For my mom and dad,
the best parents ever!
Contents
Title Page
Dedication
Chapter One: Sisters!
Chapter Two: The Very Dangerous Plan
Chapter Three: Ready or Not
Chapter Four: The Long and Difficult First Day, Part One
Chapter Five: The Long and Difficult First Day, Part Two
Chapter Six: Girlgoyles Make Excellent (Practice) Princesses
Chapter Seven: The Story of the Worst Fairy Godmother, According to Clotilda
Chapter Eight: There’s No Such Thing as a Lousy Princess
Chapter Nine: Easy Peasy Lemon Squeezy
Chapter Ten: Through the Spyglass: A Longish Chapter Full of Problems
Chapter Eleven: The Worst Princess Makes Her Wish … Sort Of
Chapter Twelve: The Things You Can’t Wish For
Chapter Thirteen: No One Likes to Be Rejected
Chapter Fourteen: Rock Scrambles and a Rock with a View
Chapter Fifteen: Flattery Will Get You Everywhere
Chapter Sixteen: Starry Night
Chapter Seventeen: Hurt Feelings and Wishes
Chapter Eighteen: Granting Wishes Just in Time
Chapter Nineteen: There’s Nothing Better Than a Big Old Party
Chapter Twenty: Rule Three C
Chapter Twenty-One: Happily Ever After Is More Than a Last Line
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Sneak Peek
Copyright
Dear Trainee, Please read and review all the rules before the first day of training. We appreciate your cooperation. —The Bests
Isabelle didn’t have to be told she’d be better off studying.
She knew she wasn’t ready for the first day of Fairy Godmother Training: Level One—not by a long shot. She didn’t need her older sister, Clotilda, to tell her that.
But that didn’t stop Clotilda. All day long, she asked things like: Why aren’t you studying? Can I give you a quiz? You didn’t fall asleep on your book again, did you?
This was the problem with older, smarter sisters who were perfect at everything. Clotilda wasn’t just annoying. She was also right.
“Why can’t you take this seriously?” she asked Isabelle. And then the clincher: “You don’t want to embarrass Grandmomma, do you?”
Grandmomma (with the emphasis on grand) was the current president of the Fairy Godmother Alliance, one of the authors of The Official Rule Book for Fairy Godmothers, 11th Edition, and the sisters’ grandmother.
More important, Grandmomma ran the official fairy godmother training program and helped select practice princesses for every new trainee. She was a godmother with very high standards and a very short temper. Trainees who couldn’t cut it were banished. Probably to the dreaded Fairy Godmother Home for Normal Girls.
Isabelle did not want to go there.
At the Fairy Godmother Home for Normal Girls, there were no princesses. There were no wands. There were definitely no sparkles. Instead, normal girls learned to do one of the non-magical jobs of the fairy godmother world. “It’s an honest life,” Clotilda had told Isabelle at least a hundred times. “It’s nothing to be ashamed of, but let’s be honest, being a fairy godmother is so much better.”
So, no, Isabelle didn’t want to embarrass (or otherwise irritate) Grandmomma. But she didn’t want to study, either. The problem with studying was that there was always something better to do.
Like eating cinnamon pies and chocolate twigs and running so fast she could almost fly. Or building puffy cloud castles that floated up into the deep-blue sky. Or going to her secret hiding place near the top of the castle tower. Isabelle always had great ideas when she sat in the cozy space between the girlgoyles (her word for the gargoyles, since they looked like girls). The girlgoyles weren’t magical—they never came to life or told jokes or helped her out in any real way—but they didn’t nag her, either. Sometimes, when she was feeling extra lonely, she pretended that one of them was her long-lost mother. Even though she was a tiny baby when Mom went away for good, Isabelle felt close to her when she was with the girlgoyles. She missed her all the time. She definitely did not believe what everyone said. Her mother was not the worst fairy godmother ever.
If only Clotilda would leave her alone, she’d go there right now.
But Clotilda would not leave her alone. Not for one second. Not when she could be telling her what to do.
“A great fairy godmother believes in happiness,” Clotilda recited. “She knows just what to do when her princess finds herself in an emergency.”
That didn’t sound so complicated. “Okay,” Isabelle said, “go ahead and test me.”
Clotilda turned to the first practice quiz at the back of the book. “Question Number One: What must you possess to pass your first level of fairy godmother training?”
Isabelle groaned. These questions! They were never as simple as they seemed. Plus, she could smell gooey pumpkin cakes baking in the kitchen below. Also, a bluebird had landed at the window and was singing a magical song.
“A ton of sparkles? A brand-new wand?” she tried, looking past Clotilda and out to the beautiful sunny day beyond her.
Clotilda pulled the curtains shut. “Isabelle, you should know that no one’s going to trust you with more than a teaspoon of sparkles until at least Level Two. Wait for the choices. I bet once you hear them, the right answer will click.”
Isabelle hated waiting. She hated the choices, too, because they were always confusing. Most of all, she hated feeling jealous of her sister. Clotilda had passed all four levels of training, as she would say, lickety-split. Or as Grandmomma would say, faster than any new godmother ever, she “couldn’t be more proud.”
Clotilda was a picture-perfect godmother. She was loving and kind (just not always to her sister), cheerful and smart, and skilled in the fine art of fairy godmother gift-giving. Isabelle had watched her turn a raisin into a sleek black convertible and an old trunk of rags into a fabulous wardrobe. She knew which magical blessings to offer new babies, and when blessings were not enough to ward off evil, she could snap her fingers and put a princess into a long sleep to protect her. Clotilda even looked like Isabelle’s version of a perfect fairy godmother. She had pretty ears, dainty feet, and shiny long hair. She wound it into a bun in the morning, and it stayed put all day.
Isabelle’s hair never stayed put. No matter how many pins she used, it always looked messy.
“I’m sorry,” Isabelle said. “Give me the choices.”
Clotilda spoke very, very slowly. “It’s either a) kindness, b) determination, c) gusto, or d)”—she paused dramatically—“all of the above.”
Isabelle liked the sound of the word gusto, but she wasn’t sure what it meant. “Determination?” she guessed.
Clotilda said nothing.
“Kindness?”
When Clotilda scowled, she looked a lot like Grandmomma. “The right answer is d) all of the above.” She started to read Question Number Two, but then she stopped halfway through. “Isabelle, snap to it! Training starts in two days. Don’t you care about becoming a great fairy godmother?”
“Yes! I mean, no. I mean, what was the question?” Isabelle hadn’t been listening. But that wasn’t because she didn’t care. The truth was Isabelle cared a lot. She cared more about becoming a fairy godmother than almost anything else in the fairy godmother universe.
She just didn’t like tests. There were too many rules.
Every time she opened the rule book she fell asleep.
For Isabelle, the answer to the question “What do you need to pass your first level of training?” was no
t all of the above. It was none of the above. She had to be more than
a) kind,
b) determined,
c) full of gusto (whatever that was), and
d) all of the above.
No matter how scary it seemed, she was going to have to e) be brave, f) take some risks, and g) get all of the answers by whatever means possible.
At least, she had to try.
The next morning, Isabelle woke up extra early. First thing in the morning was the best time to sneak around the castle without getting caught.
Grandmomma was enjoying a long early morning bath. Clotilda was already hard at work, paging through fashion magazines just in case her first real princess, Melody, wished for a new dress. A good fairy godmother had to stay up-to-date!
Isabelle had no time to waste. She slipped past their rooms, climbed two winding staircases, and hurried down the thick red carpet of the hallway to the far back corner of their fairy godmother castle.
In the corner was a very large door.
Besides being very large, it was also very thick and very red and, thanks to a big brass knocker that looked like a lion, somewhat terrifying. It was a door you never knocked on unless you had been summoned. This was the door to Grandmomma’s office.
No one was allowed into Grandmomma’s office if Grandmomma wasn’t there.
But today it was unlocked. This had to be a sign.
With both hands on the matching brass handle, Isabelle pulled as hard as she could. When the door creaked open, she looked left, right, and left again. Seeing that the coast was still clear, she tiptoed into the room and closed the door all the way.
Isabelle tried not to laugh, but it was impossible—and not just because she was nervous about getting caught. She laughed because she didn’t know where to look first. There wasn’t normally an opportunity to gaze around Grandmomma’s office. Isabelle was usually too busy getting lectured to do much but stare at the carpet.
Now she could freely take in all the amazing fairy godmother bling: pretty jewels and cups and bowls, and even shoes of all shapes and sizes. The presidents of Wand Makers Incorporated—as well as Dream-Shoe, Landmark Castle Repair, and, of course, the Fairy Godmother School Board—all wanted to stay on Grandmomma’s good side, so they gave her a lot of free stuff.
But even better than the big old spinning wheel in the middle of the room, there were sparkles. In every corner, Isabelle saw piles of them! Beautiful, magical, happiness-making sparkles. Sparkles were the source of all fairy godmother magic, the ingredient that made wish fulfillment possible. She had never seen so many at one time.
Isabelle knew she was not allowed to handle sparkles yet. To be honest, she didn’t even know the full extent of their powers. It was probably somewhere in that rule book. But she also knew that forbidden things were usually the best things. That’s why they were forbidden in the first place.
Very carefully, she picked up one sparkle and held it up to the light. When nothing happened, she picked up a few more. And when nothing happened again, she picked up a few more. They looked so beautiful—good enough to eat, even. Cautiously she stuck out her tongue. They tasted like woodchips. Maybe these sparkles were just duds.
There was only one way to find out if they really worked. Isabelle picked up two gigantic handfuls. She took a deep breath and blew as hard as she could.
Right away, the room began to change. “Wow,” Isabelle said out loud. She couldn’t help herself. It felt like she was standing inside a rainbow! As a few (or more) landed on her, she checked herself out in Grandmomma’s vintage mirror. Her messy hair glistened like it was full of diamonds. So did her skin. And her clothes—she couldn’t believe it! She looked ready to go to the Extravaganza. Even her nails looked polished. She reached down and threw a few more handfuls into the air. Sparkle magic was going to be a breeze!
The sparkles were so pretty, she didn’t worry when her head began to tingle. Or when her arms wanted to shake and her feet felt like dancing. When the room seemed lighter and brighter and almost like it was alive, Isabelle didn’t fret. Instead, she thought about grand things. Like passing Level One and going to the Extravaganza. And hugging her mother. Standing there, covered in sparkles, Isabelle could feel deep down that her mother was out there somewhere, waiting to come home.
She had to stop herself from leaping for the chandelier or standing on her head or running right out the door to the top of the tower and the girlgoyles. She could do those things later. It was time to get down to business. She’d come this far and couldn’t risk getting caught now.
She sat down at Grandmomma’s desk and very carefully opened the top drawer. Isabelle snorted at what she saw. Perfect, put-together Grandmomma was a secret slob!
The drawer was stuffed to the brim with pictures of princesses, and every single one of them was different. There were old faces and young faces of all shapes and sizes, from pale to dark and every shade in between. Some wore lots of fancy makeup. Some wore suits with bow ties and pants. Some wrapped their heads in beautiful scarves or decorated their hair with beads and strings and bows. Some wore all white. Some wore all black. Just like sparkles and snowflakes, there were no two princesses alike.
Except for one thing: All of them were smiling.
All, that is, except one.
The non-smiling girl looked no older than Isabelle. She was wearing jeans. Her hair was a little messy. She looked absolutely miserable.
Isabelle hid the picture at the bottom of the pile. She couldn’t help feeling a little sorry for her. The poor girl probably got that way because she had a really mean and bossy older sister.
Isabelle couldn’t let herself get distracted. She’d come in here to look for something. She opened the middle drawer.
It was stuffed with candy from every corner of the fairy godmother world. There were chocolate stars, candy fruit, and peppermint patties, Grandmomma’s favorite snack. After popping two chocolate stars into her mouth—and one of everything else into her pocket—Isabelle crossed her fingers. There was only one drawer left.
It was marked DO NOT OPEN. This had to be it!
Isabelle pulled on the handle. It was stuck. She braced one foot on the desk and pulled until—Eureka!
It popped open.
She held her breath. There was only one thing in the drawer: The Official Rule Book for Fairy Godmothers, 11th Edition, Teacher’s Guide. Complete with Rules and Protocols, Quizzes, Appendix, and Frequently Asked Questions.
This was what gusto must feel like!
Isabelle opened the book and stared at the pages and pages of words and numbers and symbols. She brushed some loose sparkles off the first page and imagined what Clotilda would do if she walked into the room. She’d probably run straight to Grandmomma. Or cite some section of the rule book Isabelle had never heard of. No doubt, there’d even be a multiple-choice component.
“Opening up Grandmomma’s rule book is a) totally cheating, b) very shortsighted, c) a mistake that could come back to haunt you, or d) all of the above.”
Isabelle cracked herself up. Really, reading this book might technically be cheating, but when she thought about it, it wasn’t that different from asking Clotilda or Grandmomma for some extra help. They’d been begging her to do that!
As the large grandfather clock in the corner began to chime, Isabelle opened the book to a page marked with a bright pink ribbon. More loose sparkles flickered onto the words. They were all the colors of nature—red, blue, yellow, and white—the colors that gave fairy godmothers their magic.
The first and most important secret to finding happily ever after is …
Isabelle held her breath and turned the page to look for the choices. She was sure this one thing was all she really needed to know!
And then she turned another page.
And another.
And another.
Instead of seeing words, she saw twinkles; she saw dust. Page after page, every single letter of every single word of every singl
e rule was shimmering and disappearing before she had a chance to read them.
Sparkles! They really were powerful! And not always in a good way! Isabelle knew she had to get out of there before she caused any more damage.
Isabelle shoved the book back in the drawer and headed for the door, but then she stopped and stared at all the piles of sparkles.
Before she could consider the consequences, Isabelle grabbed two giant handfuls of gold sparkles and stuffed them in her pockets. Grandmomma wouldn’t miss them. She had plenty. And they just might come in handy.
Isabelle hurried down the halls, up the stairs, and around the corners of the castle as fast as she could. She held in the urge to pump her fists and sing fairy godmother power anthems—that would be a giveaway. Most of all, she didn’t want to run into Clotilda—or even worse, Grandmomma. She didn’t need a rule book to tell her that two pocketfuls of borrowed sparkles was grounds for immediate banishment.
Safe in her room, Isabelle emptied her pockets into a spare jar with a tight lid. She hid the jar in the one and only place Clotilda never dared to snoop: her underwear drawer.
She tried to nap, but her head spun from too many sparkles, and her stomach hurt, too—but that was probably guilt.
Guilt did not make last-minute studying easier. It didn’t make her happier, either, especially when Clotilda knocked on her door with tea and toast with a sprinkling of cinnamon sugar. “It’s normal to be nervous,” Clotilda said. “But you’re my sister. You can’t be anything but great.”
Isabelle and Clotilda might be sisters, but Isabelle didn’t think they had anything else in common. Isabelle looked and acted more like another infamous fairy godmother—their mom.
And, as Grandmomma liked to remind her, that was not a favorable comparison.
The next morning, as Isabelle made her way out the door to the Official Fairy Godmother Training Center, her stomach still felt like it was twisting in knots. Or maybe knots wasn’t the right word. Really, her whole body felt more like it was full of pointy magic wands—and not in a good way at all.
When she reached the entrance of the training center, Isabelle almost turned around. To enter the room, she had to choose between two doors. This was so discouraging. She couldn’t believe she had to take a test before she’d ever set foot in a classroom!
The Worst Fairy Godmother Ever! Page 1
