Keep Calm and Sparkle On!

by Sarah Aronson

  But in this version, Isabelle’s mom sounded careless and self-centered. Grandmomma seemed short-sighted.

  Angelica said, “I don’t know why we just can’t say it. Your family is to blame for everything—and don’t think we don’t know it. No offense, but I don’t know why they even let you in this class. Everyone knows you’re just like her. I’m sorry, but someone needs to tell you. No one, not even Minerva, thinks you can do it.”

  For a moment, Isabelle stood there. She respected Angelica’s magic. She was a great trainee. Unlike Isabelle, Angelica practiced. She read the books. She didn’t need every sparkle.

  Isabelle knew she hadn’t earned Angelica’s respect, but she thought Minerva was her friend.

  She was determined not to cry. Or throw up. (Even though she wanted to do both.)

  Instead, Isabelle said, “I’m going to do everything possible to prove you wrong.” Then she took off for home and tried not to worry about Mom or Grandmomma or even the upcoming test. But that was hard. Angelica’s version of the story hurt. It made Isabelle question everything.

  Isabelle wanted to stand up for Mom. But this was the problem with gossip. Isabelle couldn’t stop wondering which story was true.

  Maybe Mom was the problem.

  Maybe Isabelle was the problem, too.

  For the first time since she started training, Isabelle wondered if maybe it wasn’t the rules that were wrong. Maybe it was her. Maybe Angelica was right. Maybe she should just give up.

  After three days of sitting with the girlgoyles, talking to Clotilda, and snacking on everything she could get her hands on, Isabelle no longer believed everything Angelica had told her. But she wasn’t totally confident, either.

  It didn’t help that when she arrived at the center (with her book and her pencil), everyone else was already there. Luciana stood at the front of the classroom. Raine, Kaminari, Clotilda, and Zahara were there, too. All of them looked very solemn, as though they had terrible news.

  “What’s wrong?” Isabelle asked, taking her seat. “Did something happen to Grandmomma?”

  Zahara patted Isabelle on the head.

  “Of course not,” she whispered. “They’re just being dramatic. You’ll see.”

  Luciana tapped her wand on her desk. “We actually have good news. It has been our honor to prepare you for this next, important step. All of you have worked hard. You have proven that you have fortitude and grit. So after careful deliberation and debate, we have decided not to formally test you. All of you deserve the chance to help a new practice princess.”

  When Isabelle heard “no testing,” she forgot everything Angelica had said about her and Mom and how she didn’t belong. Instead, she jumped out of her seat and twirled in the aisle and shared high fives with Minerva, Irene, and MaryEllen. She almost gave Clotilda a hug, but Clotilda told her to settle down and keep calm.

  Only Fawn and Angelica looked a little bit unhappy. “You mean we studied for nothing?”

  Kaminari gave them each a sour drop and a big yellow chrysanthemum. “I know it’s a disappointment, but trust me, you’ll be better godmothers for it.”

  When she was done consoling them, Luciana asked Raine to hand out the sealed envelopes.

  “Inside your packet, you will find your Level Two practice princess as well as a small parcel of carefully measured sparkles to load into your wands,” Luciana announced.

  Zahara reminded them of other things they knew: that they’d have one season (or six weeks) to make their practice princesses happily ever after. And that they wouldn’t get any more sparkles, even if they needed them, because of the circumstances.

  Isabelle couldn’t help but notice that Zahara had not mentioned regular girls. She wondered if this meant she was getting a practice princess. But maybe Zahara had just forgotten that regular girls could now get fairy godmothers.

  Angelica and Fawn opened theirs first. They didn’t smile like they had during Level One training (but maybe they were still miffed about the test). Minerva opened hers next, and she seemed downright angry. She stood up, walked down the aisle, and handed the envelope to Zahara. “I’m sorry, but this must be a mistake.”

  Zahara handed the envelope back. She told Minerva it was not a mistake. In fact, it was a perfect assignment. She called it an extra special challenge for her fortitude.

  Minerva would not back down. “Perhaps you don’t understand what an uncomfortable position you are putting me in.”

  But apparently, Zahara did understand. Perfectly.

  For a tiny old fairy godmother, Zahara could look pretty scary, especially when she was annoyed. She told Minerva, “You knew you shouldn’t have gotten so attached to your first practice princess. Perhaps you’re not as loyal to the job as you say you are.”

  Minerva reminded Zahara that her Level One practice princess had been the great-great-great-granddaughter of her first beloved princess—and that it was way too late to tell her not to get attached. She had cared for the family for years. At the last Extravaganza, she’d requested to make the young princess happily ever after when she graduated from Level Four.

  But Zahara didn’t care. “Either make this new practice princess happily ever after or … do I have to remind you of Rule Four B?”

  Now Minerva sat down. “No, you don’t have to remind me.”

  But Isabelle had no clue what that rule was for. “I thought Three C was the bad one.”

  Fawn shook her head. “Isabelle, Rule Four B says that if you don’t do what you’re supposed to do, you’re finished. Back to Level One.”

  At the word finished, the Worsts huddled around Minerva.

  Luciana tapped her wand until the Worsts sat down and stopped talking. “Trainees, please settle down. We have no intention of returning any of you to Level One. Or making any of your practice princesses unhappy.” When no one would settle down, she tapped her wand on her desk. “But we are serious about these assignments. They will test your loyalty. And your focus.” Now she raised her wand in the air. “So keep calm. Trust the sparkles. Open up your envelopes and check your Wish Lists! I understand that some of your princesses have already made wishes!”

  Isabelle opened her envelope. She hoped for a practice princess who had already wished. (That meant not so much waiting!)

  The first thing she found was a teeny tiny packet of raw sparkles—it was less than a teaspoon—less than she’d needed to make Nora happily ever after.

  But that wasn’t a surprise. Isabelle was getting used to rationing.

  So she took a look at the enclosed photo.

  She was another regular girl, not a practice princess. She had very long blond hair that she kept up in a high ponytail. Like Nora, she hadn’t wished yet. Unlike Nora, at least she was smiling. Her T-shirt was cute. It said AIM FOR THE STARS.

  She looked nice. Isabelle wasn’t sure why Minerva had been so upset.

  “Do you recognize her?” Clotilda asked.

  The truth was, Isabelle didn’t. So she looked again. She thought back to everything she had done with Nora, and then Isabelle figured it out.

  The girl in the photo was one of the girls Isabelle had met with Nora in the park—one of the girls Nora no longer talked to. Isabelle didn’t know more than that because Nora had been too hurt to explain what had gone wrong.

  Isabelle remembered how mad and uncomfortable and sad Nora was when Isabelle suggested that the girl might be nice.

  Her name was Samantha T. Butterfield.

  Isabelle had a feeling the T stood for trouble. Whatever Samantha wanted, Isabelle had a feeling it was going to involve Nora.

  All the way home, Isabelle and Clotilda argued. It wasn’t the first time. They were sisters. When something terrible happened, this was what they did.

  “I told you to be ready for anything,” Clotilda reminded her in that older perfect sister know-it-all way.

  Isabelle said, “But why did they have to give me an ex-friend of Nora’s? Isn’t that sort of mean?” Fairy godmoth
ers, she was 99.9 percent sure, were always supposed to be nice. Never mean. She asked, “Isn’t there a big chance that Samantha will want something that will make Nora unhappy?”

  When they got home and there was no truce (or answers) in sight, Clotilda went to her room and Isabelle said good-bye and gladly went to hers.

  In her room, Isabelle made a plan. First, she waited as quietly as she could until she was positive Clotilda had gone to bed. Then she tiptoed down the hall, past Clotilda’s closed door, to Grandmomma’s office and the Official Fairy Godmother Spyglass. There was no better, faster way to see what Samantha was up to.

  When she got to Grandmomma’s office, she pulled hard on the big brass handle, opened the gigantic door, and found her sister sitting behind Grandmomma’s desk.

  “I knew it!” Clotilda said. “You were going to cheat.”

  There was no point in denying it. “Not cheat. Study.” Isabelle tried to justify her actions. “Grandmomma let me do it. There’s no rule against it.”

  Clotilda wasn’t buying any of Isabelle’s excuses. “Well, Grandmomma put me in charge, and I say no spyglass or anything else out of the ordinary. Got it?”

  Clotilda ushered Isabelle back into the hall and locked the office door behind them.

  “Isabelle, if you are going to be a great fairy godmother, you have to do this the right way. I know the assignments seem sketchy, but it won’t be that hard on Nora. I promise.”

  Isabelle wasn’t sure she believed her. She remembered how sad Nora had been when they saw Samantha. She pleaded with her sister. “Are you sure I can’t peek? Just once? In the name of happily ever after?”

  Clotilda sighed. (She could be a softie when it came to happily ever after.) “Do everything by the book for fourteen days. If you get nowhere, we’ll talk.”

  Fourteen days was a long time.

  But it was a compromise.

  So Isabelle went back to her room, and for ten days (or nine days more than she wanted to), she did everything Clotilda told her to do. She loaded the sparkles into her wand, just in case. And she waited. And waited. And waited just in case Samantha made her wish. But just in case never came.

  So, on the eleventh day, she tried sitting between the girlgoyles and continued to wait there. While she waited, she pretended the girlgoyles were Samantha and Nora. She pretended to make them pretty dresses and colorful sneakers. She pretended to make them magic matchsticks and spoons and lie detector necklaces even though girlgoyles obviously never lied.

  Pretending to grant wishes is not dawdling. It’s also not as much fun as actually granting wishes. And it doesn’t make listening for a practice princess (or a regular girl) to wish easier.

  But it does make you hungry.

  So on the twelfth day, Isabelle headed to the kitchen to bake a cake. Because she was more a cake fan than an icing fan, she made the icing layers very, very thin. When the whole thing was finished, she brought three slices to the girlgoyles and ate them all, because obviously, this was a ploy. Girlgoyles don’t eat.

  While she ate, she decided to open up the rule book. She glossed over the pictures of fairy godmothers. She wiped some icing off the picture of Clotilda. Then she scanned the index to find out how to make a princess wish faster. But there wasn’t a rule about that.

  Isabelle did find a rule about determination and enthusiasm and gusto and why those things were good, though. And she also found one about why fairy godmothers don’t grant every wish of every girl. Finally, she found the section that explained humility and grace and why fairy godmothers must listen before they grant a wish. She even found a footnote about the number of sparkles and training. She was going to read that (as well as the part about sparkle conservation) but then she stumbled on some pages printed in red letters.

  This was Rule Four. It was about probation and other problems.

  Rule Four A: A fairy godmother might need to go to retraining, probation, or reassignment to the Fairy Godmother Home for Normal Girls if she

  uses her wands unsafely

  refuses or fails to grant a wish

  is guilty of wasting sparkles

  Rule Four B: Fairy godmothers in retraining (also known as Worsts) are automatically on probation. If they fail or refuse to grant a wish (or use too many sparkles) or do anything unsafe, they will need to return to Level One or retire.

  Rules Four A and Four B were even worse than Three C.

  It was so unfair and confusing.

  All Isabelle wanted was to make princesses and regular girls happy. She didn’t want to be a Best. She just wanted to be good. Or even average. Isabelle threw the book on the ground right between the girlgoyles. The gusts of wind turned the pages one after another until Isabelle spied a page covered in hearts and flowers and mushy testimonials from fairy godmothers. And also princesses. Most of them started, “When I wished on a star …”

  This gave Isabelle a great idea.

  The next morning (or, if you’re counting, Day Thirteen), right as the sun began to rise (but Isabelle could still see the moon), she took one sparkle out of her wand and for some reason—she had no idea why—imagined playing catch with her mom. She also imagined Nora’s house and then Nora’s school and the tree where Isabelle had met Samantha. Maybe Samantha just needed a signal from Isabelle—a reason to wish.

  Isabelle used her wand like a magical fishing pole and catapulted the sparkle high into the air. When it hit the sky, it looked like a shooting star.

  And then Isabelle listened.

  This time, she didn’t have to wait long to hear something wonderful. It was singing. A beautiful singing voice. Definitely princess caliber. And whoever she was, she was singing about wishes and all kinds of gifts from the heart.

  Isabelle beamed. Clotilda was right! Samantha must be the perfect regular girl for her. She was sure that somewhere in that book it said that fairy godmothers who heard their princess’s (or regular girl’s) wishes loud and clear had a strong bond and could always grant their wishes, lickety-split!

  In other words, as Samantha wished, “I really want to be in the show. It doesn’t have to be a big part. Just a little one. I really, really, really want it,” Isabelle felt a bolt of confidence.

  She didn’t care that technically, three reallys did not equal one I wish. Isabelle was tired of waiting. She figured an I want with some reallys was as good as an I wish. Unfortunately, Isabelle was wrong. But she didn’t know that. So she grabbed her packet of sparkles and loaded them into her wand. Then she imagined the tree and puffed down to the regular world.

  She landed (with a thump) next to the spot where the really reallys had been uttered.

  Luckily, it was a quiet thump. And the tree was by some shrubs, so no one saw her. This was a good thing, because one of the difficult parts of getting a regular girl was that regular girls scared easily. They didn’t necessarily believe in fairy godmothers. Or at least, Nora hadn’t appreciated her arrival. She thought fairy tales and fairy godmothers were all made up.

  Down on the ground, Samantha’s voice rang in Isabelle’s ears. It made her heart swell. Isabelle felt really confident. As she tiptoed around the tree, she was sure she could grant this wish in record time.

  At the base of a tree sat a girl. She had unruly hair and a scab on her knee. She was reading a book.

  This was not Samantha. The girl who wanted the part (a lot) was Nora.

  It’s nerve-racking when someone sneaks up on you literally out of thin air. It’s equally nerve-racking to discover that the wish you just heard was made not by your current practice princess (or regular girl) but by your former practice princess (or regular girl), who also doesn’t remember you at all because of (stupid) Rule Three C.

  In other words, Isabelle and Nora both jumped and gasped. They both needed a moment to compose themselves.

  Nora was the first to stop screaming. “Why did you sneak up on me like that? Did someone ask you to find out what I was doing?”

  Isabelle tried not to laugh. She
was so happy to see Nora, but the notion was ridiculous.

  “No one told me to spy on you,” Isabelle said, frantically patting all of her pockets to make sure she hadn’t dropped her loaded wand. “I was just taking a walk and looking around. This seemed like a good place to sit down.”

  “It is a good spot,” Nora said, giving Isabelle the stink eye. “Especially if you want to be alone.” (In other words, she was not inviting Isabelle to stay.)

  Isabelle sat down anyway. It was sort of charming watching Nora be so completely unfriendly. And secretive, too, especially when anyone (even a fairy godmother in training) could see that something important was happening in the schoolyard. In every direction, kids were sitting in circles. Or practicing scenes. Others practiced a cool-looking dance.

  “What’s going on?” Isabelle said.

  “It’s the last recess before vacation,” Nora replied, looking up from her pages. “Did you just move here? They’re practicing for the play. Auditions are tomorrow.”

  What perfect timing! This meant Isabelle didn’t have to go to school. “So why aren’t you practicing with them?”

  Nora said, “Because I don’t think practicing in public is the only way to get ready.”

  This was what is known as a silly excuse. Nora should have been practicing with everyone else, and she knew it. She just didn’t want to admit it.

  Isabelle felt bad. She knew this meant that Nora was worried. But she also needed to get things moving along. In other words, she needed to meet Samantha. She asked Nora if it was too late to sign up for the play.

  Reluctantly, Nora told Isabelle:

  The play was an annual event.

  It was not too late to sign up.

  It took place during school vacation, and kids from other schools tried out, too.

  She really wanted one specific part. But she probably wouldn’t get it. Because of last year.

  “What happened last year?” Isabelle asked.

  “It’s more like what didn’t happen.” Nora picked at her nails like she was recalling a very bad memory. “First I forgot my line. Then I messed up the dance.” She looked over at the kids who were practicing, especially the tall girl in the middle. (It was Samantha!)