Grace in the Mirror (Fairy Tale Found Book 1)

by Kristy Tate

  Grace followed Brock, Violet, and the dogs into the outbuilding. Sunlight filtered through chinks in the ill-fitting wallboards and cast long shadows over the collection of stuff. The cupboard stood apart from the piled boxes and stacks of books like it had been waiting for them to arrive. Dust and grime clung to its sides and doors, but rosy-wood and intricate carving entranced Grace. A soft whistle escaped her lips.

  “You got the money?” Violet asked.

  Brock pulled out his wallet and showed her a wad of bills.

  Violet watched, her greedy eyes carefully counting as he handed her the money. The dogs, catching a whiff of Violet’s excitement, scurried around soundlessly.

  “It’s worth more than that,” Violet said without conviction. “But I’m letting it go because it don’t fit with my décor.”

  Brock lifted an eyebrow at Grace, which she interpreted to mean Violet has décor?

  Grace tried to help move the cupboard, which probably outweighed her by fifty pounds, but Brock waved her away.

  “I think it’s easier on my own.” He leaned into the cupboard and lifted it off its bun feet.

  “Please don’t be macho. Your mom is paying me to help you.” Grace stepped in front of him.

  “And I’ll pay you to stay out of my way,” he said.

  “Used to belong to my uncle, a magician,” Violet said, “although he didn’t call himself that. Called himself an illusionist.”

  “What was his name?” Grace asked, trying to be polite while tagging after Brock to make sure he didn’t drop the cupboard on his toes.

  “Called himself Half-Light Harvey.” Violet snorted. “My dad called him Half-Wit Perv, but that’s another story.”

  “Everything has a story,” Brock muttered.

  “What’s that?” Violet asked.

  “Everything has a story,” he repeated in a louder voice. “The story is what makes a thing valuable.”

  “Well, there ain’t no—” Violet caught herself. “You folks from the O.C.?”

  “He is,” Grace jerked her thumb at Brock while he tried hoisting the cupboard into the back of the Ford. “I’m from Oregon.”

  Violet’s eyes brightened, as if she suddenly found Grace interesting. “This mutt here is from Oregon.” She rubbed the fur of a midsized dog with a rounded snout.

  Brock’s face started to purple. Knowing he wasn’t going to ask for help, Grace went to stand beside him and placed her hands next to his. Together they slid the cupboard into the truck’s bed.

  “Do you think we should lay it down?” Grace asked.

  Brock nodded, and they eased the cupboard onto its back. A door flapped open and a paper escaped. It hung in the air for a moment before Grace caught it.

  “What’s that?” Brock asked, brushing his hands on his jeans.

  “I’m not sure,” she said.

  Brock looked over her shoulder at a scrawl of cursive written in fading ink on a yellowing sheet of paper.

  “Read it in the truck,” he said. In a lower voice, he added, “Let’s get out of here.”

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  “How does my mom find this stuff?” Brock tightened his grip on the steering wheel and turned back onto the highway. His thoughts churned with unanswered questions. He wanted to confide in Grace, but he didn’t dare.

  “Did you ask her?”

  “Not this time.” Asking, in the past, hadn’t been useful. “Do you want to get something to eat? I’ll treat.”

  “No,” Grace insisted. “I pay my own way.”

  Brock pulled up beside a small joint with a sign that read Hurricane’s Hamburgers.

  “Are you sure you don’t want anything?” he asked as they sat at a picnic table covered with a vinyl red and white checked cloth.

  “I’m sure,” Grace said.

  Brock rolled his eyes, and went to place his order while Grace pulled out the paper they’d found. Nerves tingled through him. The paper made him edgy. He was used to—well, sort of—the strange things his mom brought home, but he didn’t want anyone else to know. He felt protective of his mom, and nervous about what could happen if people found out that she collected…oddities.

  Brock returned to the table a few minutes later with two hotdogs smothered in ketchup, mustard and relish, a mound of French fries, and two cups of water.

  “This is so…”Grace began.

  “Delicious?” he asked, right before biting into one of the hotdogs.

  “No,” she said. “Incredible.”

  “Incredible how?” The blood in his head pounded, but he tried to ignore it. He played it cool. Focused on his hotdog.

  Grace showed him the paper. “According to this—you can put anything into the cupboard and it will manifest your secret desire.”

  Brock snorted a half-laugh, even though he found the situation becoming less and less funny. “So you mean that if I put a French fry in the cupboard and wish it to be a hamburger—it’ll turn into a hamburger?”

  “Yes, I think that’s exactly what it means.”

  Brock bit into his hotdog and took his time chewing and swallowing. “What if you don’t want your desire manifested?”

  Grace frowned at him. “Everyone wants their desires manifested.”

  “No, not everyone. You might know something’s not good for you, but want it anyway.” He couldn’t help thinking of Alicia.

  “It would be tricky, of course. You couldn’t put in a rock and wish for a truck.” Grace wrinkled her forehead and stared at the cupboard.

  “Why not?”

  “Because the truck would be too big. It would crush the cupboard, and then you wouldn’t have it anymore.”

  “Maybe you could recycle the wood.” Brock hoped he sounded indifferent.

  Grace laughed. “You’re not taking this seriously.”

  “And neither are you. At least I hope you’re not.”

  “We have to try it.”

  “Are you going to help me?”

  “Maybe I don’t want you to know my secret desires,” she said.

  “I meant, are you going to help eat the French fries?”

  “Oh.” She took a few French fries and chewed as she read. “Wait. There’s a clause.”

  “What kind of magic cupboard has a clause?”

  “This one does.” She skimmed over the paper. “In fact, it looks like there are a bunch of clauses and provisions.”

  “Like what?”

  “The cupboard may not grant or deny life.” Grace read directly from the paper.

  “So it can’t kill or bring people back to life?”

  Grace nodded. “Oh, this is interesting. ‘One must have pure purpose of heart.’ I wonder what that means.”

  Brock tried to look indifferent and ate his French fries with studied intention.

  “Still…”

  Brock laughed. It sounded forced to his ears, but he hoped it fooled Grace. “You don’t really believe that Violet had a magic cupboard, do you?”

  “I guess not,” Grace said, her tone suggesting she wished otherwise. “I still want to try it.”

  Brock scowled at her, afraid of what would happen if they did try. What if it was magic? It really wouldn’t be so different from the whispering painting, or some of the other things he’d seen. “I don’t.”

  “Why not?”

  “All that religious training from the Catholic school.”

  “How is a magic cupboard so different from a burning bush or the parting of the Red Sea?”

  Brock’s French fry froze midair. “Seriously?” He scooted away from her. “I better stand back so I don’t get charred when you burst into flames.”

  As he’d hoped, Grace let it go.

  #

  Kelly arrived on Thursday night. When Grace saw her in the airport, homesickness rose in Grace’s throat, choking her with longing for home. Kelly looked the same—tall, thin, long dark curly hair. She launched herself into Grace’s arms. They laughed, hugged, and cried. Arm in arm, they headed for the b
aggage claim.

  Kelly filled her in on all the Salmon Dale gossip on their way home from Santa Ana, and Grace told her about her new friends, Brock, and the magic cupboard.

  In her head, Grace compared Santa Magdalena to Salmon Dale. She tried to see Santa Magdalena through Kelly’s eyes. Grace had been there off and on all her life, so she couldn’t remember the first time she’d spotted a limousine idling at an intersection or a small tract house with landscaping that rivalled a hotel on the Las Vegas strip. Kelly’s eyes widened when they pulled up to Bear Ranch’s gates behind the line of Mercedes, Teslas, and the occasional gardener’s truck. The guard waved them in.

  Kelly whistled when they drove past Brock’s house. “It looks like it belongs in a fairy tale.”

  “I know, right?”

  “And it’s so weird, especially since meeting the dwarfs, Prince Charming—”

  “Don’t forget the magic cupboard!”

  “Did you try it?”

  Grace shook her head.

  “Why not?”

  She shrugged. “Brock didn’t want to, so I didn’t push it.”

  “We have to!” Kelly bounced on the edge of her seat.

  Grace sucked in a deep breath, remembering all the other times Kelly’s ideas had gotten them into trouble, like the time they’d snuck into Dr. Burges’ pool when they thought he was on vacation, and he thought he was alone. Or when Kelly borrowed her mom’s car before she knew how to drive. Or—really, the list was pretty long and about as ugly as Dr. Burges in the middle of a green mud skin treatment.

  “I’m not going to ask Brock again.”

  “Then I will.’”

  “You don’t even know him.”

  “I’ll get to know him!”

  That was one of the things Grace admired about Kelly—she was able to see exactly what she wanted and go after it.

  “Where is he?”

  Grace hated that she knew the answer. She didn’t want to stalk Brock. She knew that he—sort of—had a girlfriend. She knew that he thought of Grace as just a friend. And yet, given that she lived right next door, she had learned to pick up on and read Brock’s clues. A surfboard in the back of his BMW convertible meant the beach. His track uniform meant cross-country practice. A backpack meant a study session.

  Kelly lightly punched her arm. “You know, don’t you?”

  Grace’s cheeks flamed. “I don’t know where he is right this second.” She pulled the Jeep into the garage beside her grandpa’s aged Oldsmobile.

  “But—”

  “There’s a football game tonight and an after-party at Patrick Swenson’s house.”

  Kelly beamed. “So his house is empty?”

  “Are you crazy? They have a security system.”

  “Do you know how to turn it off?”

  Grace climbed from the Jeep and slammed the door.

  Kelly followed.

  “How did you know?” Grace asked in a small voice.

  “Oh please, I can read you.”

  “What?”

  Kelly pulled out a suitcase. “For one thing, you always rub your nose when you lie.”

  “I do not!” Instinctively, Grace started to raise her hand to scratch her nose, but stopped herself, and shoved both hands into her pockets.

  Kelly’s laugh echoed off the garage walls.

  “Seriously, how did you know I had the security code?”

  Kelly lifted a shoulder. “The real question is what are we going to do about it?”

  “You are so bad for me,” Grace said, pulling her hands from her pockets so she could help get Kelly’s luggage from the back of the Jeep.

  “We have to make sure Brock goes to the game,” Kelly said, following her into the house.

  “How are we going to do that?”

  “Heather,” Kelly breathed as they opened the door and met Heather and Toby in the mudroom.

  “Hey, Kelly,” Heather said. “How are you?” She held out her palm.

  “Where you guys going?” Grace asked, placing the Jeep’s keys in Heather’s outstretched hand.

  “I promised Toby we’d do something fun if he aced his math test,” Heather said.

  “And I totally did!” Toby gave them a fist pump.

  “Awesome,” Grace said, rubbing the top of his head.

  “So, what are you doing for fun?” Kelly asked.

  “We haven’t really decided yet,” Heather said.

  “Heather wants to go to the lake, but I told her it’s for babies,” Toby said.

  “Why do you say that?” Grace asked.

  “Oh please,” Toby wailed. “It’s super shallow and there’s cement underneath the sand. Besides, Hudson calls it the pee-pee pool.”

  Grace lifted her eyebrows at Heather.

  “Hudson is his new BFF and the authority on everything,” Heather said.

  “You should get to choose what you do,” Kelly told Toby.

  “Well, of course, but…” Heather said.

  Grace saw the thoughts spinning in Kelly’s head.

  “The football game!” Kelly exclaimed. “I heard Superman is going to be at the halftime show. Does Hudson like football?”

  Grace elbowed Kelly. “Superman is not going to the football game.”

  “Or maybe it was Spiderman!” Kelly put in.

  “Stop lying,” Grace told her.

  Toby turned to Heather with a pleading look on his face, as if he truly expected to see Spiderman or Superman swoop onto the Santa Magdalena football field. “We have to go!”

  “No you don’t,” Grace said. “It’ll be boring.”

  Heather smiled. “I think it’s a great idea.”

  “Do you think this Brock guy will be there?” Kelly asked slyly.

  “Why?” Heather studied Grace for a few seconds before a knowing smile crept over her face. “You like him, don’t you?” she asked Grace.

  Grace wanted to hide her flushing cheeks with her hands, but since she was holding Kelly’s luggage, she couldn’t. “He has a girlfriend.”

  “But you said he found out about her kissing that other guy,” Heather said.

  Kelly beamed.

  “You want us to spy on Brock?” Toby asked, his eyes sparkling.

  “Why don’t you come with us?” Heather asked.

  “Oh, I don’t like football,” Kelly said. “Can’t stand it. Have to shut myself in my room on Super Bowl weekend to avoid the hype.”

  “And since Kelly’s only here for a few days…” Grace added. “But I think you guys should do something else. Something more fun.”

  “I like football,” Heather said.

  “I like spying on people,” Toby said.

  “Good to know,” Grace muttered, pushing through the mudroom and up the back stairs.

  “That was way too easy,” Kelly whispered as she followed.

  Grace imagined Kelly in her future career as a powerful attorney—contorting words until defendants, jury, and judges truly believed whatever Kelly wanted them to.

  “What if Brock doesn’t go,” Grace whispered back. “What if we go over there and he’s in the bathroom or something. It’ll be like naked Dr. Burges all over again.”

  “No it won’t. Nothing could be like Dr. Burges.” Kelly shuddered. “Besides, we won’t go unless he leaves,” she said. “And we’ll be really fast.”

  “How do you know how fast we can be? You don’t know anything about magic cupboards.”

  “Yeah, but I want to learn, and, if you admit it, so do you.”

  She was so right.

  #

  Brock sat on a stool in front of the cupboard, studying it. Fading daylight filtered in through the tiny windows cut into the garage doors, and dust particles sparkled in the air. Sometimes it seemed as if everything in his life was as fleeting as the dust floating around him. They had never stayed in one place very long. He’d learned to make friends quickly, but he had never learned the knack of holding onto them after a move. And a move, like everything else, was
always on the horizon. Anything was possible and everything was for sale—for the right price. Everything was negotiable. When they changed houses, as they did every couple of years, everything in the house changed as well. New towels, new sheets, new rugs, new sofas.

  Maybe that was why Brock liked math. Numbers were concrete. He could build upon them. He could count on two plus two equaling four in a way that he could never count on anything else. Numbers were real. Substantial. They didn’t change. They made sense in a way that almost nothing in Brock’s life ever could.

  So many things in Brock’s world did not make sense. Take, for example, this cupboard. Brock closed his eyes and made a wish. Seconds later, he opened the cupboard and drew out a golden coin. Studying it, he knew that it should make him happy. He rubbed it against his sweater. It gleamed a shade brighter, ramping up his frustration. He slipped the coin into his pocket.

  Most people, he knew, would be delighted to have found a cupboard that could spontaneously produce cash and prizes, but for Brock, the cupboard was just another puzzle piece in a lifelong riddle without answers.

  #

  At six-fifteen, Brock’s garage door slid open. Kelly, who had been sitting on the window seat in Grace’s room pretending to read, put down her book. She started singing the Mission Impossible theme song. “Dah, dah, dum, de, dah, dah.””

  “This is such a bad idea,” Grace muttered.

  “Admit it, you want to do it as bad as I do.”

  Grace rolled her eyes, hating that Kelly was right.

  “So why do you know the security code?”

  “Cordelia’s asked me to bring things to and from the shop,” Grace told Kelly, trying to fight the nerves niggling in her belly.

  “Any idea where the cupboard might be?”

  “It’s probably still in the garage.” Grace bit her lip, debating whether or not to tell Kelly that testing the cupboard would be cool, but what she really wanted to do was find the mirror so she could give it to the dwarfs and then they’d… Stop. Wait. She wasn’t going to steal a mirror or anything else. Besides, she didn’t believe in magic mirrors. She shook herself. “This is all craziness.”

  Kelly nodded, a giant grin on her face. “I’ve missed you so much!”

  “I’ve missed you, too.” Grace swallowed hard. “Let’s go.”