Leap Day

by Wendy Mass

Dad nods, and Katy steps back a few feet again.

  “So why is she crying?”

  Surprisingly, a brief smile crosses his face. “This is right up your alley. She’s scared of the ghosts in the Haunted Mansion.”

  “The ones that get in your car at the end?”

  “Yup. Sound familiar?”

  “Hey, I didn’t cry after the ride!” Just during it, but my friends don’t need to know that.

  “Will you help her?” he pleads.

  “All I have to do is explain the ghosts are just holograms, right? Like you told me when I was little?”

  He shifts his weight from side to side. “Actually, you can’t say that.”

  “Why not?

  “We have to ‘preserve the magical guest experience’ at all times,” he says apologetically. “It’s rule number three in the handbook. You’ll have to figure something else out. Free cotton candy maybe? Hurry.”

  I turn to my friends. Zoey glances meaningfully at her watch. “Go ahead,” Katy says with a light shove. “We’ll wait.”

  It’s not like they have much choice, since I’m the driver.

  With one last glance at the stranger who is my father, I hurry into the bathroom. I’ve never done anything like this before. Why should someone listen to anything I have to say? I know, I’ll pretend I’m acting in a play! When I get inside, I find the girl huddled under the counter, wiping her face with some toilet paper.

  “Hi,” I say to her, cringing a little at how loud it comes across. Megan would love the acoustics in this place! “My name’s Josie,” I say more softly this time. “I used to be scared of those ghosts too. Maybe I can help.”

  The little girl sniffles, and I feel her pain, I really do.

  “Do you want to go back outside, and we can talk there?”

  She shakes her head and doesn’t meet my eyes. Okay, so we’ll just have to do this here. In a bathroom. “Those ghosts looked like they were having fun, right? They seemed happy. So really, there’s nothing to be afraid of.”

  The girl keeps crying. The collar of her Hello Kitty t-shirt is getting wet. I grab a paper towel and hand it to her. She takes it and lets her hands fall to her side. I don’t think I’m doing very well here. Heck, just because Dad has to “preserve the magical guest experience” doesn’t mean I have to.

  “You know,” I say, “it’s very possible those ghosts aren’t even real. I’ve heard rumors that they might just be holograms, like in a movie.”

  The girl shakes her head. “They’re real! I know they are!” She swipes at her wet eyes angrily.

  “What makes you say that?” Hey, at least she’s saying something. That’s a good sign.

  She sniffles. “One of them... spoke to me.”

  Huh? I didn’t see that coming. All I can think to ask is, “What did the ghost say?”

  The girl meets my eyes for the first time. For the moment, she has stopped crying. “It was my nana. She said, ‘Don’t worry, Sloane, I’m here. We’ll go home together after the ride.’ But now she’s not here anymore!”

  “So it’s not that you were scared of the ghost, it’s that your nana isn’t around when she said she’d be?”

  Sloane nods her head. She wipes at her eyes again, but less angrily. A thin silver bracelet on her wrist catches the light.

  “That’s a beautiful bracelet.”

  She looks down at it. “My nana gave it to me for my birthday last year.”

  “You must have loved her very much.”

  Sloane nods. “She named me,” she says, sitting up a little straighter.

  “How come she gave you such an unusual name?”

  Sloane thinks for a while and says, “Nana said people with unusual names lead unusual lives.” When she says unusual it comes out like anooshal.

  “She sounds like a smart lady.”

  Sloane doesn’t answer. She just stares down at her bracelet. I don’t want to lose her so I ask, “What kinds of things did you like to do together?”

  Finally she says, “She used to love coming here. She wouldn’t go on any of the rides, though. She’d just watch me.” Sloane’s lips twitch in the first sign of a smile that I’ve seen.

  I move closer to her. “Sloane, do you think it’s possible that your nana was telling you that she’s always with you, whether you’re here in Disney World or at home?”

  Sloane tilts her head slightly, looking up at me.

  “Maybe it was her way of letting you know she’ll always be inside your heart.”

  Sloane thinks for a few seconds and then nods. Her face brightens.

  I smile. “You’re a lucky girl to have a nana who loves you so much.”

  Sloane smiles for real now and reaches for me to help her out from under the counter.

  “There’s someone outside waiting to give all little girls named Sloane some cotton candy.” The words are barely out of my mouth when she runs out of the bathroom. That girl might have a future on the track team.

  When I get back out into the bright sunlight, I see Sloane holding my dad’s hand, dragging him toward the cotton candy stand like nothing was ever wrong. He turns to look at me over his shoulder. He’s beaming. Zoey points frantically at her watch.

  I wave goodbye to my dad and Sloane as Megan grabs onto my t-shirt and yanks. We take off in a run down the center of Main Street.

  “I’m really sorry I made us lose so much time,” I say, huffing.

  “Don’t worry about it,” Katy says. “You were only gone six minutes.”

  “Really? It felt longer.”

  “Whatever you said must have worked.”

  “I guess so. Did my dad say anything to you guys while I was in there?”

  The three of them exchange glances. “Not really,” Megan says. “Just some stuff about working here always being a dream of his.”

  “Really? He never mentioned anything like this before.” As I say it, I remember our talk on the way to my driver’s test. All that stuff about following your dreams. I guess he was just waiting for the right moment to tell me. But the moment found itself, instead.

  We hurry through the exit turnstiles and Katy squeezes my arm. “Helping kids seems like a pretty cool job to me.”

  I smile gratefully. Yeah, it really is a pretty cool job. It feels nice to know that after the first few minutes in there, I hadn’t been acting anymore.

  As we head into the parking lot, four girls I recognize from my gym class run past us. Two of them have big knapsacks on their backs, filled to the brim. Megan says, “What, are they afraid to leave their stuff in the car?”

  I can’t help being a bit jealous. “It looks like they have a lot of things already.”

  “Hey, at least they won’t find any menus at Donald’s Hot Dog Hut,” Zoey says.

  “You think we should warn them?” Katy asks. We all look at her like she has two heads. “Just kidding,” she says. As we approach the car she checks her list. “What are we going to do about the two identical organic things?”

  “How about two rocks?” Zoey suggests. “Or leaves?”

  We look down at the asphalt. Every pebble we pick up is slightly different.

  “I know!” I say loudly, asserting my new feeling of being capable. “We’ll get the Davis twins! They’re identical and organic!”

  “Interesting!” Megan says, her eyes lighting up. “Think of all the bonus points for creativity. I can see us now, introducing videos on MTV, rubbing shoulders with all the famous people...”

  “But we can’t have more people join our team,” Katy points out.

  “They won’t have to join,” I say. “They’ll just be two more items on the list. We’ll make sure they don’t help us.”

  “What if they’re on the scavenger hunt too?”

  “We won’t know unless we try.”

  She agrees, and we hop in the car and head back out to the main part of town. Megan says she knows where the Davis boys live because they are on her bus route. We pull in front of the house an
d get out. No one moves more than a foot away from the car.

  “Who’s gonna ring the bell?” Zoey asks.

  “Well,” Megan says, “since I’m the motivator, I say Josie goes up there. She knows them the best.”

  I try to argue. “I don’t even know which is which.”

  “Nobody does,” Megan answers, giving me a slight push on the arm.

  I guess it’s only fair since it was my idea. I take a deep breath and walk up the path. I press the doorbell right away, before I can chicken out. One of the boys opens the door. He has a grape ice pop in his hand and is clearly surprised to see me. He lowers his arm and the ice pop almost touches the sides of his white shorts.

  I put on my best smile and say, “Hi, Tom. Er, Tyson. Tom. Tyson?”

  “Tom,” he says. His eyes dart around, clearly not sure what to make of this visit.

  I glance behind me and he follows my gaze. The others are still waiting by the car. They wave. Tom haltingly waves back, ice pop dripping all the while. “This is going to sound strange, but if you and Tyson aren’t busy right now, would you mind coming with us on a scavenger hunt? I’ll explain on the way. The rules say I can’t pay you, but I’ll buy you lunch tomorrow at school.”

  “Sure, we’ll do it,” Tyson says, coming up behind Tom at the door. Mental note: Tom is wearing white shorts, Tyson’s are blue. “We’re not busy, right, Tom?”

  Tom looks uncertain. “I guess not. I’ll go tell Mom.” He leaves the doorway, and Tyson and I stand there.

  “So, did everything work out with Mrs. Lombardo?” he asks. “Huh?”

  “You know, in photography today. You forgot to hand in your note.”

  “Oh, right. Well, it got sorted out in the end. I think.” Another mental note: Tyson is the one who spoke to me in class today. Tom joins us again, and we head down the driveway. “Don’t you guys want to know why we need you?”

  “Oh, we know,” Tyson says. “Even though we’re not playing the game, we saw the list on the Web site. We were wondering if anyone would think of us.”

  I make the introductions at the car.

  Zoey looks Tom over and says, “Are you the frog kid from grammar school?”

  Tom nods and stares down at his sneakers.

  “I didn’t live here then,” Zoey says, “but I heard about it.” Tom opens his mouth to say something, then closes it again. “You guys will have to sit in the way back,” Megan says. “That’s fine,” Tyson says as Tom scrambles in. “We have older brothers, so we’re used to it.”

  “Hey,” Zoey says, passing the tin of ashes to Tyson. “Would you mind hanging on to this? Be careful. It’s my cat.”

  “Uh, okay,” Tyson says, holding it at arm’s length.

  Before she joins them inside, Megan whispers, “Are they allowed to talk to us?”

  “Of course they can talk,” Katy says. “They just can’t help us.” For a second Katy and I are outside the car alone. I whisper to her, “Don’t think I’m letting you get away today without telling me what on Earth is in that note.”

  “Tonight at the lake,” she replies, opening the passenger door. “I promise.”

  3:50 P.M. – 5:10 P.M.

  Chapter 8B: Everyone

  Zoey and Megan run across the lawn that connects Zoey’s house with Katy’s.

  “What’ll we do if your brother is home?” Megan asks Zoey. “Are you just gonna ask him for the book?”

  “He’s not home,” Zoey says, turning the key in the front door. “He’s starting his twenty hours of community service today.”

  “What did he do this time?”

  Zoey pushes open the door, which always sticks. “He set a Port-a-Potty on fire at the county fair last month.”

  “How’d he get caught?” Megan asks, following Zoey upstairs.

  “He always gets caught,” Zoey replies. She puts her ear to Dennis’s door just to be on the safe side and then pushes it open. As usual, it smells like incense and old socks. She wades through the magazines and dirty clothes and kneels by the bed.

  Megan hesitates at the door. A poster of a girl in a bikini is stuck on the ceiling over the bed.

  “How come your mother lets him keep that there?” Megan asks. “Oh, she doesn’t come in here. The smell gives her a headache.” Zoey reaches under the bed with both arms and sweeps out whatever is within reach. Megan is curious now and carefully steps over to the bed. On the floor are two Playboys, a pack of Marlboro Lights, and two bottles of blackberry brandy.

  “I know it’s here somewhere,” Zoey says, reaching under again. This time she pulls out a pair of striped boxer shorts, the book they are looking for, and a locked diary.

  “That’s weird,” Zoey says. “I got this diary when I was in fifth grade. I thought I’d lost it when we moved.”

  Megan takes it from her and tries to open it. The lock holds tight. “So Dennis stole your diary? What a jerk.”

  Zoey shakes her head. “No, I never wrote in it. He must be using it.” “We better just take the book, grab Fang’s tin, and get back to Katy’s,” Megan says. The smell in the room is starting to overwhelm her. She picks up the Kama Sutra and at the last second scoops up the cigarettes too. They could come in handy tonight.

  Zoey pushes everything else back under the bed, including the diary. She knows she could pick the lock if she wanted to, but she’s not really that interested in knowing her brother’s innermost thoughts. If she had read it, she would have learned that Dennis likes doing the community service more than he likes doing the crime that leads him there. She would have learned that he also likes ancient Roman pottery, puppies but not dogs, and girls with long legs. That he wonders if he has an excessive amount of hair on his knuckles and toes, and that he fears there is no afterlife. But she doesn’t pick the lock, she never reads it, and so she will think the bloody razor she finds in the shower is a suicide attempt instead of Dennis’s attempt to shave his hairy knuckles. After she tells their parents, Dennis will wind up in therapy because he is too embarrassed to tell his family the truth. At the suggestion of his therapist, he’ll begin writing poetry. One of his poems will win a fifty-dollar prize from Writes of Passage, a literary magazine for teenagers.

  While Josie is checking out the dashboard of Katy’s mother’s minivan, Katy straps herself into the passenger seat. She then lets her right arm fall to the side of her seat and reaches behind her. Her hand opens to reveal two chewable motion-sickness pills. Zoey silently takes one and passes the other to Megan. As much as they all love Josie, it never hurts to take precautions.

  Brenda Mae Brown from Atlanta has been a cashier at Donald’s Hot Dog Hut since it opened twelve years ago. Over the last hour six groups of kids have asked her for a menu. Only three of the groups figured out they could write it out themselves. She wonders if she should’ve told those boys that the red markers they used on their stomachs were permanent ink.

  Sloane and her mother are enjoying the Haunted Mansion ride as their car turns a corner on the tracks and faces a long mirror on the darkened wall. Sloane waves at herself in the mirror and then watches with curiosity as a ghostly female figure with a huge grin appears in their car. At first she’s scared and starts to reach out for her mother. Then she distinctly hears her grandmother’s voice say, “Don’t worry, Sloane, I’m here. We’ll go home after the ride.” What she really heard was the woman in the car in front, trying to get her five-year-old kid to stop crying. “Don’t worry, son, I’m here. We’ll go home after the ride.” Now Sloane is waiting patiently for the Haunted Mansion ride to end. When the metal bar across her lap springs open, she and her mother carefully step onto the moving walkway. Her mother takes her hand and leads her outside.

  “Wait, Mommy,” Sloane says, pulling back. “We should wait here for Nana.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Nana said she’d be coming home with us,” Sloane explains. “But I don’t see her.”

  Her mother squats down and puts her hands on Sloane’s shoulde
rs. “Honey, Nana is in heaven now. You know that.”

  “But I just heard her. She was that ghost that got in the car with us!” Her mother shakes her head. “No, baby. That was just part of the ride.”

  Sloane twists out of her mom’s grasp. “No, I heard her!” She bursts into tears and starts running blindly through the park. Her mother runs after her but loses her in the line of people waiting to get on the Peter Pan ride.

  Through the walkie-talkie on Mr. Taylor’s belt, he is alerted that there’s a situation in his vicinity. Still a trainee, his job is to wander between Fantasyland and Liberty Square, keeping his eyes open for trouble. Eventually he’ll be stationed at City Hall in the main Guest Relations office. Apparently a crying girl has been sighted running through Liberty Square toward Fantasyland. The girl runs past Mr. Taylor and through Cinderella Castle. He runs after her and radios in his coordinates. When the two of them reach the top of Main Street, she pulls ahead, and his blood freezes. Standing in front of him are Josie and her friends.

  “So, Mr. Taylor,” Josie’s friend Megan says as they all wait for Josie to return from the bathroom. “You, um, work here now?”

  He nods. Leave it to Megan to be bold enough to ask. “I just started,” he explains. The three of them wait expectantly for him to say more. He sighs and explains that he never loved his job as an accountant, that Josie’s turning sixteen made him remember his childhood dream. Saying these words is good practice for when he will repeat them to his family. “Do you girls know what you want to be when you grow up?”

  “An actress,” Megan says right away, then adds, “An actress who sings. No, a singer who acts!”

  “I want to run my own company,” Katy says.

  “I have absolutely no idea,” Zoey answers.

  He nods knowingly. “Just remember that life is short, but wide.” “What does that mean?” Zoey asks, but Mr. Taylor doesn’t hear her. He’s walking briskly toward the little girl who is now emerging from the bathroom.

  “I think it means there’s more time than you think to explore different things,” Katy says.

  “Like wearing a polyester vest?” Zoey whispers to Megan.

  When the little girl runs out and reaches for Mr. Taylor’s hand, he feels a wave of gratitude toward Josie. He knew she’d find the right thing to say. He knew it, even if she didn’t.