The Last Present

by Wendy Mass

  “Kind of like knitting?” I ask, thinking of the motions Grace had been making with her hands.

  “Exactly,” Bucky says.

  “But wait,” Leo says, “you weren’t there during the magic show when Connor took the bunny at Grace’s seventh birthday. If he hadn’t taken it, Angelina’s enchantment would have worked and you would have failed to stop it.”

  He chuckles. “That darn bunny. She ate right through my favorite hat. Those two kids I spoke to outside, that was you?”

  We nod.

  “You have to remember, from where I stood, you hadn’t come back to the past yet. I’d fixed every birthday up to that point, so I figured I could risk letting one go. Always had a soft spot for bunnies. Figured Connor might, too.”

  Rory shudders. “You must never have had one for a pet.”

  Leo reaches into his back pocket and pulls out Angelina’s small notebook. Seeing it reminds me that our job still isn’t done. “Bucky, we still have two more of Grace’s birthdays left. We skipped today’s so we could go to Angelina’s party. What happens if we don’t go to the rest? Will Grace ever wake up?”

  “Not on her own,” he admits. “Only Angelina can undo it, and you know how stubborn she is. She’s up at the lake house and who knows when she’ll return.”

  “But she’s not at the lake,” Rory says. “We figured you knew that and just made up the story so we’d stop looking for her.”

  Bucky lowers the water he was about to sip. “She’s not at the lake house? You know this for a fact?”

  Rory nods. “So where is she?”

  “I have no idea,” Bucky says. His shoulders sag. He’s clearly upset, but I’m not sure whether it’s because he’s worried about her, or because she went somewhere without telling him.

  “It’s very late,” Ray says, picking up one of the lanterns. “I think we should call it a night. Bucky, I’ll lead you out to your car. Are you going to be all right driving home?”

  Bucky nods and pushes himself back up. “You’re all good kids. I know you’ll do what you think is right.”

  The three of us girls take turns giving Bucky hugs. He holds on extra tight when it’s my turn. I think it’s his way of saying he’s sorry. Leo is busy scribbling in the notebook and waves good-bye instead. I recognize that look on his face. He gets very absorbed when he’s working on a new poem. And after the week we’ve had, I’d be surprised if he doesn’t get a hundred poems out of it.

  “Look,” Tara says as we head toward our tent. She points to the fountain. Max and Flo, the two hawks that we often see here when we’re visiting the grove, have perched on top of it.

  “Maybe they’ve come to protect us while we sleep,” Rory says.

  Tara smiles. “I think they’ve come for the fountain. They’ve been drinking out of it since my parents’ eighth-grade dance.”

  Rory and I turn to her in surprise. “How do you know that?” Rory asks.

  Tara shrugs. “Some things you just know.”

  I put my arm around Tara’s shoulders. “Congratulations! You’ve mastered the art of the answer that’s not really an answer. That makes you an official Willow Falls resident now!”

  She laughs. “I guess I am.”

  We watch the hawks groom each other with their talons before they lean against each other and close their eyes. “So,” Rory says, pulling the flap of the tent aside for me to go in, “what was that about you and Leo being cows?”

  It’s a tight fit with the three of us, but I’m having fun trading stories late into the night. We purposely don’t talk about anything to do with Grace or Angelina or Bucky. Mostly we reassure Rory that it definitely isn’t crazy that Jake likes her. Tara tells us that she thinks David was going to kiss her when he came over last week with her birthday present, but her uncle wouldn’t leave and kind of ruined the moment. Then Rory says to Tara, “You ask her.” And then Tara says, “No, you ask her.” And they start hitting each other with their pillows so I say, “Yes.” And they stop hitting each other and start hitting me.

  “Why didn’t you tell us?” Tara asks.

  “I don’t know.” I push my face into my pillow so I don’t have to meet their eyes. “It was just weird.”

  They sit up and crowd around my sleeping bag. “Leo’s a weird kisser?” Tara asks.

  “That’s not what I said!”

  “What, then?” Rory asks, trying to pull the pillow off me.

  “It was … nice,” I mumble into my pillow.

  “Nice?” Rory repeats. “Your best friend for thirteen years, minus the one you weren’t talking, finally kisses you and it was nice?”

  I peek out from behind the pillow. “Okay, it was better than nice.”

  “Are you gonna do it again?” Tara asks.

  Rory throws her pillow at Tara’s head.

  Tara tosses it back off. “What? It’s a simple question!”

  They sit still and wait for my answer. “I hope so!” I finally say and put the pillow back over my face.

  They start hitting me again and laughing until Ray shouts that we’re going to wake the bears out of hibernation even though it’s July.

  It feels like I’ve only just fallen asleep when the sun streaming through the thin walls of the tent wakes me. I try to turn over but Rory’s feet are in my face. Plus I need to use the bathroom, otherwise known as the woods.

  I unzip the tent flap as quietly as I can, grab my sneakers, and crawl out. The sky is still a mix of pink and yellow. A blue jay has replaced Max and Flo at the fountain, and Leo is sitting by the burned-out fire with Angelina’s notebook in his hand again. His hair is all rumpled and he’s still in his pajamas. I wish I’d thought to bring a hair band. Or had worn nicer pajamas instead of old sweats and my BORN TO ROCK T-shirt.

  He waves me over. “The woods” will have to wait. “Hi,” I say quietly so as not to wake anyone else. I sit on the opposite side of the fire pit so I don’t assault him with morning breath. I tuck my hair behind my ears in a futile attempt to make it look neater.

  “Hi,” he replies with a smile.

  “Hi, again.”

  “I like your T-shirt.”

  I look down. “This old thing? I got it on an adventure with some guy a few years ago. Remind me to tell you about it some day. He got one, too, but he lost his.”

  Leo gets that mischievous glint in his eye and says, “So, I hear you’d like to kiss me again sometime?”

  If I had a pillow, I’d throw it at him. “You heard us?”

  “Your tent was all of two feet away.”

  I feel my cheeks growing hot. “Maybe I was talking about some other guy.”

  We hear rustling coming from my tent and thankfully Leo changes the subject. He opens the notebook to a page near the end and hands it to me. I’m surprised he’s showing me his poem at this stage. Usually he doesn’t like to show them to anyone until he’s done a few drafts.

  The last few pages are filled with his small handwriting. But I quickly realize he hasn’t written a poem at all. Rather, it’s a letter to Angelina! Skimming it, I can see he told her all about last night, and what we learned. It ends with a plea to free Grace. I look up at him questioningly.

  “I thought since she can somehow make those check marks and Xs in there from wherever she is, maybe it would work both ways and she’d see it somehow.”

  “That’s superbrilliant.”

  “She hasn’t answered, though,” he says, poking at the ashes with his old marshmallow stick.

  I look up at the sky. The last traces of sunrise are almost gone, but it’s still very early. “Maybe she just hasn’t seen it yet.” I flip back a few pages and see the familiar Xs and check marks — more Xs than checks. When I get to Grace’s third birthday, the one we skipped to go to Angelina’s party, a big question mark appears on the page. The paper is also sort of warped in spots, like it had gotten wet and dried that way. Almost like … almost like tears had fallen on it. I close the notebook and hand it back. I feel like I pee
ked at Angelina’s diary.

  Laughter comes from my tent and then Rory comes running out, wearing one shoe and holding up Tara’s phone. “Look what Jake texted to Tara for me!”

  “Seriously,” I say, reaching out for it, “you’ve got to get a better phone.”

  “My parents said if I can go three months without losing my current one, they’ll get me a real one.”

  “So basically you’re stuck with your crappy one forever.”

  “Probably!”

  I look down at Tara’s phone and then burst out laughing. It’s a picture of Jake puffing out his cheeks. He’s wearing an eye patch over his left eye, and a ski hat pulled down over his right ear.

  “He’s pretending to be me from last year!” Rory says, beaming.

  “I got that.” I hand the phone back to her. “And to think you doubted how he felt about you!”

  She grins and runs back into the tent. I turn back to Leo, hoping he’ll go back to his tent so I can run into the woods. No such luck. He’s standing by the fountain, holding the notebook open.

  “Look,” he says.

  I cross over to him and we peer into it together. The last page has five words written in red ink that definitely weren’t there two minutes ago.

  I’m still not strong enough.

  I’ve never, EVER heard Angelina admit any weakness of any kind. “Do you think that’s her response to your letter? Or something else?”

  “I have no idea. Why wouldn’t she be strong enough to undo whatever she did to Grace, if she made her this way in the first place?”

  We stare down at the words, but they don’t change and nothing else appears. Leo takes the notebook back to the tent he shared with Ray while I go in and tell the girls.

  “It may not make sense,” Tara says, “but at least she’s communicating with you.”

  “She still hasn’t heard from David,” Rory explains.

  “Oh.” We roll up our sleeping bags and bring our stuff out front. I really don’t feel like changing back into my dress from last night and hadn’t thought to bring another change of clothes. Leo’s stuff is piled outside his tent, too.

  Tara turns in a circle. “Where’s Ray?”

  Leo points back to his tent. We sneak closer and are greeted by gentle snoring. That mischievous glint appears in Leo’s eyes and he raises one eyebrow. I nod. He creeps over to the corner of the tent and starts lifting out the pegs. Rory and Tara run around to the back and do the same. In a few seconds, the tent has collapsed.

  “Stone the crows!” Ray shouts, thrashing about and shouting more random Australian sayings. We burst out laughing and the thrashing stops. “Very funny,” a muffled voice says.

  Tara feels around for the zipper and undoes it. A rumpled Ray appears. He must have slept in his clothes because he’s still wearing them. “It was Leo’s idea,” Tara says.

  Ray runs his fingers through his hair, which somehow falls perfectly into place. He shakes his head at Leo. “I thought we were mates, dude.”

  “Sorry, couldn’t pass the opportunity by.”

  Ten minutes later we’re on the road. The atmosphere in the car is much different than on the way here. Everyone’s lost in their own thoughts. Well, except for Ray, who has kept up a steady stream of ways he’s planning to get back at Leo.

  We pull up in front of Grace and Connor’s house. We hadn’t asked Ray to take us here, though I think we all knew this is where we’d wind up. It’s still really early, but Tara texts Connor to let him know we’re outside. A few minutes later, he appears at the door and beckons us in.

  The house is quiet when we enter. We tiptoe upstairs behind him. Grace’s door is open, and Mrs. Kelly is asleep on a cot set up in the corner. “This is usually where I find one of my parents in the morning,” Connor whispers. We huddle in the doorway. “It’s okay, you can come in.”

  Grace is tucked under the covers, her eyes wide open, her breathing ragged. Her coloring looks good, though, and Mrs. Kelly must have washed her hair because it’s spread out on her pillow.

  “We used to close her eyes at night,” Connor explains, reaching across the nightstand for a bottle of eye drops. “But they just spring back open after a few minutes anyway.” He leans over and, with a steady hand, squeezes a few drops into each eye. Grace doesn’t blink when the soothing drops land. Instead, she bolts straight upright, smiles widely, and says, “But I am.”

  Then she falls right back to sleep.

  Our jaws all fall open. “Did that just happen?” Connor asks, rubbing his eyes. “Or are we still dreaming?”

  “That just happened,” Rory says.

  Connor reaches over and gently shakes Grace’s arm. Grace mumbles something and slowly opens her eyes. They are bright and clear. “Hey, bro,” she says in a crackly, hoarse voice. “How about some water?”

  Connor shouts with glee, and Mrs. Kelly shoots up and flies across the room onto Grace’s bed. Through her hugs and her sobs, she asks, “Are you okay? Can you sit up? Does anything hurt?”

  Mr. Kelly runs in, wearing his pajamas, not even giving us a second glance. I guess he’s seen stranger things this week than a group of kids in rumpled pj’s. They all hug, they cry, they laugh. Mr. Kelly helps Grace sit up. She smiles at each of us in turn and then asks her mother to take out the IV tube. Mrs. Kelly hesitates for a second, then shuts off the valve and gently pulls it out of Grace’s arm. Her father runs out of the room to call the doctor, while her mother runs downstairs to get some water and food.

  We still don’t know if Angelina is blocking Grace’s powers or not. I take one of her hands in mine and Connor takes the other. She looks fully awake now. In fact her face is glowing. I think her expression of amazement is permanent, even though she’s not stuck with it now. “Grace, what do you see?”

  Connor looks up at me, surprised at my question. But if everything Bucky said is true, Connor’s going to have to learn to accept all this and to protect his little sister while he can.

  “Everything,” she says, beaming. “I see everything.” Her voice is much clearer now. “I see energy everywhere. Around all of you, around me, connecting all of us. I see it in the air. I feel it out my window. When it first happened, at David’s bar mitzvah, it was overwhelming. It was like seeing everyone’s whole lives, but all at once. I knew all the town’s secrets, all the ways that some kind of magic worked on the people who live here. I knew it was tied to that strange old woman, Angelina — you know, the one with the birthmark on her cheek in the shape of a duck?”

  We laugh. “Yup, we know the one.”

  Connor isn’t laughing, though. “Grace … are you sure you’re all right? Did you hit your head — is that what caused all this in the first place?”

  She turns to me. The power of her gaze is unsettling at first, so different from the little girl of a week ago. I can read her face. She’s giving me permission to tell him. I clear my throat. “Um, Grace has these kinds of powers now … it’s a really long story, but it was something she was born with. Only it didn’t come out until she turned ten. There’s a lot more to the story, but that’s the long and short of it.”

  Connor looks from me to her. “Is this … true?”

  Grace nods. She squeezes Connor’s hand, and each of us in the room can feel her love and appreciation for him.

  “After a few minutes of my head being all jumbled,” Grace continues, “everything got quiet. I knew you guys were trying to help me somehow, but I couldn’t really focus on any one thing. I heard Angelina in my head. I could still see all these lines, and could sort of figure out how to make them move, like weaving a blanket.” She makes the knitting motion to demonstrate. Then stops and stares at her hands. “Hey! Are my hands bigger?”

  We laugh again. Connor throws his arms around her. That’s the cool thing about him. He bounces back quickly. “Everything’s bigger, sis! You grew four inches this week!”

  “No way!” she shouts. We all step back so she can get out of bed. “The floor’s def
initely farther away!” she announces, once she’s standing. “Whose pajamas am I wearing?”

  “Those would be mine,” Rory says. She points to all the clothes hanging in the closet. “Those, too. I’m sorry they aren’t, you know, more stylish.”

  “They’re perfect,” Grace says.

  “Grace,” Tara says, approaching the bed. “You said ‘but I am’ when you first woke up. What did you mean by that?”

  Mrs. Kelly rushes back in before Grace can answer. She’s carrying a tray with water, an orange, and a bowl of oatmeal. “The doctor’s on his way over. He said to start off small, with a few bites.” Her eyes spill over again. “Look at you, standing up! My baby’s so tall!”

  Leo reaches for the tray and catches it right in time. Mrs. Kelly pulls Grace into her arms. Rory waves the rest of us over to the door. “I think we should leave them.”

  Connor shakes his head. “One of you has to stay to explain this.”

  “I’ll do it,” Tara offers. Even though she’s upset with David, it’s obvious she wants to honor his request to help out Connor in any way possible.

  I squeeze her arm and whisper, “You’re the best.”

  Grace peeks around her mom’s shoulder and waves good-bye. “I’ll see you guys this afternoon,” she says. “At the train station.”

  “Huh?” the four of us reply at the same time.

  She just smiles. Tara’s phone dings and she reaches into her pocket for it. She reads the text and when she looks up, her eyes are bright. “David’s coming home today. His train gets in at five.”

  We all turn to look at Grace, who smiles sheepishly. “Oh, boy,” Connor says. “So this is how it’s going to be from now on. And I thought she was impossible to live with before!”

  Mrs. Kelly looks confused.

  “I’ll explain everything, Mrs. Kelly,” Tara says. “Or at least I’ll try.”

  “How about come back in twenty minutes or so?” Mrs. Kelly suggests. “Let me try to get some food in her.”

  Tara nods and we all give Grace one more hug before heading downstairs. It hits me that our job is done. All that’s left is for me and Leo to toast to our friendship, and the curse will be broken. Again.