Hide and Seek

by Sarah Mlynowski

  RRRRroow! Puppy-Nory would not drop the shiny red thing.

  “Pay attention, Nory. Don’t flux back to human,” said Mr. Lan. “The goal is to remain a puppy and regain control. Use the Pinkholder technique.”

  Puppy-Nory did not know what the Pinkholder technique was, but she did know when she was being scolded. She dropped the mug on the hard floor.

  Crack! It shattered. Ceramic mug bits went everywhere.

  Mr. Lan glared at her. “My daughter gave me that mug for Father’s Day.”

  Pop!

  Nory fluxed back into human form. She couldn’t help it. “Oh, zwingo,” she said. “I could glue it back together! Want me to glue it back together?”

  “Don’t bother,” he said.

  Nory’s cheeks burned, and for the zillionth time, she apologized. “Sorry, Mr. Lan,” she said. “I’ll try harder. I promise.”

  At lunch, Nory heaved a sigh of relief when she sat down with her friends. “I don’t know how much more of this I can take,” she told Pepper. “Every other word out of my mouth is ‘sorry.’ ”

  “What do you mean?” Pepper asked.

  “‘Sorry I talked without raising my hand,’ ‘Sorry I took so long in the bathroom,’ ‘Sorry I broke your special Father’s Day coffee mug—’ ”

  “You what?” asked Marigold.

  “She fetched it when she was a puppy,” Bax explained. “It was kind of hilarious.”

  “Maybe for you!” Nory protested. “You’re lucky you don’t have to do anything! You just get to sit there watching me get in trouble.”

  “For once we agree,” said Bax. “Watching you get in trouble is definitely amusing.”

  Nory bonked her head on the table. “Ugh, I miss Ms. Starr. Everything is so serious here. And formal. And strict. And—”

  “You.” An older Sage student loomed over them. She was tall and wore her black hair in a tight braid that went all the way down to her waist.

  “Me?” Nory asked.

  “You. I’ve been looking for you.”

  “Why?”

  “I’m Monitor Sorbee. You see this table you’re sitting at? How it goes all the way down the room?”

  “Um, yes?”

  “I sit at the other end of it. And monitor.”

  “Okay,” Nory said.

  “They told us to sit here,” Elliott put in. “At our first meal. This is where they told us to sit.”

  “I am aware!” snapped Monitor Sorbee. She turned back to Nory. “When you don’t throw out your garbage, the lunch patrol removes points on our table score. Do you know what we got this morning at breakfast?”

  “I wasn’t here for breakfast,” Nory said.

  “I am aware,” said Sorbee. “And we got a ten. Do you know what we got at dinner last night?”

  “I wasn’t here for dinner either,” Nory said.

  “We got a ten then, too. And do you know what we got for lunch yesterday?”

  “Another ten?”

  “No. No, we did not. We got a nine point five. Our first nine point five since September eighteenth. Do you know why we got a nine point five instead of a ten?”

  “I am not aware?” Nory said.

  “We got a nine point five because somebody, and that somebody was you, left her empty milk carton on the table. I know it was you because I saw you drinking from that milk carton earlier.”

  “I put my plate in the wash bin,” Nory said. “I thought I had tossed my milk carton.”

  “You didn’t. But you better do it today. Are we clear?”

  Nory nodded.

  Sorbee stormed off, and Elliott put his hand on Nory’s shoulder. “You okay?”

  She nodded. But she wasn’t. Not really.

  Flare class was after lunch on Tuesdays. After thirty minutes of fire-breathing practice, during which Elliott accidentally froze his tongue, Dr. Vogel collected the circlometers. She asked how their homework had gone. “Who was able to flare the water to ninety-eight degrees in under five seconds?”

  No one raised a hand.

  “Under ten seconds?”

  Five of the Sage students raised their hands. When Lacey saw theirs, hers shot up as well.

  “Under twenty seconds?”

  The remaining Flares in the class raised their hands. Everyone except Elliott.

  “Under thirty?” the teacher asked him.

  He shook his head. “Ninety-seven seconds.”

  Rune and Lacey snickered.

  “There is no reason to laugh,” Dr. Vogel said. She strode to Elliott. “You did that by flaring? Not by cooling hot water?”

  “Yes, Dr. Vogel. By flaring.”

  She nodded. “Well done. I bet the fire-breathing exercises are helping, even if you can’t breathe fire. I want you to practice again tonight. Both the fire breathing and the water warming. I want you to see if you can do it in under seventy seconds.”

  Seventy? Elliott was never going to be able to do that. He had spent two hours trying to do it in under two minutes!

  “Okay, everyone, take out your paper bull’s-eyes,” Dr. Vogel said. “We are going to hone our precision skills with target practice. Whoever burns the smallest hole through the exact center of the target will be awarded extra homework, just for fun!”

  Everyone groaned.

  Dr. Vogel smiled. “Or, if our winner prefers, they can burn their lowest quiz score, so to speak, as a way of raising their grade.”

  Everyone cheered.

  “You didn’t win at target practice,” Lacey said to Elliott as they walked out of class. “Shock of the century, I know.”

  “Neither did you,” Elliott retorted.

  “At least I burned the target,” Lacey said.

  At least I’m a decent human being who doesn’t make people feel bad on purpose, Elliott thought.

  “You better get to work on that water warming,” Lacey said. “You’re embarrassing the rest of us. We can’t have Sage thinking all Dunwiddle kids are wonkos.”

  She flounced away, her blond bob swinging.

  “Is she always so horrible?” a short boy with green braces asked.

  “Yes,” Elliott said. “In fact, she’s just getting started.”

  “Maybe she’s jealous,” the boy said.

  “Ha! No way.”

  “I’m serious,” the boy said. “That ice trick you did yesterday was really cool.”

  “Thanks,” Elliott said, surprised.

  “I’m GJ, by the way. Can you make ice out of anything?” GJ asked.

  “Most things. I make slushies and Popsicles out of juice.”

  “Dude!” GJ’s face lit up. “Can you make us some tomorrow at lunch? I’ll find the juice.”

  “For sure.” Elliott grinned.

  Nory didn’t think she could mess up any more, but mess up she did.

  She got scolded for having an ink stain on her shirt in geography.

  She talked too much in History of Fluxing.

  She didn’t talk enough in science, and got scolded for “low participation.”

  Mitali had told her they’d be playing kittenball during gym, and Nory had looked forward to it all day. But now that gym class was finally happening, she wasn’t playing her best. Her kitten didn’t have nice whiskers, her tail-whacking aim was terrible, and the yarn kept getting caught in her claws.

  “You’re still getting used to everything,” Mitali said during a five-minute water break.

  “You think?” Nory said. She felt nervous and tired.

  “Show Coach Giovanni your dritten!” Mitali suggested. “That’s your secret weapon!”

  “Would she want me to turn into something wonky?”

  Mitali stood. “Coach G! Coach G! Do you want to see Nory’s dritten? It’s her secret weapon on the kittenball court!”

  “Her what?” said Coach G. She was burly and wore a whistle around her neck. She had once played professional tigerball for the Palm City Rogues and she took sports very, very seriously.

  “My dri
tten,” Nory said hopefully. “Dragon-kitten? It’s a kitten with a little bit of dragon. My coach at home checked the rule book. And it’s totally okay. Do you want to see it? I don’t mind. I can do it!”

  The gym teacher tilted her head, which meant she was at least considering it, and Nory’s body started to tingle. Just thinking about fluxing into a dritten cheered her up. She wanted to fly! And breathe fire! Breathe fire and meow at the same time!

  “Please?” said Mitali. “It’s really cool.”

  Nory held her breath.

  “No,” the teacher said. “Better not. I’d prefer everyone play as a kitten.”

  Nory’s shoulders slumped.

  Coach G blew her whistle. Slowly, Nory followed the others back onto the court.

  She fluxed into Kitten-Nory. She stayed Kitten-Nory. With unimpressive whiskers.

  She didn’t score any goals.

  She messed up her yaggle.

  Her tail whacks went crooked.

  She wished she were back at Dunwiddle.

  The Sage Academy library had stained-glass windows and bookshelves so high that two librarians were flying as they reshelved the books.

  Nory was here to find Pepper. They had arranged to meet after class.

  “What’s wrong?” Pepper asked, when Nory found her staring up at a huge, circular, stained-glass window.

  “I need a lemon drop,” Nory said.

  “Poor Nory,” Pepper said. “But guess what? Not only do I have lemon drops, I have the perfect place to eat them.”

  “You do?”

  “Hush,” Pepper said, and she pulled Nory to a door at the end of a long hall. She looked around to make sure no one was watching, then opened the door.

  A supply closet!

  It held two vacuum cleaners, many rolls of paper towels, spray cleaner, and a lot of other boring things, just like every supply closet everywhere. And yet! It was three times the size of the supply closet at Dunwiddle that had become Pepper and Nory’s favorite hideout.

  “I’m always on the lookout for a good hiding place,” Pepper continued. “You never know when you’ll need one.”

  With the door shut against the rest of the world, Pepper pulled a box of lemon drops from her pocket.

  “This will be our new headquarters,” Nory said. Then her eyes filled with tears. “Well, until Friday. But in January, I’ll be here alone! Pepper! What will I do then?”

  Pepper put her arm around Nory. “You’ll rock Sage Academy just like you rocked UDM—that’s what you’ll do.”

  Nory went weepy. “Oh, Pepper, you’re the best Pepper in the whole world,” she said, resting her head on her friend’s shoulder. “Who will give me lemon drops when you’re gone? Who will hide in the closet with me? How will I ever survive at this strict school? I hate it here, Pepper, I hate it!” Tears streamed down her cheeks. “I can’t look on the bright side anymore,” Nory said. “There is no bright side!”

  Pepper hugged her more tightly. Nory cried and cried.

  “When life gives you lemons …” Pepper said when Nory was all cried out.

  “I don’t think I can make lemonade,” Nory said. “Not today. Not here.”

  Pepper reached into her box of lemon drops and handed Nory one. “I was going to say, you take a lemon drop from your best friend.”

  During Tuesday’s last class period, while Nory was at gym not turning into a dritten, the Flare students were at music.

  Elliott’s jaw dropped when he first saw the music room. Wow! It was fully soundproofed. There were eight pianos, lined up in two rows of four. A large collection of drums stood at the back of the room, next to twenty guitars.

  There was even a birdcage in the corner, filled with fat yellow canaries. Elliott didn’t understand what canaries would do in music class, but hey, canaries were cool.

  The teacher, Ms. Terraform, asked the Sage kids to please take their seats at the pianos. Two kids per piano, with one kid next to the teacher. The Dunwiddle students sat in folding chairs.

  Ms. Terraform lifted the birdcage and set it on a table. “I thought the Dunwiddle students might like to see what we’re working on,” she said. The six canaries arranged themselves on a long perch in a neat row.

  The Sage students began to play. Each pair of students played the same duet. All of the students were in time with the others.

  Then, after several minutes of impressive unison, the Sage kids let loose. Some kids added harmonies. Others added jazzy riffs. Then the canaries joined in! The Sage kids played, the canaries sang, and the room rang with joyful music.

  When they finished, everyone burst into applause, with Elliott clapping the loudest. They were so good!

  “We have to practice an hour a day, six days a week,” said GJ, shrugging modestly when Elliott complimented him. “I could hardly play at all when I started.”

  During the next part of class, Ms. Terraform divided the kids into five bands, which they’d be in for the rest of the week. Within each band, she assigned at least one kid to be a keyboard player, one to be a guitar player, one to play the bass, one to be a drummer, and one to be a vocalist. Each band got a canary.

  Elliott was grouped with all Sage kids, including GJ, who was learning bass. He’d been assigned guitar, which he’d been playing since he was four. His dad taught guitar lessons, after all.

  “Today, just muddle through with your group as best you can,” said Ms. Terraform to the Dunwiddle students. “If you do your homework, we’ll get it sounding great by the end of Thursday’s class, I promise.”

  A few minutes in, GJ raised his hand. “Elliott is really good,” he told the teacher. “He’s, like, a guitar expert.”

  Ms. Terraform raised her eyebrows. Elliott blushed, but continued playing.

  “You have real skill,” she said when he finished. “Why don’t you come meet my sixth-grade rock band? The guitarist broke her thumb yesterday, poor girl. I bet they could use your help.”

  “Sure,” said Elliott, glowing.

  So, after class, Elliott stood in as guitar player with the sixth-grade rock band. The other members of the band were mostly Fuzzies, and they’d recruited a tambourine-shaking meerkat and a flamingo that played the triangle.

  It was amazingly fun.

  When practice ended, Elliott met up with Nory for afternoon tea in the Rose Parlor.

  The Rose Parlor was painted pink. It had floral-print sofas and chairs, plus little tables that looked like they belonged to someone’s great-grandmother. Mitali had explained that every Tuesday at four thirty, tea and cookies were served. Really good cookies. Large plates of them. Chocolate cream filled, jam filled, chocolate chip, snickerdoodles.

  Nory and Elliott put their cookies on pink china plates. Ms. Fujita served them tea in fragile cups with saucers. There were hardly any fifth graders there. It was mostly older students who crossed their legs and only took two or three cookies.

  Nory found a spot to sit and squeezed Elliott’s forearm so hard it hurt. “Elliott,” she said urgently. “You’re my best friend. You and Pepper. You know that, right?”

  “Yeah, sure,” Elliott said. He wondered what she was getting at.

  “Will you promise to call me every day when I go to Sage full-time?”

  “I guess so,” said Elliott, who didn’t love talking on the phone.

  “Even if you can’t, promise me we’ll stay friends, always and forever.”

  “I promise. Here, eat this,” he said. “The snickerdoodles are really good.”

  “Not important!” Nory cried. “Elliott, how will you live without me in Dunwiddle? You’ll be so lonely!”

  Elliott thought. He would miss Nory, absolutely. But unlike Nory, he’d have Willa and Andres and the rest of the UDM kids. He’d be okay.

  Nory started to cry. “You’ll have no one to walk to school with. You’ll have no one to play with. My desk next to you will be empty and you’ll just stare at it, wondering how I’m doing, and not even listening to the teacher!”
>
  She sobbed onto his shoulder. Elliott patted her uncertainly.

  “You’re going to flunk the second half of fifth grade because you’ll miss me so much!” Nory wailed. “I’m really worried about you!”

  Elliott snagged another snickerdoodle from the nearest tray. He broke it in two and gave half to Nory. “Snickerdoodle promise,” he told her. “We’ll always be friends, and I’ll focus really hard on not flunking out. Okay?”

  A fat tear rolled down Nory’s cheek. She took a sip of her tea and made a face.

  Elliott finished his snickerdoodle and helped himself to a butter cookie filled with apricot jam. He looked at the Sage Fuzzies, who were giving their rabbit companions bites of brown sugar biscuits. He watched a Flare heat up the milk for her tea, foaming it like an espresso machine. He looked at the red velvet curtains and the lovely way they framed the view of the garden.

  Maybe Sage wasn’t the right school for Nory. But for the kids it was right for?

  Those kids were the luckiest kids he’d ever known.

  Tuesday night, everyone met for a Sage Academy end-of-term tradition, the annual hide-and-seek.

  After dinner at home with her family, Nory headed straight to the Hall of Magic and Performance and snagged a seat next to Mitali. The other UDM kids were a couple of rows ahead.

  Father strode to the center of the stage. “Most of you know this already, but for our fifth graders and our guests from Dunwiddle Magic School: Tonight is a chance for the senior Flickers and the Flicker faculty to test your wits!”

  A cheer went up. The younger Flickers began to chant: “Flick-ers! Flick-ers!”

  “Ahem.” Father coughed.

  The young Flickers went silent.

  “The hide-and-seek shall take place in the main building. First, the Flickers will be dismissed and given five minutes to hide. All three floors are fair game. Then, when so directed, the rest of you will seek them.”

  Mitali leaned over to Nory. “I’ve heard it’s super fun. Did you go to the hide-and-seek when you were little?”

  Nory shook her head. She’d always been too little, according to Father.

  Father was telling everyone the rules. “You must not use paint. Or powdered sugar. Or anything else messy that might help you locate a hiding Flicker if you tossed it in the right direction. Flyers, you may not assist your Flicker friends by flying them out of reach. You are not licensed to take passengers, and I don’t want to see a repeat of last year’s chimney hijinks. The only Flicker who can fly in this game is our double talent, Kinnette.”