The Magical Land of Birthdays

by Amirah Kassem

  Elvis licked his lips. “I’m really thirsty,” he said. “Do you think they’d mind if I drank some lemonade?”

  Amirah glanced around. “I don’t know,” she said. “There’s no one here to ask. But . . .”

  Elvis walked toward the table and reached for one of the glasses. Just as he was about to pick it up, it dissolved into nothingness.

  “Wait a minute! None of this is real,” he said, trying to lift one of the seashells. It, too, vanished into a silvery mist.

  “This isn’t a party,” Amirah suddenly realized. “It’s like . . . the memory of a party. Or an idea. Something that doesn’t actually exist in the real world.”

  “Is it just me, or are all the colors fading?” Mei asked, frowning. “They’re, like, washed out.”

  “It’s not just you,” Elvis agreed. “It kind of looks like this whole party is going to . . . disappear.”

  “Like the girl!” Amirah exclaimed. “Remember how she was here but not here? And she seemed to . . . flicker? And fade away?”

  “Do you think she’s connected to this lonely party?” Elvis asked.

  Amirah nodded. She closed her eyes for a moment and listened to what her heart was telling her. “I do,” she said. “I can’t really explain it—I mean, I don’t have any proof—but I really believe they’re connected somehow. And I’m almost positive she’s one of our B-Buds.”

  “But everything else in the Magical Land of Birthdays is so bright and colorful,” Mei pointed out. “Why would this gloomy party be connected to us or one of our B-Buds?”

  “I’m not sure,” Amirah replied. What Mei said was perfectly rational. But in her heart, Amirah felt certain that the party was somehow connected to the girl, who she was sure was one of their B-Buds. And she needed their help.

  “There’s a light,” Elvis suddenly said.

  The girls looked where he was pointing. Sure enough, on the other side of the clearing, a silver light glimmered. It hovered in the branches of the trees, just above their heads.

  In silence, the B-Buds moved toward the light. Amirah reached out to push aside the tangled ribbons. Then she gasped in amazement.

  “B-Buds! We did it!” she cried. “We found Cara the Unicorn!”

  “Cara the unicorn is . . . a piñata?” Elvis asked doubtfully, staring into the trees.

  “I thought Cara was going to be a real unicorn,” Mei added.

  Disappointment flickered through Amirah. She didn’t want to admit it, but she’d expected Cara the Unicorn to be real too. But there was no doubt that the unicorn before them was a piñata. A stunning piñata—gorgeous, even—made of silvery tissue paper, with a rainbow mane of ribbon roses and a silver horn that seemed lit from within. That’s where the light is coming from, Amirah thought.

  The piñata hung from a silver ribbon that was tied to a branch. As it spun and twisted in the gentle breeze, Amirah knew that there was nothing real, or lifelike, about it.

  But nothing here is what it seems, Amirah reminded herself. If she’d learned anything during her adventures in the Magical Land of Birthdays, it was that anything was possible, anything in the whole world. Especially on a birthday.

  “She’s so beautiful,” Amirah whispered, reaching up to rest her hand on the piñata’s side. For the briefest instant, she thought she felt something. A quiver, maybe, or a pulse. But she knew it was just her imagination. Cara the Unicorn was just a piñata, after all.

  “Stand back, B-Bud,” Elvis said, his voice interrupting Amirah’s thoughts. She turned around and saw that he was carrying his present. Fully extended, the silver tube was three feet long. It almost looked like a tree branch.

  “What’s that for?” Amirah asked.

  “That’s a piñata,” Elvis replied, pointing the silver stick at Cara. “And piñatas are full of treats and surprises and good stuff. So I’m guessing we need to break it open.”

  “Ooh, remember the rock?” Mei asked excitedly. “When it cracked open, we found a map inside!”

  “And the map helped us find our way to the unicorn,” Elvis added. “I bet our next clue is inside the piñata!”

  A slight frown flickered across Amirah’s face. Everything her friends said made sense. But breaking open this piñata felt wrong somehow, in ways she couldn’t quite explain. The piñata shimmered as it swayed gently in the breeze. Amirah already knew she couldn’t bear to watch something so beautiful be destroyed.

  As Amirah thought about what to do next, her hand still resting on the piñata’s side, a silvery mist swirled around their ankles.

  “Where’s this misty stuff coming from?” Mei wondered, trying to wave it away. It continued to fill the clearing, snaking around their legs, their knees, their waists . . .

  “That party, I bet,” Elvis replied. He raised the silver stick above his head. “Let’s break open the piñata while we can still see it.”

  Suddenly, Amirah felt it again—a tremble deep within the piñata.

  “Wait,” Amirah said. She was more convinced than ever that this was no ordinary piñata. But how could she convince her friends? She had no proof.

  Amirah held out her hand. “Can I have the tube?” she asked.

  “Sure,” Elvis said with a shrug. “Give it a good whack! It should be easy without a blindfold. I can’t wait to find out what’s inside!”

  As Elvis placed the stick in her hand, Amirah was surprised to find that it felt strangely warm for a piece of metal. Then she felt something else—the faintest pulse, the slightest quiver.

  Just like when she had touched the piñata.

  Amirah lifted the stick high into the air. Instead of hitting the piñata, though, she gently touched the stick to the silver string from which it hung.

  Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz!

  The sound of sparks crackling filled the clearing, but Amirah barely noticed. She was too busy shielding her eyes from the startling light, so warm, so bright, so beautiful that it was almost blinding.

  Almost.

  Amirah couldn’t help but watch through her fingers. The shimmering light was devouring the string like a sparkling candle on a birthday cake. Not just the string, though. It crackled over the unicorn piñata, until the whole thing blazed with such brightness that Amirah really did have to look away.

  Within seconds, the warmth faded away, and it grew quiet enough in the clearing that Amirah could hear a soft thud. Then another, and another, and another.

  It almost sounded like hoofbeats.

  She opened her eyes.

  Across the clearing stood Cara the Unicorn.

  Not a piñata, not a stuffed animal, but real in every way, from her flowing mane to her eyes, which were as dark and shimmery as a lake reflecting a full moon at midnight. All the parts of Cara that had once been silver were now gold, beaming with a warmth and brightness that filled Amirah’s heart with happiness.

  Cara bobbed her head, making her mane cascade like a rainbow-tinged waterfall, and pawed at the ground with her shimmery hooves. She was so lovely, so magical, so majestic that Amirah almost wanted to bow to her.

  Instead, Amirah nodded her head at Cara.

  Then, to her astonishment, Cara nodded back!

  “I’m Amirah,” Amirah said, even though she had a funny feeling that Cara already knew that. She held out her hand, palm up, and waited, barely daring to breathe.

  Cara took a few steps toward Amirah and gently nuzzled her hand. Just standing near the unicorn made Amirah feel a little dizzy. Meeting a real unicorn had always seemed like a daydream, a fantasy that could only occur in her imagination. But in the Magical Land of Birthdays, anything could happen.

  Amirah closed her eyes from pure joy and imagined how incredible it would be to explore this wild, wonderful world with Cara by her side. Cara, she knew, could show her everything. Cara could help her find her way. They’d roam the rocky roads, skip through the field of cake ball flowers, climb the craggy mountains, and finally, explore Sparkle City at the tippy-top of the island—<
br />
  “Amirah!”

  The urgency in Mei’s voice pierced Amirah’s daydream. In all the excitement, she’d almost forgotten about her B-Buds.

  “The mist,” Mei continued. “It’s getting thicker. How are we going to get out of the forest?”

  Amirah had been so captivated by Cara the Unicorn’s appearance that she had failed to notice the rising mist. It was thicker than before, thick enough to cut through with a swipe of her hand. Yet there seemed to be no way to clear it. No matter how much Amirah, Mei, and Elvis tried to wave the mist away, it grew thicker and thicker. Soon, Amirah knew, the B-Buds wouldn’t even be able to see across the clearing.

  They wouldn’t even be able to see each other.

  Suddenly, Amirah gasped.

  “What’s wrong?” Elvis asked. She could hear him, but could barely make out his silhouette among the swirling mist.

  “My dream,” Amirah cried. “It ended in clouds of mist—just like this!”

  “Is that happening again?” Mei said urgently. “Is our adventure almost over?”

  “It can’t end like this,” Amirah exclaimed. “It just can’t. We haven’t found the girl—we haven’t figured out how to help her—”

  Amirah spun around. She could still see Cara, glimmering at the edge of the clearing. The unicorn seemed to emit a sense of calm; if she was concerned about the rising mist, she didn’t show it.

  “If this is just a dream—if we all wake up at our homes—how will we find each other again?” Elvis asked.

  “No,” Amirah said, shaking her head. “It doesn’t end yet. Not now. Not like this. I won’t let it.”

  Amirah’s emotions swirled almost as wildly as the mist. Her hands were trembling a little as she unscrewed the cap on her container of sprinkles and popped a few in her mouth.

  Think, she ordered herself. Think, think, think. Everyone is counting on you.

  It wouldn’t help to panic or freak out. Besides, that wasn’t Amirah’s style. She snacked on a few more sprinkles as she racked her brain. What had they learned so far in the Magical Land of Birthdays? What had this special place been trying to tell them?

  Find Cara the Unicorn

  The message in the sprinkles—and the map in the rock—hadn’t led Amirah and the B-Buds to the mysterious girl. They’d sent them on a search for this enchanting creature. Then, almost by accident, the B-Buds had freed Cara from her piñata form.

  Why, though?

  Why?

  Suddenly an idea sparked in Amirah’s mind. “Cara!” she cried. Even the unicorn was hard to see now through the mist. “Where is she? Where is the mysterious girl?”

  The mist swirled. The silence stretched.

  Then Cara the Unicorn dipped her head and pointed her horn across the clearing.

  A sparkling rainbow sprang from her horn, evaporating the mist and illuminating the forest.

  Not just the forest.

  Amirah blinked in disbelief. There, standing in the beam of light, was the mysterious girl she’d spotted by the candy-apple tree. The very same one from her dream.

  How long has she been there? Amirah wondered.

  Remembering how the girl had run away from them before, Amirah knew that she had to act fast. She rushed across the clearing, with Mei and Elvis right behind her.

  “Please don’t go!” Amirah cried. “We’ve been looking for you everywhere. Everywhere!”

  The girl blinked in surprise. “Me?” she asked. “You’ve been looking for me?” Her voice was soft, with an accent that Amirah recognized as Australian.

  “Yes! Since we saw you back at the strawberry field,” Amirah said. “Didn’t you see us?”

  There was a long pause.

  “Yes,” the girl finally said, her voice barely more than a whisper. She stared at the ground. “But I didn’t want to ruin your day.”

  The B-Buds exchanged a troubled glance.

  “Ruin our day?” Amirah asked. “What do you mean?”

  “Yeah, how could you ruin our day?” Elvis asked, perplexed.

  The girl held out her hand near one of the trees. Astonishingly, the chocolate-brown trunk faded to pale tan; the bright green leaves grew withered and gray. “Everywhere I go, the color fades away,” she said. “It’s like the whole world gets as sad as I am. And when I saw the three of you . . .”

  As her voice trailed off, Cara stepped forward and nuzzled her arm. The act of kindness seemed to encourage the girl.

  “You seemed so happy. Like you were having so much fun together,” the girl said sadly. “And I just . . . I didn’t want to ruin it.”

  Amirah’s heart swelled with sympathy. They’d been so worried about this girl—whoever she was—and at the same time she’d been worrying about them.

  “We were just talking about our birthdays,” Elvis spoke up. “See, this is so crazy, but we all have the same birthday—today . . .”

  His voice trailed off as the girl’s eyes widened. “But today is my birthday,” she said.

  “Really?” Mei exclaimed. “That means you’re one of us—one of the B-Buds! You were right, Amirah!”

  “That stands for Birthday Buds,” Elvis added. He stuck out his hand. “Nice to meet you, B-Bud! I’m Elvis!”

  “I’m Mei.”

  “And I’m Amirah,” Amirah offered.

  A small, soft smile flickered across the girl’s face. “I’m Olivia,” she replied.

  Amirah impulsively gave her a hug. “Happy birthday, Olivia,” she said.

  Olivia hugged her back, but her smile wavered.

  “Since we’re officially B-Buds now, do you want to tell us what’s wrong?” Amirah asked.

  Olivia looked away. “I don’t want to trouble you on your birthdays,” she said shyly.

  “Are you kidding?” Amirah asked. “That’s what B-Buds are for!”

  “Yeah!” Mei chimed in. “We want to help! However we can!”

  Olivia tried to smile at her new friends. “It’s just—today’s my birthday,” she began. “I mean, you already know that. I’ve been planning my birthday party for months. A mermaid party on the beach—”

  “The beach?” Elvis asked in surprise. “In January?”

  Olivia nodded. “In Australia, where I live, it’s summertime,” she explained.

  “No way!” Elvis exclaimed.

  “Of course,” Mei said. “The seasons are opposite in the southern hemisphere.”

  “Tell us all about your party plans,” Amirah encouraged. “I love hearing about birthdays almost as much as I love celebrating them!”

  “We were going to put a big table on the beach and cover it with seashells and glitter,” Olivia said sadly. “And make seashell tiaras and sea wands . . . We were going to have a sandcastle-building contest and a seashell scavenger hunt. Then, when the sun set, we were going to hang up all these jellyfish lanterns my mum and I made, and my dad was going to build a bonfire of driftwood. And I painted a treasure chest and put all the party favors in it—soap shaped like seahorses and sandcastle snow globes and chocolate starfish.”

  “It sounds amazing!” Amirah cried, totally captivated.

  “Thanks,” Olivia mumbled. “I think it would’ve been. But now it’s going to rain, and not just a little drizzly rain, but buckets and buckets of rain! There’s no way we can have my party on the beach. Not with the kind of storm that’s brewing.”

  The B-Buds sat in silence for a moment.

  “Well . . . can you move your party inside?” Elvis finally asked.

  Olivia shrugged. “That’s what my mum said. But our living room isn’t nearly as right for a mermaid party at the beach,” she said. “No sandcastle contest, no seashell scavenger hunt, no driftwood bonfire. Just a lot of pretending at being mermaids in a living room, like we’re little kids. I don’t even have a proper party dress and I’m not wearing my bathing suit in the house; that would be ridiculous! It’s going to be the most un-magical birthday ever. It almost . . . it almost makes me want to skip it altogethe
r and cancel my party.”

  Amirah sucked in her breath sharply. “Skip your birthday and cancel your party?” she exclaimed. “Nuh-uh. No way. Not on our watch. Right, B-Buds?”

  “Right!” Mei and Elvis said at the same time.

  Then Elvis cleared his throat. “Uh . . . what exactly did you have in mind?” he asked Amirah.

  The truth was that Amirah hadn’t quite figured that out yet. But she wasn’t worried. She snacked on a few sprinkles as she thought it over.

  “Olivia,” Amirah began. “A birthday is important. A birthday matters. It’s the most special day of the year because it’s the day you were born. There was nobody like you in the whole wide world until the day you were born—your birth-day—when that changed forever!”

  This time, when Olivia smiled, it was less wavery than before.

  “The thing about birthdays is that their joy can last you the whole year,” Amirah continued. “I call it living the birthday lifestyle.”

  “Like—every day is your birthday?” Elvis asked in confusion.

  “Not exactly,” Amirah said. “Your birthday is one and only! But the way I feel on my birthday—special and loved and happy—well, I want to feel like that every day. That’s another reason why I always carry sprinkles in my pocket. Here—hold out your hands!”

  The B-Buds stuck out their hands so Amirah could shake some sprinkles into their palms. Then everyone munched on the sprinkles together.

  “See what I mean? Sprinkles make everything feel a little bit like a party!” Amirah said. Then she turned back to Olivia. “I don’t know if your birthday party would feel un-magical at your house. I mean, I think all birthdays are magic . . . even when they’re not perfect.

  “But here’s what I do know,” she continued. “We’re in the most magical place in the universe. I mean, it’s right in the name—the Magical Land of Birthdays! So this is my idea . . . let’s celebrate here!”

  “Here?” Olivia repeated.

  “Right here,” Amirah said, holding her arms open wide. “There’s a table set up for a party right over in the clearing. It’s not, you know, the beach, but I know we can make the best of—”