The envelope sparkles like it’s saying, Open me! Open me! The wand does a little twirl and sparkles, too, then floats up to my face again. I swat at it. “Go away!”
Katarina says, “You don’t understand what a rare privilege this is! The Academy accepts only a few girls a year. You’ll have a full scholarship and be instructed, fed, clothed, and housed, all at the godmothers’ expense.”
All right, the Academy sounds kind of cool. It might even be fun. “So it’s like a summer program?”
Katarina, happy to see that I’m finally a little interested, says, “It’s exactly like a summer program! A fabulous summer boarding school that lasts a hundred years.”
“A hundred years? That’s a joke, right?”
“Godmothers rarely joke. Although I just heard this funny one where a fairy godmother, an elf, and a pixie walk into a bar and—”
“A HUNDRED YEARS! What about my family! What about my friends?”
“A small sacrifice! In ten years, you’ll barely remember them.”
“But I want to remember them!” I grab the wand and the envelope and shove them back at Katarina. “I won’t do it!”
She doesn’t take them. “You ingrate! You’re actually saying no?”
“That’s right! No, no, no! Also, no!”
The pink light fades from the room, and the magic streamers and confetti vanish.
Katarina angrily flutters her wings. “I never imagined you’d be this stupid! No one’s turned us down in centuries—and Joan of Arc regretted it!” Katarina raises her pointy little chin. “So, that’s your final answer?”
“Yes!” I try to hand the envelope and wand to her again. “You can take these with you! I don’t want them!”
“They were made for you! They’ll turn to dust when the moon is full.”
“The wand isn’t even my size! It’s tiny!”
“When you get to the Academy, we shrink you down to match the wand.”
“I DON’T WANT TO BE THREE INCHES TALL!”
Katarina gives me a look that says, You are the stupidest girl in the world. (It’s quite a look.) Then she flies out the window into the night.
For a second I feel bad that Katarina’s so upset. I thought we were kind of friends. But come on! I’m not going to leave my family! I can’t believe she even suggested it.
The little wand and the envelope lie in my hands like they’re daring me to use them. And I can still almost hear the envelope saying, Open me! Open me! I’ve got to get rid of them.
I rush into the bathroom to flush them down the toilet. But what if they clog it? And what if it’s a magic clog that blows up the toilet and bursts all the pipes? I’d be grounded for…a hundred years.
I could throw the wand and the envelope into the trash, but Madison might see them and dig them out. A couple of zaps from her and we’d all be wearing tutus and living in a house made of Skittles.
So I go back into my bedroom and hide the wand and the sealed envelope on the highest shelf, behind my oldest stuffed animals.
Even Madison won’t find them there.
The next morning, I think I just dreamed that Katarina was here, so I climb on a chair and check; the little wand and envelope are still on the high shelf, right where I left them. I’ll be glad when the full moon comes and I can sweep the two little piles of dust into the garbage can.
Over the next couple of days, I fuss some more with Sunny’s mascot costume, but I finally give up. I’m just not crafty enough to make something that doesn’t look like poop, and I’m not rich enough to buy anything. I’ll need to think of something else to make Sunny happy.
On Saturday morning, I try to get Sunny to come with me to the petting zoo where I’m an intern. If bunnies and chicks don’t make you happy, nothing will. But Sunny says she wants to see if she can get her mom out of bed and back to work in her art studio. (Gina has a cool job drawing the pictures for kids’ books; she even volunteers with the art program at Lincoln.)
So I’m all by myself as usual when I arrive at the petting zoo. The animals are superhappy to see me, and I stop worrying and smile. This really is the best job ever. Everybody’s hungry, and I run around opening feed bins and scooping out food.
“Stop that, you little brats!”
Huh? I turn around and see Scott on the other side of the petting-zoo gate taking a basketball away from his three demonic little brothers. He tells them, “Don’t throw the ball at the meerkats!”
“Hi, Scott!” I call.
Scott smiles at me—and his brothers use it as an opportunity to run whooping down the hill out of sight. Scott sighs.
“Aren’t you going to go get them?” I ask.
“They’ll be fine. They don’t listen to me anyway.” He dribbles the ball. “Did you hear I made the basketball team?”
“That’s great!”
“Coach Overdale says I’m supposed to eat, drink, and sleep with this basketball.” Then Scott says, “Think fast!”
He tosses the ball at me and, not expecting it, I gawk like a dork and let it bounce away. The ball lands between Lewis and Clark, the goats, who try to eat it.
I say, “And that is why I’m going to flunk gym.”
“You’re not going to flunk gym.” Scott climbs over the gate and points at a feed bin. “Pick up the ball and toss it in, nice and easy.”
There’s nothing easy about this, but I fling the ball anyway.
“Ow!” Scott yelps. If you got points for hitting people on the head, I’d be a star.
“Sorry.” I give the ball back to Scott. “I’m the worst.”
“No, you’re not. The problem’s with your follow-through. Let me show you.” He holds up the ball, looking like a basketball star. He shoots…
…and misses the bin by a mile. Scott turns red.
Curly, the sheep, baas, and I swear it sounds like he’s laughing.
The basketball rolls over to Gus, the pony, who gives it a swift kick with a hind leg. The ball whooshes into the feed bin without even touching the sides.
Scott whistles, impressed. “Nothing but net. Forget about me—you should let the pony coach you.”
I laugh. Somehow, Scott’s not being perfect at everything makes me like him even more.
Then Raymond, who’s in charge of the petting zoo, walks in, dripping wet.
“What happened to you?” I ask.
“Three crazy little boys jumped into the flamingo pond. I can’t catch them, so I’m calling the guards.”
Scott turns pale. “Gotta go!”
He grabs the basketball, jumps over the gate, and sprints down the hill toward the pond.
In the afternoon, I knock on Sunny’s front door. Every month there’s a group demonstration in her karate class, and I always go with her and her mom.
While I’m waiting for Sunny to let me in, Fifi, the poodle who lives next door, barks at me. She’s got one of those fussy poodle haircuts, and pink bows on her ears. I wonder if dogs can be embarrassed.
The door finally opens, and Sunny comes outside, already dressed in her white karate uniform. She hands me a camera. “My mom wants you to take pictures.”
“Isn’t she coming?”
“No.”
I’m shocked. Sunny’s mom has never, ever, missed a monthly demo. “Why isn’t she coming?”
“’Cause she wants to sit in her bathrobe, eat wedding cake, and watch the Bridemonsters marathon on cable.” (Bridemonsters is this show where women go berserk when they get married.)
I say, “Your mom’s not getting any less sad, is she?”
“No.”
“Did you at least get her into her art studio?”
“No.”
“What are you going to do?”
“There’s nothing I can do.”
“But she can’t stay in her bathrobe forever!”
Sunny picks at the paint on the porch rail. “I’m not so sure.”
Sunny and I hardly say another word on the long, long walk to karate
class.
Usually after karate class, Gina takes me and Sunny out for burgers. But tonight, since we’re Gina-less, Sunny just goes home and so do I.
Mom, Dad, and Madison are at the restaurant, and the house is quiet and empty when I walk in.
I go to my room—and I find that the stuffed animals from the top shelf have been knocked down onto the bed. What the heck happened?
Then I see an orange tail wagging in the middle of the pile of stuffed animals. It’s Julius!
“Bad kitty! What were you doing up on that shelf?”
I pull away four stuffed bears, one stuffed shark, and three stuffed elephants, finally uncovering one live cat. He’s got a pink ribbon in his mouth. A pink ribbon that is tied to…
…the magic envelope!
Oh no.
Oh no!
OH NO!
Without even thinking about it, I grab the envelope away from him. The pink ribbon slides out from the bow, the bow comes apart, and the flap pops open. All at once, streamers and confetti fall from the ceiling, and the room is filled with that annoying pink light again. And this time, trumpets sound. (I’m so glad Mom and Dad aren’t home!)
Julius, not a trumpet fan, yowls and scrambles out of the room.
I desperately try to retie the envelope, but the flap won’t stay closed. So I do the only thing I can think of—I sit on it. But the confetti just keeps falling, and the trumpets keep blaring.
A moment later, Katarina taps at the window. Without getting up from the bed, I reluctantly reach over and let her in. She flies up to me, smiling and happy.
Maybe if I pretend that I have no idea what’s going on, Katarina will leave and I can put the envelope in Mom’s shredder. So I say, all innocent, “Hey, there! What a nice surprise!”
“You opened the envelope!”
“No, I didn’t!”
“I see confetti and streamers.”
“Birthday party.”
“I hear trumpets.”
“My neighbor’s in a band.”
“And you’re sitting on something!”
“Just my bed. Comfy!”
Katarina glares at me and pulls out her wand. “So if I do a spell that burns up the envelope I gave you, you won’t mind?”
“Why would I mind?”
Katarina raises her wand and chants, “If Lacey’s a liar, her pants catch on fire.”
She looks likes she means business, so I yell, “STOP!”
Katarina flicks her wand anyway, and I cringe, but all she’s doing is turning off the music. The silence in the room is somehow even louder than the trumpets were.
I guiltily slide the envelope out from under me and put it on the bed. “Okay, okay! It’s open. But it’s Julius’s fault!”
Katarina rolls her eyes. “Why am I not surprised? I hate that miserable furbag.”
“So it doesn’t count that it’s open, right?”
“Of course it counts! You can’t reseal an envelope.”
“Sure you can! I’ve got glue, Scotch tape, or stickers. Take your pick.”
“You can’t reseal a magic envelope. Whether the cat made you do it or not, the test began the second you pulled that ribbon. You have between now and 9:23 on Friday night to make your client’s dreams come true.”
“Why 9:23?”
“That’s the precise time that the moon is full this month. People always think it’s right at midnight, but it can be any time. 4:10 in the morning. 1:50 in the afternoon. This month, it’s Friday at 9:23 p.m. A mere six days from now!”
“This is crazy! I don’t want to be a fairy godmother! And I won’t do the test!”
“All right, don’t. Then you’ll fail. But I warn you, if you fail—”
I know this is going to be bad. Fairies look all sweet and nice, but they play rough.
“—you’ll never find comfortable shoes again in your entire life.”
I blink at Katarina, surprised. “I can live with that.”
“Also, your client will be unhappy for the rest of her life.”
I don’t want to be mean, but it’s either her or me. “I can live with that.”
“Also, in addition to the shoes and the unhappy client…If you fail, people will hate you. Every single human being in the world will shudder at the very sight of you.”
Okay, I can’t live with that. I say, “That doesn’t even make sense! Why would people hate me?”
“People love you when you make their dreams come true. The hating comes when you ruin their dreams. And it’s not only hating, it’s also spitting and hair-pulling.”
The last time I got tangled up with Katarina, there were a couple of weeks when every animal on earth hated my guts, and that was awful. It would be way worse if every person on earth hated me.
I say in a trembling voice, “So there’s no way I can win. If I fail the test, people hate me. And if I pass, I get sent away to godmother school for a hundred years.” I can’t help it; I start to cry.
Katarina flies onto my shoulder and pats it. “Don’t take it so hard. Someone very wise once said there’s no situation so bad there isn’t a little good in it. Who said that? Oh! I think it was me.”
“There’s nothing good in this.” I keep crying.
Katarina stops patting my shoulder—she’s not too great with sympathy. “Snap out of it, Lacey! You only have six days. You need to see who your client is and get started.”
When I keep crying and ignoring her, Katarina aims her wand at the envelope, and it floats up in front of my eyes. A cream-colored card slides out, full of tooth marks from where Julius has chewed on it. But the words are still readable: Your client is Gina, who wants a dream wedding to her true love.
Shocked, I stop crying and stare at the card. “Gina? That’s Sunny’s mom! But I can’t help her. Her true love is already married to a dental hygienist.”
“Then he’s not her true love. And that’s the last hint I can give you. From this point forward, I’m here only to observe your progress, and I can’t give you any help or advice. Ask me no questions.”
Katarina waves her wand and there’s a buzzing mosquito noise, but I don’t see anything. Then she says, in a very serious tone, “I’ve released the pinch gnats.”
I have no idea what she’s talking about. “What’s a pinch gnat?” I ask. Then—ow! Something pinches me on the arm, really hard.
Katarina says grandly, “I can help you no more!”
“So they’re going to be here the whole time?” Ow! Something pinches me on my elbow. “Was that a pinch gnat?” OW!! Something pinches my other elbow. “How do I make them stop?” OW! OW! OW! I get pinched all over.
Katarina says, “The pinch gnats are here to make sure you don’t ask me any questions.”
Like I said, fairies play rough.
The pinching stops and I look at my arms, expecting to see welts all over them. But invisible gnats leave invisible marks.
So, whether I want to be or not, I’m back in the fairy-godmother business. And maybe I can make some good come out of a bad situation. There may not be a happy ending for me, but at least I can make sure that Gina and Sunny have one.
I dig through the stuffed animals on my bed and find the little wand. I pick it up and feel a small zap of electricity going up my arm, and the tip of the wand glows bright.
I, Lacey Unger-Ware, am now officially a Godmother Academy candidate.
Yikes.
I’m going to need some backup. I need a godmother posse. So I text Sunny and Paige: EMERGENCY! MEET ME TOMORROW AT FOUNTAIN PARK, 8 A.M.!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Katarina pulls out a little notebook and starts writing in it—about me, I bet. It makes me really, really nervous, so I send one more text: !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
When I reach the park a little before eight the next morning, Sunny and Paige are already sitting in the fountain. That would be a problem if the fountain worked, but it’s been dry for as long as I can remember. N
obody comes to this park anymore, so I thought it would be the perfect place to meet and talk.
“What’s going on?” Paige asks.
Before I have a chance to say anything, Katarina flies out of my pocket and waves. “Hiya, girls.”
“Katarina! You’re back!” Paige says, jumping up.
Sunny looks happier than I’ve seen her since her mom didn’t-get-married. (It’s so great to see a big smile back on her face.) She climbs out of the fountain and holds out her arms to give Katarina a hug, which is not easy when the hug-ee is three inches tall. So Sunny finally says, “Big hug!” and forms a circle with her arms around Katarina’s airspace.
I know that Sunny and Paige must be wondering what’s going on, so I quickly say, “Don’t ask Katarina any questions! There are pinch gnats!”
Sunny turns to me. “Can we ask you questions?”
Without even thinking, I ask Katarina, “They can ask me questions, right?” Then, OW! I get pinched on both sides of my face. Katarina smirks and scribbles something in her notebook.
Paige cocks an eyebrow. “So, what’s a pinch gnat?”
Sunny says, “And are you a fairy godmother again?”
I pause to see if the gnats are going to pinch them for asking questions. When nothing happens, I quickly tell Paige and Sunny why Katarina’s come back, leaving out the part about being sent away to school for a hundred years. (They’d freak out. I know it.) I skip straight to the reason I need their help: “Between now and Friday, I have to make somebody’s dream come true.”
Sunny says, “Who is it?”
“It’s…Gina.”
Paige looks confused. “Gina who? There’s no Gina at our school.”
Sunny says, “The only Gina I know is…” Then she starts jumping up and down. “OMG! OMG! It’s my mom! It’s my mom! That’s so great!”
Paige says, “But she’s old.” Sunny gives her a dirty look.
I say, “She’s not old. And even if she is, old people can have dreams, too.”
Katarina snorts, but since I can’t ask her whether she’s snorting about dreams or old people, I ignore her and turn to Sunny. “Your mom’s dream is getting married to her true love. And I have to make it happen by Friday night.”
The Magic Mistake Page 2
