Not a Unicorn

by Dana Middleton

  “Whatever happened to teenagers sleeping late?” Grandma takes a sip of coffee and shrugs. “Go on, then.”

  I kiss Grandma on the cheek, then grab Emma’s dress. As I walk through the parking lot, I don’t even know what I’m doing. I don’t have a plan. I just have to know why. Emma can’t be as horrible as I remember. There must be some explanation.

  It takes three sets of increasingly frantic knocks before Emma’s mom answers the door, dressed in a robe with her head a mess.

  “Hey Jewel,” she says, surprised to see me. “Whew, it’s cold out there! Come in!”

  “I hope I didn’t wake you. I just really need to see Emma.”

  Emma’s mom gives me a side eye. “You’re braver than I am.” I give her a quick smile, then squeeze past her.

  Quietly, I slip into Emma’s room and almost step on the emerald dress she wore last night, which is crumpled on the floor.

  “Emma,” I say softly.

  Sleepily, Emma opens her eyes, then jolts up, startled. “Jewel! What are you doing here?”

  “I need to talk.” I stand there, holding her dress.

  “Now? Can’t this wait?” She rubs her eyes. “What happened to my dress?”

  “I fell and ruined it. I’m sorry. I’ll pay for it.”

  “That’s what you woke me up for?” Emma leans back against her pillow. “Don’t worry about it. I’m done with that dress anyway.”

  “Okay,” I say. Still, I place the dress on a chair. “But it’s not why I’m here.”

  She looks at me, puzzled. “Then why are you here? What time is it?”

  Clasping my hands together, I take on a serious pose. “What you did to Mystic was not cool. And I need you to know that.”

  “That’s why you woke me up? To stick up for your friend the thief?”

  “She’s not a thief. I know she took Brooklyn’s bracelet, but she gave it back. If she says she didn’t take your necklace, she didn’t. It’s not who she is. I know her.”

  “Okay,” Emma says, and yawns. “I don’t really care anyway.”

  I stare at Emma, confused. Why isn’t she fighting me on this? What’s going on?

  “Can I go back to sleep now?” she asks, yawning again.

  “Sure,” I say, because I don’t know what else to say. She’s being so casual about it all. Am I somehow overreacting? That’s when I notice something hanging around her neck. “Hey, is that—You found it!”

  Emma cups her palm over the teardrop pendant. “Oh yeah, omigod! You won’t believe it! It fell through a hole in the lining of my purse. I had no idea. It was a miracle that I found it. But it was there the whole time!”

  “What?” I say, finding it suddenly hard to breathe.

  “How awesome is that? I got my necklace back.” She’s actually smiling about it.

  “Emma! It was in your own purse?”

  “I didn’t know it was there. It wasn’t like I hid it on purpose.”

  “Yeah, but what about Mystic? Everybody thinks she took it!”

  “I mean, she does have a history,” Emma says. “Relax. In a week, nobody’ll even remember it happened.”

  I can’t believe this. “Everybody will remember! That was like the most memorable event of the dance!”

  “It’s not like she’s anybody important,” Emma says. “And you needed a push. I was trying to help you out.”

  I step back. “What do you mean, a push?”

  “To see that Mystic wasn’t good for you anymore. That you needed to cut the cord. You can’t be friends with Mystic and be popular.”

  Wow. How did she become like this? And why couldn’t I see it until now?

  “Did you ask Ethan to take my stuffed unicorn?” When Noah said it, I didn’t want to believe him, but now . . .

  Emma looks surprised by the question. But guilty, too.

  “The stuffed unicorn. That you gave me. The one you got Ethan to steal from my backpack. Because, why? You didn’t want people to remember that you used to have one, too?

  Instead of answering, she looks down at her phone.

  “I can’t believe I’ve been such an idiot,” I whisper.

  Emma eyes snap up defiantly. “You’re not being cool, J.”

  “No, I hope not,” I say, and turn, leaving her bedroom.

  Emma follows, and as I walk out the apartment door, she shouts, “If you leave like this, I don’t know if we can still be friends.”

  I turn around. “Really? And if I choose you, what else do I get?” My voice is bitter, but that’s how I feel.

  “Don’t be an idiot. Look at how your life has changed,” Emma says, “You want to throw all of that away?”

  A fire builds inside me, even though it’s cold outside. “You didn’t change my life. I did! I’m the one who figured out how to get my horn taken off. And I’m the one who got chosen for the French competition. Not because I’m popular—but because I’m good.” I pause, searching for my old best friend, who is clearly no longer there. “I just wanted to be friends with you again, Emma. That’s all. What happened to you?”

  Her mouth tightens and her eyes go hard. “I made a choice, okay? I was there the day you almost killed Noah. Remember? I was right beside you. It was a freak show. You said it yourself.”

  I did say it.

  “So what was I supposed to do? I just couldn’t sit at the freak table with you anymore. Because I wasn’t a freak.” Her eyes soften. “Just like you’re not anymore. This is our chance. I missed you, J. I actually really did. It just couldn’t work before. But now—we can start all over. We’re going to be in high school next year, and I mean . . . you look good without your horn. When I first saw Brooklyn, I knew she was going to be popular. And I had that same feeling when you came back from LA. That you were going to be that girl. That we could be those girls together.”

  “Because you thought I would be popular?”

  “I thought you could be popular. You’re pretty enough. Now that your horn’s gone, you’re not hiding that anymore. You can be like me.”

  “But I don’t want to be like you,” I tell her, realizing the truth of it as I say it. “And my horn wasn’t hiding anything. My horn was part of me.”

  I feel a sudden pulse on my forehead, right where my horn used to be. It vibrates soft and steady, like a tiny heartbeat.

  “What’s wrong?” Emma asks, staring at me.

  “Nothing,” I say. “Not anymore.”

  When I get down to the parking lot, my stuffed unicorn arcs through the air and lands on the asphalt. Turning, I meet Emma’s eyes one last time before she closes the door. For a moment, I stare after her, even though she’s gone, and I know I have chosen. “Au revoir, mon amie,” I whisper softly, and pick up my unicorn.

  As I rub the unicorn’s pink fur against my cheek, the pulse in my head grows more insistent. It repeats over and over like it’s trying to send me a message.

  I don’t know what to do. Carmen is out there and I don’t know how to save her. I don’t know how to get to Rock Canyon. I have no idea . . . Nicholas! I need Nicholas! But I know he won’t answer my texts.

  I rush toward Sam who’s kicking his soccer ball against the building, already at this wicked early hour, and cut between him and his ball.

  “Hey!” he exclaims.

  “I need a favor.”

  He picks up his ball and tucks it under his arm. “Shoot.”

  That cocky nine-year-old might just have my life in his hands. So I pull back my shoulders and ask him straight-out. “Can I borrow your bike?”

  Longitudes and Latitudes

  It’s miles to town and Sam’s bike is too small for me, but I make it work. I’m out of breath when I pull up in front of Nicholas’s house. There are no cars in the driveway. What if they’re not home?

  I knock on the door and keep knocking, and eventually a bleary-looking Nicholas opens it. When he sees it’s me, he closes it again.

  “Nicholas!” I’m banging on the door now. “Please, I
have to talk to you!”

  Nothing. “PLEASE! COME BACK!” I knock some more. Nothing. Sighing, I realize there’s no other way.

  “Nicholas, there’s a unicorn!” I yell through the door. “A real unicorn! And she needs our help!”

  Three, two, one. The door opens. “Don’t mess with me,” he says.

  “I’m not messing with you. I promise,” I say desperately.

  “You’ve got like a minute.”

  “Okay,” I say, holding up my palms. I can do this in a minute, right? “First, I’m an idiot. I was wrong about everything. I was a terrible friend and you can be mean to me all you want tomorrow. But today, I really need you.”

  Nicholas crosses his arms. “Talk about the unicorn.”

  “The unicorn,” I say, and exhale. “The unicorn is named Carmen.”

  He rolls his eyes.

  “No, really! She’s been with me my whole life. She’s like my guardian unicorn or something.”

  “Ha, ha,” Nicholas says, looking around. “And where is this magical unicorn now?”

  “She’s not here. And you can’t see her. I’m the only one who can see her. Well, somebody else can see her, too, but listen—”

  “Bye.” Nicholas goes to shut the door.

  “Wait!” I tell him, scrambling. How can I convince him? What can I say? I look into his eyes and it suddenly comes to me. “Remember when your books just fell off the hood of your mom’s car that day and nobody touched them? Or when you’d put something on your desk, and look away, and then it’d be somewhere across the room?” I pause, trying to remember more, then exclaim, “Or that time outside of detention when you felt like someone was blowing on your hair?”

  He frowns. I know he remembers that!

  “You were straight-up being played with.”

  “By an invisible unicorn?”

  I throw up my hands, victoriously. “Whose name is Carmen!”

  Nicholas’s face goes into overload. “Dude, are you serious?”

  “Totally. Cross my heart. I would not lie about this.”

  “And you didn’t tell me?!”

  “I couldn’t. I didn’t want you to think I was crazy.”

  His eyes go wide. “Me? You thought I’d think you were crazy? Have you met me? This is like my wildest fantasy coming true. Well, I guess in my wildest fantasy I’d be able to see her, too. And maybe ride her. And—does she fly?” He starts looking up in the air. “So where is she?” he asks. “Is she here? Is she here now?” He stares behind me, squinting as if it would help him see something invisible.

  “No, she’s not here. That’s the problem.”

  And then I tell him everything—about Carmen disappearing after I got my horn removed, about the strange visions I’ve been having. He stares at me without expression through most of it—until I mention Hot Springs and seeing Carmen at the bottom of Rock Canyon with her horn cut off.

  His jaw drops and his eyes go wide. “Oh, crap,” he says.

  In his room—where he led me, running up the stairs without another word—he hands me Highwaymen. It’s the latest issue, one I haven’t seen yet. Sheba’s on the cover, flying with Esmeralda on her back.

  “We don’t have time for this,” I tell him. “Weren’t you listening—”

  “Page seven,” he says. “Panel three.”

  Rapidly, I flip through to page seven and stop. No, I don’t stop. I freeze.

  “If I wasn’t so mad at you, I’d have told you last night,” Nicholas says.

  I hardly hear him. I’m staring at page seven, panel three. At the latest magical creature to show up in Hot Springs. For a moment, I can’t speak. All my worlds are colliding.

  “It’s a unicorn,” Nicholas says. “A unicorn finally showed up in Hot Springs.”

  “Not a unicorn,” I say. “My unicorn. This is her. This is Carmen.”

  I look into his eyes, and there’s no doubt in them at all. Nicholas believes me.

  “Well, at least that makes sense of the coordinates,” he says, and points to the big map on the wall. “Thirty-four-point-fifty-six degrees north, eighty-three-point-ninety-eight degrees west.”

  I stare at the new red flag on his map and feel no surprise at all. Because the latest global address is our global address. Our town.

  “What does this mean?” Nicholas asks, his thoughts going into hyperdrive. I can see it on his face. “The unicorn . . . your unicorn . . . went through a portal in our town?!” He turns back to the map. “But where? The portal could be anywhere.”

  I put my hand over my eyes. I can see it just like it was yesterday. I was six years old. There was a boulder. And a trail covered in vines that descended into the earth.

  “What?” he asks. “What do you know?”

  “I think I know where the portal is.”

  Nicholas’s parents took off early to go hiking in the mountains, so there’s no one to drive us back to my apartment. We have to take bikes. So Nicholas is on his and I’m on Sam’s.

  When we finally pull up to the apartment parking lot, I’m shocked to see Mystic waiting on the stairs. Nicholas texted her before we left his house, but I didn’t think there was any way she’d come.

  “What did you say to her?” I ask Nicholas as we approach.

  “That she needed to be here,” he says solemnly.

  Oh, man. What do I say? My eyes meet Mystic’s as we roll in and stop.

  “I’m so sorry,” I start. “I was a jerk . . . and an idiot. You were right about everything, Myst. I promise to make it up to you every day in high school, and for the rest of our lives if I have to.”

  Mystic mulls this over, then glances at Emma’s apartment. “What about her?”

  I groan and shake my head. “She found it in her purse.”

  “No way!”

  “I went over there this morning and told her she was wrong about you and that what she did was not okay.” Then I say the important part. “What I did was not okay. I was so dumb. I believed the wrong person because I thought she was the right person. But she’s not, and I’ve learned my lesson. I’m done with her. I chose you. I choose you. Will you please forgive me?”

  Mystic is inscrutable. I don’t have any idea what she’s thinking. Her eyeliner makes her look so grown-up and serious. “You really hurt me.”

  “I know I did. And I’m sorry.”

  I stand there feeling like I’m waiting for a jury to read the verdict at my trial. I know I’m guilty, but I’m hoping for a second chance.

  “Okay,” Mystic finally says. “It’s going to take me a while to get over being mad at you. Just so you know that.”

  “Yeah, be mad at me as long as you want. Just be my friend again.” Mystic nods. Relieved, I give her a hug, and she lets me. She even hugs me back.

  “Are we done now?” Nicholas says impatiently. “Because, you know. Unicorn.”

  “What?” Mystic says, looking at him like he’s finally gone to another planet.

  “Unicorn,” Nicholas says emphatically, then looks toward the entrance of the parking lot where Noah and Ethan are riding up on their bikes. They skid to a halt in front of us.

  I texted Noah, too. After all, if we’re trying to find someone, it might be helpful to have more than one of us who can see her.

  “Phew. I thought you might have left already,” Noah says, out of breath. “We didn’t have a rope. But Ethan’s dad did.” Noah steps off his bike and looks at me. “So now what?”

  “Give me a minute. I’ll be right back.” I lean Sam’s bike against the railing and run upstairs. Quietly, I unlock my apartment door and step inside. The TV is on, but Grandma is asleep on the couch. Perfect. I tiptoe into our bedroom, grab the box from my closet, and stuff it into my backpack.

  The clock on the bedside table says 9:45. The wrestling van for the French competition leaves at noon. Maybe I can find Carmen and get back for the competition. I mean, Carmen’s what’s important, but she would want me to do both. And what if somehow she’s okay
and could even come with me? My chest swells hopefully at the thought of reading my essay in front of all those people—with Carmen by my side.

  I slip out of the apartment and hurry down the stairs. My friends are all looking up at me. Nicholas has the new issue of Highwaymen in his hands. I hold out my backpack and he slides it inside.

  “There’s one more thing I have to tell you before we go,” I say to Nicholas. “Full disclosure.”

  “What?” he asks.

  I look at Noah. “He can see Carmen, too.”

  Nicholas turns to Noah, stupefied. “You can see the unicorn?”

  “Yeah,” Noah says. “We think it happened because of the . . . incident . . . you know. Some kind of magical transfer. That kind of thing.”

  “This is so unfair,” Nicholas says.

  Mystic and Ethan are looking at us very strangely.

  “Oh, yeah,” I say to them. “Long story short, there’s a unicorn that only me and Noah can see. And she’s kind of my magical creature. But she’s in trouble.”

  To give them credit, they take it in, look at me gravely, and nod in unison. “So what are we here to do exactly?” asks Mystic.

  I look them over, my odd set of friends, and say with complete sincerity, “We save her. That’s what. We have to save the unicorn.”

  Truth or Consequences

  After crossing the street, I find the path that leads into the woods, and we start hiking. Nicholas and Noah walk behind me. Mystic and Ethan, rope slung over his shoulder, bring up the rear.

  “I’ve set the coordinates on my GPS,” Nicholas says, looking at his phone. “But it’s not going to be totally exact. Not enough digits. Do you know how to get there?”

  “She knows,” Noah tells him. “She and the unicorn are magically connected.”

  Are we? Noah speaks with such confidence, it makes me feel like it’s true. But honestly, I don’t know how to get there. It was more than half my lifetime ago when I rode Carmen through these woods to where the boulder sat by the stream, and where the trail disappeared under a canopy of vines. I remember this trail though. All I know to do is follow it.