A Spoonful of Magic

by Lynne Roberts

  Chapter 6 Stop and Go

  ‘What are you up to?’ demanded Joanne.

  Ryan and Andy looked embarrassed.

  ‘Nothing. Go away,’ bellowed Andy, trying to push his sister out the door. Joanne braced herself against the doorframe.

  ‘Stop it. I know you’re up to something. Why are you standing there in your swimming things, and what is it that thing Ryan’s got? And why is he holding a spoon?’

  ‘It’s a Geiger counter,’ sighed Ryan. ‘It beeps when you go near metal. We made it with my electronic kit.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Just because.’

  Joanne thought for a moment. ‘What are you going to do with it?’

  ‘None of your business. It’s a game we’re playing,’ yelled Andy. ‘Now go away. We don’t want you.’

  ‘Why can’t I play?’ asked Joanne suspiciously. ‘What’s the spoon for?’

  ‘It’s nothing. It’s just a game. You wouldn’t be interested,’ mumbled Ryan.

  ‘I might. Why don’t you tell me about it? I’ll scream and tell Mum you’re bullying me if you don’t,’ she threatened, as Andy moved towards her again. His shoulders sagged. ‘Oh, all right. Look, that spoon belongs to Ryan’s sister Tracey. It’s magic and you can make wishes with it.’

  ‘Only one per person,’ put in Ryan.

  ‘Yeah. And we’re going to make wish now. That is, Ryan is, and you are not coming too.’

  Joanne opened her mouth to scream then changed her mind abruptly. ‘If I don’t say anything can I have the next wish?’ she asked, with great cunning.

  Ryan looked awkward. ‘You’d have to ask Tracey, really. It’s her spoon. But yes, I guess so,’ he added hastily as Joanne showed signs of screaming again.

  ‘Great. Okay. You make a wish and I’ll have the spoon next.’ Joanne folded her arms and fixed an unwavering stare on Ryan, who shifted uncomfortably and did his best to ignore her.

  ‘Hurry up,’ said Andy urgently. Ryan tucked the Geiger counter under one arm and tapped the spoon firmly on Andy’s chest of drawers.

  ‘I wish Andy and I were on an island,’ he said confidently. He felt his ears pop then gave a start of surprise.

  It was incredibly noisy. Not with the roar of waves on a beach or the shrieking of brightly coloured parrots in the trees. Instead it was the honk of car horns, the roar of traffic and the occasional siren. Ryan and Andy looked around in bewilderment. To their horror they found themselves standing in the centre of a traffic island in the middle of Main Street. A steady stream of cars and trucks went past them in a circle and turned off in all directions. Ryan began to feel dizzy watching them.

  ‘What a swizz,’ howled Andy. ‘This isn’t an island!’

  ‘I guess it is, technically,’ sighed Ryan. ‘I guess we’d better go home again.’

  ‘We’re in our swimming things! I feel a total dork! We haven’t even got any money so we’ll have to walk,’ Andy pointed out in aggrieved tones.

  There was no answer Ryan could make to this. With a sigh he pulled his towel around his bare shoulders and chest, waited for a gap in the traffic, and started across the street.

  ‘Ow. The stones hurt my feet,’ complained Andy. ‘If I’d known I was going to be on a traffic island I would have kept my shoes on.’

  ‘It’s not my fault,’ argued Ryan, as they slowly walked down the street, dodging shoppers with laden bags and ladies pushing prams. ‘At least you’re not the one carrying the Geiger counter. It’s horribly heavy, and people keep giving me funny looks.’

  ‘You should have said tropical island.’

  ‘Then it might have put us on a traffic island in Fiji, or somewhere. That would have been worse.’

  ‘I don’t think anything could be worse than this,’ retorted Andy bitterly. ‘That spoon seems uncommonly fond of making me walk all over town.’

  The boys walked in silence for a few minutes, then as they turned down a side street they had a stroke of luck.

  ‘Hey, Andy, Ryan, do you want a lift?’ called Jason, as a red Mazda pulled to a stop beside them. The boys accepted thankfully and piled into the back seat.

  ‘Have you been for swimming lessons?’ asked Jason’s mother doubtfully, as she pulled the car out again into the traffic.

  ‘Um, yes,’ said Andy at the same time as Ryan said, ‘er, no.’

  ‘What have you been doing?’ asked Jason curiously. ‘And what’s that thing?’

  ‘It’s a Geiger counter,’ explained Ryan.

  ‘It’s really brilliant,’ interrupted Andy. We made it ourselves and you can use it to find treasure and all sorts of stuff.’

  ‘Wow.’ Jason’s eyes were like saucers. ‘What have you found so far?’

  ‘We haven’t actually found any yet,’ said Andy hurriedly, ‘ but it beeps like crazy when it gets near metal so it’s only a matter of time.’

  ‘Cool. Can I come and play?’

  ‘Sure,’ said Andy generously. ‘We’ll go to my place. Okay, Ryan?’

  Ryan agreed gladly. He was wondering what he was going to do to explain to his mother why he had been wandering round town in nothing but swimming shorts and a towel. He was sure that Jason’s mother would mention it when she next spoke to Mrs Hughes. He gave it up as too hard and sighed in relief as they arrived at Andy’s house.

  ‘I’ll pick you up at four, Jason,’ called his mother as she drove off.

  ‘Where’s the spoon,’ hissed Andy, as they waded through the mess of toys, books, chocolate wrappers and clothing that littered his floor.

  ‘I can’t see it. Joanne must have taken it,’ Ryan whispered back.

  They forgot about the spoon and had a blissful day with Jason, searching for treasure. They dug a large trench in Andy’s mother’s herb garden, convinced they had found a treasure chest, only to discover they had dug up the main water pipe for the house.

  ‘At least we know it works,’ said Ryan defensively, when Andy and Jason turned accusing stares on him.

  They had more luck in the middle of the lawn where Andy unearthed a broken piece of bike pedal that he was sure must be a valuable antique.

  ‘Hey look at this,’ called Jason, triumphantly holding aloft a rusty screwdriver that he had located in the long grass behind the garage. The boys duly admired it then Ryan gave a leap of surprise as a volley of barks came from the other side of the fence.

  ‘What sort of dog is that?’ he asked, peering cautiously through the palings.

  ‘That’s Bouncer. He’s a terrier of some sort, I think,’ said Andy. ‘He’s quite harmless, in fact he tries to lick my face when I see him, but he always barks like mad if I get too close to the fence.

  ‘Go away, dog,’ called Jason, waving the Geiger counter at it. To his surprise Bouncer retreated in terror. The ‘pings’ as it located the metal buckle on its collar were too much for him, and he slunk off to hide behind a large bush.

  ‘Good one,’ said Andy with satisfaction. ‘Maybe he won’t bark so much at me now. Come on guys, let’s see if we can find something out the front by the driveway. Maybe someone has dropped money there and we’ll be able to dig it up.’

  Even though this plan was unsuccessful, the boys had a wonderful time and only gave it up when the battery on the Geiger counter eventually wore out. There was no sign of Joanne all day. When Andy asked where she was his mother told him she was spending the night with a friend.

  ‘Can I have Ryan to stay the night, then?’ Andy asked, and his mother agreed.

  ‘You’ll have to tidy your room up, though, or there won’t be room for Ryan to step inside much less sleep,’ she said sternly.

  ‘I like my room the way it is,’ protested Andy. ‘It’s taken me years to get it that way.’

  ‘I realise that,’ said his mother, with a long-suffering look. ‘But there is such a thing as basic hygiene. You must tidy it at least a little if Ryan is staying the night. I’d give you a hand but I’m going to be busy in the kitchen. I’m off to Mrs Johnson�
��s farewell after lunch and I said I would take something for afternoon tea.’

  ‘Yeah, yeah. Whatever,’ muttered Andy.

  He made a token effort and shoveled a clear space on the bedroom floor for an air mattress. In the middle of doing this Ryan gave a gasp.

  ‘Look. It’s the spoon. Joanne hasn’t got it after all. She probably couldn’t find it in all the mess.’

  Andy shrugged. ‘Leave it on the dressing table. We can give it to her tomorrow.’

  Joanne came back before lunch the next day, towing a chubby dark haired girl by the hand who she introduced as ‘my friend Mindy.’

  ‘I've told her about the spoon so it had better work for us,’ she threatened, as she and Mindy stood inside the doorway of Andy’s bedroom.

  ‘I can’t guarantee anything,’ Ryan told her crossly. ‘It doesn’t seem to give very good wishes.’

  ‘Where did you go yesterday, then? You both suddenly disappeared and it felt really spooky.’

  Ryan explained that they ended up on a traffic island while Joanne spluttered with laughter. Mindy looked at him with an awed unblinking stare.

  ‘Boys don’t know how to wish properly,’ said Joanne confidently. ‘This is how you do it.’ She took a deep breath and brought the spoon down on the end of the bed with a thump. ‘I wish we all had wings,’ she said grandly.