Has Anyone Seen Jessica Jenkins?

by Liz Kessler

  “Each of the crystals is unique, and they all do a completely different thing. Take this one, for example. We had a necklace with a malachite pendant on it. When we put it in the serum, the whole necklace grew — not just the crystal.”

  “Like the whole of me turns invisible,” I said, “and not just the crystal?”

  “Right. So we know that if the crystal is physically attached to something when it interacts with the serum, it transfers its powers to the attached object.”

  “Or person,” Izzy added.

  “Or person,” Nancy agreed. “We’ve also found that once an object has been given a power from one crystal, it will never gain the power of another one.”

  “So you mean that now that Jess has turned invisible because of the rose quartz, she won’t pick up any other powers even if she touches another crystal?”

  “Exactly.”

  “So it’s safe for me to touch the malachite?” I asked.

  “According to our tests, yes. And there’s no reason to think it will be any different for you. But, look, let’s try with a different one, just to be on the safe side. One that definitely won’t make you grow to three times your size!”

  Nancy held her hand out and Izzy passed the giant broccoli back to her. “It’ll go back to its original size in a little while,” Nancy said, placing it back on the cloth and picking up another stone. It was light purple and shaped like a mini tower with a tiny hole in the top. “Here, let’s try this one,” she said.

  “What is it?” I asked.

  “Amethyst.”

  Izzy and I leaned in to study the crystal. The bottom half was a deeper purple than the top and looked as though it had been crushed and condensed. The top half was so light it was see-through. As the sun caught it, it glinted and sparkled.

  “Amethyst was the one that flew when you put it in the serum,” Izzy said.

  “Good memory,” Nancy confirmed. “OK, watch.”

  She went through the process again. The crystal bounced and shook inside the serum. A few moments later, it rose out of the bowl, hovering above it. It climbed as high as our heads. After a few minutes, it gradually came back down and Nancy caught it.

  Izzy stared, openmouthed, at the amethyst. “It’s beautiful,” she breathed.

  I stared at it, too. Nancy saw me looking and held it out to me. “You want to try touching it?” she asked.

  Accidentally being able to fly was definitely less of a problem than accidentally growing to three times my size. I reached out for the crystal. Nancy and Izzy studied me as I turned it over in my hands.

  Nothing happened. I closed my eyes and cleared my mind, just to double-check. Still nothing. Actually, not quite nothing. I could feel myself starting to turn invisible, but my feet were still firmly on the ground. I opened my eyes before Nancy could notice my fingers starting to disappear.

  “You’re fine,” she said. “I knew you would be.”

  “Too bad,” Izzy said. “Being able to fly would be amazing!”

  I passed her the crystal. “You want to hold it?”

  Izzy took the amethyst from me and closed her fingers around it. “If I could have any superpower in the world, it would be the ability to fly,” she said dreamily.

  “You can keep it if you like,” Nancy said.

  “Really?”

  “You know it won’t have any effect on you, though, don’t you?”

  Izzy smiled. “Yeah, I know, but I can always imagine.” She put the crystal in her coat pocket and zipped it shut. “Thank you,” she said.

  “Here, let me show you some others.”

  Nancy picked up what looked like a jet-black pebble with a few faint lines running across its middle.

  Izzy peered at the stone. “What’s that?”

  “Onyx.” Nancy held it out. “Here. Feel it.”

  Izzy took the stone from Nancy, weighed it in her hands for a moment, then held it out to me.

  I took the onyx from Izzy. “It’s like a stone,” I said. “Hard. Cold. Smooth.”

  Nancy took the onyx back and dropped it into the serum. “OK, watch this.”

  Just as it had with the malachite, the liquid soon began to bubble gently. I kept my eyes on the onyx as it spun around in the bowl. For a moment, nothing happened. Then it began to change. It didn’t look like a stone anymore; it had stretched and elongated. Nancy reached in and picked it out of the bowl. She handed it to me.

  The onyx felt like rubber. It flopped over my fingers. I pulled it and it stretched as thin as paper and as long as my arm. Then I scrunched it up and folded it into a ball. I threw it to Izzy. “Catch.”

  She missed it and the onyx flew past her. It hit a rock on the ground and bounced up in the air at an odd angle. As Izzy ran to catch it, I turned to Nancy.

  “I don’t get it,” I said. “Why are these things happening? What’s it all about?”

  “We don’t get it, either,” Nancy said. “We’ve worked so hard on these formulas, trying to find a breakthrough in cures for rare illnesses. We were never looking for this. To be honest, it’s turned our lives upside down.”

  “Yeah, you and me both,” I said.

  Izzy was back with the bouncy onyx and a huge smile. “This is incredible!” she said, eyeing the other crystals on the cloth.

  Nancy saw her looking. “Come on,” she said. “I’ll show you a few more.”

  We huddled around and watched while Nancy gave us a demonstration of more crystals and their superpowers: a bright-green piece of jade that split itself in two; a silver pebble called snowflake obsidian that disappeared from the bowl and reappeared ten feet away, lying on the ground; a piece of topaz that turned to ice.

  “Wow, you’re lucky you bought Jess a rose quartz,” Izzy said. “What if it had been one of these? She could have ended up as an ice statue or something!”

  I glared at Izzy.

  “I’m sorry I got you into all this,” Nancy said softly. “I really am.”

  “It’s OK,” I said. “It’s cool. OK, it’s a bit weird, but it’s amazing, too. I get to be a kind of superhuman superfreak.”

  Nancy grimaced. “It’s too bad your superpowers can’t tell me more about what’s going on at the lab.”

  “You mean about the doctor losing things?” Izzy asked.

  Nancy nodded, then shrugged. “I’m sure it’s just James being careless. I don’t even want to think about the other option.”

  “Which is what?” I asked.

  Nancy turned away. “That someone’s been breaking in,” she said under her breath. Then she gave us a quick smile. “I’m sure I’m wrong, though. The only way in is a coded keypad, and it hasn’t shown any sign of being tampered with. James has got his eye on some very high-tech security — motion sensors and all that — but outfitting the lab with the latest scientific equipment used up James’s windfall, so we haven’t installed it yet.”

  “But you think someone might be getting in?” I asked.

  “I don’t know. I’m probably worrying over nothing. I’ve already told you that James can be absentminded — I’m sure that’s all it is. It’s just — I like to know exactly where things are and what’s going on.”

  “And you don’t,” Izzy said.

  “No. I’ve been making charts of all the crystals we’ve tested and the results we’ve gained, and I’m sure some of them have gone missing. But it’s probably just James doing something with them and forgetting to tell me.”

  “Why don’t you ask him?” Izzy suggested.

  Nancy laughed. “You don’t know James,” she said. “He’s so twitchy; the slightest thing could tip him over the edge, and I don’t want anything to upset him. Not now that we’re finally on the verge of something so exciting — and potentially dangerous.”

  “Dangerous?” I broke in.

  Nancy paused. Her eyes narrowed as she thought. Then she nodded to herself. “I’ll show you. Stand back.”

  We moved back and watched as Nancy picked up a crystal with a
pair of tongs. It was an oblong shape and a shimmering amber color. Bright, almost gold, in fact.

  “What’s that called?” I asked.

  “Tiger’s eye,” Nancy replied without looking up. Now that I looked at it, it actually looked just like the bright amber eye of a tiger. It was the stone the shop was named after.

  Nancy dropped the stone carefully into the serum. Just as with all the others, the liquid bubbled and frothed.

  “Keep back, now,” Nancy warned. She carefully reached into the bowl and lifted the stone out with the tongs. As soon as it was out of the bowl, she threw the stone away from us.

  “What are you — ?” Izzy began.

  “Count to ten,” Nancy said, “and watch.”

  About ten seconds later, I was about to ask what we were supposed to be watching, when — BOOM! — the ground where the stone had landed erupted in a small explosion.

  “What the . . . ?” I stared at the smoke rising from the ground.

  Nancy waved us over to check it out. We followed her to the spot and watched, openmouthed, as she reached down into a small crater in the burned ground to pick up the stone.

  Izzy was staring at me with watery eyes. “What if this had been the one you’d given Jess?” she asked. “Would she have blown herself up?”

  “You think I haven’t been kept awake at night by precisely that question?” Nancy replied. She handed the stone to Izzy. “Check it out.”

  I looked over Izzy’s shoulder. “It’s completely unharmed,” I said.

  “Exactly. My guess is that you wouldn’t have blown yourself up — but you might have done some serious damage to things around you.”

  “Which is why you’re so terrified of something like this ending up in the wrong hands,” I said.

  “Correct.” Nancy frowned. “But I can’t try to find out if anyone’s been breaking in without setting off alarm bells for James — and that’s the last thing I want to do. I just have to hope I’m worrying about nothing.”

  “Yeah,” I said. But I was thinking, What if you’re not?

  It was only later on, after Nancy had left us and Izzy and I were ambling back through the park, that I decided to share the thoughts that were on my mind. Nancy would never approve so I couldn’t tell her — but I was positive Izzy would help me figure it out.

  “So, you know how Nancy’s worried about what’s going on at the lab but doesn’t want to bring it up with the doctor?” I began.

  “Uh-huh,” Izzy said.

  “Well. We can help her. We can find out what’s going on.”

  “We can?”

  I nodded. Then I glanced around to make sure there was no one around who might overhear our conversation.

  The coast was clear. “Listen up,” I said. “I’ve got an idea.”

  Izzy looked around, too. Then she leaned in to listen. “What’s your plan?”

  “A stakeout.”

  “A stakeout?”

  “Yep. We hang around the lab out of sight and see if anyone goes in. If they do, I follow them invisibly and see who they are and what they’re up to. It’s perfect!”

  Izzy frowned. “Well, yeah. Apart from one thing.”

  “What?”

  “It might be dangerous.”

  “How can it be dangerous? No one will see us. We’ll keep hidden; they won’t know we have anything to do with the lab. And if someone does come and I do follow them in, I’ll be invisible!”

  Izzy chewed on a fingernail. “You sure we shouldn’t check with Nancy first?”

  “Nancy’ll just get all nervous and probably say no. And you heard what she said. She’s worried. How cool would it be if we do this a couple of times, check there’s no one breaking in, and then we can set her mind at rest?”

  Izzy took off her glasses and wiped the lenses while she thought. Then she put them back on and nodded. “OK,” she said. “Let’s do it tomorrow.”

  We were just leaving the park when Tom appeared at the gates. He was out of breath, as if he’d been running.

  “Good — you’re still here!” he exclaimed, falling into stride with us as we walked down the road. “Well? What happened? I want every detail. Even the ones you don’t think are important! Tell me everything!”

  So we did. Between us, as we walked down the road, heading vaguely into town, Izzy and I relayed everything Nancy had told us — and shown us.

  When we’d finished, Tom stopped walking.

  I stopped and turned toward him. He was staring at me. His face had lost some of its color. His mouth hung open.

  “What?” Izzy asked.

  Tom shook his head. “Don’t you see? Don’t you realize what you’ve just told me?”

  “Er . . . yes. What about it? Is it something to do with Nancy?” Izzy asked.

  “No. It’s something to do with me.” Tom looked at me. “To do with us.”

  “Us?” I echoed. “You and me?”

  Tom rolled his eyes. “Jess! Three babies born on the same day. In the same ward . . .”

  I clapped a hand over my mouth as I suddenly realized what Tom was saying. How could I have missed it?

  “You,” I said simply. “Of course.”

  “You were one of the other babies!” Izzy squealed, catching on to my thinking. “That means you might have superpowers, too!”

  Tom stared at Izzy as though she’d just said that he’d been born on Mars and his parents were aliens — although, to be fair, Tom was probably the one person in the world who would have thought that sounded like fun. And I guess what she actually had said wasn’t much less bizarre.

  “I can’t take this in,” he said quietly. He looked down at his feet. “I’m not sure I want something like this.”

  “Something like what?” I asked.

  “I have a hard enough time because I happen to enjoy math and science.” He shook his head. “You think I want to be even more different?”

  I reached out to touch his hand. “Tom, it’s OK. It’s fun. It’s different in a good way!”

  He shrugged me off. “Sorry, girls.” He waved his hands in an “I’m done” kind of gesture and started to walk away. “I just can’t handle it. I’m out.”

  “Tom!” Izzy called down the road to him.

  He stopped and turned back to us. “I won’t tell anyone,” he said. “And it doesn’t change anything about our friendship. I’m just — I think I’m maybe just in shock right now. I need some time to myself, OK?”

  And then, before we had a chance to reply, he turned on his heel and paced off down the road.

  “Should we go after him?” Izzy asked.

  I wanted to, but I knew what Tom was going through. I’d been through the same panic and disbelief myself. I’d dealt with it by confiding in Izzy and figuring it out with her. Tom had a different way of handling things. I knew that. And so did Izzy. Tom dealt with worries in the same way he dealt with everything — in his brain, on his own, logically.

  “He just needs some space to think things over. Let’s leave him for now. He’ll be all right in a couple of days, I’m sure,” I said, hoping it was true.

  Izzy nodded. We walked in silence, each thinking our own thoughts.

  Izzy was the first to speak. When she did, it turned out her thoughts were on the same lines as mine.

  “You know it’s not just Tom, don’t you?” she said.

  “Yeah,” I replied.

  “We just need to find out who the third baby was, and then — ”

  “No, we don’t,” I interrupted. Somewhere between Tom reminding me of Nancy’s words and Izzy breaking the silence, I’d already realized who the third person was. I wished I hadn’t. If you had asked me to compile a list of people I’d rather not be wrapped up in this adventure with, she’d have been somewhere near the top. But I couldn’t avoid the truth.

  I’d seen her celebrating on the same day as me. I’d overheard her telling her friends how her daddy had bought her a pony for her twelfth birthday. I’d listened to the girls
in my grade screeching with delight about her thirteenth birthday party. On the thirtieth of March.

  Izzy looked at me quizzically. “You already know?”

  I grimaced. “It’s Heather.”

  Izzy looked blank for a moment. Then she registered what I’d said. “Heather Berry? Most-popular-girl-in-our-class? That Heather?”

  I nodded. “I suppose there might be someone else in town with the same birthday, but my money’s on her.”

  In fact, the more I thought about it, the more convinced I was. I thought back over the last few times I’d seen her — how she’d seemed different. Like that time outside the bathroom.

  Then I remembered something else — her new ring!

  Was it possible that she’d not only been affected by the serum like me, but that she also had a power like mine and already knew about it? If so, had she guessed that I had a superpower, too?

  There was only one way to find out.

  “Izzy,” I said. “We have to speak to Heather.”

  “Yeah. Only trouble is, how do we do it without sounding insane — or scaring her off like we just did with Tom?”

  I thought about it for a second. Then it came to me. “I’ve got another idea! A stakeout!”

  “Yeah, we’ve already agreed on — ”

  “No. A double stakeout. We do the lab tomorrow evening, but during the day . . .”

  “A stakeout of Heather!”

  “Exactly. We don’t let her know what we’re doing. We make it casual. Check out what she’s up to, see if there’s anything different about her. Be subtle and cool.”

  “Hmm, subtle and cool. Not exactly our trademark qualities,” Izzy pointed out.

  “Yeah. Well, you know. We’ll do our best.”

  “And if subtle and cool doesn’t work, we could always just come out with it and ask her.”

  I frowned. “Yeah. Maybe. As long as we can think of a way to say it without ending up at the school counselor’s office with a note saying we’ve lost our marbles.”

  “Sounds like a plan,” Izzy agreed.

  And for the first time in roughly . . . well, forever, I realized I was actually looking forward to Monday morning at school.

  My first stakeout opportunity was second period — French. Izzy is in honors French. She’s in honors everything, actually. I hate French and always have. It’s the accent you have to put on when you speak it — I just can’t do it. I feel silly trying. I barely made it into French 2.