loads of black eyeliner, not a young man in a neat gray suit. He was clean-shaven, with soft brown hair and kind eyes. The air around him was quieter somehow. He gave a shy smile from beneath the brim of a squashed hat. In his hand he held a large white flower, faded and dying, the petals spotted with tan and brown.
Molly looked at the flower. “What is it?” she asked as she neared his table. “What do you have there?”
“Just magic,” said the man. He gave the flower a soft shake.
“Real magic?” Molly asked.
I watched Molly watch the man. He looked nice enough, but Prophesies and Predictions? It was like something from an episode of the Twilight Zone or Alfred Hitchcock Presents. Too much like a story to be real.
“Wait,” he said. “Patience.” In front of our eyes, he opened a bottle of silvery blue dust and sprinkled a pinch of it onto the flower. He closed his eyes and shook the blossom, and when he stopped, it didn’t look so dead.
I blinked, rubbed my eyes, and stared again. Was it possible the brown spots and streaks were vanishing? They were! Right in front of my eyes. The flower in front of me now was perfect, pristine, white, and fresh, as though it had just been plucked. A few petals had fallen to the tabletop, but even those now gleamed.
“No way! How’d you do that?” I asked, looking from the man to the flower and back again. “What’s the trick?”
The man’s eyes were soft. “A trick is only a game you haven’t figured out the rules to,” he said in his calm voice.
“You want us to believe you have real magic, in bottles?” I said. “For sale?”
The man shrugged. “I don’t have magic. Magic just is.”
“What do you mean?” asked Molly.
“Magic is what people call it when the universe corrects itself and they happen to be watching. Sometimes this”—he held up the bottle—“can help.”
“I don’t understand,” said Molly.
“Now and then,” said the man, “a thing needs to happen so badly the universe decides to rearrange itself. People like to call such events evolutions or miracles, depending on who they are and what they profess to believe. But it’s all the same. I prefer to call it magic.”
“So if I wish for something, it could actually happen?” asked Molly.
“Why not?” said the man. “If you’re wishing hard enough, and it’s something you genuinely need, why wouldn’t the universe set things to rights?” He winked and added, “It only takes faith. But for only one shiny half dollar, I can help your faith along.”
“This is a scam,” I said, tugging at Molly’s sleeve. “Let’s go.”
She shook me off. “Does it only work on flowers?” she asked. “Or can it help other things?”
“A true wish can do anything,” said the man. “If you need it, in your heart.”
“Please,” said Molly. “Speak plainly. We’re in a hurry. I only want to know—can that dust make people better? Can it make me better?”
The man looked her straight in the eyes. “Better than what? Better depends on how bad things are.”
I don’t know why, but I got the chills when he said that. The man seemed nice enough, but there was something about his calm tone that made me nervous. “Let’s go,” I said. “We’ll miss Frank. Please?”
Molly set down a big half dollar on the purple cloth and took the bottle. “Thank you, Fortunata,” she said.
“Oh, you can call me Seymour,” he said pleasantly.
Molly waved over her shoulder as we ran, but I reached up and grabbed her hand midwave and pulled her along with me faster. Through the brick streets and past the music and the booths, until we were back near the market and the smell of fish.
“Slow down.” Molly laughed. “Frank will wait.”
But I didn’t feel like slowing down. Something about all the wishing talk had made me nervous. For the first time, I only wanted to be back, safe, in the hotel. Still holding hands, panting slightly, we pushed right through the market, past buckets of flowers and men in bloodstained butcher aprons. When we shot out on the other side, there was Frank’s shiny black taxi. He leaned against his door, smoking a cigarette.
I was relieved to see him, a familiar face. Besides Molly and Nora, I guessed I knew Frank better than anyone in town at this point.
“Frank!” I called.
“Why, hey!” he shouted, jumping up and opening our door. “You made it!”
We walked around the car. Molly climbed up onto the running board and I followed her.
Frank tossed his cigarette into the street, slammed our door shut, climbed in, and stepped on the gas. The car sprang out into the brick road.
“How was the fair?” he asked. “Yous guys see anything good?”
“We did,” said Molly. “We saw it all.”
“Very nice, very nice,” said Frank. “And where exactly do you want me to take you now?”
“The alley behind the Hotel Calvert,” I said without thinking.
“The alley?” He turned around. “Really?”
“It’s … umm … a shortcut to our house,” I said.
Frank chuckled. “I don’t even want to know what you girls are up to, do I?”
“Perhaps it’s better if you don’t,” admitted Molly.
“Your money, ladies. Your choice.” Frank whistled as he drove along.
Safe in the car, Molly cradled Fortunata’s tiny bottle in her hands, then held it up to the sunlight streaming in the rear window. It dazzled. “Do you think I’m supposed to eat it?” she asked. “Or perhaps sprinkle it onto my skin, like he did with the flower?”
“I don’t think you should do anything with it,” I said. “Definitely don’t eat it.”
“But you saw what it
did to the flower! It made it perfect.”
“That was a trick,” I said. “Don’t you think if he really had a magical lifesaving potion, he’d be working at a hospital? Obviously I believe in magic. Just not the kind people sell in bottles. Seriously, that stuff could make you sick.”
“I’m already sick,” said Molly.
“Look,” I said, turning to her. “I know you’ll be fine without any stupid dust. You’ll live a long time. You just have to believe me.”
“But …”
“If you’re sick, I’m sick, Molly. I have trouble breathing too. Do I need to eat blue sparkles? Don’t I seem fine?”
Molly nodded slowly. “You do,” she said. “You always do.”
“So we wheeze. We shouldn’t run up mountains. But we’re in the same boat, Molly. Please trust me?”
I thought Molly would argue, but she didn’t. She just said, “I do, Annie. I do trust you. If you really believe that I shouldn’t try it, I won’t.”
“You mean that?”
“Truly,” she said, slipping the bottle into her pocket.
That night, when Nora came up with dinner, we were collapsed on the carpet with Friend, staring at the ceiling. The maid burst into laughter. “I won’t ask what you’ve been up to,” she said. “But you look like tired puppies.”
“Oh, Nora!” said Molly, sitting up. “We are tired, but it was such a day! We went to a fair!”
“When you weren’t here for lunch,” said Nora, “I was a mite concerned. But I’m pleased you had a good day.” She set down her tray and served us each a plate of something fishy. Without meaning to, I wrinkled my nose.
“Now, now,” scolded Nora, “plenty of children would be delighted with a nice bit of fish. You two don’t know how lucky you are.”
A picture of Annika’s and Olivia’s grubby, hungry faces flitted through my brain. I felt instantly awful, and I forced down a bite of the fish as penance.
“That said,” added Nora, “I have something else for you too. Look!” She ducked into the hallway and returned with a red metal box.
Seven Stories Up Page 10
