Who Needs Magic? (3 page)

“Oh, okay.” She surveys the room one more time with a mix of frustration and disappointment. I can tell she’s used to getting her way. “Well, I have to go now. Sorry.” As if I’ll be crushed she’s leaving. “I might be at the mall a lot in the next couple of weeks, though, so I can check back. If you find any angels, will you save them for me?”

“Of course. I’ll make it my sole purpose in life.”

Tink cocks her head. I think my sarcasm has finally penetrated her very dense filter. She bites off another piece of the lemon stick and casts a final disapproving look around at the all-old-stuff-all-the-time clutter and then flits out.

“A little less of that, Delaney,” Nancy says without looking up from her book.

“Less of what?”

“You know.”

“Sorry. I’ll be nicer the next time she comes in.” Which I pray never happens. Nancy turns another page in her
book without saying anything, so I guess I’m forgiven. I return to the vintage clothing room and head to the corner to retrieve my mangled boot so I can toss it in the trash, but I find the unmarred one instead. I must’ve tossed the wrong boot.

I carry it to the worktable, but the boot on the table is unsliced too. I lift up the boot in my hand and study it from all sides. It’s the left boot, the one I
definitely
hacked up and ruined. Except it’s not ruined anymore. It’s back to where it was before I cut the first strip—back in time, like I wished.…

It can’t be. It
can’t
. Just because she sparkles and dresses in pink and collects chopsticks?

And
fairies
 …

I drop the boot like it’s on fire and race out to the counter. “I have to take a break,” I tell Nancy. “It’s an emergency.”

“Honey, I told you, you can use the bathroom in the office anytime.”

“No, it’s not that, it’s … I have to …”
Think, think
. “I’m really hungry.”

“Good idea. Let me give you some money.” Nancy puts down her book and opens the cash register.

“No, that’s okay.”

“I want you to get me a Nutri-Fizzy. Something different. Hmm … pomegranate and walnut, maybe.”

I snatch the twenty out of her hand without even
bothering to make a retching noise at her flavor request. “Got it.”

“If they don’t have pomegranate, acai is fine—and buy whatever you want for yourself. My treat!”

I wave the money and yell “Thanks” as I dash out the door.

It’s always a shock when I leave the Annex, the old part of the mall where Treasures is located, and enter the huge, new, glossy Wonderland section. The new mall’s real name is the Alcove, which suggests it’s some small, quaint, set-off area, but it’s actually this sprawling outdoor pseudo-paradise three times the size of the Annex. There’s a curving path that winds through the Alcove, past all the gigantic storefronts, and although the path is made of cobblestones, it might as well be a Yellow Brick Road, because when you enter the Alcove, it’s like that scene in
The Wizard of Oz
, when the black-and-white shifts to color, and everything is shiny and rainbow bright. It even smells
different here, like a mix of sunshine and citrus and some faint flowery scent that they probably pump into the air from little misters hidden in the artificial ivy draping the pretend balconies on the top floors of the stores. As I dash around modern-day Munchkins and their mothers, I scan the crowd for a sign of Tinker Bell. She couldn’t have gotten far. I hope.

I text Posh, but there’s no response. This is no surprise. I’ve barely heard from her since she and her new boyfriend, Christopher, went off to NASA summer camp. She’s my sole link to my life back in New Jersey, and the one person aside from Flynn, Dad and Gina who knows I’m an f.g., but our worlds barely intersect anymore. She’ll email me back eventually, but it’ll only be to tell me about some Mars moon that’s gone out of orbit or a new ring discovered around Jupiter. The email will include three million “links to more information,” approximately zero of which I’ll click on and exactly zero of which will relate at all to what is going on with
me
.

I could call Dad, but he gets pissed if I interrupt his “writing time,” even though, from what I can tell, his writing time involves a lot more Internet searching, snack making and desk reorganizing than writing. But whatever. The one person I’d really like to tell is Mom, but I can’t. I could “imagine” talking to her, or talk to her “in heaven” like people do sometimes—but it’s not talking to her that I miss, it’s her talking back, and that won’t be happening.

I wade my way through bickering families and
awestruck out-of-towners and clusters of BFFs (male and female) that always seem to be around on the weekends. The beach is twenty-five minutes away, but instead of surfing or sailing, they’re all
here
, strolling happily along the curvy mall avenue, wandering in and out of the high-end chain stores with their enormous window displays of expensive furniture and clothes and vases and jewelry, all of which will be on the sale rack tomorrow (and in Treasures fifty years from now). It may be outdoors, but whenever I’m over here, I feel like I’m suffocating from all the plastic newness.

In the middle of the mall, across from the movie theaters, is the fountain. It’s currently playing some song that isn’t exactly “Over the Rainbow,” but it’s close. The water sways along with the music, and toddlers lean over the side, reaching their hands toward the dancing droplets. Parents clutch their kids’ belt loops to keep the urchins from face-planting into the penny-filled pool.

This is pointless. Tinker Bell’s not going to stand out here where
everything
is sparkly and candy-colored. And now, because I promised Nancy, I have to join the five-mile-long Nutri-Fizzy Bar line, which winds past the surf shop, the organic chocolate boutique, Brennan’s bookstore
and
the custom-designed kids’ furniture emporium. I should’ve brought a book. I could run inside Brennan’s and get one. I think Gina’s working today, so I could use her manager’s discount. But then I’d end up even farther back in the Nutri-Fizzy line.

“Nutso-Fizzy” is more like it. I don’t get what the thrilling appeal is of combining carbonated water with disgusting flavored powder mixes. But I’ve stopped being surprised by the weird behavior of the bleached-brained locals in this part of the country. I only hope I don’t suffer the same mental sun damage. I should’ve brought a book and a
hat
.

A few days go by as I inch forward in line. Why did I even come out here in the first place? I already know what Tinker Bell is—a bossy, irritating, angel-collecting brat—and
nothing else
. I was looking at the wrong boot back at the store, that’s all. There was another pair, unsliced, and I got the two pairs mixed up. This is obviously the explanation, because it’s too much of a coincidence for my suspicions to be right. And whoever heard of an f.g. who actually looks the part? Look at me. Look at
Dad
. Maybe I can tell Nancy that they ran out of the fizzy part of the Fizzy. I’ll wait until the current fountain song (something about seagulls and star beams) is over, and if I’m not any closer, I’ll leave. Through the spouts of waltzing water, I can see a group of kids dancing on the mini-lawn on the other side of the fountain. A little girl trips on the sash from her dress, which has come untied, and it rips off. She grabs the sash off the ground and presses it onto the dress, as if it might repair itself. Her eyes go wide in pre-tantrum warm-up as she presses harder and harder without success.

I reach down toward my boot to unzip the chopstick
sleeve—just as the little girl’s eyes go even wider with delight when the sash
does
repair itself. The girl smiles, pleased, not at all surprised by this tiny miracle, and she goes back to dancing. None of her friends are fazed either, but then, magic is nothing special if you’re young enough to still believe it’s a part of daily life. I, however, feel my breath catch, and then I glimpse a slash of a pink skirt disappear behind a vendor cart selling Crocs accessories. I dart out of the Fizzy Bar line, making the thousands behind me thrilled to move up a micro-inch, and race after her. Now that I’ve seen her, I’m able to keep her in my sight, despite the gaggles of camera-snapping tourist couples, app-playing boys and stroller-pushing nannies that get in my way. Tinker Bell holds a green candy stick now, and she points it this way and that as she strides along. Around her, falling sunglasses make slow-motion soft landings, pacifiers are restored—clean—to babies’ mouths before their mommies see, and melting ice cream cones re-freeze mid-drip. Small wishes granted all around, and they happen so fast, I’ve only just spotted the last before she does the next. There’s no effort either. No sense that she’s concentrating, willing her energy through the candy stick. To anyone passing by, it looks like she’s licking the candy and then pausing briefly and then licking again. No one would ever suspect her.

Except another f.g.

Tink interrupts her wish-granting marathon to check the time on the big clock that hangs over Taylor & Taylor’s
for Men. She holds the lime stick in her mouth, pressed against the inside of her cheek like a lollipop, and reaches into her pink vinyl purse to lift out her phone (pink, of course). She glances at the cell’s screen and then takes a seat on an empty bench nearby. Behind her, a spray-tanned male model seems to stare down from an ad for sunglasses that’s posted on one of the stand-alone pillars that line the mall’s weaving walkway. Sunglasses Man and I watch as Tink reads a text and then types a reply. She taps her foot as she types, her frosty toenail polish firing off little flecks of reflected sunlight. The sun glints off her headband. This girl really is too sparkly—I expect Sunglasses Man to come alive and push those designer shades all the way up to block the rays. Tink puts the phone away, takes the lime stick out of her mouth and taps it against her teeth, deep in sparkly thought.

I should go up to her. Now is my chance. But what do I say? It’s not like “how to greet a fellow f.g.” is in the rule book anywhere. Partly because there
is
no rule book and partly because Dad told me there
aren’t
any f.g.s except him and me. Of course, he initially thought I wasn’t one either, and he was wrong about that too.

Suddenly I feel nervous, but why? What am I afraid of?
Tinker Bell?
I force myself to walk up to her. She raises her head and shields her eyes with her hand as I approach. “Oh, hey,” she says. Her tone is one-quarter surprised, one-quarter curious and one-half wary. “Did you find an angel?”

“No. Something else.”

“Really?” She sits up straight, eyes wide,
all
curious now. I lower the zipper at the top of my boot and pull out the chopstick. “Why are you hiding it in there?” She lowers her voice. “Did you steal it? You didn’t have to do that. I can pay for it.”

“It’s mine. This is where I carry it. I’m one too.”

“One what?”

“You know.” I wave the chopstick in the air and then point it at her. “You fixed my boot.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Her voice has now gone as frosty as her nail polish.

Striding up behind Tinker Bell, a woman with moussed hair and lots of chunky gold jewelry bats at a crease of dirt that zigzags above the knee of her bright white slacks. “Watch,” I tell Tink. The woman has stopped to retrieve a bleach pen from her power purse. While she’s involved in screwing off the top of the pen, I clamp down on the chopstick and focus—because unlike Tinker Bell, über-f.g.,
I
still have to concentrate. Now that she’s got the cap off, the lady leans down to attack the stain, pen poised—and frowns. The stain is gone. She glances at the other leg, as if the dirt might have migrated, but that leg is as blindingly bright as the first. The woman shrugs, laughs to herself, returns the pen to her bag and saunters off, problem solved.

Or rather, wish granted. I blow on the end of the chopstick like I’m a sheriff in an old western movie and return
the chopstick to its boot pocket. As I straighten up, I’m thrown off-balance by two arms grabbing me, squeezing me in a ribs-crunching bear hug. “Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God. I can’t believe it! It’s true, isn’t it? It is! Oh my God!” I flex my arms and she finally lets go. “You have to tell me everything! Are you in disguise? I’ve never heard of a”—she lowers her voice to a whisper—“you know”—then back to regular volume—“who dressed like you.” She whirls the lime stick in a big oval loop to take in my black boots, black tights, black minidress and black neckband, stopping before she gets to my long black hair. “But then, the only other ones I know about are my mom and my grandma.” She claps her hands together and her eyes gleam. “I can’t wait to tell my mom I’ve met another one, and my age too! She’ll flip out.”

“So will my dad.”

“Your dad?”

“It’s a long story.…”

A little while later, Ariella Patterson, f.g., and I are sitting cross-legged on the grass at the far edge of the mini-lawn, away from the stage and the tiny toddling dancers, eating ice cream and talking about magic wands and fairy godmothers like we’re kindergartners during story time. But what we’re talking about isn’t made up. It’s real. And we’re living it. Ariella is the perfect name for her. Very Tinker Bell—like. Even sitting, she flutters constantly,
waving her hands as she chatters on in enthusiastic bursts, as if this is the most exciting conversation she’s ever had in her life. It’s not really a conversation, though, so much as Ariella talking and me listening. Despite about five more pleas to “tell me everything,” Ariella Patterson is the one doing most of the telling.